by Aidan Truhen
I hate him.
Reinhard is here to introduce me to our crime connections in this country although he would absolutely never say that because it would be rude to talk about these people as if they were in some way part of the same ecosystem as purse snatchers and housebreakers.
“Hi Reinhard I’m Jack.”
“Hi Jack welcome to Bern.”
“Thank you it is good to be here.”
“Well okay that’s great can I get you all some drinks maybe? Tea or maybe you would prefer schnapps? What time do you feel it is?”
“Oh well your magnificent clock says that it is breakfast so that is what it is let me introduce everyone I mean Doc you already know but—”
We do intros. Reinhard shakes hands with everyone exactly the same like pow pow pow. Me Doc Charlie Rex like we are all the same we are professional people. Volodya grips his hand and Reinhard grips back and they both make a little grunt and log-cabin motherfucker honor is satisfied. I am quite sure every walnut within a five-mile radius is presently thanking God it was not in the room.
I do not do crushing handshakes in my world they are a dick move but there are cultural norms among men who consider the day poorly spent if they have not actually skinned a large mammal and it is best to let them get on with it. It is real important not to do that with Lucille though because if you macho him he goes for the hug.
Reinhard shakes Lucille’s hand solid but absolutely median like he can smell the razorsuit under Lucille’s overcoat and maybe he can because he has these really long nostrils.
I do not stare at my lawyer’s nostrils that is not professional.
Reinhard does pleasant for a bit longer and then says that we should go.
Our meeting is about to start. Mr. Calvanese is—let us not say he is waiting he does not do that. Let us say that he is presently in the agreed location presiding over other business.
Ottavio Leopold Calvanese is a big old wheel of cheese in a thing called the ’Ndrangheta. This is a sort of a version of the Mafia that they do not make movies about because you do not fuck around with the ’Ndrangheta. The ’Ndrangheta did not get the memo about cooling it off and going corporate they are still very traditional men and they do a whole lot of shit that is on the hot side of criminal. They are quite comfortable duking it out in the street with your Albanians your Ukrainians your Taiwan mob your Irish Republicans your Basque your Islamic Jihad your just about any sombitch got ideas of his own regarding the disposition of nonlegal cash flow in a given region. And yet at the same time in a peculiar sidebar or parallel upper echelon these are the folks who do organized crime over the border here in Switzerland and in that connection they are organized to the max and very dressy. Ottavio Leopold was a knife man in his younger days but now he is fat and velveteen and powdered or manicured and he is quite the best-presented former street thug you will ever know. Fucker has a waxed mustache I shit you not.
We do bullshit:
“Good day Mr. Price I am Ottavio Leopold Calvanese.”
“I’m Jack Price hi it is nice to meet you.”
“Mr. Price you are welcome in Bern.”
“It is great to be in this lovely city.”
Ottavio Leopold Calvanese points one finger points at the ceiling like: (wait I was not finished). “Providing always that you are not here to make a fuss.”
I guess the bullshit portion is over.
“That is music to my ears Mr. Calvanese because although I was constrained into some fairly extreme negotiating tactics recently I personally have no truck with fuss.”
Ottavio Leopold does not know this expression to have no truck but he glances at a flunky and the flunky says something in Italian and Ottavio Leopold smiles.
“That is excellent Mr. Price. I will confess that I had not heard of you until your new appointment and this gave me cause for concern. I do not like to deal with people I do not know.”
“Well I respect and understand that Mr. Calvanese but think of it in this instance as a surety. There I was dealing millions of dollars of cocaine in the gaps for years and you never heard anything about that at all and that was my whole deal. No one who didn’t need to know knew anything at all.”
“Yes quite so. I understand that the Pale Peruvian Stallion was—”
“Do not mention it Mr. Calvanese I beg you I am still mourning its demise.”
“A sweet deal?”
“I loved that cocaine Mr. Calvanese. I loved the operational hygiene of it. I loved its invisibility its distributed order and fulfilment infrastructure its all-but-fucking-legality. It was SO sweet.”
“Perhaps one day you will have the chance to return to that enterprise. Let us say, with a helpful partnership organization?”
“Yes that might well be an investment opportunity for the future.”
Ottavio Leopold laughs because he knows as well as I do that the whole point of the Pale Peruvian Stallion was that I did not have to deal with legacy industry organizations such as his but obviously the fact that I am willing to lie politely is what he wanted to know. Yay I have passed his sophisticated test of character go me.
“Mr. Price forgive me I had to ask. You understand? Here I am embedded deep. In club with ministers I have dinner. With administrators I arrange building permissions for overseas companies there is no bribe no threat just favors one way then the other okay? Maybe someone got a client with bad neighbors in Umbria. They got a daughter in college in Milan her boyfriend is not so nice. You see? But nothing is formal no one has to be concerned. Nobody keep score that is business this—this is just life, like music. I do drawing room. You know this expression?”
