1932 Drug & The Dominos

by Ryohgo Narita

  Nicholas and Elean looked at each other, then asked about something that had been on their minds:

  “Uh, President?”

  “Hmm? What is it?”

  “It seemed like the police took a lot longer to get here than we’d anticipated.”

  In fact, the police had arrived roughly thirty minutes after everything was over. As a result, they’d had time to carry out the wounded and falsify the circumstances, but…

  “Oh, that? Yes, yes, there was that.”

  The voice that came from behind the documents sounded as if it had caught itself being careless.

  “It was apparently top secret, but they held a hearing for the terrorist Huey Laforet yesterday. He was transported out of Manhattan today, in strict secrecy, under guard. After all, in order to retake that man, there was a train robbery—you know, the Flying Pussyfoot incident from a few days ago. At any rate, since there was a group that had been plotting something like that, to safeguard against a possible attack from the remaining terrorists, the police had absolutely every available officer guarding that area. I’d wager that’s why.”

  The genie of the documents spoke matter-of-factly, and Elean lobbed another question at him.

  “When we were, erm, how should I put it; you know… When we’d evacuated outside. While Gustavo was on that flashy, jaw-dropping, spectacular rampage of his, where on earth were you, boss?”

  In response to that question, the voice from behind the documents seemed to laugh a little.

  “I was here the whole time.”

  “Huh?”

  “Sir?”

  “Oddly enough, people tend not to notice. Thanks to that, I got to hear the conversations in all the rooms through the speaking tubes in here.”

  As the two stood aghast, for an instant, they got the impression that the pile of documents itself had laughed. In closing, the magical paperman wrapped up the debriefing by saying something very unlike an information broker:

  “At any rate, it’s best to take great care of information one has seen and heard directly. There’s no such thing as Laplace’s demon in this world, no absolute intellect. No matter how much knowledge you have, in the end, you must rely on your own instincts and experience. That’s how I see it.”

  Several days later

  That day, the president, Nicholas, and the others were all out, and Henry was manning the information desk by himself.

  I nearly died to get that information. I want to be the one who tells it, no matter what. I’m certain I’ll be able to tell it better than the president. After all, I experienced all sorts of things directly. I feel as if I lost an assortment of other things in exchange, but there’s no help for that. Information is power. In order to obtain it, a commensurate price must be paid. I still believe that, even now.

  However, in the future, I think I’ll avoid getting carried away.

  Henry didn’t worry about the fact that his hairline had turned pure white. He was itching to tell someone the information he himself had paid for.

  Just then, a customer stopped in.

  He was an odd young man with a tattooed face. His leg appeared to be injured; it was wrapped in bandages, and he was leaning on a cane.

  The editorial department’s atmosphere seemed to intimidate him, and he looked as if he might start crying from that alone.

  “Welcome to our information brokerage. We sincerely appreciate your visit.”

  Even as the young guy looked bewildered by the overly courteous greeting, he said the words Henry most wanted to hear:

  “U-um, about the, the train robbery that happened a little while ago—”

  And so, today as well, information races through the streets.

  Those who use information, and those made to dance by it:

  In order to trick and be tricked, to flourish and fall, they steal information from each other.

  As if jeering at them, this mindless power gradually grows and spreads, higher and further.

  Wishing to accumulate, or to collapse and vanish.

  Evolving and atrophying, over and over, as if living eternally.

  Information: It resurrects again, and again, and again.

  The End

  RUNORATA FAMILY

  On the outskirts of Newark, New Jersey

  “And so?”

  Under a bright, cold, clear blue sky, an elderly man stood alone on the grass.

  There was a young man behind him. He’d been Gustavo’s subordinate and had delivered constant reports on the situation.

  “Sir. By some miracle, Gustavo is alive. We don’t know what sort of weapon was used, but it seems to have missed his carotid artery. The bullets left in his body were fired by the staff in self-defense. They seem to have decided that the wound to his throat was self-inflicted while he was out of his mind.”

  In response to the words from Bartolo—his true boss—the man made his report without showing the slightest nervousness.

  He seemed like an entirely different person from the guy who’d cowered in front of Gustavo.

  “In addition, the police seem to have begun to consider him a suspect in the Genoard murders, and we think it’s only a matter of time before he’s arrested. The groundwork has already been laid. We’ve made arrangements with the politicos, and they won’t touch any of us beyond Gustavo.”

  “I see.”

  Giving a small nod, Bartolo looked up at the sky and murmured, as if he were talking to himself.

  “Well, I suppose you could say he was lucky.”

  “What do you mean, sir?”

  “We’ve had requests from other councils to hand him over for a while now. The guy did flashy things in the past. The others probably wanted to settle the score.”

  He stated the bottom line in an indifferent tone, as if he were talking about the economy.

  “If he’d gotten the Gandors’ territory, that would have been fine. We would have put an end to the matter by handing that territory over to Manhattan’s Five Families.”

  “And if he’d failed, you would have given them Gustavo…?”

