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            Len Burnstein, Purple Gang member and son of one of the original brothers, Abe Burnstein, sat in his cell at Michigan’s Jackson Prison, resigned to his fate.  He had just turned eighty, and he knew he would never see another birthday on the outside of these cement-block walls.  The Parole Board had just turned him down a second time, and he now knew he had a job to do.  He had a story that needed to be told and information that needed to be shared.

               Len had started his criminal career working under his father’s tutelage on the east side of Detroit.  As the empire run by his father and uncles had expanded, his father had sent him north one summer to work as a runner in the safer atmosphere of Club Manitou.

               When Len had arrived, Willy was the head runner for the club, and Len had trained under, then assisted, and finally replaced Willy by the end of the summer.

               Len leaned back in his cell and smiled, remembering the summer evenings he had spent working with Willy and the day’s early morning hours he had spent chasing after Evie.  Evie had been his first love, and he’d been smitten from the first moment he’d seen her at the Harbor Beach to which he and Willy had often biked.

               Evie had had a short, dark bob with heavy bangs, as was the fashion at the time.  Her skin was snowy white, and her eyes large and blue.  She had become the reason behind everything he’d done that summer and the reason why he’d begged his father to let him stay in Harbor Springs for the school year.

               “The club will be closed, and you’re not old enough to stay up there alone yet,” Abe, his father, had told the boy.  “Besides, you’re in a good school here, and you’re gonna finish.”

               “You didn’t finish,” Len had argued.

               “You’re right,” his father had agreed.  “And I want more for you.”

               “I’m fifteen,” Len had pushed his cause.  When his father didn’t bend, Len continued with “Willy said I can stay with his family,” offering the false statement as a last attempt.

               Abe spoke to his son in a tone that let Len know the subject wasn’t up for debate.  “Do you realize all your family has been through so you could have a better life?  Do you realize where we came from and the things we have done to make sure that you get the best schooling and the opportunities that we never had?”

               Len felt deflated.  He’d heard it all before.  He’d heard how his family had emigrated here from Eastern Europe and how they had arrived with nothing.  He’d heard how his father and uncles had resorted to extortion, stealing, smuggling, and murder so they could make a name for themselves in this new country.  He knew he was a special kind of royalty that could only be found in America yet, today, here he sat in a prison cell.  Here he sat with secrets and opportunities that he now realized he would take to the grave with him if he didn’t do something about it.  Even if he got out now, he would be too old to travel and too old to spend the forgotten treasure before his hourglass ran out.

               His sweet childhood memories of Evie evaporated as a loud buzzer sounded and two prison guards walked down his row, stopping at his cell.

               “You have a visitor,” the first guard announced coldly, fumbling through a ring of keys before sliding one into the keyhole on Len’s barred door and swinging it open.

               Len wasn’t surprised.  It was Tuesday, and, every Tuesday, he had one visitor.  Without saying a word, Len stood, turned his back to the guard, and held his hands behind his back.  The first guard placed cuffs on his wrists and shackles on his ankles as the second, a newbie in his twenties, looked on.

               “The guy is so old he can barely walk,” the second guard observed.  “Does he really need the chains?”

               As the first guard stood and turned Len around to face his captors, he said, “If you knew what he’s done, you would never say that.”

               The second guard looked at Len in a new light and stepped out of the way as Len exited his cell.

               The guard ushered Len down the noisy row of cells, through the first security check, and then down a lower-security row of cells.  After what felt like an exhausting walk to Len, he arrived at the visiting room that was divided by a row of cubicles and Plexiglass wall that separated the free from the unfree.

               “Over there,” the first guard pointed.

               Len followed the point, moved to a chair, and waited as the shackles were removed from his hands.

               “You have ten minutes,” the first guard said, reiterating information that Len knew all too well.

               As Len dropped into his chair, he saw a taller, younger version of himself sitting on the other side of the Plexiglass, and his dark brown eyes softened into a smile.  Lifting the phone in the cubicle, he spoke into the receiver.  “Erik, how are you?”

               The handsome man in his thirties with dark hair and blue eyes looked back adoringly.  “Hi, Grandpa.”

               Over the years, Len had learned how much things had changed on the outside.  Although the original members had lived in fear until their end, the remaining gang members had eventually lost power, shrunk in size, become obsolete, and finally dissipated.  Their descendants now lived the life that the gang members had always wanted for them:  They were well-educated lawyers, bankers, investors, and shrewd businessmen.  Although they had drifted from their origins, they were well aware of their roots and always showed preference towards their fellow descendants when it came to business, each making sure the other was successful.

               Len also knew that, by the time Erik’s generation had come along, his history seemed like nothing more than some kind of myth that his older relatives would talk about but that the grandchildren didn’t really believe.

               After the usual chit-chat, Len’s demeanor changed.  “Erik, there’s something I need to tell you before you leave today.”

               “Yeah, Grandpa?  What’s up?” Erik asked in a lighthearted tone.

               “There’s something I need you to get.”

               “Sure, Grandpa.  Anything.”

               “It’s a ways away, in northern Michigan.”

               Erik began to roll his eyes and dropped against the back of his chair.  “This isn’t another Club Manitou story, is it?”

               Len hid his irritation at his grandson’s impatience by lowering his voice and leaning forward in the cubicle.  “This isn’t some story, Erik, and I only have a few minutes, so listen up.”

               Erik, acting as if he knew what was coming and it was something he’d heard many times before, begrudgingly leaned back into the cubicle.  “Okay, okay.  What do you need, Grandpa?”

