1931 The Grand Punk Railroad: Local

by Ryohgo Narita

  “Yeah, yeah. Killing’s fun because I do it just for kicks, see? Using the outfit’s name would make it boring, Uncle.”

  “Don’t talk as if you know! If you want to kill people so badly, become a mercenary or something and go to the death fields of South America!”

  “Isn’t that real rude to mercenaries?”

  “Shut that filthy mouth! If you go to a battlefield, as long as you don’t get killed, you can kill all you want! That’s what you want, isn’t it?! Satisfy yourself by sneaking around and hiding and imagining the pleasure of killing tough guys!”

  At that point, abruptly, the strength went out of Placido’s hands. In response, Ladd’s own hands went to the arms that had grabbed his collar and caught them firmly about the middle.

  It felt as if something were being shoved into the spaces between the old man’s muscles. As he felt the strength drain away, in the blink of an eye, his hands had released the collar.

  Taking advantage of the opening, Ladd leaned in close to his uncle’s face. At a distance where he could feel the breath from his nose, with his eyes opened abnormally wide, he spoke. He just spoke, calmly.

  “You’re the one who’s talking like you know, aren’t you, Uncle? You don’t know a thing about me. Battlefields? Those aren’t our style. Those are places where warriors gather, warriors, warriors! Guys prepared to die in order to kill, guys who fight like they’re gonna die because they don’t want to die, guys like that, see? Frankly, there’s nothing fun about killing those guys. Get me, Uncle?”

  Placido was no longer able to object: While he’d rattled on, at some point, Ladd had pulled a rifle out from who knew where and had jammed its muzzle against Placido’s jaw.

  “Looking for enemies stronger than we are—that ain’t how we roll. That doesn’t mean we only go after women and kiddies or weak guys, though.”

  Using the muzzle of the gun to toy with his uncle’s jaw, Ladd explained his aesthetics.

  “The guys I kill, the guys that are fun to kill, are the ones who are completely relaxed. Get me? The type who are somewhere absolutely safe, without the tiiiiiniest suspicion they might die in the next second. Guys like that. Like, for example—”

  The eyes that watched his uncle changed completely. The cheerfulness that had been in them a moment ago vanished, and he glared at his uncle—contemptuously, pityingly, lovingly—with the sort of eyes that dealt death equally to anyone who met them.

  “He…Hey, wait, wait, Ladd. Stop, stop!”

  “Yeah, for example—”

  The final stop for Ladd’s gaze was the tinge of terror that had risen deep inside Placido’s eyeballs. When he’d seen that tinge appear, Ladd’s face twisted happily, and he began to tighten his trigger finger.

  “—guys just like you right now, Uncle.”

  “For the love of God, stoooooop!”

  There was a hollow click.

  …And that was all.

  In the hushed room, only Ladd’s quiet laugh echoed briefly.

  “Ha-ha, ha-ha-ha, ha-ha! Ha-ha, as if I’d actually kill you. It ain’t loaded, Uncle. You’ve taken real good care of me up till now. Even a murderer like me has that much decency. See?”

  Ladd’s wired mood hadn’t changed a bit. Placido’s heart had already been completely swallowed up. He fell to his knees on the floor, drawing in deep breaths, over and over.

  “Well, we need to hit the road. We probably won’t meet again, but take care, Uncle.”

  As if to declare he had nothing else to say, Ladd spun, turning his back on the man.

  “D-don’t you ever come back!!”

  For Placido, who’d been completely whipped, that parting shot took all his resources. However, Ladd shattered even that hint of pride.

  “Nah, I doubt I’d be able to even if I wanted to.”

  “Eh?”

  “See, Uncle, you’re, what’s-it-called, all washed up. You groused about Luciano’s reformers’ proposal the other day, remember? And y’know, I bet you’re on their hit list now.”

  Lucky Luciano. He was right up there with Capone as a made man who symbolized the era. He was working to modernize the mafia and was taking steps to get rid of outfits with old ideas. In other words, he was promoting an inventory clearance of guys who talked about things like “duty” and “tradition.”

