Grayson's Knife

by Russell H Aborn

  “Hey, Grayson,” Carl says. He stops mowing. “How’s Don?”

  Grayson got out of the car. “Hi Carl. I haven’t seen him yet.”

  Grayson looks up at the house and sees the concerned mien of Millie Winslow in the first-floor window. The front door opens and she trundles out and stands on the porch.

  “Is he okay?” she says.

  “I’m….What’s going on? Did something happen?”

  “Oh,” Carl says. “You don’t know? Don got shot last night, right here. That’s his blood right over there.” He points just up the sidewalk to a brown stain the size of a Volkswagen. “He was alive but unconscious when the ambulance took him away. To the Carney.”

  Grayson is speechless for a brief time.

  “Who shot him? Did anyone see?”

  “No. Like I said, he was out cold.”

  “Carl, come inside, I made French toast,” Millie says.

  “I’ll be right in,” Carl says.

  She says, “Hurry up. The kids are at the table already. Yours will be gone.”

  “Millie, I’ll be right in, I said.”

  Millie waddles into the house.

  Carl says, “She’s worried you’re going to tell me something I already know.”

  Grayson jumps in his car. He thought it was quicker to go the Carney than to start calling a bunch of people who weren’t home because they were at the Carney.

  He asks for the room number at Information and runs up the stairs and down to Donny’s room.

  He pulls the privacy curtain open. His cousin is sitting up, sipping soup and listening to the radio news. His right arm is in a cast that runs from his wrist to his shoulder.

  “Fuck happened?” Grayson asks.

  “I got shot. Right outside my place.”

  “You’re by yourself here?”

  “My mother and your sisters just left. My mother has been here since I was brought in.”

  “Was it the bikers?”

  Donny shook his head. “No. Uh, uh.”

  “Who was it?”

  “I’d prefer to keep it under wraps. For personal privacy reasons.”

  “Who was it?’

  Donny makes a face. “Sandra. Okay. Sandra. I told the cops I didn’t know who did it, so don’t say anything.”

  “Sandra? Who’s Sandra?”

  “You don’t know her.”

  “Where were you hit?”

  “She was aiming at my business, but I turned around and tried to run. I grabbed the fence, and I was trying to hop over it. She fired and hit me in the side of my thigh and I fell on the sidewalk and shattered my elbow. She came over with the gun, and I thought, oh, oh. Curtains. But she saw how much I was bleeding, started crying, really bad, and just said, sorry, and ran away to call an ambulance. I think the poor thing feels awful. She knows she messed up.”

  Grayson falls into a chair by the bed.

  “Cripes,” he says. “Who is she? You never mentioned her.”

  “It’s kind of awkward. She’s an older lady. She’s 44. People won’t know what to make of that. She wants to get married.”

  “To you? What the fuck?”

  “Yeah. I think I might do it.”

  “What, you like her shooting you?”

  “I love her passion,” Donny says. “She’s got it bad for me.”

  “Hey listen, I’m going to your place and grab your guns and so forth.”

  “Yes. Good idea. Thanks,” Donny says. “That’s stuff I might get in trouble for. In case the cops decide to search, who knows what they do when a person gets shot.”

  “Well, I need it, too.”

  “Right, no, I get it. Thanks.”

  But he didn’t get it and it didn’t matter, as long as Grayson had been straight with him.

  Back at Donny’s apartment, he tries the door and it opens. He goes in, does a fast look around the place, then hustles back into the kitchen and pulls open the oven door and sees the .38 in there. He pulls it out and heads to the bedroom.

  In the bedroom closet he’s moving giant shirts from side to side looking for anything behind the shirts, on the shelf, in the corners. In the corner of the closet there is a length of round black aluminum tube with a rubber handle. On the other end of are two metal pins. Grayson looks at it, then throws it on the bed.

  The dresser drawers are full of clean socks, tee shirts and skivvies. The bottom drawer contains a paper bag which itself contains a box of rounds for a .38. He put the gun on the bed while he looks at the black tube with the electrodes at one end. He picks it up, read the logo, HotShot, and then figured out what it was.

  “Jesus! A cattle prod?”

