There were five bodies lying helter-skelter in front of the theatre. Glass and debris everywhere.
Several slugs had whacked the car.
“Looks like a bomb went off in front of the place,” I said.
“It was fuckin‟ surreal, is what is it was,” Salvatore intoned.
“Who‟re the rest of these people?” I asked, pointing at the massacre.
“Coupla shooters, the driver, and another guy I‟ve seen with Stizano more often than not,” Salvatore
said.
“Pasty-faced little runt, looks like he died of malnutrition?” I asked.
“That‟s the one.”
“Name‟s Moriarity. He‟s Stizano‟s number one button.”
“Not anymore,” Salvatore said. His tone was changing, becoming almost gleeful.
The scene was as bizarre as any Fellini film.
Stizano lay on his back, staring at the underside of the marquee with a smile on his face and a cigar
still clamped between his teeth. His black suit was full of bullet holes. It looked like a rabid dog had
chewed up his chest. One of his shooters was five feet away, huddled against the box office on his
side in an almost foetal position. His Borsalino hat was knocked down over the side of his face,
somewhat rakishly. The bodyguard, whom I had pegged as a onetime Chicago hoodlum named
Manny Moriarity, a.k.a. Dead Pan Moriarity, was leaning against the side of the theatre on his knees,
his right hand under his coat, and the only expression he ever had, on his face. Two slugs in the
forehead, one under the right eye, and his chest was open for inspection. The other gunman, who
looked like a body builder, lay face down with his hands buried beneath him, clutching the family
fortune. The chauffeur had managed to get around the side of the car and had sat down, made a little
cup in his lap with his hands, and tried to stop his insides from spilling out. He hadn‟t been very
successful but it didn‟t make any difference. He was as dead as the rest of them.
As the little Italian completed his story, the Stick arrived in front of a trail of blue smoke that wound
like an eel back down the dark street and, looking at the scene of the crime, said, “They giving away
free dishes?”
“You‟re very sick,” Dutch said. “There‟re five people dead over there.”
“Bank night,” Stick said.
Salvatore repeated his story to the Stick and then pointed across the street to the park.
“Had to be from over there. And, uh, uh
“Yeah?” Dutch said.
“This is gonna sound a little crazy.”
“I‟d feel there was something wrong if it didn‟t,” Dutch said wearily.
“Okay.. . I don‟t think—judging from the way these people went down, okay—I don‟t think. . . or
what I think is, it was one gun.”
“One gun did all this?” said Dutch. “This looks like the Battle of the Bulge here.”
“I know it. But, see, uh, they went down just him, barn, boom, right in a row, like they was ducks in a
shootin‟ gallery, starting with the driver, there, swingin‟ straight across. Next it was the two gunners,
then the button—what was his name?”
“Dead Pan Moriarity,” I coached.
“Dead Pan Moriarity,” Dutch repeated, and smothered a giggle.
“Yeah, him, and finally Stizano. I mean, Dutch, it was some kind of fuckin‟ weapon. Took „em all out
in like. . . ten seconds!”
The Stick was leaning over Stizano, pointing his finger and counting to himself. He stood up, shaking
his head.
“1 make it eight slugs in Stizano, could be more. Look at him, he didn‟t know it was coming. Fucker‟s
still smoking his cigar and smiling.”
Stick giggled, a kind of uncontrollable, quirky little giggle, which got Dutch started, only he didn‟t
giggle, he laughed, and the laugh grew to a roar. Then Salvatore broke down and started in and before
I knew it, I was laughing along with the rest of them. The harder we tried to stop, the harder we
laughed. We were standing there in hysterics when the chief of police arrived.
Chief Walters was fifty pounds overweight and had bloodshot eyes, a nose full of broken blood
vessels, and a neck that was two sizes too big for his collar. He looked like a man who sweats easily.
“I must have missed something,” he said, in a fat man‟s laboured voice, heavy with bourbon. “What
the hell‟s so funny?”
“You had to be here, Herb,” said Dutch.
“Obviously you weren‟t,” Walters said. “Maybe we better talk about this in the morning.”
“We can talk about it right now,” Dutch said with more than a touch of irritation as his smile faded.
“Right now I think I‟d better join my people,” Walters said, leaning on the “my.”
Dutch defused the situation by introducing Walters to me, earning me a damp, insecure handshake.
“Dutch can obviously use all the help you can give him, right, Dutch?” he said.
“Why don‟t you go over and give the boys in homicide a pep talk,” Dutch said.
“I‟ll help you in any way I can, Khmer, just pick up the phone. I answer all my calls personally.”
“That‟s wonderful,” I said.
As he walked away he added somewhat jovially, “At least you can‟t say we‟ve got a dull town here,
right, Kilmer?”
I began to wonder if the whole damn police force had been recruited from some funny farm for old
cops.
“Well, you‟ve met the chief,” Dutch said, “now you can forget him.”
“Twelve in Stizano and this guy with the hat,” the Stick cried out, returning to his self-appointed task
of counting bullet holes in dead people.
Callahan was last to arrive, wearing a three-piece gray suit with a rose in his lapel. He got out of his
car and looked around. No comment. While we were counting bullet holes and scratching our heads,
Callahan vanished into the park and returned five minutes later with a whiskered, filthy relic wearing
the dirtiest trench coat I‟ve ever seen. You could smell his breath from across the street.
“Don‟t anybody light a match,” Salvatore said as they approached.
“Saw something,” Callahan said, explaining the bum in tow.
The drunk sniffed a few times, then wiped his nose with the back of his hand.
“D‟wanno trouble,” he mumbled.
Dutch leaned over him, his hands stuffed in his pants pockets and an unlit Camel bobbing in his
mouth. “I‟ll tell you what,” he said. “You don‟t spit it out, you‟ll have more trouble than a constipated
goose.”
The bum looked offended at first, until it dawned on him that he was, for the moment, the centre of
attraction. Suddenly he started singing like a magpie.
“1 was down in the park near the pond, see, grabbing forty on a bench, and, uh, first thing I know, see,
I hear a lotsa like clicks. Sounded like, uh, m‟teeth.” He hesitated and laughed but the laugh turned
into the worst cough I‟ve ever heard.
“Keep talkin‟, pops,” Dutch said. “You‟re doin‟ fine. Just don‟t cough up a lung before you‟re
through is all I ask,”
The bum‟s Sterno eyes glittered feebly. “What‟s in it fer me?” he demanded. Then, looking around,
he said, “Got a butt?” to everybody in earshot.
The Stick gave him a cigarette, steadying the old man‟s hand while he lit it.
“What‟s your name?” he asked.
“J. W. Guttman,” he said proudly. “My friends call me Socks.” He grinned and pointed to his feet. He
wore no shoes but his toes wiggled through holes in a pair of rancid, once-white sweat socks.
“Okay, Socks, so you were on your favourite bench down there, you heard somebody‟s teeth
clicking,” Dutch said.
“That‟s what it sounded like.” He flicked his uppers loose with his tongue and rattled them sharply