The Triple Shot Box (Goodey's Last Stand, Not Sleeping Just Dead & Fighting Back): Three Gritty Crime Novels

by Charles Alverson

  Before Harry could go on with the inventory of the remains, a figure detached itself from the darkness of the side porch and walked toward him. It was a fireman, complete with long-billed helmet, rubber coat and fire ax. Like the house, the fireman seemed to smolder still, and as he crossed the lawn his high rubber boots squeaked. “You Mr. Caster?” the fireman asked.

  “That’s right.”

  “My name’s Coogan, Parker’s Landing Fire Department. Had a pretty nasty conflagration for a while here tonight.”

  “So I see,” Harry said. “What’s the damage?”

  “Living room gutted, smoke and water damage on the rest of the ground floor, suspected deterioration of first-floor beams and chance of collapse.”

  Almost idly, Harry asked: “Okay if I go in and take a look?”

  “Sorry,” Coogan said, “no one is allowed on the damaged premises until arson investigators complete their work in the morning.”

  “Arson,” Harry said.

  “Suspected arson,” the fireman corrected. “There is a strong suspicion that the fire may have been initiated by a type of fire bomb—what is popularly known as a Molotov cocktail.”

  “Oh.”

  “With this sort of suspicion, we can’t allow anyone in your home—not even you—until investigations are completed. That’s why I’m here, as well as to deal with any fires which may rekindle.”

  “All right,” Harry said. “Thanks very much.”

  “Any time,” said the fireman.

  As Harry turned to go back to his car, the fireman spoke again: “You been away from Parker’s Landing this evening, Mr. Caster?”

  “Yes, I’ve been in the city. Why?”

  “It’s been one hell of a night. A local boy got shot and killed this evening on Central Avenue. On his way to play in the football game. Bobby Rice, the quarterback, it was. Some fella shot him three times in the back and then got run down and crushed by a bus. You never saw such a mess in all your life.”

  Harry couldn’t react with surprise, so he just said: “It sounds like it.”

  “Sure was,” said the fireman. “And the boy’s father was really broken up, so I heard. A terrible thing. He was dead before anybody got to him.”

  “The guy who shot him,” Harry asked, “who was he?”

  “A stranger,” Coogan said. “Nobody I ever saw before. I didn’t catch the name exactly, but it was Harney or something like that. I don’t know what he’d want to shoot a boy like Bobby Rice for. It doesn’t make sense.”

  “No, it doesn’t,” Harry agreed. “No sense at all. But then a lot of things don’t make sense.”

  “You’re right there,” said Coogan. “Good night now.”

  “So long,” said Harry.

  Harry got back into his car wearily like a gypsy being pushed on yet another time. The dried blood on his shirt and undershirt was scratchy, and the slight wound on his neck still bothered him. He sat for a moment wondering why one of the peaceful, darkened houses wasn’t his. Then he turned the key to start the engine.

  Baptiste Speranza wheeled the car stiffly around the corner. It had been years since he’d driven. He was so intent on what he was doing that for some time he didn’t notice the red-and-blue light flashing behind the car. It took a long blast of the horn to get his attention and make him pull over to the side of the road.

  What a nuisance, Speranza told himself as he shut off the engine. He slipped the big gun from his pocket to the seat beside his thick thigh and began to fumble in his wallet for a long-invalid driving license. Rolling down the window, Speranza looked up at the policeman who’d parked behind him and walked up.

  “Officer,” he started to say, and then he recognized Beddell. “So, it’s you, Roy.”

  “Yes, Baptiste,” Beddell said, looking down at the old man. “What do you want?”

  “You know,” Beddell said.

  “Carmen called you,” Speranza said almost petulantly. “I should have known.”

  “No, she didn’t,” Beddell said. “Nobody called me. I wasn’t looking for you—didn’t even know you were out. I’m looking for Carlo Rizzo. He burned out Caster’s house a little while ago.”

  “Caster killed Rizzo’s boy,” Speranza said. “And my Gino.”

  “That’s not the point,” Beddell said. “What I’m saying is that it all has to stop right now. Where’s Rizzo?”

  “Have you tried his house?” Speranza asked. “He might be there.”