  Grayson could only wonder what sort of sales pitch was used to induce Donny to purchase this item. He operated in zip codes that were entirely cattle-free.

  Grayson sits on the chair in the corner, and looks at the revolver. He had never carried a firearm of any kind. The first time he’d used a gun for anything was when he held the .22 to Donny’s head.

  Grayson takes the guns, the cattle prod and bag of ammunition down the stairs and almost crashes into Millie on the porch.

  She raises a section of her top lip in a sneer and looks like she is going to say something. Grayson raises a finger to his own lips in a ‘shh’ gesture.

  “Don’t speak,” he says. “Not one word.”

  CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN

  “Please God, don’t let me shoot myself in the nuts. Amen.”

  Grayson tucks the .38 into his belt, taking care to point the barrel away from the interior of his pants. He zips his jacket to cover it, grabs the cattle prod from the back seat and heads toward Gumby’s place of business. He knows that Gumby and his brother operate their late father’s printing business in the industrial area not far from Brewer’s Corner. The business’s main purpose is to act as a front for Gumby’s real business, crime of all kinds. Anyone asking for a quote on a printing job, would be shocked to get back a price like you’d see on a new Cadillac. Consequently, the presses were usually idle and the taxable revenue stream was a trickle, at most.

  On the only part of the building that faced the street is a faded sign that reads, Gummer and Sons Printing. The area where there once was a front door is bricked up. Grayson walks along the side of the building, out to the back. There are a number of parking spots and the new front door is now located beside a high, wide and closed garage door. He notes one could easily back a 48’ trailer in there and close the garage door. The unlocked front door inserts you into a lobby so small there is only room for an old vinyl armchair, one person and a door to somewhere else. There is a doorbell beside the door to somewhere else, and above it, written with shaky hand and a black marker, a sign reads, No solicitations! Ever! The only other thing in the lobby is an 8x10 publicity picture of Shemp Howard tacked to the wall, above which, also written in a shaky hand is, Our Founder, Franz (Gummy) Gummer 1890-1967.

  Grayson reaches toward the bell when the door flies open and he is grabbed at the neck of his zipped jacket and yanked into the somewhere else. He’s sprawled on his stomach and when he turns over he’s looking at the scary end of a sawed-off shotgun, wielded by homeliest guy he’s ever seen.

  “Can I help you?” the guy says. His voice is muffled by the rubber Halloween mask he’s wearing.

  “Hi. I’m looking for Gumby. Is he in today?”

  “I’ll have to check. Whom shall I say is calling?”

  “Mike Grayson, Hugh’s brother.”

  “What’s this in reference to?”

  “My cousin Donny bought this cattle prod here and I wanted to see if I could return it.”

  From behind, he hears, “What? You think I’m Sears Roebucks Junior?”

  Grayson allows a small chuckle, unsure if this other guy is attempting humor.

  Grayson assumes this is Gumby himself standing above and behind him, looking down at his face.

  “Get up from the floor, come on,” Gumby says. “It’s making me dizzy, looking
at your upside-down face.”

  Grayson gets to his feet, still hanging onto the cattle prod. Before him stands Gumby, legendary, but largely unseen. He is tall and lean, and has a high forehead and a long jaw, with a fearsome unibrow bisecting it all. He’s wearing a pair of striped bell bottom pants that end high above his ankles and a long-sleeved thermal undershirt.

  “Are you Hugh’s brother?”

  “Exactly.”

  He’s standing with Gumby to his left and the masked man to his right. He grips the HotShot at the top, and holds it out to Gumby.

  “I’m not taking it back,” Gumby says. “I don’t care what you do with it. How did you get it, anyhow? I sold it to Big Donny What’s-his-name, that big lunatic from up Norfolk Downs.”

  “He’s my cousin. He’s worried the cops are going to search his apartment. He told me to get rid of it. I thought maybe I could give it back, rather than throw it out on the street where kids might find it. Start shocking the shit out of each other.”

  “Sounds like good, clean fun to me,” Gumby says. “If you don’t want it, throw it in the ocean.”

  “Won’t it shock the fish?” the masked man asks.

