The five men fidgeted nervously, all of them looked at the floor.
“G’wan, get outta here, an’ remember what I said,” Zeus bellowed one more time.
All five turned and quickly exited the kitchen. A moment later a balding butler with gray temples and a pencil thin mustache walked in carrying a tray with a pot of steeping water and a single tea cup.
He placed the tray before Zeus and said in a voice tinged by a British accent, “You did not murder any of them? Not even one as a reminder to the others? I am genuinely surprised.”
“Stow it, Oscar, I ain’t in the mood,” Zeus replied angrily.
“Very good sir,” Oscar replied. He turned and left the room, then returned a moment later with a tray of scrambled eggs and ham; he placed them before Zeus and stepped back.
Zeus began eating in silence, but then Oscar continued, “You know what you must do, don’t you?”
Zeus fumed a moment then looked up at Oscar, “No Oscar, why don’t you friggin’ tell me?”
“Well sir, you must call in some outside help, as it were. Someone who has a history of dealing with interlopers who consider themselves above reproach.”
“What are you talking about, Oscar? This is a friggin’ ghost.”
“It is a man playing at being a ghost, sir. Not a true apparition, and if it is indeed a vengeful spirit of some sort then it should be sent back to whatever hell it escaped from. There are those who can do that very thing, as you well know.”
Zeus looked at his butler and confidant and slowly nodded his head in agreement, “I’ll take yer idea into consideration, Oscar, thanks.”
“As always, I am here merely to serve, Sir.”
Bowing deeply, Oscar turned and left the room through the double swinging doors behind the table, leaving Zeus to his paper, and his dark thoughts.
Chapter 10
“Did you see this?” Tammy Thomas asked Bobby Terrano. She handed him a newspaper and within it on the tenth page was a small headline about a housepainter in Germany who had taken over in the past few years and was now fully in command of that nation, but according to the article, his sights had not stopped there. He was beginning to look beyond Germany’s borders.
Bobby put the newspaper down on the table and shook his head grimly, “That’s bad. This is going to lead to trouble, big trouble.”
The two of them sat at another outdoor café, one far away from Boss Zeus’s newest plaything.
Tammy sighed and said, “Too bad they don’t have this ghost guy over there. He could take out this Nazi before he caused any more trouble.”
“The Grim Spectre? I don’t know if he’s that kinda ghost. I mean I-I don’t think he’s that proactive.” Bobby stammered.
“What? You don’t think he should just go over there and kill this guy? He’s already stirring up trouble. The next thing we know the whole world could be at war again and it could all be this creeps fault,” she said.
“Tammy,” Bobby sighed in exasperation, “All’s I’m sayin’ is that this guy really hasn’t done anything yet. You can’t just aim a weapon at someone who hasn’t committed a crime and kill him because he might. I don’t think that’s the way the Grim Spectre works anyway.”
“Oh, so now you’re the expert on how the ghost guy works? You’re a musician, Bobby; leave the thinking to the educated people.”
Bobby looked at her angrily, then quickly calmed down. Finally he said, “Ya know Tammy, you’ve got a sharp tongue on you that your brain doesn’t do too good a job of controllin’. You should learn ta get that in check before you mouth off at the wrong people, instead of someone who cares about you.”
She looked at him and touched his hand before saying, “I-I’m sorry Bobby. I know I got a hot head an’ a big mouth.”
He nodded slowly then said, “I’m not kidding, Tammy. You’re gonna say the wrong thing to the wrong people an’ you’re gonna end up disappearing, especially in this town.” He watched warily as a beat cop exited the inside of the café and walked by, eyeing them with a smile.
She saw his gaze and matched it, then turned back to him, “What’s the matter? You’re not trustin’ cops now?”
“Red, in this town I’m not trustin’ anyone, anymore. C’mon, let’s get outta here.”
He rose to his feet and left a few dollars on the table. Tammy stood as well, her mop of red hair bounced as she did. She turned and followed him out of the café and back onto the sidewalk.
