The younger cop, smiling like a Buddha now, slowly raised the bottom of his gaily printed shirt, revealing the butt of a nickel-plated.45 stuck in his waistband. "Take it off, honey," he said, then did a bump and grind.
"Ease off, Joe," I said. "They'd love to shoot us in the backs and say we were resisting arrest. Keep your face to them, and your mouth shut, and we'll be all right."
"You shut your mouth, joe," the younger said, dropping his shirt back over the pistol as if he meant it to be a dramatic gesture. "This not California. You not mess with Beni Boys now," he sneered.
While Morning was looking puzzled, I got mad again that day. "You're not too smart, are you?" I said. "That gun's in a bad place. A good fast man could break your neck while you're reaching for it. Your partner might get him. But that ain't going to put your head back on."
"Hey, man," Morning said, smiling, too, now. "Don't scare the little man; he'll blow his balls off going for that cannon."
The younger cop suddenly looked afraid, then bent into a slight crouch, but the older one said to him in Spanish, "That's enough. Go to the car, now. I will talk now." The younger one didn't look happy, but he moved. As he reached the door, I said, "Si muchacho. Tu padre lo dice get out." Tex-Mex, but he understood and started back, but the old one waved him off again.
"You speak Spanish?" he said, turning to me.
"No, man," I said.
He turned to Morning and said, "You boys shouldn't talk to him like that. He's really a nice kid. He's just got a quick temper. He really likes Americans." His English was very good, his voice quite naturally kind. "Now, if you…"
"Don't pull that buddy-buddy shit with us, man," Morning said. "We've seen as many movies as you."
"Your friend is quite a wise ass," the older cop said to me, no longer even faking kindness. "You should teach him to keep his mouth shut."
"Nobody likes a cop," I said. "Particularly a crooked one."
"Let's go," he said, motioning us out the door. "Bring the cigarettes."
"Oh, the little shit told you they were cigarettes, huh?" Morning said as he picked up one suitcase. "Tell him hello from me, will you, when you pay him off. Tell him I'll have another drop next Break, huh? A big one. A cement overcoat in the bay."
We followed the silent cop out the front and into an old jeep, gray and rusted, touched with a thousand dents. The younger cop sat behind the wheel, smoking a hastily lit cigarette, posing tough. He drove us through more crooked lanes for about ten minutes, stopped once at a call box to prepare the station for us, then took the longest way round to the station house. Morning and I carried in the suitcases and set them on a desk in an office shut away from the rest of the large wooden room by glass, then the cops took our names and our valuables, our belts, and Morning's shoe laces, and afterward locked us in a wooden cage in the center of the room, across from the glass office. No place to sit, the floor, smeared with shit and vomit, too filthy to sit on, so we stood, waiting, saying nothing, watching the other occupant of the cage, a ragged drunk curled in a corner who never moved the whole time we were in the room, so still he might have been dead waiting to stink. We might have smoked, but the cops, the two who had brought us in and five or six others, were quickly demolishing our cigarettes in front of the booking desk at the other end of the room. The booking desk, like the one in the office, still bore the marks of whatever American military unit had used them before they were released for surplus. I shouted about the cigarettes, but one of the cops told me to smoke my toe, whatever that meant. If it was an insult, it didn't work because it gave us a terrible case of nervous giggles, which relaxed us more than any cigarette. Morning shouted back to ask if it was okay if he smoked his thumb because his toe was empty, but the cops missed the joke.
In about an hour a tall neat man in a barong tagalog came in the room, neatly combed hair, neat nails, and a dapper line of moustache. He nodded as he passed, as if we were casual acquaintances, spoke to the man at the desk, then walked in the straightest line into the glass office. Two different cops came, handcuffed Morning, then led him to the office. For five minutes there was a quiet businesslike talk, calm motions, thoughtful head movements, but Morning began, it looked like, saying no, no, no, in more fiery language. He stood up, and though I couldn't hear him I could tell he said Bullshit in his best voice, allowing no argument. He was handcuffed again, not roughly, but forcefully, and taken outside. Then they came for me.
"Sgt. Krummel, I believe it is," he said, reaching out a hand as they removed the cuffs. "Capt. Mendoza, second in command of the Pasay City Secret Service."
I didn't shake his hand. "Where did they take my friend?"
"Just to an outside cell. He will be all right. I didn't want him making any more, how should I say, bad blood with the two sergeants who brought you here." His English was very neat too, but he sounded like an insurance man making a pitch for increased coverage, or a Bible salesman.
"Just talk straight, huh? What's your price? What's it going to cost us to get out of this fairy tale?"
"Oh, everyone is in such a hurry today. But it is late, and I, ah, shall we say, have a lady waiting. So to the point. If you had not made my two worthy sergeants quite so angry, we could arrange some sort of deal where I, ah, would purchase your cigarettes at a very small loss to you. You pay seven for them on Base, I would pay you seven. You would be out nothing but your profit and expenses, and be much the richer, as they say, for the experience. A very small loss, indeed," he said, pausing to offer me a cigarette, which I didn't take.
"A small loss?" I asked, "or a shakedown?"
"Oh, such a crude term. I would have expected more from an educated man," he said, lighting his Chesterfield.
"Educated?" I said.
"Oh, yes, I know about you, Sgt. Krummel. I've known Teresita for many years. A lovely woman, as they say, yes, indeed. I've known about your business for some time. I also heard about your unfortunate encounter with Mr. Garcia this afternoon. He is a pig, but he could be dangerous, yes, indeed. As they say, I have my ear to many walls, yes, and you might call this a tax, a luxury tax. And the small loss you speak of so heavily would indeed be small compared to the price you would pay if you force me to call the U.S. Military Adjutant. You will surely face charges, be, as they say, busted, and perhaps spend some time in the stockade," he said, finishing with a perfect smoke ring.
"But, as I said," he quickly continued, "that was before you two boys made my men so unhappy, so damned unhappy. Now, unfortunately, it will take only a gesture for you and your friend. You must walk out, forgetting you ever saw these cigarettes. You have reserve, surely, and it will take all of this to, as they say, grease the angry palms around here." There wasn't a trace of irony or of threat in his voice, but a slight note of sadness; the director of one company hearing about the director of another falling into a bad but not disastrous deal.
"My friend said no deal, didn't he?" I said.
"Unfortunately, yes. He's such an emotional creature." Another perfect smoky circle.
"Then no deal."
"Don't be foolish. You made a mistake dealing with such a, as you might say, small tomatoes for a drop." He rustled in his desk for a moment, then handed me a card, and offered me another cigarette. I took this one. "My address and telephone number. I also deal slightly in the market. When you make a run after now, call me. If you can boost your load to three hundred cartons a week, guaranteed, I can raise the price to eleven and a half. You will get rich; I will get richer. But you have to take this small loss. The younger man has, as you might say, political connections. A small loss. You'll make it up in a month."