Darkman

by Randall Boyll

  Darkman squinted. The can’s label read TRUELIFE. TrueLife? What the hell was that?

  It sunk in, at last, and he could tell exactly what the cigar really was.

  It was a finger in the process of being mummified with taxidermist’s solution.

  Nausea slithered up Darkman’s throat like sour heartburn. This Durant guy was a real sweetie. What a hobby.

  Durant picked up a box from his desk and opened it. It was lined with purple velvet. He carefully put the finger inside. Darkman had no need to look. Sixteen fingers were in that box, one of them Yakky’s own.

  He clicked off the recorder and headed for home. It was a long walk but he had plenty to think about, most of it visions of Durant being killed in various ways.

  The trip back seemed much shorter than the trip out had been. Darkman was home by dawn, bent with fatigue, but with no time to spare on useless sleep.

  He sat at the computer and began to work, a picture of Durant hanging from twine in front of him, listening to the tape over and over again, imitating the voice badly at first, then better.

  By the time Durant’s face and hands were done and Darkman was able to imitate his posture and voice, it was close to eight o’clock.

  He put himself together, Durant’s twin brother, pocketed a handful of cigars, and gave his new voice one last test.

  “That would be . . . just fine.”

  And it was just fine.

  Time for phase two.

  25

  A Brazen Robbery and Happy Times at Chin Fong’s

  THE NEAREST 7-ELEVEN happened to be a monstrous distance away, and once more Darkman wished he could buy a car, but this Darkman routine was draining his bank account at a tremendous rate. He doubted that he had two thousand dollars left. Pauly’s marked bills were too risky to use. And when he was broke? Your basic slow starvation.

  But today he was Robert G. Durant and not ashamed to announce it to the world. He came to the 7-Eleven and breezed inside, the sole customer at this early hour. With satisfaction he noted that the store had four security cameras peering down, every corner covered. He went to the frozen-food case and withdrew eight boxes of frozen pizzas, then went to the checkout.

  The young man looked sleepy and uninterested. There was an ashtray piled full of butts by the cash register, and he was smoking a fresh one. Darkman slapped the pile of pizzas down and waited for service.

  The clerk took his own sweet time. The cash register made noises. Presently the man informed him of the total. “Twenty-nine oh-four,” he said tiredly.

  “Fuck you,” Durant’s crafty twin told him.

  He frowned. “What’s your beef, buddy?”

  “The name isn’t Buddy.” This Durant said with a snarl. “It’s Durant. Robert G. Durant.” He turned to the nearest camera and waited until it had swiveled his way. He grinned at it. “Get that? R.G. Durant. I have a concealed weapon and am about to use it on this pimple-faced shit head.”

  The clerk went pale, making his pimples stand out like infected bee stings on his white skin. He swayed on his feet.

  “Boo,” Darkman said, and the young man ducked out of sight. The brazen, yet petty, crook bearing the false name of Durant ambled out with the pizzas. Outside, he threw them in the gutter. A passerby stopped and frowned down at them.

  “Old?” he asked. “Moldy?”

  Darkman shook his head. “Stolen.”

  The pedestrian scooped them up and scrambled away, shouting out a belated thank-you. He rounded a corner and was gone.

  Darkman leaned back inside the store, grinning. The poor clerk was dialing a phone with shaking fingers. He looked up and saw Darkman. The phone clattered to the floor.

  “Nine-one-one,” Darkman said, and left, actually laughing for the first time in ages. Durant was headed for a ton of trouble. Far less than he deserved, but enough to keep him occupied while Darkman began the process of destroying his empire and ruining his reputation as a good crook.

  He got to Chin Fong’s restaurant shortly after nine, cursing the world and the nonexistent taxicabs for forcing him to walk so much in his dilapidated shoes. He stopped at the entry, breathing hard, and checked the stopwatch.

  Ninety minutes. Great. Nine minutes left in which to do this dastardly deed. And this one would be tough—yes, it would. He was not famed for being a good impostor, but it was either this or nothing at all.

  An old green Chrysler drew up beside the curb and stopped with a short squeal of tires. Martinez, failed boxer and no beauty-contest winner, stepped out. On the other side the chap named Skip climbed out and stomped to the sidewalk, walking in the peculiar, swaying way amputees tend to. The morning sun slanted down from a flawless blue sky, an autumn beauty of a day. Darkman felt his insides tighten up. Was this going to work at all?

