Floodgate

by Johnny Shaw

  —Headstone discovered in the St. Dymphna Memorial Cemetery

  Andy came within a nanosecond of shooting Mrs. Hammond. He held the gun inches from her face. Tears filled her eyes.

  “Oh, hell.” Andy lowered the gun, a glance over his shoulder at his own apartment door. “I didn’t mean to scare you.”

  She didn’t seem to notice the gun. Thick mascara poured dark lines down her cheeks. “You didn’t tell me you were moving, Crazy Andy. I would have made you a Bundt cake.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “I’ll miss you, you damn lunatic.”

  “I’m in the middle of something here.” Another glance at his door.

  “A fresh start. A new leaf. We all need it.” Mrs. Hammond looked Andy up and down. “You’re a ten, Crazy Andy.”

  “I’m flattered,” Andy muttered, “but on my best day I’m maybe a six after a haircut and shave. To someone who is myopic.”

  She pointed at his feet. “Your shoes, you insane bastard. I still have Marvin’s things. Are you a nine and a half or ten?”

  “Oh. A nine and a half.”

  “Wait, Crazy Andy.” She slammed the door. He heard about ten locks engage.

  After thirty seconds, he wondered why he was standing there. If there was anyone in his apartment, that person surely knew he was there by now. He decided to call it strategy. He was icing them, like you would a field goal kicker. Making them nervous by making them wait. Throwing them off. If there even was a them.

  The locks clicked, and the door opened again. Without leaving her apartment, she held out a pair of white wingtips that were in fashion never. The moment he took them, she screamed, “You’re crazy, Crazy Andy,” slammed the door, and engaged the locks.

  The shoes looked considerably smaller than a nine and a half. He tried to wedge one onto his foot. Without a shoehorn and a lot of butter, it wasn’t going to happen. He put the shoes in his duffel bag.

  “Here goes nothing.”

  Andy kicked open his apartment door the rest of the way. The extra-heavy—yet apparently ineffective—door slammed against the wall inside, the knob digging into the cheap drywall. When he flipped on the lights, Andy’s view of his apartment nearly knocked him over. The front room was empty. Completely empty. Gutted. No filing cabinets, no maps on the wall, no mini fridge, no dust bunnies in the corner. For some reason, they hadn’t taken his telephone. It sat in the middle of the floor.

  He glanced at the apartment number on the door. It was his apartment. He could see the former layout like a blueprint from the indentations in the carpet where his furniture had been. He walked through the space on the outside chance that his possessions had become invisible.

  Andy ran his hand over the pinholes in the wall. Whoever had taken his things had literally taken everything down to the brass tacks. He was surprised they hadn’t spackled and repainted.

  He focused on the telephone, waiting for it to ring. Waiting for the person at the other end to give him an explanation. A deep, mysterious voice with a series of instructions. He had seen too many movies.

  His anger boiled to the surface. He wanted to throw something, break something. Of course, there wasn’t anything. Then he remembered the shoes. He took them out of the bag and threw them across the room. It was unsatisfying. He considered shooting a wall. Instead, he clenched his fists until they hurt.

  Calling the police was what a normal person would do, but the police probably did this. Even if they didn’t, they wouldn’t care about helping the rat Andy Destra.

  “Be careful with that gun.”

  Andy started at the voice and turned, pistol aimed and ready. The old pickpocket stood in the bathroom doorway. Now in a suit and fedora, the man held his hands palms up to show he was unarmed. With his pencil mustache, he looked like a retired magician in a Philip Marlowe costume.

  “Who the hell are you? Where is all my stuff?”

  “What’s with the shoes?” The man nodded to the pair of shoes. “Were you bowling?”

  “What’s happening?” Andy asked.

  “You ignored our previous warnings. Making a dramatic statement necessary,” the man said. “This is your last warning.”

  Andy did a turn of his apartment. “You took all my stuff.”

