A Brief History of Seven Killings (82 page)

—Meaning?

—Meaning certain people still trying to find a good way to kill me. I mean, they tried once or twice. Or three times, no four. My men in here deal
with the fourth last week and didn’t even tell me until guard find the pussyhole head in the toilet when one of them go in to piss. All now they can’t figure out what an inmate’s head doing in the guard’s toilet. As for the guards, bunch of fucking ’prentices, them boys. The first guard? Shitting through a tube now and by the time the second reach my cell and burst shots into an empty mattress, him already turn into a widower who find out two days later he would have been a father.

—Damn,
hombre
.

—Some people forget why they’re sitting on top and who the fuck put them up there.

—You say that like somebody owes you something.

—They do owe me. Everybody fucking owe me. I give the country to that fucking government.

—That government ain’t the government no more and nobody owes you shit, Josef. Nobody forced your hand, nobody stopped you from turning into fucking Tony Montana, and everybody was fine looking the other way until you decided to murder some fucking junkies who weren’t worth shit in a fucking crack house for no reason other than maybe somebody stepped on your new shoes, knowing you. You already got what you think you’re owed and more. You fucked this up, you hear me? You fucked this up.

He’s off in the dark again. I wait for him to come back, listening if his feet are shuffling now. Not Josey. He comes out of the shadow standing tall, almost too tall, like he’s bracing his chest for something.

—You want crackhead go to Dumfries Road in New Kingston and get anyone you like. Who to r’ass miss a bombocloth crackhead?

—Nobody. The pregnant girlfriend of a crackhead? Kinda different. There’s a whole story about her in
The New Yorker
. Some pattern of yours, Josef? Offing pregnant chicks?

—Fuck off.

—Real classy, don man. Your whole crew of Jamaicans and their whyshoot-one-
hombre
-when-you-can-liquidate-the-whole-block way of thinking. Storm of bullets, eh? Storm Posse. Real classy.

—You are the man who make them, boss, not me. Don’t make monster then bawl how them monstrous.

—Dude, when I was running with you some of these boys were still getting breastfed. Not me they’re taking after, Pops.

—You know how long it take for me to check my food?

—What? What are you—

—Twenty minutes, three times a day. Ask the rats. Every day me throw piece of the food down and see if they eat it. Every day me expect a rat to drop dead. Every day I have to take each banana and cut it up little, each clump of rice I squash it, each box of juice I suck it through my teeth just to stop any broken glass, or rusty nail or maybe even something with AIDS. You know how long it take before I swallow just a spoonful of food? And me already buy off everybody in the kitchen.

—But nobody would dare, Josey.

—Maybe not, but since everybody outside fucking scared of what they think my mouth going do is only a matter of time, brethren. Only a matter of time before they find a guard or inmate more scared of them than me.

—You’ve been behind bars too long.

—Maybe I should redecorate, put up a few curtains.

—Never pictured you for gallows humour,
mijo
.

—Not dead yet, Doctor Love.

He sits down on the bed and looks away as if he’s done talking for now. It’s the first time I’m looking away since I got here, and the first time I notice that the cell, and the entire corridor, is red brick, several of them already fallen out. Figures that Jamaica is where you’d find the exact prison you think of when somebody says prison. At least the floor is now concrete. Seriously it’s the kind of prison where you think that all you need is a spoon and some of what these Americans call gumption, and you could dig your way to freedom in a few years.

—Peter Nasser, poor bitch, stumble in here and try to threaten me.

—Oh yeah? How did that go?

—Something like when an impotent man threaten to rape you. He sud
denly worrying if the canary going sing. Exact words him say. I would never say such dumb shit.

—I know. But he’s not the only one, Josey.

—Which for the two hundredth time leads to why you come here.

—Maybe I’m paying a visit.

—You can visit me in America. Going be there in two days.

—It’s a shame they didn’t let you out to bury your boy.

—You is a fucking pussyhole, de las Casas. A fucking pussyhole.

