The Warriors

by Sol Yurick

  He turned to leave; the little boy-girl asked if he’d like a drink, a reefer, a fix, anything to fly-on a little. But they had tempted him with drugs before and he knew where that led. It meant to be out because the Family wouldn’t tolerate addicts. How could you depend on somebody with a habit that could betray you? He knew; he had seen it happen to his half-brother, Alonso. He jostled past and the voice became mean, a couple of octaves lower than his, asking him if he wanted to tangle. He didn’t say anything but moved on. And that was when the neat, normal-looking fag had asked the first time, “What is your name?” He kept on moving. The man walked with him. They went out the door together. He was free again. The homo asked, “What’s your name?”

  He said, “Hinton.”

  “Pretty,” the man said. “Skin like chocolate and gray eyes. Milk-chocolate Hinton.”

  But Hinton kept on walking, turning here and there, through the galleries, and shook the fag by going out through one of the heavy-bar, man-high turnstiles and came to stairs. A lot of distorts were there, their fix-faces weird, sitting on the staircase like they were in bleacher seats. They stared ahead as if watching some kind of performance. Hinton almost turned around to see what they were looking at. He couldn’t go back, so he forced himself to go through them, and he soft-footed past and up, afraid he would step on one, or he would trip on another, or he would lose his shoe and have to grope for it, and they would drag him down and make him join them.

  Then he was up and out in the street. Free. But he wasn’t sure where he was. He could see he was a block from all the wild Broadway lights. He walked that way because there must be an entrance back to the subway there. The air was almost as hot outside, only it smelled of gasoline fumes instead of piss. He was a little knee-shaky. He couldn’t stop perspiring. He was still hungry and thirsty. He came to 42nd Street and Broadway and turned left, into the lights. The clustered, movie and amusement lights and the crowds passing made it hotter.

  He came to a food stand and the smell of frying fat made him hungry—the candy hadn’t satisfied him at all. He stopped and ordered a hot dog and an orange drink. The first bite made his mouth spurt spit; his stomach contracted and churned. He had eaten nothing but candy since the morning, and then he only had a plateful of cold cooked beans at one of the Family cousin’s homes. He ate the frank and sipped the orange, turning his back to and leaning his elbows on the counter. He stared out to the street through a curtain of hot lights. People walked back and forth; it didn’t matter that it was late, almost four o’clock now, maybe more.

  He watched. He had lived a few blocks away from here once, around Ninth or Tenth Avenue, but he had been too young to remember it now. His half-brother, Alonso, hung around here now. Alonso called the street no-turf. The cool cats and the hot, all the smartest cats, came here, Alonso said. Hinton couldn’t see it. There were no warriors around. They all looked strange; Something Else. Small mob-fragments drifted by. Loner toughs leaned up against walls between store windows. Little handkerchiefed, short-skirted girls, tailed by hungry drifters, marched up and down in clumps, shrilling, giggling at some endless jokes. Drunks staggered, muttering, fighting their way through the heat and through their own sickness. Small explosions were going off all around; they were still celebrating here. He finished the drink and the food, but it left him unsatisfied, even hungrier. He ordered a hamburger and a grape juice. The counterman told him, “Give me the whole order at one time, will you? I can’t keep trotting up and down, waiting on you all night.” Hinton wished he had the heart to tell him off. Hadn’t he killed his man? Didn’t he have rep now? But on the other hand he remembered the tunnel and was ashamed. But who knew about that? he asked himself. He did, he told himself. Hinton ate his hamburger and drank his grape juice and thought that if the Family had been here with him, that slave wouldn’t dare to talk to him like that, because they would have taken the whole operation apart and drowned the creep in his own orange juice. Yes they would. But he knew he couldn’t lip the man down alone. Not yet.

  Wild fag-queens with powdermask faces flutterfooted by, their feet seeming to float along the ground, tails waggling past, jackets swishing on their shaky shoulders, shirts flapping on their arses; they wore dyed hair and their eyes looked through make-up rimholes. Grinning sailors followed and you could see the make-trouble look on their faces. Weren’t they just going to give it to those fruits when they caught up with them? Well, Hinton didn’t like homos either, and he remembered the voice that had whispered to him, inviting. That was what they turned you onto if they got hold of you.