  “I was just there, but Rizzo wasn’t. He had three punks staked out at the house, but now they’re on the way to the lockup.”

  “You left Angela without protection?” Speranza asked anxiously. “Roy—”

  “My men are there,” Beddell said. “She’s protected. There will be no more killings—on either side—in Parker’s Landing.”

  “My Gino is dead,” Speranza said.

  “I don’t care. Gino was asking to be killed. If you want to blame someone for his death, blame me. I should never have let him have those two hoods this morning. Or blame yourself, Baptiste, if you want to.”

  “Me?”

  “Yes,” Beddell said. “You bought me a long time ago. I had a debt to you that I could pay only by staying bought. That’s why I didn’t take the situation in hand on Tuesday as I should have. Then there would have been no killings at all.”

  The old man said nothing.

  Beddell continued: “I was wrong to think I could sell only a little bit of my soul. I’m taking it back right now.”

  Speranza looked up into the policeman’s face. “Roy,” he said softly but forcefully, “maybe you’re right. But if you want to buy your soul back, get in that car of yours and leave me alone tonight. I’ll never ask anything more of you.”

  “I’m sorry, Baptiste,” Beddell said. “I can’t pay the debt, so I’m canceling it. You’ll have to accept that fact. Now, I want you to give me your gun and go home, or, so help me, I’ll take you into the station.”

  “Arrest me? What for?”

  “It doesn’t matter. You know I’ll find a charge and make it stick.”

  “You’ll be ruined if you do.”

  “I’m ruined already,” Beddell said undramatically. “I’m just trying to stop the rot from spreading. Baptiste, give me that gun.” He gave his revolver a little hitch in its holster. “I don’t want to have to take it from you.”

  “You’ll have to, Roy,” Speranza said calmly, and he leaned forward to start the car.

  Beddell cleared his gun from its holster and leveled it at Speranza. The old man leaned back from the steering wheel and laid his hand lightly at the side of his thigh. He looked up again at Beddell.

  “You’d shoot me, Roy?” he asked. His eyes lowered to the gun in the policeman’s hand.

  “I’ll shoot you if I have to, Baptiste,” Beddell said evenly. “Give me that gun.” He held out his left hand.

  Only then did Speranza understand that Beddell really meant what he said. Without further thought or hesitation, he swept his gun up from the car seat and brought it across his chest. He pulled the trigger and then pulled it again.

  Beddell saw the stiff motion in plenty of time. Almost in slow motion, he saw the gun in Speranza’s hand travel up from his thigh and turn until he could see the darkness of its large barrel.

  It was then that Beddell should have pulled the trigger. It was the last thing his brain told him. Even he couldn’t have said why he didn’t.

  Beddell rocked back at the first shot, but he felt no pain, only a numbing sickness. He stared at Speranza and then down at the gun in his own hand. He didn’t hear the second shot.

  Speranza watched his old friend fighting the rising flame. He knew the feeling and he knew it wouldn’t last. He watched Beddell rock back and come forward with a creeping red stain spreading across the taut front of his gabardine shirt.

  “Baptiste,” Beddell said, leaning stiff-kneed against the car door.

  “I’m sorry, Roy,” Speranza said. “I
didn’t want to.”

  “Baptiste,” Beddell repeated. Then he slumped forward, momentarily filling the window with his bloody torso. Then he rolled off to the right, grabbing the rear door handle of the car. His body twisted and he fell face up alongside the car with an arm propped up toward Speranza. His face was as blank as a burned-out light bulb.

  Speranza looked down at the dead policeman and then at the bloody smear at the bottom of the window. His face showed no expression except fatigue. Dropping the gun on the seat beside him, Speranza leaned forward and started the car’s engine. He raised his eyes to the street ahead and started to press down on the accelerator. But something stopped him. He switched off the engine and doused the car lights. It was dim in the little pocket holding the two cars. Speranza let both hands drop from the wheel into his lap.

  A sleepy milkman found the two men exactly like that two hours later and called the police.

  37

  Harry let himself into the darkened Lamplighter by the front door and slipped behind the bar without bothering to turn on the lights. The only illumination was from a blue-lit globe advertising a mixer. Reaching blindly for the whiskeys, he grasped the neck of a bottle and poured two inches into a highball glass. He raised the glass to his lips.