—You know what I always found fascinating about you, Josey? Most people I know, man, they can turn it off and turn it back on, but you can keep both going the same time. You can barely bring yourself to talk about your dead son, but can talk about offing two pregnant chicks just like that. You’re like what they call a psychopath. What? What’s so funny?

He laughed. He laughed so long he started to hiccup, and even then he wouldn’t stop laughing. Long enough that I started to hate him a little, I really did, and I’ve never felt that way about him before.

—That whole sentence, you practice it before you come here?

—Fuck you, Josef.

—No, seriously. What them call the man, you know the man I’m talking about, him even have a show on TV one time. You know the man with the puppet in his lap, the puppet mouth moving but somebody else talking.

—Ventriloquist. You calling me a ventriloquist? For who, the CIA?

—No, I calling you the dummy. So who send you, brethren? Mr. Clarkjust-ditch-the-E? Serious now, them man still around?

—Haven’t thought about him in years either. I hear he’s in Kuwait.

—Your memory too spotty. On the other hand man like me remember everything. Like names. You know how most people forget names? Like Louis Johnson. Mr. Clark-just-ditch-the-E, Peter Nasser, Luis Hernán Rodrigo de las Casas. Sal Resnick? I don’t forget names. Certain things like Operation Werewolf? I don’t forget things. Even certain dates like October 16, 1968. June 15, 1976. December 6, 1976. May 20, 1980. October 14, 1980? I don’t forget dates. What you think? Sound like you run out of talk,
muchacho
.

—I think people are more concerned by what you might say these days.

—Going to say, Luis. Going to say. People dig me this hole. I didn’t tell them to make it so big it swallow all of them. I don’t know what your boss worried about. All he need to do is make a call to the DEA—the Feds, right? Make a call and part of the story squash.

—DEA aren’t Feds. And they don’t control either.

—They? So somebody did send you.

—I liked our conversations more when we were on the same side.

—There is the gate and there is the lock. Come over.

—You’ve gotten all witty in your old age, man.

—Still younger than you. What you want, Doctor Love? You have some stash of money lock ’way to give me when me come out of prison if me keep quiet?

—I didn’t say that.

—Well let me say it for you and answer. What make you think I coming out of prison?

—The deal you’ll probably sign with the DEA.

—Still don’t know what you worried about. Doctor Love is blur, no you tell me that? Most people don’t even know him exist. Maybe you die in Bay of Pigs, maybe you blow your own self up on the plane in Barbados, maybe you working for them Sandinistas now.

—Contras.

—Same difference. Or maybe you is just something people make up from scratch when they need a duppy.

—Maybe I’m a ghost talking to you now.

—You might as well be. Man like you the world don’t need no more. You know from when I see that? From 1976. Politics don’t mean shit. Power don’t mean shit. Money mean something. Give people what they want. Peter Nasser think he can send man to talk to me about the error of my ways, but which man in Kingston I don’t own?

—You sure about that, Josef? Every man?

—Yes.

—Every single one?

—What, me need microphone in this place or you deaf?

—Every single one?

—Yes, to fuck.

—Even in New York?

—Especially in New York. Must be why them hungry for me over there.

—Who do you think off’d your boy Weeper?

—You mean other than he himself? This argument getting tired, Doctor Love. You don’t have to look hard to find out what happen to Weeper.

—Hmm. Before she flew the fuck off the grid I had a nice chat with Mrs. Griselda Blanco.

—Didn’t Medellín already sort out that mad cunt business?

—Before, Josey. Listen to me, will you? This was back when she saw the writing on the wall and was looking for friends. She’s telling me about this gang, er . . . posse named Ranking Dons, ever heard of them? Most of them are Jamaicans.

—Yes, Luis, I know about the Ranking Dons.

—Oh. Didn’t know if you knew them or not. Anyway, so she was telling me how they almost took over the Miami racket at one point. Yet within like a month they all vanished.

—So?

—So, while Griselda certainly had the desire to get rid of them she sure as fuck didn’t have the smarts to pull it off. Or the manpower to deal with you Jamaicans. To deal with Jamaicans she needed a guy from the rock. Preferably one already in the States who could mobilize quick and who had a vested interest. And that motherfucker ain’t you, Josef. Not like you to underestimate a guy,
mijo
. He gave her back South Miami. She gave him Weeper. And then he just decided to wait out the mighty Josey Wales. Just waiting on you to fuck up. Enter the crack house. Why didn’t you just let it go, man?

