POE MUST DIE (28 page)

He lifted his booted foot high, preparing to bring it down on Figg’s ankle.

Bloomin’ amateurs, thought Figg.

The squat thug’s foot was on the way down, when Figg slid off the bench and brought his ankle up into the thug’s crotch with all his strength. The thug folded in half, jaw slack, eyes entirely white. Then Figg was on his feet, moving into the thug whose hands were folded across his crotch in a vain attempt to stop the pain.

The punch was a short, vicious left hook; it didn’t travel far but it had most of Figg’s power behind it. The punch crashed into the thug’s right temple, lifting him from the floor and sending him flying backwards and into the crowd of dancers. Immediately a space cleared around him.

When Figg took the one step which brought him belly to belly with Johnnie Bill Baker, both of the boxer’s hands were again in his pockets and he spoke through clenched teeth. “Mr. Baker, we are needin’ to talk with you. Please accommodate us.”

Baker felt the pressure against his gut. When the other thug and the huge black woman started towards Figg, Baker lifted up both hands to halt them in place. The Irish thief’s smile was forced.

“Suddenly I feel the need to talk with Mr. Figg. And with you too, Mr. Poe, of course. Would you be tellin’ what make of persuasion you have hard against me, Mr. Figg?”

“From this distance, it don’t matter, do it Mr. Baker?”

“You have a silver tongue, Mr. Figg. Figg.” Baker snapped his fingers. “Of course! The boxer. Pierce James Figg.”

Baker’s manner changed. He relaxed and seemed genuinely pleased to meet Figg. He clasped both of the boxer’s shoulders. “Twenty-five years ago in England, it was. I was a lad of ten and me dad took me to see you fight Ned Painter. Fifty-two rounds and you lost because of a broken arm and by God, man, you were winnin’. Winnin’!”

He turned to the crowd. “Keep on dancin’, folks. Meself and me friends here is talkin’ over old toimes.”

Baker said to the man and large black woman behind him. “Give yer greetin’s to Mr. Pierce James Figg, one of the best who ever put a foot in a prize ring.”

“Figg,” muttered the other thug. He blinked, flinched. “’Eard of ’im.”

“Heard of’im, now have ya?” Baker placed his face almost nose to nose with the thug. “’E’s the best, ‘e is, and you were fixin’ to die young by bracin’ the man.” The thug took one step backwards, licking his lips.

Baker said, “Mr. Figg, this here lady is Black Turtle. As you can see she is ample and black as a hangman’s heart. But I loves her, yes I do. She’s my lieutenant of sorts, keepin’ the girls in line and seein’ that peace and harmony reign over these here premises. Fights like a wounded tiger, she does, and she’s put a few men under the earth. No man in Five Points dares stand up to her unless, of course, he has provided in advance for his widow.”

Baker’s smile was easy, filled with white teeth. “I see, Mr. Figg, that you are in the company of that known man of letters, Mr. E. Poe and I say welcome to ye both. Yes sir, welcome to ye both.”

Poe said nothing.

Baker placed an arm around Figg’s shoulders. The boxer sniffed twice at the Irishman’s heavy cologne which smelled of cinnamon and gin.

“Figg me bucko, it is indeed an honor and a privilege to have a warrior like yourself in me place. Yes it is, sir. Your name is legend among those who follow ‘The Fancy.’ You have carved your name high atop the mountain crest of pugilism, sir. Saw you fight twice,
twice,
and a thrill it was. Bested Jem Ward, you did. Year was ‘26. And him goin’ on to become heavyweight champion of Britain. Good fighter he was, but I heard stories about him.”

Figg’s eyes were on the huge black woman who looked as though she wanted to kill him. The other thug was dragging away the man that Figg had knocked out. Figg said, “Ward had the skill, true enough. But he was a disgrace to the prize ring. He gambled too much. Bet on ‘isself to lose and he usually made sure he did.”

“You beat him fair and square, if I remember.”

“I did. He come into the ring that afternoon to kill me, so we had a go at it, ‘im and me.”

