Flood

by Andrew Vachss

  I drove past Mama’s to check her front window. Usually there are three beautiful tapestries of dragons on display—one red, one white, one blue. Tonight the white one was missing—undercover cops of some kind were inside. If the blue was gone, it would mean the uniformed police. I kept rolling like I was supposed to do. I could have gone inside, since only the red dragon standing alone meant danger, but I needed to find Max and he wouldn’t be inside, at least not upstairs with the customers. When Max wanted to leave he climbed down to the sub-basement, below the regular storage area. It was pitch-dark down there, and dead quiet. I was there once when two uniforms came looking for him. The young cop wanted to go down there after him but his partner had more sense. He just told Mama to ask Max to stop by the precinct because they wanted to talk to him. Going down in that basement after Max would be about as smart as drinking cyanide and have the same long-term effect.

  I pulled into the warehouse with the headlights off, rolled down the window, lit a cigarette, and waited. It was quiet there, so quiet that I heard the faint whoosh of air before I felt the gentle thump on the car’s roof. I stared straight ahead through the windshield until I saw a hand press itself against the glass, fingers pointed down. I told Max that one day he would break his fool neck jumping from the second-story balcony on to the roof of cars. He thought that was hilarious.

  We went into the back room and I pointed to one of the chairs, then spread my hands to ask “Okay?” When he nodded, it meant he’d wait there for me. He knew I’d explain when I got back.

  The basement of the warehouse was my next stop. The only light down there came from the diffused rays of a streetlight through one of the dirty narrow windows, but it was bright enough for me to find the exit door behind a pile of abandoned shipping pallets. Inside one of the pallets was a rubber-covered dial telephone with two wires ending in alligator clips and a set of keys. One of the keys let me into another basement halfway down the alley, and the second got into the telephone wire box for the commercial building on the corner. It was peaceful—the collective of Oriental architects who inhabited the place in the daytime never worked at night. I checked my watch. Another three or four minutes until James would be expecting the call. I opened the telephone junction box, hooked up the handset, checked to see if anyone else was on the line, got a dial tone, and waited. At fifteen seconds to six I dialed the number James had given to Mama. Someone answered on the first ring.

  “Mr. James’s wire.”

  “This is Burke.”

  “One moment please.” I was supposed to think I was calling an office. James came on, another voice, so at least two of them were in on the game. “Burke. I’ve been trying to reach you. You’re a hard man to catch.”

  “Why didn’t you just stop by the house, pal?”

  “I don’t know where you live.”

  “That’s right, you don’t. What do you want?”

  “I’ve got some business for you; something right up your alley. There’s a considerable sum involved. Can we meet?”

  “You know somebody I know?”

  “I don’t want to say names on the phone. But let’s say I know your reputation, and this would be something you would want to do.”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “I do think so,” his voice turning what he thought was hard and forceful, meaning that he was going to be a continual pain in the ass and stay on my case. It was better to meet him once and have done with it.

  “Okay, pal. Tonight—all right?”

  “Tonight’s fine. Just tell me where.”

  “I’ll send a cab for you. The driver will bring you to me.”

  “That’s not really necessary.”

  “Yeah, it is.”

  There was silence as he thought for a minute, not that there was much for him to think about. He was probably going to tell me to send the driver to some fancy hotel and he’d be standing out in front like he belonged there. It was time to show him we weren’t going to spend the evening being stupid. “Look, here it is. The cab will be there at ten o’clock on the dot. You and your friend just get in the backseat, don’t say anything. The cab will have its off-duty light on and it will blink its lights twice when it comes up on you. Just get in and it’ll bring you where I am. You get out when the cabby stops, wait on the corner, and I’ll pick you up and take you to the meeting place.”

  “That sounds a bit complicated.”

  “Suit yourself.”

  Another short silence. Then, “Okay, Burke, tell your cabby to meet us at—”

  “Never mind all that. The cabby will be at the same corner you’re standing on right now. And don’t waste your time trying to talk to him, he won’t say a word. Yes or no?”