  “Wha…?”

  “Lucky Luciano’s killing hundreds of mafia bosses just because their attitudes are outdated. That’s a hell of a lot scarier than a murderer like me. You really don’t want to be on that guy’s bad side. Right, Uncle?”

  At his receding nephew’s words, Placido’s body was once again dominated by trembling and nausea.

  “Th-that’s nonsense…”

  “Just be real careful not to end up like Salvatore Maranzano, a’right?”

  Ladd’s warning intentionally invoked the name of a mafioso who’d been killed in New York a few months earlier, while in his own home. It wasn’t clear whether it was Ladd’s kindness or cruelty talking.

  “Well, maybe you feel safe because you’ve got great guards here, but it sounds like the police and the tax men also have their eye on you after this latest mess. As a ‘sacrifice,’ see, to take back the town of Chicago from the mafia.”

  Ridiculous. That’s a bluff. It’s nothing but nonsense. That was what Placido wanted to think, but at this point, he finally realized something: He hadn’t told Ladd a thing about the current mess. And more than that, how did Ladd know he’d quibbled with Luciano’s reforms?

  Something else occurred to him then. Up until now, the Russo Family had often had to clean up after the kills Ladd had carried out without permission.

  However, now that he thought about it, they had all been just within the limits. The number of people Ladd had killed, the places and the circumstances, were all just inside the boundary of what the Family could handle completely.

  Then, the moment their ability to deal with the aftermath had evaporated, he did this. It meant, in other words, that Ladd had always intentionally reveled in the pleasures of murder. He hadn’t been pushed into action by impulses; he’d been quite cool and calculating.

  There had been nothing deliberate about the kidnapping plan from a moment ago. However, at this point, Placido finally managed to understand Ladd’s character.

  It wasn’t that the guy couldn’t plan. He just didn’t.

  He was the type of man who always came to action from nothing more than rough ideas, then forced those actions to succeed through on-the-spot calculations made in response to each individual moment.

  In fact, he seemed to have put out antennae all through his immediate area and had been actively gathering information.

  The result had been today’s breakaway. In a word, if he stayed with the organization, he wouldn’t be able to relax and enjoy killing. With that determined, he’d summarily abandoned Placido’s outfit.

  “It’s too bad, Uncle. A long time back, even in a sitch like this one, you might’ve been able to recover, but…”

  On his way out, Ladd spoke:

  “When I had that rifle on you, you didn’t strike back, see. You just screamed. I’d say that disqualifies you as a mafia boss, yeah?”

  Fixing him with a look that was completely different from what it had been a moment ago, Placido stopped his retreating nephew.

  “W-wait. What happened to the guards?”

  “Nn? Oh. Relax. We didn’t kill ’em. I said they were good, didn’t I? They were ready to die guarding you. Remember what else I said? ‘It’s boring to kill guys like that.’ They’re just taking a little nap. They’ve got a few broken bones, but whatever.”

  Then he added one final, uncalled-for sentence:

  “Lucky you, huh, Uncle? Your sweet lil’ grandkid was away at school.”

  At those words, rage welled up once more, and Placido’s face turned bright red again.

  “Just get out, now! If you’re not planning to come back anyway, why did you come here in the first place?!�
��

  “Aaah! Right, I forgot!”

  For the first time, anxiety came into Ladd’s expression. He directed a brazen question at his uncle, whose fists were shaking.

  “Listen, Uncle, that white suit of yours. Could you give me that, to commemorate my marriage to Lua over there? Although I dunno when we’re getting married.”

  Naturally dumbfounded by this, Placido forgot his anger and spoke:

  “That’s right: Why are you people all in white?”

  This dumb question received a dumb answer. The answer was also more than enough to provoke a strong feeling of revulsion in anyone who heard it.

  “We’re on our way to kill several dozen people in a narrow train, see? If we’re in whitethe blood will show up better, and it’ll look cool.”

  “Yeah this, this! The size is perfect. Ain’t that great!”