  “Your leg loaded?” he asked Skip in the best Durant voice he could muster.

  Skip grinned. “You betcha. We gonna see fireworks today?”

  “Chinese fireworks,” Darkman said, and all three of them laughed. But meanwhile . . .

  . . . the real and actual Robert G. Durant was walking angrily down the marble steps of the courthouse, ablaze with rage. His attorney, Myron Katz, was beside him, hurrying to keep up.

  “Idiots!” Durant was screaming. “Restitution for the pizzas! Forty hours of community service! Seven-hundred-dollar fine! That’s what will happen if I get convicted, and I wasn’t even there!”

  “Count yourself lucky they let us post bail,” Myron said. “They have the whole thing on video. Are you sure you weren’t sleepwalking? It’s a lousy defense, but it’s all we’ve got.”

  “Get screwed,” Durant snapped. “Where’s that goddamn taxi you called?”

  As if on command, the taxi appeared. Durant jumped in. “Chin Fong Restaurant. Fast.”

  It took off, fast as ordered, leaving Myron Katz behind to flag down his own transportation. And at the restaurant . . .

  . . . Darkman, Martinez, and Skip went inside, clanging an overhead bell. Darkman was shivering within, aware of the slipping time, the unhappy position he was in, and the smell of Chinese food, which filled the place like a pleasant fog. At least it was semidark inside, good news for his disguise.

  A short, middle-aged Chinese man in a white suit passed through the colorful bead curtain that blocked the kitchen from the dining area. He looked at Darkman and smiled apprehensively. “Wahbuht Dewant! So good of you to favor me with your venerated pwesence. Pwease honor me by sitting in my shabby chair.”

  Darkman stared at him, not moving.

  Chin Fong bowed. “Or do me the greater honor of remaining on your feet.”

  “Tell him,” Darkman said to Martinez.

  Martinez blinked. “Huh?”

  “Tell him why we’re here.”

  He shrugged. “Okay, boss. Hey, Fong! Where’s the fucking money?”

  Fong looked surprised. “Money?”

  “Yeah, the dough I was supposed to collect yesterday.”

  Fong brightened. “The money! Yes! Wahbuht, how I tremble with shame. How I hide my face.”

  He did so, looking absurd. Darkman kept quiet, wishing he knew what the hell this might all be about. Probably a payoff of some sort. Protection money? Let’s make a dope deal? There was no way to know right now, but Martinez and Skip were staring at him, obviously uncertain. What was wrong with Wahbuht today? Going soft in his old age?

  Martinez spoke up, frowning. “Quit the crap, Fong. We’re here for the money and we ain’t leaving until we get it.”

  Fong bowed again, looking genuinely sad. “How I regret having to burden you with my miserable difficulties. You see, I have no money.”

  Darkman stared at him, suddenly at a loss. How would Durant be handling this?

  Chin Fong stared back, curious. He seemed to be waiting for a reaction, some tough-guy stuff. “The white powder no longer flows in its former volume, Wahbuht. All of the members of Tong languish in poverty.”

  Tong? Oh, yeah. The Chin
ese Mafia in these parts. And the white powder that no longer flowed? Take a guess.

  Fong covered his face again. “And of all your unworthy servants, Chin Fong is certainly the most destitute. I do not have a dollar, much less fifty thousand!”

  “You’re making us cry,” Skip barked, glancing at Darkman with the same puzzled expression Martinez wore. “Make him pay, boss.”

  Fong raised a hand and snapped his fingers. Four very large and very mean-looking men the size of sumo wrestlers came through the bead curtain and ranked themselves into a forbidding line. Darkman grinned to himself, knowing exactly what to do. This was exactly the development the doctor had ordered.

  “Even my own miserable friends sometimes ignore my wishes,” Fong said tenderly, “and they tend to upset those whom I cherish most deeply. Wahbuht, they know nothing of our golden fwendship and are likely to injure someone!”

