Tornado Pratt

by Paul Ableman

  By that time Horace, the sun was high and the buzz and clatter of Chicago rose from the streets. I stood up. Pony looked concerned:

  “Hell, you can’t go now. Tornado.”

  “Sure, I can.”

  “Everyone says: Pratt takes what he wants.”

  “What am I supposed to want?”

  “Me. You want me.”

  “The hell I do.”

  Of course now I can see, Horace, the reason I got so mad was because maybe there was an element of truth in what he said. I mean, why didn’t I just pull out? I was pretty smashed but I could have found my way to the door. Instead, I just stood there, swaying, and listening to Pony’s jibes.

  “Maybe you’re chicken. Maybe that’s what nobody figured yet. Yeah, that would figure—a guy like you.”

  He kept hinting at disreputable things, Horace, or so it seemed to my addled brains. It irritated me because I couldn’t see what he was getting at. Now I figure he was doing it deliberately—cleverly working me up into a fury, like the picadors do with the bull. Or maybe like the giant. The after-image I have of that fearful morning, Horace, is of me planted like the giant in a fairy tale, glaring from side to side, beneath the flaring beams of the lifting sun, while a sprite or pixie, with Pony’s square face and fetching grin, swoops about, banging me with his small, hard club or firing painful arrows into me. Finally, he said something stunningly obscene about Harvey—about his being a faggot—and with just enough truth in it to make me wild. I gazed at the malice and mockery in his eyes and, remembering how touching he’d been when he was telling about his life, I shook my head in wonder. I said:

  “You—bastard.”

  “Oh, go fuck yourself, Pratt! You’re not kidding anyone. You’ve drunk a few gallons of spunk in your time.”

  So, finally, Horace, I went to hit him. I didn’t swing back—didn’t telegraph anything—but just jabbed from the hip and that jab should have connected with the midget’s Jaw. But it didn’t. He somehow wasn’t there and the force of the punch took me lurching forwards a step or two. Remember I was canned. But Pony didn’t seem as drunk as he should have been considering how much Irish whiskey he’d swallowed. I heard a disapproving click behind me, swung round to take another poke at him and found him standing steady as a rock, and holding an automatic pistol that was pointed at my belly. Amazed, I muttered:

  “Gun—”

  Pony grinned.

  “That’s right, Tornado, it’s a gun. It’s a Browning .38 if you like technical details. Hey, guess what I’m going to do with it? I’m going to shoot slugs into you until you roll over from the weight of lead in your belly.”

  It was crazy, Horace. There was no conceivable reason for Roach to want to kill me. At least—just as I thought that, a whole network of possible reasons lit up in my mind: people I’d slighted, husbands of women I’d seduced, businessmen I’d outsmarted—hell, yes, there might be all kinds of people in Chicago who’d pay a hood for my corpse. Yeah, but hell! Pony hadn’t known I was going to visit him. It was just too hell of a big coincidence to assume that I’d walked in on my hired executioner. I blinked and said:

  “Put it away, Pony.”

  I tried to sound indifferent but Pony just grinned again.

  “Still giving orders, Pratt? But shit, man, I’m not one of your flunkeys. So—sit down!”

  The last two words were barked so sharply, Horace, that I automatically obeyed. And the calm, wary thought glowed in my brain: he wants to kill me.

  He stood there grinning, perhaps two feet away and, because he was so small, his head only slightly higher than mine. His automatic was held loosely, at an angle to the ground and it looked like he hadn’t much control. But I knew that Roach had out-fought and killed Charley Guzman, that he’d ambushed single-handed three of Mazetti’s boys and left them dead or dying. I’d heard that he practised for at least half an hour every day and that, to amuse people, he’d do tricks like shoot the hump off the camel on the cigarette pack at ten yards. I figured Pony’s aim was to make me reckless but, I suspected, just the fraction of an aggressive move from me would have activated him like some super-sensitive alarm system. His gun would have flicked towards me and I’d have—died. That’s haw I had it figured at the time. Now? Well, I reckon Pony’s motive was to make me think those things but now I also know he wasn’t aiming to kill me. But as for what he was aiming at—I still don’t know what really happened that red morning.