  Inside a black double-decker bus that was his personal property, Ladd had dressed himself in formal attire for the coming feast.

  As she watched him out of the corner of her eye, Lua asked him a question, sounding puzzled:

  “Why didn’t you kill that man?”

  “Hmm?”

  “Normally, you would have killed him, Ladd.”

  She was talking about Placido, apparently.

  “Mm. That’s true,” he answered easily, humming.

  “Why not?”

  “You’re supposed to let yourself get nice and hungry before a feast, right?”

  The sociable murderer responded without a moment’s hesitation. Lua lowered her eyes, murmuring quietly:

  “You’re the worst, Ladd.”

  “And you like guys who are the worst, don’tcha?”

  Without giving an audible answer to that question, Lua nodded silently.

  Not bothering to confirm this, Ladd declared the opening of the “feast” to the dozen or so snow-white individuals who were packed into the bus.

  “All right, let’s go. We’ll admire those poor passengers like livestock, we’ll despise ’em like maggots, and with love and hatred, we’ll crush ’em real, real carefully. Ha-ha, ha-ha-ha!”

  The bus sped away.

  Toward their last stop and their point of departure: Chicago’s Union Station.

  PROLOGUE V

  BEFORE BOARDING

  Ladd’s party, uniformly and brilliantly clad in white.

  The white group elegantly descended the lobby staircase, which later would be made famous by the baby carriage scene in The Untouchables.

  From the shadow of a column, a man and woman gazed at their abnormally white costumes.

  “Wow, Miria, look at that! It looks like lots of people in white are going to be on the same train we’re taking!”

  “Pure white for sure!”

  “I wonder if they’re going to get married on the train.”

  “Uh-huh, a happy wedding!”

  “We are affiliated with the Chicago Paysage Philharmonic. As the orchestra’s instruments are delicate, we request that they be handled with particular care, even in the freight room.”

  Beside the freight car, a group clad in black tuxedos and dresses was delivering an explanation to a station clerk.

  “As a precaution, we will place an orchestra member in the freight car. Thank you for your cooperation.”

  “Huh? I’m terribly sorry, but that isn’t a decision I can make on my own…”

  The clerk was at a loss. The man who was negotiating took out a single permit.

  “We received permission from the company in advance. If you’d like, you may conduct rigorous physical searches in New York, but…”

  “Oh, no, if you’ve got permission, there won’t be any problem, sir.”

  After exchanging a few more words, the orchestra loaded large crates and parcels one after another. Upon confirming that the contents of the large crates were timpani and horns, the luggage checks also ended safely.

  If it hadn’t been just before departure, and they’d checked the freight more carefully, or if the clerk had been slightly more competent, they might have noticed.

  That the packing material meant to cushion the instruments against impacts included large amounts of ammunition. That all sorts of weapons were hidden beneath false bottoms. That the permit from the company was an outright forgery.

  However, even if they’d been suspected, it wouldn’t have been a problem. They had many other alternate methods ready.

  That was how the Lemures, disguised as an orchestra, managed to carry a vast amount of equipment right onto the train.

  “Look, Miria! It’s a symphony, an orchestra! Mozart! Paul Dukas!”

  “Yes, Beethoven!”

  Seeing the black suits loading their instruments in front of a freight car, Isaac’s and Miria’s spirits soared much higher than was really necessary.

  In contrast, one man was looking terribly worried as he watched the proceedings.

  “Wh-what’ll we do, what’ll we do? It sounds like they’re putting a guard in the freight room…”

  Had their plan fallen through already? Jacuzzi, his face tearful, pleaded with Nice.

  “It’s fine. It looks as though the cargo we’re after is in another compartment.”

  “B-but…”

  “Ruh, relax. I do…something, about guard.”

  Donny thumped his chest enthusiastically, and Jacuzzi gave a shriek:

  “Nuh-nuh-no, no, no, no, NO! If you do something about them, they’ll die, Donny!”

  “It’s fine, leave to me. Probably.”

  “‘Probably’ is not good enough!”

