Come Morning - Joe Gores

by Gores

  "Something?"

  Runyan's eyes roved across the room to the other, empty, desk. Its plaque read ANGELO TENCONI. Angelo Tenconi was one of the names given him that morning by Cardwell.

  "Tenconi."

  "Workin' North Beach today," said Delarty.

  Out on Mission Street, Runyan checked his watch. He'd made another appointment with his parole officer to report his change of residence. By the book. That way, nobody could claim he'd violated his parole and send him back inside.

  ***

  Benjamin Sharples was a bland-faced mid-thirties, with a stubborn chin and mean eyes and the habitually irritated expression of a Persian cat. He was reading in a stamp dealer's catalog about a pair of 1893 Columbia Expositions, unused. Seven-hundred catalog, a thousand retail. Not the sort of thing you find in the post-office booklets on the memorial first day covers currently available, but he wanted them. Very badly.

  His secretary opened the door and stuck her head in. On the outside of the glass was:

  STATE DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONS

  REGIONAL PAROLE SECTION

  BENJAMIN SHARPLES

  "Mr. Runyan," she said.

  Sharples felt a tightening in his stomach. He nodded, quickly shoving the stamp catalog under some folders on his desk. He was studying one of them at random when Runyan came into the room. After a full 60 seconds, Sharples clapped shut the folder and looked up snappily.

  "Runyan-is that it?"

  "Same as three days ago," said Runyan. "I have a new residence address. Sixteen-Twenty Bush Street."

  "Why have you moved from the ... um..." Sharples was finally consulting Runyan's file. "The Westward Hotel?"

  "They've received a demolition notice. The building is going to be torn down."

  Sharples closed the file. Runyan continued to stand there. Sharples looked up with irritation which seemed laced with nerves. "Was there anything else?"

  "I'm waiting for you to write it in the file."

  Sharples flung the file open almost petulantly and wrote the new address on the COMMENTS sheet with a ballpoint pen. He turned the file around so Runyan could see the address and the date written there.

  "That satisfy you?"

  Runyan turned and left the office without speaking.

  Sharples blew out a long pent breath, then wrote the address again, this time on a sheet of scratch paper which he folded into his morning newspaper. He picked up a porkpie hat with a red feather in it off one of his filing cabinets, put the hat on his head and the newspaper under his arm, and walked out.

  Sharples maneuvered his white-bread tuna and his coffee, white, through the noontime office workers to one of the standup counters at the rear of the little sandwich shop on Mission and 18th. A slouchy mid-forties man, finishing a cup of coffee while reading his newspaper, grudgingly made room for him.

  Sharples laid down his newspaper to arrange his sandwich and coffee fussily. The slouchy man put his newspaper down beside it to wipe his mouth with a napkin from one of the shiny metal dispensers, picked up Sharples's folded newspaper while leaving his own, and walked out. He had sleepy eyes and an unmemorable face and a slightly toed-out walk.

  Sharples removed from the newspaper the sealed white envelope containing his bribe money for Runyan's new address. He put the envelope unopened into his inner suitcoat pocket and started eating his sandwich while reading the newspaper. Maybe this would be enough for one of the 1893 Columbia Expositions.

  ***

  Runyan's room on Bush Street was almost half again what the Westward Hotel had cost, but it was neat and clean and sunny, with real lace at the windows and a nice framed Audubon print on the wall. He sat on the edge of the bed and, with the Phillips-head screwdriver on his Swiss Army knife, loosened the two tiny screws holding shut the shallow secret compartment of his handmade chess board.

  Inside he had hidden the nearly $800 he had saved during his seven years in San Quentin. Since any money a prisoner is trying to remove unofficially from any California State penal institution is considered contraband, no matter how honestly accumulated, Runyan had chosen this method of bringing out his meager hoard. Others used the backing of photos or paintings, the bindings of books, the heels of their shoes.

  Perhaps Runyan should have tried one of those more common methods. The compartment was empty. His money was gone. By flashing his ace around to show he had only one day left, he had given whichever con had ferreted out his secret enough time to grab Runyan's stash.

