I shouted, “Hold it,” hiked up the dress, and sprinted toward the men who were dragging Short and Tall out of the smoking wreckage.
George the Blood Clot cussed up a blue streak in the middle of the alley, a gun in one hand and a handkerchief stuffed into the wideness of his bleeding nostril. He bellowed to his men to bring Short and Tall to him. Pinned behind the wheel of the crumpled sedan, barely conscious, Tall was dragged out last and dumped, like rubbish, to the ground.
Short lay in the street and screamed like a banshee. He clutched his left leg with one hand and clawed the ground with the other. George, with his sensitive self, kicked the man’s broken leg, then jammed his gun into Short’s ear, ready to waste him when I shouted, “George, the point is to get back the money. How we going to do that if he’s dead?”
George froze. The wheels ground slowly in his head and I smelled the smoke. “If they’re dead, how’s that gonna happen, huh?” I repeated.
Short looked up at me and snarled, “You double-crossing son of a bitching ...” He took in my attire and screamed, “... Faggot!”
Payback time. Now I knew how Wilbur felt—a painful moment. I looked down at the man, sanding his nails on the cobbled bricks, and said, “Never mind, George, shoot the bastard.”
Short screamed.
“Sticks and stones, motherfucker, ain’t gonna get you nowhere. Harry ain’t doing business with you no more,” I said.
Where’d that come from? Was I entitled to speak for Harry? Hell, Harry dubbed me a duke, who better? The bottom line, Harry wasn’t there to argue.
And then I bent down and drawled in his ear, “Your shit was poison, see? Harry wants his money back.”
George stood nearby, agitated. George didn’t like secrets, so I said loudly, “That’s right. Harry wants his money back. If I was you, man, I’d cooperate and tell George here everything he wants to know, and I’d end each and every sentence with a please, thank-you, or sir.”
George smiled at that. Everyone likes a little respect. With dead eyes, George shot a round into the brick next to Short’s pinkie finger, the one that was clawing, and clumps flew up into Short’s face. Short’s body jerked, and he hollered loud, long, and strong.
Tall came to, raised himself up, checked out what was happening, and passed out again.
“Where the money?” George said, over Short’s screams.
Between screams and when he could catch a bit of air, Short called me some really nasty names. I got even and gave him a good one for Seltzer. I applied pressure to his broken leg with my foot and heard more bones snap. His scream was horrendous, but he deserved it.
George got jealous, pushed me out of the way, and took over the torture. And, I have to admit, George was more focused about it. He demanded that Short tell him where the money was while he inflicted pain, which made me happy, I can tell you, because he ignored Short’s accusations leveled at me. In true gangster fashion George prepared to beat the information out of Short.
And I stood by, watching justice at work. See, Short had made a big mistake when he knocked George out night before last, and George wasn’t forgetting it. And I wasn’t forgetting that George had knocked me out last night.
Everybody was getting theirs. Payback is a bitch, ain’t it?
In no time at all, Short sang like a canary bird. He mentioned a boat, a slip number, and where the money was stashed. Well, my job was done. Time to split.
I walked over to Stepchild. She looked like somebody’s foster child now, her chassis in horrible condition, all bent and warped. I prepared to give her last rites, and without much hope, I climbed into the car on the passenger side and patted and stroked her dashboard. On an impulse, I inserted the key in the ignition. Hot damn, her old engine roared to life, and Foster Child hummed and purred like a pussy.
And then I was dragged out of the car, my wrists tied with someone’s belt, and thrown into another limping car and we headed to the docks. George wasn’t through with me yet.
Chapter 44
In the marina only a few boats bumped hulls against the dock, their owners absent. The rest of the boats had gone to join the Tall Ships, celebrants in the bicentennial armada that filled the harbor—Operation Sail a roaring success. Fireworks burst in the air, and sizzled and spurted, lighting up the Manhattan skyline and bringing sight and sound to this deserted Bronx inlet and this thirty-two-foot cabin cruiser in which I was currently imprisoned.
