Pagan Babies

by Elmore Leonard

  The Mutt looked up, saw the priest turn from the counter behind him holding a big goddamn machete, raising it and saying now, “This was used to kill some of them.” He held it to one side like he was ready to slash with it and the Mutt wasn’t sure he could get his gun out in time. Go to shoot somebody and get your goddamn head cut off. The priest surprised him then.

  He said, “Tell me something. You’re supposed to be a hit man—how many people have you killed?”

  The Mutt, still holding on tight to the gun in his coat pocket, said, “I’ve shot three . . . no, four. And I shanked one.”

  “That must’ve been in prison.”

  “Yes, it was.”

  “Well, I shot four Hutus with a Russian pistol,” the priest said, “one right after the other, like ducks at a shooting gallery.”

  “What’re Hutus?”

  “The bad guys at that time,” the priest said. “I wonder if I could’ve done it with this, hack them to death like they did these poor people in the church. You should’ve heard the screams.”

  “I bet.”

  The priest started hefting the weapon like he was feeling the weight of it, getting it balanced just right in his hand, ready to swing it.

  The Mutt felt his shoulders hunch.

  The priest said, “You know what? I believe I could use it if I had to.”

  “I’d have to be good and drunk,” the Mutt said, “cut a man down like a tree. Why’d they do it?”

  “The same old story,” the priest said. “Poor people killed the ones that weren’t as poor. They got juiced up on banana beer and went crazy.”

  “Banana beer’ll do that, huh? Southern Ohio Correctional,” the Mutt said, “we made shine’d give you the worst headache you ever had, turn you mean. There was a riot while I was there? What you said reminded me. Six cons in L Block and a guard got killed, beaten to death. They set fire to anything’d burn and busted what didn’t. You wonder what gets into people, don’t you?”

  “They killed children, too,” the priest said. “These orphans’re some that are left.” He looked up then, placing the machete on the table, and said, “I’ll tell you what happened, Mutt. I believe that’s your name?”

  “Yes, it is.”

  “I asked Tony Amilia if he’d help me feed these starving children. Look at this one, picking through a garbage dump. Tony said yeah, he’d get the money from Randy. You probably know about that.”

  “You’re right,” the Mutt said, “and Randy didn’t want to give it to him.”

  “But Tony made him, didn’t he? Randy gave him two hundred and fifty thousand dollars that was supposed to be for these children, but Tony kept it for himself. I haven’t seen one nickel of it.”

  It caused the Mutt to frown and squint.

  “You understand what I’m saying?”

  “Yeah, but I already got paid.”

  “To get rid of Vincent Moraco, wasn’t it? Johnny told me on the phone.”

  “No, I got half up front to hit Mr. Moraco. But it was him, Mr. Moraco, paid me to hit you.”

  For a moment there the priest looked confused, but said, “To keep me from getting Randy’s money, right?”

  “Yeah . . . ?”

  “And I didn’t. Tony’s got it. You want to shoot somebody, go shoot Tony. You got no business with me.” The priest turned to the pictures again. “Unless you want to give something to feed these poor orphans. Look at these little fellas here. Look at their eyes.”

  Fran and Mary Pat were on the sofa in the library watching television. They both looked up as Terry came in, Terry wearing a white shirt now and jeans. “He’s gone?” Fran said.

  “Yeah, he left.”

  Fran said, “He has to be the weirdest-looking gangster I’ve ever seen. What’d he want?”

  “He heard about the orphan fund,” Terry said, “and stopped by to make a contribution.” He saw Mary Pat giving him her cool appraising eye as he held up a wad of bills. “Five thousand dollars, cash.”

  “He had that much in his pocket?”

  “I guess he just got paid,” Terry said. “You never know where it’s gonna come from, do you?”

  Mary Pat kept looking at him, but still didn’t say anything, holding his gaze as he stood there.

  Fran said, “Will you please sit down and talk to us?”