  ***

  Big Art Elliott had planned to be back to his office by three, but it was closer to four-thirty when he walked in. Gladyce was typing a letter he'd given her last week, handwritten on lined yellow paper. His mind seemed to go blank when he tried to organize his thoughts aloud, and besides, the blond secretary didn't take shorthand anyway. She had the job because her husband Hank was a long-haul driver in the union.

  "Any calls or anything?"

  She jerked a thumb at his private office. "Or anything," she said darkly. "The auditors were here waiting when I got back from lunch."

  He remembered then. He made a disgusted but resigned face.

  "They give you any idea of how long they'll-"

  The phone rang and Gladyce held up a hand for him to wait.

  "Amalgamated Truckers Local Number Eight-SevenThree."

  Art stared moodily at her as she covered the receiver with her hand. "A man calling long distance, says he's your brother?"

  "Oh yeah, sure." Art grabbed the receiver and talked standing beside her desk. "Where the hell are you, kid? I thought you were coming up after you got. .." He paused, shooting a glance at Gladyce. "After, you know. .."

  "Something came up, I'm still in San Francisco," said Runyan's voice. There was an embarrassed pause. "I hate to ask, Art, but is that offer of a loan still good?"

  "Hell yes, whadda ya need? Five-hundred? A thousand?" Art winked at Gladyce as he listened. Gladyce had a nice jiggly chest and wore blouses that showed plenty of it. Maybe he'd take a crack at her one of these days when her old man was out of town on a run. "You got it. Give me your address, one of the guys in the local down there will drop it by in a hour."

  Runyan gave him the Bush Street address, which he wrote on Gladyce's scratchpad. Runyan thanked him and promised to get the money back as quickly as he could.

  "Whenever-or never," laughed Art. "Remember, I'm expecting you up here in a few days." He hung up and gave Gladyce the slip of paper. "Give Tandis a call down in San Francisco, tell him to have somebody drop five hundred from petty cash around there this afternoon. My kid brother'll be waiting. Tell him I'll send him a check to cover it this afternoon."

  "Sure, Art." Gladyce leaned forward, a wistful look on her face and her best attributes offered for inspection. Art inspected. Nice. Damn nice. "I wish somebody would give me five hundred bucks just like that," she said.

  "Maybe we ought to talk about it sometime," said Art. "Hank's not coming until tomorrow night."

  "Well, maybe I'll come tonight," he said, straight-faced.

  "Count on it," said Gladyce.

  Going into his office, Art realized that Gladyce looked a little like his ex-, Dolly. Even had that look in her eyes like she was gonna pop the weasel any second when she was talking about money. Fucking broads, they were all the same.

  ***

  Angelo Tenconi turned in at a tiny Italian deli a few doors down the street from a large supermarket on Columbus Ave. He was just about finished with his rounds. He had collectors and, if necessary, muscle to make collections in the rest of the city, but North Beach was home base for him. Keep in touch with his roots. Local boy makes good--or I'll break your freaking arm.

  Inside, he swaggered through the rich Italian smells of garlic and tomato paste and onion and salami and peppers and basil and olive oil and dried anchovy. Behind the little sandwich counter the old Mustache Pete and his broadbeamed wife, both in their sixties, were chattering volubly in a patois of English and Genovese as the
y covered the cut meats left over from the noon sandwich trade.

  The old man looked up as Tenconi loomed up beside the counter, starting, in a heavy accent, "Can I helpa ..." then stopping and going on in a different tone, "Oh. You. Tenconi."

  Tenconi thrust by them without speaking and punched NO SALE on the old-fashioned ornate scrolled cash register. As he did, another customer entered the front of the shop. Tenconi paid no attention; in North Beach, he did what he wanted.

  He took out the thin sheaf of bills held with a rubber band and counted them. He looked up scowling when he had finished.

  "There's only the vig here. Nothing on principal."

  The wife burst out despairingly, "Eche vuoi. Sempre l'interesse, sempre piu interesse . . ."

  Tenconi shrugged in cold indifference, meanwhile fighting hidden laughter. Actually, he didn't want these old jerk-offs ever getting to their nut. They'd pay him interest forever.

