King Suckerman

by George Pelecanos

  “That’s right.”

  “Well, he ain’t no busboy now. Likes the warmer climate, too. More natural for him. But you know how it is, you improve your station in life, all you’re doin’ sometimes is tradin’ in one set of troubles for another.”

  “Things aren’t going so good for my friend Carlos down there?”

  “Don’t misunderstand me, now. Things are all right. But the goods Carlos trades in, well, the competition in South Florida, it can get a little fierce. And you get locked in to certain distribution channels, all of the sudden they start owning you.”

  Got to keep the vendors on their toes, thought Tate. Competition beats negotiation every time.

  “So,” said Cooper, “Carlos was talkin’ to you, and you claimed you could hook him up with a sweet deal on a few keys of ’caine. Something we could take back home, step on a little, make a nice profit. At the same time, let our suppliers know in a subtle way that we can always buy somewhere else, but out of town, not in our own backyard, so we don’t be startin’ no wars down there and shit.”

  “That’s exactly what I told him. I have a source—”

  “A source,” said Cooper.

  “That’s right,” said Marchetti. “A biker I know. Guy by the name of Larry.”

  “Larry.”

  “Uh-huh. Him and his gang—well, I don’t know if you can call them a gang, exactly, but they all ride bikes—they’re staying out in a little house on some farmland in a place called Marriottsville, up near Baltimore. Larry and his friends, they deal in quantity.”

  “You know this.”

  “I struck up a friendship with Larry and his lady—Larry calls her his lady—in a bar here in D.C. Right on Capitol Hill. Same bar I took Viv over there away from, the place where she was serving drinks, getting her ass patted all day by the customers. Right, Viv?”

  “Yeah, Eddie,” said Vivian. “You swept me off my feet.”

  “So I tell Larry what I do. ‘I buy and sell things for a living,’ I say. And Larry says, ‘I got something you can buy, bro, and you can turn around and sell it for a whole lot more.’ And I’m like, ‘Oh, yeah?’ ”

  “Why didn’t you, then?” said Cooper.

  “What I do here,” said Marchetti, “I buy hard goods, move them around for a profit.”

  “You’re a fence.”

  “Yeah. And I move a little reefer, too. Viv likes to smoke it now and again, so it keeps us in a private stash. But cocaine? Shit, Wilton, I gotta be honest with you, I’m playing an away game there. I wouldn’t know what to do with it if it was sitting in my lap.”

  “Start by gettin’ it out your lap,” said Russell, “and up your got-damn nose.”

  “Got that shit right,” said Ronald, cooler than a corpse, giving soft skin to Russell without even moving his eyes.

  “So you got to talking to Carlos,” said Cooper.

  “Thought we could work something out.”

  “You be the broker,” said Cooper.

  “For the standard ten points,” said Marchetti.

  “And that would bring us up to today.”

  “Right. The way Carlos put it, he’d send you up here, you show me you got the money so I don’t embarrass myself, and I put you up with Larry. You make the buy, I get my twenty G’s, you go home, everyone’s happy. How’s that sound?”

  “Solid as a motherfucker, Eddie.”

  “So,” said Marchetti with a nervous smile. “The money.”

  “What,” said Cooper, “you thought I’d forget about that?”

  Tate looked over at the white boy, hip cocked, his finger grazing the back of the shotgun’s trigger.

  Cooper arched his back, dug into his front pocket, grunted. “Be glad when these tight jeans go out of style. Here we are.” He pulled free a roll of bills, leaned forward, dropped the bills on Marchetti’s desk. “Twenty grand. How’s that look to you, Spags?”

  Eddie Marchetti smiled, picked up the money. He looked at it briefly, like he didn’t need to count it, counted it quickly in his head. Tate got off the desk at the sound of a car door, went to the window behind Marchetti’s desk.

  “Black dude and a white dude, Eddie, comin’ to the door.”

  “White dude look like a Greek?” said Marchetti, his eyes still on the bills.

  “How should I know, man?”

  “It’s that Karras guy, most likely, come to pick up his dope.”

  “Should I tell him to come back later?” said Tate.

  “Hey, Wilton,” said Marchetti, “you don’t mind I do a little business real quick, do ya?”

