Pagan Babies

by Elmore Leonard

  Debbie’s gaze drifted off. “What do you think of the decor? Nothing’s been changed or moved in forty years. Fake logs in the fireplace.”

  Terry put his finger to his lips and Debbie hunched her shoulders and made a face. Terry stepped in close. “The room could be wired. I mean by Tony, so he can hear what people think of his house. They don’t like it, he has ’em whacked.”

  “It’s lovely,” Debbie said out loud. “They have some beautiful pieces.” Then dropped her voice. “Like my grandmother’s place.”

  “Mary Pat wanted to know if you liked their house. I told her you loved it. Then she asked, did I think you’d stand by me if I fucked up. Would you?”

  “What kind of a question is that? Of course I would. But how can we fuck up? We’ve got it made.”

  “That’s what I told her.”

  “She guessed about you?”

  “She knew. She said for whatever the reasons guys become priests, I don’t fit any of ’em. She called Fran and told him. He didn’t get home before I left, so I haven’t talked to him yet.” Terry said, “On the way here,” and paused to glance at the door.

  “What?”

  “Vito asked when I was going back to Africa. I said I think pretty soon, and he said, ‘I think so, too.’ ”

  “Yeah . . . ?”

  “Like they’re gonna make sure I go back. I told Vito I flew out of Congo-Zaire with a guy who smuggles in guns. Vito wanted to know if there was any money in it. I explained to him I got the hop to Mombasa, and then bought one-way tickets after that ’cause I was low on money. So I don’t have a return ticket back. And Vito said don’t worry about it.”

  “What’s that mean?”

  “What I just told you, they’re gonna make sure I go back and spend the money on the orphans.” He watched Debbie thinking about it.

  She said, “They’re not gonna send a guy with you, are they? We could meet somewhere like Paris—why not? And play it from there.”

  “Yeah, we could.”

  Vito appeared in the doorway motioning to them. They crossed the front hall with him to Tony Amilia’s study.

  Debbie looked at the ornate seventeenth-century desk—Oh, my God—and gave the mob boss a perky smile. She said, “Mr. Amilia, I can’t tell you how much we appreciate what you’re doing.”

  Tony was standing now, wearing a dark suit and tie for the photograph. He said, “We’re ready, let’s get it done,” and turned to the photographer testing his strobe, bouncing the light off a white umbrella on a stand. He looked over and said, “Hi, I’m Joe Vaughn,” and edged toward them to shake hands, a young guy in his thirties, Tony Amilia’s height; he seemed pleasant but maybe a little nervous. He said, “Father, if I could get you and Mr. Amilia to stand right against that wall—”

  Debbie moved aside. She watched Joe place them in front of a commemorative plaque mounted on the wall:

  The University of Detroit Mercy honors

  Anthony Amilia as a patron member of the

  Ignatian Circle in recognition of his

  generous financial support and dedication to

  higher education in the Jesuit and Mercy traditions.

  “You see this?” Tony said to Debbie. “I went there when it was just U of D, before they went in with this other college and tacked the Mercy on. I don’t think it helps the basketball team, you’re U of D Mercy Titans. I was there they played football, Oklahoma, Kentucky, some good teams.” He looked at the plaque again. “I want it to be part of the picture, show I do this kind of thing and it’s not fake photography. Joe’ll give it to the News and the Free Press and they’ll run it. Joe takes my family pictures, different events, birthdays.”

  Debbie heard Terry say he went to U of D, too, but Tony didn’t comment. He said, “Come on, take the picture.”

  Joe said, “You want the check in the shot, don’t you?”

  Tony motioned to Vito. “On the desk.”

  Vito brought Tony the check and Debbie watched Terry trying to read the figures, Terry smiling, taking the end of the check between his fingers as Tony presented it and then pulled it away from him.

  “You don’t need to touch it I’m handing it to you. All you have to do is look grateful. Joe, take the picture.”

  “I want to shoot a Polaroid first,” Joe said. “See what we’re getting.”

  “You’re getting me and him and the check’s what you’re getting. Now take the picture.”