Short lay moaning on a bunk against the wall. George had discovered the booze early on and him and his men worked on three bottles of gin, scotch, and vodka sitting on top of the kitchenette’s counter. Me and Tall were handcuffed to each other—and believe me, neither of us was happy about that.
Tall’s breath smelled like rank garbage, and we sat facing each other across a dinette table, two sets of cuffs locking us together. George’s brain had short-circuited, a trust issue, I think, and he wasn’t letting me go. Where was Bundt when I needed him?
George and two of his men stayed belowdecks to guard us—it was crowded—and four more wandered above us, oohing and ahing at the fireworks and playing with the boat’s engine. Every so often the boat’s motor came to life, sputtered, then died out, and the Clots had great fun laughing and carrying on.
You can bet I didn’t see the humor. On this Fourth of July, with everyone celebrating freedom, I had just lost mine, and suspected my life was pretty much in jeopardy as well.
So far George had trashed the cabin in an unorganized search and come up with only twenty keys of heroin and no money. I’d bet there was more, but I was prevented from joining in the search by the manacles on my wrist. Besides, George didn’t deserve my cooperation after the way he treated me.
Tall started negotiating. “Look, if my partner and I don’t report in soon, somebody’s going to start looking for us. Kidnapping federal agents? Life without the possibility of parole. They’ll bury you under the jail.”
“Yeah?” said George. “And what if them agents get killed and can’t nobody find their bodies? How much we get for that?”
Tall squirmed in his seat. “You got the heroin. What else do you want?”
“Where the money? Anyway, this one say the H is no good. What you got to say about that?”
“This one”—Tall indicated me and jerked my wrist—“is lying. There’s nothing wrong with the dope. And I told you, I don’t keep money on board. For what? The money’s deposited in a bank.”
I kept my mouth shut, but I doubted he was telling the truth. In the bank, ha! George looked at me the way you’d study a bug and said, “One way to find out.”
He tore open a bag of heroin and sniffed. Then he rubbed it between his fingers. Then he whispered to his Clots and the two disappeared. George stood, hunched over, in the alcove of the small kitchenette and waited.
A few minutes passed, and then Tall asked, “What are we waiting for?”
“Syringe.” And then George smiled.
Tall and I got it at the same time. No peep out of Short, he was wrapped up in pain.
“You’re not going to inject us with that shit, are you?” Tall said.
I jumped in with my two cents, and winked at George. “If it ain’t poison, what’s the big deal? A little nod, and it’s over with.”
“Are you out of your mind? These idiots might kill us with an overdose and still not know if the skag was good or not.”
I leaned toward George. “You know, George, he’s got a point. Better give those two just a little pop.”
George rested his pudgy hands on his belly and said, “Gone give you all a pop. How you like that? Know soon enough who’s lying.”
I blanched. He was serious. “George. You ain’t thinking right. Harry ain’t going to like it if his duke gets offed. Better check with him before you do anything rash.”
The smile on George’s face twisted and turned mean. “You ain’t a duke yet.”
I’ll be damned, I thought, George is jealous—of me. Tall got hyste
rical and tried to climb out of his seat, but to do it he had to drag me with him and it wasn’t happening. George backhanded him, and he crashed back onto the bench.
Down the stairs came a skinny Clot, paraphernalia in hand. He set about—all businesslike—preparing the stuff, cooked it over a burner on the cabin’s stove, and then he wrapped a belt around Short’s arm, and Short got the first injection. Probably a relief to Short, who, earlier, had been groveling in pain on the bunk.
Next they shot up Tall and he didn’t go down without a struggle. Whadda ya know? He probably believed the stuff was poison too. It took a minute before Tall’s eyes glazed over and he relaxed into his seat.
Mind over matter. I licked my lips and started my own negotiating. “Look, George, it’d look bad for a fellow countryman to be found dead with a dress on. Not good for our image.” Owning up to the fact I was part Monkey Chaser was not as difficult as I thought. Acceptance, when you know the truth, didn’t have to be a pill to swallow. I shook my head, to focus on the now. “How about you let me take this dress off?”