  “When I get back,” Terry said.

  He went over and kissed Mary Pat on the cheek.

  “I got to go see Debbie.”

  27

  * * *

  HE PUSHED THE BUTTON NEXT to D. Dewey and waited in the light over the doorway to hear her voice on the intercom or for the door to buzz open. She would know who it was. He pushed the button again and waited and then stepped back on the sidewalk to look up at the windows. But then he remembered her apartment was in back and faced the golf course and remembered looking out from the door to her balcony and seeing all that space where crops would be growing in the country he had left, seeing it that night as land going to waste. He ran around to the back of the two-story building and there was her balcony. Lights on in the apartment. He stood at the edge of the fairway looking up and called out, “Debbie!” A light came on in the apartment below hers. He called her name again and saw her at the glass door to the balcony. “It’s me!” She saw him. He waved and ran around to the front and pushed her button and still had to wait for the door to buzz open. What was she doing? The door buzzed and he went up the stairs to 202.

  She was wearing a pink kimono he hadn’t seen before. She smiled, but in a tired way, nothing in her eyes.

  “Why aren’t you the happiest girl in town?”

  She said, “I was in the bathroom.” She turned from the door saying, “I thought you’d at least call first.”

  “What happened? He tried to jump you, didn’t he?”

  “Nothing like that. You want a drink?”

  He followed her into the kitchen saying, “Are we celebrating or what? Why did he want you to stay?”

  She brought an ice tray from the refrigerator and cracked it open. Her vodka and the bottle of Johnnie Walker were on the counter, left from that first night he was here, her bag with the shoulder strap lying next to the bottles. She said, “He asked me a lot of questions. He seemed to think he could help me.”

  “Do what?”

  “Get into comedy. He thinks he can open doors, even get me on Leno.”

  “Why, because they’re both Italian?”

  “He said he had a connection.”

  “Are you all right?”

  She said, “I’m tired, I’m worn out,” and pushed his drink to him across the counter.

  “Tell me what happened.”

  “He tore up the check.”

  Like that. No attempt to get him ready for it.

  Terry had picked up his drink. He put it down again. “What do you mean he tore up the check?”

  “He tore it in half.”

  “You’re kidding.”

  “And then tore it again. That’s what I mean when I say he tore up the check.”

  “The one he was handing me we’re having our picture taken.”

  “That one.”

  “But he said okay. He gave us his word.”

  “Terry, the guy’s a fucking gangster.”

  “Did you happen to, in some way, piss him off?”

  “He asked who my favorite comic was and I said Richard Pryor. His is Red Skelton.”

  “You didn’t hit it off like you thought.”

  “Oh—and when he said he could help me? I go, ‘What’re you gonna do, write my material?’ ”

  “Really? You said that to the boss of the mob, the mob boss? ‘What’re you gonna do, write my material?’ ” Terry paused as he saw Lauren Bacall delivering the line and his mind picked up one of her lines, his favorite, and changed it to, You know how to write, don’t you, Tony? You put your pen in your hand and . . . He said, “It’s a good line except for your timing, the occasion. What did he say?”

 
; She came close to Tony’s low voice saying, “ ‘You take chances, don’t you, kid?’ No, he didn’t say ‘kid,’ just that I take chances.”

  “And you took one and it didn’t work.”

  “Actually I think he liked it, the line.”

  “Then why’d he tear up the check?”

  She said, “If he ever meant to give it to us in the first place. I don’t know . . . He’s very matter of fact. He asked if I wanted a drink. I said, ‘If you’re having one.’ He said, ‘I’m not, so you don’t get one.’ Gruff, but kind of cool.”

  “You seeing him again?”

  “No. God, no. Why would you ask me that?”

  “You think he’s cool.”

  “I thought the line was cool. He said it and right away I wondered if I could work it as a bit.”

  Terry picked up his glass. He looked at the Scotch and swallowed most of it.

  “What’d you say when he tore it up?”