  Joe went to work shooting, the flash popping, Joe getting warmed up, five shots in the camera, and Tony said, “That’s enough. Vito, help Joe with his equipment. Pack it up out’n the hall.” He walked over to his desk with the check.

  Debbie said, “Well, that was quick. We are grateful, Mr. Amilia, more than I can tell you.”

  He was looking at Terry. “All right, Father, you all set? Vito’s gonna take you back.”

  Debbie said, “Well, if that’s it,” standing at the desk now, waiting for Tony to hand her the check.

  He turned to her saying, “Father’s going home, you’re staying awhile. I want to talk to you.”

  Debbie said, “Would you mind if Father waited? So we can go back together?” She beamed a smile at him. “We’re pretty excited.”

  Tony said, “Do what I ask, all right? I would like you to stay.”

  She gave him a cute, wide-eyed shrug, all innocence. “I just thought it might be easier—”

  The man’s expression did not change. He’d spoken and that was it, end of discussion. Debbie said, “No, if you want me to stay, I’d be happy to.” God, overdoing it. She heard Terry, behind her, thank Mr. Amilia.

  He said, “I’ll call you later, Deb.”

  And she turned in time to see him going out the door, Vito closing it behind them. She thought of what he’d said in the other room, about their making sure he went back to Africa.

  The first thing Tony said was, “Don’t be nervous. Come on over here and we’ll sit down, have a talk.”

  He brought her to a grouping of white leather chairs around a slate cocktail table, a phone there, a floor lamp turned low, but she didn’t sit down right away. Debbie walked a few steps past the chairs to a glass door that looked out on water, the wide expanse of Lake St. Clair narrowing in the dark to enter the Detroit River. She stood close to the glass, hands shielding her eyes against the light in the study, to see what was out there. Nothing. Gray shades of night. His voice asked if she wanted a drink. She said without turning to him, “I don’t want to put you to any trouble.”

  “Yes or no.”

  “Okay, but only if you’re having one.”

  “I don’t think I will, Miss Manners, so you don’t get one.”

  Even as he said it she was thinking, Do you hear yourself? He even caught it. She remained at the glass door looking at nothing, into herself in the dark, wanting to get back to being herself and stop acting cute and so fucking grateful. She’d gone over the top thanking him and that was enough. Now there was a pinpoint of light out there in the gray that was a darker gray than the sky, two lights, moving. She said, “Is this where you used to bring in liquor from Canada?”

  “Me?”

  “During Prohibition.”

  “How old you think I am? No, that was mostly the Jews, the Fleisher brothers and Beeny Bernstein, the Purple Gang. Before my time.”

  She turned from the glass and sat down with him, the slate table between them. She said, “What’s the catch?”

  “What’re you talking about?”

  He reminded her of Ben Gazzara, maybe a bit older and heavier, but that type. She said, “What do I have to do?”

  “Oh, you think I want to have sex with you. Pop a few Viagras, listen to Frank Sinatra while we give the pills time to kick in. And you know what? I think it’d be terrific, even with Clara upstairs saying her beads.” He said, “Are you fucking the priest?”

  Out of nowhere.

  Like a heckler in a comedy club, something she could handle. She said, “No, are y
ou? Does he get the check or not?”

  Tony brought it out of his inside coat pocket and looked at it, a pale-green check. He said, reading it, “Pay to the order of The Orphans of Rwanda Fund,” looked straight at Debbie and tore the check in half.

  She said, “Well, that’s that. You’ve got your picture and you’ll come off looking great in the paper. I should’ve known.”

  “You should’ve known what?”

  She said, “Considering how you make your money.”

  “You don’t know what I do.”

  “I’m following your trial.”

  “The feds don’t know half of it. I don’t talk about what I do, I don’t advertise. I don’t put on a show. You see these pro backs, these jitterbugs, they score a touchdown and do their dance, the funky chicken? Larry Csonka, one of the greats, said if he ever did that in his time, Howie Long, another one of the greats’d punch him in the head. That’s my style, do the job without calling attention to yourself. You say you should’ve known, like you know what you’re talking about. What do you do? You work for lawyers, right? Personal injury stuff, but you want to do comedy. That’s what Ed tells me. He says you’re funny. He’s never seen your act but that’s what he says. Are you funny?”

