by Tim Dorsey
They stared.
“We have them right where we want them!”
Doug and Rusty dove for the door handles, but Serge hit the child safety locks.
“They’re overconfident! So now we attack them!”
Rusty and Doug jiggled the handles some more, then started banging on the windows with their fists.
“It’s time for the big strike,” said Serge. “We’re going to assassinate the godfather, Mr. Palermo. That’s where we’re headed right now. I know you’re not that familiar with guns, but I’m going to need you to cover me and lay down suppression fire.” They pulled up to a red light. “Do you think you can handle that?” Serge turned around and saw Rusty and Doug’s feet as they climbed out the sunroof and scrambled down the trunk of the car. “What got into them?”
Serge watched in the driver’s-side mirror. Rusty and Doug ran up the middle of the street, waving frantically at a police cruiser.
Serge took a quick left, turning around in a pet-grooming drive-through. Rusty and Doug were getting in the police car. Serge followed the cruiser back to a satellite precinct house and parked a block short of the station, watching the gate where the patrol cars went in and out of the fenced lot.
“This is when they’ll be in the most danger,” Serge told Lenny. “Wherever they take them next, they’ll be coming through that gate. We can’t miss ’em.”
“Won’t they get suspicious of us sitting here?”
“Chauffeurs are always waiting in limos. This is the perfect vehicle for a stakeout.”
“You think of everything.”
They waited. Pot smoke filled the car. Serge showed Lenny his collection of antique Florida View-Master reels. Lenny hit the lever, and a ’58 Edsel crossed the old Sunshine Skyway.
“The best is when you can actually go to the place where they took the View-Master stereographs,” said Serge. “I’ve got this one vintage reel from the 1940s down in the Keys. Priceless shots of the Bahia Honda Bridge and Sloppy Joe’s. I like to stand on the same spot as the photographer and put the left eyehole of the View-Master over my right eye, so I can overlay the images. One eye is looking at the current scene, the other the way it appeared a half century ago. I go back and forth, blinking one eye and then the other, pretending I’m a time traveler. Hours of endless fun!”
Lenny hit the lever on viewer. A 1950s model in a madras swimsuit plucked an orange off a tree in a grove. “Why do you love Florida so much?”
“Because I need nonstop stimulus. Living here is like being in a permanent studio audience for Cops.”
Lenny hit the lever again. Mermaids. “Everyone thinks we’re dumb. Flori-duh.”
“And that’s exactly what we want them to think. Then they come here on vacation all superior and off guard, and we pick them clean in a Miami minute…. Hold on. Something’s happening.”
A squad car with two people in the back rolled out the gate and turned south. Serge started up the limo and pulled into traffic.
The cruiser made a straight shot down Biscayne, then turned left on Northeast Fifth.
“They’re heading for the port,” said Serge.
“I didn’t know they had a police station out there,” said Lenny.
“They don’t.”
The limo shadowed the cruiser down South American Way, over the bridge, onto the island with the big ships. They crossed train tracks, passing stacks of giant cargo containers stretching football fields. Pavement changed: concrete, tar, gravel, slab, sand. They reached the isolated back part of the port, no work going on, metal containers getting rustier, a long line of huge, idle cranes.
“Look at the size of those things,” said Serge. “From time to time, I see giant cranes in a variety of settings, and I always wonder: Who makes them? And where? How much do they cost? How hard are they to operate?”
“I used to run a forklift at Home Depot,” said Lenny. “I could barely stay in control of those things.”
“Because you were high?”
“I thought that would help my concentration. But the things are constantly making this beeping sound that gets on your nerves, so I turned the beeper off. Then they fired me. I got the prongs hung up on the top shelf one afternoon and dumped a pallet of those mosquito-repellent tiki torches on a Girl Scout troop. I’m just lucky I was in a protective cage. That is not a safe place to work.”
“Don’t they drug-test?”
“Sure, but I tricked them with one of those secret rubber bladders of someone else’s urine taped to my stomach and a little tube running down under my—”
Serge raised a hand. “Hold that touching thought. We’re getting close.”
