Chapter 80: Fire On The Docks
Frank Knox pinned the heavy street map of the West Side flat against the scarred wooden table, weighting the corners down with four heavy iron lead weights.
An hour had passed since Frank had sent Rubber Shaw down the avenues to round up every available lieutenant in the Hudson Dusters. Now, the drafty, empty warehouse near the river was packed tight with over thirty street captains, lieutenants, and senior enforcers. The room smelled of wet wool, cheap tobacco, and stale beer. Outside, the steady rumble of drayage wagons on the cobblestones provided a muffled backdrop to the heavy breathing inside.
Frank stood at the head of the table, his immaculate wool coat unbuttoned, his sharp eyes sweeping over the crowd of hardened faces.
"Let’s make this quick," Frank said, his voice quiet, clear, and cutting through the low hum of the room instantly. "We want to catch them off guard. This isn’t just a retaliatory strike for what Owney Madden did to our collectors on the border. We are taking this opportunity to retake our old territory—the Chelsea docks currently occupied and controlled by the Gophers."
A murmur of low approval rippled through the lieutenants.
"Not only that," Frank continued, leaning forward on his knuckles over the map, "we’re going to deal massive, permanent damage to their shipping operations. We burn their coal barges and supply boats at the piers. And while they’re running around trying to put out the fires, we hit their primary stash. A heist on their cocaine supply."
The room went dead silent for a beat, followed by sharp grins breaking out among the lieutenants.
"Fortunately for us, Madden thinks we don’t know where it is, so it’s lightly guarded," Frank said, tapping a spot on the map just north of 14th Street. "If we take their powder out of the picture for a while, Chelsea will boom using the stash we strip off them."
"Here’s the split," Frank instructed, tapping the paper sharply. "Jack and his lieutenants will be the vanguard at the Chelsea docks. You smash up their landing spots and start the trouble. When the Gophers respond in numbers, two of Kid’s lieutenants and their crews will reinforce you. If they don’t bring heavy numbers, Jack, you push until you drive every last one of them off the riverfront. Meanwhile, me, Barney, Kid, and the rest will bleed deep into Hell’s Kitchen to hit the stash."
Circular Jack wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, shifting his weight. "I assume the precinct coppers aren’t going to interfere with this, Frank?"
"I made a few calls," Frank answered without hesitation. "An operation this size is going to attract attention from Tammany Hall politicians. The paddy wagons will respond in twenty minutes flat."
A nervous ripple ran through a few of the younger captains.
"Don’t worry," Frank cut in smoothly, his voice commanding total authority. "The main priority is their cocaine and burning those supply barges. The beatings are secondary. Shoot only if they shoot first. If any of you get rounded up by the uniforms, you’ll do a week at most in the Tombs before the precinct captain tosses the charges. But when we walk away, we’ll be reaping the harvest of Madden’s stock and locking up their cocaine market, because they won’t be making deliveries with their barges turned to ash."
Broad, ruthless grins spread across the room.
"That’s all," Frank said flatly.
Jack immediately gave a sharp hand signal to his men. Rubber Shaw kicked open two wooden crates in the corner, revealing lead pipes, iron crowbars, wrapped truncheons, and heavy butcher knives. The older lieutenants and street captains stepped forward first, reaching into a smaller steel box to draw out battered .38 revolvers.
Minutes later, the warehouse doors swung wide. A column of forty Hudson Dusters spilled out onto the street, led directly by the three bosses. Dockworkers hauling sacks of grain and dray drivers guiding heavy draft horses quickly backed out of the way, stepping onto the curb to let the armed procession pass.
Barney Knox walked right beside his brother Frank, his coat unbuttoned, calmly thumbing lead cartridges into the cylinder of a heavy revolver with a sharp, metallic click. Seeing Frank, Jack and Kid Yorke marching side-by-side at the front made the older Dusters feel like the bloodier, early days of the West Side had returned.
---
Down on the Chelsea docks, the afternoon air was thick with the smell of river mud, coal dust, and low tide. Steam whistles blared out on the Hudson, and longshoremen shouted as crated machinery swung from ship cranes.
Circular Jack walked along the pier with his hands shoved deep into the pockets of his heavy wool overcoat. Behind him, a dozen Duster enforcers strolled casually in small pairs, looking like ordinary dock laborers off shift.
Ahead, three Gophers stood near a cluster of pine crates, laughing and tossing copper coins against a wooden post. One of them, a broad-shouldered man wearing a stained cloth cap, had his back turned to the main walkway.
Jack didn’t slow his stride. He smoothly pulled an iron crowbar from beneath his coat, stepped up behind the broad-shouldered Gopher, and swung it with all his weight.
*CRACK.*
The iron hit the back of the man’s skull with a sickening crunch. He crumpled instantly onto the wet cobblestones, motionless.
"Dusters!" the second Gopher screamed, reaching toward his belt—
"Get ’em!" Jack roared.
