He had to figure where they would go. To Tom-Tom’s? Not likely. The baby-faced soda clerk would probably close early, having heard about the trouble Friday night. He would want no difficulty so soon after a hot period like that. To someone’s home? Possibly, if the kid could get his parents out of the apartment. But that was still dubious, because a war council usually turned into an orgy—as did most club gatherings. The garage? Not again. Fedakowski who owned it had taken to carrying a Stillson wrench since the kids had been coming around. And he was too big and Polish to be screwing around with.
Rusty slumped down on a standpipe for a minute, and let his mind kick the ideas around. Where would they be? Finally he had two possible answers.
They were either on the roof at Fish’s building, which faced on an empty lot and was pretty well secluded or they were in the condemned warehouse on Wharton Street.
He checked the first out, and it was silent, black, with the silhouettes of pigeon coops among the TV antenna tendrils. The Cougars were not “high” on the roof tonight.
But they were in the warehouse.
They had put blankets up around the broken windows on the third floor, but Rusty was not a cop walking the beat and ignoring a warehouse about to be torn down. He was a member of that select clan of delinquents who knew what he was looking for and where to go to find it. They were having a war council in the guts of what had been a toy factory—till the building was done dirty by the man who owned it, who had it planted for arson, who had the insides fire-gutted and then got nabbed for the job—and they were after Cherokee hide. They were gonna get it too, sure as lights light and breath goes in and out. Rusty made it by the back way, up the stairs, close to the wall, so the steps didn’t creak and let on he was upcoming. Halfway up, the stairs just quit and charred planks ran across. He went back down a ways, and climbed into a hole burnt through the wall. The structural boards were somehow still there, and he walked inside the wall, past the spot where the stairs were gone, though he almost took a header three times.
Finally he made the right floor, and climbed back out through another hole, just below the door level. He stopped on the stairs, and saw a thin wash of dim yellow light under the ajar door. Another gloss of yellow watered down the right-hand wall, where the door was partways open.
He crouched down, and stuck his ear close to the opening, to listen.
He could hear them, clear and smooth, and right down the line, the way it had been when he had been Prez.
“Now, who wants to be War Councilor?” It was Candle, being the big wheel, as per usual.
A mumbled jumbling of high and medium voices, and finally Boy-O’s watery piping. “Hey, Jack! Lemme go, I wanna be a hero this time.” Laughter filled the room.
Then Candle Shaster’s voice rose up above the babble, annoyed and peremptory. “Shaddup. You just wanna go up there to peddle your snuff. They’d cut you up and drop ya down a manhole. Shaddup!”
Boy-O said something frail and the laughter rose again. Someone chimed in with another remark and the noise grew. Then Candle said, “Okay, wise guy. You so smart, you can be War Councilor. You go on up there with the white rag.”
Rusty heard Poop’s voice, querulous and angry. “Hey, why the hell me? Lotta other guys goofed off. Don’t toss that crap at me, man.”
Candle said something low, barely distinguishable in the rising clamor, and for a moment Rusty thought there would be a fight. But Poop backed down and the rumble discussion went on.
Rusty decided now was the time to make his play.
He stood up and threw the door open wide. It banged against the wall of the stairwell, sounding like the report of a pistol in the shallow confines of the passage. For a moment, while his eyes were adjusted to the gloom of the stairwell, he did not see those inside in sharp focus. Then the light flooded in, and Candle came through nasty-looking and a little frightened at who was before him.
Beside the new Cougar Prez was Weezee.
Her eyes banged open wide till the blue of them was a color contrast with the white of her painted face. Her hand flew to her mouth and for a moment she looked to Rusty as though she would faint. Everyone else remained motionless.
They were all there. The Greek, Poop, Johnny Slice, Tiger and the broads. But most of all, and it hurt on top of all the rest, there was Weezee, sitting beside Candle. He had his big, hairy spade of a hand on her knee. She didn’t mind. Times change, people change. Maybe. Not down inside. What’s there is there, and you’re screwed if you think what’s there is what you want it to be. She was here, now, and that was what counted. There were no excuses in the jungle. Live or die was all that counted. Rusty had long since decided he would live.
