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[B]Fortunate Son
Part II:
The Bowery Boys
[/B]

[I]“Give me your tired, your poor,
your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.”[/i]
 
-- Emma Lazarus[/center]


[B]Gotham City
July 1st, 1888[/B]


Jonah Hex smoked a cigarillo while he and Eliot Kane rode in the back of the rich man's personal coach and buggy, pulled by a great big cart-horse. Hex blew smoke out the open window and watched the street as they passed by. There were plenty of people out and about in the early evening. The hot summer night was humid to the point of being unbearable, and being inside made it worse. At least outside there was the faint hope of a wayward breeze. Hex had only been in Gotham for a little over a day and he was already tired of seeing so many people together. They looked like cattle herded up in a pen, all waiting to head to the slaughterhouse. He exhaled smoke and ruminated on that last part, figuring that all life was a long wait for the inevitable slaughter. 

"Tonight begins the hunt," Kane said vigorously. "I am not embarrassed to admit, Mr. Hex, that I am as excited as a child await St. Nicholas' arrival.  Somewhere out there is a man, or men, who are preying on the less fortunate of the world. It is our duty to protect those who cannot protect themselves, Mr. Hex!"

Hex grunted neutrally. He wasn't entirely sure what to make of Kane. The man talked like a jackass and loved to hear the sound of his own voice. He was definitely the picture-perfect definition of an Eastern Dude with his immaculate clothes that cost more than everything Hex owned or had ever owned. Still, underneath all that, there was something that intrigued Hex. Yes, his constant yammering was annoying, but underneath it seemed a genuine desire to help the people of this hellhole of a city. Like employing Jonah Hex himself to help him find a man abducting prostitutes. Hex wasn't coming cheap and he was paying for it out of his own pocket. That may mean Kane had more money than sense, but he was at least trying.

"On the topic of Shanghaiing, there is a particular street gang here in the city that is rumored to use kidnapping as one of their methods of terror. They take anyone they can get their hands on and sell them to whoever is interested. There are stories of women being sold to Siamese princes, men being impressed into working as little more than slaves for the Russian Imperial Navy."

"Sounds like a good place to start."

"They call themselves the Bowery Boys," Kane said with a wry chuckle. "They are a motley group of Polish and Italians who intermingle in the name of criminal enterprise. Jews and Catholics mixing together, you can hardly be surprised that crime is where they would turn to. Those hyphenated Americans, the [I]German-Americans[/I] or the [I]Italian-Americans[/I] or the[I] Jewish-Americans[/I], are where this country will find its downfall."

Hex grunted again and flicked what was left of his cigarillo out the window. He leaned forward and looked at Kane, his hands on his knees as he spoke.

"I don't give a good goddamn about any of that, just take me to where we gotta go."

"We shall," Kane said with a grin. "We are going to meet one of my allies in the police force. He runs a special strong arm squad that works the Bowery's street gangs and polices vice. You'll like him, Hex, he's a lot of like you. A rough man who has to do rough work, but all for the greater good. I see you two getting on smashingly."


[CENTER]*****[/CENTER]


Hex and Kane climbed out of his coach in a back alley and approached a loading bay hidden by shadows in the early evening. A man stood waiting for them.

"Jonah Hex, Lieutenant Worthington Smythe."

A big, beefy man with a thick mustache and pince-nez glasses looked Hex over while the bounty hunter did the same with him. He was almost as tall as Hex, and at least fifty pounds heavier. Not all the weight appeared to be fat, Hex noticed. While he wore a crisp suit with a flat cap and a snapped brim, a gold GCPD badge pinned to the chest, he carried himself like a brawler. Hex confirmed that when they shook hands and he saw the scar tissue along the man's knuckles.

"The name rings a bell," said Smythe. "Aren't you some kind of gunslinger or something?"

"Or something."

"I have brought Hex into the city to show him a taste of city life, Lieutenant. I would like him present with us on tonight's raid."

Smythe raised his eyebrows at the commissioner before he looked at Hex. The lieutenant wore a look of passive annoyance that Hex could only speculate on. With Kane's nature, there was no way this was the first time he had asked to tag along on a raid. Now, he was also asking that a stranger come along with them.

"Commissioner... I..." he stammered and tried to find an appropriate response.

Kane held a hand up to silence the cop. "I promise you, Lieutenant, tonight will not be a repeat performance of that fiasco six months ago. I shall stay well enough back, as will Mr. Hex. We just wish to observe, I promise you."

Lieutenant Smythe stared for a long moment before he spat and shrugged.

"Very well. Come with me."

They followed Smythe down the alley and through a doorway. Inside, six men were cleaning and loading weapons. Like Smythe, they all wore suits and ties with a GCPD badge pinned to their lapels. Five of them carried small revolvers while a sixth loaded up a scattergun with shotgun shells.

"Listen up, men," Smythe said with a motion towards Kane and Hex. "Commissioner Kane and his guest will be joining us tonight, but I have their word that they will not interfere. The commissioner is a man of his word, so I believe he will fulfill that promise to stay back. Tonight's agenda..."

Smythe pulled from his jacket a crinkled and faded photograph of a swarthy young man with dark hair and a Roman nose. Underneath his face were the words "GCPD: 10/4/87" written in white chalk. The man stared straight ahead at the camera with a look that could only be described as smug indifference.

"This is tonight's target. Giuseppe Maroni, better known on the streets of as Gyp the Blood. He's something of a mover within the Bowery Boys. He's got a crew of ruffians at least six deep. Robbery, extortion, murder for hire, you name it and they do it. I want him taken alive, got it?"

The men mumbled acknowledgment and Smythe nodded. He looked back at Kane and Hex and slightly sighed.

"Okay, mount up."