  “No,” said Cooper, “I don’t mind.”

  “Go ahead, Clarenze,” said Marchetti. “Buzz the Greek in.”

  FIVE

  Up this way, I guess,” said Karras. Clay followed him up a darkened concrete-and-steel stairwell.

  “You mean you’ve never been here before?”

  “This isn’t my usual distributor.”

  “So you don’t even know who you’re dealing with.”

  “Technically, yeah. But my distributor, guy named Loopy, he’s going on vacation, he offered to hook me up with his man, just this one week.”

  “Loopy.”

  “Yeah. Don’t worry, Loopy’s cool.”

  “Name like Loopy, he don’t sound all that cool to me.”

  Karras opened the heavy door at the top of the landing. He and Clay walked into a large room with a concrete floor, where several men stood and sat around and one young woman reclined on a wine leather couch. One of those standing, a skinny white kid with a face full of acne, held a sawed-off shotgun at his side.

  Karras and Clay had a look at the group, all of whom had turned to look at them. Clay knew then he should not have come along. His friend had asked him to, and because Karras was his friend, Clay had done it. But he shouldn’t have come, just the same. He only wanted to run his business, live a quiet kind of life. He had seen all the guns he would ever want to see. And here he was, facing a roomful of country knuckleheads and a teenage peckerwood with his finger curled around the hot trigger of doom. Clay knew there was nothing more dangerous than a young boy with a loaded gun. The young, they just didn’t understand death.

  “Who’s Eddie Marchetti?” said Karras in a gregarious, confident tone, stepping across the room, a friendly smile on his face. He’d talked his way out of tighter situations than this: squarehead cops and jealous boyfriends and barroom bad-asses and all the rest. Clay walked with him.

  “That’s me,” said Marchetti, dropping the money on his desk. “You Dimitri Karras?”

  “That’s right. This is my friend Marcus Clay.”

  Clay nodded, noticed the tall brother, the one with the gentle eyes who sat on the edge of the desk, give him a second look at the sound of his name.

  “Dimitri and Marcus,” said Marchetti, giving it his smile, just one of the boys. “Sounds like a couple of gladiators.”

  “Look more like Christopher Salt and Charlie Pepper to me,” said Clagget. “Right, Wilton?”

  “What’s that?” said Marchetti.

  “Salt and Pepper,” said Cooper. “Peter Lawford and Sammy Davis Jr. Nineteen sixty-eight. Am I right, B. R.?”

  “That’s right,” said Clagget. “But what was the sequel?”

  “One More Time?”

  “Damn,” said Clagget. “Most people get snagged on that one.”

  Clay turned his head briefly, checked out the two Bamas who were arguing about something behind his back.

  “Loopy said you could hook me up,” said Karras to Marchetti, hoping to get the transaction in gear.

  “Sure. You’re looking for what, an LB?”

  “A pound ought to do it.”

  “Premium Lumbo,” said Marchetti.

  “Sounds good.”

  “Four bills, for you. You get what, fifty an OZ, you make a nice four-hundred-dollar profit.”

  “Sounds fair,” said Karras with another smile. If this Marchetti wanted to brag like he kn
ew the business, make himself look bigger in front of his guests, that was all right with him. “So let’s do it.”

  “Clarenze,” said Marchetti, “go get that bag out of the back.”

  Tate got off the desk, began to walk through the door to the hall, stopped, turned around to look at Clay. “Marcus Clay. I hear that right?”

  “Right,” said Clay.

  “You played for Cardoza. Y’all won the Interhigh title in what, nineteen sixty-four?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Clarenze,” said Marchetti, “go get the weed.”

  “In a second.” Tate put one finger up in the air. If Eddie would’ve asked, he would have told him that he, Tate, that is, was simply trying to get to know the men who had entered the office. Trying to qualify the customer. But Eddie never would have thought to ask.

  Tate said, “I remember that championship game against Dunbar. Aaron Webster had the winning bucket, got a pass inside from that tiny-ass guard you had, what was his name?”

  “Phil Scott.”

  “Yeah, that boy could play. You could sky, too. Saw you jump from the foul line once all the way to the bucket, just like Connie Hawkins.”