  Silence, a muffled conversation. Then, “Yes, we’ll—” I unhooked the alligator clips, terminating the conversation. If they weren’t on the same corner as the pay phone when the cab rolled up, that would be the end. I went back the way I’d come, returning the equipment and the keys, and rejoined Max in the warehouse.

  When I put the hack license on the table in front of Max his face broke into a joyful grin—he loved to drive the cab. I got out paper and a marking pen, showed him the corner where he’d pick up the two clowns, and gestured that he should bring them back to this neighborhood. He nodded and I diagrammed that he should bring them only to the far corner, make the turn, stash the cab in the back of the warehouse, then go back and escort them inside.

  Max patted his face with both hands, shrugged his shoulders, and spread his palms out wide, asking me if they wouldn’t recognize him as the driver of the cab when he brought them inside. I held up one finger, got up, and walked over to the big trunk where we kept our supplies—hats, wigs, false beards, face putty, stuff like that. Max was in seventh heaven now. This was perfection—not only would he get to drive the cab, but he’d have a disguise too. We brought the mirror out from the bathroom and tried on a few different versions of Max’s face. His favorite was the Zapata mustache, which, together with mirror-finish sunglasses and a fat cigar in his mouth, made him impossible to recognize. I added a jaunty beret in a dashing shade of pink. Max wasn’t crazy about the color but he did smile at the sight of the hat, no doubt remembering the would-be mugger who had donated it to our collection one dark night last summer.

  We found Max an old army jacket and some regulation combat boots, very comfortable for driving. Everything went fine until I got out the gloves—Max never wore gloves even in the dead of winter. But his hands were more recognizable than most people’s faces. I didn’t know how observant these guys were, but I wasn’t taking any chances.

  Max slammed the gloves down on the table in a gesture of total refusal. I grabbed the gloves in one hand and balled the other into a threatening fist, telling him to put on the damn gloves or I’d break his face. His face broke all right, into silent laughter. Then he lightly touched the first two fingers of his right hand to his forehead and to his heart, and opened his two hands in front of me. This was an apology, not for refusing to wear the gloves but for laughing at me. Max thinks I’m more sensitive than I am. At least I think he does.

  We went to examine the cab. It was typical of the breed, a battered old Dodge with hundreds of thousands of no-maintenance miles on the clock. The trunk, as expected, was empty, since fleet owners don’t want the cabbies to sell the spare tire and claim it was stolen. We spread a heavy quilt on the floor of the trunk, checked to make sure the exhaust system was free of leaks, and Max punched a few tiny holes in the trunk lid with an icepick. I’d be wearing a one-piece padded refrigerator suit while I rode along in the trunk, the kind guys use to work inside meat lockers. That, plus the quilt, would keep me from breaking a few bones when Max slammed the cab around like I expected.

  While Max finished checking over the cab, I got the giant portable tape player (another mugger’s donation) and a supply of tapes for Max to play while he drove. It was a little after eight when we finished, so I put some Judy Henske tapes in
the player and Max and I continued our game of gin. We had previously agreed to play until one of us won a million dollars from the other. We’d been playing almost ten years and Max had all the score sheets from our first game in the Tombs to last week’s. I was a good seventy bucks ahead. We sat there, playing gin, smoking—me listening to the music, Max feeling the bass lines through his body. It was good to be sitting in the one club where I was always welcome. I think Max felt the same, although we never talked about it.

