A BUSINESS OF CONSEQUENCE

The Conclusion...

Photo by Aidan Bartos on Unsplash

I picked the money up at the bus station—six hunnerd and thirty-five thousand dollars according to the book I found in the outside pocket of one of the suitcases—and drove to Jimmy’s apartment. The traffic was light, but the clouds were coming in fast and the sky looked dark and overcast. I circled the block once. There was a voice inside my head telling me something wasn’t right. If Jimmy was planning to double cross me, he’d have a geek sitting outside every place he knew I’d be likely to go to.

I spotted the car parked in an alleyway on my second trip around the block. I watched as Legs and three other geeks stepped out. Legs pulled the brim of his hat down as he looked up and down the sidewalk. There were maybe a dozen people on the street, but no one seemed to notice him..

I pulled into an alley across the street and looked at the suitcases in the back seat, wondering if I should just cut and run. Nobody would think any less of me for running; nobody knew about the money. Jimmy was a dead man no matter what sort of deal he tried to cut with Charlie. He had to know that. The only deal he could make was to throw me to the wolves. If Lance knew Jimmy took last week’s take, you could be certain Charlie did too. I threw my overcoat on top of the suitcases and saw my coronet case on the floor. I wondered if I would ever play it again after tonight.

No woman is worth this much trouble, I told myself, but I don’t think I believed it. For some reason I knew I’d walk to the ends of the earth for Lacy. She didn’t deserve any of this. She was going to end up dead because she was part of a game she didn’t even know she was playing.

I pulled my gun out of its holster and checked the safety, then reached into the glove box and took out a second gun. I made sure they were both loaded and then re-holstered the first gun. I stepped out into the alley. I wrapped my scarf around my hand as I walked across the street. I wanted to muffle the sound of the shot.

As I walked toward the car and looked through the back window, I could see the driver looking up at Jimmy’s apartment. He was eating a sandwich. It was the same geek I saw in the kitchen at Lindy’s the day I went to see Arnie. I tapped on the window and when he turned, I pointed my gun at his head and pulled the trigger. The glass shattered and he fell on the seat. I reached inside to pull him back up, putting his hat on his head and hoping no one would notice him. I only needed two minutes.

I walked into the lobby, pushed the button for the elevator, and then closing the doors I ran up the stairs beside it hoping the sound of the elevator would cover the sound of my shoes. I waited for the elevator to stop before I peeked into the hall. I could see Jimmy’s room. The door was open; it’d been kicked in. I thought someone might look into the hall when the elevator stopped, but whoever was inside closed the door instead. I saw an old woman poke her head out of the door across the hall; she closed her door as soon as she saw me. I figured it was only a matter of time before she called the cops. I started counting time in my head.

I walked toward Jimmy’s room and pushed the door open part way, looking through the splintered doorjamb. There was a mirror against the far wall and I could see Mookie’s twisted body lying on the floor. There was a lot of blood and I knew from the way he was laying that he was dead. I was hoping Lacy was still alive.

I was up to a ten count.

I stepped into the apartment. Couldn’t remember the last time I’d been in Jimmy’s apartment. It looked bigger than I remembered. A part of me was wondering the usual: what did a girl like Lacy see in a mug like Jimmy? He may have been my best friend—hell, he was probably the only friend I’ve ever had—but I knew what he was like. I knew how he treated women. I might not have been the nicest geek—I mean, I beat people up for money and I’ve killed men — but I knew enough to show respect when I had to. I think that’s why Arnie liked me. He understood geeks like me and Lansky. We didn’t look at women the same way Jimmy, Charlie, and the others did. Geeks like Jimmy and Charlie looked at women as possessions. They couldn’t help it. But Lansky, Arnie said, he knew how to keep his business life separate from his personal life, and if I could learn to do that, I’d always have a little haven of security where no one could touch me.

I didn’t know what Arnie meant at the time, but I was beginning to think I wouldn’t mind finding a secret place so I could hide Lacy away until it was all over. I untied the bloody scarf wrapped around my hand and wound it around my face. I didn’t want Legs knowing it was me. I could hear voices coming from one of the rooms and inched my way along the wall.

I was up to a thirty count.