  Darkman looked at them, glad that just because he looked like Durant he was not supposed to act like him. In fact, he realized with amazement, this was developing even better than the original plan. Durant would soon be laughed out of business with the tough boys who ran the crime scene. About now the real Robert G. would doubtless whip out a pistol or some such, instruct Skip over there to take his leg off, tell Martinez to get it and spray these ass wipes with hot lead, and all kinds of other nasty crook-type things. The phony Durant was going to make a scene no one would forget.

  “W-well,” he said, stammering, “I d-don’t want anybody to get hurt, Mr. Fong. What’s fifty thousand when you stack it up against a friendship like ours?”

  Fong nearly fell over. His associates’ jaws dropped open. Martinez and Skip gaped at him, amazed.

  “In fact,” Darkman went on in a high, whining Durant-voice, “if any other men of Tong have debts to me, well, tell them to forget repayment. I know times are tough for the Chinese-American community.”

  “Boss!” Martinez hissed out of the side of his mouth. “We net over five mill a year from the chinks!”

  “Please,” Darkman said daintily. “No racist remarks. We dare not offend others.”

  “What?”

  Darkman turned back to Fong. “My friend, this opens a new avenue for understanding between our two peoples. By setting an example we can ease the tensions between us.” He went to Fong, picked up his limp hand and shook it. Fong seemed to be in shock. Darkman stifled a chuckle.

  “Skip, go start the car, please,” he said. Skip was rooted to the floor, blinking in astonishment. Darkman got out a cigar and handed it to Fong, who was mute with surprise. “I hope the brand is acceptable.”

  “Eh?” Fong stared at it. “Uh, sure. No problem, Bob.” In his state of confusion he forgot to use the accent. Now Darkman did chuckle. He handed cigars to the other Chinese, as joyful as a man with a new baby to celebrate.

  “Good-bye, old friend. Rudy, my boy, shall we go?”

  Martinez looked like someone attempting to solve a difficult math problem. He stared hard at Darkman. “You’re kidding, right? I mean, you’re just softening them up for the real stuff, right?” He flipped his T-shirt up and jerked a black pistol out of his belt. “Who gets wasted first?”

  “Stick that thing back in your drawers,” Darkman snapped. “The time for killing is over. Skip, I thought I told you to go start the car.”

  Skip flinched, looking about ready to faint. “But the fifty grand . . .” he mumbled, and Darkman waved him away. He lurched outside, clanging the bell above the door.

  “Well, then,” Darkman said warmly, “I guess it’s time to go. So long, men. Rudy, lead the way.”

  Martinez turned like a slow robot and went outside. Clang clang. Darkman cast a last sweet smile to his new friends and started to follow him.

  He had the door halfway open when a taxi squealed to a stop in front of the restaurant and Robert G. Durant jumped out.

  The nine minutes were up. And so, it seemed, was the short career of Darkman.

  26

  A Confusing Situation

  ROBERT DURANT SKIRTED Skip’s aged green Chrysler, stopping long enough to bend down and snarl at him. “Where the fuck is Martinez?”

  Skip pointed over his head. “Right behind you. But I thought you were still inside.”

  “Still inside? What kind of dope you been smoking?” He straightened and turned. Martinez was most certainly behind him, and behind him, halfway through the door, was Robert Geoffrey Durant in the flesh, dressed in nearly identical clothes, his face taut behind the glass, his jaw hanging open in surprise.

  “Who the fuck is that?” the real Durant screamed into Martinez’s face, in such a frenzy that spit flew from his lips, making Martinez blink and rub his eyes.

  “It’s you, boss,” he said.

  “You dumb fucking spick! I’m right here!”

  Martinez eyed him. “I guess you are. How’d you pass me up? And what’s with the racist remark, asshole?”

  Durant shoved him aside, screeching with rage. He went to the door and tried to pull it open.

  His twin held it shut. They stared at each other through the glass, one livid with hate, the other pale and unchanging. But pale or not, he was still healthy enough to hold the door shut. Durant began kicking it, hoping to break the thick glass, but it was reinforced with wire mesh and too stubborn to give in easily. Durant tried to punch a fist through it, needing to smash the imposter’s face in, but the topside glass was just as stubborn as the bottom, and all he got was a case of sprained knuckles and more fuel for the fire burning inside him, Hate Central Station flaming red-hot and out of control.

  He tried to bite the glass, an inner, surviving part of his sanity asking quite calmly if he really hoped to accomplish anything by this. He decided not and whirled around.

