Men Who Walk Alone

by T. J. Martinell

  The glass fell on the table as Forsyth jerked his head to see me in the chair next to the fireplace.

  Forsyth couldn’t recognize me. I sat too far away from the fireplace to be seen clearly. All he got was a general impression of me; my heavy trousers, my black leather jacket, the glass of whiskey in my hand. He turned to see my fedora on one of the pegs installed on the wall.

  He remained relatively calm, which I had expected him to be. He had encountered situations like this before. Panic never helped.

  “Who are you?” he asked calmly.

  I pointed at the telephone box on the wall by the stove.

  “Where were you when I called last night?” I repeated.

  Forsyth played along; still didn’t recognize me. He smiled lightheartedly.

  “I was out. Did you miss me?”

  “Absolutely.”

  Forsyth walked over to the table. He picked up the latest edition of American Amore, one of his favorite smut magazines. He threw it across the room, where it landed on my lap.

  “Enjoy that while you’re here,” he said sweetly. “Page twenty is especially good.”

  I didn’t glance at it for even an instant. I didn’t go along with the perverted humor, either. I shoved magazine it into the fireplace, then leaned back in my chair. I threw back my whiskey as the flames hungrily consumed the pages.

  “I always thought it made good kindling,” I said. “You?”

  “Not quite.”

  “Too bad. Kept me warm plenty of nights. This house is a bit drafty. Ya might wanna reconsider that.”

  Forsyth moved away from the kitchen, into the main part of the room. He stood by the small red sofa that overlooked the mantelpiece. He held his moonshine in his hand, but didn’t drink from it. Not until I, his uninvited guest, had been removed or eliminated.

  “Can I help you with something?” he asked.

  I got up, set my whiskey down. I dipped my hand in my pocket discreetly. Forsyth didn’t stir. He knew how this worked. If I had come to kill him, I would have done it without the banter. He realized I needed him alive.

  I brought my hand out in a closed fist. I then casually tossed one of the bullets at him. A man of quick reflexes, Forsyth caught it. He opened his hand, peered at it curiously.

  “One of yours, I believe,” I said.

  It was; but Forsyth knew better. “Perhaps. I’d have to look at it.”

  “Don’t bother. I already did. It’s yours.”

  I laughed as I lugged a pack of cigarettes out and extracted one. I stuck it close to the flames. I breathed in, then exhaled. A circle of smoke hovered over my chair as I gestured at him.

  “Care for one?” he asked.

  “Don’t mind if I do.”

  I flicked a cigarette at him. Forsyth took it with a puzzled demeanor. I could read his thoughts effortlessly. He tried to form an ambiguous expression, but it didn’t work on people like me.

  He wondered why I was there. I hadn’t come to kill. My conversation so far had been vague. Did I intend to propose a business deal? Or was this merely a test to see if he was the right person for me to work with?

  “Speaking of competition,” I said, “how have ya customers been? Got any real winners?”

  “A few,” Forsyth replied. “Some can afford more from me than others.”

  “Any in particular?”

  “Why do you ask?”

  “Just wonderin’.”

  We smoked wordlessly while I put more wood on the fire; flames roared brightly as I fanned them with a bellow until it filled the room with an reddish orange glow.

  Forsyth laughed wryly. Finally, he recognized me.

  “Good evening, Seth Moore,” he said with faux cordiality.

  “Same to ya, Forsyth.”

  “What’s a cop like you visiting a businessman like me?”

  I moved over to the sofa. We stared at each other for a while wordlessly. Forsyth had never met me before, but he was acquainted well enough. My reputation ran as rampant as it ran notorious. A small job perk.

  “I didn’t come here to talk business,” I said as I puffed on my cigarette. I raised my eyebrows for a brief instant. “Then again, maybe I am.”

  “What can I do for you?” Forsyth asked.

  “I hear ya like sellin’ military-grade Tommy guns and ammo. Is that the truth?”

  Forsyth grinned, nodding his head with a sense of suavity.

  I was on his turf. I had had the draw on him. But I obeyed the first unwritten rule of Beverly: You never kill someone you can negotiate with. As long as someone was amenable, they lived. Most of the time.

