“You better not be lying about the place being empty,” Eastland said. “If there’s anybody in there you’ll be dead before they can do anything.”
“Nobody’s in there, young man. When I need help I send for it. Nobody bothers Shecky, nobody but you.”
“Open the gate,” Eastland said.
The gate swung back on its hinges as soon as the old man turned the key. A long distance truck went by the alley with a roar. They got back in the car and drove to a squat concrete building set in the middle of a weed-grown lot. The building was one story, with steel shutters on the windows and a steel door. There were three locks in the door; Eastland knew the thinnest keyhole, a slit, was the one that controlled the alarm system.
Dirt blew in the wind as Shecky unlocked the alarm system first. Inside, Shecky turned on a single light after the door was closed. Then he threw a switch that set hundred watt bulbs blazing in wire cages in the low ceiling. The arsenal was clean and bare, all steel and reinforced concrete. An aisle ran down the center of the room, the single room, that stretched all the way to the back wall. The whole place smelled of gun oil and cosmoline. To Eastland, it smelled of death.
Still trembling, Shecky stood with his back to Eastland. In the glaring light he looked old and frail. He looked like what he probably was—somebody’s grandfather. What he didn’t look like was a merchant of death.
“Where are the M-16’s?” Eastland said.
The old man pointed without turning. “Take what you want, young man. Just don’t hurt me.”
“The handguns?”
“Upstairs. On the left when you go up the stairs.”
Eastland walked the old man to the end of the room and handcuffed him to a shelf support. At that distance he would be nothing more than a blur to the old man. He sat Shecky on the floor before he hooked him to the shelf.
There were steel shelves on both sides of the aisle; boxes of guns and ammunition ran from floor to ceiling. One of the boxes of M-16’s had been pried open, and when he reached in and took one out, it gave him a strange feeling to be handling a rifle again. In spite of all the time that had passed, the M-16 was as familiar as the back of his hand. The machine rifle was slick with grease, and this was no weapon lifted by a thieving soldier: all the weapons here had come directly from the factory, and the only time they had been fired was before they were shipped.
Eastland carried the rifle and a stack of clips to the door before he went upstairs to look at the handguns. As he went up he heard the old man coughing in the corner. There were army issue Colt .45 automatic pistols on the first shelf. Eastland had used Old Slabsides in Nam; he didn’t like it. The army brass swore by it—the army hated to try anything new; Eastland thought it felt like an iron salami in the hand. The Browning Hi-Power was a superior semi-auto; that didn’t interest him either. What he wanted was a big caliber revolver with a long barrel; a heavy weapon with plenty of inertia to keep it from riding up when fired.
A box of Colt Pythons; .45 caliber, looked good until he found a box of Smith & Wesson .44 magnums with 8½-inch barrels. He hefted a Smith, pointed it, tested the balance. It was a bitch of a gun—a long range shooter, perfect for what he wanted to do. Even if you didn’t doctor the cartridges, the S & W magnum would just about rip a man’s arm off. A man hit in the head would lose his head, especially if you bored out the nose to make hollow points.
He loaded the magnum and found a holster for it after stuffing his pockets with boxes of shells. The holster looked long enough to accommodate a sawed-off shotgun. That was all right: he wasn’t going to wear it under a tight suit. He looked at his watch and it was seven twenty-five.
The last weapons he carried to the door were a British commando knife and a German machine pistol, a Schmeisser, and plenty of extra clips. He switched off the light before he went outside and put the stuff on the floor of the car, behind the back seat, and covered everything with his jacket. The old man was muttering to himself when he went back inside. Staying well back from the old man to prevent recognition, Eastland threw the handcuff key at his chest. The key rattled to the floor between his legs. Under the old man the floor was wet: Shecky had been pissing in his pants.
“You have a watch,” Eastland said. “Wait an hour before you unlock the cuffs. Do it before an hour is up and I’ll find you and kill you. This never happened, right. You don’t want the Treasury people on your ass.”