  “I’m working on it.”

  “How serious are you?”

  “I’m trying seriously to do comedy. How’s that?”

  “I touched a nerve there. Maybe you have trouble making up your mind what you want. Or how you want to do it. I don’t think you have to be that funny to get by. Most of the clowns doing comedy these days’re stupid. They come on the stage like they got shot out of a fuckin cannon, and that’s as good as it gets. Who’s your all-time favorite comic?”

  “Richard Pryor.”

  “Jesus Christ, the jig with the filthy mouth. What about Red Skelton? You ever see him do the Guzzler’s gin skit?”

  “Gimme a break.”

  “You don’t like Red Skelton?”

  “I put him right up there with Milton Berle.”

  “Now you’re the tough kid, uh? On your own turf.”

  “You have your style,” Debbie said, “and I have mine. If I make it, it’ll be on my terms.”

  “Do whatever you have to, uh?”

  “Whatever.”

  “You know I can help you.”

  She said, “How, write my material?”

  Tony smiled at her. “You take chances, don’t you?” He got up from his chair saying, “Don’t move,” walked over to his desk, brought something out of a file folder and came back with it. A check. This one a pale blue. He handed it to Debbie and sat down again.

  “What’s the amount?”

  “Two hundred fifty thousand.”

  “Made out to?”

  “Cash.”

  “You notice,” Tony said, “it’s a cashier’s check, not like the other one for the newspaper picture. This one’s good the minute you put it in the bank or you cash it. You don’t have to wait for it to clear.”

  She looked up at him. “You’re giving this to me?”

  “It’s all yours.”

  “Why? Is this like a test?”

  “You mean see if you do the right thing? Sweetheart, there isn’t any right or wrong about it. I’m giving it to you ’cause I don’t care one way or the other about the mick priest and his orphans. There’s always orphans around, it’s the way it is.”

  She said, “But the whole idea, what we talked about, you know, his mission—”

  “I make the deals,” Tony said. “I say it’s your money, it’s yours, nobody else’s.”

  Debbie was looking at the check again.

  She said, “Really?”

  “And if you’re worried about seeing the priest again, forget about it,” Tony said. “I’m sending him back to Africa.”

  26

  * * *

  TERRY WANTED TO RIDE IN front with Vito Genoa, maybe this time mention the cigarette business, try to get next to the guy and find out what was going on. Were they getting the check or not? But Vito said no, he had to ride in back. After that Vito pretty much kept his mouth shut. Terry did mention the cigarette business, but all Vito said was, “Yeah?” It was a quiet ride along the freeways, nothing to see.

  Once they got to Fran’s house it was a different story. Vito got out of the car to tell him face-to-face, “You gonna leave tomorrow, Father. I pick you up at nine and we go out to Metro. That means you gonna be right here.”

  “I told you,” Terry said, “I don’t have return flights.”

  “It’s taken care of,” Vito said.

  “Do I leave without the check?”

  “Don’t worry about it.”

  “Does Debbie have it, Miss Dewey?”

  “It’s none of my business,” Vito said. “I see you at nine.”

  “That won’t give us time to deposit the check.”

  And Vito said it again, “Don’t worry about it.”

  Fran let him in, Fran asking questions from the moment Terry stepped inside, and Terry said, “Let me get something to eat, okay? I’m starving.” Almost nine-thirty and he hadn’t eaten anything since lunch, one of Mary Pat’s famous minced ham sandwiches. Mary Pat was on the phone in the library talking to her mother, talking to her for the past hour. Fran said they talked two or three times every day; how could they have that much to say to each other? Terry had another minced ham sandwich, potato chips and a beer while he answered Fran’s questions up to and including the photo session with Anthony Amilia and Debbie having to stay; he didn’t mention being picked up tomorrow at nine. Maybe he wouldn’t be here.

  While they were talking two things happened at the same time: the front doorbell rang, and Mary Pat came in with the girls to say good night to Uncle Terry.

  * * *

  The door opened and the Mutt said, “I’m looking for Fr. Dunn. You his brother?”

