The Apaches of New York

by Alfred Henry Lewis

“Two bits a shell. Of course, that's for yen-chee. I couldn't give 'em number-one for two bits. After all, w'at I cares most for is me cats—two long-haired Persians.”

“Cats?” repeated Beansey, suspiciously. “W'at be youse handin' me?”

Beansey by the way, knew nothing of opium.

“W'at am I handin' youse?” said Mike. “I'm handin' you th' goods. Cats get th' habit same as people. My cats would plant be some party who's cookin' a pill, an' sniff th' hop an' get as happy as anybody. Take 'em off the pipe, an' it's th' same as if they're Christians. Dogs, too. Let 'em once get th' habit, an' then take 'em away from a pipe joint, an' they has pains in their stummicks, an' twists an' yowls till you think they're goin' mad. When th' cops shut down on me, I has to give me cats to th' monk who's runnin' th' opium dump on th' top floor. Sure t'ing! They'd have croaked if I hadn't. They're on'y half happy, though; for while they gets their hop they misses me. Them toms an' me has had many a good smoke.”

Folks often wondered at the intimacy between Mike and Little Maxie—not that it has anything to do with this story. Little Maxie—his name on the Central Office books was Maxie Fyne, alias Maxie English, alias Little Maxie, alias Sharapatheck—was the opposite of Big Mike. He was small; he was weak; he didn't drink; he didn't hit the pipe. Also, at all times, and in cold blood, he was a professional thief. His wife, whom he called “My Kytie”—for Little Maxie was from Houndsditch, and now and then his accent showed it—was as good a thief as he, but on a different lay. Her specialty was robbing women. She worked alone, as all good gon-molls do, and because of her sure excellencies was known as the Golden Hand.

Little Maxie and his Golden Hand, otherwise his Kytie—her name was Kate—had a clean little house near Washington Square on the south. They owned a piano and a telephone—the latter was purely defensive—and their two children went to school, and sat book to book with the children of honest men and women.

The little quiet home, with its piano and defensive telephone, is gone now. Little Maxie died and his Golden Hand married again; for there's no false sentiment in Gangland. If a husband's dead he's dead, and there's nothing made by mourning. Likewise, what's most wanted in any husband is that he should be a live one.

Little Maxie died in a rather curious way. Some say he was drowned by his pals, Big Mike among them. The story runs that there was a quarrel over splitting up a touch, and the mob charged Little Maxie with holding out. Be that as it may, the certainty is that Little Maxie and his mob, being in Peekskill, got exceeding drunk—all but Little Maxie—and went out in a boat. Being out, Little Maxie went overboard abruptly, and never came up. Neither did anybody go after him. The mob returned to town to weep—crocodile tears, some said—into their beer, as they told and re-told their loss, and in due time Little Maxie's body drifted ashore and was buried. That was the end. Had it been some trust-thief of a millionaire, there would have been an investigation. But Little Maxie was only a pick-pocket.

Big Mike, like all strong characters, had his weakness. His weakness was punching Chinamen; fairly speaking, it grew to be his fad. It wasn't necessary that a Chinaman do anything; it was enough that he came within reach. Mike would knock him cold. In a single saunter through Pell Street, he had been known to leave as many as four senseless Chinamen behind him, fruits of his fist.

“For,” said Mike, in cheerful exposition of the motive which underlay that performance, “I do so like to beat them monks about! I'd sooner slam one of 'em ag'inst th' wall than smoke th' pipe.”