John Lutz - Fear the Night

“They were told they had the opportunity,” Strong said. “They all chose other activities. That’s okay. They don’t like guns.”

More snickering.

Strong ignored it. He picked up the nearest rifle and handed it to Charley, then gave out the other rifles. When he handed one to Dante, Dante hesitated, remembering the gun his father had used.

But this wasn’t like that. This was another kind of gun. A rifle. And Adam Strong wasn’t his father. He accepted the rifle but knew Strong had noted his reluctance.

When everyone was armed with unloaded rifles, Strong sat down on the truck’s open tailgate, a rifle across his lap, and said, “Gather round.”

They spent the next three days learning about the rifles, how they were different from shotguns or handguns, and how to aim them, allowing for wind and distance. They learned how to lead a moving target. It struck Dante that shooting a gun wasn’t so complicated. It was mathematical, a matter of angle, speed, time, and distance. And variables like wind and the rhythms of motion and momentum.

He also learned from Kelly that Adam Strong had been an alternate small-bore rifle shooter on the 1976 U.S. Olympic team that went to Montreal. He hadn’t actually shot in competition there, but he’d been ready.

On the fourth day, Strong gathered the boys around the back of the pickup and said, “Today we shoot bullets. I have targets set up beyond the barracks, against a safe backdrop. Vic will lead the way, and I’ll follow in the truck, where we’ll leave the rifles for now.”

When they reached the new target range ten minutes later, Dante saw that the tractor sat nearby and now had a scoop on it like a bulldozer’s. It had been used to create a bank of earth about eight feet high. In front of the banked earth were bales of straw, and on each bale was a sheet of paper with a target on it, a series of circles around a red bull’s-eye. At intervals Dante later learned were twenty, fifty, and a hundred yards were low stakes in the ground with twine strung tautly between them, marking lines for the boys to shoot from.

They shot first from a distance of twenty yards, using the standing position Strong had taught them. Dante sighted carefully, squeezed the trigger gently as instructed, and felt the rifle’s stock buck against his shoulder. He winced, and his ears buzzed from the explosive bark of all the rifles firing almost at once.

“Not bad,” Strong said. “We’ll examine the targets later.”

Beginning with his second shot, Dante tried to factor in all the conditions he was shooting under. It wasn’t difficult, since it was a calm day and wind had little effect. That left the simple geometry of sending a predictable moving object toward a stationary one. He held his breath and felt an unexpected connection with the target, as if a wire were strung between it and the gun barrel, and squeezed the trigger, ready this time for the bark and buck of the old M1.

He felt a rush of excitement. He knew that this time he’d hit the target. And could do it again.

Every boy fired from standing, sitting, and prone positions at varying distances, a total of twenty rounds of ammunition.

Strong walked out and collected the targets while Vic and the boys stood and watched.

When Strong returned, he held all the targets but one in his right hand. In his left hand was Dante’s target.

He looked at Dante and said, “Holy Christ!”

All the boys froze. They had never before heard Strong utter a profanity.

“Eighteen out of twenty in the target, four in the bull’s-eye,” Strong said. “Holy. . Toledo. Have you shot before, Dante?”

Dante shook his head no.

Strong stared at him for a long time, silently, with something like doubt and with something like wonder.

Then he said, “Okay, let’s go back to the barracks. Remember to be neat. Pick up your shell casings.”

It was an instruction Dante never forgot.

The present

There was a small savings and loan on the ground floor of the Maigret Building on West Twenty-third Street. Repetto entered through a door alongside it, which led to an unadorned foyer lined with mailboxes. A narrow stairway led to offices above, which were identified by a directory that had yellowed over the years beneath the clear plastic plate protecting it from theft and graffiti. The directory informed him that B. Grams, Inc., was on the second floor.

That was fine with Repetto. There were six floors and no elevator in the building, and he didn’t feel like climbing stairs. Also, he didn’t feel like being reminded of how he was getting older.

Last week Repetto had happened across one of his longtime snitches, a burglar and sometime fence named Artie Silver. Artie was smart enough to fence stolen goods of all sorts without leaving a trace, so, if there was going to be an actual prosecution, it was necessary to nail him while he still had the loot in his possession. It had never happened. Another way Artie had of insuring himself against a conviction if he did get caught was to sparingly provide police with information about some of his clients, both buyers and sellers. He was a discreet snitch, and through the years Repetto had been discreet with his information.

Repetto actually liked Artie, and had been talking with him about things in general, while both men stood in the sunlight and ate knishes from a sidewalk vendor on the corner of Third and Fifty-fourth Street. This was New York at its best: vendor food, warm sun, and an endless variety of people streaming past, as if it could all last forever for everyone.

So why not do a little business, Repetto thought, for old times’ sake? He asked Artie if he knew any gun dealers or collectors specializing in rifles.

“Almost always it’s handguns or automatic assault weapons,” Artie said, with an exaggerated shrug that was pure Artie. “Rifles are something else altogether, more for hunting than the kinda thing that’d interest you.” He wouldn’t cheapen what he had by giving it away too quickly.

Repetto chewed a bite of knish and waited in the warm sunlight.

Then, as in the past, Artie smiled thinly and gave Repetto a name: “Boniface Grams.”

“Dealer,” Repetto asked, “or collector?”

“Facilitator. If he can’t help you, he might be able to tell you more than I know. Guns wouldn’t be my specialty, if I had a specialty. I don’t like the things around. I’m all for the Brady Bunch Bill.”

Repetto wasn’t sure if Artie was joking, so decided to let that one pass.

Artie put on a pious expression. “Like everybody else in this town, I’d like to see you collar the Night Sniper.”

“Are guns this Bonepart guy’s-”

“Boniface.”

“-guy’s specialty?”

“Are they ever!” Artie took a big bite of knish and chewed enthusiastically with his mouth open. “And I tell you,” he said around the knish, “he’s mostly legal. His expertise is in obtaining valuable pieces for serious gun collectors.”

“Sounds all the way legal.”

“Well, sometimes the guns aren’t legal, or maybe they’re from a museum or who knows where. Maybe the collector doesn’t have a permit. I don’t know, mind you. I’m speculating.”

“So speculate as to where I might find Boniface Grams.”

Artie gave Repetto the Twenty-third Street address.

“I have to level, Artie, I’m not sure if I can do you any good if you’re angling for payback. I’m not with the NYPD anymore on a permanent basis.”

“I know. I read the papers. Which is why I wanna help, so you can stop this Sniper prick and the city can get back to normal. It was after dark, I wouldn’t be standing here eating this knish.”

“Boniface,” Repetto said, folding his paper napkin so he could write on it. He unclipped a pen from his pocket. “How do you spell that?”