“Yes you talk about wine and wear slippers and you talk art maybe.”
“Esatto. I wear slippers. Not working boots. But you understand I still got boots.”
“Of course.”
“This is natural.”
“It is natural Mr. Calvanese. I was raised on a farm sir and I know how it goes with slippers if you don’t also got boots.”
Big laugh like to rattle the Venetian chandelier. Big hand waving. Big big everything and now we are all friends forever.
“Wonderful Mr. Price WONDERFUL so few modern men in our line remember the soil. I am delighted to see the Demons in this city again. And I will be honest Jack I did not find your predecessor convivial. He was—come si dice insipido?”
Flunky steps up and whispers.
“Veramente, is called: bland? It’s the right word? Okay bland Jack he was bland. So tell me what can I do for you?”
“I need a guy. Like a guy with certain capabilities that I do not propose to use.”
“What capabilities?”
“Gunplay and hitting folk.”
“Ay ya ya yai.”
“Yeah I see where that would alarm you maybe a little given our conversation but again I gotta point out the negation is the promise sir we don’t have that person already on the team. That is not our thing right now hence we recruit. The one thing we do not have is a straight-up guy who goes first through the door.”
“I could lend you this.”
“With respect sir—”
“No. I also would not accept. You promise me you are going to be quiet?”
“I want to show a certain mood like to reassure my wider clientele at this time. It is just good business I am reviving a very traditional brand of crime here.”
“Okay Jack. Okay you go ahead. I am delighted to meet you and I look forward to seeing what you can do. But please don’t put me in the way of a…noise complaint.”
We shake hands. Under the manicure, Ottavio Leopold Calvanese has skin like he builds stone walls for a living without gloves.
“I am pleased you come to me Jack not the other guys.”
“I had no idea there were other guys Mr. Calvanese.�
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“Jack in Europe there are always the other guys. Deep in the woodwork there are always those guys. You know what guys I mean?”
“Those guys?”
“Those guys.”
“We’re talking about those guys still?”
“Those guys still again Mr. Price. Now more than for some time. They are everywhere.”
Doc says: “La sua gente era partigiana,” and Ottavio Leopold starts a little, then smiles like a sunrise.
“Dottore,” he says, and makes a little bow over his gut, and a nod. Partisans like anti-Fascists, back in the day when that meant the Calabrese equivalent of mujahideen.
I know there are Fascists because there are always Fascists but the idea that there are enough of them that a guy like Ottavio Leopold is talking like they are an actual opposition to his thing—but I guess I watch the news so I should not be surprised.
“Well I do not in general make business decisions on the basis of personal distaste Mr. Calvanese but even if you were less of the kind of person that I like to deal with than you are I still—well gosh how to put this delicately—”
“You do not feel they would be a good fit?”
“Well maybe not but also just to put it nicely and in language appropriate to a working environment and where there might be children and so on: fuck those guys.”
Ottavio Leopold stares at me for a moment, and then mirth ripples out of him like dancing. He waves his hands up and up in huge approval.
“Oh yes. Oh yes! Quite so indeed.” And then intense as he takes my hand: “I am sure we can find a fellow who will work well with you Mr. Price.”
* * *
—
So Ottavio Leopold has arranged at my request a brief recruitment fandango and it is here in this hotel. It is a nice hotel and I do mean nice. It is a luxury hotel in the business district it is totally anonymous and very shiny because it is not for tourists it is for the other kind of people who need a two-story fish tank in the lobby to know that someone somewhere will one day love them. It is opulent and yet not opulent because really opulent is unfettered by good taste and true bad taste is not Swiss. There’s good taste involved even in the really terrible decisions around neon ceiling art and Cyber-Casbah chic. They’ve gone completely overboard in this totally non-ridiculous way. The Swiss are a people who own lots of guns but do not have much gun crime and evidently there is a connection there with interior design.
We take the big conference room, which we do not need but it is big and there is a giant gold squid over the table and I am all about the giant gold squid.
Because you got to have a fucking process.
“Hi Nico so tell us about yourself.”
“Hi Jack I am very happy to be here I got my start in the ’Ndrangheta. I have experience with blockade running and interpersonal violence, extortion, high-level governmental corruption. Some criminal-systems analysis, you know, because I am modernizer.”
Doc says: “We are looking for someone familiar with small arms and close combat at a commando level ideally I would like to see some krav maga or similar.”
“Wait Jack I must ask it would be required to work with this lady?”
“Yeah and Charlie too.”
“I have a concern there. It is alien to my culture. Also historically it has not gone well for my people, to share secrets with females.”
“I—wait females?”
“Is not the right word?”
“Something of a red flag in terms of nuance there buddy.”
“Thank you is better to say girls?”
“Okay thank you for coming in.”
“No problem man.”
