Harlan Ellison - Web of the City

“You hear me?” he snarled, his voice thick and syrupy.

Rusty tried to move sidewise, tried to get away, but though the boy could not see in the dark of the alley, the standing man could and Rusty heard the swish of fabric against legs an instant before the feet struck him in the stomach. A ball of pain exploded outward in his gut, sending tracers of agony up into his chest and down into his groin and he slumped over with a moan. He was not out, he was not even graying, but the shock of it was so great, he lay still, motionless—yet quivering inside.

“I asked ya hear me?” his father repeated. He bent over to see if he had hurt the boy, but more to see if he had ruined his chances of communication than in concern over injuries. He bent down, slumped onto his haunches and Rusty acted by reflex. The compulsion was not there, nor the confidence, but the streets had done their work, and his leg—bent at the knee in front of him—came up whip-fast and caught the man in the groin.

Pops Santoro screamed with the querulous screech of a confused animal and doubled over, his mouth wide, his eyes fully open, and Rusty took the opportunity to move. He started to his feet and the pain in his side sent a sharp cramp through him. He could barely walk and his hand scratched across the rough brick surface of the building as he tried to get away.

The little moans of agony that had been coming from his father ceased and Rusty felt a hand, tentatively, on the back of his neck. The man was trying to stop him. Rusty spun, using the hand that held him as a pivot, and shoved his elbow into his father’s chest. The hand let loose and Pops Santoro stumbled back. Pain continued to blanket them both.

The spoor of conquest was high in Rusty now and he thought of this man before him not as his father—no, it had been a long time since he had considered him that, anyhow—but as an opponent. Another obstacle the gutters had thrown up to confound him. His hand went to his pocket and the switchblade he had put there for no one but the man in the camel’s hair coat came out.

Even in the darkness of the alley, with only the faintest light from a street lamp down the block casting a lighter shadow over the building, the knife seemed to draw all brilliance to itself. It was up straight in the boy’s hand, and its pointed head was aimed at Pops Santoro’s throat.

Rusty dragged for breath, came up with enough to gasp, “Y-you hear me, I don’t know who set ya on me, but you stay the frayk away from me, far away from me. Cause I hate you, you sonofabitch, I hate you all over, and you come near me again, I swear to God I’ll kill you. I’ll kill you and that’s it!”

The man stumbled back again, seeing the line of steel that extended out from Rusty’s fist. He put a hand to his stubbled chin and his voice was too thick with liquor to be forceful.

“You stay home, an’ stop interferin’ with people’s business.”

Rusty backed away and as he passed out of the line of faint light that came in through the alley’s mouth, he saw his father’s face in a half-light. At that instant, it all tied together and he knew he had been right. Something he had seen in the man’s face told him he was right.

And after he had left the alley at a dead run, after he had scrambled over a fence and run through a dozen other alleys, after he was on the roof of his own building, with the night a hood over him, he sat down and thought. And knew he was right, that he had stumbled onto the answer long before and was going about it in the right way.

No wonder they were all scared. No wonder they were all trying to get him to lay off. Boy-O was the key right now. What he had seen in his father’s face was the same thing—he now realized with shock—that he had seen in Miss Clements’ face.

The eyes had been the same. Very white and no pupil at all but a pin-prick of black. Eyes that were made by the Devil, eyes that were made by one thing. The dream-dust. The narcotics habit.

His old man was on it, too. Miss Clements had been on it.

That was why he was being warned away. Now all he had to do was find Boy-O. After Boy-O, if he could make the pusher talk, the next link, and on up, till he found the one he wanted.

Hell yes. The man in the camel’s hair coat.

rusty santoro

boy-o

Boy-O didn’t come out of his hole for almost a week.

It was a bad week; one of attending classes and having to bite his nails while waiting for a break. He had considered cutting school and spending his time looking, but a stern warning from Carl Pancoast bit the end off that idea. Also, Rusty was certain whoever had put Miss Clements on him would do his damnedest to make sure he was stopped from looking too hard—though how they could know he was looking for Boy-O was something Rusty could not imagine—even if they had to send the police after him, to arrest him as a truant.

Moms lay still in her bed, though now she was well enough to take a little clear chicken broth from either his hands or Mrs. Givens’. The kids in school avoided him. Cougars passed him in the halls with softly murmured catcalls and Weezee was a total stranger now. Only Carl Pancoast was any help. Rusty spoke to him several times, and though the older man harped endlessly on staying away from this business—allowing the police to solve the murder in their own time and way—he was a reassuring factor and Rusty knew he had at least one friend.

Then, the following Saturday, Boy-O crept out of hiding and Rusty went for him.

The boy had obviously known Rusty was looking for him. Rusty no longer trusted anyone in the neighborhood, and had carried on his efforts surreptitiously. Yet the neighborhood, with that unspoken instinct, like the mute communication of jungle vines, knew there was something going on, something tense, lying in wait. Rusty had not for a moment given up hope of trapping Dolores’ murderer, and the low plant sense of the neighborhood may have felt it. But they wanted to stay out of the line of fire, and almost no one would help him.

So when Boy-O left his pad—a room in a cheap flophouse outside Cougar turf—and wandered back to Tom-Tom’s for his dope-peddling run, Rusty knew it and he was there.

No planes to the face. Just a floating hunger, with no bones to support it. A starving animal, with eyes that never rested, never closed. Boy-O lived where he was supposed to live—in the gutter. His clothes reeked of the street and his face was always marred by patches of dirt or soot. A high-water mark ringed his thick neck. He had quick, scarred hands; filthy, untrustworthy hands.

He was passing a bundle to a Cougar named Clipper when Rusty came into the malt shop. He was removing the little white packets from the slit inside-edge of his pants-top, as the boy came through the open door. He looked up, started, then dragged himself into a semblance of nonchalance. It was instantly apparent to Rusty that whoever had been warning him off the finding of Dolores’ killer had also warned Boy-O that Rusty was on the scent.

A thought flashed through Rusty’s mind: why don’t they just put me down and stop this bullshit? The thought flickered and was gone. Along with the fear. He was doing what had to be done, just as he had had Giulio, the butcher, watching Tom-Tom’s place from his shop across the street, watching for Boy-O, forewarning Rusty.

Just as he had crossed into Cherokee turf. Just as he would find that last man, and do him the way he should have been done.

Just as he was going to make Boy-O talk today.

Boy-O saw him and a film of craftiness clouded his eyes. He turned his head slightly, continued talking to Clipper. But he knew every step Rusty took and as the Puerto Rican came up behind him, Boy-O did not move, but said quietly, “Anything I c’n do for ya, Santoro?”