The two of them walked in the opposite direction the cop had taken with Bobby’s arm locked within hers, guiding her.
“What’s the matter?” she repeated.
“Nothin, cutie-pie; I just got a bad feelin’ is all.”
She swiveled her head back toward the direction the cop had taken, but he was long gone within the milling crowd.
He picked up the pace as he walked, guiding her down the block. An instant later the sidewalk rumbled around them and a loud explosion rent the air with enough force to throw them and everyone else around them to the hard concrete ground. Immediately Bobby was on his feet, and at Tammy’s side, grasping her by the arms and helping her to sit up, “Are you all right? Tammy, answer me!”
“Y-yes Bobby, I’m g-good,” she whispered.
Both of them looked up the street in the direction the earth shattering explosion had come from. The direction of the café they had just left.
Tammy turned toward him, her flaming curly red hair falling across her forehead as she did, “T-that cop, he was no cop was he?” she asked nervously.
“No, I don’t think so. He had just walked out of the café when I noticed him. But something about him seemed wrong somehow.”
By now police-real police were arriving in cars as well as ambulances. As soon as several of the officers exited their cars Bobby knew what had set him off to the fake he had just seen.
“His shoes,” he murmured to Tammy, “He wasn’t wearing cop shoes. That’s what it was.”
She followed his gaze and noticed the shining black shoes all the officers wore.
“He had on a dull pair of old black boots. I knew something wasn’t right.”
“That was your tell?” she asked incredulously.
“Yeah, it was, an’ it was right. Let’s get outta here before someone starts askin’ us questions.”
“But shouldn’t we be givin’ the cops-the real cops a description of that guy?” she asked.
“Would you believe anyone who told you that story? Or would you think maybe they were the guys who did it, considerin’ they just hustled out of that restaurant themselves?”
“B-but what do we do? We can’t let that guy get away with it,” she stuttered.
He grasped her by both arms and said, “We won’t. You’re going to report it; that’s your job, you report. Let the press do its work like it should, got it?”
Tammy nodded slowly and then said, “A-all right, but what are you going to do?”
“Me? I’m going to see if I can help. I want you outta here and nowhere near this mess. Go and be a reporter. You go directly to George and tell no one else but him what we saw. Got it?”
Tammy nodded nervously and swallowed hard, tears beginning to well up in her eyes.
Bobby hugged her and kissed her, hard. Then he ruffled her mop of red hair and pushed her along toward the building that housed her newspaper.
After watching her disappear into the crowd he turned in the direction the fake cop had walked and began running down the street.
Chapter 11
Bobby ran toward what was left of the café, against the tide of people running from it. Halfway down from where he was, he ducked into an alleyway, running far enough down it that with a curve between the two buildings walls, he was in a blind spot.
‘I’ve never done this in the daytime,’ he thought.
He touched the belt at his waist, and grasped the buckle. Instantly the plain black belt shimmered and then his clothes began to blur as well. Bobby Terrano was g
one and in his place was the hooded Grim Spectre. His face, as always, was half hidden in the shadow of his hood, only the protruding lower portion of his skull mask showed.
He looked around carefully then floated upward eerily, his cape billowing behind him. He disappeared a quarter of the way to the top of the building.
‘Gotta remember to always tell the magic belt that I wanna be invisible durin’ the day,’ The Grim Spectre thought.
He touched down invisibly and lightly upon the roof and surveyed the scene below. Then he began to float skyward, flying slowly over the sidewalk, trying to trace the steps the fake cop had taken.
‘I wish this magic belt could track this guy,’ Bobby thought, half hoping it would at his command.
But there was no action from the belt, no tracking ability, nothing.
The Grim Spectre invisibly floated high up above the pandemonium filled street.
He continued to float away from the disaster searching, searching until two blocks away he saw exactly what he was looking for, ‘There! A cop heading in the wrong direction and he’s movin’ fast.’