They reached the end of the island, driving slowly along the seawall. Serge made a right around another cargo crane and saw the police car pull inside a warehouse. Two men slid the large metal doors closed behind it.
“I know this place,” said Serge. “It’s a major smuggling dock. Mr. Palermo’s a partner.”
“This doesn’t look good.”
“Unless I’m mistaken, Doug and Rusty will be dead in a few minutes. Here’s the plan….”
TWO INDUSTRIAL LAMPS hung from girders inside the damp warehouse, making two bright circles on the greasy cement floor. In one circle, the police car, doors open, Doug and Rusty standing outside with two cops. In the other, three Cadillacs, a dozen broad-shouldered men in black turtlenecks positioned by the fenders, cradling submachine guns. In front of them, a wheelchair holding an old man in a flat golf cap with a plaid blanket over his legs.
The old man made a slight motion with his right hand, like an expensive auction bid. “Pay the police officers.”
One of the turtlenecks nodded and pulled two brown envelopes from his jacket.
They began hearing a noise. The crew tried to place it. An engine sound, like a stock car overrevving, the tachometer pegged, getting louder, then a screech of tires. They turned toward the sliding metal doors at the front of the warehouse. The pair of men guarding the entrance peeked through a slit, then dove in opposite directions as the steel panels buckled and broke away, flying up over the hood of a limousine, which spun out and stopped in the middle of the floor.
Serge jumped from the driver’s seat and smiled. “Am I late? Did you start? Could you please repeat anything you might have already said, because I don’t want to miss anything good.”
Serge turned and winked at Doug and Rusty, who became faint and fell back against the side of the police car.
The Palermo lieutenants stepped forward and cocked their weapons.
“No,” said the old man, holding out a hand. “Not yet.”
Mr. Palermo thoughtfully appraised Serge, standing there grinning, bopping jauntily on the balls of his feet. The old man raised his chin and spoke in an understated voice. “What are you doing here?”
“Just gettin’ my swerve on,” said Serge.
“You’ve come to the wrong place.” Mr. Palermo began to signal his lieutenants.
“I’m here to deliver a message,” said Serge.
Mr. Palermo folded his hands in his lap. “What is this message?”
“Luca Brasi sleeps with the fishes.”
The lieutenants looked at each other.
“I didn’t know until this day it was Barzini all along.”
One of the turtlenecks leaned down to the old man. “What’s he talking about?”
“He’s doing The Godfather,” said Mr. Palermo. “He’s mocking us.”
“Mr. Corleone is a man who insists on hearing bad news immediately.”
The lieutenant stood back up and ran the slide on his Mach 10. “Mr. Palermo, let me shoot this cocksucker!”
“Cocksucker?” said Serge. “Oh, so you’re homophobic?”
“What?”
“You realize that gay-bashing is the IQ demarcation line of the subzero intellect?”
“Shut up! It’s just a figure of speech!”
“How long have you been a bigot? What do you have against gay
s anyway?”
“Nothing!”
“Are you a moron? Do you have some kind of problem with cocksucking?”
“No!”
Serge pointed dramatically. “He sucks cock! He sucks cock! You heard him!”
The other lieutenants turned their guns toward the first.
“That’s not what I meant! Guys! He’s putting words in my mouth!”
“Along with, say, cocks!” added Serge.
The other lieutenants surrounded the first.
“Enough of this foolishness!” said Mr. Palermo. He grabbed a cane off the armrest of his wheelchair and slowly stood.
Serge fell to his knees and clasped his hands together. “He can walk! Praise Jesus!”
“You talk too much,” said Mr. Palermo. “You have no respect. The only reason you’re still alive is you may have some information I need.” He aimed at Serge with his cane. “Where are the stones?”
“The Stones? I think they’re playing Philly tonight. And I must say Jagger is still moving quite well for his age.”
“You tire me. You’re wearing out my pacemaker.” Mr. Palermo sat back down in his chair and made another small gesture. One of the lieutenants wheeled him toward the newest Cadillac.
