Michael Collins - Act of Fear

‘You got it, buddy boy? You got it now?’

I hit him again. My strength was pretty near gone, the punch did not even knock him down. But it must have made him crazy mad. He did not hit me, and he did not kick me. Maybe he had decided, somewhere in that vicious and cunning but not too intelligent brain, that kicks and punches were not doing the job. I felt his hands on my throat. I was lifted. And then I seemed to hurl through the air and hit a wall with a crash.

I was on a floor, and it was cold. Somehow my brain was still working. I felt a little like the time I had been torpedoed and had had a concussion but somehow had been able to think clearly enough to get over the side and into the raft and even help row the raft. I knew that I was not functioning, not well, but perhaps enough. Anyway, I felt the coldness of the floor and realized that Roth had thrown me into the kitchen. By the neck like a chicken. I think it was that thought that made me mad — like a goddamned chicken.

I shook my head and looked around. Roth was coming towards the kitchen. It all seemed to be in slow motion, distant. I got to my knees and counted the drawers in the kitchen cabinet. I opened the one I wanted. I took out the heavy, fifteen-inch butcher knife. It had a razor-sharp edge. I had sharpened it for Marty myself. I fell back down with my back against the cabinet, sitting up, the butcher knife in my hand. I made a hell of an effort, and the room came clear. Roth and Bagnio were both in the kitchen doorway.

They had their automatics in their hands. I suppose that was actually a reflex action for them as soon as they saw the butcher knife. They both stepped into the kitchen. They stood apart so that I could only get to one of them at a time. The kitchen was small with little room to manoeuvre, and I was sort of wedged into a corner against the cabinets. I looked straight into the muzzles of those two guns. Roth laughed.

‘A stinking shiv against two guns! You’d die real quick, sucker. I’ll gun you before you move a hair.’

‘Put it down, Fortune,’ Bagnio said.

‘No closer,’ I said. My voice sounded strange even to me. My lips were swollen like balloons. My jaw hurt. My nose had begun to throb like a hammer.

Roth was pale. ‘I’ll kill you, buddy.’

‘You’ll have to,’ I said. I held the knife.

Bagnio took a step. ‘Listen, Fortune…’

I flicked the knife in front of me. ‘You’ll have to kill me. Get close again and I’ll kill you. You want me, you better use those guns. Come near me and I’ll kill you.’

I meant it then. I had been hit hard enough and often enough to mean it. I really meant what I said. I had had enough. But I was also thinking. Roth and Bagnio had no orders from Andy to kill me; I was sure of that. I counted on that. I hoped I was right. Not that it mattered. If they had orders to kill me, they would do it one way or the other. There was a chance that if they shot, I might be able to knife one of them. No, there was no chance. The automatics were both. 45 calibre. Roth pointed his.

‘Jake,’ Bagnio said.

‘Beat it if you don’t like it,’ Roth said.

‘Let’s go, Jake,’ Bagnio said.

I heard his voice. Bagnio was uneasy. I was sure of it. Bagnio was nervous. Something was bothering Little Max more than a beating should have bothered him. Especially a beating ordered by Andy Pappas. Maybe I was wrong.

‘This dirty bastard punk,’ Roth said.

‘We done the job,’ Bagnio said. ‘He got the message.’

I’m not even sure when they left. I found myself alone on the kitchen floor. I thought I remembered Max Bagnio looking back in the kitchen doorway, saying, ‘Take it easy, Fortune.’ A testimonial. Max Bagnio was giving me a salute, man to man. The way the Zulu warriors had saluted the surviving British soldiers at Roark’s Drift after about one hundred British had held off eight thousand or more Zulus for a whole day and night and the Zulus had given up. Bully. That was why the Zulus had lost in the end.

I remember the pain building.

I remember thinking that not only my nose was broken when the pain grew in my side and chest.

I remember Marty’s face bending over me.

I think I remember the doctor.

I know I remember the pain.

The first time I woke up I concentrated on where I was. That is an old reflex of a drifter like me. I was in a bed. There was sun outside drawn shades. The furniture was not my own bedroom. It did not look like the room in the Hotel Manning. It was not jail, and it was not a hospital. It was a problem, but I gave it up. I was more interested in the pain.

The second time I woke up I concentrated on how I was. My head was light and not attached to my neck. There was a headache in the head that floated somewhere above the bed. My face was swollen. There was a bandage of some kind on my nose. I ached all over. I seemed to be strapped across the ribs. But I also seemed to be all there.

I thought about what had happened. I knew I had been beaten by Jake Roth, but the details were confused. The thought of Roth must have been on my face.

‘You look like you’re seeing a ghost.’

It was Marty. I was, of course, in her bedroom. She stood with a tray. I saw orange juice, coffee, a bowl of something that steamed. I was hungry.

‘I am,’ I said. ‘Mine.’

She put the tray down on the bed table and gave me the juice.

‘You found me last night?’ I said.

She nodded. ‘In the kitchen. You had a butcher knife. Did you…?’

‘All take and no give,’ I said.

Then I recalled my two punches. That pleased the hell out of me. At least Roth would have a sore mouth today. I also remembered my ultimatum. That made me feel cold. It is one thing to take a chance like that in the heat of action and another to think about it later. Jake Roth wasn’t a man filled with logic or self-control. He could have lost his head.

‘When I saw you I nearly fainted. I saw the knife, you looked dead. When I found you were just out cold, I called the doctor. He said it looked worse than it was.’

‘It feels worse than it looks,’ I-said. ‘What’s the score?’

‘Broken nose; you won’t be so handsome.’

‘That could help.’

‘Facial bruises, a lot of them. Cuts inside and outside on your face. A mild concussion and a cracked rib. Some torn ligaments in your chest, too. I’m so sorry, baby.’

‘I bet I look grand,’ I said. I smiled. It hurt.

‘You’ll need a visit to the dentist, too. Who did it, Dan?’

‘Just forget it,’ I said. ‘You should have shipped me home.’

‘Yes I should have!’ Marty said. ‘Now eat. Soup is good.’

I had the soup. It was good.

‘What did they want?’ Marty said.

‘No questions,’ I said. ‘I was stupid to come here.’

‘Finish your soup.’

I finished the soup and the coffee. She sat on the edge of the bed and watched me until I had finished. Then she leaned and kissed my forehead. She stood up.

‘You stay here.’ she said. ‘And try to do something more constructive than being a human punch bag.’

‘Where do you think you’re going?’ I said.

‘Work, baby,’ she said.

‘Work?’

‘It’s almost nine o’clock.’

‘At night?’

‘The doctor gave you a shot. He said you need at least two days in bed — alone.’

‘I slept all day?’

‘You did, and you looked cherubic,’ Marty said.

‘Sure,’ I said.

‘Two days the doctor said.’

‘Sure,’ I said. ‘You go to work.’

‘You’ll be here when I get back, Dan?’

‘Maybe,’ I said. ‘No, baby, I doubt it.’

‘Meaning you might come back, but first you’ll go.’