All hell broke loose. The trailing Dusters yanked lead pipes and clubs from their coats, swarming the pier. The two remaining Gophers were overrun in seconds, knocked to the ground under a shower of heavy iron blows.
Further up the wharf, a group of eight Gopher loaders froze in terror. Realizing they were heavily outnumbered on the open pier, they turned and fled toward the northern warehouses, their heavy boots clattering frantically over the wooden planks.
"Choke ’em out!" Jack shouted, pointing his iron bar forward. "Take the pier! Drive ’em back to Hell’s Kitchen!"
The Dusters gave a collective roar, chasing the retreating Gophers off the Chelsea docklands and reclaiming their old territory in a matter of minutes.
---
A few blocks north, near the Hell’s Kitchen border piers, chaos of a different kind erupted.
Shouts of alarm echoed across the water as smoke began billowing into the gray sky. Duster raiding parties had already swarmed two Gopher coal barges tied up at the wooden slips. Kerosene lanterns were smashed against canvas covers, and within seconds, bright orange flames roared along the wood decking. Fire spread rapidly, catching a nearby commercial barge and forcing civilian deckhands to scream in panic as they leaped off the deck and splashed into the cold Hudson River.
"Where the hell are the shooters?!" a senior Gopher enforcer yelled, stumbling out of a pier office with his hand on the grip of a nickel-plated .32 revolver. "Defend the slips! Shoot any Duster that steps on the plank!"
He raised his gun, aiming directly at Circular Jack, who was leading a second wave of torch-bearing men down the ramp.
Jack didn’t even flinch. He stopped ten feet away, blood dripping from the heavy crowbar resting on his shoulder, and spat onto the wooden dock.
"Go ahead, shoot!" Jack taunted, stepping closer as the flames roared behind him. "Pull that trigger and put every copper in the city on your ass for a murder charge! See what Owney does to you when the precinct shuts your piers down for a month!"
The Gopher enforcer hesitated for a single second, his finger trembling on the trigger as he weighed the warning.
That single second was all Jack needed.
Jack lunged forward, swinging the iron bar sideways. The metal smashed squarely across the enforcer’s wrist, sending the revolver flying into the dirty river water. Before the man could scream, Jack drove the flat end of the crowbar into his midsection, following up with a violent crack across his jaw that dropped him unconscious onto the flaming wooden dock.
"Burn it all!" Jack yelled over the roar of the fire.
---
While the docks raged in smoke and violence, Frank Knox, Barney, and Kid Yorke led a squad of ten men silently around the back streets of Hell’s Kitchen.
They stopped before a small, weathered brick parish church nestled between two cramped tenement buildings. Three heavy-set Gopher guards were stationed around the front steps, trying to look like casual churchgoers, but their nervous eyes kept darting toward the columns of black smoke rising from the river.
"Now," Frank muttered.
Kid Yorke and Barney charged up the stone steps like madmen. Before the guards could even reach into their coats, Barney smashed one across the face with the heavy barrel of his revolver, while Kid and two lieutenants dragged the other two down, kicking and beating them into silence on the cold stone.
Frank stepped over the groaning guards, kicking open the double wooden doors of the church.
They marched straight past the empty pews and pushed through the side door into the rector’s private quarters. An elderly priest in black robes jumped up from his desk, his face turning pale as ten armed mobsters flooded his room.
Barney grabbed the priest by his collar, dragging him out from behind the desk and throwing him roughly into the center of the room.
"Where’s the cocaine?" Frank asked calmly, leaning over the priest.
"I—I don’t know what you’re talking about, my son," the priest stammered, his voice shaking violently. "This is a house of God—"
Frank pulled his revolver from his coat and pressed the cold steel barrel directly against the priest’s temple.
"Where is it?" Frank repeated, his voice deadpan.
The priest swallowed hard, staring at the hammer pulled back on the gun. "Under... under the rug," he whispered desperately, pointing a trembling finger. "Under the floorboards!"
Frank gestured to his men. Barney and two lieutenants kicked the heavy Persian rug aside, revealing fresh pine floorboards. Barney wedged his crowbar between the planks and levered them up with a loud *crack*, exposing a hidden wooden hatch.
They pulled the hatch open, revealing a square shaft with a wooden ladder leading down into the dark basement.
Barney grabbed an oil lantern from the desk and climbed down first, followed closely by Frank and Kid Yorke.
When Barney held the lantern up at the bottom of the ladder, the light cut through the subterranean gloom. The three bosses froze in place.
Stashed floor-to-ceiling across the hidden stone cellar were hundreds of wooden crates, packed tightly with sealed bricks of pure white powder.
Kid Yorke’s mouth hung open in absolute shock. Barney stared, a wild, breathless laugh bubbling up in his chest.
Frank slowly lowered his head, a cold, triumphant smile spreading across his face as he surveyed the massive haul.
"Jesus Christ..." Kid whispered, stepping closer to touch one of the wooden crates. "How much is down here?"
Frank took a slow breath, his eyes gleaming in the yellow lantern light.
"It’s at least four tons," Frank said.