Red Rag Blues (20 page)

Spence Mallaby thought that Manhattan was at its best in the rain. Everything wet looked clean. That was one of the first things he'd learned in the military: when an inspection takes place, if it's wet, it's clean. Later, his career in the military became more hazardous; now he was grateful to be alive. The world looked good, especially at night, when he was on the penthouse terrace, enjoying the rain, watching headlights that had lost their glare and tail-lights that were deeply and softly reflected by the soaking pavement. It was the only time when traffic was a pleasure to see.

He waited a long time, over two hours, but that was nothing; there had been occasions in the military when he had waited motionless, all day and night, until small animals came up and sniffed him and decided he was dead. Now he watched the traffic and thought about the quadriceps extensor muscle, the biggest muscle in the leg. From the pelvis to the knee there was nothing but muscle and perhaps fat and only one bone, the femur. The thigh made a large, clean target, unlike the lower leg, which was guarded by much bone; or the abdomen, packed with gastrointestinal plumbing. He had studied these things.

A cream-and-brown Studebaker convertible appeared and parked down below. A man got out and entered the building. No woman. Well, Mallaby was glad of that. Simplified the job. He left the terrace and opened the penthouse door. There was a light outside but the penthouse was dark. After a minute or so the whine of the elevator ceased and he heard its door slide open. Soon, Sammy appeared, silhouetted, and Spence Mallaby shot him in the left thigh. The sound was softer than a popped balloon. Sammy made more noise falling on his rump.

“There's a message,” Mallaby said. “Go back to Venezuela.”

“Jesus Christ,” Sammy wheezed. “What the shit you do that for? That goddam hurt.” He felt his leg, and groaned. “I never been to fuckin' Venezuela, pal.”

“Uh-huh. I have to leave now.”

“You do that an' you're a dead man. I got blood pourin' out of me. I'm Sammy Fantoni, you asshole. Get me to a doctor, fast. Otherwise my family's gonna blow your fuckin' brains out. Christ Almighty, look what you did!”

Mallaby turned the lights on. He recognized Sammy, and he saw blood spreading rapidly outward from his thigh. “Maybe I clipped an artery,” he said. “Your femoral runs through there.” He took out a knife and slit Sammy's pants. Blood was throbbing over the leg. “Where did I hit you?” Sammy's fingers groped for the hole. “Press hard on that,” Mallaby said. He went away and came back with a kitchen spoon and a handful of neckties. “You like the blue or the green?” he asked.

“I feel like shit,” Sammy said.

“Nobody's wearing shit this year.” Already a necktie was around the thigh, and knotted. Mallaby made a pad from a handkerchief, slid it under the knot, and tightened the tourniquet with the kitchen spoon. Blood still pulsed through Sammy's
fingers. Mallaby shifted the tourniquet, forcing his thumbs into the inside of the thigh, hunting for the spot where the artery could be jammed against the bone. He found it, moved the tourniquet, used another tie to lash the spoon in place. The flow stopped.

“You got your knee in my balls,” Sammy said weakly.

Mallaby dragged him into the apartment, searched him, found a short-barreled automatic in his hip pocket. “You here on business?” he asked. Sammy nodded. “Well, business is closed for the day. Remember when you said you felt like shit?” Sammy nodded again. “You've gone downhill fast since then,” Mallaby said. He shoved the gun back in the pocket.

His training in the military took over. First priority: get the casualty treated. Problem: moving Sammy out of the building. Solution: create a diversion. He called the Fire Department. Then he made a heap of newspapers, magazines and books on a table near the balcony, put a match to it and waited until it was burning hard. He picked up Sammy by the armpits and carried him to the elevator, put him inside, leaned him against a corner. Two floors down, the elevator stopped and a young couple got on. “Just a fainting fit,” Mallaby told them. “It happens.” He smiled, so they smiled too. Smile and the world smiles with you. Hitler had a nice smile.

There was a couch in the lobby. He and Sammy sat there for a short while, until he heard the fire siren whooping joyously. He slid his right arm under Sammy's coat and got a good grip around his ribcage and half-carried him out of the building. Everyone was looking at the firemen, or pointing up. There were cops, but they were busy keeping the traffic moving. And the rain helped. Mallaby got Sammy into the Studebaker, found the keys in his pocket, drove away. Stage one completed.

*

Luis was drifting along, searching for a parking slot, when Julie saw the flames. “That's us!” she said. “The penthouse is on fire!” He swung the Buick into a space reserved for buses and they watched a fire truck blare a hole through the traffic. “How extraordinary,” he said. “And look, all the lights are on. We didn't leave the lights on.”

She had nothing to say about that. The whole experience was bizarre: sitting in comfort, watching her home burning through
curtains of rain, while Nat King Cole sang
Misty
on the car radio. It was totally cock-eyed.

“And I think that's my Studebaker.” He pointed to the opposite side of the street. She nearly said it was impossible, the car was in Jersey. But what were the odds against a different cream-and-brown Studebaker convertible being parked on this block? It wasn't a car you saw every day. Or every week. As they looked, it drove away. “Fantoni keeps the Studebaker, which turns up here just as our apartment burns. This is not a healthy place,” he said. “We are not wanted.” He pulled out and joined the traffic. She felt sad; she had begun to like the penthouse. There were books of hers, and records, up there … Now what?

“I timed that nicely, didn't I?” Luis said. “Spot-on.”

“You didn't time anything, you schmuck. It was luck.”

“Ten minutes earlier, you'd have got your eyebrows singed.”

“Pure luck! Jesus Christ, Luis, you got
lost
three times, just getting here.”