  23

  JUST PAST NINE we loaded up the cab and pulled out, me driving and Max as the passenger. We rolled the cab into my own garage. Max stayed there while I went upstairs, let Pansy out, and got her something to eat. Then I climbed into the trunk and Max took the wheel. No way I was going to let these people get a look at my face until I was sure it was going down like it should. If there were cops on the corner, Max would just motor right on by. We headed for the pickup point near Thirty-fourth Street. Although Max loved to drive, he generally behaved himself when he was at the wheel of a cab. Cabs were too sloppy for him—they didn’t respond to a delicate touch. The Plymouth was another story—every time I let him drive that beast he’d happily tear chunks out of the pavement, corner in four-wheel drifts, break 125 on the West Side Highway, and generally act like the city was a giant demolition derby. A lot of cabbies drove like maniacs but there was a purpose to it—making money. Max was immune to money.

  I could feel the streets slip by—I could tell where we were just from the sounds and smells. I lay there wrapped in the quilt, looking like so much garbage in the filthy refrigerator suit. If anyone were to open the trunk, it would take them more than a second or two to figure out there was a live human being in there. By then they’d have mace, if not stars, in their eyes. We had checked the trunk light to make sure it wasn’t working.

  The cab slowed to a gentle stop and the engine revved sharply—once, twice. It meant we were a few minutes early and Max didn’t want to turn the corner until he could do it right on the money. Okay. We started up again, turned a corner, drifted over to the right, and began slowing down in a long gradual slide. By now Max was blinking the lights like we had arranged. I heard someone say “That’s it” and people approach the cab. The back door opened and a voice said, “Are you the guy from Burke?” The cab lurched as Max took off—the body of one of them slammed backward from the acceleration and the cab shot straight ahead, heading for the West Side Highway.

  One of the passengers started to say something, but gave up as the shrieks and screams of contemporary disco pounded through the cab’s interior from Max’s ghetto blaster. There was no hope of them getting any kind of look at Max—the interior light hadn’t gone on when they’d opened the door, Max had kept his high beams on while picking them up so they couldn’t see through the windshield, and the protective screen of plexiglas between driver and passenger was black with years of nicotine and grime.

  Max sped downtown, obviously ignoring several red lights, judging by the occasional gasps of the passengers and the uninterrupted flow of our passage. When he got near the Division Street underpass, he slammed to a stop. There was no action from the backseat, but when Max turned off the cassette player they got the message that this was the place. They got out and the cab was moving again before the back door was closed. We were out of their sight in less than ten seconds, around the corner and heading for the warehouse.

  Max pulled the cab in the back, I let myself out of the trunk, and we both covered the cab with one of the tarps we always kept around. You never know what you might have to cover in an emergency.

  I set up the meeting table in the side room while Max removed his disguise—he changed into a pair of chinos, sweatshirt, and black leather shoes so thin they could have been ballet slippers. While I sat at the table with the light behind me and waited, Max faded out the side door to bring on the clowns. If they had split the scene, Max wouldn’t bother to look for them. Unless they got out of the area real fast, one of the roving packs of kids would take them quickly enough.

  It was about twenty minutes before they came back. Max led them inside to the table, ushering them over to a pair of chairs facing me, then floated over and took the chair to my left.

  Two men. One beefy-faced and bulky, close-cropped hair, a thick drinker’s nose, steel-frame glasses. A fringe of whitish hair poked out of the top of a white sportshirt worn outside his pants. Omega chronograph on his left wrist, dial facing out, short, fat hands, flat-cut nails. Expressionless face, piggy eyes. The other, taller with a heavy shock of blond hair parted on the side, suede sportcoat, mobile clean-shaven face, two thin gold chains around his neck, hands clean and well-cared for, a metal case protruding just slightly from his breast pocket.

  We looked at each other for a moment or so, then the taller one spoke. “Are you Mr. Burke?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’m James. This is my associate, Mr. Gunther.”

  Gunther leaned forward so I could see his little eyes and clenched one of his hands into a fist. The heavy. “Who’s this?” He pointed a fat finger at Max.

  “This is my silent partner.”

  “We’re just dealing with you. Nobody else.”

  I looked back at him pleasantly. “It’s been a pleasure talking to you. My driver will be happy to take you back to where he picked you up—”

  James broke in. “Mr. Burke, you will have to pardon my friend. He’s a soldier, not a businessman. There’s no reason why your partner can’t sit in if you wish.”