The guy who had killed Dolores… He would die.
The room was silent for a long minute and then there was lots of movement. Rusty wished in that instant he had borrowed a gun from somewhere, but there had been no place, and all he had was the stuff he was born with. He knew it was bluff or get stomped. He was no longer a Cougar, so he had to make a fast place for himself here, right this instant.
“Okay, knock it off!” he yelled. And stepped into the room.
The place was rotting away. Fire had consumed one entire wall, leaving the skeleton structure of old wood and plaster showing through. Metal, small-holed sheeting was peeled away within the walls, as though a giant hand had crumpled it up. The floor sagged noticeably. The ceiling was shrouded in darkness and the three kerosene lamps they had brought with them cast a fitful wavering glare across the room, down the now-empty stairwell.
They were stopped by his command for a moment. He had burst in and the time was not that far past that they had looked up to him as Prez of the club. He seemed to have momentary authority, for he had found them in an illegal place. Rusty came through the door, pulling it closed behind him. He walked across the room, staring straight into Weezee’s wide, frightened eyes. She had begun to nervously twist her ponytail.
Candle stood up, dropping his hand from her, and advanced a short step. Rusty bawled at him, “Sit down! I wanna talk to ya for a minute, and you’d damn well better feed me straight…”
Three of the club members moved in toward Rusty. He edged to the side, closer to Candle. The Prez of the Cougars had not sat down. He had moved a step further away from the girl, but he had not sat down. Rusty came on straight, and in one sharp movement had the Prez by the arm. He whipped it back so fast and he yanked it so hard, Candle screamed sharply in pain, and then the arm was up behind in the ridge of his back, and the knife from the sleeve was in Rusty’s hand.
The hand moved a fraction of an inch, the blade snicked open, and the point was indenting the cloth just between the fifth and sixth ribs on the right side of Candle’s body.
“Now,” Rusty forced his bluff, “now, if you wanna see how hot I am to get to know what I wanna know, then you brace me, all you fraykin’ rocks, and I’ll slide this so easy he won’t know it’s in till it’s out.”
His false bravado rang like tin on his ears, but the knife was in Candle’s side, and he had come bursting in suddenly, and he did look like he wasn’t playing around. The three members backed off. Candle struggled.
“My sister got it last night. You know that. You all know it. You guys’re sittin’ here and my kid sister’s downtown in the chill house. Now I’m gonna know who did it like, or so help me god like I’m standin’ here, I’ll scream fuzz so loud, you’ll all stay pokey till you drop.
“I know enough to get ya all canned in the Home for five years, and you,” he drove the point of the knife a little deeper into Candle’s side, “ya sonofabitch, I’ll cut out ya gut if ya don’t open up.”
Candle Shaster’s mouth opened wet and wide. He wanted to speak, but there was sharp, tiny pressure alongside his ribs, and the fright was big in him, so damned big. He squirmed in Rusty’s grip, but the boy was a rock, and held the knife tight to the cloth. It was the only thing between him and the violence the Cougars could unleash in a secon
d, if they overcame the cold sweat of the switch in his hand.
“Talk, damn ya!” Rusty said tightly, edging the point of the knife in more sharply.
Candle could not speak. He could only squirm, and he did that with abruptness that threw Rusty off-balance. In a moment he had a wedge with his hip against the boy’s side, and an imperfect lunge tossed Rusty away from him. Rusty went sidewise, into the crate on which Weezee sat, frightened and still toying unknowingly with her ponytail. He slammed into her and she went over, her legs flashing brown and slim as she tumbled to the dirty floor. Then Rusty had his hand under him for steadying and was coming erect. The gang moved in fast.
The first three who had attempted to take him when he had entered the room came at him again and Candle was right alongside. The blades flashed wickedly in the glare of the kerosene lamps, but Rusty was on his feet and backing away.
This was it, so this was it, damn it this was it.