Baker produced another wide, sincere smile. “I was twelve then but by God, I did love ‘The Fancy.’ Lived for the prize ring, I did. The smell of it, the sounds, sights, the blood. All of it. Excitin’ world to a little fella. To a big fella too, let me tell ya. We have our boxers over here, some of ’em pretty good. But ahhh, those from me days as a snot-nosed little mick brat, they were the best I tell ya. Me dad never had a job long enough to tie his shoes but he always had a coin to bet on a prizefight. Tell me, has the game in England gone down as low as I hear?”

Figg nodded once. “It has. Gamblin’s taken its toll. Crooked fights, poisoned water to the fighters ‘twixt rounds, hooligans hired to break up a match if the wrong man’s winnin’. It’s gone wrong, true enough.”

Baker hung his head. “Sad. Very sad. Well now, how may I serve ye?”

Figg’s hands still did not leave his pockets. “Hamlet Sproul. Wants you should arrange a meetin’ with ‘im.”

“Hamlet Sproul, Hamlet Sproul.” Baker’s handsome and cross-eyed face turned thoughtful.

Poe, impatient with Baker’s hypocrisy, stood up. “Sproul has bragged about accompanying you and the Daybreak Boys on unscheduled visits to country homes.”

Baker’s eyes narrowed. Figg had seen that look before. The mick was measuring Poe’s neck for a blade; but then Baker smiled. “Yes, yes. Now it comes to me. Ham-a-let Sprou-well. I understand he is in the business of removals, of a sort.”

Behind him, Black Turtle snorted.

“Mortal remains and all that,” said Baker, hooking his thumbs in the pockets of his gray silk waistcoat. “And what would you two citizens be wantin’ with such a man?”

Figg’s hoarse voice was even. The harp’s plink-plink and the shuffle of boots on sand were a musical counterpart to his words. “We will discuss that with Hamlet Sproul. We prefer you get word to him that Mr. Poe and Mr. Figg wants a face to face with ‘im as soon as possible. Tell ‘im it would be to ‘is advantage to do so. Tell ‘im it could very well save ‘is life.”

Baker nodded slowly, gravely. Cross eyes do indeed make him look funny, thought Figg. He’s slicker than egg white on a tile floor. Mr. Johnny the Gent would kick a nun in the head when she’s down, then charge her sixpence to help her off the floor.

“Save his life,” said Johnnie Bill Baker. “Now that ought to get his attention, eh Black Turtle me darlin’.”

She’d stepped away from him. A fight. Not too far away from where they stood. Without hesitating, Black Turtle waded in swinging her slung shot, scattering men and women before her as though they were driven by a strong wind.

Two men didn’t run. Sailors by the look of ’em, thought Figg, and they want to try her. They’re not the type to bow to a woman, so now she’s being put to the test.

Johnny Bill Baker smiled, gently nudging Figg with his elbow. “Behold, Mr. Figg. You are about to witness a remarkable performance which shall include the education of two gentlemen unacquainted with our ways.”

Now there was a space on the dance floor. The music trailed off and people watched. Two sailors, angered at being hit by the Negro woman, the both of them unfamiliar with her, were ready. They wanted to fight. So did Black Turtle.

“Nigger bitch,” grunted one. “Nigger bitch.” He charged her and Black Turtle kicked him in the knee with her booted foot, spinning him around and to the floor. The other sailor, smaller but as mean, was almost on her when she turned, hooking her right fist deep into his stomach. As he doubled up, she jammed her left thumb into his eye. He squealed, both hands quickly covering the eye.

Figg, who’d seen fighters in his time, was fascinated. She was the equal of any man and better than, most and she wasn’t finished, not by a long shot. The woman fought without heat, without passion, saying nothing and showing no expression and Figg hadn’t seen many with that kind of control or love of bloodsport inside ’em. Black Turtle was that rare one, a fighter empty of all feeling or compassion. Expect no mercy from her, for it was none you’d get.

Bending over, she came up with the stiletto from her boot top. Quick hands, thought Figg. Decisive. No hesitating with this one. The blade was against the temple of the sailor whose eye she’d just tried to put out. Then with one savage stroke, she brought the blade down, removing the ear. He screamed, spun around, spraying those near him with his blood.

Now the unlucky one on the floor had her attention. Black Turtle took her time walking over to him, which was just as well because he wasn’t going anywhere. Couldn’t stand. Figg watched the Negro woman raise her arm, then bring down the slung shot on the man, whipping him brutally, bouncing the egg-shaped piece of metal off his arms, thighs, head, stomach, hitting him again and again. Those watching laughed, pointed, howled, applauded. There was no mercy in Five Points. There were victors and victims and nothing in between.

