Hoffa gasped out hoarse. Pete said, “What do you want?”

Jimmy caught some breath. “I’ve got a job for you in Miami.”

“How much?”

“Ten thousand.”

Pete said, “I’ll take it.”

o o o

He booked a midnight flight. He used a fake passenger name and charged a first-class seat to Hughes Aircraft. The plane landed at 8:00 am., on time.

Miami was balmy working on hot.

Pete cabbed over to a Teamster-owned U-Drive and picked up a new Caddy Eldo. Jimmy pulled strings: no deposit or ID was required.

A note was taped under the dashboard.

“Go by cabstand: Flagler at N.W. 46th. Talk to Fulo Machado.” Directions followed: causeways to surface streets marked on a little map.

Pete drove over. The scenery evaporated quick.

Big houses got smaller and smaller. White squares went to white trash, jigs and spics. Flagler was wall-to-wall low-rent storefronts.

The cabstand was tiger-striped stucco. The cabs in the lot had tiger-stripe paint jobs. Dig those tiger-shirted spics on the curb- snarfing doughnuts and T-Bird wine.

A sign above the door read: Tiger Kab. Se Habla Espanol.

Pete parked directly in front. Tiger men scoped him out and jabbered. He stretched to six-five-plus and let his shirttail hike. The spics saw his piece and jabbered on overdrive.

He walked in to the dispatch hut. Nice wallpaper: tiger photos taped floor to ceiling. National Geographic stock-Pete almost howled.

The dispatcher waved him over. Dig his face: scarred by tic-tac-toe knife cuts.

Pete pulled a chair up. Butt-Ugly said, “I’m Fulo Machado. Batista’s secret police did this to me, so take your free introductory look now and forget about it, all right?”

“You speak English pretty well.”

“I used to work at the Nacional Hotel in Havana. An American croupier guy taught me. It turned out he was a maricуn trying to corrupt me.”