by Daniel Finn
Moro had taken her! Reve felt sick in the pit of his stomach. He was stupid. He was an idiot.
He felt a hand on his arm.
It was Baz. She must have just slipped round the corner and out of sight and then sneaked back as soon as the car had pulled away. Demi was right behind her, shuffling his feet, glancing this way and that, looking like he hardly needed to be there; that it was nothing to do with him that Mi had been taken.
‘No.’ she said to Reve. ‘You don’t go there. Not now.’
Of course he was going there. He shook her hand off. ‘You plan this? Fay plan this?’
‘No.’ She pulled at him again.
‘Leave him be, Baz. Country boy’s all cooked in his head.’
‘That right?’ Something snapped. ‘You the one take us this way, Demi. Hey! Maybe you done it on purpose, feed Mi to that man!’ He wanted to grab the little boy and shake him like a rat. ‘That what you done, eh!’ Abruptly he turned away, disgusted with himself. Why blame the boy? He, Reve, he was the one to blame. He should have had his eyes open.
‘You want to go ’cross to that place,’ Demi said sullenly, ‘you go, but we seen kids goin in there, all ages – that right, Baz? Goin in and not comin out. So you go if that what you want to do.’
Baz was standing right beside Demi, his shadow, two or three inches smaller, eyes that would melt a soft woman. ‘Seen ’em, Demi.’ Her eyes were fixed on Reve, looking up at him. ‘Fay say we never go near that place. Never. She rage if we do wrong thing. That man the spider,’ she said.
Reve stared across the broad dusty square, half shadowed now, the old buildings cracked and peeling, boarded windows. In the middle the fountain spluttered silently and then died. The tram they had been going to catch swung round the far end and slipped away down an avenue to the right. There was hardly any traffic: a truck, dirty vans pumping oily smoke from their exhausts. The only thing shiny in all that wide space was down the far end of the square, where the buses and the trams stopped, where there was a row of cafes, a corner market and the glinting blue lights of Señor Moro’s bar.
Mi would be so frightened.
‘Come on, we got to get back, tell Fay,’ said Demi. ‘She know the señor, don’t she, Baz? She can give him talk. Get your sister maybe . . .’ He didn’t sound convinced.
‘Why’d she send you looking for us in the first place!’ exclaimed Reve. ‘Cos that man over there told her to, tha’s why!’ They didn’t answer. ‘Your Fay just his runaround.’
‘Fay different to what you sayin,’ said the boy defensively. ‘An’ why Fay so sweet on you an’ the girl?
You real slow, nothin like me an’ Baz. An’ we been with her a long time, yeah. Long time. Almos’ family. That right, Baz?’
Something warm and wet slapped the top of Reve’s forehead. Rainwater trickled into his eye. He blinked.
Baz didn’t answer and Reve wasn’t listening, not really, but the word ‘family’ jostled him. ‘A’right,’ he said bitterly, ‘I tell you what you do. You go tell her that if she help us this time, she won’t see us never again.’
The rain was slow and lazy, slapping the dusty ground here and then there, like it was testing where it should fall. Demi stared at him for a moment, then he and Baz ran off back into the Barrio.
The blue lights of the Slow Bar flickered at him from the far side of the square.
Cars passed and then he darted across the road and into the wide open space of Agua, jogging down the length of the square, the rain falling around him, running down his neck. He didn’t even feel it.
He just kept thinking. How do you walk into the middle of a web and not get caught?
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
A minute or so later Reve was crossing the road on the far side of the square, skipping round behind a tram and then stepping up on to the wide pavement. The market at the corner was closing, the thickening rain hastening the traders to pack away the remains of their vegetables and the few stallholders selling cheap clothes were bundling jeans and shirts in plastic and then tossing them into the back of vans. The pavement was almost empty, just a man standing in the doorway of the Slow Bar, and opposite, parked on its own, a police car.
What did Moro want Mi for? Because she was pretty? She didn’t look so special, not after a night in the city . . . What was his plan? A man like that always had a plan. He was clever, like Theon.
The man at the door of the bar was small, whip-thin, his head tilted forward, arms folded, an S-shaped shadow man. Reve straightened his shoulders and walked up to him. ‘I got business with Señor Moro.’
