Bad Die Young

by Jerome Charyn

  “Well, you’re a badass, Parky, and you know what people say. The bad die young.”

  “What did I tell you?” Giles muttered. “She’s a graceless girl.”

  “And you, Mr. Giles? You’re nothing but a pretentious snob who sucked around the Rockefellers night and day.”

  “Stop fighting,” Parky said. “I have to think.”

  Who had the balls to go after Parky in the middle of Bloomingdale’s? And while he was deliberating, there was a knock on his door. Tatiana had come upstairs, wearing a mink coat and safari pants from Banana Republic. His own security people had let her in. She’d posed as Parky’s fiancée. But he couldn’t be too harsh with his people. He’d never broken off the engagement. Tatiana saw Parky’s wounded ear and her eyes started to swim. He found her a chair, fed her an aspirin.

  “Look at you,” she said. “You can’t survive on your own. You’re hopeless.”

  “It’s nothing. I had a little accident in Bloomingdale’s.”

  “Bloomingdale’s? You wouldn’t go near Bloomingdale’s with me. Parky, have you been shopping for the concubine? Where is she?”

  “Right here,” Carla said, standing in her silk pajamas and smoking a cigarette.

  “She’s trash,” Tatiana said. “Ask her where she grew up.”

  “Poor,” Carla said. “On a farm in North Dakota. I had to milk cows at five in the morning. I never went to school. All the farm boys started feeling me up. My father chased after me when he was drunk or sober. I was the only girl in the territory who had tits at ten and a half. Shall I give you more of my biography, Miz Tatiana Klein?”

  Tatiana hissed at her. “No one said you could pronounce my name.”

  The counselor kept listening. His “concubine” had told him more about herself in thirty seconds with Tatiana than in all the time she’d spent with him.

  “Oh,” Carla said. “Should I call you Little Miss Hunting Pants, or Park Avenue Pet?”

  “Edward Parkchester,” Tatiana said, “are you going to allow this tramp to insult me?”

  “Don’t pick on him,” Carla said. “He isn’t worth much in classic situations. He’s a counselor. He saves his best sentences for court.”

  Carla took her chocolate bars into the bedroom and closed her door. Tatiana started to shake. Soon as Parky noticed her, the shaking stopped. She took several sheets of paper out of her safari pants, uncrumpled them in her lap.

  “You write briefs, Parky, and I’ve written some of my own.”

  “On what subject?”

  “Edwina Herndale.”

  “Who’s that?”

  “Your concubine. That’s the name she was born with. I’ve done my homework.”

  “You hired detectives to chase down Carla’s past?”

  “Edwina’s past. And don’t you have detectives on your payroll?”

  “That’s different,” Parky said. “The courts have all the thunder on their side—cops and clerks, stoolies, lying witnesses. I have to fight their thunder with my own. I need detectives to dig out the law’s fucking lies.”

  “Then you ought to congratulate me. I’ve been digging too. And I came up with a gold mine… . She was in a juvenile shelter at fourteen. She joined a roving gang of prostitutes, went to jail in New Orleans.”

  “Tatiana,” Parky said, “keep quiet.”

  “Here,” she said, rattling the paper in her lap. “Don’t you want my briefs?”

  Parky grabbed the sheets of paper and tore them into shreds.

  “Edward Parkchester,” Tatiana screamed. “Our engagement is off.” And she ran out of Parky’s crib. Edwina Herndale, he thought. Edward and Edwina.

  * * *

  He had to go to court with an injured ear. It gave him an edge. The counselor looked romantic. He worked on witnesses like a quiet tiger. He could have walked out of Wuthering Heights. Heathcliff of Sugar Hill. Tatiana couldn’t provoke him. He wouldn’t rehearse Carla’s past in his head while he was at court. “Edwina” was a lifeless entity, the name of a trick. He didn’t probe. He’d only accept information from Carla herself. He bought her flowers and a rare book.

  “What’s that?”

  “Oblomov,” he said. “It’s about a man who can never get out of bed.”

  “Funny,” she told him. “That tickles me to death.”

  “I read it at school, swear to God. I never got over Oblomov. I was busy with a hundred projects. Kid Harlem at Whitey’s College, tap-dancing in a lot of directions. Oblomov had his projects; but he couldn’t get out of bed.”