  “You played, too, didn’t you?”

  Tate nodded. “Clarence Tate. I was a forward for Roosevelt then. Sixth man.”

  “You played with Harvey Sebree, right?”

  “Sebree and Ronald Graham.” Tate looked over at Karras. “You look familiar, too, man.”

  “Wilson,” muttered Karras.

  “Guard, right?”

  “Yep.”

  “The Wilson Tigers.” Tate grinned. “Losingest basketball team in high school history. Even made Sports Illustrated and shit. What were y’all, oh and seventy-three?”

  “Something like that, I guess. I don’t remember.”

  “And that’s why you’re white today,” offered Russell Thomas.

  Marchetti said, “Clarenze, go get the weed.”

  “Hold on a second, Eddie,” said Tate, and he looked at Clay. “Funny. I ain’t seen you around D.C. in all these years gone by. Not in the Jellef league, nothin’ like that. Where you been, man?”

  “I was out of town for a few years,” said Clay.

  Wilton Cooper sized up Clay. Out of town… Vietnam. Which meant the tall cool brother with the easy walk knew how to handle a gun. The way he was built, Trouble Man looked like he could use his hands to fuck some niggers up, too.

  “Out of town?” said Tate.

  “Overseas.”

  “And I didn’t happen to catch what you said you were doin’ now.”

  “I didn’t say.”

  Cooper laughed.

  “We wouldn’t mind hangin’ around with you guys”—Karras drew four one-hundred-dollar bills from his wallet, slapped them against his palm—“but we gotta get on our way.”

  “The weed,” said Marchetti.

  Tate looked at Clay a moment longer, pushed on the door, went through.

  Cooper pulled his Salems from his shirt pocket, drew one for himself, tossed the pack over to Clagget, who caught it with his free hand. Cooper gave himself a light, lit a cigarette for Clagget, who walked over slow and cocky, off the same match.

  “Guess you two basketball players are wonderin’ who we are,” said Cooper, examining the cigarette between his fingers.

  Clay turned to the side a little. That way he could keep the two dark-skinned brothers in his sight.

  “I’ll tell you anyway,” said Cooper, “ ’cause I got the feeling, despite the way you’re actin’, all ice-cool and shit, you want to know. We come up to D.C. to do a little business, see. But I figure, we finish our business straight away or not, we gonna stick around a little bit. You all got this Bicentennial celebration up here next week, they claimin’ it’s gonna be the biggest party in the history of the Yoonited States. Thought it might be somethin’ for us to see.”

  “Got some freaks up here, too,” said Ronald Thomas.

  “Ain’t that cold?” said Russell Thomas.

  “Talk about it,” said Ronald.

  “You and your boy,” said Cooper, “you gonna check it out? Bet you two know all the spots.”

  Clay didn’t answer. He wondered what was keeping Tate.

  “You too good to talk to me, brother?” said Cooper to Clay.

  Clay glanced at Karras, now checking out the Chinese freak on the couch. She was checking him out, too. Karras, even in a situation like this, always looking to get some play. Someone needed to talk a little sense to that boy.

  “I see you’ve noticed Vivian,” said Marchetti, good naturedly enough but with an edge. Karras saw a hardness in Marchetti’s eyes, but a surface hardness, with only insecurity beneath the veneer.

  Vivian smiled at Karras.

  “She’s beautiful, isn’t she?” said Marchetti, raising his voice some. “You gotta admit, she’s a mover.”

  “She’s a mover,” repeated Karras, because it made him think of the song. “Big Star.”

  “Radio City,” said Vivian, naming the LP, which made Karras smile. A hot-looking chick like this, hip and into good tunes, sitting in a dark warehouse in Southeast with a meatball like Eddie Spags. Why?

  “Chill, man,” said Clay in a soft way.

  Marchetti wiped sweat off his forehead. With the AC on, it was colder than a nun’s snatch in there, and still he was sweating. It was the Greek and his little Chinese girlfriend, the one who never even fucked him, it was those two and the way they were flirting in front of him—in front of everyone—it was the two of them and the way they were disrespecting him that was making him sweat.

  “Hey, Viv, honey,” said Marchetti, but she didn’t answer.