  “Martinez! Shoot the fucker! Through the glass!”

  Martinez whipped his pistol out fast, through force of habit. He aimed at the man behind the glass, then became confused, his eyes snapping from one Durant to the other. He lowered the pistol. “Have you got a twin or something?”

  A knot of morning pedestrians hurried by. A woman saw his gun and screamed. They scattered like dandelion seeds in a storm, heading for safety should the ugly brown man decide to use the gun he had been waving around. Durant’s face was taking on a decidedly purple hue. “Shoot him!” he bellowed.

  Martinez aimed, but once again that twinge of doubt stopped his trigger finger. What was going on here, anyway? How could there be two identical bosses? Was this a practical joke, something to test his loyalty? If so, the man in the mask (whichever one that might be) was taking one hell of a chance, and so was the real Durant. Unless, of course, they had loaded his gun with blanks.

  He stared down the barrel while the Durants wrestled the door back and forth. Nope, there was a bullet waiting down there at the bottom, where the pretty spiral dead-ended. So just what was the deal?

  The Durant inside the building let the door go. It flipped open, sending the other one crashing down on his butt. The inside Durant became an outside Durant, and the outside Durant became the Durant on the sidewalk. Martinez began to sweat, not used to posers like this one. He looked helplessly at Skip. Skip shrugged.

  “Shoot him!” the new outside Durant commanded, and Martinez aimed the pistol at the man on the ground. The Durant on the ground wobbled to his feet and pointed at the outside Durant. But they were both outside now, and there weren’t any handy labels to differentiate the two. But then, one Durant was red-faced and sputtering mad while the other seemed just as mad but still looked okay.

  “Shoot him!” one of them said, but it was getting hard to tell now. Martinez fought the urge to point the gun at his own head and end this confusion. Both Durants were pointing at each other, shouting. From nowhere a puff of yellow smoke rose in the air, smelling funny. Now one Durant had a hand clapped to his cheek.

  Shoot him!

  Shoot him!

  Shoot him!

  Shoot him!

  Shoot him!
<
br />   Shoot him!

  Martinez almost wept. That stinking yellow smoke had drifted his way, and it smelled like burned hair. It occurred to him that the red-faced Durant was hot enough that his hair might catch fire, so he aimed at him. But no, it was still impossible to tell. Unfortunately, as far as mental prowess went, Martinez was not Mensa material. More puffs of yellow smoke were drifting up, along with strange popping noises. The white-faced Durant lunged at him, screaming “Shoot! Shoot! Shoot!” He swung a hand and slapped Martinez across the face.

  Now that was more like the boss. He aimed at Red Face.

  “You fucking idiot!” Red Face screamed, and lunged at Martinez as well. He began to throttle him. Also unfortunately for Martinez, this was more like the boss too. On the verge of nervous collapse, he threw the gun at the door, managing to explode the glass and make four huge Chinese fellows charge out. Twinkling glass crunched under their shoes and sluiced across the sidewalk like glistening pebbles. Martinez was relieved when two of them pulled Red Face away, who was most certainly the boss, because the other Durant had sprinted away with his hands over his face, trailing smoke as he high tailed it from the scene of the botched crime.

  Durant wrestled himself away from the Chinese men. He snatched Martinez’s gun from the place it had landed and charged after the impostor. Happy once again, Martinez bent and yanked a small backup pistol from his ankle holster. Together he and Durant, followed lamely by Skip, gave chase.

  The impostor turned a corner, ducking out of sight. Durant and his employees thundered around the same corner thirty seconds later. Durant stepped on a smoking pile of slop on the sidewalk and fell down hard, hurting his knees and elbows. He jumped up, enraged, and looked down the street for the other Durant.

  Pedestrians, dozens of them. He had melded with the crowd.

  Durant shook his fists. What the hell was this bullshit all about?

  “Hey,” Martinez said behind him. “Hey, boss.”

  Durant spun around. Martinez had picked the puddle of slop up with two fingers. It was sizzling, producing foul yellow smoke. As Durant watched with endless disgust it fell into three revolting pieces, two of them plopping to the cement. They looked like melting latex gloves. Martinez slung the last piece against a building. It stuck on the bricks there, dripping and burping, Durant’s own footprint marring the features, but Durant could still tell what it had been.