Modern Masters of Noir

by Ed Gorman (ed)

  “I know that, Johnny, it’s just—” Mac stared out into the dark alley, gripping the steering wheel so tightly that his knuckles turned white. “Be careful, huh?”

  “I will. Promise.” Johnny opened the car door. “It’s like a movie,” he said, whether to himself or Mac wasn’t quite clear. “It’s just a movie, that’s all.” He got out and walked without hesitation into the apartment building.

  Mac started the car again. He lit a cigarette and began to watch the clock. This was crazy. Really crazy. Johnny and him carrying on like a couple of creeps from a late movie. Did they really expect to get away with this? Johnny would probably get blown away, was probably getting his guts splattered all over the hallway as he sat here, blowing smoke rings and watching the lighted clock face.

  And if that happened, what should his own next move be? Well, he might make a run for it.

  Run where?

  Home and hide under the bed, I guess.

  Except that home wouldn’t be there anymore, not really. It would be just an empty room. It had been too damned long since he’d lived in an empty room, and he wasn’t sure he could hack it again. You got used to having somebody around. Maybe Johnny wasn’t the greatest company in the world, but then again maybe he was. They got along just fine.

  Mac touched the .45 tucked into his belt. So he better stay here and shoot it out. Shoot the bad guys and shoot the good guys; shoot any damned bastard that got in his way.

  Oh, yeah, tough guy. You’re so frigging tough, so goddamned hot to start blowing the bums away, how come he’s in there and you’re out here?

  It seemed like hours, but was really only four minutes ticking away on the clock before the door to the apartment building opened, and Johnny appeared. One hand was shoved into his pocket and the dirty cast caught the dim moonlight. He kept his head bent as he walked swiftly to the car and slid inside.

  Mac pulled out of the alley immediately. “You all right?”

  There was no answer from Johnny. He bent forward, resting against the dashboard, his face hidden, his breath sounding harsh and raspy.

  “Johnny? Did you do it? You okay?” When there was still no answer, Mac pulled the car off the street, into another dark alley, turning off the engine. He switched on the interior light and stared at Johnny in the pale white glow. “Hey, man?” He reached over, putting a hesitant hand on Johnny’s shoulder and pulling the unresisting form up. “Babe? Hey, say something, please.”

  Johnny took a deep breath and then bit his lip. “I did it,” he said finally. “I knocked and he opened the door and I shot him in the face.” He gagged a little, then recovered. “I closed the door. Nobody saw me.” His eyes behind the glasses were bright as he looked beseechingly at Mac. “Was it right, Mac? Did I do what you wanted?”

  “Oh, shit, Johnny,” Mac said, pulling the other man closer. For a long time, he just held on, feeling Johnny’s heart race. “Yeah,” he whispered at last, the word muffled in blond hair. “You did fine, kid, real good.”

  It was Johnny who pulled away finally, straightening in the seat. His face looked confused and a little flushed. “Next time it’ll be easier,” he said; his voice sounded husky.

  “Don’t worry about that right now. Let’s just take this one step at a time.” He started the car and they rode silently back to the parking lot, leaving the car there to be picked up by one of Tedesco’s lackeys.

  One of Tedesco’s other lackeys, Mac thought as they walked home.

  When they reached the apartment, Johnny put the gun away in the bottom of a drawer, covering it carefully with an old sweatshirt. They stood awkwardly in the middle of the room, not looking at one another. “You mind if I go out?” iMac said at last.

  Johnny shook his head. “Can I have some money?” he asked. “Maybe I’ll go to a movie or something.”

  “Good idea,” Mac said, handing him a couple of bills. “Be careful. Don’t get mugged or anything.”

  “I won’t.”

  Mac patted his shoulder. “See you later.”

  “Yeah.” Johnny smiled a little. “Have fun.”

  Mac hesitated another second, feeling as if he should say something more, but not knowing what. “You have fun, too,” he finally mumbled, then left.

  He picked her up in a bar called Eddie’s. The place was filled with people trying to make connections quickly, because the night was disappearing much too soon. Her name was Sherry. Or Carrie. Something like that. The music was very loud, and he wasn’t really listening anyway.