  I said nothing. Max said nothing. Before James could continue, Gunther spoke up again. “He’s a gook. I don’t like fucking gooks—I saw enough of them. What kind of white man has a gook for a partner?”

  “Look, asshole,” I told him, “I’m not buying any master-race stock this week, okay? You got business, talk—you don’t, walk.” I was pleased at the rhyme.

  “You do all the talking for the two of you?”

  “Yep.”

  “What’s the matter with the gook, he don’t talk?”

  “He doesn’t do any talking. And so far neither have you.”

  James put his hand lightly on his pal’s clenched fist and patted him. A tender gesture. “Mr. Burke, I must again apologize for my friend here. His family was killed by terrorists back home. They were blacks, of course, but we later learned that they had Chinese leadership. You understand . . .”

  “You think my partner was one of the terrorists?”

  “Don’t be silly. I just mean—”

  “I’m not silly, just confused. Are you people cops, journalists, businessmen, or just a couple of thrill-seeking faggots?”

  Gunther was on his feet, opened his mouth to say something, then focused his eyes sufficiently to notice the double-barreled sawed-off I had leveled at his face. He closed his mouth and sat down. James hadn’t moved. I turned the shotgun sideways so they could see it didn’t have a stock. It didn’t have much of a barrel either, just about enough to sheath the shells waiting inside. I moved it lightly from one to the other.

  “You call and pressure me until I finally agree to meet with you. I send a cab for you, bring you to this place I had to rent for the evening. You cost my partner and me a lot of time and some money too. Then you come here and talk a lot of garbage—now you want to threaten me too? You have business or not?”

  “We have business, Mr. Burke, serious business. Business that could make you a rich man, if you’ll just allow me to speak.”

  “Speak. First, you carrying, either of you?”

  James said no, but Gunther reached in his pocket and took out a pair of brass knuckles. Laying them on the table in front of me, he said, “That’s all.”

  “That’s all?”

  Gunther wasn’t finished with his heavy act yet. “That’s all I ever need,” he said, and settled back into silence.

  “Let’s just start over,” James said. “We have a buyer for certain goods in our home country, and we have a seller of those same
goods. What we need is for those goods to reach the buyer, and when they do, there is a handsome commission available to the individual who expedites matters. We understand that you have the means to accomplish this, and we simply want to put that proposition on the table.”

  “What goods?”

  “Fifteen hundred long arms, about half-divided between Armalites and AK–47s, two thousand rounds for each weapon, five hundred bulletproof jackets, four dozen SAM–7s, some pump-action .12 gauges, and some other miscellaneous items.”

  “To where?”

  “That’s not important.”

  “How do I move them if I don’t know where to?”

  “You don’t have to move them, Mr. Burke. That’s the beauty of this. All we want from you is a valid End Use Certificate from your friends in Africa. We’ll do the rest.”

  “And the money?”

  “Half a million, U.S. Payable anyway you say.”

  “What makes you think I can get an End Use Certificate?”

  “Mr. Burke, suffice it to say that we are aware of your services to the former Republic of Biafra. We are aware of an exile government now operating in the Ivory Coast and your friendship with that government.”

  “I see.”

  “It would work like this. We would purchase the goods and stockpile them in this country. You obtain the certificate, valid in the Ivory Coast. How we get the goods from there to our home country is our problem—we simply trade the certificate for the money.”

  “Sounds simple.”

  “It is simple.”

  “And you’d purchase the goods simply on my say-so?”

  “Well, of course, we’d have to have a deposit on your end. We’re risking all the goods, and we have people to answer to. But it’s important enough to our cause to take the chance and trust you substantially—”

  “How substantially?”

  “I don’t follow.”

  “How much of a deposit?”

  “As you know, ten percent is traditional. But in your case, because of your reputation, we would accept only two percent.”