Ring of Smoke

By Kenneth Ferguson

It’s a story about a young man from Hell’s Kitchen who struggles to become a noble knight in a corrupt NYPD.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Oct 28, 2021
• ISBN: 9781663224408

Kenneth Ferguson

I was born in Hell’s Kitchen New York and grew up in Chelsea. My first job was as a bell boy in a hotel. I also had four years in the US Air Force and in Vietnam. I was also in the NYPD – I did patrol duty for nine years and seventeen more years in internal affairs. Afterward, I became the head of security for a major corporation in New York.

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Copyright © 2021 Kenneth Ferguson.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

Certain characters in this work are historical figures, and certain events portrayed did take place. However, this is a work of fiction. All of the other characters, names, and events as well as all places, incidents, organizations, and dialogue in this novel are either the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

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Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

ISBN: 978-1-6632-2422-4 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-6632-2441-5 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-6632-2440-8 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2021913042

iUniverse rev. date: 10/25/2021

CONTENTS

Chapter 1 Manhattan

Chapter 2 The Hotel

Chapter 3 The Candidates

Chapter 4 The Police Academy

Chapter 5 The Open Drawer

Chapter 6 The Coop

Chapter 7 The Mannequin

Chapter 8 The Foot Post

Chapter 9 Crisis Intervention - Brooklyn Style

Chapter 10 Happy Thanksgiving

Chapter 11 The Thief

Chapter 12 Jingle All The Way

Chapter 13 Excessive Force

Chapter 14 A Taxicab Dispute

Chapter 15 The Picnic

Chapter 16 Illegal Gambling

Chapter 17 Collision Course

Chapter 18 Freeze - Don’t Move!

Chapter 19 Setsuko Sissorhands

Chapter 20 The Letter

Chapter 21 The Escape Ladder

Chapter 22 Grave Robbers

Chapter 23 Going Ape

Chapter 24 Sunday Brunch

Chapter 25 Shattered Dreams

Chapter 26 The Elephant House

Chapter 27 The Ambush

Chapter 28 Black Cats and White Cats

Chapter 29 To Be or Not to Be

Chapter 30 Black Panthers

Chapter 31 Ring of Smoke

Epilogue

1

MANHATTAN

In the summer of 1954 the Denato Family, two adults and five children, moved 22 blocks from their Manhattan tenement apartment in Hell’s Kitchen to a larger tenement apartment on west 17th Street in an area known as Chelsea.

A few months later, twelve-year-old, Peter Donato, came home from his new school in Greenwich Village, he was forced to stop on his block by a local bully named Billy Horton.

PAY UP, KID!

Donato studied Horton and the other five boys who stood behind him. They were all taller than him and looked tough in their matching black motorcycle jackets.

Horton moved a step closer to Donato blocked the blazing sun that was hitting Donato in the face. You have to pay to walk down this street, kid! Horton threatened again.

Donato stepped to the side and glanced at some of the people in Kelly Park, a small vest pocket park on the south side of Seventeenth Street. He also looked again at the boys standing behind Horton; the boys looked at each other but stayed back.

I live on this street now.

So do we. Horton side-stepped again to face Donato and raised one hand to touch Donato’s chest. Horton repeated his demand for money.

Denato took another step to the side and considered his situation. Billy Horton was perhaps three or four years older than Donato and had a scary, ruddy complexion, he seemed to be the leader of this gang.

Young Donato toyed with the three quarters in his pocket but had no intention of paying this toll. He remembered his old neighborhood and knew that once he gave these boys his money; he would be marked as an easy target from this day on. He stepped to the side again to get the sun out of his eyes and Horton mimicked his move. This time the sun was on Horton’s face. Look, I live here now and I don’t have any money to give you guys.

Horten shot a confident smirk at his friends and reached to feel Donator’s pockets."

Donato side-stepped once more time to avoid the bully’s jostling but Horton moved in front of him again to block his path.

Raising and lowering the zipper of his motorcycle jacket, Horton acted like a very cool and confident character with his gang standing behind him. He seemed all-powerful and slowly pulled a loose cigarette from his shirt pocket and lit it with a shiny new Zippo lighter. Horton took one more intimidating step closer to Donato and snapped his jaw to send a small ring of smoke toward Donato’s face.

Donato inched backward, coughed once and lowered his books to the ground. Menacing him had been a mistake. Peter Donato was no stranger to street extortion and had already been hardened in a number of street fights in his old neighborhood, Horton flicked his cigarette away and compounded his errors by spreading his arms wide to prevent Donato’s advance.

Shifting his weight, Donato planted his right foot firmly on the ground and uncoiled with a lightning right to Horton’s nose.

Shocked by the unsuspected attack, Horton staggered backward against his buddies and dropped on his butt. His fair skin and white tee shirt were now splattered red with blood. The other boys backed away and scattered.

