by Roddy Doyle
—Maybe it’s the pictures they want to keep from our eyes, I said.
—No, said Brotman. —No.
—Recognise her? said the half-sister.
I did: she was standing beside me.
—You’re Moll.
—The original, she said, and touched the page.
—What about Shy Boulez?
—My nom de cunt. Which hit you first? The clock or the tits?
—Both at the same time.
—Liar.
The black certainties were shoved aside; those guys outside were gone.
—Even better pics inside, she said. —Want to see them?
But Brotman took the book and put a lighter one into my hand. The State and Revolution. V.I. Lenin.
I gave it a flick; no pictures. But I knew who Lenin was. I looked at Brotman. I pointed at Moll in his hand and lifted the book in mine.
—What’s this got to do with that? I said.
—Freedom of expression, he said. —I am not a Bolshevik but I think that I am entitled to know what its greatest exponent has to say. That is my fight.
He waved at all the books.
—My cause.
He smiled, and waved again.
—Please.
I picked up books, flicked and put them down. Fanny Hill, The Merry Order of St Bridget, Revolution and Counter-Revolution. They watched me. They stood there as I browsed. La Ronde, Oscar Wilde Three Times Tried, White Meat, The Secret Places of the Human Body, Ireland and the Irish Question. Marx and Engels. I didn’t pick that one up; I didn’t even stop.
There were hard men outside again.
Broadway Virgins, Pavement Lady, Ireland and the Irish Question. Nita offers the treasure of her beauty. Ireland and the Irish Question. A California girl’s love madness is awakened by a vagabond artist. At the north-western corner of Europe lies the land whose history will occupy us. Untrodden Fields of Anthropology. Her money-mad father dangles her in front of wealthy directors. Birth Control: A Practical Guide for the Married.
Ireland and the Irish Question.
I stopped strolling.
I listened.
—So, I said. —What’s the story?
—What is the story?
—What’s going on?
—I distribute and publish these titles, said Brotman. —Much of the great literature of the age. Many of the classics. The most challenging political theory and polemics. The groundbreaking works of anthropology and sexology.
—And good old dirt, said Olaf’s half-sister. —He’s a smut-monger, daddio. But he’s right, you know.
I listened for noise behind the boxes, slow steps in the hall. And Brotman watched me. This, too, was a man who had to listen.
She had my hand again.
—Max there is a pioneer, she said. —And he’s grinding out a living.
It was her turn to pick up a book. She let go of my hand and opened it. She pointed to the bottom of the title page.
—See that?
She read.
—Privately printed. Know why that’s there?
—Why?
—Keeps some of the heat off and sells more copies. How’s that for moxie?
—Are all of these books banned? I said.
—Just like the booze, she said. —Ain’t that the truth, Max?
—In a manner of speaking, yes, said Brotman.
—Bootlegging and booklegging, daddio, she said. —Same business, see.
If that was true, there were hard men near and listening. Hitmen and smut-hounds – they were all behind those boxes.
And she had my hand again.
—Freedom, daddio. Freedom to drink and to read. Freedom to think different and dirty. Will you do it, daddy? He’ll pay you handsome. You with us?
I remembered how to talk and listen to shifts and shushes that crept around the talk. I held her hand now. I felt and read it, like the fourth Mister Levine at the Yiddish theatre – I heard it.
I picked up Moll Flanders again.
—This was written in 1722?
—Published, he said.
—Get down off your fuckin’ horse, I said. —1722, you said.
She squeezed my fingers.
—Yes, said Brotman.
He’d stepped away from me.
One neat step.
She eased her grip, petted my thumb.
—Moll here wasn’t around in 1722. So, why is she in the book?
—Don’t be a mugwump, daddio, she said.
Her fingers grabbed my index finger.
—Freedom and profit, she said. —I’m the profit, I guess. Max has a name for the dirty ones. Don’t you, Max?
She let go of the finger, held it again.
Brotman coughed.
—Furtive tomes in tasty bindings, he said. —I must make a living to survive.
A whistle from outside, train a station away, foot on the roof, maybe not our roof.
—You want to draw me for a book? I said.
—You and me, both, she said. —And not draw.
—I need a selection, said Brotman.
He stepped forward.
One neat step.
—A variety. Of poses, if you will. For various publications that I have in mind.
—What publications?
—As I said. A variety.
Another neat step.
—One or two works of erotology.
—How to do it, she said.
—A sexological study.
—How others do it.
—Religious ceremony, sexual mores. Being written by an eminent professor of anthropology. At Harvard.
—Still a smutbird, she said.
The feet on the roof were gone.
—Some illustrations for new classic editions.
—Your chance to dress up, daddio.
—What about Ireland and the Irish Question?
—Excuse me?
—D’you need pictures for Ireland and the Irish Question?
—No, said Brotman. —No.
He took another step.
—Fifteen to twenty illustrations in total. Twenty-five, twenty-six, at a push.
He was right in front of me. She stroked my wrist.
—Photographs, he said.
—The thing, daddio.
—My illustrators work from photographs. And, of course, the serious works of sexology require photographic accompaniment.