  “I sell a myriad of weapons,” he replied. “I like that word, by the way. Myriad. It sounds so eloquent.”

  I stared harder at him. Forsyth gestured diplomatically.

  “But I can tell you aren’t interested in eloquence,” he said.

  “Ain’t ya a regular Abercrombie,” I spat back.

  “I’m simply a businessman, detective. If you wish, I can supply you with a list of the items that I provide for my customers.”

  I waved a hand off to the side dismissively. “Don’t need to. I already know that ya suppliers are the best. All it stolen from Army depots.”

  “My customers don’t complain.”

  “Who are they?”

  “Come now, detective,” Forsyth stated. “That is confidential. They wouldn’t do business with me if they knew that I was divulging identities with a law enforcement officer.”

  “Consider this a social visit.”

  “Well, they wouldn’t want to know I allowed social visits with police detectives either, would they?”

  I approached Forsyth, our faces now inches apart. The height difference was noticeable; I had at least six inches on him.

  Forsyth suspected the negotiations were about to take a nasty turn. He had to remain calm. No display of hesitation. I had to make a bargain first.

  “That’s the business I’m interested in,” I said. I poked Forsyth’s chest with sharp, painful thrusts.

  “What business?” he asked.

  “I ain’t in the mood for this kind of talk, so I’ll give it to you as straight as a shot of bourbon whiskey.”

  “I’m listening.”

  “Ya know those wops the mob bumped off?”

  “Who hasn’t?”

  “Yeah, well they didn’t do it.”

  Forsyth crossed his arms. He perceived an impending accusation.

  “Explain.”

  “I compared two slugs I dug out of two different bodies. Both out of a Tommy. One was recovered from the scene of the massacre, the other I pulled out of a pal of mine after someone plugged him. The slugs don’t match. They have different shell casings, different primers, the whole thing. They were made by two different manufacturers. The slug from the massacre was good quality, real nice stuff. The other slug, from the mobster, was cheap shit. Ya don’t sell that stuff.”

  “I see....”

  I put my hands on my hips, set my jaw with an accusatory sneer.

  “Yeah. Startin’ to get the picture? I figure the cheap stuff was bought from a smuggler. We’re talkin’ about people who deal with the black-market type trade. Gun smugglers get the lousy stuff. Anyways, somebody set Mario to take the rap for pluggin’ the wops.”

  “Two birds with one stone, wouldn’t you say?”

  “No, I wouldn’t.”

  “I can’t imagine why, considering how many times they tried to kill you.”

  “Here’s the thing, Forsyth; I ain’t got love for wops like Marzio, but not every egg in the basket is rotten, get me? I knew those dagos on Rantoul. They were sonuva bitches sometimes, but they didn’t deserve to get knocked off in front of their families.”

  Forsyth masked his nervousness by placing his hand over his face, pressed his cigarette between his fingers. He saturated the air with more smoke as he spoke as nonchalantly as he could.

  He didn’t think I was certain. He chalked it up to th
e so-called “arrogance,” which apparently was my trademark. Another part of my reputation as one of the greatest bluffers in Beverly.

  “Debatable,” Forsyth replied quietly.

  “Not the point.”

  “What is the point?”

  I poked him again, knew it got to him. His scowl was delightful to look at.

  “The real perps are still out there, thinkin’ they got away with it. I think ya know who those perps are. I think ya know because ya sold ‘em the ammo and the guns.”

  Forsyth laughed facetiously. “Do you have any idea how many customers I have? Hundreds. You honestly think I know which one did this?”

  I smiled. “Yeah. I do. I know how ya operate. Ya an old-timer. Ya survived ‘cause ya know enough about ya customers to sell them out.”

  Forsyth remained quiet. His cigarette ran out of tobacco, became a stub wedged between his fingers. He let it burn his skin for a moment, then he dropped it into the ashtray on the table.

  “This ain’t hard,” I finally stated. “Give me a name, just one, and I’m gone.”

  “And if I don’t?”

  “Ya will.”

  “You sound rather overconfident.”

  “It ain’t overconfidence if ya got a swell reason to be.”

  “Care to tell me?”