‘That so?’ The man lifted his head: a thin, weathered, familiar face, a heavy black moustache . . . It was LoJo’s father!
‘Pelo!’ Reve couldn’t believe it. ‘What you doin?’
‘Working for the man,’ Pelo said drily, ‘That what it look like to me.’
Reve shook his head. The last he’d seen of Pelo was in that boat, the spreading white V of his wake into the darkness, his family left standing on the pier. And then Calde giving his name to the police . . . Reve suddenly registered the police car parked right there. ‘Pelo, don’ you know police lookin for you? Theon said . . .’
‘S’all right. Theon got me word. Told me keep low.’ He grunted. ‘Never been lower ’n this place.’
‘But that car!’
Pelo pulled at the end of his moustache. ‘No,’ he said, that same dry tone in his voice, ‘I’m safe enough.’
‘But you goin back? You heard what happen?’
‘When this man let me drive his boat –’ he tilted his head towards the closed door – ‘he done me favour,’ he said. ‘Now I owe him. That’s what he say . . . and he got a long reach.’
Yes, thought Reve bitterly, he had – reached right out of the bar and snatched up Mi, easy enough.
As if reading his mind Pelo said, ‘I seen your sister gone in not ten minutes ago. You hopin’ to get her?’ Reve nodded. ‘There wasn’t anything I could do. You understan’? I just hold the door here.’
The rain had started to hiss against the pavement. Reve stepped closer into the doorway. ‘Tha’s my plan.’ It wasn’t a plan at all. Just one of those things you have to do.
A hint of a smile crossed Pelo’s face. ‘Jus’ like that? I hear you took on Calde’s men in the cantina – you an’ the Boxer.’
‘How you hear ’bout that?’
‘Word always get back to Señor Moro. You know what I mean? An’ you done favour to my family.’ He shook his head. ‘You something, eh.’
Reve didn’t feel he was something.
‘You gonna do the same thing here?’ he said still in that same dry way he had.
Reve shrugged. The business in the cantina had been different. ‘Someone pull a knife on Tomas.’
‘I know. Someone always pull a knife. You got to have someone watch your back, Reve, that’s what you got to do.’ He pushed open the door.
For a moment Reve thought that maybe Pelo would come in with him, stand at his shoulder.
But the door swung behind him and he was on his own.
‘Well. Well. Well. The bull boy from the sea. What did I say, Captain? Everyone come to Moro’s bar. Everything happen here.’ Moro laughed, a rich oily sound from deep in his chest.
It took Reve a couple of seconds to adjust to the bluish gloom of the long room. There was no sign of Mi.
The shirtsleeved barman with the long face was on his left, drying glasses. The counter was gleaming, and bare apart from a tray of tall thin glasses, a jug of iced water and a bottle of red wine. Down the room two tables had been pushed together and covered with a white cloth. Moro was at the head of the table, a big bowl of pasta in front of him from which he was scooping out vast helpings for his guests. Zavvy was on his left and beside him was the shark who’d snatched Mi. Sitting with his back to Reve was a broad-shouldered man in the full rig of a police commander, silvery tabs on his shoulder. A policeman sitting down with the spider. Same all over.
Reve didn’t care if they wrapped their arms around each other; they could eat and drink and tear up the city as much as they wanted. It was Mi he was looking for.
The policeman twisted round to look at Reve. ‘Since when you interested in street rats, Moro?’ he said dismissively, turning back again, accepting the bowl that had been passed to him and immediately spooning the pasta round his fork and funneling it up to his mouth.
‘You don’t know this one? You surprise me, Captain. You who have the whole city under your thumb.’
‘Where is she, señor?’ said Reve.
The señor smiled. ‘She? She’s all right.’ He lifted his hand. ‘You wait, eh. I done you favour. You’ll see.’
A wind must have picked up because the rain was now slapping against the window. Reve was aware of the door behind him opening. ‘Just till the rain finish,’ said Pelo. ‘Is that a’right, señor?’
‘Sure,’ said Moro expansively.