  Gumby ignores his henchman. “You’re really here looking for your degenerate gambler brother Hugh. Am I right? I’m right aren’t I? Come on admit it.”

  “No. Why? Is he here? He’s not here,” Grayson says. “He’s too smart to get caught.”

  “He’s right down in the room in back, asshole,” the masked henchman says, gesturing with the shotgun up toward the street side of the building. That’s when Grayson, backhand, whips the prod around and clouts him on the side of the head with the metal shaft. The guy lands so hard he drops the shotgun and it skitters away.

  “Oh, no!” Gumby shouts and starts going for the sawed off. He’s bent over, scrambling, and is almost to it, when Grayson presses the tip of the cattle prod into Gumby’s kidney area. Gumby falls over onto his back and screams, “Ow, mother---” and Grayson gives him another, longer jolt, just below his chest.

  “Stay down,” Grayson says. He gives Gumby another jolt for good luck.

  “Ach, ach,” Gumby says, as his eyes flutter. He’s panting up a storm. “I can’t get my breath,” he says, between the gasps. “I can’t catch my breath.” He’s in obvious distress and Grayson kneels beside him and gets him to a seated position.

  “What can I do?” Grayson says.

  “Call an ambulance, you stupid fuck,” Gumby says between gasps. “I have cardiac issues, all my life. Since I’m a boy.” In between shallow, rapid breaths, he continues, “When I get back on my feet, I’m going to fucking kill you, and your brother.” Then, seeing the tactical flaws in his announcement, he gasps, “I’m just kidding.”

  Grayson thinks about it. It takes him less than half a minute to decide he has to call an ambulance, then another 15 seconds to conclude he must be an idiot. Meanwhile, Gumby’s panting has grown irregular and he starts to fall backward from his seated position. Grayson grabs him, and puts an arm behind Gumby’s back to stop his fall.

  Gumby says, “Shit.” His eyes roll back and he relaxes totally, then begins to shake and then really relaxes and stops shaking. It seems that Gumby is dead.

  Meanwhile, a key is inserted into the lock on the lobby door, and Gumby’s ghost enters. He came back, quickly, having only changed his clothes. Grayson’s blood is chilled until he realizes it’s got to be Gumby’s brother, and that they’re twins. Gumby Two halts in his tracks when he sees his brother lying in another man’s arms.

  Two says, “What the fuck? What are you guys doing?”

  “It’s your brother. I think he had a heart attack. I think he’s dead.”

  Two grabs Gumby from Grayson and shakes him like a rag doll. “Willard! Wake up! Willard!”

  Grayson says, “I’ll call an ambulance. Where’s there a phone?”

  “What happened here. Why is Jean Claude wearing a mask? And lying on the floor with blood coming out of his ear?”

  “Let me call an ambulance first.”

  “Yes. The office down front, there’s a phone in there.”

  Grayson runs to the front, and finds the door marked office. He finds the phone and dials zero then hangs up when he remembers you’re supposed to call 9-1-1 now. After the call, he tries to open a few doors which are locked, then he comes across a door marked Break Room, which is open. Inside, Hugh is strapped to a straight-backed kitchen chair with a gag in his mouth.

  Grayson strips the gag out, and undoes the strapping. Hugh tries to stand but falls back. His face is badly bruised and one eye is closed up from the swelling. His lips are swollen to about four times their regular size.

  “There’s at least two of them here now,” Hugh says. Grayson has to recast the sounds in his mind before he figures out what’s being said. “Gumby and Jean Claude.”

  “Gumby’s dead. Jean Claude may be, too.”

  “We’re in for it now,” Hugh says.

  “Maybe not. I’ve got a story to tell Gumby’s brother, whatever his name is. I didn’t know they were twins.”

  “Gumbo.”

  “Figures. Look, don’t talk anymore, it must hurt, and you sound so funny, I’m afraid I’m going to laugh.”

  Hugh says, “Asshole.”

  “We’re not going to escape, per se, I want him to let us go.”

  “How?”