  Forsyth knew the second rule of Beverly as well as the first: If you couldn’t keep your mouth shut, someone else would shut it for you. He would fight to the last, as expected.

  “I can’t help you,” he said.

  I wasn’t dissuaded. I nodded my head subtly, looked behind his shoulder.

  A heavy metal object struck Forsyth in the back of his head. The blow sent him to the floor, knocked him out immediately. As he lay motionless, the Vigilante stepped out from behind his crumbled body, held his revolver by the barrel.

  He looked at me with distrust.

  “You had better be right,” he said. “I risked much when I told the men to stand down tonight.”

  “Trust me,” I said as I checked Forsyth’s pulse. “They’re gonna have a new enemy by dawn.”

  “How?”

  I groaned as I began to pull Forsyth across the floor. He weighed heavier than he seemed.

  “Help me drag him outside,” I said. “This guy’s tough. I didn’t expect him to crack easily. He’s gonna require something else.”

  ***

  Forsyth opened his eyes. A powerful gust of wind blew into his face; he shivered violently. The salty taste in his mouth announced our watery location in the middle of Salem Sound. Off in the distance, the lights of Beverly glowed like fireflies.

  He looked over at me; his eyes narrowed as he tried to make me out.

  Then, he felt the wooden surface below him. As the weight shifted back and forth, he realized we were on a boat. It was confirmed by the slapping sound of waves as they smacked up against the hull.

  The rocky boat made him even dizzier. Good. Make my life easier.

  He grabbed the back of his head, felt the large lump. A hasty bandage had stopped the blood.

  His senses returned, he looked at me again as I sat in the back of the boat, my hand rested on the stern. At my feet was a pair of oars. The wind blew my hair into my face, which I brushed back casually.

  Then Forsyth looked at the Vigilante next to me. His eyes widened in terror.

  Forsyth didn’t need someone to make an introduction. The deformities of the Vigilante’s face left no question as to who he was. His black hair flew like seaweed in the water. The location I had chosen made him appear twice as creepy as he might have been inside of a house. He had the natural ambiance of a corpse, but his presence was anything but dead.

  The Vigilante’s blue eyes dazzled brilliantly as he stared at Forsyth. His hands gripped the edge of the boat to hold him back from his violent nature. I was also ready to intervene if necessary. We had talked several times before, but I still didn’t quite believe him. It was strange. I trusted Sean Blood. When the mask came on, however, all that fell out the window.

  Forsyth groaned as another stab of pain struck his neck.

  I chuckled, spoke loudly above the noise of the waves.

  “I always enjoy a good interrogation as much as the next man,” I said as I waved at the Vigilante. “If case ya wonderin’, he’s the next man.”

  Forsyth said nothing. It would be another minute or two before he fully recovered.

  “There is a drawback to interrogations, though,” I continued. “They get old, real fast. And it has to be with the right fella. The wops were fun to interrogate. They think they were so loyal to their don, until it’s their lives on the line and suddenly their spines turn into jelly and they rabble on for hours. A fella that’s scared will always talk.”

  Forsyth turned his head to the side, looked down at the murky black water. Foam brewed on its surface like bubbles inside of a witch’s cauldron. It rolled around viciously, as though it attempted to destroy the boat.

  I noticed Forsyth’s consternation, couldn’t help but use it to my advantage. There was no such thing as fair, no rulebook that governed how to conduct yourself.

  “It don’t look invitin’, do it?” I asked.

  “Must I reply?” Forsyth asked.

  The Vigilante’s grotesque mouth opened like a bottomless cave.

  “Who killed those men?” he asked.

  “I don’t know.”

  “LIAR!”

  With a hiss, the Vigilante lurched across the boat, grabbed Forsyth by the throat. The smuggler felt hot, intense breaths pour onto his face as he struggled to keep his own breaths alive. With a lantern in his hand, the Vigilante lifted it up so that it was next to their faces.

  Forsyth froze. He saw the monstrosity that wasn’t supposed to exist. The razor-like eyebrows, the cruel scars, the gruesome burns, the distorted features; they proved that the Vigilante was no myth invented by a sensationalist reporter. He was an incarnation of Hell.