Reve wondered whether Baz and Demi had really gone and told Fay what had happened. If they had, wouldn’t they all just take shelter from this rainstorm? Keep their heads down?
‘See, Captain,’ continued Moro, clearly enjoying himself, ‘it is my job here to please. This boy looking for his sister . . . who I’m giving a little shelter to. An’ you looking for promotion, maybe governor of the city. That could be your future, Captain. I can help you with that too.’ The señor was spinning another web, this time to snag the Captain. But how could Mi have anything to do with that? Just a girl from the country . . . Maybe he wanted to make her a thief. Was that it? Well, she wouldn’t do it, wouldn’t do it for him, this big man with all his power, so much power he made Calde look like a rooting pig.
The Captain laughed and raised his glass. ‘You can fix all that, eh, Moro? If you do that for me, I think we can do business.’
Reve shifted uneasily. What if it was something worse than being a thief? He felt the skin tighten round his eyes and his heart banged in his chest. He forced himself to breathe, like Tomas had told him. Did they think they could keep him standing there forever, make him be a donothing. He needed something to wake them up.
He glanced over at the barman, who was leaning over the counter, talking quietly to Pelo. He saw the water jug, and the bottle of red wine. Pelo was listening to the barman, but his eyes were on Reve.
Outside a tram rattled past and there was a loud blast on a car horn. ‘Sounds like my driver getting impatient,’ laughed the Captain again. ‘He going to find himself on the late shift if he’s not careful.’
Reve made up his mind. He twisted back and snatched up the bottle of wine from the counter, spun it so that he was holding it by the neck and, just like he had seen the cantina men do, he smacked it hard down on the edge of the counter, shattering the base, red wine splattering his arm, dripping down his jeans and pooling on the floor. He was left gripping the neck, pointing the splintery glass mouth at Moro’s face.
That got their attention.
The shark was on his feet, a stubby gun in his hand, but Moro had a restraining hand on his arm; behind him Reve sensed that the barman was ready to move too. He took a step forward and away from the counter just to put himself out of reach. He couldn’t afford to turn his head to see for real; he only had eyes for Moro. This was it, he was in deep water now.
‘What you think, boy?’ said Moro. ‘You goin to do something with that bottle or just stain my floor?’
‘You got my sister. I want you bring her out here now. We done nothing ’gainst you . . .’
Moro put up his hand. ‘Wait,’ he said. ‘You better learn some patience, bull boy. I got a thing to play out here, and some thing take time. You,’ he said to Pelo, ‘fetch the girl. You want to see her, see she all right, you go with him,’ he said to Reve. ‘And you,’ he said to the barman, ‘you clear up the floor. My pasta’s cold.’
The men at the table laughed and settled back into their places, the shark, Secondo, slipping the gun back into his shoulder holster, and taking his jacket off and hanging it on the back of his chair.
Reve felt a hand on his elbow. ‘You give me that. You made your mark,’ said Pelo quietly. Reve let him take the jagged remains of the bottle and then Pelo ushered Reve down the room towards the door at the back. It was the door that Reve had been through before when Moro had taken them up to the roof and shown them the city, his city.
As they were passing the table Moro beckoned Reve. ‘Here.’
Reve stepped over to him. Moro smiled and patted his cheek. ‘Frighten of nothing, this one.’ Then, in a move that was so quick Reve had no time to react, Moro had gripped the back of his neck in his right hand, yanked him forward and had his face pressed up against the blade of a small knife he had in his left. Reve could feel the steel against his cheek and could just see the tip up by his eye. He stiffened. Held his breath.
‘You think you can manage with one eye? Slow you down a little, maybe make you think a little, eh. That might be a good thing. What do you say?’
Reve reckoned it was better to say nothing.
He felt the blade prick the skin on the underside of his eye; he could smell the garlic on Moro’s breath; all he could see were the shiny black hairs on the back of Moro’s hands.
‘You want me to take him through, señor?’ Pelo sounded as if he couldn’t have cared less whether or not Reve was sliced up like a salami, but it seemed to distract Moro. He gave a humph and then with a flick of his wrist he nicked a line down the side of Reve’s face. He smiled and patted Reve’s cheek again, but the other side from where he had cut him, and sat back in his chair and Reve straightened up. His face stung a little and he felt something warm running down to his chin. He hoped it wasn’t tears. He couldn’t be weak, not in front of these men. A little cut was nothing.