  He finished eating and walked along. He passed a newsstand. A headline said something about resumed atom-bomb testing. He passed the pokerino places where gamblers played all night. Bored boys leaned around, waiting for anything to grow into action. He knew all about that kind of waiting. In the store windows, big-headed hula-dolls waggled their electric tails; thousands of must-go-now, two-ninety-nine Swiss watches ticked out different hours; ever-thirsty birds dipped their long beaks politely and drank perpetually from glasses. Hinton thought of buying one. Great, innocent-eyed, gauze-clothed dolls blinked ahead blindly and stayed unsmirched by what their blue eyes saw. A wire coil bunched from one end back to the other while a sign said, PERPETUAL MOTION: HOW IS IT DONE? Playing cards with big-tit naked girl backs were strung in rows. He saw more ragged people, too, a lot of them—begging—and these were the most frightening because their faces were odd, distorted, and their bodies seemed badly connected. They were still horrifying even though he had heard they were all fakes.

  A kid, not much younger than him, came up and asked, “Mr., you got a dime so I could have a place to sleep?” Hinton didn’t answer and the kid yelled, “Well, fuck you,” but not too angrily, more as if he was supposed to, and moved on. Tourists walked by, not seeing it for what it was. You could tell them by their gape-mouth look and their ever swiveling heads, and the fact that they had to see it all yet saw nothing at all, and that made them look crazy, too. A fat girl with orange hair beehived high walked by, offering for a price, looking satisfied with herself; that was because she was fat, Hinton thought, not like the urinal girl. Cops patrolled, club-swinging, always on the alert, but prepared only to see what was not paid for. But that was nothing new, Hinton thought; that was the way it was wherever you went. And he could see the pushers passing around all kinds of dream, back and forth, and he knew that you could buy any kind of kick here, even those he had never heard or thought of. But he wasn’t going to let happen to him what had happened to Alonso.

  He came to the end of the block, at Ninth Avenue, turned right, crossed 42nd Street, and started back toward Broadway. He had to stop and have a few slices of pizza and a pineapple drink because the hunger had come back. He finished and walked on. He passed a lot of movie houses and looked at the titles and the photographs behind the glass cases on the walls. One place showed nudist movies all night; he wondered if he should go in. But then he might miss the Family. He passed a milk bar and went in and had a glass of milk. That didn’t satisfy him and so he had a chocolate malted too. He might run out of money soon, but he couldn’t help himself: He had to eat. He took out his money and started to count it. An old, slit-eyed bum gave him a hungry, no-teeth look, and he put the bread away again. He was sure he still had a lot left. His hunger kept getting worse. He walked a little further, went into a cigar store and bought a cheap cigar and some caramels. He lit the cigar, smoked it, sucked the caramel and went out to walk around some more.

  He went downstairs into the subway. He passed through an amusement arcade, with a big eat-stand in the middle. He stopped and had an order of French-fries, a knish, and a papaya drink to wash it down. He left his cigar on the counter ledge beside his elbow while he ate. A jukebox played the top hits over and over again, but he couldn’t make out the words over the sounds of speakers talking, trains rumbling, target shooting, game-noise, and whistling. He rocked and chewed in time to the beat. When he finished, he turned to pick u
p the cigar but it was missing. Someone had stolen it.

  He went over to the arcade newsstand and looked at the big-breasted girls on the magazine covers, but the newsstand owner watched him suspiciously, so he bought a lot of candies, stuffing his pocket with chocolates, cashew bars, chocolate-covered raisins, candied fruits. One of the newspapers showed that someone was suing a famous actress for divorce, because of adultery, and it had a full-page picture of a beautiful blonde with an innocent smile.

  He walked around the arcade looking at the games. He saw someone pass close out of the corner of his eye and turned to see a dirty-suited weird little coolie tailing him. He looked closer and saw it was himself. He recognized himself because of the pin. He stared, thinking it might be one of those distorting funny-mirrors, but it wasn’t. It was because of what he had been through, the night’s journey, the running, the fighting; it had made his clothes ragged and dirty. No wonder the others looked at him like he was a slave, like all the other slaves he had run across down here. He stared again, straightened himself till he saw a warrior in the mirror, a Dominator, a Family man, and he moved on.