Suddenly the door to the bathroom opened and one of the geeks stepped out wiping his bloody hands on a towel. He was just as startled to see me as I was to see him, and then he reached inside his jacket for his gun. I pointed mine and pulled the trigger. I moved to the bedroom thinking they’d come out with guns blazing. When no one came out, I went in.

I was at one minute on my count.

The window was open and I could hear voices outside—Legs yelling at whoever was with him to hurry up. I ran to the window and looked out. Legs looked up at me and pointed his gun at Lacy’s head. I heard her scream as she slipped and tumbled down the last three steps. She looked up at me and I could see a mist of dried blood splattered on her face and dress. She must have been standing beside Mookie when they shot him. One of the two other geeks took a shot at me.

I could hear sirens in the distance. I didn’t know what to do, so I ran out the door and down the stairs.

I still had a minute left in my count.

I drove to the club thinking I might see Jimmy’s car parked there. Instead, I saw two geeks I didn’t know waiting for me in a car across the street. I thought maybe things didn’t work out the way Jimmy planned, and Charlie killed him.

Well, if it’s a war they want, I thought.

I parked the car a block away in a nearby garage and gave some kid a dollar to watch it for me. I took the coronet case out of the backseat, pulled my collar up, my hat down, and then walked up the street and let myself in through the stage entrance. Neither one of the geeks in the car gave me a second look. I locked the door and went to my office, looking through the window before I closed the blinds.

The phone rang and I felt my heart pounding in my chest. It took a moment to settle my nerves before I picked up the phone.

“Mel?”

“Yeah, Charlie?” He sounded surprised to hear me.

“I didn’t think you’d have the balls to show up there,” he said, and I could hear the laughter in his voice.

“Why not?”

“Where’s Jimmy?”

“Jimmy? Last time I saw him he said he was on his way to see you. Said he had to talk business and that I should just mind the club, same as usual.”

“Same as usual? Well, I’m sorry to say there ain’t no same as usual with Arnie gone. Things have changed. You must’ve know this day was comin’?”

“I s’pose I did,” I said, trying to figure out what sort of deal Jimmy might have cut with him. I was looking through the blinds at the two geeks in the car. One of them got out to use the phone in the small grocery store they were parked in front of, and I realized that’s why they weren’t in a hurry to check things out. They were waiting for the call. And if not from Charlie, then who?

“What can I do to make it right, Charlie?”

The man stepped out of the store and walked to the back of the car. He pulled a sawed off shotgun out of the backseat and tucked it under his overcoat while the other geek checked his gun. They were crossing the street.

“Look, someone’s at the door, Charlie. Must be one of the geeks come for rehearsal. I gotta let him in.”

“You wanna make it right, Mel, you take care of things,” Charlie said with a coldness that made me catch my breath. I could feel my hands start to shake, and my voice catch in my throat before I was able to speak.

“What things?”

“Jimmy. You gotta take care of Jimmy.”

“He didn’t come see you?”

“You know he didn’t, Mel.”

“You want me to kill Jimmy? Why?”

“Because I’d rather not have to kill you.”

“Look, Charlie, let me get the door and I’ll be right back.” I had to stall for time. I had to figure things out. It was starting to look like Charlie didn’t send my two visitors.

I took one last look out of the window and saw two pairs of shoes walking down the narrow stairwell. I put the phone on the desk and took my gun out of its holster. I ran to the front door, opened it and made my way around to the back. When I was close enough, I took my shoes off and crept up behind the two geeks. They were standing side by side and wouldn’t be able to turn quick enough in the narrow stairwell.

“You want me?” I asked, and put a bullet in the back of their heads before they had a chance. I went across the street, drove their car into the alley, and dumped their bodies in the back seat. I went through their pockets and found a phone number, but no name.

I went inside to hang up the phone.

“Charlie?” I said calmly. “You still there?”

“Yeah?” he said a little too easily. He didn’t seem surprised to hear my voice.

“I take care of Jimmy for you, we square?”

“Square with what?”

“I leave you the club, take the girl, and leave town. No strings attached.”

“Girl? What girl?”

“Legs grabbed her outta Jimmy’s place. She’s not part of this, Charlie. She’s innocent.” I couldn’t leave her behind. I knew that now. Charlie would have her working for him within the week; no one deserved that.