  “There are things happening you can’t see. Important things. You think you’re doing some kind of good, which is admirable, but you’re causing problems. We need you on the sidelines. For your safety,” the man said. “We debated what to do about you. The vote was close. I fought for you. This was what was decided. Instead of killing you.”

  “We? Who is we?” Andy checked the open door behind him. “Who are you?”

  “It doesn’t matter, son.”

  “It does matter. It’s really the only thing that matters. Who are you, and what did you do with my possessions?”

  “I took them.”

  “Why did you leave the phone? Just the phone?”

  “To call you.”

  “I have a gun in my hands,” Andy shouted. “That means that you’re supposed to answer my questions. How do you not know that?”

  “Your investigation of the deputy commissioner drew our attention. It led down some interesting avenues. You did impressive work. But it grew from nuisance to threat. There has already been an attempt on your life. This is the compromise that could keep you alive but declawed. Without your files, you are impotent.”

  “You think this is going to stop me?” Andy said.

  The man smiled. “Personally, no. But if you keep going, someone will kill you. You have no idea the thinness of the razor you’re on. I’ve done what I can.”

  “What’s stopping me from taking you down?”

  “I’m on your side,” he said. “But more relevant, the red dot on your chest.”

  Andy looked down. A red laser dot marked his shirt, center mass. It came from somewhere outside his windows, but he couldn’t track the angle.

  “You’ve got to stop all investigations of the police and Deputy Commissioner Gray. Find a new hobby. Macramé, maybe. Model railroading. Ventriloquism.”

  “Did Gray send that man to kill me?”

  The old man didn’t answer or move.

  Andy stared at his empty apartment. “You took everything.”

  “Not everything. Not your life. Not your phone,” he said, reaching into his jacket pocket. Andy tightened his grip. The old man shook his head.

  He tossed something underhanded to Andy, who caught it out of reflex, his feet rooted to the ground. He stared down at the watch—his stolen watch—in his hand.

  “What is it with you and my watch?” Andy asked.

  “Leave Gray alone.”

  The phone rang. Andy jumped at the sound and accidentally fired his revolver. The bullet missed the old man and lodged itself into the wall behind him. The old man drew a pistol of his own, aiming it at Andy.

  “Sorry, sorry, sorry,” Andy said. “An accident. I flinched.”

  “Christ, son,” the old man said, exhaling loudly. “It’s like you’re trying to get yourself killed.”

  The phone rang again. They both looked at it. Andy glanced at the red dot still on his chest. The phone rang again.

  “I’m going to answer that,” Andy said.

  The man shook his head. “Don’t.”

  “It could be important.”

  “Don’t answer it.”

  They stared at each other. The old man’s face had become familiar to him quickly, as though he had known him longer than he had.

  “Yeah, Pops,” Andy said, “I’m done listening to you.”

  Andy walked to the phone and picked it up, expecting to get shot. He didn’t.

  “Hello?” Andy said.

  “I’m looking for Mrs. Destra. A Mrs. Andrea Destra.”

  “I am Andrea. Andy. It’s a man’s name in Italy.”

  Andy glanced at the old man, who did little more than fume. Andy’s minor act of defiance had taken away most of his fear of
the man.

  “You are listed as the emergency contact for a Claudia Destra?”

  “What happened?”

  “Is Mrs. Destra with you?”

  “No. She’s—what happened?”

  “I don’t know how to say this, but we can’t find her. Mrs. Destra is no longer at the facility. We think she left an hour ago. Maybe with someone. A policeman was here earlier.”

  “She wouldn’t. There’s no—what policeman?”

  Andy looked at the old man, wanting some sympathy from the man who’d taken all his possessions and threatened his life. No such luck. The old man walked to the wall where the phone jack was and pulled it from the wall. The line went dead.

  “Gray,” Andy said.

  “Hold on, son,” the old man said. “You need to listen to me.”

  But Andy didn’t. He turned and sprinted to the front door, expecting his heart to get exploded from the unseen sniper. When he reached the hall, shocked he was alive, he continued his frantic run to the back stairs. He never looked to see if the old man followed. After throwing the stairwell door open, he hit the stairs and climbed to the roof.