Quickly arcing downward, the Grim Spectre invisibly and in broad daylight grasped the fake cop under his arms, instantly turning the man both invisible and intangible to everyone else, save himself, at his touch. He sped skyward again before the man could shout and dumped him unceremoniously upon the closest rooftop. The fake police officer rolled several feet painfully and came to a stop.
Slowly the man crawled first to his knees and then to his feet. He looked around the rooftop and saw nothing.
“W-what happened? H-how’d I get here?”
Then an eerie disembodied voice replied, “I brought you here, evil one. I saw what you did. You must be made to pay for your sins.”
The man looked around frantically, pulling a gun from his waist holster, “Who’s there? Show yourself!”
“Very well.”
Like a bad image suddenly growing sharp, with his cape floating behind him, The Grim Spectre slowly solidified into view. Without hesitation the gunman fired first two shots then another four, emptying his revolver. The bullets merely passed through the ethereal figure before him.
“W-what are you?” the gunman stammered.
“I am the spirit of revenge. I have come to exact that revenge against you for your horrible sins; most especially for the sins you have just committed,” the ghostly Grim Spectre replied. He floated above the rooftop and pointed menacingly at the fake police officer, “You will tell me why you killed those innocents below. You will tell me who hired you, and you will tell me now, or you will suffer my great and terrible wrath.”
The man backed away from the Grim Spectre, stuttering, “I-I ain’t tellin’ you nothin’ you damned ghost.”
The Grim Spectre advanced quickly on the man, his outstretched right hand began to crackle with energy and he said, “Murderer! Villain! You will tell me what I ask or you will suffer for all eternity!”
The murderer threw his gun at the Grim Spectre who merely let it pass through him harmlessly.
Then he floated quickly toward his enemy, who was still backing away from him.
“N-no! Stay back you damned ghost!”
“Stop!” The Grim Spectre roared.
But it was too late, for with one final misstep, the mad bomber stepped backward over the edge of the roof and immediately fell from sight!
“No!” shouted the Grim Spectre as he threw himself after the falling man.
But it was too late, the Spectre watched helplessly as the man fell to his death far faster than the Grim Spectre’s ability to reach him.
Disgustedly The Grim Spectre turned and floated skyward, turning invisible once more as he disappeared overhead.
Below a figure hidden in shadow nodded silently to himself acknowledging The Grim Spectre’s disappearance overhead. Then he turned and disappeared himself but more mundanely, into the crowded street, walking away from the crowd that had gathered around the crushed and broken body of the bomber.
***
That night, Joey DeLuca stood outside a bar on the Warf, flipping a coin and drinking a beer near the entrance to the bar, when a ghostly figure stepped out of a nearby wall behind the man and said, “Joey DeLuca, I seek information from you.”
DeLuca almost jumped into the water at the sound of the terrible, ghastly voice.
He turned and faced the ghastly visage that floated behind him, “Geeze man, don’t do that. You scared the life outta me,” DeLuca cried.
“That is most appropriate I believe, Joey DeLuca. You will tell me who murdered the patrons of a café that exploded today. Who ordered that foul deed done? Who ordered the deaths of innocents?”
“I-I don’t know man, I-I’ll find out though, I promise.”
The Grim Spectre extended his right arm and pointed at DeLuca, and then said, “Heed my words Joseph DeLuca, if you do not do this thing I ask of you, there will be hell to pay.”
DeLuca shook his head, obviously frightened by the skull faced figure before him, then replied, “R-relax man or ghost or whatever you are. I toldja I’d help ya out, an’ I will. Meet me at my place tomorrow night an’ I’ll have whatever info I can find for ya, I promise ya.”
“You had better, DeLuca. There is a great evil in this city and it calls to me to be expunged.”
Looking away, DeLuca swallowed hard and said “I don’t even know what ‘expunged’ means.” But when he turned back The Grim Spectre was gone without a trace, as if he was never there.
DeLuca entered the bar again and murmured, “I need another drink, an’ a strong one.”
The door closed behind him.
