Bagmen (A Victor Carl Novel)

by William Lashner

  The Brotherhood was in session, and the conclave was not a total surprise, since this time it was I who had called them to order.

  In the middle of my meeting with Tommy Bettenhauser, when it had become clear that there was no affair and that anyone who had done any research to that effect—like, say, Stony—would have known the truth, I realized I was being abjectly betrayed. Stony had come into my office that very first day with every intent to betray me. He was working for someone else, had been working for someone else even before Bettenhauser announced, which meant he wasn’t working for Bettenhauser. There was only one player big enough to have bought Briggs Mulroney’s son so early in the game: the Big Butter. I wasn’t sure yet why, but I was sure it wouldn’t stop with a few misleading photographs. I was being set up, I was being made a fall guy, and Stony, sometime soon and for whomever the hell was paying him, was going to send me falling into a grave.

  So even as Mrs. Bettenhauser spoke about the sexual predilections of the woman in the grainy black-and-white photographs, I acted to protect myself.

  “Can I borrow your phone, Carrie?” I had said.

  “My phone?”

  “Mine is out of power.”

  She looked at her husband, looked back at me, made it clear that she was not so pleased with the idea. “Sure, I suppose.”

  “Thank you,” I said, galloping forward despite her hesitance. In the corner, my back shielding my work from prying eyes, I texted a message.

  ITS VC. BEEN BETRAYED BY STONY. NEED HELP!

  And who did I text it to? Well, who did I have? McDeiss? He would just laugh and tell me he told me so. Melanie? Who knew which side she was on. The Congressman? He had his own problems, and whatever was going on, his sister was tit-deep in it. Duddleman? Already dead. Timothy from Boyds? He’d just try to sell me an overpriced Trussini for my corpse. No, I had no one to go to with my pathetic plea for help, no one other than—

  “Who wants a cigarette?” said Maud, taking out her pack.

  “Don’t mind if I do,” said Hump.

  “Stony?”

  “I suppose if you’re twisting my arm.”

  “Is it menthol?” said Schimmeck. “I prefer menthol.”

  “You don’t get a choice, Miles, I’m not a fricking Wawa. And anyway, smoking a menthol is like smoking a can of deodorant. You, Victor?”

  Soaked and still bleeding, still in pain, still scared out of my wits, I looked back and forth at the four of them, nonplussed by the calm. “I . . . I don’t smoke,” I said.

  “Oh, yes, that’s right,” said Maud before handing out the cigarettes, inhaling deeply as she lit hers, and then tossing the lighter to Hump. “Being handcuffed to a pipe and having a gun pointed at your face is one thing, but a cigarette, now that’s just asking for trouble.”

  A swarm of laughter, like a swarm of bees, flew around my head. One by one they lit their cigarettes and stood together, smoking, bonding, like an ancient tribe over the nightly fire. And I felt, just then, the stirrings of a love, true and grateful, for all of them, minus that son of a bitch Stony Mulroney.

  “You might as well light up, Road Dog,” said Stony, “since I have to shoot you after this smoke.”

  “You’re not going to shoot Victor,” said Maud.

  “Thank you,” I said.

  “But that’s why I brought him here,” said Stony. “That’s why I have this gun. I’m going to shoot him dead, and then I’m going to shoot him again just because.”

  “Tell him, Hump.”

  “You can’t be shooting Victor in the basement,” said Hump.

  “Thank you again,” I said.

  “Too messy,” said Hump.

  “What?” I said.

  “The blood will end up splattering on the plaster and pouring onto the floor,” said Schimmeck. “Linoleum is one thing—it cleans up nice—but cement just soaks up the stain. You’ll end up with a crime scene you’ll never be able to clean. When the cops come, and they will come, if Victor did what you said he did, then it will be like an announcement of the murder.”

  “Oh, don’t you be worrying about that,” said Stony. “By then I’ll be gone.”

  “But we won’t,” said Schimmeck. “You kill Victor and they’ll be on us like bears on honey. We don’t need that kind of heat right now.”

