Ed Lacy - Shoot It Again

Swarthy started for me, so did the bartender—chopping hands spread like a crab's. I kept my back to the wall. The bit in Judo is the surprise element—I'd had my share of surprises for the day. Turning slightly to face the bartender, I feinted with my left hand as I kicked him on the knee. Yelling, he sat down, hard. I then crossed what I thought was a nifty right to the side of the gangster's face, expected him to drop. Merely grunting, he hit me with a left hook any number of heavyweights would have been damned proud of.

Floating down a well of whiteness, I thought: This is also my day to tangle with pros! For a long time I seemed to be swimming hard and painfully in soupy brightness, a vast, creamy-white ocean—then night came on fast.

When I opened my eyes I was on the floor of a cell-like room, the only light being the sun streaming through a small, square opening high on one rough wall. I closed my eyes again to stop the throbbing in my sore head and jaw. Opening them seconds later, I made out dirty clothes piled on a chair, worn copies of Life, the Paris edition of the N. Y. Herald-Tribune on the stone floor next to an army cot.

Mr. Robert Parks was sitting cross-legged on the cot, wearing only torn and badly-soiled shorts—pimples and sores all over his broom-handle arms. A wispy, reddish beard outlined this thin face—looking pale and sickly, the eyes watery blue blurs, sharp nose dripping. Parks looked worse than his passport photo. For a moment we stared at each other with mutual suspicion.

Digging under the lumpy cot mattress, he pulled out my passport. Opening it, he cackled in an utterly silly voice, “Why... of course! It's you! You're Clayton Biner...!” He waved the passport at me. “Old man, you didn't come alone?”

I tried to talk but my numb jaw refused to work. Gangster-type could wallop! I'd taken three head beatings in less than that many hours.

Rubbing the silky hair on his chin, Robert Parks went on in the same childishly shrill voice, “Oh man, I thought you'd dig... was positive you'd bring the police. Instead... now... here you are... like me. Man, you duded out... on me!”

His wash-eyes began to tear as he grinned, showing neat, dirty teeth. Then Parks rocked back and forth on the stinking cot, full of low, intimate laughter... absolutely insane giggles.

CHAPTER 3

After several false starts I managed to stand. Except for a distant ringing in my dome, I felt okay. Grabbing a chicken shoulder, I jerked Parks to his feet—he didn't weigh in at much over 115 pounds—although he seemed six feet tall—each bone, tiny muscle, vein of his pitiful chest and scrawny neck showing, as in a medical illustration. “What's the big laugh?” I asked, my mouth and lips finally coming alive. “What the hell are you doing with my passport?”

The watery, vague eyes didn't even see me as I yanked the green booklet out of his limp hand, feeling a true sense of relief at having my passport back. I spent a second thumbing through it with my free hand—all was in order, including my bloated-face evil passport photo.

“Come on, laughing boy, what's this about?” I snapped, shaking him again. Up close he had this unwashed stink.

Flinging one skeleton arm at the sunlight coming down from the wall opening like a stage spot, Parks shrilled, “What is this all about? Man, why not go for the larger question—what is life all about? Gaze at the sun's staircase. Often I crawl up that golden gangplank, escape this filth—soar out into a new world of dazzling colors and fuzzy warmth. As Tennyson said, 'Yet all experience is an arch wherethro'... Gleams that untraveled world, whose margin fades... Forever and forever when I move.' Old Tenny bugs me, because man, it really is forever and...”

I shook him hard. “Come on, cut the stupid chatter! What the hell is your story, Parks?”

Blinking many times, tears started down his hollow cheeks. “My story? Haven't you heard? I'm Robert Parks, the junkie poet!”

“The news shatters me! Stupid, what's going on here? What did I step into?”

“I'm the talent chump, the new Sandburg, the modern Thomas Hood. 'Talent is that which is in mans power: genius is that in whose power a man is.' James Russell Lowell. I...”

I shook him until his bones rattled. “Stop making school boy quotes! What's happening here?”

As if talking to himself, Parks said, “I came to Europe to study that elusive passion called art—poetry, the art of communication... and now I'm carrying the world's largest monkey on my back. My Christ, what a buggy term, what horrible imagery—I cart the whole damn zoo on my poor back! Thomas Grey so perfectly stated, 'The paths of glory lead but to the grave.' Trouble today—our poets are snobs, don't dig the wisdom of the old masters or the...”

“Cut the lecture, you foolish bastard!” I slapped him: not much of a slap but his nose began to bleed and he crumpled in my arms. His blood was such a faint, pastel pink—I almost threw up in horror.

I let him fall on the cot. Watery eyes, running nose, pasty skin, sores on his arms—he wasn't kidding about being on dope. Okay, that was his private little red wagon, he could pull it any direction he wished- How did my passport fold into his nightmare? Far more important: how was I to get by the goons outside, ever shake this trap?

I tried the door, as if doubting it would be locked. One of these ancient, solid doors, built when a man's home was truly his castle. I couldn't even rattle it. Pushing Parks and the cot out of the way, I stood on the chair. The opening was about a foot square in the thick wall. Squinting against the sun, I saw the destroyer anchored in the harbor. Getting up on my toes for a moment, I had a better view—of nothing. We were on the top floor of an old, balcony-less building. If it was possible to climb out—and I couldn't even get my fat head through the window—I'd face a sheer drop of at least a hundred feet.

Coming down off my toes, I rested, the sea breeze sweeping through the opening cooling me off—a little. One thing was for certain—I'd never be missed. No one would bother looking for me, nor report me missing. Even Syd didn't have any idea where I could be. The only out was to tangle with gangster-boy and the Judo barkeep—I wasn't sure I could take another pasting. But if I could talk to them, explain I didn't know which end was up in this deal, the old innocent bystander who...

I heard dragging sounds outside the room. The heavy door creaked open—big blondie was flung into the room, bouncing hard on the stone floor, as the door slammed shut fast. They'd worked her over. The meaty face, never pretty, was bruised, one eye already swollen shut and turning a Mars Red.

Noel lay on the floor, whimpering and moaning. Glancing down at Parks, still out cold on the cot, I crossed to an old pipe and faucet sticking up from the floor in one corner. Noel was wearing a white and blue flare-skirt, thin white sleeveless blouse fighting her great breasts. Tearing a hunk of the ripped skirt—seeing much heavy thigh, I wet and ran the damp rag over her face. The good eye slowly blinked at me. In slow, hysterical French, she said, “Fool! We thought you would surely come with the police—now we all die!”

“Take it from the top. Why should I bring the police?”

“They are going to kill him.” She nodded her over-blonde head toward Parks. “He's a childish man, but I want no part of murder. When he is not high with the drug, Roberto clearly understands his situation, offered me five thousand dollars to help him escape. Since I work in the club, we thought a good plan was to switch passports with another American. We assumed you would remember the club, go to your Consulate, then bring the police. With a little work, the police could follow the trail from the club to here. But—you had to come alone!”