  “And I suppose I’m Lady Oblomov.”

  “Oblomova,” Parky said. “That’s how the Russians would pronounce it.”

  “But I’m not Russian … and I only have one project, Edward dear. And that’s to cancel out every other project. I promised myself when I was a little girl that I wouldn’t have to live by any clock. The cows can milk themselves… . Tatiana told you my real name, didn’t she?”

  “Can’t remember.”

  “Say it!”

  “Edwina Something.”

  “Don’t toy with me. Edwina What?”

  “Herndale. Edwina Herndale.”

  “Well, I’m not Edwina anymore. She milked cows… .”

  The telephone rang. Parky had installed a line for Carla, with an unlisted number so people wouldn’t start pestering her about newspaper subscriptions and stock market reports. The phone kept ringing. Parky watched her squirm in her silk pajamas. His injured ear began to pulse with its own premonition.

  “Aren’t you gonna answer?” he asked.

  Carla picked up the phone, whispered a few words, and put it back in its cradle.

  “Who was that?” he growled.

  “Wash,” she said.

  “General Starke? … Where’s he calling from?”

  “The Pentagon.”

  “I don’t believe it. The brigadier chats you up, just like that?”

  “Well, he found out my telephone number, and—”

  “That’s a lie,” Parky said. “It’s unlisted.”

  “And you think the telephone company would ever deny an unlisted number to a brigadier general?”

  “Dial him back,” Parky said.

  “I couldn’t disrupt him, Edward dear.”

  “Dial him back.”

  Carla dialed, and Parky grabbed the phone out of her hand. “This is the Infantry calling. I’d like to speak to General Starke.”

  “Parky, is that you?” he heard the general say.

  “Meet me at the Brig, motherfucker. Around nine or ten tonight. And don’t be late.”

  He hung up the phone. Now he understood who that gentleman caller was at Bloomingdale’s. No white gang would have bothered the king of Sugar Hill. It was a professional, a hired assassin from Army Intelligence, doing a little favor for the brigadier.

  “Bitch,” he said. “You had it all planned with the brigadier. Chocolates, you said. Pantyhose. You knew Giles wouldn’t shop for you, that the burden would fall on me. And you told Wash that I was going to Bloomingdale’s.”

  “I did not.”

  “The ofays wouldn’t touch me. It’s fatal. They had to have had instructions from the brigadier.”

  He unplugged Carla’s telephone, had Giles watch over her with a gun. “She’s a prisoner of war,” he said. “Now she’s really gonna play Oblomova … Giles, she doesn’t leave this bed. If she wants a fruit, have one of our people bring it to her. Shadow the bitch. She doesn’t pee without your permission.”

  Parky walked out of the bedroom, met with his two black lieutenants, retired cops whom he liked to call Grave Digger and Coffin Ed, even though they’d never worked Harlem in their lives and hadn’t read Chester Himes. They both had pockmarked faces, big ears, and tiny eyes.

  “I’d like to smuggle a piece into a cathouse,” he said.

  “What’s it for?” the Grave Digger asked.

  “I’m gonna murder a general.”

  His two lieutenants laughed. Cof
fin Ed winked at the Grave Digger. “Mr. Parky, you ain’t the murdering kind. Leave that business to us. I mean, who’s gonna defend you in open court? You’re the best counselor there is. We get into trouble, you can look after us. Now who is the sucker?”

  “Brigadier Washington Starke.”

  “That nigger general? It’s bad luck, Parky, offing a brother who works at the Pentagon. Why do you want the United States on your tail?”

  “He’s been talking to Carla on the telephone … without asking my permission.”

  “Parky,” said Coffin Ed. “Let the punishment fit the crime. You wanna off him for chatting with your white bitch … Miz Carla, I mean. We could pistol-whip him, steal his medals, burn his coat. But I wouldn’t mess with the Pentagon much more than that.”

  “I don’t want to burn his coat,” Parky said. “I’ll sit with him. And then we’ll see.”

  * * *

  The brigadier arrived first. Wash was entertaining a chess problem while he waited. He was in his uniform, without any bodyguards. And he seemed remorseful.

  “Parky, I apologize.”

  “You were gonna steal my woman.”