  “Then what do I do?” said Stony. “I’ve got to kill the man.”

  “We understand, Stony. We do,” said Maud. She took a long inhale and blew a thin stream. “And truth is, I don’t think we could stick him with any more checks at Rosen’s, so what happens to him is not our concern. But this shooting-in-the-basement thing just isn’t going to cut it.”

  “Just do the usual,” said Schimmeck. “Drive him out to Hog Island, find a boggy strip of marsh, and make him start digging.”

  “You gots to go deep though,” said Hump, “or the body starts rising. We had that problem in New Orleans, arms and legs sticking out the swamp like stunted trees. Not good. Don’t know if Victor is up to digging deep enough. You work out, Victor?”

  “Just looking at him,” said Maud, shaking her head sadly, “my guess is no.”

  “That’s a problem right there,” said Hump.

  “Hump, aren’t you carrying for that new parking lot going in on Sixth Street?” said Schimmeck.

  “I am,” said Hump.

  “When are they pouring?”

  “They been. Got the basement almost formed.”

  “There you go, Stony,” said Maud. “I’m sure Hump could reserve a corner for you.”

  Stony lifted the gun. “Then I’ll kill him here and take him there. It’s as simple as pain.”

  “Don’t forget the blood,” said Hump. “Better to kill him on scene.”

  “Will that work?”

  Maud shrugged. “It’s worth a try.”

  “You want to do it right,” said Hump, “get a barrel.”

  “Barrel?” I said.

  “A metal barrel, the kind they start fires in,” said Schimmeck.

  “You stick him in a metal barrel,” said Hump, “fill it with concrete, then roll that down into the foundation.”

  “That’s what they done with Hoffa,” said Schimmeck.

  “Do I get to shoot him first?” said Stony.

  “It’s neater if he goes in alive, so they say,” said Schimmeck. “Try to make him climb in himself and then hunch down. Put a gun to his head, and a lunkhead like Victor will do anything.”

  “I will not,” I said.

  Stony pointed the gun at my head and said, “Shut up.”

  I shut up.

  “Then when you pour in your cement,” said Miles, “they struggle, but quietly, see, and eventually they breathe it in. They say the cement fills the lungs nicely.”

  “That sounds a bit cruel to me,” said Stony.

  “At least it’s not a cigarette,” said Maud.

  They laughed and laughed.

  And then came the footsteps.

  They weren’t trying to be soft or unheard, the footsteps from the floor above us. There was no furtive creeping. Just a single set of heavy, assertive steps, a man’s footfall. And the laughter died, cackle by cackle, as the Brotherhood, one by one, heard the steps. And they each looked up, first Maud, then Hump, then Miles Schimmeck, and finally Stony, tossing away his lit cigarette and pointing his gun at me as he put a finger to his lips.

  Step-by-step, closer and closer. McDeiss? The Congressman? Colin Frost, out to kill another? Aubrey, bringing a tray of Sazeracs? I couldn’t imagine who the hell it was, but I sensed, rightly, that something fierce was bound to follow in the footsteps’ unerring wake. The footsteps stopped at the door to the basement and we were engulfed in a cold, smoky silence.

  And then a voice called out, ragged as a chain saw and hearty as a pirate: “Lower your hats a
nd raise your bottles, you deadbeat beans. I’m coming down.”

  CHAPTER 43

  THE COMEBACK KID

  The man who appeared was a colossus, with ham hands and a jaw like a slug of whiskey. He was old, sure, but one of those old men who have held onto their size and aura of ferocity. He wore a gray suit, a beige raincoat, a fedora the size of Pittsburgh. His ears were great sprouts of cauliflower, his mangled nose looked like it had been sacked by Gaul. I didn’t recognize him, of course I didn’t, I had never seen the like of him before. But Stony’s face grew curiously pale, like it was Hamlet’s ghost who had come down that stairway for him, and I guess, in a way, it was.