Shecky’s head nodded vigorously. “Anything you say, young man. You want an hour, I’ll give you two. You want me to sit here all night—I don’t mind that.”
“Fuck you, Shecky,” Eastland said, thinking of all the dead people Shecky should answer for, and never would. The hell with Shecky and all the rest of the rats who leeched off human misery. He wasn’t out to right the wrongs of the world. Michael Jefferson, his only friend, came first.
Anyone who read the New York tabloids knew that the Ghetto Ghouls controlled all the territory between Wallis Avenue and Brimmer Street. There had been a time when they tried to invade the streets north of Brimmer, only to be driven back, after many bloody battles, by an unlikely alliance of Italian and Irish gangs. The Irish and the Italians hated the Puerto Ricans more than they hated each other, and so a temporary alliance was formed. However, the new combined force was no match in ferocity for the Puerto Ricans; and they might have had to give up ground, if not for the intervention of the police, in the person of a deputy inspector, a misanthropic Irishman who called a secret meeting of the gang chiefs and warned that certain parties were going to get killed “while fleeing the scene of a crime” if the war was not brought to a speedy conclusion.
Those not killed would be framed into Attica for the sale of heroin, said the deputy inspector, and there they would remain for many years under the provisions of the harsh Rockefeller drug law. And, said the deputy inspector, there were in the possession of the police a number of handguns that had been used in the commission of hitherto unsolved homicides. A street fighter found with a murder weapon might very well find himself in prison for life.
And so, unlike the Israelis, the Ghetto. Ghouls agreed to pull back to their borders.
Eastland knew the Ghouls had a clubhouse somewhere in their territory. There were people who would know where it was; he couldn’t ask questions because that would tie him in. For now all he could do was drive around and hope that he’d get lucky. Except for the M-16 all the weapons had been stored away in a steel box in his apartment. The M-16 lay on the floor of the car with a small propane blow torch. He took the M-16 instead of the magnum because he didn’t know how many Ghouls there would be when he found them. There might be five, ten, even fifteen—and the magnum couldn’t take care of everybody, if they came at him in a bunch. He would have preferred a Soviet AK-47 assault rifle, everybody’s favorite piece in Nam, but Shecky didn’t have any in stock.
It was dark now and the night creatures who terrorized the South Bronx were on the prowl. So was he. He drove slowly but not so slowly as to attract attention. He didn’t want to kill a cop, yet he wasn’t about to let some meddlesome cop get in his way. Whores were out in droves in the streets where too many street lights hadn’t been broken. At this time of year the whores’ uniform was iridescent hot pants and titty revealing blouses. The whores wobbled on their stiletto heels, their asses jiggling seductively; and except for the whores and a few cruising johns in cars with New Jersey plates the streets were deserted, for no one in his right mind went out at night in the South Bronx without a very good reason. Even the derelicts, numerous in other parts of the city, stayed well away from the South Bronx: too many bums had been splashed with gasoline and cremated for kicks.
Eastland had been driving around for an hour, and that was too long with an M-16 in the car, when it occurred to him to check the liquor stores. The Ghouls had demonstrated what could happen to uppity niggers; unless he was wrong, that would call for a celebration. At some point in the evening the liquor and wine would run out and they would have
to send for a fresh supply. It wasn’t much of a theory; it was better than what he had, which was nothing. If he kept on prowling the cops would be sure to stop him, if for no better reason than they were bored. Unless he scored in the next thirty minutes, he would ditch the car and go home.
There were only two liquor stores between Wallis Avenue and Brimmer Street. He knew where they were because he had passed them several times during his hour of cruising. The one he picked to watch was bigger than the other; it was having a big sale on wine; the Ghouls would like that. Driving toward it he stiffened when a police car passed him. It was a one-man car and the cop in it gave Eastland a casual glance but kept on going.
Eastland parked about a hundred feet from the store, but he knew he couldn’t be there when the patrol car came around again. A car with a man in it near a liquor store would mean only one thing to a cop—some guy was planning a robbery.