  “I’m going to tell Gumbo I rang the bell, Gumby opened the door and let me in, then this guy appeared out of nowhere, with a mask and a shotgun. He levelled the gun on Gumby, who collapsed in a heap, when the masked guy took aim at Gumby, I took the opportunity to brain him with the cattle prod. Now, if the guy wakes up, and has amnesia, we’re golden. If not, I hope I can come up with a Plan B. But this should get us out of here, anyway. So, stay in here for now.”

  Grayson runs back to Gumbo and tells him the ambulance is on the way. Gumbo asks for help carrying his dead twin out to the parking lot.

  Gumbo says, “I don’t want the cops and ambulance guys looking around inside the building. We got stuff that’s none of their business.”

  “Should we carry the other guy out, too.”

  “No, that turncoat bastard. That low IQ swine. I’ll get rid of him.” He pauses and looks pained. “I was going to say I’ll have my brother take care of him.”

  Grayson worries Gumbo is going to cry and then get mad at Grayson for seeing it.

  Grayson goes back inside to confirm the existential status of Jean Claude. He lifts the mask a little to see Jean Claude’s blank eyes. He listens for breathing and hears none. He looks at the side of his head where Grayson had whipped him with the length of the prod. He’d hit him just above his ear, and Grayson wonders if he’d hit and snapped a major blood vessel of some kind. He stands up and says aloud, “Jean Claude est morte.”

  Grayson almost falls to pieces when he realizes he’s killed three men in just the last week or so. It’s no consolation that they were all bad news, and in all cases their deaths were accidental. He came on this job to keep Donny and Hugh, his family, plus Charlie, from screwing things up. Now look. Four men are dead, when Hawthorne is included.

  He says a Hail Mary for Jean Claude and Gumby, then adds himself onto the list. As he goes back up front to check on Hugh, he looks around at the hundreds of pallets of razor blades, power tools, French wine and premium grass seed that the Gummer brothers had acquired. No wonder Gumbo didn’t want anyone in here looking around.

  After discussing things with Gumbo, and twisting everything around to fit his story, Gumbo tells him that he and Hugh are free to go. But, Gumbo warns, he’s going to need the loan repaid.

  “It’s a way for me to honor my brother,” Gumbo says. “We can work out terms.”

  “How about a hundred a month? That work?”

  “How much does he owe?”

  “Three thousand? I think that’s what he said.”

  “Okay. In any event, get your brother out of here, before I change m
y mind. I was told we were essentially storing him for those bikers. By the way, they roughed your guy up pretty good before they brought him. I’d take him straight to the hospital if I were you.”

  “Will do. Thanks.”

  “This business is just nasty, loan sharking, fencing hot goods, beat ups, hit manning, I never liked any of it. It’s ugly. We don’t need to do it. We have a first-rate print shop, and all the tools to make money right here, right now.”

  “All the best to you, man. I’ll be rooting for you.”

  “I never wanted to be in this dirty business, anyway,” Gumbo says. “I was just trying to protect my brother from himself. Now, I’ve got to tend to getting my brother buried, and that damned Jean Claude, too, although he’ll be getting buried at sea. Then, I will immediately get to work to extract myself from this slimy operation, selling the hot goods and so on. Who needs it? I can make good money in the printing business.”

  “Oh, I bet,” Grayson says.

  “And, it’s great fun, printing counterfeit money!”

  CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT

  Hugh looks terrible and sounds worse. He’s down his T-shirt and boxers and is covered in ugly bruises everywhere that can be seen. He’s moaning in the front seat of the car, and every time they hit the slightest bump in the road, he moans a little softer.

  “Hang in,” Grayson says. “We’re almost there.”

  “She asked if I wanted to go get a coffee with her, we could talk about what had to be done.”

  “Save your strength.”

  “Instead she drove behind the Mr. Donut, where they were waiting. They yanked me out and beat the piss out of me. I was in and out a bunch of times and had no idea where I was, what day it was or the time. Then they said Stan was dead and they were dumping me at Gumby’s. Which meant I was dead.”

  “Yeah, but now, you’ll be fine, and Gumby’s dead.”

  “Did Gumbo say anything about collecting the debt?”

  “Yes. He wants a hundred a month in an installment plan. I told him you owe three grand.”

  “How did you know?”

  “Donny told me Gumby wouldn’t lend more than three grand to the Queen of England.”