“What do you want us to do with him?” asked one of the turtlenecks.
“Wait until I leave the building.”
The crew watched the Cadillac drive out through the bright square of sunlight where the metal doors had been. They turned back and raised their weapons.
Serge muttered under his grin, “C’mon, Lenny. What’s taking you so long?”
“Any last words, smart guy?”
“Hold it!” yelled Serge. “Stop! Wait!”
“What is it?”
“I’m still thinking….”
They took aim.
“Okay! I got it!” Serge cleared his throat and began singing, only slightly off-key. “…I’ll repeat myself, at the risk of being crude, there must be sixty-four ways to die in Miami…. There must be sixty-four ways to die in Miami….”
The goons’ eyebrows angled in confusion.
Serge snapped his fingers and began a little soft-shoe routine. “…Another shark attack, Jack; bad robbery plan, Stan; you’re a DEA decoy, Roy, and now your soul’s free. Fall off a bus, Gus, you don’t need to be dragged much; just snort a whole key, Lee, and it’s curtains for thee….”
The goons looked back and forth.
“…Mob double cross, Ross; potent designer drug, Doug; innocent bystander, Flander, just listen to me. Agree to testify, Sly; botch a bank job, Bob; Tainted seafood, Jude…”
The crew raised their guns again.
“…Sudden sea squall, Paul; leaky gas heater, Peter; watch out for that machete, Eddy!…”
A tremendous crash. The goons didn’t have time to look up as a semi container of chopped car parts smashed through the metal roof.
It missed everything.
“Nice aim, Lenny. Shit.” Serge dove for the limo, dodging gunfire. Bullets raked the side of the stretch as he swung around and T-boned the police car.
Another long burst from the machine guns. The cruiser’s headlights exploded. Rusty was standing between them and stared down incredulously at the line of red bullet holes across his chest. He was dead before he hit the concrete. Doug screamed. Serge yanked him into the limo and punched the gas for the exit. The hoods ran for their own cars.
Lenny jumped down from the controls of the cargo crane and ran for the warehouse entrance. Serge slammed the brakes as the limo broke into the light, and Lenny dove in with the limo still rolling. The Cadillacs were right behind.
“What took so long?” asked Serge. “You said you knew how to run those things.”
“I thought it would be like the forklifts at Home Depot, but the controls were way, way more complex. Finally, I thought, Just do what you did that time you dropped all that stuff.”
Serge made a hard left, throwing up a cloud of dust. He checked the rearview. Two Cadillacs emerged side by side from the cloud, guys hanging out windows shooting guns as they all raced along the seawall, the bright Miami skyline across the water in the distance.
“Lenny, take the wheel.” Serge hung out his own window, returning fire.
It was a bumpy road. Nobody was hitting anything.
“Lenny, stop the car!”
“What?”
“Stop the car!”
Lenny reached for the brake with his left foot and skidded to a halt. Serge braced his shooting arm on the roof. The Cadillacs were almost on top of them, ready to plow right through the limo’s trunk. Bullets from the goons whizzed by Serge’s head.
“Remember Jaws?” Serge shouted to Lenny.
“Who doesn’t?”
Serge gritted his teeth and began squeezing the trigger. “Smile, you son of a—!”
Ka-boom.
Tire pieces went flying. The two Caddies banged into each other, locking bumpers, still closing on the limo. They veered wildly, the two drivers fighting each other for control, finally swerving past the limo with inches to spare and sailing off the seawall in tandem. Two pairs of black tailfins bobbed in Biscayne Bay.
“That settles that,” said Serge, climbing back in and hitting the gas. He made another tight left around the back side of the warehouse, sending up a last big cloud as they headed home.
Lenny glanced over his shoulder. “Holy shit! Where did they come from?”
Serge looked up in the mirror. A white van came through the cloud.
“Fuckin’ Sunshine Tours,” said Serge. “Will they never learn?”
“Look out!” yelled Lenny.