  When he reached the roof door, he stopped and listened. He heard footsteps, but the sound receded. He quietly opened the door and then set it closed behind him.

  Staying low, he made his way to the edge of the roof and found the board that he’d hidden months before. He dropped it over the gap to the building next door. Looking down to the alley six stories below, he crawled the ten feet between the buildings on his hands and knees. His whole body shook. The board bowed in the middle. He had always hated heights. Halfway across, he froze, his body refusing to move. A deep breath, a small prayer, and a fart later he was on the move again.

  On the neighboring roof, he pulled the board to him. He entered the pigeon coop, feeling the birdshit squeeze between his bare toes. He woke a few sleeping birds. They did little more than coo. Andy opened the trapdoor that he’d built and got inside the space with just enough room to lie down. Closing the door, it felt like a casket, but Andy knew it was the opposite. Lying among the feces and feathers, he was safe.

  In the cramped and smelly place, he had time to reflect on recent events, but they only confused him more. The parts didn’t connect. Nothing added up. The only thing he knew for sure was that Gray was his enemy. And that Champ was in danger. He would stop guessing and focus on the facts.

  An hour later by his oft-stolen watch, he exited the coop and took a peek at the street below. Nothing and nobody as far as he could tell. It didn’t really matter, though. He was tired of running.

  CHAPTER 11

  What I’m going to tell you is crazy. The fuzz, the suits, the rackets, the whole thing. Sister, it’s big. Meet me at the Southside at seven.

  —The last known words of Nat Turner Shabazz from a phone recording made by Auction City Echo reporter Kate Malmon. An hour later, Shabazz was found dead from multiple gunshot wounds. The case remains unsolved (1966).

  From the shadows of the alley across the street, Andy observed the front entrance of the senior living facility. Three police cars sat parked out front, red lights painting the buildings around them. Through the glass doors, Andy watched the nurse talk to a uniformed Thornton.

  There was no way to get inside. No way to get past the cops. No way to get answers of his own. Not that he could find anything there. If Champ was missing, this was the only place he didn’t need to look.

  There was a five percent chance that Champ had wandered off on her own, but with all the weirdness going on the last few days, it would have been too much of a coincidence. He faced the facts. Champ had been abducted, and only one person could have done it. He knew only one supervillain. He had only one archenemy.

  It was time Andy Destra and the deputy commissioner had their showdown.

  The walk to Gallows Terrace took longer than his previous barefoot promenade had. The plus side was that as he got closer to the moneyed neighborhood, the sidewalks got cleaner. Maybe rich people didn’t chew gum. Or they didn’t spit it on the ground when it lost its flavor. Or more likely, they had minimum-wage employees power wash it off regularly. Andy cooled his cut and swollen feet on the wet lawns until he stubbed his toe on a sprinkler head. After that he kept to the sidewalks.

  Gallows Terrace was the only neighborhood in Auction City with buildings more than sixty years old. The destruction of the Flood never made it up the hill. When the fighting had broken out in 1929, the rich industrialists and politicians who made the Terrace their home pooled their staffs to create a makeshift militia. Standing in formation at the single road that led up the hill, valets and butlers and maids and chauffeurs, armed with guns and wood, protected the people they despised against their own. Revolt was discussed but dismissed. Paychecks came from somewhere. And there weren’t going to be a lot of jobs after the city was in ashes.

  Walking that historic path, Andy knew his appearance would raise eyebrows. Bloody, bare feet. Covered in pigeonshit and loose feathers. A busted-up face with an eye that was bruised black. And an expression that would register between befuddled and infuriated. If the neighborhood watch or rent-a-cops were on the ball, they would stop him before he reached his destination. Or at least try.

  They had taken everything. His belongings, his life, and worst of all, Champ. The only family he knew. If she was hurt in any way, people would pay. There was no one more dangerous than a man with nothing left to lose.