  “Hump,” said the old man, with a nod. “Maud. Schimmeck, you twit.” He put those ham-sized fists on his hips, looked around at the mess in the basement, including me—still cuffed to the pipe, still bloody, now sitting in a puddle—and thumbed his fedora higher on his head. “What the hell happened to my water heater?”

  “Are you . . . ?” I said. “You couldn’t be . . .”

  “Who were you expecting?” said the old man. “The Batman?”

  “I thought you were dead,” I said.

  “Dead?”

  We turned to look at Stony, who had stayed silent and pale.

  “Did you tell this sopping piece of meat I was dead, laddie?” said the old man.

  Stony’s head sagged and his gaze hit the floor. “Not exactly. I left some wiggle room.”

  “You sure as hell implied it,” I said. “What was all that stuff about his going off to greener pastures?”

  “I was talking about Shannondell,” said Stony. “His retirement community in Valley Forge.”

  “Oh, I understand, all right,” said Briggs Mulroney, the one and only. “It’s a hard thing living in a shadow as grand as my own. It wasn’t until my father was buried deep that I myself began to roar. But no, I’m not dead, just shacked up with a young piece of quaff in that Shannondell. Quite the lively place, actually. I’ve got an art exhibit next week.” He stuck out a thick, squat finger and swept it at the rest of the Brotherhood, like a machine gun wiping out an entire troop. “And all of yous beans is coming.”

  “What are you doing here?” said Stony.

  “Maud called me in, said you were in the middle of a situation. She was right, as usual. First off, give up the gun.”

  “I’m taking care of things myself,” said Stony.

  “Not with a gun. Rule One: we carry bags, not guns. Too many things go wrong when the bullets fly.”

  “I thought a bagman always working for himself was Rule One,” I said.

  He turned and looked at me like I was a patch of mold growing on the wall. “Every rule becomes Rule One when you screw it up.”

  He reached out his hand and snapped his fingers, once, twice, and then waited. Stony seemed to deflate with each snap, until, with the hesitance of a child, he stepped forward and put the gun in his father’s huge paw. The old man slipped it into his jacket pocket.

  “Christ, look at the water heater,” said the old man. “What were you shooting at, rats?”

  “I’m in the crapper, Pop,” said Stony.

  “You was always in the crapper, even as a kid. No matter how much we banged on the door, we couldn’t get you out.” He looked at Maud and shook his hand like he was shaking dice. “Of course, then at least he was being productive. So what is it now?”

  “I got caught up with the Big Butter.”

  Briggs Mulroney nodded sadly. “What did I tell you, you dumb squirt? The Big Butter is always fatal.”

  “But the only butter left is the Big Butter,” said Stony. “The world’s changing.”

  Briggs’s head snapped toward his son like a chain had been yanked. “Don’t let it,” he growled. “How deep are you in?”

  “Up to my neck.”

  “What do they got on you?”

  “They have me on a murder rap.”

  “Ah, Christ, who’d you kill?”

  “I didn’t kill anyone. There was a woman I was supposed to tail. I didn’t know what was going to happen, I swear. But they have me as an accessory.”

  “Accessory?” said Briggs, with a spit of disgust. “That’s a handbag or a belt. A pair of socks. Accessory we can work around, or I’m not Briggs Mulroney. I’ll make calls.”

  He took out a cigarette and lit it. The others tossed what shortened butts they still held and lit new ones. They stood in a circle, the five of them, Briggs and his son, Hump and Maud and Miles Schimmeck, silently smoking, like the pure purpose of the world spinning around and all of humanity scurrying to and fro was for that very moment, in that foul, soggy basement, when they could grab a second of respite to light up a cig.

  “Does he want one?” said Briggs, thumbing toward me.

  “Doesn’t smoke,” said Hump.

  Briggs raised an eyebrow and shook his head. “That’s smart, it might kill him.”

  General laughter at my expense.

  “It would do a better job than Stony, in any event,” said Schimmeck.

  “Shut up, Miles,” said Stony. “He’d be dead now if you degenerates hadn’t stuck your noses in.”