“Yeah. We’re square,” Charlie said and hung up the phone.

I dialled the number on the paper and waited. It was Jimmy.

“Milo?”

“Yeah.” I didn’t know what else to say.

“Any problems?”

I put my hand on the phone and dropped my voice.

“Naw. It’s done”

“I’ll be right there,” he said, and hung up.

The drive out to Boston was the longest drive of my life. Once we left New York, there was little for me to say. The rain came down in heavy pellets and I felt like pulling over and letting it wash me clean. Lacy sat with her legs drawn up to her chest, her arms wrapped around herself, staring out of the window. I could see her reflection mirrored against the glass, the silent tears glistening on her face matching the raindrops weeping against the window. I knew she was thinking about Mookie, and told myself it had to be hard on her. I tried not thinking about what might’ve happened to her–-what could’ve happened. They hit her a few times, and were probably planning to make sport of her, but I’d spoiled it for them when I shot that geek coming out of the bathroom.

Charlie was just hanging up the phone after talking with me when Legs showed up with her, Lacy said. She said Charlie was mad, but Legs explained how Jimmy wasn’t there, so taking her seemed like the next best thing. She was supposed to be bait. It was a case of being in the wrong place at the wrong time, I said. There seemed to be a lot of that going around, I thought.

She was scared, she said. More scared than she’d ever been in her life, but then, Lansky showed up and he took her to his place where his wife made her something to eat and told her to have a soak in the tub. And all the while she was soaking in the tub, I thought, I was waiting to kill Jimmy.

Jimmy, the best friend a geek could ever have I thought, wanting me dead so he could walk away with everything and put the blame on me. It was business, Charlie told me. I shouldn’t take it personally. Once you’ve crossed the line, you have to pay the price, eventually. Jimmy knew that. He knew as soon as he saw me that I’d have to kill him. No amount of begging was gonna change that. It didn’t matter that I had tears in my eyes when I pulled the trigger.

I waited a week before I finally phoned Charlie. He was quiet for a long time before he said anything, and when he did, it wasn’t much more than to say he was sorry about Jimmy.

Me too, I thought. Me too.

“It’s for the best, Mel,” he said

“What d’ya mean, Charlie?” I asked.

“Legs is saying that you have it.”

“Have what?”

“Last week’s take for the club.”

“Did Jimmy tell him that, or is that what Legs told you, Charlie? I don’t remember Legs seeing Jimmy between the time he grabbed Lacy, and me seein’ Jimmy.”

“It’s what Legs told me. But he mighta said it so we’d think it was you grabbing everything, instead of Jimmy. That guy really hates you,” he laughed.

“I don’t know nothing ‘bout what kind of deal Jimmy had with you and Arnie, Charlie,” I said, stumbling over my words and hoping he didn’t see through the lie. “I was just apposed to get the entertainment.”

“Yeah, that’s what Arnie said,” and I could hear the smile in his voice. “But we still had to make a show of things with you two.”

“How much money we talking ‘bout here, Charlie?”

“Last week’s take? Couple of thousand maybe. Don’t worry, we’ll make up for it somewhere else,” Charlie laughed. “Me and Lance, we got big ideas about what we’re gonna do. My suggestion to you Mel, is take an early retirement. Besides, it wasn’t us he stole the money from, it was Arnie’s. It’ll turn up sooner or later. Take the broad and disappear.”

“We square now, Charlie?”

“We’re square,” he said after a moment.

“You remember that time when you and Frankie got jumped by the JR.’s? When me an’ Jimmy stepped in and busted them up?”

“Yeah, sure. I guess you guys was out of the club by then an’ feeling a little pissed. You dusted ‘em up pretty good.”

“Yeah. I guess we did,” I said with a laugh. “You wanna hear the funny part of it, Charlie? The guy’s nose I busted? That was Legs.”

“Yeah, I know,” Charlie said. “Mel?” he said to me a minute later. “Do yourself a favour, and disappear.” And then he hung up the phone.

I looked at Lacy sitting on the bed.

“Charlie says we should disappear. Can you think of anywhere you’d like to go?”