  “As it turns out, he did fail, but if they put him in the clink, the other fellas won’t be able to get at him easily. As far as he’s concerned, it was a lucky break. That said, to compensate, I’ll have to part with some of my profits.”

  Pausing for a moment, Bartolo gave an unamused smile and grumbled mildly to his underling.

  “This is quite an age we’re living in. You need the approval of councils or the Commission just to bump off a man who’s sold you out or to get revenge for a follower.”

  Since Luciano’s blood-soaked revolution, the mafia world had undergone a rapid transformation into a modern organization. Connections with politicians had grown stronger, and their excessively antagonistic relationships with Jewish and Irish gangs had cooled down.

  The Runorata Family was continuing its operations a step removed from those waves of modernization. That said, they weren’t fighting them. Like the other syndicates, they’d chosen coexistence, and Bartolo had enough clout to force that whim through.

  “Lucky Luciano’s a guy with power. However, he doesn’t personally rule as the head of the organization. Instead, he created a council, just like a politician. See, he knew if he said he was the guy at the top, he’d be setting himself up as the next target. Even so, everybody acknowledges him as the boss. Well, at the very least, it’ll be his age for a while now.”

  Bartolo abruptly turned to look at his subordinate, and a hint of emotion stole into his expression. “It may be a rough age for us and the Gandor men, though. I’m looking forward to seeing how high we can go.”

  When he heard those words, the subordinate looked surprised. “Then, the Gandors…”

  “Establish a nonaggression pact with them. From here on out, we’ll treat them as equals, whether we become enemies or decide to coexist.”

  “Even if they’ve got a contract with Vino, an outfit that size couldn’t—”

  “
You don’t get it, do you?”

  His cold expression returned in an instant, and from behind his glasses, Bartolo scrutinized the man’s face quietly.

  “In our world, it’s either one or zero. It’s a straight choice between two things: Either they’re an enemy on equal terms, or they don’t even exist. There’s no such thing as lower rank. Never think of the other guy as being less than yourselves. The second you do, they’ll start to trip you up… When it came to that, Gustavo thought the same way. However, I see them as ones, and he saw them as zeroes. We differed there.”

  Bartolo lightly raised a hand in the direction of his mansion.

  He’d seen his grandchild, who was still very young, running toward him.

  “By the time my grandkid’s grown, what will the Gandors be, enemies or neighbors? I’m looking forward to finding that out, too.”

  As he stepped forward, to finish up, he stated his impression of the man who’d negotiated with him:

  “Keith Gandor, hmm? He was a real resolute guy; quite eloquent.”

  GANDOR FAMILY

  January 5, 1932

  Kachak.

  Quietly, Keith hung the receiver back up on the wall. Then he pulled on his coat and began getting ready to leave. He was headed home for the first time in about a week, and there was a faint suggestion of a good mood about him.

  “How’s Kate?” Berga asked. “Doing good?”

  At the teasing, which was delivered with a grin, Keith gave a small nod and left the room.

  Keith talks a lot, as long as he’s on the phone…

  Whether or not he knew what Berga was thinking, Keith was as reticent as ever… Or maybe he just didn’t want to take the time to say anything.

  In the Gandor Family office, their daily routine had resumed, and in the midst of it, only Luck looked gloomy. He was leaning back into the sofa.

  “No drive…”

  True, when they’d been working to isolate Gustavo, he’d said they wouldn’t turn away anyone who joined them.

  He’d said it… But.

  “Don’t do that, amigo! You can’t use scissors to cook!”

  “Aww… But it tastes really good. By the way, what does amigo mean?”

  “It means ‘friend.’”

  “Yay! I’ve never had a girl call me her friend before!”

  In the office’s kitchen, Tick and the Mexican girl were having a carefree conversation.

  It was the first time anyone from Mexico had ever come to the office, and his men kept asking him questions, looking dubious.

  “Um, Mr. Luck. That doll. What’s…?”

  “Don’t worry about it.”

  “But…”

  “Even if it bothers you, pretend you don’t care, please.”

  “…Yessir.”

  The men reluctantly withdrew. Watching them out of the corner of his eye, Luck sighed again.

  Keith’s at fault here, too. We already have Tick; we don’t need anyone else that odd. And besides, she cut my arm off.

  Well, that wasn’t terrible. If he thought of it in terms of having gained another skilled member, he could probably put up with it.

  Claire had also grumbled, “I got way more exercise on the train…” and wandered off somewhere. He’d probably gone looking for the person he was planning to marry. As always, the guy was self-centered.

  However, the most self-centered, most apathetic person anywhere… That was definitely Luck himself.

  Gazing up into space, Luck Gandor recalled what had happened after the incident.

  “Miss! Ohh, miss! I’m terribly sorry! You ended up in such a perilous situation, and all through my sheer incompetence!”

  Eve hadn’t even been given time to apologize before apologies were heaped on her.

  “Benjamin, Samantha, I…I—”

  Smacking her very lightly on the head, Samantha smiled at her. “You thinkin’ you done wrong, don’tcha? Then it’s all gravy.”

  As Eve was leaving, Luck, who’d woken up, approached her.