  They had a couple of drinks and then went to her place, which was located, conveniently, just around the corner from the bar. Once there, she disappeared into the bathroom. Mac took off his clothes and stretched out on the bed, lighting a cigarette. He stared at the cracks in the ceiling, trying to find some recognizable object in the criss-crossed lines.

  He knew that the hit had come down too late to make the morning papers, but the later editions should have something. Tedesco had said that as soon as he knew for sure that Danata was dead, they’d be paid.

  Shit, Johnny had been pretty cool about the whole thing. Blowing off a guy’s head, after all, was a damned hard thing to do. But the kid did it. Of course, it wasn’t the first time for him. He’d killed Al and Frank. And the people in Tan Pret. Almost iced Crazy George that time, too.

  Always because of me.

  That was an uncomfortable thought and one he wished he could deny. But it was true. Except for Tan Pret, which didn’t really count, because it was war and all, every time Johnny killed or came close to killing, it was for him. Weird. Really weird.

  Mac frowned at the cracks on the ceiling, deciding that they looked like the state of Oklahoma. Of course, Johnny was a little shook afterward, but who the hell wouldn’t be? Hell, he thought, I was shook, too, and I didn’t even do anything.

  Could that be used in court? I didn’t do anything, your honor. Except plan it all and drive him over and tell him the apartment number. Little things like that.

  Mac ran through the whole evening again, replaying it like a movie in his mind. Pulling into the alley behind Danata’s place. Watching Johnny go in. The waiting, watching the seconds tick away so damned slowly. Johnny coming back at last, all pale and spaced-out. The moments later in the car and the terrible crashing of Johnny’s heart against his own.

  The girl, whatever her name was, slipped into bed next to him and put a hand between his legs. She giggled. “All ready for me, huh? You don’t leave a girl much to do except lay back and enjoy it, do you?”

  Slowly, he crushed out the cigarette and then rolled over on top of her. Ignoring the preliminaries, he pushed himself into her, moving back and forth silently, still thinking about the kill. Remembering it all in excruciating detail. He clutched at the pillow beneath her head, closed his eyes, and remembered.

  He opened the door and I shot him in the face.

  Mac pictured the eight by ten glossy looking like the magazine cover of Nixon’s face after Johnny shot it.

  Was it right, Mac? Did I do what you wanted?

  The eyes, pleading, needing.

  Oh, shit, Johnny.

  Johnny’s heart beating so fast, too fast.

  Mac came much too quickly. He rolled off her body and stared at the ceiling again. “Shit,” he said aloud.

  She said something he didn’t hear. A moment later, she began to kiss his neck and chest, working her hips against his. He sighed, then tangled his fingers in her tawny hair, pushing her head down between his legs.

  A part of his mind was very aware of her presence, of her mouth on him, sucking, nibbling, urging, and the heat began to rise in his groin again. Another piece of his consciousness, though, was apart from what was happening, hovering somewhere up above it all, lingering up there by the absurdist rendering of Oklahoma, watching with weary bemusement.

  They were murderers, he and Johnny, and that truth bound them together in a reality that was much more interesting than the fact that a girl whose name h
e didn’t even know was sucking him off in a cheap room around the corner from a bar called Eddie’s.

  He could hear the television as he walked up the stairs and unlocked the door. Johnny was sitting on his bed. “Hi, Johnny,” Mac mumbled wearily.

  “Hi.”

  “What’s on?” Mac asked, getting a beer from the refrigerator and starting to undress.

  “Bogart. The one about the truck drivers.”

  “Oh, yeah, you like that one.” He turned out all the lights but one, then sat on the edge of Johnny’s bed. “Did you go out?”

  “Uh-huh. I saw a movie. A western.”

  “Terrific.”

  “And I had a giant Chunky and some popcorn and a lemonade.”

  “Quite an evening.”

  They watched the movie until the next commercial. “You okay?” Mac asked, staring at the ad for toothpaste.

  Johnny nodded.

  “You were great tonight.”

  “Thanks.” He shrugged. “It wasn’t so hard, I guess.”