  He tried a machine gun against flashing lights that were supposed to be Jap and Kraut pilots. He fired at a light that flickered across a board which was meant to be a plane in the sky. There was a loud-speaker by his side and he heard the sound of machine guns and the dive-roar of pursuit planes, but it sounded as if it came from far away and it was unsatisfying, even though he had shot down a lot and made a high score: the gun didn’t even make his hand shake. He left it and moved around the arcade, eating candies, wondering why he was still hungry. He couldn’t stop eating. People hung around, giving him the hard look-over, sizing and figuring, trying to see if he was fish for their catching. He didn’t dare to linger anywhere too long. He tried to keep looking cool, as cool and hard as he could, in spite of his clothes, showing that he was preyer, not prey. They eyed him and they eyed his pin. He knew the pin was a come-on, a cause to fight. Everyone saw you belonged, had something, were something; it made them mad and they wanted to take it from you and make you the way they were. He couldn’t take off the pin because it would reduce him to the others.

  He passed a booth. Someone was standing at the end of a narrow aisle, watching him, and he turned around. The cowboy was about six feet two, wide-shouldered, and his arms were perpetually crooked into the fast-draw position. His face was young, manly, clean; the eyes were blue and innocent; the hat was tilted low over his eyes; the cowboy wore a fancy blue-checked Western shirt with white piping, a scarlet silk bandanna, a white ten-gallon hat, and the holsters on his flanks held low-slung forty-fives, big and menacing. He wore a badge. He was the sheriff.

  The sheriff was set back about ten feet from a counter and a sign announced, TRY YOUR LUCK WITH THE FASTEST DRAW IN THE WEST—ONLY 10¢. There was a town painted around three sides of the sheriff; his wide stance blocked the main street. The lights from above beat down like sunlight on the nearest part of the yellow-painted town; it looked hot and Western. Behind the sheriff it was cooler, green, inviting. There was a railing in front of the booth, a coinbox on the railing, and a stiffened ammunition belt curved to step into as if you were wearing it. There were two holstered guns attached to the belt with electric wire.

  Hinton thought it over while he ate a fruit bar. He could smell burning coffee; the waves of grill-heat became like the heat from sunbaked rocks, or off the hot building planks. Beyond the sheriff, it looked cool; there would be a bar there; you could get a drink and rest a long while. The figure gazed back at him; the blue eyes were lifeless, staring everywhere. If that sheriff were alive, how tough he would be, Hinton thought, how much tougher than any headbuster, in spite of the bland face.

  Hinton knew all about it; he had seen The Duel, the Fair One, ever since he had been an infant. He had seen it in the movies, seen it on the streets, seen it in the newsreels; they told about it in school; he had acted it out a thousand times. And it only took a dime to make the sheriff live. Of course the bullets weren’t real; the risk was a fake one, Hinton told himself. But still . . . Hinton fished a dime out of his pocket and stepped into the belt. It was lowslung so he could clear the holster without trouble. He put a dime into the coinbox.

  The eyes lit up. The face menaced. The sheriff lived. The lights beat down harder, making the tired scene-paint more real and unbearable, and the land the sheriff blocked more inviting. The hot lights began to make the figure of the sheriff misty, hard to see in the sunglare. The sheriff spoke; “I’m the Law of this here town and I’m here to protect it. And if you think any varmint like you is a-goin’ to ride in here, a-makin’ trouble, why mister, you’ve got another think comin’, because you’re a-goin’ to have to get past me.”

  The words made Hinton angry—they were so scornfully spoken—putting him down when he hadn’t even done anything.

  “Now, I’m a-goin’ to count to three and when I do, I want you out of this town. But if you’re not gone, you just better come out firin’. You draw them pistols. You cock ’em. And when I say to fire; you fire. And we’ll see who wins the showdown in three shots.

  “Y’ready?” the sheriff asked and then, louder, angrier, “There’s no room for your kind on the streets of El Dorado. This is a law-abidin’ town and we aim to keep it that-a-way. Clear out, you polecat, or I’m a-goin’ to run you in. You won’t? All right then, One. Two. Three.” And the sheriff’s arms drew the pistols out of the holsters and moved them up and pointed them at Hinton. The eyes blazed. He looked at the two barrel circles. It was enough to make him shaky. He was almost ready to turn away; for a second he forgot to draw. “Fire,” the sheriff said.