  “I said I should’ve known.”

  “You weren’t surprised?”

  “I was, but that’s what I said.”

  “What did he say?”

  She let her eyes close and opened them again. “Terry, I’m tired, I want to go to bed.”

  “You want me to stay?”

  She took a sip of her drink. “If you want.”

  “Tell me what he said.”

  “He said, ‘You should’ve known what?’ I said something about how he makes his money, without coming right out and saying he’s a crook, and he said . . .” She paused. “He said, ‘You don’t know what I do.’ Like no one does, because he keeps a low profile, he’s not a show-off. He compared himself to that guy who used to play for the Dolphins, Larry Czonka, who said if he ever did the funky chicken after he scored—and I wondered if I could do that as a bit, how pro football players showboat. If he ever did it this other guy would punch him in the head.”

  “Howie Long.”

  “That’s the one. I pictured a guy in uniform punching another guy in the helmet, and the guy saying, ‘Oh, shit, my hand.’ ”

  Terry said, “I did, too, when I heard it.” He said, “So I guess the whole thing, Tony just wanted to talk to you?”

  “Well, nothing came of it. If you’re staying, Terr, let’s go to bed.”

  “But he went to all that trouble—”

  “I don’t know . . . Come on, Terry, let’s go do it.” She walked away.

  He heard it as if she was saying let’s get it over with. Maybe she was. He thought of the morning in Fran and Mary Pat’s bedroom talking about changing the sheets and Debbie saying no, they’d just sleep in the bed, they could fuck anywhere; and he remembered it, not so much as a coarse thing for her to say, but as a remark that described what she thought of making love, something you could do anywhere, nothing more than knocking one off.

  Terry poured another drink, sipped it and took it with him into the bedroom, sipping it again as he watched Debbie slip off the kimono he hadn’t seen before and stand looking at the clock on the bedside table in her white panties that had a tiny pink bow on one side. She rolled them off and Terry saw he’d better get ready. He watched her walk into the hall to the bathroom. She was in there a few minutes and he was in bed when she came out, turning off the bathroom light.

  “I took a Seconal. I’ve got to get that scene out of my mind and sleep.” She turned off the lamp and got in bed.

  “You’ll wait, though, huh, till after?”

  “Don’t worry, I’m up for it if you are.” She reached over and grabbed him and said, “Yes, you are,” and away they went, kissing and touching, making adjustments and finally getting into a slow groove, Terry looking at Africa, misty hillsides and tea plantations, houses of red adobe, bats swooping out of the eucalyptus trees to help him stay in the groove and not become frantic; but as he looked at Ah-fri-ca and the sky at dusk, a thought came to him, a question:

  If he tore up the check, why is he making sure you go back?

  She said, “What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing. No, we’re fine.”

  And they were. They made love and finished. Debbie reached for a Kleenex and fell asleep while Terry stared at the ceiling in the dark.

  Why doesn’t he want you around?

  You can’t hurt him. You’re not gonna tell on him, say the photo’s a fake. No—he’s doing it for her. Getting you out of her way, not his.

  It wasn’t even his money. Something to make grand gestures with. Tear up the check and write another one to wave in front of little Debbie. He reached over to get his drink, finished it and looked at Debbie asleep, breathing, her cute nose letting little Debbie snores slip out now and again. The guy tore it up in front of her. She said she should’ve known. She said he wasn’t a show-off. But what was tearing up the check if it wasn’t putting on a show? Part of the show. Why else go to all that trouble? He likes her and wants to impress her and makes her an offer, like the one in the movie, and she accepts it, it’s only for her and she doesn’t want to face you, she’ll go to bed and hide. You want me to stay? If you want to. What else can she say, she has a headache? She thought you’d call first. Annoyed. She thought at least you’d call first. She didn’t want to talk about it, but then wanting him to believe she’s being open and honest said more than she had to.

  But she didn’t ask about your leaving.