  “Enjoy your drink, Caster,” said a voice from the darkness. “It’s the last one you’ll have.” Carlo Rizzo came out of a booth with a pistol pointed over the bar at the middle of Harry’s body.

  “Hello, Rizzo,” Harry heard himself say. He was surprised at the calmness of his voice. “I thought I’d be seeing you someplace.” He took a drink from the glass.

  At the first taste, Harry shuddered convulsively and had to fight the urge to gag. He spat the rich, fruity liquor into the stainless steel sink and poured the rest of the drink after it.

  “What’s the matter?” Rizzo asked sarcastically.

  “I got the wrong bottle,” Harry said. “It was a peach liqueur. Do you mind if I find some Scotch?”

  “Go ahead,” said Rizzo. The easy voice didn’t go at all with the gun he was holding. Harry shook his head to try to bring back reality. It didn’t help. Switching on a small lamp, he located a bottle of expensive Scotch and reached out for it.

  “Only the bottle,” cautioned Rizzo. “Don’t try anything.”

  “Only the bottle, Rizzo,” Harry said, showing him the richly crested label. “Do you want a drink? It’s on the house,” he added with heavy irony.

  “Pour it out.”

  Harry poured two heavy drinks and carefully set the bottle down. Then he looked up at Rizzo and really saw him for the first time since he’d spoken.

  Rizzo was as sharply dressed as ever. But there was something markedly different about him. Before, Rizzo had been confident that he could ward off disaster. Now that confidence had been worn through like a cheap veneer. But with Rizzo, the veneer had been ripped rather than worn, and something naked and ugly showed through.

  They drank. Rizzo drank carefully, keeping his pistol aimed at the middle of Harry’s body. “You’re going to die, Caster,” he said.

  Harry didn’t answer. He thought of the revolver in his coat pocket with one shell left in the cylinder.

  “You don’t seem to care very much,” Rizzo said. “Or are you just playing it cool? It won’t do you any good.”

  “I’m not playing it cool, Rizzo. I’m scared of dying. But so much has happened that I haven’t any emotions left. If you’re going to kill me, kill me. I won’t put on a show for you.”

  Rizzo thought this over, but he wasn’t ready yet to kill Harry Caster.

  “You know what that goon of yours did to my boy tonight?” he asked. “Did you tell him to do that? Did you?”

  “I know,” said Harry, “but I didn’t tell Hoerner to kill your son, Rizzo. I didn’t even know where he was tonight. Hoerner must have gone crazy.”

  “Hoerner,” Rizzo said. “Yes, that’s the name—Hoerner. Where did you get ahold of such a guy, Caster? To shoot a boy like that?”

  “Where did you get the men who beat Marco Carradino to death?” Harry asked boldly, not caring about Rizzo’s reaction. “I’m sorry your boy was killed, Rizzo, but I don’t see a lot of difference.”

  “You don’t,” said Rizzo.

  “No.”

  Rizzo thought this over for a few moments. “You’d feel different if it was your son. You don’t have a son, do you, Caster?”

  “I did once,” Harry said, “a long time ago. He died when he was fourteen months old.”

  Again Rizzo was silent. “You can tell me something else,” he said. “How did you come to hire a gunsel like this Hoerner? I mean, what made you decide to fight me?”

  “You didn’t think I would?”

  “No,” said Rizzo. “I didn’t think you had it in you.”

  “Do you mind if I pour us another drink?” Harry asked. “I could use one.”

  “Go ahead,” Rizzo said. He still pointed the gun at Harry, but the hand holding it rested on the bar in front of him.

  Harry poured two more stiff drinks and then returned the bottle to the service counter below the bar. He picked up his glass with his left hand. As he drank and Rizzo drank, Harry stealthily took the revolver out of his pocket, the move hidden from Rizzo by the high bar. As he put his glass down on the bar with a clink, Harry laid the revolver softly on a towel in the shadow of the bar.

  “No,” Rizzo said, “I really didn’t think you had it in you. Who would have thought a two-bit guy like you would fight it out just to keep a crummy joint like this?”

  “It’s all I’ve got, Rizzo,” Harry said. “What would you have done in my place?”

  “You really want to know?”

  “Yes.”