A puzzled look started in George’s forehead and moved to his eyes. He nodded, hauled me up, and roughly pulled the dress over my head and down my arms. Then he suddenly realized he’d have to uncuff me to finish the job. He searched Tall’s pockets for the keys, dangled them in the air at me, and then threw them across the room. Okay, to be honest I didn’t think he’d go for it, but hey, I had to try. George signaled to the skinny Clot; he belted me up and I steeled myself for the needle.
Mind over matter. Nothing and nobody could touch me. I felt it when it hit—hands pulled me down into a long, dark tunnel. Across the table Tall started heaving and dry-retching. George jumped into action, undid one of the cuffs, and hauled Tall to the tiny bathroom, me stumbling after, and stuffed Tall’s head in the toilet. Just in time, the vomit exploded out of Tall, and George jumped over me to miss it. I slumped on the floor with my back against the door, waves of peace and contentment rippling through my body. No wonder junkies liked this, I thought. I tried to focus and keep my mind sharp, but I lost it and drifted down a river.
I was moving down a river. When I opened my eyes, I felt the movement of the boat, the hum of the engine. No Clots in the cabin—their shouts and laughter rang out up on the deck. Tall’s head rested against the commode, his body stuffed into the small space, one long leg bent under the sink and the other one stretched out the door and laid across my crotch. I moved his skinny leg and thumped his shoulder to bring him around. No luck.
I struggled to my feet, still dizzy and in a twilight zone, and grabbed him and dragged him with me over to a porthole and looked out. The boat was speeding across the water. No surrounding boats were going this fast. What the fuck—the Clots were joyriding? Surely this boat would be stopped.
Band music played nearby. I moved to the opposite porthole. Jesus. We were in Lower Manhattan. The carrier USS Forrestal was all lit up—we were about a mile from the dock. Limbs heavy, I fought to remain alert and searched the cabin for the keys to the handcuffs. Then I tried both Short’s and Tall’s pocket again. Nothing. I looked up. George must have taken them.
The drug kept trying to take over my body. I didn’t let it. I weighed more than the other two—maybe that was the reason. I stumbled about the cabin, searching for life jackets. I found six of them in a hatch above the galley. I unrolled two, and what did I find in the pockets of one of the vests? Money, that’s what. Lots and lots of it. Way more than a hundred thousand, I’d bet my watch. I wrapped the vest around me and buckled it tight. Then I put another vest on top of that one—as best I was able, since only one arm could go through. I secured it, hoping to hell it wouldn’t come off. Then I put a life jacket on Tall.
The Clots caroused above me. They sang, “Oh, say, can you see?” while the band played.
I was inflating Tall’s vest when out of the corner of my eye I noticed Winnie’s purse lying on the floor under the dinette table. Hoping against hope, I reached for it and opened it. The guns were there. No one had bothered to look inside. Thank you, God. I just became a believer. I took the loaded one, Harry’s 35 mm, and stuffed it in the top of the vest.
Then I hauled Tall to his knees and slapped his cheeks a few times. He needed to be on his feet if we were going to do this.
I kept my voice low. “Listen, Mr. DEA Dope Dealer, if you want to get out of this alive, you’d better follow instructions. You have to make it up those stairs, hear me?” I shook him hard. “You have to.”
His eyes rolled around in his head, but he seemed to know what I was saying. I pulled him to his feet. He leaned against me. This wasn’t going to work. “Damn it, stand up,” I hissed. I shook him again. “We’re going up those stairs and when we get to the top, we have to jump overboard, hear me?”
He nodded, he understood. But then he looked over at his partner; I snapped his head back around again. “If we get out alive, maybe we can help him. But for now we got to leave him.”
I moved to the bottom of the steps and he followed on his own steam, then began to wilt to the floor. I grabbed him by the collar and held him up. I pulled him up the stairs, gun poised in front of me, ready to shoot. “Let’s go,” I shouted and fired four rounds as I broke through the opening at the top of the stairs.