  “Counselor,” the brigadier said. “Let’s recap our history. I meet Carla at Marie’s. She has a sensational sluggishness, a sloth that’s never been seen at any bordello, black or white. I’m ape about her. I’m willing to sacrifice my position, my wife, my kids, and my home for Carla. I’m truly insane, a guy whose head had gone out the window. And a certain lawyer comes to my rescue. Plastic Man. He can bend the penal code to his will.”

  “General, don’t exaggerate. I have the gift. I’m good in court.”

  “You take Carla off my hands. I get back my sanity, but I still can’t forget her. And pardon me, Counselor, if I’ve fucked your love life with a couple of calls. It’s that husky voice of hers. I’m addicted to it.”

  “Her voice isn’t husky. And it’s not the phone calls per se. It’s the total picture. Some ofay in a business suit tried to cut my throat in the men’s room at Bloomingdale’s.”

  The brigadier suppressed a smile. “And you think that ofay is me?”

  “No, but it could have been your agents at the Pentagon.”

  “Parky, you’re distorting my powers. I’m a lowly brigadier. I don’t have any agents.”

  “You know what I mean. You could have borrowed some raw recruit from Army Intelligence.”

  “God,” the brigadier said. “I’m a pencil pusher. I don’t run recruits. And if I did, I wouldn’t strike in Bloomingdale’s. Whoever attacked you wasn’t an army man.”

  “Then who was it, Wash? I’m feared on Sugar Hill. I have the best two lieutenants in the world. But people start stealing from me. I’m cut with a knife. It isn’t natural.”

  “Perhaps it wasn’t meant to be. Somebody’s covering his tracks, pointing you in a false direction.”

  “But the only enemy I have is you.”

  “Counselor, you disappoint me,” the brigadier said. “I happen to love your woman, but I’m not your enemy. Just a vicarious rival, that’s all. I’ll help you solve this conundrum of a knife in Bloomingdale’s.”

  “How?”

  “I’ll lean on Army Intelligence, lend a couple of spooks.”

  “No,” Parky said. “They’ll get near my operations, squeal on me.”

  “Parky,” the brigadier said. “We’re not squealers. This is the U.S. Army.”

  They drank champagne. Parky wouldn’t sleep with a girl. He left Marie’s around midnight, whistled to himself. He crossed Ninety-Sixth Street. A limousine came at him out of nowhere, sped down on Parky. He heard the plop of a muffled cannon, felt a breeze on his shoulder. Someone with a silencer had ripped into the padding of his coat. There were no other shots. Coffin Ed and the Grave Digger appeared, ran after the limo, then returned to Parky, who was sitting in the gutter with a ruined coat.

  “Mr. Parky,” said Coffin Ed, “are you all right?”

  The counselor began to cry with a bitter rage.

  “Take me home,” he said.

  3.

  HE WAS STILL IN SHOCK when they brought him to Sugar Hill. He looked into Carla’s eyes. “Oblomova,” he muttered and slept for two days. He was wearing silk pajamas when he woke up, like Carla’s twin. He had thirty-four messages on his night table, from Sasha Klein, Tatiana, his Mafia clients, the district attorneys of Brooklyn and the Bronx, and his junior partner, Harris Teitelbaum. Harris had called him sixteen times. Parky ripped up all the messages. He’d been shot at in the street. The courts would have to wait.

  He made love to Carla, barely moved. He’d become the prince of sloth. “Baby, I shouldn’t have persecuted you,” he said, sipping orange juice that the Grave Digger had squeezed for him. “It’s not your fault that men are insane about you. You don’t have to whisper when you speak to Wash on the phone.”

  He sampled Carla’s chocolate. “That’s incredible stuff.”

  “It’s the signature,” she said. “Never eat chocolate that doesn’t have a lion on the label.”

  Mysterious masked men kept stealing from him, hijacking his trucks of merchandise. Grave Digger began riding shotgun with all the deliveries. He was knocked on the head. The fuckers were out to humiliate him, ruin his credibility on the Hill. But Parky kept sipping orange juice. The world had reduced itself to a king-sized bed. His blanket was the only office Parky would ever need. This wasn’t a honeymoon, a short idyll with Oblomova, an incubation period. It was a whole new life.

  All his diligence was gone, his capacity for detail, his desire to seduce. He had no ambitions. He wasn’t in a rat race of winners and losers, masters and slaves. He had his household. That was enough. But Harris Teitelbaum managed to get through the Grave Digger and Coffin Ed and appeared in the Oblomov bedroom with a mountain of briefs.