  "Hey, Mama, that's your problem. The supermarket, they got lower prices, good fresh produce, Italian run, they get the business, capisce?" He added coldly, "Nobody asked you to borrow money to keep this dump going."

  He went out of the store shoving the money in his pocket, savoring the moment as he did every week. He'd worked as a delivery boy for these old sciagurati, they'd ordered him around plenty then. Now it was his turn. Jerk-offs.

  When he was gone, the other customer appeared from the other aisle. He seemed not to notice their humiliation; instead, he gestured after Tenconi. "Wasn't that Angie Tenconi?"

  "Da big man," muttered the old Italian.

  "Where's he living these days?" the man asked idly.

  They knew, of course. Despite everything, North Beach was still an Italian community where people knew each other's business. Runyan had counted on that.

  CHAPTER 15

  Louise, dressed in sloppy, comfortable country clothes that went with the Norman Rockwell room, worked through the manuscript with her ballpoint pen, scribbling revisions, crossing out words, writing a whole new sequence into the right margin. The phone rang. She swivelled to reach down and pick it up. "Yes?"

  "I'm back. We have to talk."

  "I thought maybe your plane had crashed." She wrote in another phrase. "Hoped it had crashed."

  The heavy voice began, "There was a time when you were plenty goddamned grateful to-"

  "That was before you started asking me to fuck other men on your behalf," she said. She put down the manuscript page and, with the phone clipped between shoulder and jaw, fed a fresh sheet into the typewriter.

  "Why not, you had plenty of practice in Vegas."

  "And you wonder why there's nothing between us any more," she said, and hung up.

  She forced her mind back to Assault on the Citadel. She had written it over again since San Francisco, she thought it was a lot better than the version she had left behind. Writing as therapy? She started to type with the quasi-despairing concentration of impending interruption, dreading whatever scene was to come, but grateful for these few hours.

  She wondered what Runyan might be doing.

  ***

  Runyan walked briskly along the posh Pacific Heights street. Carefully nurtured hardwoods gave the block a slightly Eastern air, as if some early gold-rusher had been nostalgic for Connecticut. He was dressed in black tight-fitting clothes; his shoes were tight-fitting also, rubber-soled rock-climbing shoes that scraped no leather echoes from the sidewalk.

  Gatian Sheridan had an impressive Queen Anne Victorian with a steeply slanting driveway which ran up to level off alongside the house and then continue back to the garage where the stable and carriage house once had been. No lights showed, but in the rounded turretlike structure at one corner of the house-a feature of Queen Anne architecture-a window was open.

  That would do. If he still had his nerve.

  He hyperventilated, went up the slope in a rush, cleared the low picket fence around the planting beds in a nimble leap, landed coiled in the bushes directly in front of the house, and sprang upward--all in one burst of movement. There was the adrenaline constriction in the chest, the feeling that he had to move, do something, act, or he would explode. God, he hadn't known that feeling for eight years!

  At arms' length below the decorative trim under the front windows, he worked quickly over to the slot between bays. He chinned himself, kicked one leg up and hooked a heel, levered himself up, and was standing erect on the two-inchwide trim.

  He began chimneying himself up the slot exactly as he had done dozens of times rock climbing before San Quentin, his back against the side of one bay, his feet against the side of the other. His technique was rusty; but from the countless hours of gymnastics in prison he was stronger than he had ever been.

  At the top he paused, wedged between bays. Directly above his head was the heavy metal rain gutter. He shook it with one hand, testing it for support; then he swung at arms' length below it, kipped neatly up into a pressout, swung a leg up, and rolled over into the trough between the roof coping and the rain gutter.

  The lower sill of the open third-story window in the curving face of the tower was only about two feet above his outstretched hands. As he crouched to spring, a heavy sedan turned into the slanting driveway.

  ***

  Gatian Sheridan had gone to work in his father's wholesale jewelry business after college at the age of 22. He had convinced old Hiram that if they ever wanted that nice standard 300 percent markup, they would have to enter the retail trade. His father had died a year after Runyan's conviction.

