Death of the Extremophile

by Stuart Parker

  *

  With a Navy Gun Boat newly docked and its crew at liberty after four months at sea, Hammer Coller had chosen a busy time to declare war on the dockside brothel. The joint was called Daffy’s and there were three floors of rooms. Brawny sailors were pouring out into the passageways, well used to being called to battle stations at unexpected moments. Hammer was tearing through the brothel with a sledge hammer, smashing up furniture and anything else in his sights and knocking out makeshift doors in the walls as he moved from room to room. It was not the aggrieved sailors, however, with their pants down who were brandishing arms: Lance Shipton’s house security were fully clothed with plenty of pockets for their knuckledusters and knives. Hammer was using the beds to block their access before proceeding to smash the rooms to smithereens and flooring anyone foolhardy enough to step into his path with ring-worthy left hooks. He had never worked so hard, not even with Iganov in his most anti-Bolshevik moods. When Hammer found himself in the girls’ dressing room, he smashed every bottle of perfume he could see and ignited an intense, sickly fragrant fire. The flames spread quickly and commandeered the attention of his pursuers away from him as he jumped out a second floor window.

  He limped away on jarred knees. He still had the sledge hammer in hand but tossed it away. At the end of the block he looked back to see scantily clad prostitutes and sailors spilling out onto the street while smoke and flames bellowed from the girl’s dressing room. The flames were lighting up the building’s dull brown brickwork in an eerie orange glow. Hammer continued on to Hope’s parked Ford.

  Hope emerged from street-side darkness with a pistol in hand. He looked Hammer over a moment before plunging a hand into his breast pocket and removing the Shipton target list. Hammer was too exhausted to resist.

  ‘Let’s see what we’ve got here,’ murmured Hope as he opened up the list and flicked over the names. He nodded his head, impressed. ‘It’s a long list. A lot of work. But you’re already bloodied and bruised; do you really think you can get to the bottom of it?’

  ‘I’m going to try,’ gnarled Hammer.

  Hope checked that they were not being chased. ‘First time is the easiest. They weren’t expecting you, and they’ll put your rampage down to an aggrieved bout of the clap. Or some such complaint.’ Hope helped Hammer into the passenger seat of the Ford and hurried around to the driver’s side, swinging in behind the steering wheel. A press of the ignition sent the engine roaring powerfully to life.

  ‘The second time, however,’ he said as he screeched out a neck wrenching turn into traffic, ‘they will know it’s war. Then they’ll take measures.’ He shook his head doubtfully. ‘Your only chance is to make the second time count. Hit them hard and hit them everywhere.’

  ‘How am I going to do that?’ Hammer used his spent cigarette to light the replacement and then flicked it out the window.

  Stacey leaned over the front passenger seat, displaying her new ring on one finger and a knuckleduster on the other. ‘With friends, of course.’

  ‘I don’t have any friends,’ said Hammer. ‘Not the kind that stick around once the prize money has stopped flowing. Or are you talking about your friends? Have you got some rotten eggs to throw up against my wall?’

  Hope smirked. ‘We’ve got a basket of them.’

  16. ‘Where there might be convoluted dossiers, we have a shopping list.’

  ‘The Police Commissioner?’ Detective Longworry shook his head at the notion. ‘To the best of my knowledge his son is twelve years old - somewhat too young to have a gambling addiction.’ His brow furrowed. ‘Deputy Commissioner Orter Haven, however, has nurtured a more likely candidate. Indeed, he lost out on the top job thanks to the murky dealings of his offspring. You can’t help the family you’re born into but at least you don’t have the same guilt as when it is something you’ve given birth to.’

  Hope and Longworry were strolling through Central Park. The afternoon sun was occasionally breaking through the congestion of cloud to tease with a taste of the new season’s warmth. There were others about, taking their recreation circumspectly, seemingly still rediscovering the Great Lawn after the long bleak days of the Hooverville. Woolen coats that would soon be consigned to cupboards altogether, were currently draped over wrists or shoulders.

  Longworry was one of the few still wearing his, though mostly just for the purpose of buttoning up over his Smith and Wesson revolver; his dark brown tie pulled down low off his neck was his alternative acknowledgement of the mild weather. The deep flush of his freshly-shaven cheeks suggested that far more heat needed to be released still. It was difficult for Hope to ascertain, however, what worries truly lurked beneath the deep lines riddling his uncharacteristically cleaned up face. His standoffish nature suggested there was something dark at work within his core. It might have only taken a shave to expose it, but Hope had the distinct impression it would take far more for it to truly articulate itself. And all Hope could really conclude about such intrigues was that he looked better with a beard.

