Ричард Деминг - Manhunt. Volume 3, Number 1, January, 1955

Glancing at his own bare left forearm, I suddenly understood what he was looking for, because the underside of his bore a small scar in the shape of a cross. Vaguely I remembered somewhere acquiring the knowledge that part of the Mafia initiation ceremony is the gashing of the left forearm in that manner in order to let the blood which is supposed to seal the blood oath.

Dropping my arm, the man said, “He is not of the Mafia,” and stepped back to take his place in the encircling ring.

“No, I’m not of the Mafia,” I announced, deciding that if my captors were going to kill me, I might as well have the pleasure of telling them what I thought of their cloak and dagger outfit first. “I’ve just been checking up on your extortion racket. It must take a lot of bravery to belong to a secret gang which demands tribute from its own countrymen on the threat of death.”

For a long time there was silence. Then the voice from behind me said, “I think you do not understand the Mafia, Mr. Moon. It is part of our way of life. It has been used for evil, but it is not in itself an evil thing. Here it is only an instrument of justice.”

“Sure,” I sneered. “The kind of justice that takes from the rich to give to the poor. The poor in this case being members of the Mafia. Who do you think you’re kidding? I could name at least three of your fellow Italians you’ve been knocking down for tribute.”

“Name them.”

I managed a forced laugh. “And have them bumped off? No thanks. None of them squealed anyway. I ran across your racket by accident.”

“You have proof?”

“Oh, come off it,” I said irritably. “I tailed two of your pickup men only this evening. Matter of fact, your gunnies nailed me just after I’d run them to ground.”

“You know the names of these men?”

“No,” I admitted. “That was to be my next move. All I got was their address and the license number of their Buick. 819 North Eighth. License X-223740. But from that you ought to be able to figure out which of your pickup men I was on.”

Again there was a long silence, then the leader behind me issued an order in such a low voice I failed to catch it. A moment later the blindfold was being refitted to my eyes.

Again I was taken for a long, winding ride in what I recognized from the wheeze of its motor as the same old Dodge touring car. When we stopped and the blindfold was removed, I discovered we were double parked next to my Plymouth and I was in the company of the same two middle-aged men who had originally picked me up. One of them handed me the clip to my P-38, told me to put it in my pocket, and when I complied, gave me back my gun. I put it back under my arm.

Then he motioned me out of the car. As I stood in the street, staring at the two men without comprehension, they nodded impersonally and drove off. I noted the rear license was so coated with mud, it was indecipherable.

When I checked my wallet, I found the contents intact.

The whole thing was too much for me. I drove home and went to bed.

Next morning I was routed out of bed at eight o’clock by a phone call from Warren Day. “I want you at the morgue immediately,” he growled.

“No thanks,” I said. “I’m not dead yet.”

“I’m in no mood for wise cracks, Moon!” he yelled. “You be at the morgue in thirty minutes, or I’ll send the paddy wagon.”

I got to the morgue in thirty minutes.

Day was already waiting. Grunting a noncommittal greeting, he led me into the cold room and over to two sheet-covered figures on marble slabs. Both sheets he pulled back only far enough to disclose the faces.

Carefully I did not change expression when I recognized them as the two men I had tailed from El Patio to the rooming house on Eighth.

“What makes you think I know them?” I asked.

“You were asking me questions about the Mafia, and these are the first Mafia killings in this town in twenty years.”

“How do you know they’re Mafia killings?”

In answer he stripped the sheets all the way down. My stomach turned over when I saw the gaping holes in the chests of the two men.

Their hearts had been cut completely from the bodies.

Reaching over first one corpse and then the other, I raised the left arms and examined their under sides.

“These guys didn’t belong to the Mafia,” I said. “Mafia members all have a crossed scar on the left forearm.”

I could have explained to the inspector right then and there what had happened, but I didn’t see what it would accomplish. I doubted that he would even believe me.

In a definite tone I said, “I’m sorry I can’t help you, Inspector, but I don’t know who either of these men are.”

I didn’t in the sense that I didn’t know their names, and there was nothing Warren Day could do about it but growl at me a bit and let me go. He would have growled even more had I told him the truth. For I realized I had condemned the two men to death.

Even now it is difficult for me to understand how a group of respectable Italian merchants could be so steeped in the traditions of the Mafia that they would so ruthlessly avenge the misuse of the Mafia’s name. None of the men who had ringed me the previous night had ever before committed a crime, I am now sure. Yet the blood oath, probably taken by some as long as twenty, or even forty years ago, held in the face of all other law.

I tried to visualize the mental processes of the honest barbers and restaurant owners and grocers as they reached one-by-one into a hat to withdraw a small ball, each hoping his would be white instead of black, but each steeled to perform his sworn duty if the lot fell his way.

I felt a little sick when I realized my experience of the night before had been in the nature of a trial, and if the local Mafia had decided that, on the evidence, I was using its name for extortion purposes, my own heart would now be separate from my body.

It was silly to be afraid of the old man. But the scythe he carried was long and sharp and dangerous ...

She hated to ride in streetcars, and she especially hated it when she had to sit on one of the long seats at the rear, the ones that faced each other across the aisle. Usually, she walked home from her job at the post office, but today she’d gone to work with a sore throat, and during the afternoon it had grown worse. When her supervisor discovered she couldn’t talk above a whisper, she’d been sent home on sick leave. She hadn’t felt up to the long walk, and there had been no empty cabs, so the streetcar had been her only choice.

She opened the top button of her blouse and closed her eyes a moment, wondering if the slight dizziness she felt was due to her fever or the stifling August heat.

When she opened her eyes again, she saw the man. He was standing directly across from her, next to the rear door. An old man, tall, but very thin and a trifle stooped. His hair was a dirty white and there was a heavy gray stubble on his chin. He was wearing a sweat-darkened blue shirt and frayed denim pants. There was a pair of pruning shears tucked into his belt, and in his right hand he held a large grass sickle. He was staring fixedly at the top of her blouse.

She frowned her annoyance, but the old man’s eyes never wavered. She reached up and buttoned the blouse, looking at him as coldly as she could. Old men disgusted her, and on days when she wasn’t feeling well, they disgusted her even more.

The old man’s eyes moved slightly, and now she realized that he had not been looking directly at the top of her blouse. His eyes were deep set, heavily overhung by the gray eyebrows. The direction of his gaze had been deceptive. Actually, she knew, he had been staring past her shoulder, probably watching the traffic down in the street. In the instant it took her to realize her mistake, the old man’s eyes moved again, and now he was looking directly into her own. She saw his eyes narrow slightly, and his lips tighten, and it came to her that she was still giving him the same cold look she’d given him when she thought he was staring at her opened blouse.