  “GIVE ME A NAME!” the Vigilante screamed as his grip tightened around Forsyth’s throat. “A NAME!”

  Time to intervene.

  I instantly reached over to grab the Vigilante by the shoulder, yanked him back. He offered a little resistance; a small hint of Sean Blood’s conscience swirled in his gaze. While Forsyth coughed over the side of the boat, I glared at him like a father to a disobedient child. His glare was equally furious, but not at me. All his anger was self-directed.

  “Killing me won’t get you any answers,” Forsyth gasped. “It won’t help you.”

  I moved further up the boat, switched places with the Vigilante. He held his infamous revolver in his hand, the muzzle pointed directly at Forsyth. I wasn’t sure if I knew he’d restrain himself. But I had no choice at this point.

  “Ya right about that,” I said to Forsyth. “Ya no good to us dead. But if ya don’t talk, you ain’t no good to us livin’, either.”

  I then untied a bag at my feet as Forsyth watched with a confused expression. I reached into it, produced a metal ball and chain, along with a pair of fetters.

  “Move and ya dead,” I growled to Forsyth. “And don’t test my friend. He’s already prayin’ for ya to do somethin’ stupid.”

  I worked quickly as I clapped the fetters to Forsyth’s ankles, then connected them to the ball and chain. Forsyth, meanwhile, watched apprehensively, his fingernails dug into the wooden boards with apprehension.

  “What are you doing?” he asked.

  “I knew this copper once from Seattle,” I said in a matter-of-fact tone. “Not a real swell guy. But he told me about what those boys do over there when they got an uncooperative suspect. They bring ‘em out to this place called Lake Washington, put ‘em on a boat like this one, and attach a ball and chain to their neck. They give the suspect two options; talk, or try swimmin’ ya way back to land.”

  I chuckled sardonically. “I never bothered to ask him how many of ‘em chose the second option. I can’t imagine there were a lot. Whatever their fates were, it was
probably better than sleepin’ with the fishes in a bed of algae, don’t ya think?”

  Finished with the fetters, I moved away from Forsyth, held the ball in my hand. I prayed this would transpire fast. It weighed as much as it seemed, which was more than I cared to hold for long.

  “Seriously, do I really need to tell ya what the score is here?” I asked. “Ya seem like a smart guy. Ya can figure it out.”

  The Vigilante roared like a lion.

  “Just let me shoot him and be done with it! He won’t talk!”

  That one was faked; just to scare Forsyth.

  “Yeah, he will,” I said confidently.

  Forsyth wiped a cold sweat from his brow. He stammered. This hadn’t been anticipated.

  “I don’t know anything!” he exclaimed. “I swear!”

  “Tell us what ya don’t know, then.”

  His voice lost its arrogance. Now, he sounded pitiful. “Please, let me go. I’m a businessman.”

  “Yeah? Then consider this a hostile takeover. Very hostile.”

  “Please. I hadn’t nothing to do with what happened.”

  “I never said that, Pierre. All I said was that ya know who and ya holdin’ it back from me. I don’t appreciate that none. Neither does my friend here. The sooner ya talk, the sooner we start rowin’ back to dry land and ya can go back to peddlin’ porn for the perverts out on Vice Street like the rest of ‘em.”

  The smuggler looked frantically at the waterline. He then gazed at the distant twinkle of the lighthouse by the cliffs, at the heavy ball in my hands, then at the Vigilante. Meanwhile, my hands grew tired. Either he would break, or I would.

  I had a reputation to uphold. I wouldn’t drop it for him. I’d drop the ball, though. Whether it was in the boat or in the water was anyone’s guess.

  “Better talk fast,” I said.

  Forsyth deliberated.

  “Please,” he begged.

  The ball hovered over the water as my hands shook.

  “Please.”

  I started to lower the ball.

  “Please!”

  I dipped the ball into the water, where it disappeared. My spine ached from my tailbone to the top of my neck as I strained to hold it.

  Finally, something in Forsyth cracked. The last bastion of resistance in him shattered.

  “Stop! Don’t do it! I’ll talk! I’ll talk! I’ll talk!”