  Hinton drew, cocked, but the pistols of the sheriff fired before he got them halfway up. Hinton flinched and he shot. There was a sound of bullets ricocheting close.

  And the sheriff’s voice was saying, “Got you, you varmint. Winged you, didn’t I? What? Need another lesson? Well then prepare to draw again.” The arms were returning the guns to the holsters. Hinton stuffed his guns back and crouched to fire again. People were watching from the side and behind him. He paid them no mind, concentrating on his draw, looking hard, watching for the sheriff’s play.

  The sheriff’s tough, angry eyes tried to stare Hinton down: Hinton faced up to him. The voice droned at Hinton: Hinton pressed his lips tightly. He wouldn’t let himself be put down. The sheriff said, “Now.” Hinton drew, cocked, shot, and hoped the bullet entered the sheriff’s heart. Body would jerk back, chest would rip apart, blood of the man who put Hinton down would gush out. He heard the report of the guns. The voice of the sheriff mocked Hinton, telling him that he hadn’t done it again. He had one shot left.

  Hinton slid the guns into the holster. His whole body tensed now. He forgot the heat. He forgot the tiredness. He forgot his bad heel. He set his hat low on his forehead; he touched his pin; he straightened his war cigarette. He hunched his shoulders quickly once, twice, and pulled his sweaty pants free from his balls. Around him, he could see the distorted faces, the glistening eyes, hungry to see a good man put down. A fat-shouldered fairy was making remarks about him. Crazy kids, all weirds watched. He saw them out of the side of his eyes. He leaned forward. He drew at the command, cocked, and fired. Who could fast-draw better than Hinton? Bullets whistled by again and ricocheted. The mocking voice of the sheriff was telling him to get out of town, to keep on moving along. He had lost the fight.

  He straightened out. His muscles were stiff from holding that tense posture. Of course. They always rigged it against you. They always put you down and you had to teach them a lesson, but good, to show them. But you couldn’t do it if you did it their way. He stuck the guns back into the holsters regretfully. They felt heavy and satisfying and he was sorry to let them go. He wished they were real—then he’d show them. He reached into his pocket and took out a small box of chocolate-covered raisins and lifted his head high and poured the whole packet into his mouth. He limped slowly away, chewing his
mouth clear of them.

  He thought he should go back to the station platform to see if the Family had made it back. He walked around the arcade and looked at the other shooting galleries and the pinball games. Flipheads hung around; the Other hurried through, never seeing it. He passed the newsstand where he had bought all the candy. The headlines said something about a gangland-style killing. Another paper’s headline said that there had been a big rumble uptown where thousands had been involved. He turned the page to read about it, but it took him too long to make out what it said. The man told him to leave the paper alone and move on if he wasn’t going to buy. Hinton yawned and wondered if he should buy some more candy.

  A seven-year-old kid came up to him and asked him for a dime, but he ignored the punk. He walked past a window with man-sized pictures of naked girls and he stopped to stare at them. Underneath was a pile of dusty astrology magazines, five cents apiece. His mother was always looking up her horoscope to figure out what was a good omen and what was evil any day, so she could know what she should do and what she shouldn’t. Hinton put no faith in these things. Norbert, he was always saying that if he knew what the future held for him, man, what couldn’t he do, what races couldn’t he win. A silly dream. Hinton turned back to the naked girls, looking at their big, slick-paper breasts, shining. The kid came up again and asked Hinton to give him a dime so he could go home because he was stranded. He looked down at the kid but saw the wise, conning look; that kid didn’t need any money to go home, Hinton decided: He was home—here. The kid seeing Hinton’s skeptical look, said to him that he really needed the money for a drink. Hinton shook his head. The kid acted twitchy and said he needed a fix. Hinton shook his head. Then the kid looked at him, and looked up at the pin in Hinton’s hat, and wanted to know if Hinton wanted to have him, because for a dollar, he would do anything Hinton wanted. Hinton was about to smack the kid, but he saw one of those wild ones looking at him, waiting for the action, and he turned away instead. He walked till he came back to the sheriff, standing under the hot lights, blocking the dusty street, waiting for Hinton.