  “Sooner or later, kid, we’re going to figure a way out of this. Sooner or later, life is gonna turn around for us.”

  “Life is okay.” Johnny shifted the weight of the cast with a weary sigh.

  “Bet you’re sick of that damned thing.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Three more weeks, the doctor said.”

  “I know.” Johnny stood, pulling off his jeans. “Mac?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Stay here with me awhile, would you, please?”

  Mac nodded. He reached over to switch off the lamp and turned the volume all the way down on the TV, leaving the image of Bogart flickering on in silence. He stretched out next to Johnny on the bed.

  “Danata knew,” Johnny said softly. “He saw the gun, and for just a second, he knew what was going to happen.”

  “Yeah?”

  “His eyes got all sort of scared. He didn’t want to die.”

  “Nobody does, kid.”

  Johnny sighed, his breath warm and damp against Mac’s skin. “I wanted to explain it to him, you know? Tell him why it had to be this way.”

  “He knew why. Because he crossed Tedesco.”

  Johnny shook his head and blond strands brushed against Mac’s chest. “No, not that. I wanted to tell him that he had to die so that Tedesco would leave us alone. Because if I didn’t kill him, you might get hurt.”

  Mac stroked Johnny’s hair gently. “Don’t think about it anymore. Just forget it. Go to sleep, boy.”

  After a few more minutes, Johnny relaxed against him and his breathing softened into the steady pattern of sleep.

  Mac was alone then in the dark, except for the tiny figures on the silenced TV screen. He sighed deeply. The tears were unexpected, but he didn’t try to hold them back. He made no sound that might disturb Johnny, but let the tears roll down his cheeks unheeded, dampening the pillow and the blond strands that touched his face.

  The movie ended, but Mac was still awake, still stroking Johnny’s hair with a kind of quiet desperation, waiting hopelessly for the morning.

  Chapter 22

  Mac kept running. The knife of pain stabbed against his left side every time his shoes hit the pavement, and he was starting to get dizzy, but he kept running. Finally, just before he collapsed completely, he reached his goal.

  Johnny looked up, grinning. ” ‘Bout time you got here.”

  Mac gave him a dirty look and dropped onto the bench next to him. “Don’t . . . forget,” he panted, “you’ve got . . . some years on . . . me, you bastard.”

  “Hah,” Johnny sneered. “Eight years. Big deal.”

  Mac managed to catch his breath and smiled, shakily. “Well, from where you’re sitting, eight years may not seem like much, but it’s a helluva lot from where I’m sitting.”

  “Not easy being over forty, is it?” Johnny asked, even at thirty-three managing to look about twelve.

  “Remind me to ask you that in a few years.” Mac became aware that the grey November wind was getting colder. He blew on his fingers. “I need some coffee.”

  Johnny jumped to his feet, jogging in place. “Let’s go then, old man.” He smiled again and took off across the park. “See you at the drugstore!” he called back over one shoulder.

  “Son of a bitch,” Mac mumbled. He pushed himself up and started after Johnny, trying to remember whose bright idea it had been that they should start jogging. Probably his own. It sounded like the kind of suggestion he might make, especially if he was drunk at the time. And, of course, that idiot Johnny would agree. Hell, Johnny would agree to walking across a bed of hot coals in his bare feet if Mac suggested it.

  Mac shrugged. After six years, he was used to Johnny.

  “Mr. McCarthy?”

  The quiet voice came from behind him. He tensed, as always half-expecting to feel a bullet crash into his body. When none did, he turned slowly. “Yeah?”

  A husky man nearly his own height stood there. He obviously wasn’t a jogger, because he wore a long leather coat and carried a briefcase. Automatically, Mac surveyed the immediate area. He wasn’t surprised to see two gorillas hovering nearby. “Yeah?” he said again.

  “Could we talk, please?”

  Mac glanced around, but Johnny had already vanished. “What about? I’m supposed to—”

  “Mr. Griffith will wait, I’m sure.”

  Mac gave the man a sharp look. A lot of people knew his name; not many knew Johnny’s, and it didn’t especially make him feel good that this guy did. He tucked both hands under the jogging jacket. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see the two apes straighten. “I’m cold,” he said loudly enough for them to hear. They relaxed again. “Who are you anyway?”

