Calvi shook his head. “The old RCA building in Camden,” said Schmidt into my ear. I repeated it into the phone.

“I’m too old to go to Camden,” said Raffaello. “No. It must be on this side of the river. Packer Avenue Marine Terminal, South Gate.”

Anton Schmidt shook his head and whispered in my ear. “The Naval Shipyard,” I said. “Pier Four.”

“That’s interesting,” said Raffaello. “Good neutral territory, the Naval Shipyard. But how are we going to get in? There are guards.”

“The Penrose Avenue gate will be open and unguarded,” said Schmidt.

“That Calvi he’s a rat-fucking bastard,” said Raffaello after he heard what I relayed, “but at least it’s not one of those Young Turks who don’t respect the traditions. Calvi I can trust to keep his word. Tell him tomorrow morning, five-thirty at the Naval Shipyard, Pier Four, is acceptable. Tell him I will leave town that afternoon. Tell him after all these years the trophy, it is finally his.”

“So,” said Calvi after Raffaello had hung up, “it’s exactly as you said, Vic. We’re all going to make so much money it will bring tears to our eyes.” He turned to Schmidt. “Is that the place we wanted?”

Schmidt nodded. “Get me a piece of paper.”

I found him a yellow pad and Schmidt quickly sketched a pier sticking out from a straight shoreline.

“This is Pier Four,” said Anton Schmidt. “It reaches out into the Delaware River. Docked on either side of the pier are two old Navy ships, mothballed for future use. Between the two ships is a giant hammerhead crane. We’ll have our men here, here, and here.” He placed X’s on either side of the pier, where the ships would be, and an X in the middle of the pier, where the hammerhead crane sat. “If we set up the meeting so you confront Raffaello here,” he said, placing two circles on the pier between the crane and the shore, “then during the whole of the exchange you’ll both be covered.”

“Who will be with the Cubans?” asked Calvi.

“Domino and Sollie Wags will be on the deck of this ship here, Termini and Tony T will be on the ship there, and on the crane will be Johnny Roses, keeping an eye on everyone.” These were all names of minor mobsters, generally known as the most vicious and impatient of the Young Turks, who had apparently switched allegiances to Calvi to hasten their rise. “With our men set up like I say, we’ll dominate the center.”

“That’s good. I don’t want no trouble until I get what I came for.”

“Raffaello’s a man of his word,” I said. “There won’t be trouble.”

Calvi looked at me and sucked deep from his cigar and let loose a stream of smoke that billowed into my face, leaving me in a spasm of coughs. “You’re dead right about that, Vic,” he said. “There won’t be no trouble.”

“The crossfire here,” said Anton, “could wipe out a division.”

“There won’t be no trouble at all,” said Calvi. “Now we need a signal, so everyone’s on board at the same instant. What’s Spanish for ‘now’?”

“Ahora,” said Anton, rolling the “r” like a native.

“A-whore-a,” said Calvi. “Good. That’s the signal. A-whore-a. When I say a-whore-a I want all hell to break loose.”

Schmidt turned to the Cubans and gave them instructions in Spanish. The only word I caught was ahora, a number of times, ahora from Schmidt and then ahora repeated by the Cubans with smiles on their faces.

“I’ll call Johnny Roses on the cell phone,” said Schmidt, “and set it all up. They’ll be on site in an hour.”

“Good work, Anton,” said Calvi. “We’re going to do great things together. You’re going to be my man in Atlantic City. Together we’re going to rule the board-walk.”

Schmidt nodded, a small smile breaking through those pursed lips. Then he went off to the corner with his cell phone.

“What about the girl?” I said.

“Forget about the girl,” said Calvi. “We’re taking care of her. She’ll stay right here while we wait, what could be safer?”

What indeed? I stood up and headed away from the table.

“Where you going?” asked Cressi.

“I’m going to the pot, do you mind?”

“Well, hurry up, ’cause I gotta drop a load myself.”

I walked across the living room, the dark stares of the Cubans following me, and stepped into the bathroom. As soon as I closed the door I locked it and dropped down to the seat on the toilet and shook for a bit. Then I stood and went to the sink and ran the water cold and washed my face and let it tingle for a moment before I dried it with a towel. I took the towel I had just used and stretched it across the crack at the bottom of the door. There was a window in the bathroom, and I thought for a moment of climbing out and jumping, but the window was small and the fall was three stories and Caroline was still imprisoned with Sam the cat in my bedroom. So what I did instead of climbing out the window was reach for the light switch, turn it off, and then click it on three quick times, on again for three longer times, and then three short times again. On the last short burst of light I heard a banging on the door that scared the absolute hell out of me.

“Get the fuck out of there,” yelled Cressi through the door.

“What’s the matter?” I shouted back.

“I told you I gotta go.”

“Give me a break. I’m still on the pot.”

It was a good thing just then I was already in the bathroom.

THE PHILADELPHIA NAVAL SHIPYARD rises rusted and desolate on the southern tip of Philadelphia, a flat slab of land that reaches out like a claw into the confluence of the Schuylkill and Delaware rivers. Surrounding the yard, like funeral pyres, refinery stacks shoot the flames of burnoff into the sky, scorching the air with the thick rotted smell of sulfur. Thirty thousand blue-collar heroes used to march to work each day into the yard, bringing their hard hats and lunch buckets and cheerful profanities, before the government closed it down and sent the work to Charleston or Norfolk or Puget Sound and the workers to unemployment. Now the furnaces are cool and the machine shops quiet and the dry docks empty of all but the pigeons, who leave their marks like avian Jackson Pollocks on the wide flat-bottomed gashes that once held the proudest ships in the fleet: the Arizona , the Missouri , the Tennessee. There was one last gasp for the naval yard, when a German shipbuilder looked to set up shop there, but the governor played it badly and the German took his toys and went away and the shipyard now is left to rust.

We were in a black Lincoln, driving south on Penrose Avenue, toward the bridge that would take us to the airport, but instead of going straight over the bridge we turned left, onto a deserted four-lane road that I had passed a hundred times before, never knowing where it went. Well now I knew; it went to the rear entrance of the Naval Shipyard. I was sitting in the middle on the front bench of the Lincoln, with Cressi driving and Calvi beside me. Wedged into the back were Anton and Caroline, with the two Cubans at either window. I had hoped there would be a chance for Caroline to bolt as we made our way from the apartment early in the morning but Cressi, his gun back in his pants, hovered as protectively over her as if she were his sister at a frat party, so Caroline was still with us when we reached the car. Cressi literally threw her in the backseat and put the Cubans on either side as guards.

We approached the rear gate. It was unguarded and seemingly shut tight. A sign warned against unauthorized entry and cited the applicable provisions of the Internal Security Act. Another sign warned that the site was patrolled by Military Working Dogs. Cressi stopped the car just in front of the gate and Calvi stepped out. He walked to the chain that held the gate closed and gave the chain a yank. It unraveled with a slinking hiss. Calvi slid the gate open and Cressi drove us through. While Calvi shut the gate behind us and got back in the car I looked out the side and saw the signs to the now abandoned Navy Brig.