  “Oh…” She was at a loss for words. This was the man who’d said such self-centered things and had been about to do such selfish deeds, and yet he’d saved her, even so. Her brother’s enemy.

  If she’d fired the gun as she’d intended, she would probably never have been able to see Benjamin and Samantha again. This man had saved her again and again in that room, and in the end, she hadn’t been able to thank him even once.

  Because in her heart, she wanted to rescue Dallas.

  What expression could she possibly wear when she addressed a man like that?

  But then he spoke to her, handing her a scrap of paper.

  “When you think my pain is gone, pull him up or do anything you like. I leave that decision to you.”

  That was all the young man with the vulpine eyes said before he turned to go.

  The scrap of paper had a detailed map, with a mark over a spot in the river.

  “Um! Mr. Luck!”

  Thrusting a palm out toward Eve, he cut her off.

  “Don’t say anything, please. Abuse or thanks, it will only irritate me.”

  Then he left. As she watched him go, Eve quietly hugged the paper to her heart.

  If his brothers found out he’d said a thing like that, they’d send him to sleep with the fishes.

  More importantly, what excuse could he give his dead comrades?

  Firo would probably say, If they’re dead, who says you need to excuse yourself to them at all? without a blush. On that point, he was far more hard-boiled than Luck.

  That wouldn’t do, though. It was a common belief that anyone who ended up in this business was prepared to die. However, reality wasn’t like the books or the movies: Nobody wanted to die. When it came to that, they were no different from ordinary humans.

  If there was any difference at all, it was just one thing: They were villains. That was all.

  That’s right. We are villains.

  He certainly hadn’t forgiven Dallas and the others, and Eve hadn’t softened his heart.

  What he’d done had been nothing more than one of the calculations he was so good at.

  In the end, it isn’t possible. Even if they know their location, they won’t be able to pull them up.

  They’d sunk Dallas’s group in a particularly deep spot in the nearby river. If they dredged the riverbed with a crane, they might manage somehow, but as an individual, Eve probably didn’t have the power to make that happen.

  All he’d done was give the girl a token consolation. As long as he told her the place, she probably wouldn’t approach him and the others again. She also wouldn’t have any reason to hold a pointless grudge. Regardless, Dallas and the other ruffians would no doubt continue to suffer.

  Everything went according to plan. There’s nothing to feel gloomy about.

  Even as he thought this, Luck couldn’t rid himself of the feeling that he’d lost his drive.

  If he’d never intended to let her save Dallas, he could simply have given her a map with a false location. Even if it was only a slight chance, why had he given her any chance to save that man and his cronies? The mere question of why he hadn’t lied to Eve kept nagging at his heart.

  As Claire had said, maybe he wasn’t cut out for this business. Still, his hands were far too dirty to let him quit this late. Besides, protecting this territory was both their mission and their duty. And more than anything, they felt a sort of family pride in the business.

  Conversely, that was all it was.

  That might have been the whole of the world that had been given to him.

  Maybe…

  Luck remembered the girl’s face, before and after she’d confronted Gustavo. His eyes couldn’t look the way hers had anymore. Her gaze had been filled with a certain determination, a willingness to sacrifice herself for the world she believed in.

  Maybe I was jealous. Jealous of the fierce, violent emotions that filled that child. That’s something I’ll probably never have again.
<
br />   …Because I doubt I’ll ever be able to “prepare to die” again. Never, not for all eternity.

  With these thoughts on his mind, Luck decided to quietly lose himself in reading.

  THE WEALTHY

  “C’mon, let’s do it again, say, tomorrow.”

  “This time you help, too, Firo!”

  There were several liquor barrels in Alveare. At the moment, instead of liquor, they were packed with a vast quantity of domino tiles. That said, the barrels had been empty to begin with; the Martillos kept them around in case of a police raid.

  Seated on top of those barrels, Isaac and Miria were speaking loudly, swinging their legs.

  “No,” Firo tossed off, briefly. Then, sighing, he asked the pair a question. “Look, lemme ask you one more time… What’s so fun about that? You spend hours and hours setting those up, and then you shoot it all to hell in just a few minutes.”

  In response, Isaac and Miria grinned like children:

  “But it was fun to watch, right?”

  “Yes, it was fun, wasn’t it?”

  “……Yeah, I guess.”

  Firo agreed with them on that point. Although he’d razzed it to pieces as he watched, once the dominos had started to fall, he’d been so fascinated by the motion of the tiles that he’d forgotten about his empty stomach.

  “Well, that’s what’s fun about it! When we knock down the tiles we set up, we have fun, of course…”

  “And if the people watching have fun, too, that’s two birds with one stone!”

  “In other words, we make out like bandits!”

  “Yes, we have fun, and everybody watching it has fun, and then the whole town’s happy!”

  As he watched the two, who looked genuinely and thoroughly delighted, Firo smiled, half in surrender.

  “You’re right… When you think about it that way, it might just be the perfect game for you guys.”

  It’s a whole lot like your lives, too.

  That was what Firo thought, but he didn’t bother saying it aloud.