Donato molded his body into a boxing stance, shifted his weight, and waited. His adversary was bigger and stronger and also a fool for starting a fight with someone he didn’t know.

Holding his bloodied nose with one hand, Horton sprang to his feet with a raging battle cry. He persisted with his faulty decision making by continuing this fight. Horton thrashed away with windmill punches as Donato darted out of his way like a young Jim Corbett. Tall and lanky, Horton managed to land a few blows but he was no match for his fast moving adversary.

Donato stung him with lightning left jabs and sledgehammer rights. Donato was faster and kept his hands high, landing ten punches for every one he received. He learned his middleweight antics from a washed up prizefighter named Tiger Smith. Smith was the current janitor at a local CYO Golden Gloves Gym.

Two Tenth Precinct policemen stopped their patrol car at the curb but remained in their car to watch the fight. No one noticed them until Horton threw in the towel by yelling Chicky the cops!

All the observers ran for cover and scattered like a flock of frightened pigeons. Donato was shoved into a candy store newsstand and fell on the front page of the New York Daily News. Face to face with the front-page headline, Young Donato grinned as he read the headline; Jersey Joe KO’s Charles in the seventh for heavy weight title.

The two cops drove away without taking any action.

Peter Donato had to walk past that candy store every school day on his way to and from his bus stop or walk three blocks out of his way. He chose the shorter route.

Horton frequently flicked a lit cigarette at Donato or spit in his direction whenever he walked past. The bully also barked out an insulting remark once in a while but all in all he and his gang remained near the candy store steps when Donato passed them. The confrontations between Denato and the gang became less and less but it was one of the gang’s main hangouts; they were there almost every day.

About a month after the fight, Horton’s harassment of Donato ended and some of the gang members begin nodding at him, some even smiled. A couple of weeks later, the whole gang suddenly surrounded Donato again. This time there were too many of them and no way to escape. They were all around him. Donato inched backward to a brick wall, dropped his books on the pavement and threw up his hands. He waited for the first attacker.

Buddy Daly, the tallest member of the gang, filtered through the crowd and approached him. His hands were up too but they were palms forward. They, ah Daly flicked his thumb at the boys behind him. They wanna know if you wanna join the gang. Daly lowered one hand slowly and offered it in friendship. Whattaya say? Wanna join us?

Donato took Daly’s hand and became a member of the Royal Kings Street Gang. Membership meant wearing a Garrison belt with a sharpened buckle and a black motorcycle jacket with the gang’s insignia painted on the back; the portrait of a human skull wearing the crown of a king. Membership also required a pricked finger, exchange-of-blood-ceremony, fighting rival gangs, harmonizing on street corners at night, smoking, drinking beer and acting tough; especially at the school dances.

Donato was also an explorer of the neighborhood and shortly became the gang’s expert on local escape routes. He discovered and plotted passageways and arteries through alleys; over rooftops and under buildings that none of the other gang members ever considered or could navigate alone.

Once he led a select group of them through a honeycomb of tunnels he discovered below the neighborhood streets; tunnels, unused and long forgotten by most of the residents. The passageways were dark and scary but Donato installed dozens of stolen clotheslines, with various numbers of knots tied in them so that anyone with the knowledge could navigate the tunnels in total darkness. Two knots led to Kelly Park, three led to the west side docks and so on.

Several months later, Donato found himself hanging out with a small, select group of the gang members: Ernie Claudio, Buddy Daly, Sandy Hartmen and Little Joey Castiglione became good friends and they slowly slipped away from the rest of the gang. Their weekday routine included cutting classes at school, hanging out on stoops, smoking cigarettes, drinking beer, shoplifting and playing poker on rooftops and in backyards for loose cigarettes. When the weather was bad they explored new areas of the underground tunnels on 17th Street but all that subterranean stuff ended one day when they came upon several skeletons bound together with heavy chains.

Weekday nights were spent at a local bowling alley or the pool hall on 23rd Street or just dawdling on a street corner. On weekends; there was always the challenge of a stickball match on 16th Street against a rival gang for a keg of beer or a raid on the Saturday night school dances. The boys like spiking the punch bowl with booze just to cause trouble but rarely danced with the girls.

They established a clubhouse in Donato’s basement with personalized church keys (beer can openers) hanging from teacup hooks and Pete’s pals liked playing with the model trains that Donato’s father had constructed. It has several sets of American Flyer trains complete with landscape, tunnels, bridges and track switches.

Donato was fleet-footed and lucky. He was never caught shoplifting and only did it to impress the other members. Larceny rubbed him the wrong way so he became a legitimate businessman. He peddled newspapers at night in the neighborhood bars and shined shoes on Saturday mornings in front of the Merchant Seamen’s Hall and helped his Dad with odd paint jobs in the neighborhood, and went fishing on Sunday morning; but not for fish. He dropped a greased padlock through the subway sidewalk gratings near bus stops to recover the coins that people dropped while boarding buses.