  As Jacuzzi panicked more than was really necessary, a light impact ran through his back.

  When he gave a small scream and turned around, he saw a boy of about ten who was staggering a bit.

  The boy regained his balance almost immediately, looked straight at Jacuzzi’s face with its large tattoo, and—

  “I-I’m sorry! I wasn’t looking where I was going, and I just…”

  —apologized, bowing his head slightly.

  “Oh, sure, it’s fine. It’s okay. It’s my fault; I shouldn’t have been in the middle of the road like this. What about you? Are you okay?”

  The young man with the tattoo gave a kind smile, and the kid smiled back at him happily.

  “Uh-huh! Thank you, mister!”

  With that, he bowed one more time, then ran off toward the entrance to the second-class passenger compartments.

  “Aww, how cute! Say, listen, did you see that kid? He was just like Jacuzzi when he was little!”

  “Stop, you’re making me blush.”

  “You’re still cute now, though, Jacuzzi.”

  “Eh-heh-heh… Seriously, quit.”

  As Jacuzzi looked down, embarrassed, Donny got in an uncalled-for verbal jab.

  “Aah, Jacuzzi. She say you cute at your age, even though you guy. She making fun of you, right?”

  Once again looking as if he was about to burst into tears, Jacuzzi boarded the train, heading for their third-class compartment with his companions.

  At the same time, Ladd’s white-clad group boarded a second-class carriage, taking only hand luggage.

  “All righty! Second-class compartments are great, yeah? Not at the bottom, not at the top; it’s a really half-assed place, and I love it! It’s like, gray bats swinging in space, see?”

  That said, the second-class carriages on this luxury train were fairly posh in their own right, and on an ordinary train, they would easily have passed as first-class cars.

  “I wonder what sort of rich fat cats ride first class in a place like this? Ah, I guess one’s that orchestra of black suits, huh… It’s pretty nifty how they contrast with our duds. I wonder who else is in there; did anybody see?”

  One of Ladd’s friends responded:

  “I saw a mother and daughter get on a minute ago.”

  “Nn? You mean a lady and a girl? That don’t necessarily mean they’re mother and daughter.”

  “No, I recognized th
eir faces.”

  “Oh, yeah?”

  Possibly out of interest, Ladd stopped and waited for his subordinate to speak.

  “I saw them in the papers. I’m pretty sure they were Senator Beriam’s wife and daughter.”

  Senator Beriam. He was a powerful senator who was involved with the anticrime measures that had accompanied the Depression, and who was often mentioned in newspapers and on the radio these days.

  Ladd seemed to like that answer enormously: His face twisted into a happy grin.

  “Oho. The senator’s, hmm? I bet they’re really enjoying life. Riding in their first-class compartment… I bet they think they’re gonna have a real safe trip.”

  His eyes were like those of a dog confronted with a feast, and his lips warped further and further.

  “Sounds like we’ve got our first victims all picked out for us, huh?”

  Just then, the door at the front of the car rattled open. Ladd’s group was standing in the middle of the corridor, and they involuntarily looked that way.

  The person standing there was swathed from head to toe in gray cloth.

  He wore a gray coat over gray clothes, had a gray cloth wrapped around his head, and a thick muffler covered the lower part of his face, hiding it. His eyes were in the shadow of the cloth, and it wasn’t possible to discern their attitude from the front.

  Closing the door quietly with hands encased in thin gloves, he walked right past Ladd and the others, who watched him suspiciously.

  After the man had exited into the next car, one of Ladd’s men spoke, an expression of relief on his face:

  “What the hell was that, huh?”

  “It looked like the kinda magician that shows up in operas and stuff.”

  Completely ignoring their own clothes, they whispered together about the man, whose costume had been far too eerie.

  In the midst of this, only Ladd’s heart danced with onrushing expectations and unease for the journey.

  “Interesting, man oh man is this interesting. An orchestra, a senator’s family, and a magician? Great, that’s great—it’s variation like that that makes fun fun. In the end, the source is the same, but there’s nothing wrong with having several kinds of sauce, yeah?”