  As the lights of his conservative black Mercedes four-door swept across the front of the beautifully maintained Victorian, he noted with a little thrill of anticipation that the tower window was shut.

  "I did close it, Norman," he said. "You were right."

  The man beside him, who was about ten years younger and quite beautiful, said softly, "I'll have to chastise you for doubting me, Gatty."

  A delicious shudder ran through Gatian as he killed the engine and the lights and got out, a soft pale man of 36, exquisitely dressed in a grey three-piece suit with a slight hint of salmon stripe running through it. Norman was taller, lithe as a dancer, with long blond hair that Gatian loved to kiss.

  This was going to be some night. First Leontyne Price in Tosca and in magnificent voice; now ... the tower room.

  Inside, they went directly up to their adjoining bedrooms to get ready. Norman had spent a year in Morocco learning things that made Gatian weak to think about. He pulled on black silk pajamas, put on his superb velvet quilted smoking jacket, and padded barefoot to the connecting door.

  "I'm going up, Norman," he called through it. "I have the new Tosca as a surprise for you."

  "I can hardly wait," said Norman in those soft tones that raised the hairs on the back of Gatian's neck.

  He opened the door with the mirror on it, flicked on the lights, and went up the circular staircase to the tower. The walls were covered with pornographic photos of copulating males; there was another full-length mirror on the ceiling above the king-size waterbed with the mauve velvet spread. He crossed to the expensive unitized stereo and put on the Tosca.

  The haunting voice of Tosca pleading with Scarpia for her lover's life filled the room. Still crouched in front of the stereo, he opened a small compartment and removed a small golden platter. He did not see the door of the antique armoire behind him open cautiously. From the same compartment he removed a small plastic bag of coke, which he ripped open to heap on the platter, a one-edged razor blade, and a tiny golden spoon.

  Something round and metallic and hollow was pressed against the back of his neck. A hand grabbed an agonizing fistful of his hair and jerked his head back. A voice grated in his ear.

  "Scream, I'd love it."

  Gatian had already opened his mouth to do so. He had never known such mingled terror, revulsion, and excitement in his life. His heart felt as if it was going to stop, but he also had an instant and rock-hard erection.

 
; The man pulled him to his feet and walked him across the room to the ornate, mirror-topped coffee table. "Put the tray on the table," he said, "then sit in the chair."

  Gatian did so, hoping the robber wouldn't notice his erection. Or maybe he wanted him to. He didn't know. He was terrified, not thinking straight.

  "You ... you can have the coke, any cash. .."

  The pressure of gun against the back of his neck went away. The man, lithe as Norman but more muscular, with an absolutely marvelous build set off by his tight black clothing, walked around the coffee table and sat down on the arm of the couch. Gatian realized the hollow socket of the candlestick he was holding in one hand was the "gun" that had been pressed against the nape of his neck. He looked involuntarily at the stairwell.

  "I wouldn't," said the man. He made no threatening motion of any sort, but his tone jerked Gatian's eyes back to him, and shocked recognition brought another terrified frisson.

  "Runyan!" he exclaimed. "You're Runyan!"

  "Eight years ago, you fingered a robbery of your father's wholesale diamond firm. Pretty neat idea. You collect on the insurance, then peddle the stones later at retail. The one trouble was that I ended up in the slammer for seven years."

  Gatian's mouth was suddenly very dry. "I ... I had nothing to do with ... any of that, Runyan. I wouldn't-"

  "It looks like the insurance set you up pretty well, but your kind always wants more." He leaned forward. "Did you want it bad enough to come after me with a shotgun last night?"

  Gatian looked into his eyes and was totally still, suspending even his breathing. Runyan answered his own question contemptuously.

  "Not you. You'd come in your pants the first time you touched a gun." He paused speculatively. "Your little friend?"

  "Norm. .." It came out as a squeak. He tried again. "Norman wouldn't..."

  "Of course not. You wouldn't put yourself in his hands that way." Runyan started around the coffee table, then paused. "Stay clear until I get the insurance man off my back, or there won't be any diamonds. Just. .."