  “I would have fought, too. I’d have blown your head off if you’d tried to muscle in on my rackets.” Rizzo laughed bitterly. “You want to know something really funny, Caster?”

  “What’s that?”

  “I don’t even need your lousy joint now. I don’t need it. Do you know who Abe Montara is?”

  “I’ve heard of him.”

  “Well,” Rizzo said, “Abe’s the guy who squeezed me so hard that I came on to you. He was very mad at me for a couple of small reasons. But when he hears what happened tonight—that Bobby was killed—he’s not going to be mad at me anymore. He’s going to give me my piece of the action back, Caster. And maybe a bit more. What do you think of that?”

  “It’s crazy,” Harry said.

  “Yeah, it’s crazy. But Abe Montara’s got a heart—he’s a snake with a heart—and he’s going to forgive Carlo Rizzo. And Carlo Rizzo is going to be a good boy from now on.” His laugh could have etched glass. “A very good boy. Pour us another drink, Caster.” Harry did, and when he put the bottle back down below the bar, he let his hand fall on the butt of the revolver.

  “Drink,” ordered Rizzo. “Drink to my good luck. I’m a very lucky guy.”

  Harry drank silently. His other hand remained on the pistol grip. Rizzo let his gun hand relax, and the pistol lay canted on the bar. “You know something else, Caster?” he said.

  “No.”

  “I’m not going to kill you.” Rizzo looked at his pistol and then returned it to the holster between his arm and his chest. “Not tonight. I’m going to give you your life, Caster. Do you know why?”

  Harry shook his head. He didn’t trust his voice.

  “Because it’s not enough,” Rizzo said. “I kill you, and you’re gone. I can’t reach you anymore. No, Harry, I want you alive. I want you to think about how you got my boy killed tonight. Think about it good. And think about me, Harry, still around. And this.” He gave the gun in its holster a thump with his knuckles. “Imagine me behind you with a gun wherever you go. Because I might be.”

  Rizzo pivoted a little unsteadily and started walking along the bar toward the front door of the Lamplighter.

  “Rizzo!”

  Rizzo turned with a sour smile on his face and found Harry Ca
ster pointing a revolver at him from behind the bar. Harry held the gun well out from his body at shoulder height as if he were taking target practice.

  Rizzo’s hand jerked, and his fingers splayed in anticipation of a gun butt.

  “Don’t,” warned Harry deliberately, “or I’ll kill you.”

  “I believe you,” said Rizzo. He let his hand drop to his side. From where Harry stood, Rizzo was perfectly framed in the Lamplighter’s glass door.

  “So?” said Rizzo.

  “I listened to you, Rizzo,” Harry said. “Now, you listen to me. I didn’t start all this; you did. I fought you, and now I’m sorry that I did. Nobody won a damned thing. But I want you to know that I’ll do it again if you don’t leave me and mine alone. You’re not the only one who can use a gun. You’d better think about that. Now get out of here, Rizzo. Go home to your wife.”

  Rizzo said nothing, only raised his eyebrows and walked out of the bar onto the sidewalk.

  Harry waited until the sound of Rizzo’s car died out in the street. Then he put his pistol back on the service counter. Ducking under the bar, he followed Rizzo’s path out of the door, locked it behind him and got into the rented car. Starting the car, Harry made a wide U-turn on Parker Street and headed north to the Expressway and Hildy.

  THE END

  Because reviews are critical in spreading the word about books, please leave a brief review on Amazon if you enjoyed The Triple Shot Box. Thanks.

  Sign-up for the free newsletter (no spam, no BS) to receive news and exclusive discounts on the latest Charles Alverson books: watchfirepress.com/alverson

  THE WORD: when lifetime criminal Joe Dixon is released from Folsom Prison, he vows never to return - but with no skills and no prospects, Joe turns to the best grift of all: the word of God.

  Buy The Word on Amazon at watchfirepress.com/theword

  The Word: An Excerpt

  When lifetime petty criminal Joe Dixon is released from Folsom Prison again, he vows never to return. To support himself on the outside with few actual skills and no prospects, Joe turns to the oldest grift of all: spreading the gospel. Mail-order ministry license in hand, Joe rents a ramshackle storefront, calling his new church “The Word.”