  He started to give me a rough time. He called me a rat. That hurt because I wasn’t a rat in those days. Maybe I never have been a rat but—yeah—I guess down in Peru I was certainly a rat and—okay, I’ve left rat’s droppings in other stables of the world but then—in Chicago when I was a burning globe of benign bustle—calling me a rat! How did he justify it—I can’t remember: said I was a rat with women or a rat in business. Yeah, he had some facts, garbled facts about—Jewish factory owner—or something—

  The point is, I didn’t get too mad or depressed at first because I was pretty sure of myself, but then he snarled:

  “We’re going to teach you a lesson, Pratt. We’re going to put you in a cage like the rat you are and we’re going to bring all the guys and dames who hate your guts and let them do what they want to you. A lot of them are just going to get up on that cage and shit on you. We’re going to give them all knives but we won’t let them get at you—not at first—they’ll just be able to throw the knives.”

  On and on he went. And gradually my ironic amusement waned and, through half-closed eyes, I began to watch closely for my chance. But a moment came when I didn’t think I was going to get one. Pony suddenly broke off his filthy speech, shrugged, raised the black gun and said:

  “The hell with it. You’re going to get yours now, Pratt.”

  And pulled the trigger. I could feel the blood flee my face and a little whirlpool of dismay swirl in my brain. But I went on feeling it and for that reason knew that something was wrong—or right. The gun hadn’t gone “bang”. It had gone “click”. Then I registered Pony’s face. It had a wide grin on it and the gun was coming apart in his hands.

  “Empty,” he explained and I saw the butt was hollow.

  I shrugged to let the world back into my body and began to rise. Pony stopped grinning and an anxious look sprang into his face. He took a step back.

  “Aw, come on, Tornado. You can take a joke.”

  I didn’t say anything, Horace, but I guess I must have looked fearsome. I advanced on Pony Roach. Now he darted round the drinks-trolley, begging and pleading.

  “It was only a gag. What’s wrong with you? Tornado? We’re buddies. Okay, maybe I went too far. Forget it. Now, I’m warning you, Pratt—”

  But he was backing up all the time. I wasn’t in any hurry. No one, but no one, had done a thing like that to Tornado Pratt before and I intended to pound Roach until his bones cracked. I kept my back to the terrace door and stalked him ponderously like a monster in a movie. He dashed from side to side—yeah, like a cornered rat, appealing repeatedly to my sense of humour. But there wasn’t a laugh in me. Soon I had him trapped in a corner of the terrace. He glanced about desperately and then hopped up on to a concrete tub. I took another step forwards. He babbled:

  “It went too far, that’s all. I apologize, okay? Look, pal, just forget it this time—”

  And then suddenly I froze, Horace, for Pony had made another little leap and a flash of sanity showed me he was now perched on the parapet thirty floors above Chicago. I cooled off immediately and shouted:

  “Roach! For Christ’s sake—”

  And he was gone. I blinked in amazement. I was suddenly alone on the terrace. Far below cars were honking in jammed streets. For a moment, dazed, my eyes followed the dip of a circling gull and then I stumbled forwards to the parapet. There hadn’t been a sound. In movies when people fall off cliffs or roofs there’s always a long, dissolving cry. So could be he was still kidding around. Sure that was it! There must be another terrace beyond
the parapet, or a wide ledge or—

  But I gazed straight down into the canyon. Streams of insects crawled along its bottom, oblong ones in the middle going faster than the dots at the sides. And something was wrong with the flow. The streams weren’t moving evenly as they should be. Immediately below me was a disturbance, a little vortex, and I could guess at the red, shapeless thing that marked its centre.

  So why? I can fit this or that explanation to the facts but none of them are snug. About five years later, I heard by chance that Roach had been Vasari’s boy-friend and that the big man, trying to go erotically straight as he did from time to time, had given the little man the push. Fits—to some extent—but it’s not snug. Always there are pockets at the edges and the only thing I’ve had to fill them with is guilt. Did I, in some crazy, American way, murder Pony Roach? Okay, Horace, I admit I never lost a lot of sleep over it. For maybe five years, after the initial shock, I never even thought about it much. But nothing gets lost and a lifetime is long enough to chew out all the juices, bitter and sweet, of every mouthful of living.