  This kind of porky fella said yes he was and asked, “Is he expecting you?” Like he wasn’t going to let him in otherwise.

  “Yeah, I’m suppose to see him.”

  The porky fella hesitated like maybe he didn’t believe him. He said, “By any chance did Mr. Amilia send you?”

  The Mutt felt the right answer would get him in and he said, “Yes, sir, he did.”

  It opened the door all the way. The porky fella motioned, this way, and the Mutt followed him out to the kitchen. There was the priest in his black suit turning to look this way, and a woman and two cute little girls, the Mutt thinking, Shit. Now what’m I suppose to do?

  The porky brother said, “This gentleman has something for you, Terry, from Tony Amilia.”

  This gentleman—the Mutt had never heard that one before. He just nodded.

  The woman, their mom, was telling the little girls now to leave the pictures where they were—a bunch of photos they were looking at on the high kitchen table—and kiss Uncle Terry good night. She said to the Mutt, “We’ll get out of your way.”

  He said, “Much obliged.” But shit, those little girls were going to make it hard for him to do the job he’d come for; he sure didn’t want to have to shoot the mom and dad and their little girls. The priest got down so they could hug and kiss him. Then they ran out of the kitchen, their mom and dad shooing them and also leaving. It was the priest that spoke first.

  Saying, “I want to thank you for helping me catch my breath the other night. I had all the wind knocked out of me.”

  “Yeah, you took a shot, didn’t you?”

  The Mutt could hear the little girls talking loud to their mom and dad, wanting something, their little voices saying please please please. Shit. He didn’t need that. The priest was finishing a sandwich, taking the last bite and wiping his mouth with a paper napkin.

  This was when the phone rang. It rang twice and stopped in the middle of a ring, somebody in another room picking up a receiver.

  The priest said, “You have something from Mr. Amilia? It wouldn’t be a check by any chance.”

  �
�No, I don’t have any check.”

  “Okay, then what’s it about?”

  The Mutt saw the priest looking past him and turned to see the porky brother in the doorway. He said, “It’s for you.”

  “Debbie?”

  “Your friend. He sounds like he’s out of breath. Said he’s been trying to get you but the line’s been busy.”

  His friend, which gave the Mutt an idea who it was. He said, “Is that Johnny?”

  The porky brother said, “Yeah, you know him?”

  “I met him a couple times.”

  The brother left and the Mutt turned to see the priest with the wall phone, standing there facing the cabinets listening, like he didn’t dare look this way. Well, there wouldn’t be any surprise now, the priest getting the word from that son of a bitch Johnny, the priest acting like it was just any phone call from a friend, saying, “Uh-huh,” saying, “No, uh-unh,” putting on an act. The Mutt slipped his hand into his leather coat to take hold of the Glock. He wondered if the priest would piss his pants when he saw it. Now the Mutt glanced at the pictures the little girls had been looking at. He saw a bunch of little nigger kids playing on hardpack. Some others digging what looked like yams. They’d have to be the orphans over there, the ones the money was suppose to go to help.

  He was hanging up the phone now, taking his time to look this way.

  The Mutt said, “I’ll tell you something I don’t understand. You see pictures of skin’n bones starving nigger kids, they always have flies all over ’em. Not so much these, but what’re flies doing there if there’s nothing to eat?”

  “Dead people,” the priest said, “attract the flies.”

  He came over to where the pictures were, at one end of the high kitchen table, saying, “Let me show you,” and reached into a canvas bag—the Mutt ready to draw the Glock and do it right then. But the priest’s hand came out of the bag with a stack of pictures wrapped with green rubber bands he took off and then laid the pictures out on the table with the others, saying, “Over a half-million people were murdered while I was there.” The Mutt looked and saw dead bodies, skeletons, some that looked like old dried-up pieces of leather, bits of cloth stuck to bones, all of ’em laid out flat on a concrete floor. He had never seen anything like this in his life, but for some reason it reminded him of prison, Southern Ohio Correctional. He heard the priest say, “I was there. I saw these people and about thirty more in the church that day. I saw them murdered, most of them hacked to death with machetes, like this one.”