‘Good. No sound. I like that. Are you not impressed with this boy, Captain? Does he not even seem familiar to you? Not at all, no?’
‘Should he?’
‘Oh yes . . .’
Pelo nudged him through the door and then, instead of going upstairs, he turned left down a corridor which had two doors on the left-hand side. Reve pressed his forearm against his cheek; it came away smeared with red. ‘You were lucky,’ murmured Pelo, unlocking the door and swinging it open.
He didn’t feel lucky. But if he had had to pay an eye to get to Mi, then that’s what he would have paid.
It was an ugly room with a scabby tiled floor, a sink, a barred and rain-streaked window that looked out on to a closed-in yard with tall metal gates. No way out there, then. Just inside the door was an iron-framed single bed with a thin stained mattress and no bedding. A bare bulb hung from a wire in the middle of the ceiling, casting a sickly orange light over everything. Standing in front of a long mirror over on the far side of the room were two young women.
Even though he was expecting to see Mi, for a split second Reve didn’t recognize her. She was standing in front of the mirror wearing a green, backless dress, like dancers on one of those TV shows might wear. The other young woman Reve had certainly never seen. She was wearing skinny jeans and had pins tucked into her mouth. She was twisting Mi’s wild red hair into a knot at the back of her head.
‘Mi?’
Mi stood unmoving, a statue.
The girl took the pins from her mouth. ‘A’right,’ she said. ‘You look more pretty now than when they drag you in. Who this visiting?’
‘Her brother,’ said Pelo.
The girl raised her eyebrows, glanced at Pelo and then slipped out of the room.
Mi turned round. She didn’t look like like Mi, not the Mi of twenty minutes ago. No. Almost took his breath away, seeing her look so different.
‘Knew you’d come and get me,’ she said. ‘The man said that to me, but I knew it anyhow . . . What happen to your face?’ Her own was a mask under the make-up the girl had put on her; her voice was brittle, just under control.
‘I’m a’right . . . They hurt you?’
&nb
sp; ‘Done nothing ’cept put me in a dress, pat powder on my face. He say he want to show me someone. I look like a street woman, eh?’ Her words started to speed up. Sentences tumbling together. ‘They made me drink something, Reve, and it’s fuzzing up my mind . . . This the hole, Reve. This the sinkhole goin take me down to the place where bad spirit come . . . You got cut on your face . . .’
‘Shh.’ He took her hand. She fell silent, her breath coming in little sips. He gently guided her to the bed and made her sit and then looked at Pelo. ‘What did they give her?’ he said angrily.
Pelo grimaced. ‘Just saw her bundled in, but I reckon they just give her something to quiet her down . . .’
‘Quiet her down and then pretty her up for the Captain. That man,’ he said to Pelo, ‘he the one they call Captain Dolucca?’
Pelo nodded.
There was such a sour taste of bile in his mouth, Reve almost gagged. Moro was going to sell her to that man, the man who’d run with their mother!
‘Is there a way out the back, Pelo?’
‘No. Place like a fort, Reve. Those gates locked up all the time . . .’
The door behind him pushed open and the barman appeared. ‘Señor says bring them in.’ Then he saw Mi. ‘Phoof! Maria work a miracle or something. Maybe I get her paint me up, give me looks.’
‘Need more than a miracle to do that for you, Bo,’ said Pelo, pushing him back out of the doorway. ‘Don’t need you back here. We’re coming. ‘
‘All right, fisherman. They come from your village, eh? Don’t get cosy – that what the señor tell me to say. Don’t get cosy.’
He went back down the corridor. Pelo looked at Reve, his thin, weathered face thoughtful, like he was weighing a catch, seeing what it would bring, whether it would pay off Calde and leave a few dollars over for his family. ‘Bring her in, Reve,’ he said, and then very quietly murmured, ‘If any chance happen, you make a break, all right. I won’t stop you. That’s maybe all I can do, but if I’m standing at that door, you got a way clear out to the street.’
‘And then what?’