Chapter 30: Shifting Shadows
The mood in the attic loft settled back down, the echoes of their shared oath lingering in the dusty air. Outside, the evening sky over Washington Street was deepening into a bruised purple, and the heavy rumble of drayage traffic below was beginning to slow to a steady, night-time trickle.
Ricky lowered his arm, looking around at the five faces watching him. "Now that the name and the vision are settled, we need to talk about our schedule starting Monday. Things have changed."
John Caldwell leaned his back against the brick wall, crossing his long arms. "Changed how, Ricky? We still doing the panic-stocking orders from Bleecker?"
"Originally," Ricky said, stepping over to the small pine table where his master ledger lay, "the plan was just to restrict our daytime deliveries under the excuse of ’supplier delays.’ But we’ve got a bigger problem now. We’re sticking out."
Marek tilted his head, his brow furrowing. "Because of the prices?"
"Because of the competition," Ricky said, looking Marek in the eye. "Rival wholesale spotters from Soho have already been seen tailing our wagons. Now, in a normal business, competitors trying to figure out who you are is just trade. But we aren’t a normal business. We don’t have shipping manifests, we don’t have customs stamps, and we don’t have a paper trail."
Arthur Murphy let out a low, dry grunt, nodding in agreement. "A competitor gets curious enough, he doesn’t just ask around the saloons. He goes to a precinct captain or a Tammany inspector and pays ten bucks to have the coppers track our wheels. If the coppers stop a wagon with two hundred-weight of white sugar and no bill of lading... we’re done."
"So we operate by night then?" Frank asked, sitting up on his crate.
"Yes and no," Ricky replied.
Marek frowned, looking puzzled. "What do you mean ’yes and no’?"
"We’re splitting the team into two distinct shifts," Ricky explained, his voice calm, practical, and grounded. "Marek, you take John and Tom. Your crew handles the daytime shift. But you won’t be driving a wagon, and you won’t be hauling a single crate."
John Caldwell raised an eyebrow, his flat English accent sharpening. "No wagon? How do we move the stock then?"
"You don’t move stock," Ricky said. "You go out on foot. Your sole job during the day is visiting our regular accounts, building relationships with new shopkeepers, and taking down the order lists in your pocketbooks. You tell the merchants our international steamship deliveries are restricted, so each store has a strict quota on how much they can buy per order. And you stick to our new prices—matches the wholesale market, but our quality is ten times better."
Marek’s eyes brightened as he caught the logic. "No wagon means no spotters following a horse back to our storage shed. To anyone watching the street, we just look like three clerks walking around taking notes."
"Exactly," Ricky nodded. "Then, once the sun goes down, my crew steps in. Me, Arthur, and Frank. We load the wagons at the storage shed, hit the routes, and drop the cargo at the merchants’ back doors while the avenues are quiet."
John shifted his weight, looking thoughtful. "Why not just have everyone run day and night together? Move twice the weight."
"We need to test the waters first, John," Ricky said smoothly. "We see how the night drops go for a week. If the streets are clear and the patrolmen stay out of our way, then we can think about going all-out. We don’t jump into the deep end until we know how cold the water is."
Frank rubbed his chin, looking at his older brother Arthur. "What time do we roll out for night drops, Ricky? Ten at night till two in the morning? When the whole block is asleep?"
Arthur shook his head before Ricky could answer. "Ten’s too late, Frank. If a shopkeeper’s sitting in his back room waiting on flour at one in the morning, every dog on the block is going to bark when the iron wheels hit the stones. The streets go quiet as soon as dusk settles—around eight o’clock. If we run eight at night until two in the morning, we’ve got six solid hours. Gives us enough room to handle the heavy bulk without rushing if another panic-stocking rush hits."
Ricky ran the timeline through his head, nodding slowly. "Fair enough, Arthur. Eight to two it is."
Frank grinned, but then hesitated, looking at Tom and John. "Wait... if night shift gets two bucks base pay plus overtime like you said yesterday, doesn’t that mean your crew makes way more silver than Marek’s daytime crew?"
John and Tom looked over, a faint flicker of concern crossing their faces. To working-class boys in 1910, a difference of a dollar or two a day was huge.
"We can’t afford double wages for everyone right now," Ricky said, addressing the room before any resentment could brew. "So we’re rotating."
Tom looked up. "Rotating?"
"Every week, the crews swap," Ricky said, laying out the terms clearly. "Next week, Marek’s crew takes the night deliveries while my crew handles daytime orders on foot. That way, everyone gets equal time on the night shift, everyone gets the overtime pay, and everyone learns both sides of the business—taking orders and running drayage."
The tension in the room vanished instantly. Tom smiled, and John gave a sharp, satisfied nod of approval.
"And there’s one more thing," Ricky added, a sharp, ambitious glint in his gray eyes. "Right now, we’re working as two teams. But as we expand across Greenwich and start pushing into the outer blocks, each of you is going to lead your own route with your own wagon and your own crew. And when that happens, I’m implementing a quota system."
Marek tilted his head. "Quota? What’s a quota?"
Ricky offered a small, knowing grin. "It means every route leader gets a monthly sales target based on their territory. You hit your target... you get a direct percentage bonus on top of your three-dollar base wage."
Frank gasped, leaning forward with a wide, incredulous laugh. "A bonus? On top of three bucks a day? How much are we talking, Ricky?"
"Work in progress, Frank," Ricky chuckled, tapping his pencil against his ledger. "First, we make sure the night drops work without bringing the coppers to our door. One step at a time."
Ricky closed his master notebook with a clean, solid snap. He looked at his five crew members. "That’s our new setup starting Monday morning. Anyone got an issue with it, speak up now."
Silence met his question, followed by nods of agreement from all five boys.
"Alright," Ricky said, gesturing toward the door. "Let’s unload the remaining crates from the wagons downstairs and get the floor set up before Reinhardt’s barn closes for the night."
The six of them headed down the dark stairs to the Washington Street alley. Together, working in the cool evening air, they hauled the remaining boxes of candles, spools of linen thread, and small hardware tins up to the fourth floor, stacking them neatly in the rear room.
By the time the last crate was set down and the Murphy brothers and John bade their goodnights, the attic loft was quiet, smelling cleanly of fresh wood and cool river breeze. Ricky stood by the window, looking out over the flickering gas lamps of Washington Street, ready for Monday night.