—That’s pictures in American. Do it, daddy. Say Oui.
I got to wear the three-cornered hat.
—Grab the threads.
I held onto the huge dress that she’d let drop to her waist – good, tough velvet – and I heard the zip and thump of Brotman’s flash as she pretended to pull away. Two flashes later, she took the hat and put it on her own head; she lifted the dress as she backed into me.
—Two hundred and twelve pages later, she said.
Zip, and flash.
—Bodies never lie, daddio.
Through three books at least, two literary classics and a how-to. The smell of the flash was trapped and dangerous. Get out when you smell the cordite. She led me from cardboard tree to couch, to and onto every prop in the studio, the last room in the long corridor.
We were right under the camera now. On my back on the floor, she had me in her mouth. Her knees held my arms; her fine, long hands pinned my knees to the floorboards.
Zip, flash – into my eyes – I was blinded and coming and the room was full of shoes. She was sitting hard on me, there were men standing on my feet and hands.
—Well, well.
I knew the voice.
The weight of bodies on the floorboards; patent leather sent sparks around my face. I tried to get up – I still couldn’t see – but she was strong, and the feet on my wrists and ankles pressed until I stopped. I closed my eyes; I couldn’t wipe them. I’d slipped from her mouth but she still held me down. She hadn’t budged. She’d done her bit.
—Good job, said the voice.
I could see again. The half-sister’s gee was an inch from my chin, aimed at me like a sawed-off. The room was full of hard men; spats, leather, trouser cuffs.
—Good job.
Johnny No said it again.
And it wasn’t the half-sister who answered.
—Nothing to it.
Mildred.
There were feet on my wrists.
And a scream.
Olaf’s half-sister was off me and at the other side of the room. Thrown there. She was crying now, curled to as small a ball as a fine girl could manage. Her hair a shield.
I couldn’t see Mildred. I looked to the door, got kicked – a slice to the side of my face.
There were men at each of my corners. Standing on my ankles and wrists. & Son was one I knew, and I’d seen the other three. They’d been following me for weeks.
—Want to know why you ain’t been dead for quite a spell? said Johnny No.
He was standing beside the camera.
He tapped my cheek with his shoe.
—Why?
—I’ll tell yis. I wanted to see if there was a limit to a blockhead’s fucking stoopidity. And guess what?
He kicked me.
—There ain’t. You’d’ve kept on being stoopid for fucking ever.
He kicked me again. I watched him draw back his foot – I turned my head, he sliced my neck. Now his foot was on the side of my face. I could feel stone and glass in the sole.
—I could of got you any time. But Mildred says to wait. Something about a gat in a wedding picture her mama told her about. Here’s a guy to be careful with, she says. So what? I think. But, I agree. But then a little fucking boid tells me you’re tomcatting with a certain piece of ass that is un-fucking-touchable. So now’s the time, I say, and Mildred here don’t argue with me. And she brings me here, and what do I find? I find the guy I told to get the fuck out of town so long ago I wasn’t even shaving. Only, that’s not all I find. He’s with the broad. I was hoping, no. But, there they are. On the fucking floor. And, not only is he polishing his cock in the certain broad’s kisser, but he wants fucking photographs.
Someone lit a cigarette.
—Do you know who that is who was sitting on your face not two minutes ago there? said Johnny No.
—No, I said.
It was true enough, and I thought the answer might save her.
—Well, said Johnny No. —I do, see. And it fucking scares me.
He held his trousers away from his knees and brought his face right down to mine. His eyes got bigger, yellower, his lips more cracked; the cigar was red and quickly hot.
—She belongs to a gent called Owney Madden. Have you, by any fucking chance, heard of Owney Madden?
—Yeah.
—Yare. You have and you are dead.
He stood up again.
—’Fact, he said. —Way I figure it, everyone here in this room is dead. Know who owns this room?
—Owney Madden.
And he kicked me, twice, took pieces of my face.
—You knew that?
—No, I said. —I only guessed now.
I could feel blood on my neck. I couldn’t move.
—What are we going to do? said Johnny No.
It was a real question.
—Do you know Owney Madden? he said.
—No.
—Owney Madden is a little banty rooster from fucking hell. He is the fucking Devil. And you are so fucking stoopid, you might come up with an answer. How do we get out of this fucking thing?
—Well, I said. —Why don’t we forget we saw anything and just go.
—Go where?
—Home.
—Jesus, Mildred, he said. —When you said he was a numbskull you didn’t come fucking close.
—Yare, said Mildred. —Sorry, Johnny.
—That’s okay, lady.
His face was right over mine.
—You took something belonged to me. You remember this, by any chance?
—Yes.
—You took the boards that belonged to me. Right?
—Right.
—Wrong. The boards did not belong to me. They belonged to a man that’s bigger than me. That is why I was sore with you. Nothing belongs to me. Nothing will ever belong to me. Or fucking you. The boards you took, who did they belong to?
—Owney Madden.
—Wrong. But not very wrong. They belonged to a man that is like Owney Madden. Everything belongs to a man like Owney Madden. Every fucking thing. Even the fucking air.