Close, but not nearly close enough. He knew there was something here, but now he was stopped. He was going to be stopped good and proper in a minute. How much blood could three switches draw?
He saw a flash of big movement from the corner of his eye and then the three Cougars were being elbowed aside. One of them turned to the newcomer, his blade rising, and a thick hand came down from the darkness, plucked the knife from the boy’s fingers and it leaped upward, was stuck far above in the ceiling. The thunk of the knife sticking into the charred wood of the exposed ceiling stopped the others. All but Candle.
He kept coming, not quite realizing he was alone again, and facing Rusty’s knife. The activity to his left had been so swift, so complete, he had not realized what it meant.
Rusty saw it all. He saw the gigantic hulk that was the Beast come out of the shadows where he had lain slumped against the wall. He saw the huge idiot face contort in anger and violence as the Beast shouldered aside the three Cougars, and he saw the dummy rip the knife from the boy’s hand, and with a movement more agile than any Rusty had believed the Beast could employ, had seen him throw the knife, quivering, into the ceiling.
Now Rusty bent forward at the knees and the knife came out before him, like the head of a snake, swaying, swaying, deadly and waiting. Candle came on solid and then he realized he was alone. He brought up short and started to turn, but a hairy arm went around his chest and he was lifted clear of the floor. He hung there, thrashing for a long instant, and then another hand caught him under the crotch. Candle went up, up, over the matted, caked filth of the Beast’s hair, went up bubbling and trembling and the Beast pitched him forward heavily.
Rusty watched as Candle Shaster swung through the air and fell heavily. The boy hit, and then flopped onto his belly. He lay there for a moment, then heaved and lay still. He was not unconscious, but the sharp, tiny exclamations of pain that escaped him showed he was not going to get up soon.
Rusty stood staring into the round, idiot eyes of the Beast. The eyes that said nothing at all. The eyes that were filled with a great void, a great sadness, a great uncaring, unknowing nothingness. They were windows to the house of his soul and they were dead windows. Rusty saw the great face in its rigid immobility, nearly incapable of expression with meaning. The putty wart of a nose sucked air in, quivered as the air sped back on its outward journey. Rusty watched the Beast’s face for a moment, letting the full, unpleasant picture register clearly.
He had seen the Beast around the neighborhood for years. He was a traditional joke, taunted by the younger punkies around Tom-Tom’s place, avoided by women and snapped at by the fuzz. He was always in some alley, or under a pile of newspapers in an apartment building’s basement. What he did to keep himself alive was a mystery, though from time to time rumors flashed about him. Robbery, breaking and entering, assault, mugging. Lord knew he was capable of any of them—but there was never any real inquiry into his affairs.
He was just the thing called the Beast. And he was there. That was all.
Now he had made a definite step. He had done something concrete and had saved Rusty’s life. Why? The boy could not recall ever having done anything to acquire the huge man’s good will and friendship. Why?
The Beast looked down at Rusty and put out his hand. For a moment Rusty had no idea what he wanted, then he realized he was still gripping the switch, underhand. He rubbed a finger along the green plastic of the handle and then closed it reluctantly. The knife clicked as he lifted the lock at the back and he awkwardly handed it to the big man. The Beast shoved the knife into a side pocket of his rumpled, dirt-streaked slacks and turned away with a nod to Rusty.
The Beast walked back into the shadows and slumped down once more, his back edging down the wall till he lay in the angle of the charred walls.
Rusty pursed his lips. There seemed no sense to it. The Beast had never spoken more than three words to him and suddenly he had become Rusty’s protector. The boy was confused, but sensed his advantage now. He took three short steps to the barely stirring body of Candle and hoisted the boy to his feet roughly. He shoved the squat Cougar leader to the wall that was bathed in the yellow light of the kerosene lamp, and systematically brought him to.
The almost-Mongoloid features of the Prez began to flicker out of grogginess and he batted his eyes several times as Rusty shook and slapped him.