  PRATT PLUMMETS

  So then—something was going on and—there was—something—Give me a boost, boy! I—yeah, it’s coming back. Those hard years. Did I—yeah, I did, didn’t I? Tell you about Wheatear? This tramp I knocked about with—that’s not true, Horace. It was more than that. When I walked out of Chicago—and I walked out—after having my eschatological revelation—look it up—I was death-bound. I was heading for the lip of night, seeking my slab because I had concluded that I was pollution. Nat had turned into an angel in my recollection and although the living girl had been sunshine and wings, she’d been human too, Horace. With faults. Not a bright nucleus decked in human form. But when I contemplated Tornado Pratt, making money and squeezed dry of love, I wanted to escape him. And hand me this, boy. I’ve got guts because I stuck it for several years and I never did go back to my fortune. I made another one—but that was later.

  When I walked out of Chicago, the only plan I had was to stay away for at least a year. I figured that would be long enough to atone. I walked out through an endless slum, with cats sniffing in the garbage. Grey-faced wrecks were clustered around steaming barrows, fingering dimes and gazing hungrily at the knishes and hot dogs. Jubilant kids danced around with slabs of pizza and orange sodas, kicking out at smaller kids who begged for a share. I saw one girl of about twelve, in a red dress, clutching a popsicle and spitting repeatedly at a grimy infant trotting hopefully beside her. Junkies, coke-heads, every kind of mind-twisted derelict was milling in that crowd. Winos were stretched puking in the gutter with rats tugging at their fly buttons. In second-floor windows grim black whores, in low-cut dresses, sat clucking invitations. Hustlers and hoods breasted the throng, trawling with outstretched claws for graft. And from that maggot heap of American citizens issued unending yells of: “dirty Kike!” “lousy Mick!” “stinking Polack!” “goddamn Wop!”

  A week later I was sitting in the town square of a little place in Kentucky and down to my last five bucks. Just then a guy asked me for five bucks. He was a strong, good-looking man with a brown, bushy beard, buckskin pants and blue t-shirt and he just said:

  “Could you spare five dollars?”

  Hell of a funny thing, Horace, but when he said that I felt a flicker of panic. Five bucks! All the money I had in the world. I saw myself stretched in a ditch while the rain drummed down. I saw myself reduced, by hunger, to crawling along the highway, too feeble to dodge traffic. I asked:

  “Why five dollars?”

  “Oh, I can give you a receipt for it. I can prove my address. It’s up in Massachusetts.”

  “Why’d you ask for five dollars? Why that amount?”

  “That’s what I need to make up my bus fare.”

  He explained that he worked on a farm up North and some family concern had brought him spinning down South and he hadn’t left himself enough to get back. He just wanted a loan of five bucks. My panic abated and a light-hearted feeling infused me. This was the chance to take the plunge.

  “It so happens I can oblige you, stranger.”

  And I handed him my last five bucks. I gave him a phoney name and address for the IOU but I took down his real address, figuring it just might come in useful. Besides, I had a feeling of respect for that guy, even after ten minutes conversation. Perhaps, one day I’d offer him a job—then I smiled, Horace, because the businessman inside me just wouldn’t lie down.

  But he took quite a beating over the next week. I didn’t exactly starve and I didn’t quite get drowned in a ditch but I lived pretty rough. I ate yams, tugged from the fields, and bread bought with the odd quarter I earned chopping wood and sweeping.

  Then one day, I was hungry and hot and there was nothing to be seen but fields and trees and I thought to myself: what the hell am I trying to prove? I can get by. I’ve already proved that. So why stick it for a year and maybe get some skin disease (as a kid I’d seen a horrible picture of lepers) and ruin my life? And then I thought of the house in Chicago and a whole cascade of enticing memories followed: of Paris and London, of good friends who’d welcome me to their opulent estates and ranches, of glamourous restaurants, of sleek swimming pools and—I started to walk faster. I figured I’d make it to the next town, phone Harvey collect and get him to cable me a thousand bucks and then I’d head for home.

