The Bottler’s killing, however, must be managed with a decent care for the conventionalities. For either Twist or Dahl to walk in upon that offender and shoot him to death, while feasible, would be foolish. The coarse extravagance of such a piece of work would serve only to pile needless difficulties in the pathway of what politicians must come to the rescue. It was impertinences of that character which had sent Monk Eastman to Sing Sing. Eastman had so far failed as to the proprieties, when as a supplement to highway robbery he emptied his six-shooter up and down Forty-second Street, that the politicians could not save him without burning their fingers. And so they let him go. Twist had justified the course of the politicians upon that occasion. He would not now, by lack of caution and a reasonable finesse, force them into similar peril. They must and would defend him; but it was not for him to render their labors too up-hill and too hard.

Twist sent to Williamsburg for his friend and ally, Cyclone Louie. The latter was a bull-necked, highly muscled individual, who was a professional strong man – so far as he was professionally anything – and earned occasional side-show money at Coney Island by bending iron bars about his neck and twisting pokers into corkscrews about his brawny arms.

Louie, Twist and Dahl went into council over mutual beer, and Twist explained the imperative call for the Bottler’s extermination. Also, he laid bare the delicate position of both himself and Dahl.

In country regions neighbors aid one another in bearing the burdens of an agricultural day by changing work. The custom is not without what one might call gang imitation and respect. Only in the gang instance the work is not innocent, but bloody. Louie, having an appreciation of what was due a friend, could not do less than come to the relief of Twist and Dahl. Were positions reversed, would they not journey to Williamsburg and do as much for him? Louie did not hesitate, but placed himself at the disposal of Twist and Dahl. The Bottler should die; he, Louie, would see to that.

“But when?”

Twist, replying, felt that the thing should be done at once, and mentioned the following evening, nine o’clock. The place should be the Bottler’s establishment in Suffolk Street. Louie, of whom the Bottler was unafraid and ignorant, should experience no difficulty in approaching his man. There would be others present; but, practiced in gang moralities, slaves to gang etiquette, no one would open his mouth. Or, if he did, it would be only to pour forth perjuries, and say that he had seen nothing, heard nothing.

Having adjusted details, Louie, Twist and Dahl compared watches. Watches? Certainly. Louie, Twist and Dahl were all most fashionably attired and – as became members of a gang nobility – singularly full and accurate in the important element of a front, videlicet, that list of personal adornments which included scarf pin, ring and watch. Louie, Dahl and Twist saw to it that their timepieces agreed. This was so that Dahl and Twist might arrange their alibis.

It was the next evening. At 8.55 o’clock Twist was obtrusively in the Delancey Street police station, wrangling with the desk sergeant over the release of a follower who had carefully brought about his own arrest.

“Come,” urged Twist to the sergeant, “it’s next to nine o’clock now. Fix up the bond; I’ve got a date over in East Broadway at nine-thirty.”

While Twist stood thus enforcing his whereabouts and the hour upon the attention of the desk sergeant, Dahl was eating a beefsteak in a Houston street restaurant.

“What time have youse got?” demanded Dahl of the German who kept the place.

“Five minutes to nine,” returned the German, glancing up at the clock.

“Oh, t’aint no such time as that,” retorted Dahl peevishly. “That clock’s drunk! Call up the telephone people, and find out for sure.”

“The ‘phone people say it’s nine o’clock,” reported the German, hanging up the receiver.

“Hully gee! I didn’t think it was more’n halfpast eight!” and Dahl looked virtuously corrected.

While these fragments of talk were taking place, the Bottler was attending to his stuss interests. He looked pale and frightened, and his hunted eyes roved here and there. Five minutes went by. The clock pointed to nine. A slouch-hat stranger entered. As the clock struck the hour, he placed the muzzle of a pistol against the Bottler’s breast, and fired twice. Both bullets pierced the heart, and the Bottler fell – dead without a word. There were twenty people in the room. When the police arrived they found only the dead Bottler.

O’Farrell recalled those trade differences which had culminated in the charge of disturbance, and arrested Dahl.

“You ain’t got me right,” scoffed Dahl.

And O’Farrell hadn’t.

There came the inquest, and Dahl was set free. The Bottler was buried, and Twist and Dahl sent flowers and rode to the grave.

The law slept, a bat-eyed constabulary went its way, but the gangs knew. In the whispered gossip of Gangland every step of the Bottler’s murder was talked over and remembered. He must have been minus ears and eyes and understanding who did not know the story. The glance of Gangland turned towards the Five Points. What would be their action? They were bound to avenge. If not for the Bottler’s sake, then for their own. For the Bottler had been under the shadow of their protection, and gang honor was involved. On the Five Points’ part there was no stumbling of the spirit. For the death of the Bottler the Five Points would exact the penalty of blood.

Distinguished among the chivalry of the Five Points was Kid Pioggi. Only a paucity of years – he was under eighteen – withheld Pioggi from topmost honors. Pioggi was not specifically assigned to avenge the departed Bottler. Ambitious and gallantly anxious of advancement, however, he of his own motion carried the enterprise in the stomach of his thoughts.