He bent down to me again. He had a club made of wrapped newspaper, the New York World. There was a length of lead pipe inside that package; I could smell it.
He placed the end of the club on my chest.
—It’s not a bat, I said.
—The fuck you talking about?
—You whacked the others with a baseball bat.
—Yare? Well, you ain’t fucking American. So you ain’t getting that particular treatment. And, also, you want to open a cheap guy’s head and don’t want to see his brains on your fucking hands, you use what I got in my fucking hands here. The lesson is nearly over.
He pressed on the club. I tried hard not to gasp.
—You’re lying on this floor, in this part of town, you belong to Owney Madden. I drag you downtown, and I throw you on a floor down there, who do you belong to?
—I don’t know.
—Well, I do, see. Mildred knows. All of us here know. You’ve heard of Louis Lepke?
—Yes, Mister Vaux.
—He remembers my name. Fuck you.
I’d heard of Louis Lepke. I’d seen him. Leon the Cob had pointed him to me, as he went into Jimmy the Priest’s, on Fulton Street.
—Bad news comes to town, Leon had said. —Stay clear of that man, my friend.
And I thought I had. I’d seen him, and his boys, waiting on stoops, leaning on Ford Coupés. I’d never gone close.
—The boards you took belong to Mister Lepke, said Johnny No.
—I gave them back.
—You forget my name again? You got yourself some more boards. And they belonged to Mister Lepke. You didn’t know that, did you?
I didn’t answer.
—No, said Johnny No. —And the shrimps you got to tote them for you. Those kids belong to Mister Lepke. They know that. Now. But you didn’t know that, did you?
—No.
—And neither does Mister Lepke. He don’t have to. He’s got me and other persons like me to look after his business interests. He is king of all he fucking surveys, until he crosses the street where somebody else is the fucking king. Everybody knows this. Everybody knows where Louis Lepke is king and isn’t king. Except fucking you.
He stood up straight and lifted the club over his head. He looked down at me – I watched yellow eyes, teeth – the cigar was gone – fury pumping weight and power into his arms.
I stretched, went nowhere. I couldn’t even shut my eyes.
I stared up at him.
I heard the half-sister crying.
I heard one of Mildred’s heels.
I heard Johnny No’s teeth.
I heard the club brush the ceiling.
I watched the club come back, down.
But something happened. He chickened out, his grip strayed – he was talking to me again.
—The hooch inside the boards. Who do you think the hooch belonged to? Eddie Anderson?
—Fast Eddie?
—Dead Eddie. The poor fuck. Your fucking fault. You decide to skim off the top. Did you think you was fleecing Eddie? Are you that stoopid? Stoopider than fucking Eddie? Even he began to figure out he was in trouble. So he begins to baptise the hooch. Which is fine. Until there’s no hooch in the fucking bottle, only fucking water. Then it is not fine. Then I find out. Then I deal with the situation before Mister Lepke finds out he has a situation. And poor fucking Eddie learns how to fly. And all this time you think you are the fucking smart guy.
He prodded me with the club.
—Who owned the boids?
I heard a sigh; someone in the room was getting bored.
—Mister Lepke, I said.
—No. Mister Lepke has no interest in boids. He lets them fly for free off his roofs. But, no. Those particular boids that ended up dead belonged to someone else. The same someone that owns this room.
—Owney Madden.
—That’s right. Eddie was looking after them for Owney Madden. Because Mister Lepke said so. As a favour to his friend, Mister Madden. Eddie knows about boids. Owney Madden knows about Eddie. Asks Mister Lepke if it’s okay for Eddie to breed him some good ones, whatever it takes to make a boid a good fucking boid. To fly fucking fast and come back. So, Mister Lepke says, Certainly. And that’s dandy. But, somehow or fucking other, all those boids that belong to Mister Madden end up not being able to fly any more. Not even fucking slow. And who’s in the middle of the dead boids?
—I didn’t do it.
—Do I fucking care? said Johnny No. —I fucking did it. Lesson over.
He was up. The club brushed the ceiling again, paint dust nicked my face. The club began to sing. I watched, I heard it—
The room exploded, and my head went with it.
But I was alive. I could see – I could smell a spent gun, my hands and feet were mine again. I couldn’t hear anything, except the explosion, rolling in my ears – and the scream I’d heard before it.
I looked around.
Olaf’s half-sister was standing there and the smoke was coming from the gun in her hand. Left, right – no floored bodies, the door was shut, no one crawling towards it. I blinked the ceiling from my eyes, I shook my head, tried to free the scream.
The scream. I looked. Mildred. Behind Johnny No. Standing, heels apart a foot or so. I couldn’t see her face.
Olaf’s half-sister was pointing the gun at Johnny No. The club over his head was starting to look funny. I still couldn’t hear but the hard men could because their hands were in the air and they were listening to Olaf’s half-sister.
I sat up; I could do it. I looked at her lips as I shook blood to my hands. She looked at me, barked an order I couldn’t hear but understood. I hopped to it, leaned on the poor hands, got up, no bother.
And I could hear.
And I could see Mildred. She was scared and angry, trying for just scared. She looked at me.
—At me! the half-sister roared.