  ‘A top cop with a criminal in the family,’ murmured Hope, ‘you stick your toe in the water to test the temperature of that and you might find a shark waiting to take the whole foot.’

  ‘You’re right. That is one pond we should stay away from. And besides, Hammer has given us plenty of even more interesting things to consider.’

  ‘Are you talking about his list?’ said Hope. ‘You’ve had the chance to look at it?

  ‘That’s why we’re here,’ said Longworry. ‘It could be the most priceless piece of barely legible intelligence I’ve ever seen. A whole criminal empire laid out on paper. Where there might be convoluted dossiers, we have a shopping list.’

  ‘So, you’re going to act on it?’

  Longworry nodded with a cruel smirk. ‘And soon. Just because it’s written on paper doesn’t mean it will stay true for long. But right now it’s true enough for my liking. The entire Buster and the Treatment are out confirming targets. Sharpening knives for the oncoming feast.’ He gave Hope a lingering glance. ‘But there was something about my interview with Hammer that puzzled me. For some reason he doesn’t seem to think we’re the law. Even when I flashed my badge so close under his nose he could see the reflection of his nasal hair he just laughed and called me comrade. Who did you tell him we were?’

  ‘My friends.’

  Longworry’s gaze was thick with a policeman’s suspicion. ‘Is that all you said we were? He seems a tad too keen to tell us everything he knows.’

  Hope shrugged. ‘His trainer, Curtains Iganov, knew firsthand the power of revolution, having lost his father and uncles to one. Iganov indoctrinated the socialist doctrine into his charges. Once they really believed it, he could begin training them with the pent up hatred for a murderous enemy. That is how he went about producing such tough fighters.’

  Longworry fetched a cigarette from his jacket pocket and lit it up. ‘Interesting. He turned his boxers into Bolsheviks so he’d want to hurt them?’

  ‘That’s what I’m saying. And Hammer took to the ideology with the same gusto as he did his right hook.’ Hope chuckled. ‘Which meant Iganov trained him with a truly devoted cruelty.’

  Longworry blew his first draft of smoke the way of an attractive middle aged woman passing along the walking track with a well-groomed poodle pulling at its lead. He offered out his scrunched up packet of cigarettes to Hope on an afterthought.

  ‘No thanks,’ said Hope, patting the thick Cuban cigar just poking out of his jacket’s breast pocket. ‘I’m keeping my sinuses clear for the evening.’

  Lost in his own thoughts, Longworry scrunched the packet a little more as he returned it into his pocket. ‘The first time he called me a commie I was about to hit him with the chair and probably the table as well. I only held off because he is a friend of yours. And I’m glad I did. He’s really spilling the beans. It seems making love to his girl involved finding out everything about her, including every little dirty p
iece of her father’s secret world. Maybe he had some grand design of marrying into the family and being an integral part of the operation. Whether it be sewing a comfy suit or hacking off limbs. Lance Shipton is going to wish that’s what happened ‘cause the Buster and the Treatment make a particularly nasty embodiment of justice.’

  ‘I don’t want to be left out,’ said Hope. ‘I want to be part of the show.’

  Longworry pondered a moment. ‘Fair enough. There’s one item on the list that is particularly compelling: Doctor Cyanide’s Cocaine Ranch. The boys were still talking about that one when I kicked them out of the office. You can take that, if you like.’ He released a blast of smoke out of his nostrils. ‘That’s if you can spare the time away from your flagpoles. You can do the scouting work on it. Hell, I’d trust you more than one of those Orten Haven cronies who have started crawling out from the woodwork, trying to be my new best friend. But you’re getting involved is only on the proviso you can keep Coller out of it. A hothead like that will quickly turn things into a bloodbath. And just as likely get himself killed. There are no two minute rounds in this game, and no ref to break up the clinches.’

  ‘He won’t like being caged.’

  Longworry snarled. ‘I’ll do my best to keep him out of prison, even sniff through the records for any trace of bent cops and their errant sons, but only if he keeps his nose clean. Tell him that. He’d better understand I’m his only chance of staying out of prison long enough to reunite with his sweetheart.’

  ‘That will put you in the same league of influence over him as Iganov,’ replied Hope. ‘But I should warn you his rampages are impressive.’ He chuckled and sniffed the cigar in his pocket like it were a carnation adorning a lapel buttonhole.