The winter’s snow melted into spring, spring lapsed into early summer. It was a brilliant evening, and Pioggi was disporting himself at Coney Island. Also Twist and Cyclone Louie, following some plan of relaxation, were themselves at Coney Island.

Pioggi had seated himself at a beer table in Ding Dong’s. Twist and Louie came in. Pioggi, being of the Five Points, was recognized as a foe by Twisty who lost no time in mentioning it.

Being in a facetious mood, and by way of expressing his contempt for that gentleman, Twist made Pioggi jump out of the window. It was no distance to the ground, and no physical harm could come. But to be compelled to leave Ding Dong’s by way of the window, rubbed wrongwise the fur of Pioggi’s feelings. To jump from a window stamps one with disgrace.

Twist and Louie – burly, muscular, strong as horses – were adepts of rough-and-tumble. Pioggi, little, light and weak, knew that any thought of physical conflict would have been preposterous. And yet he was no one to sit quietly down with his humiliation. That flight from Ding Dong’s window would be on every tongue in Gangland. The name of Pioggi would become a scorning; the tale would stain the Pioggi fame.

Louie and Twist sat down at the table in Ding Dong’s, from which Pioggi had been driven, and demanded refreshment in the guise of wine. Pioggi, rage-swollen as to heart, busied himself at a nearby telephone. Pioggi got the ear of a Higher Influence of his clan. He told of his abrupt dismissal from Ding Dong’s, and the then presence of Louie and Twist. The Higher Influence instructed Pioggi to keep the two in sight. The very flower of the Five Points should be at Coney Island as fast as trolley cars could carry them.

“Tail ‘em,” said the Higher Influence, referring to Twist and Louie; “an’ when the fleet gets there go in wit’ your cannisters an’ bump ‘em off.”

While waiting the advent of his promised forces, Pioggi, maintaining the while an eye on Twist and Louie to the end that they escape not and disappear, made arrangements for a getaway. He established a coupé, a fast horse between the shafts and a personal friend on the box, where he, Pioggi, could find it when his work was done.

By the time this was accomplished, Pioggi’s recruits had put in an appearance. They did not descend upon Coney Island in a body, with savage uproar and loud cries. Much too military were they for that. Rather they seemed to ooze into position around Pioggi, and they could not have made less noise had they been so many ghosts.

The campaign was soon laid out. Louie and Twist still sat over their wine at Ding Dong’s. Now and then they laughed, as though recalling the ignominious exit of Pioggi. Means must be employed to draw them into the street. That accomplished, the Five Points’ Danites were to drift up behind them, and at a signal from Pioggi, empty their pistols into their backs. Pioggi would fire a bullet into Twist; that was to be the signal. As Pioggi whispered his instructions, there shone a licking eagerness in the faces of those who listened. Nothing so exalts the gangster like blood in anticipation; nothing so pleases him as to shoot from behind.

Pioggi pitched upon one whose name and face were unknown to Twist and Louie. The unknown would be the bearer of a blind message – it purported to come from a dancer in one of the cheap theaters of the place – calculated to bring forth Twist and Louie.

“Stall ‘em up this way,” said Pioggi, indicating a spot within touching distance of that coupé. “It’s here we’ll put ‘em over the jump.”

The place pitched upon for the killing was crowded with people. It was this very thronged condition which had led to its selection. The crowd would serve as a cover to Five Points operations. It would prevent a premature recognition of their assailants by Twist and Louie; it would screen the slayers from identification by casual citizens looking on.

Pioggi’s messenger did well his work, and Twist and Louie moved magnificently albeit unsteadily into the open. They were sweeping the walk clear of lesser mortals, when the voice of Pioggi arrested their attention.

“Oh, there, Twist; look here!”

The voice came from the rear and to the right; Pioggi’s position was one calculated to place the enemy at a double disadvantage.

Twist turned his head. A bullet struck him above the eye! He staggered! The lead came in a storm! Twist went down; Louie fell across him! There were twelve bullets in Twist and eight in Louie. The coroner said that they were the deadest people of whom he owned official recollection.

As the forethoughtful Pioggi was dashing away in his coupé, a policeman gave chase. Pioggi drove a bullet through the helmet of the law. It stopped pursuit; but Gangland has ever held that the shot was an error. A little lower, and the policeman would have been killed. Also, the death of a policeman is apt to entail consequences.

Pioggi went into hiding in Greenwich, where the Five Points had a hold-out. There were pullings and haulings and whisperings in dark political corners. When conditions had been whispered and hauled and pulled into shape satisfactory, Pioggi sent word to a favorite officer to come and arrest him.

Pioggi explained to the court that his life had been threatened; he had shot only that he himself might live. His age was seventeen. Likewise there had been no public loss; the going of Twist and Louie had but raised the average of all respectability. The court pondered the business, and decided that justice would be fulfilled by sentencing Pioggi to the Elmira Reformatory.

The best fashion of the Five Points visited Pioggi in the Tombs on the morning of his departure.

“It’s only thirteen months, Kid,” came encouragingly from one. “You won’t mind it.”

“Mind it!” responded Pioggi, in disdain of the worst that Elmira might hold for him; “mind it! I could do it standin’ on me head.”