He was ready to quit when he spotted one of the Ghouls coming up the street; and if it hadn’t been for the lettering on his jacket, Eastland would have taken him for just another Puerto Rican. The punk went into the store and Eastland started the motor and waited for him to come out. The punk came out and from the size of the bag he was carrying he had loaded up on a lot of booze. The car crept after the punk as he went back down the street. Eastland drove with one hand, he held the M-16 in the other. The punk turned when he heard the car and when he did he saw the M-16 pointing at him through the open window. His body jerked with fright and the bag of bottles shattered on the sidewalk.
“Run and you’re dead,” Eastland said. He looked up and down the street; there was no one in sight.
“What are you, crazy?” the punk said with unconvincing bravado.
Eastland, holding the rifle, got out of the car. The punk moved and Eastland hit him in the forehead with the butt of the gun. The punk fell to the sidewalk and Eastland cuffed his hands behind his back. Then he searched him and came up with a gravity knife and a .25 caliber automatic pistol of foreign manufacture. The punk’s face was puffing out by the time Eastland got him into the car and drove off.
At first the only light in the rat-crawling basement came from the big flashlight set on top of an old trunk with the sides kicked in. The trunk was alive with roaches. The flashlight was aimed straight at the punk, who said his name was Vinny; and he stood in the position of crucifixion, his arms stretched out wide and handcuffed to water pipes. The light threw his shadow on the wall behind him. He watched in terrified fascination while Eastland turned on the blow torch and held a spark striker to it. The torch roared to life and Eastland carefully adjusted the length of the flame.
There was a button control on the torch; all Eastland had to do was press his thumb on it to send flame shooting out. He did it now and flame roared against the wall, lighting the filthy basement in the glare of hell. Dead roaches fell from the smoking wall, making tiny sounds in the silence that followed. He eased up the pressure and the flame retreated along its length.
Another roar and flash brought a scream from the Ghoul. A big rat ran across the floor. Eastland pressed the control button and incinerated the rat. The rat stank and smoked for a while, and Vinny screamed again when Eastland came close with the torch. Vinny was sobbing, dripping with sweat.
“You got the wrong guy. I don’t even know you.”
“Who worked over Michael Jefferson?” Eastland said. “The black man from the market, who worked him over?”
“I don’t know. Honest to Jesus Christ I don’t know. On my mother’s grave I swear to you.”
The flame came close to Vinny’s crotch when it roared out again. It didn’t touch him, but he could feel the heat. He screamed again.
“I’m not going to fuck around with you,” Eastland said, and meant it. “The next one burns off your cock and balls. Then you get it in the face. If you live you’ll be a freak. No more girls for you, Vinny. Not when you look like that. You got ten seconds to make up your mind, then I go to work.”
Eastland pointed the blow torch and Vinny fell apart in tears of self-pity. “I had nothing to do with it. It was Smiley and the others did the nig … the black guy. Smiley and the two guys were with him at the market.”
“Shimmy and Paco?”
“Smiley and them. Three other guys went along. Listen man, I wasn’t even there. You can’t kill me when I wasn’t even there. You want me to prove it, I can prove it.”
“Where’s the clubhouse? Talk straight or you’ll never get out of here alive. Lie to me and I’ll burn you by inches. See this torch, this torch can cut through steel. You’re not steel, Vinny. You’re shit. Where’s the fucking clubhouse?”
“1501 Simpson Street,” Vinny babbled.
“There’s a party going on, right?”
Vinny said there was a party.
“How many at the party, Vinny?”
“Just Smiley and Shimmy and Paco.”
“The other guys got scared and took off, is that it?”
Vinny said yes. “When they got down from their high they got scared.”
“How about whores?”
“Three whores. They’re scared too, but Smiley won’t let them leave. Smiley is crazier than he was today. That’s why everybody’s scared of him.”
Eastland had to be sure that Vinny was telling the truth. “If you’re telling the truth you got nothing to worry about. If you’re lying … what can I tell you?”