  “My name is Hagen.”

  The name sounded vaguely familiar, and Mac thought for a moment. “From Philly, aren’t you?”

  Now it was Hagen’s turn to be surprised. “Yes, as a matter of fact, I am.”

  “So? What do you want with me?”

  “I have a business proposition to offer.”

  “We don’t deal that way,” Mac said shortly. “You’re in the company; you must know how it works. All our deals come down through—a higher authority.” He turned to walk away.

  “I’m offering you a chance to get out from under Daniel Tedesco’s thumb.” Hagen spoke softly, but his words reached Mac clearly.

  He stopped. “What?”

  “Can we talk?”

  Mac looked around the park again, wondering what the hell was going on. This wasn’t part of the routine. Shit, he thought. “It’s too cold here. Come on.”

  They walked out of the park and across the street to the drugstore. The two apes trailed behind, taking up position just inside the door. Johnny was already in a booth, two cups of coffee in front of him. He was spooning sugar liberally into one cup. “At last. Thought you were crawling on your—” He saw Hagen and broke off, looking at Mac, puzzled.

  Mac slid into the booth next to him. “Mr. Hagen here wants to talk some business,” he explained, wrapping his chilled fingers around the coffee mug.

  “Oh.” Johnny took a gulp of his over-sweetened coffee and added one more load of sugar to the cup. “Maybe I’ll go look at the magazines,” he mumbled.

  “Okay.” Mac moved to let him out, then waved Hagen into the booth.

  Hagen sat down across from him, his eyes on Johnny, who was already engrossed in the magazine display. “He doesn’t seem very interested in what I have to say.”

  “He’s not.”

  “It concerns his future, too.”

  Mac lifted the coffee mug. “I’ll take care of his future. You said you wanted to talk. I’m waiting to listen.”

  “You two make a good team.”

  “Uh-huh. I already know that, Hagen.”

  “Over the past couple of years you’ve handled some very tough jobs for Tedesco.”

  The coffee was as bad as usual, worse than the stuff Johnny made, and that was the pits,
but at least it was hot. “Have we?” he asked after taking several sips.

  Hagen smiled. “Thirteen, to be precise. Beginning with Mike Danata and then, last week, Karl Schmidt.”

  Mac shrugged. “I heard he was shot.”

  “Right. You two never miss. A lot of people are very impressed.”

  Mac smiled blandly. “I’m not sure I understand what you’re talking about. And even if I did, like I said before, we don’t take on outside jobs.”

  Hagen was searching his pockets. “This isn’t really that kind of thing. It’s very much within the company.”

  “Yeah? Then how come Tedesco isn’t telling me about it himself?”

  Hagen didn’t answer.

  Mac drank coffee and watched Johnny snicker over something he was reading. Suddenly, he looked at Hagen, realization dawning. “Hey, you mean . . . him?”

  Hagen took time to light a cigarette. “Want one?” he asked, holding out a gold case.

  Mac shook his head. “Trying to quit.”

  “Smart man. These things will probably get all of us sooner or later.” He tucked the case away. “Tedesco owns you, McCarthy. He owns both you and your programmed killing machine over there.”

  They both glanced toward Johnny, who was oblivious. “You seem to know a lot about it,” Mac said.

  “I know everything about it.”

  Mac sighed. “I still don’t know exactly what it is you’re saying here, man.”

  “It’s very simple, and very much a matter of company politics, which I’m sure don’t interest you at all.”

  “You got that right. You guys can screw each other around all you want, as long as you leave us alone to do our job.”

  “Fair enough.” Hagen folded his neatly manicured hands on top of the formica table. “Let me just say this much. Tedesco has fallen out of favor in recent months, and it’s been decided by the board of directors that his territory should be redistributed.”

  “And Tedesco himself?”

  Hagen sighed and looked unhappy. “Well, the old man was offered a very generous retirement plan. Which he, unfortunately, has chosen to reject.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “So we have naturally decided that a more permanent solution is called for.”