Andrew Vachss - The Weight

He looked at me funny. Just for a second, but I caught it.

“You don’t mind Ken’s daughter getting a look at you, right? I mean, we went over this. You might need to stay here sometime. Who knows how things are gonna go?”

“Nobody,” I said. “Nobody knows.”

“You believe that?”

“Huh?”

“By me, ‘nobody,’ that’s people. Not…” He pointed at the ceiling.

“You mean, like God or something?”

“There’s no God ‘or something.’ Either there is or there isn’t. A God, I’m saying.”

“Okay.”

“You got one?”

“One what?”

He took a deep breath. Let it out slow. “All I’m asking, it’s a simple question, Sugar. I’m not trying to get into your business. Some people, they get raised a certain way, it stays with them forever. Some trace of it, anyway. I knew a guy, Rico. He did contract hits. I even saw one go down.”

I gave him my listening face. You can’t trip yourself up if all you do is listen.

“Only reason I was there,” Solly told me, “it had to be out in public. No other way anyone was gonna get to the man who was on the spot. He lived in a fortress. Never went out without bodyguards. But, see, he had to go out. If he couldn’t show his face, the up-for-grabs stuff was all going over to the other guy.

“Certain rackets, you’d think they’re all… transactions , okay? Like a whorehouse. You pay the money, you buy some broad’s time. Then you’re done. That’s all the customer ever sees. But what you need isn’t just customers, it’s the license to operate.”

“You mean the cops?” I asked him.

“Depends on how high-class the operation is. But that’s not what I’m trying to explain. If you want to open a house, you got to pay. Not some cop on the pad, that’s pennies. The big money goes to whoever owns the territory.”

“Like that tax thing you were saying? Like with Ken?”

“Yeah, like that, only this is regular money. Every week, every month, every year. The collectors aren’t leg-breakers. They’re just like the paperboys out in the suburbs. Toss the paper on your porch every day, come and collect once a week. But the paperboy doesn’t set the price for the paper, see? That all gets negotiated. And it’s never a percentage. It’s not like these places keep receipt books.

“Now, this time I was telling you about, the time I saw a contract kill up close, it was over that kind of thing. Guy’s running a whorehouse, he knows he’s gonna have to pay someone . But he’s not gonna pay more than one.”

I moved my head and shoulders a little, so Solly could see I was paying attention, but maybe not getting everything he was saying.

“Look at it this way, Sugar. Paperboy knocks on the door. Woman opens it. He says he’s there to collect for last week. The woman says, ‘My husband already paid you for last week.’ What’s the kid gonna do?”

“I don’t know.”

“That doesn’t matter. Here’s what matters: that woman’s not going to be paying that paperboy. See?”

“Yeah. Two big players were in a war over who gets some territory. Maybe even new territory…?”

“Right! Okay, now I’m on this bench in Central Park. Just an old man, reading his paper, taking the sun. At an angle across from me, there’s Rico. Him and this broad; you couldn’t really see her face, what with her hair being so long and those big round sunglasses.

“Not that anyone’d be looking at her face. Whatever those implant things cost, this broad, she’d paid double. Probably why she couldn’t afford a bra.

“The mark, he’s strolling down the path, big slabs of beef on each side of him. Going for an outdoor meet with a guy who’s supposed to be like a go-between.

“The woman yells something at Rico in Spanish. Rico gets to his feet, like ‘I don’t fucking need this ,’ you know what I mean? He turns like he’s gonna walk off, but then I see him cross himself, the way you see some fighters do just before the bell.

“Before you could blink, Rico spins around and puts one in the boss’s head, drops one of the bodyguards, and he’s still spinning, like, when the other bodyguard opens up on him. Bang-bang-bang.

“Close-range, but the last bodyguard, he’s-I don’t know-scared, maybe. Anyway, he misses. Rico, he don’t. Even runs over and blasts the boss a couple more times in the face, probably in case the guy was wrapped.

“Everybody’s screaming, ducking for cover. A kid on a bicycle swoops in, takes the handoff from Rico, and keeps rolling.

“I look up, the girl is gone. Disappeared. It was a beautiful piece of work.”

“Expensive, right?”

“Had to be. But what I’m trying to tell you about Rico: how’s a guy, does what he does for a living, think he’s not going straight to Hell when his time comes?”

“You mean, being a Catholic and all?”

“He’s no more Catholic than I am,” Solly said. “But he was raised Catholic-see what I’m telling you? That crossing himself, it’s just a habit. But one he can’t break.”

“Maybe he thinks it’ll bring him luck.”

“Sure. Maybe he throws a wad in the collection plate once in a while, too. It don’t matter what Rico believes. What matters, you see Rico cross himself, you better start shooting.”

“I don’t have those.”

“Those…?”

“What you’re talking about, it’s not a religious thing, right? It’s a tell.”

“You got it,” Solly said. Smiling at me like he was a teacher giving me an A. “Habits, they’ll kill you. Like smoking. I don’t mean that lung-cancer bullshit, I mean, say, if you’re holed up in a little town. People looking for you. They know you got to be close, but that’s all they got. Okay, so they figure Sugar, he’s too smart to be going out shopping himself. Must have someone doing it for him. Probably a broad. If they know you smoke a certain brand, that could be enough, right there.”

“I… guess so. Maybe. But it seems like a-”

“That’s just an example. Say you light up while you’re waiting to do a job. With what they got today, just the butt can put you right at the scene.

“That’s what you got going for you, kid. All anyone knows is that you’re reliable. You’ll do the work. And if you get caught, you’ll take whatever weight they drop on you.

“That scar”-Solly touched his own eyebrow-“you could make it disappear with stuff you could buy in a drugstore. Yeah, you’re a big guy, got a body on you. But there’s a million guys fit that description, no offense. And sure, you got those two different eyes, but that’s an ID thing. You don’t have a trademark . No way the cops look over a crime scene and say, ‘Yeah, this had to be Sugar’s work.’ ”

“This is about Jessop, huh?”

Solly was just starting to open his mouth when Ken’s daughter walked in.

“Oh, Mr. Vizner! I didn’t expect to see you here.”

“Well, my nephew just came in from out of town.”

I stood up. The girl looked at me, but she didn’t jump back or anything. Her face was… I don’t know what you call it, but you could see she was one of those kids. When she smiled, it was like the whole room got brighter. Then I remembered. Down syndrome, I think they call it. I knew about it from a TV show this girl I used to stay with watched all the time. The boy on that show, he wasn’t a baby-like a teenager, I think. He had that, too. And he was an actor.

“My name is Jerome,” I said, and held out my hand.

“I’m Grace,” she said. Even her voice was like that kid’s on TV. “Did you know my dad, too?”

“Yes, I did. Not as well as… my uncle here, but we worked together a few times. He was a…” I was stumped for the right word, but she just waited, like she knew I’d get it, sooner or later.