  Clarence Tate came back into the room with a brown paper grocery bag in his hand. He walked it over to Karras, who exchanged it for the four hundred dollars.

  Tate folded the money. “You want to weigh it, make sure? I got a scale in the back.”

  Karras hefted the bag, shook his head. “I don’t need to scale it out. It’s got good weight.”

  Tate said, “Solid.” He walked back to the desk, where Clagget now stood, dragging on his cigarette.

  “Let’s go, man,” said Clay.

  “Vivian,” said Marchetti. “Get me a beer out of the fridge, bring it over to Daddy, will you?”

  “Get it yourself, Ed—”

  “I said bring it here!”

  Marchetti’s voice left an echo in the room. Cooper put his cigarette between his lips, stifled a grin. His eyes moved from the Italian to the girl.

  “All right, Eddie,” said Vivian, uncoiling off the couch and walking, back straight and with a bounce, to the compact refrigerator in the corner of the room.

  Dimitri Karras took her in: not just hip and hot and tune savvy. Long legs, a rack, and a nice package in the back, too.

  “Hey, Mitri,” said Clay. “Didn’t you hear me, man? I said let’s go.”

  Both of them turned, but Marchetti, standing out of his seat now, said, “Wait a sec, fellas, I want you to see something here. After all, Karras, you been lookin’ at it the whole time. You might as well stay another minute, have a look at it all.”

  Vivian was moving across the room with quick, even steps, the can of beer in her hand. She pulled the ring off the top of the can and tossed it back over her shoulder.

  “Aw, look at her,” said Marchetti, “she’s all upset.”

  “Let’s do it, boy,” said Clay.

  “Karras,” said Marchetti. “You ever see a Chinese broad with such a beautiful set of tits?”

  No, thought Karras, I haven’t. But why’d you have to go and disrespect her like that?

  Vivian reached the desk, made a quick, sharp jerk of her wrist. The can in her hand shot off a short arc of beer. The beer splashed across Eddie Marchetti’s face.

  Clagget flicked his Salem against the cinder-block wall.

  Marchetti said, “Bitch.” He backhanded Vivian at the jawline. There was the dull clap of flesh on flesh
, and Vivian went down before the desk.

  Later, Karras couldn’t remember crossing the room. It was like he was by the door one moment and around Marchetti’s desk the next. With the pound of pot still in his left hand, he punched the fat little Italian in the eye with a short right, followed through with the punch. Marchetti went back over his own chair, did a half somersault to the concrete floor.

  Clay had moved with Karras and now he pulled on the back of Karras’s T-shirt. Then he turned at the sound of the shotgun’s pump. The white boy with the fucked-up face was walking toward them, gun up and pointed, now just two feet away. No one else, not the dark-skinned brothers or the slick brother or Clarence Tate, had moved an inch.

  It was slow motion from there but quick in its own way, the way heat time had always been for Clay. He straightened his arm, dropped it a little, came up with a snake-strike, knocked the short barrel of the shotgun to the side, grabbed as he did, and pulled the gun free. He had one hand on the pump then and the other on the stock, and the white boy stood in front of him with nothing in his own hands but air. Clay swung the stock of the shotgun sharply, smashed it into the white boy’s mouth. Something cracked, and a couple of thin dice flew away from the kid’s face in one direction while some blood and saliva sailed off in the other. The kid went down. Clay pumped out the shells that had been loaded into the shotgun. He tossed the shotgun across the room.

  “Whoooeee,” said Wilton Cooper, one leg crossed over the other, the cigarette still in place.

  Clay heard Karras say, “C’mon, you’re coming with us,” and when he turned his head in the direction of the voice he saw Karras helping the Chinese girl to her feet.

  Marchetti had gotten to his knees. He reached up toward the desk drawer.

  “Don’t, Eddie,” said Tate, who hadn’t gone forward at all, had not even moved his hands. “Just don’t. Let it lie.”

  Marchetti sat back.

  Clay, adrenalized, picked the stack of money up off the desk. He clumsily folded it into two rolls, put one roll in each pocket of his shorts. He couldn’t have said, at that moment, why he had done a dumb thing like that. He felt it was owed him, and that was all.