  “Junior,” Parky said, “haven’t you heard? I’m indisposable.”

  “I can’t keep all your court dates. I don’t have the talent. I get diarrhea the minute I see a judge.”

  “It’s stage fright. It will pass. And you haven’t said hello to Carla.”

  Harris couldn’t take his eyes off Carla’s silk pajamas. He was another fool in love with Lady Oblomov. “Hello, Miz Carla.”

  “Sit with us, Harris,” she said. “Have some chocolate.”

  Harris closed his eyes. “I don’t dare … I might never be able to climb off the bed.”

  Carla laughed. It wasn’t malicious. It was a pretty laugh. “Are there sirens calling, Harris? Parky’s been working you to death.”

  “It’s much worse than that,” Harris said. “Lord Byron’s been threatening me.”

  Byron Abando was the New Age prince of all the Mafia tribes. He had a law degree, like Parky and Harris. He was a year younger than Parky, at thirty-six. He banked the Mafia’s money, ordered hits from his office on Gold Street, protected the older chiefs. Parky was Lord Byron’s personal lawyer, kept him out of jail, represented Byron in front of jurors as a philanthropist and high financier, “an essential son” who contributed to the Police Athletic League, the Harlem Boys Club, the Catholic Charities, the United Jewish Appeal.

  “Lord Byron doesn’t like it when you can’t be reached.”

  “I took a bullet in the shoulder,” Parky said, lying a little.

  “The man is concerned. He says he will go after the malefactors, whoever they are. No one has the right to menace his lawyer. He will cut their balls off. Those were his words. But he still can’t accept silence from you. There are court cases he would like to discuss.”

  “Junior, didn’t I make you my field general? … Start fielding for me. Tell Byron I’ve been traumatized, lost my tongue.”

  “He won’t believe me,” Harris said and walked out of the Oblomov bedroom, like a sick passenger on some ghostly sailing ship.

  Parky went back to his dark chocolate. He borrowed Carla’s Chester Himes and was about to read in the bathtub when he heard the intercom. It was Coffin Ed, who was guardi
ng the lobby.

  “Mr. Parky, you got a guest.”

  “Send him away,” Parky shouted into the intercom.

  “That was my intention, sir, but he’s a stubborn bastard. Insists he’s General Washington Starke.”

  “Impossible. Wash wouldn’t make a trip from the Pentagon. And he’s never been north of Ninety-Sixth Street. It’s an impostor. What’s he look like?”

  “A ramrod.”

  “I dare him to speak into the intercom.”

  “Counselor,” the brigadier said, “am I gonna have to play ‘twinkle, twinkle, little star’ with one of your ruffians all afternoon?”

  “Wash,” Parky said, like an unhappy child, “come on up.”

  The brigadier arrived with all his medals intact. He kissed Carla on the cheek, like a fucking grandfather, but he didn’t have a grandfather’s eyes. He presented Parky with a military folder. Parky peeked inside, discovered a photograph of a man with a boyish face that was a bit too familiar. He had cropped hair and a mustache with Carla’s platinum tint.

  “There’s your persecutor, Parky, the chap who’s been planning your downfall. He’s the devil’s own architect.”

  “But who is he?”

  “Carla’s husband, Jupiter Drake.”

  “Carla doesn’t have a husband,” Parky said. “And no one’s named Jupiter.”

  “He is,” the general insisted. “And he kind of owns Kansas City. But he’s moved his network here momentarily … to break your ass.”

  “Piss on him,” Parky said.

  Carla pulled the blanket up around her eyes until she looked like a harem girl in an endless veil. “Edward dear, it’s true.”

  “What’s true?”

  “I’m married to that walking insane asylum. And I’ve been hiding from him. That’s how come I came to Manhattan and was lying low in the Brig.”

  “Clever,” Parky said. “A cathouse with a black clientele. And you knew he was trying to wreck me?”

  “I suspected it … after a while.”

  “I almost got killed.”

  “No. That’s how I figured it was Jupe. He likes to whittle at the corners, whittle very slow. Jupe takes his time. It was really a message to me. If I didn’t come back to him, I’d have to suffer the consequences. I didn’t have the heart to tell you, Edward dear.”