"What did the cops do?" asked Brink.
"They listened to their wives!" snarled Fitzgerald. "They begun to find little grabbag packages in the mail an' with the milk. Fancy perfume. Tricky stockin's. Fancy underwear they shoulda been ashamed for anybody to know they had it on underneath. The cops weren't bribed, but their wives liked openin' the door of a mornin' an' findin' charmin' little surprises."
"Ah," said Brink.
"Then there were juke boxes," went on the detective. "He went in that business—an' trouble started. People'd drive up to a beer joint, go in, get in a scuffle an'—bingo! The juke box smashed. Always the juke box. Always a out-of-town customer. Half the juke boxes in town weren't workin', on an average. But the ones that were workin' were always Big Jake's. Presently he had the juke-box business to himself."
Brink nodded, somehow appreciatively.
"Then it was cabs," said Fitzgerald. "A lot of cops felt bad about that. But their wives wouldn't be happy if anything happened to dear Mr. Big Jake who denied that he gave anybody anything, so it was all right to use that lovely perfume.... Cabs got holes in their radiators. They got sand in their oil systems. They had blowouts an' leaks in brake-fluid lines. Cops' wives were afraid Big Jake would get caught. But he didn't. He started insurin' cabs against that kinda accident. Now every cab-driver pays protection-money for what they call insurance—or else. An' cops' wives get up early, bright-eyed, to see what Santa Claus left with the milk."
"You seem," said Brink with a grin, "to hint that this Big Jake is ... well ... dishonest."
"Dishonest!" Fitzgerald's face was purplish, from many memories of wrongs. "There was a guy named Burdock who owned this business before you. Y'know what happened to him?"
"Yes," said Brink. "He's my brother-in-law. Connors or somebody insisted on having a share of the business and threatened dreadful things if he didn't. He didn't. So acid got spilled on clothes. Machinery got smashed. Once a whole delivery-truck load of clothes disappeared and my brother-in-law had to pay for any number of suits and dresses. It got him down. He's recovering from the nervous strain now, and my sister ... eh, asked me to help out. So I offered to take over. He warned me I'd have the same trouble."
"And you've got it!" fumed the detective. "But anyhow you'll make a complaint. We'll get out some warrants, and we'll have somethin' to go on—"