  He’d been to the deputy commissioner’s house on one previous occasion back when he’d been on the force. Andy never forgot the opulence of the mansion. All the cops he knew lived in sad brick structures out in Merseyside or East Salop. Identical drab boxes with toy-littered porches and clotheslines out back.

  Andy had wondered how a deputy commissioner could afford such a lavish estate. Gray wasn’t hiding it, so he figured it had to be legit: inherited, rich wife, or Irish Sweepstakes. On the Terrace it was mostly old, old money, last names that went back to the city’s founding. Captains of industry, city royalty, and prominent political figures. However, on deeper inspection of the residents’ pasts, one could find just as many bootleggers, slave traders, and gangsters.

  The wrought iron gate to Gray’s estate was decorative, not for security. The gate of a man who wasn’t afraid of other men. Andy easily squeezed through the bars and headed up the almost vertical, winding driveway. The steep incline forced him to take a break every twenty strides. At one point, Andy thought he might puke, squatting with his head between his knees to quell the sick.

  The old elms that lined the drive reached their bony limbs overhead in an eerie arch. Small lights illuminated the drive. Gallows Terrace—while still in the city—had the quiet of deep country, rowdy insects and rustling leaves.

  Reaching the edge of the circular drive in front of the house, the ground leveled off. Andy caught movement and ducked into a crouch. The raccoon that spooked him scurried into the brush, another thief in the night.

  Now that he was at Gray’s mansion, he realized that he hadn’t really thought everything through. He knew the why, but it hadn’t occurred to him to figure out the how of the thing. He wouldn’t let that slow him, though. Andy had momentum.

  Andy made his way around the building toward the back. He glanced into the windows as he passed. In the few lit rooms, he saw no one. No life. But the size of the house only offered a small view. There could be a party going on at the other end, and he would never know it.

  The backyard was expansive, lit near the house, but fading into the dim light of morning. At least the size of a football field, he imagined croquet and even polo had been played on that manicured grass.

  He tried a window into what looked like a pantry. It opened with a loud creak, but no alarm bells rang. Andy froze for a moment and waited for the hounds to be released. Nothing.

  Andy pulled the pistol from his pocket and climbed inside with neither stealth nor agility. A brief panic set in when Andy thought he’d go
tten stuck. He eventually freed his bulk, knocking over a stack of canned goods. He landed hard on the linoleum, the thud quieter than expected. The upside of natural padding. He thanked fate that he hadn’t accidentally discharged his firearm. Small victories.

  Andy moved through the house, pistol to the floor. Nobody in the kitchen. The dining room, empty. Quiet to the point of distraction, not even house sounds. It had the smell of people, though, not stale like an abandoned building.

  He stopped at the door to the library. He heard Gray’s voice.

  “Your objections are noted, Ashley. Wrong-minded and weak, but noted. You’re in the minority. If this was a democracy—and it is not—you would be outvoted. Never forget that you can be replaced or removed.” Silence for a moment. Gray listening. “A moot point. The thing is in motion. All that’s left is to read this week’s obituaries.” Gray hung up with a slam.

  Andy used that as his cue, kicking the big door wide and walking into the expansive library like a cowboy into a saloon. With a pistol in his hand and hate in his heart.

  Gray stood up, surprised. The surprise turned to exhaustion. “Of course it’s you, Destra. How did you get in my house?”

  “An innocent man would ask me why I’m here,” Andy said.

  Books lined the walls floor to ceiling. There was a piano, a large globe, and a taxidermy mountain lion. A man’s room. It smelled like aftershave, pipe smoke, and leather.

  “I haven’t been innocent since I stole a kiss from Mary Hopkins in the back pew of Saint Jude’s. I hope this isn’t going to take long,” Gray said. “I’ve only been awake an hour, trying to get an early start on my day. It’s a difficult job keeping the people of this city safe. Even more difficult with unnecessary distractions.”

  “Where’s Champ?” Andy asked.

  “What is that all over your clothes? Is that birdshit? And where are your shoes, man? You look a mess.”

  Andy didn’t answer. The two men stared at each other silently.