  “And then where would you be?” said Briggs. “So far inside the crapper you could only breathe when they flushed. Okay, what’s the play?”

  “There is no play,” said Maud.

  “There’s always a play.”

  “Not here,” said Hump. “Not now.”

  “Who’s the lead on the case, and how much will it take?”

  “It’s McDeiss,” said Miles.

  “Oh, crap,” said Briggs, as if that settled that. “How the hell can you trust someone you can’t buy?”

  He stood there for another moment more, smoking and thinking. Briggs Mulroney smoked in black and white. He held his cigarette between thumb and two forefingers, and shriveled it an inch with each inhale. He twisted an ear as he thought. Finally, he looked up at his son.

  “How does the beach sound?” he said.

  “The beach?” said Stony. “For real?”

  “For every fucking day of the rest of your fucking life. You might be better off in prison. But I know a guy who knows a guy who’s got a plane. I got a scam going down in Panama and you’re the perfect guy to screw it up. Grab your coat and let’s get out of here.”

  “What about me?” I said.

  Briggs stopped and looked at me, a complete afterthought. “You was the bean in the papers.”

  “That’s right.”

  “Didn’t anyone ever tell you to keep your fucking face out of the papers?”

  “Actually, yes.”

  “Do you still need to kill him?” said Briggs to his son.

  “Not anymore.”

  “And you, paper boy, you’ll keep your fucking mouth shut?”

  “Yes, sir,” I said.

  “Let him go.”

  Stony hustled over and fumbled in his pocket for the key. “I wasn’t going to do it,” he said softly.

  “Sure you were,” I said.

  “Maybe. But I wouldn’t have been happy about it.”

  I rubbed my wrist when I was finally freed, and scrabbled to standing to get out of the damn puddle. “What is she doing with the girl?”

  “I don’t know the details,” said Stony. “I was just the hired help. But something, for sure.”

  As he started to walk after his father, I said, “Stony. My wallet.”

  He stopped, came back, and popped it out of his pocket. “Sorry.”

  “Let’s go, boy,” said Briggs Mulroney before tossing down his cig and starting up the stairs. “Time to ride into the sunset.”

  “So long, suckers,” said Stony.

  Briggs was halfway up the stairs, stooping so as not to bang his head, when he stopped, turned around, an
d pointed.

  “Don’t forget my show,” he said. “Next Wednesday. I’m working in clay now. Horses.”

  “We wouldn’t miss it,” said Maud.

  “And make sure you buy something, too, you beans,” he said, and then he turned and disappeared up the stairs, Stony dutifully disappearing behind him.

  And that was how a dead man named Briggs Mulroney saved my life.

  Wet and bloody and smelling rank, I looked at Hump and Schimmeck and the luminous Maud, and my heart opened to them. I owed my life to them, each of them, and my indebtedness felt surprisingly rich.

  We all want to be the heroes of our own stories. We all want to use our wits and wiles and outsized physical gifts to save our own damn lives. But I learned early and hard that I am not James Bond, that in the tightest of spots I would always be dependent on the beneficence of others. It is a frightening state of affairs, true, but it is not a terrible way to go through life. And I felt just then that I needed to say something, to let them know how I felt. But what could possibly convey the multitude of emotions that were flooding through me? And then the words came, as if formed by gratitude’s own sweet lips.

  “A stinking barrel?”

  CHAPTER 44

  PUBLIC POLICY

  She was waiting outside my apartment when Maud dropped me off, sitting in a black-and-white illegally parked in front of a hydrant. Before I was halfway up the front steps she swooped out to intercept me, her figure as short and squat as the hydrant itself, in full uniform with gun weighing down her side.

  “You’ve got to be kidding,” I said.

  “Why don’t we avoid the meaningless patter,” said Officer Boot, “and just go where we have to go?”

  “But meaningless patter is the basis of our entire relationship. What would we have if we didn’t have meaningless patter?”

  “Nothing. That’s the point.”

  “So you want to go deep.”

  “If that means silent, like a submarine, then yes.”