Two years later, Donato and his buddies sat in a neighborhood backyard waiting for another school day to end when a second floor window opened. They continued to play poker for cigarettes while an old woman dressed in black turned her worn face to a dark gray sky. She had clothespins wedged between her lips and painstakingly pinned her wet wash to a clothesline and pushed the dripping wet wash closer and closer toward the boys. Pin by pin she propelled her wet clothing at them.

Hey! stupid lady. Ernie yelled at the old woman; You’re getting us all wet.

Whatta you call stupid? The old woman planted her hands on the windowsill and spoke in broken English, Get atta here, you tramps. You don’t live here. Go home, bastards! Dirty sons-of-bitches. She wiped her wet hands on her dress. Go to school.

Peter Donato, now fourteen going on forty turned his face to that same dark sky and focused on the clotheslines. "There’s gotta be a hundred clotheslines in this backyard, maybe a thousand. They’re strung like giant spider webs, waiting, and ready to snare us and hold us here in this neighborhood forever".

Maybe it’s raining. Little Joey Castigleone said.

Ernie covered the cigarettes with his hands. It ain’t raining, squirt.

We should’ve gone to school today. Donato said.

What for? Ernie said.

That’s Mrs. Civello. She’s gonna tell my mother I was here.

So.

So, my mother thinks I’m in school learning something.

Fuck school; I’m getting wet here.

Little Joey held out his hand. It’s only water.

Quiet, squirt.

Sandy scoops up the cigarettes with two hands and carried them to a dry spot under an overhang. Little Joey followed him and began shuffling the cards.

Hey, lady. Ernie screams at the now empty window, Go fuck yourself.

Donato put his hand firmly on Ernie’s shoulder. Don’t do that.

Pete’s right, Ernie. Joey said. You don’t live here. You’re just making trouble for us.

Fuck that old witch. Ernie turned to yell at the empty window again. Ffff-

She has three sons. Buddy interrupted. Big ones.

Ernie hit Buddy with a sly look.

And they’re ugly too. Sandy said.

Ernie looked at Sandy.

Little Joey paused with the cards in his hands. …And they ride motorcycles.

Ernie turned to Joey. Quiet, squirt.

As the game continued, Donato lit a cigarette and took a deep drag. He puffed out a ring of smoke at the cards on the ground and the smoke ring disintegrated when it hit them. He passed his lit cigarette to Ernie and Ernie snapped a smoke ring. Buddy and Sandy mimicked Ernie and Sandy gave the smoldering stub to little Joey. This was a sign of their loyalty and comradeship. This was their brotherhood. This was their ring of smoke.

C’mon, Ernie dropped his cards, let’s do something. He turned to Donato. Whatta you wanna do, Pete?

I don’t know. Donato took a long look around the backyard. He sensed a transformation-taking place in his mind and his body. He felt a craving to wonder. Suddenly, all the broken bottles and rubbish mounds on the ground near him came into focus. "What am I doing here?" He thought and traded glances with a passing fat alley cat and the cat paused for a moment to consider him, and then moved on. A third floor window curtain shifted and a faceless figure looked out at him.

Let’s grab a few cokes from a delivery truck? Buddy suggests.

"We could go puke on the 23rd Street cafeteria window." Little Joey laughed.

Yuck, Ernie extended his tongue in disgust. This is handball weather; let’s go to Kelly Park for some hand ball.

Can’t do that. Donato swiped some dirt from his pants; There’s a new cop in the Tenth Precinct assigned to the park area who likes giving out JD cards.

So, I’ve got plenty of ’em. Ernie said.

On the way out of the yard, Buddy Lifted a trash can lid and sniffs at the contents. Lunch anyone?

Dig in! Sandy pushed Buddy’s head down and the can topples over into the alley.

Their laughter causes a ground floor window to be opened and a beefy man with a hairy chest looked out to see an empty alley.

Bent on changing his ways, Donato went to school the next day only to find out that he and his four friends were suspended for chronic absenteeism. He walked to an empty pier near the Hudson River to ponder his future and his friends gathered around him. "I can’t bring this bad news to my parents. I have to leave home. My parents have been too good to me. They don’t deserve the bum that I’ve become. Perhaps I can change, if I can get away from this neighborhood for a while. I have to go somewhere else, somewhere far away from here and come back in the future. They’d be better off without me. They did all they could with me, cared for me and never laid a glove on me, loved me. I can’t do this to them."

Donato’s friends, Buddy, Sandy and Joey were afraid to go with him but Ernie signed on in a flash.

Early the next morning, Donato scratched out a crude apology note