  They’d talked about it before going in to see Tony, told her they were making sure he went back, but now it wasn’t on her mind. Or if it was she wasn’t bringing it up; it would happen and he would never know what she got from Tony.

  She was wearing a kimono he had never seen before and it made her look different. Or she was different and it had nothing to do with the pink kimono with a deep-red border. He didn’t believe she was in the bathroom when he buzzed. He didn’t believe it because she told him she was in the bathroom. Picture it. She hears a buzzer she doesn’t expect. Then another buzz. She decides to wait it out. But then hears him call her name and looks out—a mistake, but too late, she knows you saw her and if you’re coming up she wants to get whatever Tony gave her out of sight, if it isn’t already. He buzzes again and has to wait before she lets him in. She’s putting it somewhere, whatever it is. I thought you’d at least call first—not sounding happy to see him, not sounding much like his love, his little schemer, his ex-con con-artist girlfriend of what, five days?

  Ain’t love grand—

  She goes to sleep because she wants it to be over, behind her, what she’s doing to you. She does like you. He believed that. But does she like you enough to trust you?

  She said she was in the bathroom when he buzzed.

  Maybe she went in after he buzzed.

  She went in the bathroom for a Seconal and turned the light off when she came out. The first night he was here she left it on, so they could see each other while they made love.

  He stared at the ceiling.

  Did she hide it?

  Or does she trust you, Fr. Dunn, to remain innocent and believe her?

  Where does she hide things?

  Didn’t she tell you one time . . . ?

  He stared at the ceiling.

  He listened to her peaceful breathing.

  He slipped out of bed . . .

  * * *

  Debbie woke up a little dopey but knew enough to turn her head on the pillow, see if he was still there. Nope. She sat up before looking the other way, at the clock: 9:25. She wanted to brush her teeth, yuk, get the sticky taste out of her mouth, but decided to make the call first. She expected Mary Pat to answer and she did.

  “Hi, it’s Debbie. Did Terry get off all right?”

  “He was picked up, if that’s what you mean. There were two of them.”

  “They’re reliable,” Debbie said. “I mean there’s nothing to worry about, really.” She said, “I don’t know how much he told you . . .” and paused to see if Mary Pat would tell her.

  Mary Pat said, “Well, Terry didn’t seem worried, so I don’t think I w
ill.”

  Debbie said, “Oh.” And said, “Okay then. Nice talking to you, Mary Pat.”

  She tried to imagine Terry’s frame of mind as she walked in the bathroom to brush her teeth, walked in and saw fresh rolls of toilet paper, nine of them, stacked on her makeup counter, the plastic bag they came in lying on the floor. The sight came as a shock and postponed brushing her teeth for several more minutes.

  It meant he didn’t believe her. Her buddy, her partner, didn’t fucking believe her. He looked for it but couldn’t possibly know what he was looking for. He looked here because, shit, she must’ve told him about Randy snooping in her bathroom.

  But she didn’t hide it here. She didn’t hide it anywhere. She had thought about it in a panic between door buzzes and thought, Wait. Why? It’s Terry. What reason would he have to snoop around?

  No, she left it in her bag, in the kitchen. She went in there and that’s where the bag was, on the counter, the check in a plain white envelope inside . . .

  But it wasn’t.

  28

  * * *

  RIGHT AFTER THE TRIO FINISHED their set the piano player would say into the mike, “And now, to tickle your funnybone and your fancy, here is that rising star of comedy, Detroit’s own Debbie Dewey.”

  It reminded Debbie of the bored voice on the PA system in M*A*S*H announcing the movie for that evening and what it was about. She said to the piano player after the first time he brought her on, “Carlyle, I don’t tickle funnybones.”

  Carlyle said, “I know you don’t, girl. But this is the only game in town for us, you dig? The man, dumb as he is, tells me what to say, I say it.”

  That fucking Randy. She said, “Well, could you not sound so bored?”