The Clots were slow to react. George reached clumsily for his gun, and two Clots hit the deck. The others bumped into each other, confused. I fired another round, dropped the gun, grabbed Tall by the shoulders, and heaved him over the edge of the boat. He sailed through the air and I sailed after, both of us plunging into the cold waters of the Hudson.
Chapter 45
The Hudson River animated both of us. The water shocked us and got our attention. We floundered in the backwash from the craft vessel, gulping for air and spitting out river water. Bound together, we had no choice but to cooperate with each other. After some tentative tries we got our act together and began stroking through the water in rhythm. A yacht two hundred feet away with music coming from it had couples dancing on its deck, watching the fireworks, heads tilted toward the night sky. Our shouts went unheard over the music, and the yacht was moving away from us. To our left a cabin cruiser, the Tilloo III, larger than the one we had left, was being piloted by a bearded man sitting high up on its bridge and about the same distance away, but this vessel was moving toward us. Without words Tall and I made the decision at the same time and we swam toward it.
All the boats traveled in the same direction down the river—all of them, except the boat we had just leaped from. It made a wide circle in the water and was now coming back for us. I could see its name across the left bow, the Money Changer.
Tall and I put on as much steam as we could muster, stroking faster and faster, but the waves from the oncoming vessel lapped over us, submerging us time and again. We were directly in its path and had to get to the other side—put it between us and the Clots. Tall was near drowned and so was I, but I kept fighting to get to the lee side of Tilloo III.
Gunshots popped in the air behind us. “C’mon, asshole, stroke,” I yelled to Tall. Tilloo III slowed; its owner blasted its horn and yelled through a megaphone to the Clots to turn their boat around. The Clots ignored him. Other boats noticed the offending boat and joined in the act. They too called, honked, and chastised.
What the Clots didn’t want was to call attention to themselves. They veered the boat around once more and headed back down the Hudson. Tall and I made it to the other side of the Tilloo and waved our arms and shouted, lungs bursting with the effort. Tilloo’s owner spied us in the water, idled his engine, and threw out two life preservers. A woman appeared at the boat’s railing and helped to haul us in.
We flopped on the deck of the Tilloo like two spent sharks. The woman shrieked when she noticed the handcuffs, and the man immediately grabbed a gaff and held it overhead—to protect himself, I guess, from two handcuffed men.
Tall and I pointed accusing fingers at each other and the couple’s gazes
jerked back and forth between the two of us as if they were watching a Ping-Pong match.
Finally, Tall dug inside his jacket and pulled out his badge. The couple was impressed, I could tell, and cast dark looks at me as if I were a serial killer or something. Graybeard shifted his body and pointed the gaff at my chest.
“Hold it,” I said. “If you don’t believe me, call the Twenty-eighth Precinct, ask to speak to Detective Bundt. He’ll straighten this out. This man is a criminal.”
Tall spoke up, authority in his voice. “Get me something to break these handcuffs. I’m a federal agent with the Drug Enforcement Agency and this man is my prisoner. I’ll need to use your radio.” Graybeard hesitated for an instant, but Wifey disappeared below and returned within minutes with a gun, leveled at me. Guess a suit and a badge beats out a nigger in his underwear any day. Should I have been surprised?
Her hands shook and I thought, Don’t let her hiccup. Her husband found a hammer and placed the boat’s anchor between us and hammered on the cuffs with all his might. It took a while, but they finally split.
Tall got up, eased the gun out of Wifey’s hand, and said, “I’m taking over. Stand back, all of you.”
Oh, shit no ... out of the frying pan into the ... I lunged at Tall’s knees, knocked him over, and he hit his head. I didn’t wait. I leaped, once again, into the breach and over the side, and this time, made it to shore.
I scaled rocks, people in the crowd lifted me to safety, and I disappeared quickly among the thousands of people that lined the pier.
Chapter 46
I loved New York. Dressed as I was in a life vest, with only my undershirt on and wet pants, and half of a handcuff attached to my left hand, nobody looked at me twice as I walked the streets in search of a phone booth. When I found one that wasn’t broken, I stopped a passing teenager and exchanged a fifty I had pulled out of the vest for some change.
Hard Luck And Trouble Page 18