“…”
“…”
“Doc did you pat him on the shoulder? Like in a friendly way?”
“Guiding him to the door.”
“Doc.”
“Price.”
“Doc.”
“Price.”
“…How long?”
“…Fever in ten hours, respiratory problems in seventeen, total deliquescence in eighty-one hours give or take.”
“Dammit Doc what if he turns out to be the best option?”
“Well he’s not now is he?”
“…no that is true but please do not do that anymore.”
“Mmph.”
“Doc.”
“Mm.”
“No melty.”
“Mm.”
“Hallo m’name is Anthony ’m a foh’mah mimbeh of the Rhodesian Light—”
“Nope thank you nope.”
“I’m Susan I was in charge of interrogation at Camp—”
“Adieu.”
“Hi I—”
“Nope.”
“Price—”
“Dude has a lightning bolt tattoo—”
“We cannot hire on aesthetic principles Price that is irrational—”
“Excuse me hi about this tattoo? Actually it is a caduceus with lightning bolts instead of snakes?”
“…”
“…”
“Doc?”
“Mm.”
“Comments?”
“Mm-mm.”
“I am Colonel—”
“No.”
“No?”
“No but we do really like your epaulets man that is a lot of braid.”
“It is important to convey authority.”
“Disco authority please god please let this—”
“Hi I am Saul—”
“Do you have any obvious fucking personality flaws or stupid body art?”
“No if you wish I will remove my—”
“Please god no you are hired. Trial basis for this job probation five months thereafter no-fault break clause.”
“I have a variety of unarmed skills and I am proficient in big guns that go fwoosh and small guns that go bang I do not do sniper work that is kind of not my thing.”
“I said you’re hired.”
“I also like to be the first man through the door in combat situations that is kind of my thing.”
“You’re—”
“Yes I heard you man I just don’t like to stop until I’m good and finished I’m a fucking commando. Respect the skill set.”
“…Okeydokey.”
“Also the break clause is mutual and I will under no circumstances shave my head or respond to any of the following names: Skipper, Chuck, Zinger, Flea-Ring, Dumptruck, or Kandahar.”
“Why not?”
“Did you just hear me say those names? Those are terrible fucking names for me my name is Saul.”
“…I’m giving you a raise Saul.”
“Pleasure to work with you sir.”
“And you Saul. My name is Jack.”
“Hi Jack.”
“Hi Saul. Saul Saul Saul.”
“You don’t have to keep saying Saul every time Jack.”
“I’m just getting myself over the hump I really kinda liked Kandahar.”
“Yeah well I thought I did but then I went there.”
* * *
—
So that was nice Saul is a perfectly nice person who also will shoot someone in the head for me and he starts in the morning because he has to go say goodbye to his boyfriend who comes from Chur and is a landscape designer. We say ciao to Saul and Saul says ciao to us and we finish the coffee because it is not at all bad and then we go see the mountain we are going to climb.
Figuratively. We are going to rob the bank on top of the mountain we are not climbing the actual mountain because it is huge and cold and none of us has the faintest fucking idea how you climb a mountain. Except Saul probably you look at Saul and you just know he will just bivouac all damn day and night. He probably bivouacs at home
in his living room like his partner is making vegan bauernwurst on a science-fiction-looking Swiss stove top and Saul is hanging from the ceiling by two fingers singing along to Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau in his all-spandex briefs.
I have asked Saul about this and he says that is exactly how it is so there.
No one is allowed up onto the plateau until later this week. So we take the tourist bus and look up at the black rock.
* * *
—
Swiss tour lady wears Hermès like it is just overalls.
“Welcome to the Kircheisen this is a UNESCO Heritage site we are twinned with Huascarán in Peru here you will see many remarkable wildlife opportunities including chamois and ibex. We cannot dismount from the car at the summit there are preparations in place for the art fair but we can make a round trip and the view is quite amazing. Before this we will go to the waterfall called the Teufelhammer. This is a very important natural resource here in the valley. There is here hydroelectricity for the whole region and also a tourist attraction here one may see thousands of cubic meters of water passing through the underground cavern every second down the fall pipe from the gipfel that is the peak. It will be very nice.”
“Thank you yes I am sure that will be nice.”
“So here we will please all put on the wet-weather gear although in the mountain of course the weather is always the same it is wet. You will notice there is no life jacket included do not fall in.”
“Okay.”
“There is no life jacket because no point. If you fall in you will not drown the water is very mineral heavy not so much like the Dead Sea but still you will float.”
“Okay.”
“But you will still die because you will be crushed by the force of thousands of cubic meters of falling water descending from a distance of one kilometer also because the shock of the temperature would be fatal within a few minutes if you did not already die from the crushing.”
“Yes I see.”
“So it is best to not fall. We do not include a life jacket because we do not encourage this experiment.”
“No right no.”
“Okay then we make the tour.”
We make the tour.