Serge turned and saw a big yellow object up ahead, closing fast. “Oh, shit!”
“I must have forgot to set the parking brake,” said Lenny.
Serge swerved, barely missing the crane rolling backward down the incline next to the warehouse before plowing broadside into the van, sending it sideways into the bay like a Matchbox car.
Serge did a quick head count. “Doug, you okay? Mick, you good? City and Country, how’s the worst generation?”
“Serge, the limo’s full of bullet holes again,” said Lenny. “It’s even worse than at the airport.”
“You’re right,” said Serge. “I don’t think we can let it slide this time with ‘It’s a Miami thing.’”
They drove ten blocks and pulled up in front of Auto Parts Nation. Serge went inside and was out in three minutes with a shopping bag.
“Lenny, give me a hand.”
Ten minutes later they were finished covering the bullet holes with bullet-hole decals.
“Wow,” said Lenny. “It’s the perfect disguise.”
“They’re not marketing these things right.”
They headed back to the beach. Serge looked over his shoulder from the driver’s seat. “By the way, hope I didn’t offend anyone with that gay-baiting back at the warehouse. Sometimes you’re forced to turn small minds against one another, and homophobes are the easiest to spot.”
“Why do we need to spot them?” asked Lenny.
“Because they’re a safety hazard,” said Serge. “The frontal cortex isn’t developed. You’ll see them smoking while gassing up four-by-fours. And when they drink whiskey, it speaks to them.”
“What’s it say?”
“‘Clean your gun collection.’ They’re the people you read about in the paper who say things like, ‘Gee, the pack of Rottweilers we kept in our mobile home seemed so gentle we never thought they’d eat the children. They never did it before.’”
“I’ve heard of them,” said Lenny.
“Besides, heterosexuals are the strangest. I should know. You want freaks? Take a stroll down hetero alley. I’ve personally got a whole steamer trunk full of little Freudian peculiarities that I’d rather not have see the light of day.”
“What about putting gerbils in your ass? Ever done that?”
“Yes, but only the non-cruel, gerbil-safe, all-synthetic N’er
bils®. You know how I feel about animal rights. What a horrible way to go. What if some giant space alien landed and did that to you?”
“I’d stay perfectly still, just out of spite,” said Lenny.
“You know, I never thought of that,” said Serge, picking up his mini digital recorder. “Note to self…”
40
1964
A SMALL PLANE pulled a banner through the clear blue sky over the Atlantic. WELCOME TO MIAMI BEACH.
Another magnificent day in paradise. Eighty degrees, carefree, the mating reflex in play. The deck behind the enormous Fontainebleau Hotel crawled with tourists filling poolside loungers. Waiters circulated with trays of umbrella drinks. Women frolicked in the most daring new one-piece suits. Playboys positioned themselves for sex by doing cannonballs off the three-meter board.
Five serious men in hats and guayaberas worked their way across the patio, the only people in trousers. A splash from a cannonball hit their cuffs.
Greek Tommy heard a noise. “What’s that!”
“Just a plane and some helicopters.”
They looked up and shielded their eyes. A Cessna and banner passed overhead, followed by two copters with movie cameras on the runners.
“They started filming Goldfinger today,” said Moondog. “The new Bond flick.”
“I’m just a little jumpy,” said Tommy.
“We’re all jumpy after last night,” said Mort.
“Was that guy really dead?” asked Coltrane.
Chi-Chi inserted a fresh toothpick. “What are you, completely simple?”
Mort looked up as the plane and copters circled again. “Then Lou had to go and steal the gems off him. That probably makes us murder suspects.”
They walked past the high dive, a man doing a triple somersault into the water. Moondog got splashed again but didn’t care. “I’m more worried about whoever really killed him, not to mention whose diamonds those are. Did you see the size of those things?”
“That’s what scares me the most,” said Mort. “I think we’ve stumbled into something that’s way out of our league.”
“We just need to stay calm and wait for Lou in the bar,” said Chi-Chi. “She’ll straighten this out.”