Chapter 12
“Didja see this?” Tammy Thomas shoved the newspaper in front of Bobby Terrano the moment he walked up to her desk in the office of the Riverburgh Gazette.
“Uh, not yet Tamm, what is it?” Bobby looked at the paper and his eyes went wide in recognition. It was a photo from the street of The Grim Spectre staring over the edge of the rooftop the false police officer had fallen from.
“Holy cow! What the heck is that, Tamm?”
“What does it look like, Bobby? It’s The Grim Spectre; he’s some kind of ghost, or a guy made up to look like one, and he pushed that fake cop we saw to his death.”
“Well, if he’s a ghost, Tammy, how can he push anyone?” Bobby asked with a slight grin.
“Then it’s not a ghost an’ it must be some guy.”
“Whatever it is, how do you know it pushed him? And where’d this photo come from anyway?” Bobby asked.
“A guy had a camera with him. He was photographing birds in the park when he saw the fake cop disappear from the street. A minute later he was falling from the roof and The Grim Spectre was staring after him. He kept takin’ pictures of the roof waitin’ to see somethin’, and he did. He saw that ghost kill a guy, who he thought was a cop. Turns out the cop who owned that uniform ended up dead yesterday. They found his body floatin’ in the river.” Tammy said.
“Okay but did this guy see the Grim Spectre shove the fake cop, and probably a murdering cop killer too, over the edge?”
“No, but what else could have happened?” Tammy spat back.
“Maybe the guy got scared and fell over the edge?” he offered matter of factly.
“Why are you protectin’ this Grim Spectre ghost?” she asked.
“Watch it Tamm, you’ve been contracting your words since I got in here. People are gonna forget you’re the edumacated dame you act like you are,” Bobby said with a grin.
“Aaah shut up you. Did you even look at the by-line on the article?” Tammy questioned.
Bobby picked up the paper off the desk once again and looked, then began to grin, “Your first cover story! Baby, you did it!”
“She did, Bobby, and I couldn’t be more proud of her,” a voice from behind them both interrupted.
Bobby turned and saw George Kowalski walking up behind them. He was as unkempt as usual, his wh
ite dress shirt was out of his pants and his belly was hanging over his belt. But for all his disheveled look George was a top notch newspaperman, and that’s what counted.
“Hey George, how are you doing?” Bobby asked with a smile.
“All right kid, how about yourself?”
“I’ve been better. I’m sure Tammy told you, the place I regularly played at burned down the other night. Now I have to hunt up another gig.”
“Kid, you’re the best trumpet player in the city, I’m sure it’s going to be easy for you. Everyone knows Bobby Terrano,” the big man finished with a shrug.
“I’ve been looking, George, and so far the only places that want me all belong to Phylo Zeus; and I’d really rather not be in his pocket.”
“Sometimes in life we don’t have a choice,” George replied, “things could be worse, Kid, you could’ve ended up being an editor in chief for a newspaper and have to deal with lollygaggers like Miss Thomas here,” George nodded toward Tammy, who shot him a faux annoyed glance in return.
“That’s true George, thing’s could’ve been a lot worse, now that I think about it. But I’m still going to continue to look around a bit before I take Zeus up on his offer. There has to be a club somewhere in this town that’s not under his heel.”
“Good luck finding it, Kid. When you do, let me know. That man is cornering the market on entertainment in this town, and I’m afraid it’s not the only thing he’s getting his hands into.”
“What have you heard, George?”
“Nothing concrete, Bobby. But rumors are coming in that the docks are now under his control, as in nothing gets in or out without paying a fee to him. That and the usual stuff, gambling, prostitution, drugs, you know the drill. Anything bad and profitable these gangster types go for. It’s a vicious cycle. One gets caught and put away, another one appears and takes his place and the new one is always worse than the old one he replaced. More ruthless, more brutal. That’s one thing we can say about ol’ Phylo, he may be a crook, but as far as crooks go, he ain’t that bad.”
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