Eastland turned away and the punk yelled after him. “I told you what you want to know. You can’t leave me here. Please don’t leave me.”
Eastland liked the way Vinny said please. It showed the lad had manners.
“Can’t let you go till I know you’re telling the truth.”
“But I am. Please …”
“I don’t doubt you for a minute,” Eastland said, coming back to the punk. Then, with a quick thrust up under the ribcage, he killed Vinny with the commando knife.
“One down,” Eastland said.
CHAPTER 5
1501 Simpson was the best looking abandoned building on the street. Eastland watched it from behind a stripped car that was half on, half off the sidewalk. Near the car an old refrigerator lay on its back like a capsized turtle. A rangy cat ran across the street chased by another cat. In the South Bronx cats were an endangered species; they were no match for the huge, ferocious rats that were mutations of a kind.
No one went in or out of 1501. Eastland knew there might be a lookout posted in the hall, but he didn’t think so. After all, the Ghouls were at peace with the harps and spaghetti benders to the north. But still he waited, listening for sounds.
Getting back on the sidewalk, he worked his way down to 1501, with the M-16 in a long plumber’s tool case. When he was inside the piss-smelling hall, he took out the machine rifle and pushed off the safety. He left the tool case under the stairs before he started up.
Faint sounds of merriment drifted down from the second floor; just as he figured, the Ghouls were celebrating their victory. Operating Paraplegic had been carried out according to plan; the Ghoul strike force was whooping it up. The sounds of the celebration should have been louder, and he guessed the Ghouls had nailed a mattress to the apartment door to assure privacy.
Eastland’s hands tightened on the M-16 when he thought of Michael lying in the hospital. Guilt tore at him because he knew he had caused Michael to be where he was. There were so many things he could have done, and if he had done them Michael would be at home with his family at this very minute. He could have walked away and let the rancid bastards have the fucking beer. He could have taken the number of the Ghouls’ car and called the cops. How much beer could the punks have stolen? What difference did it make: it wasn’t his beer. Gus Myers was paying big bucks to the Mob, so what difference did it make if he was ripped off for a carload of cheap beer.
Fuck it, Eastland thought. What’s done is done.
At the top of the stairs he took the flashlight from his belt and turned the beam to the sign on
the door:
PROPERTY OF THE GHETTO GHOULS
NO TRESPASSING
Above the lettering was a crudely rendered skull and crossbones; the Ghouls regarded themselves as latter-day pirates. Inside the apartment a stereo throbbed, and there was the sound of girlish laughter. Eastland grinned like a wolf though he wasn’t aware of it. Just a bunch of kids having a swell time.
Now! Eastland raised his heavy work boot and kicked the door open. The door slammed back against the wall and one of the hinges tore loose. Then he was in the room, his finger curled around the trigger of the rifle, and they were staring at him, as if he didn’t exist. Smiley, Paco and Shimmy and three whores. The first screams of the whores became a sort of frightened mewing. Shimmy had been fucking one of the whores on a dirty mattress. His pants were down around his his legs, but he hadn’t bothered to take them off. Caught in midthrust, he turned to face the fearsome rifle. Under him the whore whimpered. Shimmy pulled out of her and suddenly his dick was as limp as the rest of him.
Paco had been dancing with two whores at the same time. Smiley had been in private communication with himself, lying back in a ruined armchair with his fingers pressed to the sides of his head. The party had not been going well for Smiley; somehow he hadn’t been able to get off, no matter how many rum and Coronas he drank, no matter how many pills he popped. Now he took his hands away from his head and looked up at the man with the gun.
“You should have let it drop, Smiley,” Eastland said. “Now it’s too late.”
One of the whores, the youngest, was blubbering into her hands, and Eastland told her to get the fuck out of here. “All you cunts take off,” he said. They were just dirty stupid whores and he hadn’t set out to kill women. They knew what he looked like, but what could they do even if they felt like it? They wouldn’t feel like it, because whores and cops were natural enemies; and it wasn’t likely that the killing of the three Ghouls could cause them any great sorrow.
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