The Cougars watched in transfixed helplessness, knowing if they moved the Beast would move; and though fat and filthy, the dummy could crush any one of them easily. They stayed put and watched Rusty work Candle over thoroughly.
“Now, I wanna know,” Rusty said, each word accentuated by a sharp, stinging slap of his palm. Candle’s face was becoming flame red along one cheek, as Rusty tried to drag information from him by the only sure method he knew.
“Talk!”
The hand came out, flashed and cracked briefly against skin. Candle’s head jerked. His eyes opened wide and he twitched as though he wanted to retaliate. From the shadows the red coals of the Beast’s eyes, staring straight at the Prez, kept his hands at his sides, limply.
“Talk!”
Candle jerked his head away and Rusty’s next slap landed against the shoulder. It went that way for ten minutes, as Weezee sat biting her fist, her eyes wide. Violence was loose and there was no telling when it would come her way.
“Who killed my sister?”
No answer. The bond of silence was tight. Candle could no more speak, if he knew anything, than he could throw himself off the Staten Island Ferry. He was tied to silence. Rusty grew furious with frustration. His blows became more violent, and the Cougars knew this was not the fake rah-rah they usually saw in fights and rumbles. This was serious, this was the next thing to slow death. Rusty Santoro was on the edge and he wanted the word. The straight stuff, and they knew he would work each of them over till he got it.
Then their silence was no longer challenged, for the one who had stopped them before spoke from the shadows.
The Beast’s hoarse, unsteady voice came up in the room and he said, “I seen who took ya sister…”
Rusty was holding Candle against the wall with one white-knuckled hand, the other poised for a sidearm whack at the squat boy’s face. The hand never landed. Rusty stepped away slowly, letting his grip loosen on Candle, and the boy slid in a bumbling shuffle, before he fell again and lay panting, angled against the wall.
Rusty turned to the dummy, and there was a strange luster to the boy’s glare. This was what he wanted, this was all of it. This was the beginning of the trail that would end with a dead man in a gutter or hallway or alley, a Santoro-driven knife in his gut. This was it on skates and Rusty wanted it all.
“I seen her come in, an’ then I seen her go out, before you come to th’ dance.” The Beast mumbled scratchily. His voice was like a rusted saw laboring through tough wood. He stumbled over words and many of his sounds were mere suggestion. But the words were the right words.
“ ’N’ then she come back again, y’know, an’ when she left, I was outside lookin?
?? fer some beer what they might’ve left inna cans they t’rew outside, y’know, an’ I saw’r with a guy inna long coat…”
And then the dummy gave a remarkably lucid description of a camel’s hair coat.
NINE:
TUESDAY
rusty santoro
mirsky
miss elements
pops santoro
Rusty had not been to bed. The week’s sweat had dried on him and he felt filthy inside and out. The memories of the weekend were a jumbled, kaleidoscopic horror. The stand with Candle, the dance and the drag back to the old ways, the rumble and jail overnight—staggeringly terrible in terrible gray and steel—and then Dolores. The terrible wallop in the head of her death, like that, that way, in an alley. Then Moms and the trouble with the Cougars. And the first word about what had happened in the darkness back there, behind Tom-Tom’s malt shop. The word about the man in the camel’s hair coat. It was all too much.
Rusty had gone home and Mrs. Givens had still been there, hunched over in the big armchair, shrouded in darkness, only the black, scuffed tips of her shoes showing from shadow, in the reflected light from a streetlamp outside.
He had sent her away, telling her he would watch. She had asked him nothing, not where he had been, or what he had found out, nothing about Dolores or the word from the street. She merely nodded at his words and left silently, like some velvet-furred animal.
Rusty had sunk down into the armchair and summer night had gone by in remote noise from crosstown, and mugginess. Now with the faint gray wash of dawn slipping down the buildings, he met the day with a desperation and determination to find that man in the camel’s hair coat. Somehow, some way. And kill him.
The past had forged strong chains, not easily broken.
The buses ground past downstairs, and the sounds of the city awakening climbed higher and higher, like a generator warming up. Rusty sat immobile, thinking.