               “I’m not even sure if the building is still standing,” Len began.

               “What building?  Club Manitou?”

               “Shh,” Len chastised.  “Keep your voice down.  Yes, that place,” he whispered into the corded phone.  “If the building on top isn’t standing anymore, you need to know that there was a whole world underneath it.”

               “Yeah, yeah, I know,” Erik said impatiently.  “There are tunnels and escape routes, and yada, yada, yada.”

               “And a fortune,” Len added the three words that caught Erik’s attention.

               “Fortune?  Really?  Yours?”

               Len felt like a bit of a traitor as his grandson’s last question came out.  Some of the urgency left his voice. “No, it’s not mine.”

               “Then I’m not getting involved,” Erik said, holding up his hands.  Although stories of The Purple Gang ran through his family, and he and his cousins regarded them as exaggerations and maybe even myths, he was well aware of the rules and consequences that occurred when you put your hands on something that wasn’t yours.

               “But,” Len continued, “if no one has claimed it by now, it’s mine by default.”

               “Before I go digging around the northern Michigan woods for some treasure, can you at least tell me who it rightfully belongs to?”

               Len looked side to side before saying the name of the man he had never met but Willy, his northern Michigan friend and former runner for Club Manitou, had once thought walked on water.  He was an original member of The Purple Gang, and word had it that he was calm, cool, collected, accomplished, and had women chasing after him.  Len smirked as he remembered hearing that there was one woman in particular who had his superior’s eye.  Willy had told Len that the man would never admit it, but he would have done anything for that woman…even leave the only life he had ever known.  Whispering into the phone as if uttering the name would resurrect the man and his wrath back from the grave, Len divulged, “Paul Preston.”

               The color left Erik’s face.  That was a name that even his generation knew.  Paul had been one of the biggest hit men for the Purple Gang, so much so that he had been sent to northern Michigan to work in their speakeasy until things cooled off in Detroit.  Legend had it that Paul and an heiress had mysteriously disappeared during a raid at the club.  After their disappearance, things had begun to fall apart as the feds cracked down on the club.  When prohibition had ended, gambling had been the only source of income, and even that faded out after a few years.  “How do you know someone else hasn’t gotten it?” Erik asked, not yet convinced he should be getting involved.

               “I don’t,” Len stated flatly, “but Willy is the only other one who knew about it, and, although he was sent to work in a club out east, I don’t really know what became of him after I was convicted.”

               “So Willy must have it,” Erik concluded, turning his hands up to show that this was a pointless conversation.

               “If Mr. Preston came back and his money wasn’t there,” Len said, “it would be – ” he made a throat-slitting motion that made Erik blanch. “Willy didn’t take it.”

               “What if he’s got descendants?  What if they come for it?”

               “If they haven’t come by now, they aren’t coming,” Len said.

               Erik thought a moment, weighing his options.  He had some vacation time coming up, and he could use a getaway, especially one with a possible reward.  “Are you going to tell me how to find these secret tunnels?” Erik asked, now looking around nervously.  His generation was not one of criminals, and the thought of doing something that could make him his grandfather’s bunkmate went far beyond his comfort zone.

               “They’re all over.  You can’t miss them once you know what to look for,” Len told his grandson, “but there’s one in particular that you need to get to.”

               As Erik leaned forward and listened with wide eyes, his grandfather gave him directions from Jackson, Michigan to a place that held some of the old man’s happiest memories.  It was a place in Harbor Springs, Michigan.

               As the conversation neared its end, Len reached into the shirt pocket of his orange prison uniform and fished out his most prized possession.  Sliding it under the glass, he said, “In case anything happens to me, you should have this.”

               Erik picked up the wrinkled and faded photograph of two people and studied it.  Recognizing the eyes, he confirmed, “Is this you, Grandpa?”

               Len smiled at his grandson’s recognition.  “It was.  It was me in what seems like another lifetime.”  He let out a sad sigh.  “I don’t know, maybe it was another lifetime.”

               Studying the photograph, Erik asked, “And who is this in the photo with you?”

               Len leaned forward on his elbows so he could get a last look at his most prized possession before it disappeared.  “It’s the love of my life.  Your grandmother.”

               Erik shook his head.  “I can’t take this, Grandpa.”

               Len smiled a peaceful smile.  “I won’t be here much longer, and – ”

               Worry crossed Erik’s face.  “What aren’t you telling me, Grandpa?”

               The convict shook his head.  “I’m an old man, Erik.  In case I’m not here when you return, you need to have that.”

               “You’ll be here,” Erik assured.

               Len wasn’t so sure he agreed with his grandson, and part of him didn’t want to agree.  He was tired, and his life had become nothing more than a waiting game.  Seeing the worry in his grandson’s eyes that matched the blue eyes of his Evie, he smiled, content to merely bask in the presence of this handsome, young man.  “I’ll try, Erik.  I’ll try.”

               Armed with information and a photographic piece of his past, Erik left the prison that day with a mission.  It was a mission he wanted to accomplish more for his grandfather than for himself.  As Erik’s car pulled out of the parking lot of the Jackson Prison, a mail truck pulled out behind him.  Unbeknownst to Erik, there was a letter in that truck that shared Erik’s destiny.  It was a letter on its way to Harbor Springs, Michigan, and the person it was addressed to was the Harbor Springs Fire Chief, Mr. Jason Lange.

*** Watch for The Tunnels 2 coming late summer/fall 2022!