Брайан Гарфилд - Gangway!

None of which explained why the two tough guys were regarding him with such undisguised awe.

Ittzy Herz either ignored their stares or didn’t even notice them. Probably the latter, Gabe judged; the little guy didn’t seem to be aware of anything around him at all.

Ittzy Herz turned away from them and walked sorrowfully up the street. When he had gone out of earshot Gabe said, “Who is that guy anyway?”

“You never heard of Ittzy Herz? He’s one of the world-famous sights of San Francisco.”

The tough seemed to be draping his arm in friendly fashion around Gabe’s shoulders. Gabe shifted away, and the guy moved with him. Gabe kept his hand on the knuckle duster in his pocket. He didn’t want a donnybrook with these guys — he wasn’t sure he could stand the smell — but he was ready if one came. He said, just to keep the conversation friendly, “What’s he world-famous for?”

“Just watch him. You’ll see.”

Gabe moved out of the encircling grasp and looked up the street. Ittzy Herz was leaving the curb to cross the street. A dilapidated junk cart was coming down the street above him, but Ittzy Herz had plenty of room to get across the street ahead of it. But two things happened. First Ittzy’s little round hat fell off, and Ittzy bent down to pick it up. Second a piece of white paper blew across the street under the cart-horse’s nose, causing it to shy, rear and bolt.

Suddenly the junk cart was a runaway, and Ittzy was square in its path. Gabe stiffened involuntarily, but behind him he heard the gamy guy’s unruffled chuckle.

Ittzy Herz didn’t even seem to see the cart thundering down at him. He merely stepped aside to avoid dirtying his boot in a horse pie on the cobblestones. It took him to the left a pace. At the same time the cart horse, for no discernible reason, jerked to Ittzy’s right and bolted past him up onto the curb, scattering panic-stricken pedestrians like a fox chasing chickens in a barnyard.

Eventually the cartman brought the runaway under control. A lot of people picked themselves up and dusted themselves off and shook their fists and hollered at the cartman.

Not Ittzy Herz. He didn’t seem to realize what a close call he’d had. He was still walking across the street, without hurry. And as he reached the sidewalk a woman leaned out a second story window and knocked a flowerpot off the sill with her elbow. Gabe opened his mouth to yell a warning because the flowerpot was on a collision course with Ittzy Herz’s head.

But somebody had left a bucket on the sidewalk, so that Ittzy Herz had to walk around it. As he did the flowerpot clanged into the bucket, and he strolled on unscathed. Not merely unscathed; he also seemed totally unaware that anything out of the ordinary had happened.

“You just can’t beat that little son of a bitch,” the gamy guy said with unconcealed admiration.

“I don’t get it,” Gabe said as the partner eased in closer and hugged his shoulders.

“Old Ittzy,” the gamy guy said, “he’s the luckiest son of a bitch ever born. You know one time he fell out of a third story window up at the Odeon, and there just happened to be a hay wagon going by, and he just happened to land in that nice soft hay?”

“Hell that’s nothing,” the partner said, “I heard a guy tried to roll Ittzy in Dead Man’s Alley, but a boa constrictor grabbed the guy just before he was about to sap Ittzy on the head.”

Gabe said, “A boa constrictor?”

“Yeah, some clown had it in a circus wagon, and it escaped that night. They found it next morning wedged into a hole in the back fence. Seems it couldn’t fit through because it had this huge lump in its middle, where it swallowed the guy that’d tried to roll Ittzy.”

“Nobody’s tried to lay a finger on Ittzy since then,” the gamy guy said. He was around on Gabe’s other side and getting closer. Gabe’s nostrils wrinkled.

The partner said, “I’ll tell you, friend, Ittzy’s so lucky his mother keeps him locked up in a room in the back of the store here. She charges people twenty-five cents just to look at him through a hole in the door.”

“And people pay it,” the gamy guy said. “They figure maybe a little luck’ll rub off on them too.”

Gabe was trying very hard not to breathe at all. “Kind of stuffy right here, wouldn’t you say?” And he shook off the partner’s arm, took two quick paces out to the edge of the curb, and dragged in a deep breath while he was upwind of them.

The two guys looked at each other. The gamy guy shrugged, the partner nodded. Then the gamy guy pulled a sack out from under his coat. “You know what I got in this sack?”

“It looks empty to me,” Gabe said.

“Well just take a closer look.”

“GABE!”

They all three looked up, startled. Here came Vangie. She was waving a wallet in front of her as if to shoo away horseflies. “You two get away from him. Get away! Go on — git!”

The two guys looked at each other. The gamy guy shook his head, the partner shrugged.

Vangie hurried across the street. “Go on. On the run, before I call the police.”

“Yeah,” the gamy guy said, “that’ll be the day.” His lip curled. “This dude belong to you, Miss Kemp?”

“Yes. And I’ll thank you to keep...”

“All right... all right. We’ll do you a little favor this time.” The gamy guy stuffed the empty sack back under his coat and made as if to tip his hat but only tugged at the brim a little. He said to Gabe, “All right, friend, we’ll take our leave. But a word of advice — you hang around this female, you better count your fingers every time she touches your hand.” And the two of them turned and sloped off.

Gabe felt a lot better without those birds crowding him the way they had. He said, “What was that all about anyhow?”

“Roscoe and his partner? They’re crimps.”

“Crimps? What’s that?”

“They shanghai people. To get crews for the ships.”

Gabe paled. “To go on the ocean? ”

“An awful lot of sailors jump ship when they get to San Francisco,” she said. “They all want to head for the gold fields. So the ships need crews, and that means there’s good money to be made in crimping.”

“Oh, I couldn’t take the ocean,” Gabe said.

“Good thing I came back when I did.” She seemed calmer than necessary, under the circumstances. Handing him the wallet she’d been brandishing, she said, “Here. Now come buy me dinner.”

Ittzy Herz was happy. He was out on his own and that was a rare treat. His Mama kept saying all the time, “Ittzy, you got to stay home where it’s safe, people always want to take advantage of you. You got to stay home in your room where it’s safe.” Never had a man had such a protective Mama, and never had a man needed one less.

He didn’t mind sitting in the back room while the rubes paid a quarter to look in at him through the peephole. It made him feel important. And it gave him time to read, play solitaire, and think about where he’d go and what he’d do when he was finally free for good. What he minded most was Mama fussing over him all the time. And maybe even worse than that was the times when store business was brisk and peephole business was slack — like it had been tonight. Mama would make him put on an apron and get behind the counter just like everybody else in the family.

Ittzy didn’t like that at all. After all he was in show business.

So today when her back was turned he’d scooted out of his apron and out of the store. And here he was: free. It was the first time he’d run away in quite a while, and it was just as much fun as always. All the people gawking at him, trying to touch him, fawning over him as if he were royalty.