Baker turned to Figg and Poe with his biggest grin of the night. Stands there like a proud parent, thought Figg, on the day his first born has finally learned to walk without daddy holding her up.

“Devoted to me, she is,” said Baker. “Ain’t nothin’ on two legs or four that can beat her.”

He stepped between Figg and Poe, an arm around each man’s shoulders. “Gents, tonight you will be drink-in’ the finest and it is on Johnnie Bill Baker, none other. Now sit you down and a waiter gal will bring you a small libation—”

“None for me,” said Figg. He hesitated, then, “And Mr. Poe is on temperance.”

Baker’s eyebrows crawled up his forehead in mock shock. “Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear. Well, Mr. Poe, I do hope the distilleries of Manhattan refuse to panic at this sudden news. And all this time I thought the most wondrous sight of all would be that of a camel sashayin’ through the eye of a needle. I offer me finest spirits and I am refused. Well, no matter. Take a pew the both of you, and I will have Mr. Sproul summoned and your business with him can be concluded. Johnnie Bill Baker knows how to treat a guest. Yes sir, that he does.”

From where they had originally been sitting, Figg and Poe watched Baker, Black Turtle and two men talk out of earshot several feet away. A dancing couple came between both groups, then moved on.

Figg, both hands still in his pockets, wished the lad with the trumpet would lay it down and go milk cows. The lad was a sorry mess and had no more music in him than a pig could fly. The lady harpist knew what she was doing and the one armed drummer appeared to have gotten drunk and passed out. As Figg shifted his eyes to Baker’s group, a hideous looking old woman, tiny and dry as a dead sparrow, crossed the dance floor, miraculously managing to avoid dancing couples. Her hair was sparse and white and she barely had a handful of teeth in her tiny head. She’d been somewhere in the darkness behind Baker.

Standing in front of Figg and Poe, the old woman began speaking softly in French.

Figg whispered from the corner of his mouth. “A nutter, she is. Balmy and around the bend. You takin’ charge of ‘er life, too?”

Poe answered her in French. Ain’t that nice, thought Figg. The two of ‘em carrying on like they was in Paree. French ain’t no language for a grown man. All them foreign words in it and you speak it from your nose.

The little old woman swayed, smiled at Figg, then continued speaking in French to Poe. Looney, moonstruck old biddy. They only come to the little poet when they are crippled in some manner. Cripples. They’re drawn to him like flies to rotting meat.

Poe’s southern drawl was respectful. “Mr. Figg, have you a coin to spare?”

“For this one? Give me a good reason why I should.”

“She has just warned us. Baker plans to betray you and me. No, do not stand, do not move. Stay as you are and listen.”

Poe sighed. “This dear woman is called Montaigne, though it is not her real name. It is the name of a sixteenth-century French philosopher. Her own name? A mystery to us, perhaps even to her, for her mind has been ravaged by alcohol and drugs. The sorrow that brought this on was great. She is French and once she was tutor to the children of the King of France. How she came to fall this low is another tale for another time. Life has treated her with contempt and disdain and to most, she is only a pile of rags in a doorway or under a bar, something to be ignored and discounted. Which is what happened tonight. Baker and others ignored her and she heard him plan our destruction. Baker knows where Sproul is, but will not lead us to him.”

“Did she learn why Baker is against us?”

“Does it matter?”

“No it don’t.”

Figg took a hand from his pocket and stuck it inside his coat. When he brought the hand out, it held a gold sovereign.

Poe said, “A suggestion, Mr. Figg. If you give her the gold coin, there is the chance that someone in here will see it and cut her throat for it. In Five Points, children are stabbed for their pennies. I suggest you buy her two or three bottles of liquor. She would be most appreciative, I am certain.”

“Ask her.”

“She understands English, Mr. Figg.”

“Yeah, I guess she does.” Figg tipped his hat to her. “You will ‘ave it, miss. And I am thankin’ yew muchly.”

She smiled. Her eyes were too bright, Figg thought. She’s addled, but thank dear Jesus, she ain’t too addled. “Mr. Poe, please find us a waiter gal for Missus Montaigne.”