—Because I hate the taste of piss.

—What?

—Nothing.

—No, you said something.

—Ah never say bombocloth nothing, Doctor Love.

—One man, Josey.

—Eubie?

—Eubie.

Eight

I
’ve just never
been around a, you know, before . . .

—A what?

—A man. I mean, one of these men.

—What a way you facety. Me tell you that me man is one of these man?

—You said he was with those Ranking Dons.

—Not everybody in church ah Christian.

—I’m not sure I get your point.

—You not sure you get my point. For serious, you did always talk so stoosh or is white people you ah take showoff with?

—You think anybody speaking proper English trying to take after white people?

—Trying to take after something.

—Oh so chatting bad must mean you is a real Jamaican then. Well if it make you feel better white people love hear you people talk much more than me.

—You people.

—Yes, you people. Real Jamaicans. All of you so damn real. And you . . . you know what. I’m way out of line here, and this could get me fired. Bad enough I’m talking to next of kin, now I’m getting in an argument. Next thing you know complaints are lodged and I’m reprimanded if not fired. I really hope he recovers.

—What you mean you never see a gunman before? Why you want to see gunman?

She’s looking at me like she really wants to know. Her eyebrows raised and her mouth open a little, like she’s really curious. I wish I could attack
her defensiveness, but it’s like she really just wants to know. And I don’t have any answer that makes any sense. Mostly because I don’t really know either. She gets up from beside him and goes over to the window. This day is going nowhere, and it’s March?

—I can’t think of anybody else in the whole world who me never want see, she says.

—I understand.

—Where you come from original?

—Havendale.

—Then you don’t understand. And you never see one up close.

—No.

—Well . . . hold on. Listen to we nuh, talking like we in zoo and him is gorilla. Me should laugh since it funny. Is long time now this thing boiling up between Ranking Dons and Storm Posse.

—But why it come here?

—How you mean? Where else it fi come? No yah so people want the drugs?

She looks at me like she’s some mother who just run out of patience with her kid. I want to tell her I’m not some idiot, but I go over by the window and stand beside her.

—At least it almost done.

—What? That came out so quiet I wonder if she heard me.

—The killing.

—How you know?

—Not too much people leave to kill. And Josey Wales going end up in Yankee prison for a good while. Although me believe it when me see it.

—I didn’t know he was in jail.

—Well what ’bout Jamaica you know? News ’bout Josey Wales was all Jamaican newspaper could write ’bout. Yes me read. Every day was a new story about court and trial and witness and delay and privy council. All the people him kill and how America want him bad. Turn on the TV and even American news talking ’bout him like him was movie star. Just Josey Wales,
Josey Wales, Josey Wales and . . . you alright? Jesus Christ, lady . . . hold on . . . me have you . . . me have you.

I nod and realise I’m sitting on the chair beside the Ranking Don. It almost flies out of my head how I got to the chair, but I’m not dizzy enough to forget.

—You alright now?

—I don’t need a glass of water.

—Wha?

—In TV show them always ah give people a glass of water.

—Rahtid my girl, you haffi faint fi talk Jamaican? What a ting.

—I didn’t faint.

Then she laughs really loud, loud enough I think she might wake up the Ranking Don. Long enough that it turns into a grin, then a cackle, then her chest just heaves. Something tells me that at some point in the laugh she stopped laughing at me.

—When last you talk Jamaican?

—How you mean, I talk Jamaican all the . . . you know what? Last week when this little bloodcloth fatass who run the Rite Aid in the Bronx ask me how far up me legs the white stockings go.

—Rahtid, wha you tell him?

—Further than you ever going reach, you big fat slabba shithouse.

My head has stopped spinning, I think. I don’t know. Not sure why it was spinning in the first place. But then she says,

—I wonder if the trial going be ’pon TV?

—What trial?

—You never hear me the first time? Josey Wales.