  I walked so fast, breaking into a run now and then, that I wore myself out and by the time I came in sight of the town, I was bushed. So I sat down for a minute, under a tree, to get my breath and after I’d been sitting there a spell I heard a funny sound. It made me jump because it was so weird, and I reached down for my stick. I imagined that it was the panting of a wild animal. What animal? Wolf? Wildcat? But there was nothing savage in this neck of the woods. Maybe it was a big mad dog—I backed away easy and when I could see between the bushes I saw that it was a man. He was laid face down on the ground and sobbing. The whistle of his breath had made me think of an animal panting. What the hell!

  I eased up to him. He was a big guy, nearly as big as me but maybe five years younger. He looked like a bum with long, matted brown hair and that’s all I could see. I asked:

  “Anything wrong?”

  And that made him freeze. He stopped sobbing and he stopped breathing. For what seemed a long time he just lay there still as a corpse. I squatted down beside him, reached out and touched his shoulder, saying:

  “Hey—”

  And he turned into a wildcat. He rolled over and, in the same movement, jack-knifed his legs and propelled himself at me. It was so sudden, I went down on my back with him on top and the next minute we were struggling like enemies. I saw trees whipping past and then I was eating dirt. I heaved and felt him give. I squirmed round and jumped on him. Then, hugging like lovers, we rolled into some weeds. Soon, I realized something. He was fighting like a machine but he wasn’t trying to hurt me. He’d had a couple of chances to swing hard but instead he’d just shaken me. I, on the other hand, had connected solidly with his face, squirting a moan out of him. It was clear that I had a big edge. I was heavier and stronger so I just settled for gradually working him beneath me until finally I was crouched on his chest, my knees on his biceps and my hands pinning his lower arms and, very wisely, he yielded and his body relaxed. I looked down on a very winning face, tanned, intelligent, somewhat lined but youthful. In spite of his long hair, he was clean shaven. I asked:

  “Are you crazy?”

  He shook his head.

  “If I let you up, will you jump me again?”

  Again he shook his head. So I waited a moment, to see if he’d tense up, and then I jumped to my feet ready for any further attack. But he kept his word. He sat up and shrugged. But he didn’t seem as if he was going to speak. So I asked:

  “You always greet people like that?”

  “I never done that before.”

  “Then what was it all about?”

  “I guess I meant to hurt you—for once.”


  “How do you mean ‘for once’? I’ve never seen you before.”

  “I wanted to hurt someone. I got mad. I guess maybe that’s the first time I ever really got mad. You know something—that’s the first fight I ever had.”

  That seemed pretty incredible. He continued:

  “I mean, normally I just get picked on. I’m always getting picked on.”

  He started to breathe deep again and I could see that sobs were near. I suddenly sensed what a gentle spirit this was. I said soothingly:

  “Tell me about it.”

  “I was just—I guess—desperate. I think maybe I was hoping you’d kill me.”

  “Now, look here, youngster, don’t blaspheme. The gift of life is not something to be treated lightly.”

  “Maybe not for you.”

  “Not for anyone. Why I’ve never known a man who was talked out of committing suicide and who didn’t live to thank the Lord for the happiness that later came to him. So you see, son, even when things seem blackest—”

  Which must be some kind of horseshit out of a movie. That wasn’t how I met Austin Turner. Then how did I meet him? What the hell does it matter? If I say that’s how I met him, then that’s how it was. Who can contradict me? And if someone did contradict me—say, maybe, Austin is still around and finds out I said I met him in a particular way and contradicts it in public—so what? Suppose he claims I met him on the back of a truck, that doesn’t make it true. It’s just words. Even if we did meet on the back of a truck, when he says we met there it’s just an invention exactly the way it is when I say we met having a fight. Except that I know we didn’t meet that way. What does it matter how we met? Suppose I said I saved him from a mad dog—shit! That’s how we did meet! Except it wasn’t a mad dog, but just a mutt. Now I’ve got it straight.