“I was one hundred percent right about the tunnel. It's definitely faster than the bridge, isn't it? If we'd taken the bridge, we'd never have seen the Studebaker.”

“And if I hadn't turned you round, we'd be in Ohio, you moron.”

“Perfect timing,” he said. “It's an instinct we Spanish have.”

“My American instinct tells me we have nowhere to sleep. Think you can find a hotel?”

“I'll find you six hotels, sweetheart, all different colors. Which d'you like?” Luis was feeling buoyant. He was glad to be out of the penthouse. Too many people knew about it.

*

The dealer had sold the Studebaker cheap because he knew it was a lemon. The previous owner had spent zero on servicing, and now, at the worst possible time and place, in the rain, halfway between the apartment building and the hospital, the car died of neglect.

Spence Mallaby was driving one-handed, using the other to hold Sammy upright. He was heading uptown on Broadway, aiming for Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center, talking to Sammy, asking how he felt and was there any blood running down his leg, and getting mumbled answers, and not seeing the red light glowing on the dash. Up ahead, someone changed lanes without
looking, a truck-trailer slammed on its brakes, the trailer fishtailed, a bus swerved and sideswiped a couple of cars and in a few seconds, uptown Broadway was jammed. Heavy rain, heavy traffic, it happens.

The Studebaker wasn't hit, but the road was blocked, Mallaby couldn't go forward, couldn't go back. The red slight still glowed. Clogged oil filter. The engine was being starved of lubricant, the pistons were hotter than hell. Soon, the Studebaker died. By then, Sammy wasn't even mumbling. Mallaby had a flashlight. He meant to check on the tourniquet but the flashlight showed a spreading pool of blood at Sammy's feet. His heart had been young and strong and it had pumped him dry. Well, deep potholes, poor suspension, thumps and shakes, what else can you expect? No tourniquet lasts forever. This one must have slipped.

Mallaby wiped his prints off everything he might have touched, got out and ran through the pelting rain to the nearest subway station.

Win some, lose some.

The day after the fire, they left New York as soon as Luis could get to the bank and empty his safe-deposit box. He had about fifteen hundred dollars. The
Times,
the
Trib
and the
News
ran short reports on the finding of Sammy Fantoni's bloodless body in an abandoned Studebaker. No mention of a double slaying on 10th Street, but the
Trib
carried an interview with Stevie Biaggi. Asked when she last saw her husband Vincent, she said their different careers kept them apart. Clearly the
Trib
had been tipped off.

“No tunnels, no bridges,” Luis decided. “I don't like toll gates. Too easy for the FBI to watch.”

“The FBI doesn't know we've got the Buick.”

“Jerome Fantoni could have reported it stolen.”

“Why would he do that?”

“Why would somebody kill his nephew?”

Silence, while Luis studied a road map.

“I don't know,” Julie said. “Sammy wasn't smart but he wasn't a total schmuck. He deserved better.” She still couldn't believe he was dead.

“We take Broadway to Route 9,” Luis announced. “Same way we went to lunch at Tarrytown, remember? But we keep going, alongside the Hudson, north, past Ossining, Croton, Peekskill …” The map ran out. “Until we find a bridge over the river without a toll. Then we'll think again.”

They drove 150 miles to Albany, ate lunch, bought suitcases, pajamas, toilet kit, changes of clothing, and more maps.

North led to Canada. They turned southwest into the mountains and cow pastures of New York State. Julie drove. “Now that we're not in Manhattan,” she said, “where the hell are we going?”

Luis was studying a map of the East Coast states. “It seems to me that all the roads lead to Washington, DC.”

“That's so decent people can get away from it.”

“I smell power. Greed. Vanity. Lust. All that man needs to make life a thing of simple joy and staggering wealth.”

“Uh-huh.” She tried to think of a better place to go. Philly? Baltimore? Pittsburgh? She had an aunt in Roanoke, Virginia. Not necessarily still alive, though. She gave up. “I guess DC is as good as anywhere,” she said.

By midafternoon they were in Pennsylvania, following back roads. The land looked prosperous; the folk were friendly: often they raised a hand in greeting. “Hey, this is nice,” she said. “This is tranquil. Let's stay here for a week or two. My nervous system needs a break. DC can wait, can't it?”

Luis agreed. “Smell the flowers. Walk in the woods,” he said. “As a matter of fact I could use some peace and quiet. There's a screenplay I've been thinking about. Brilliant idea. Just needs to be put on paper.”

They found a small hotel: nothing more than a large inn but it was comfortable. Luis borrowed a typewriter from the owner and spent the days writing his screenplay. He never discussed it, and she never read it. In the evenings they walked, often arm in arm, while the sunset turned the air to a golden haze and fireflies provided free entertainment. Julie thought:
This is too good to last,
and of course she was right. After a week they packed up and drove to Washington, DC. She checked into a motel and took him to the airport. “Well, I hope it stinks,” she said. “Hollywood loves crap.” They kissed. Luis flew to Los Angeles, a reckless extravagance but justified by his raging talent; rented a black car; bought a dark suit and a snap-brim hat; and headed for Warners.

*

The guard on the gate at Warner Brothers was not easily surprised. When a man gets to salute Gregory Peck arriving in the morning and June Allyson leaving in the afternoon, he regards the world differently. But he was surprised to see a modest black Ford hardtop drive up and stop. Black was not fashionable in Los Angeles. Must be a tourist got lost, looking for directions. The driver got out. Didn't dress like a tourist. Dark blue suit, black shoes, gray tie, snap-brim felt hat, aviator glasses.

“Howdy,” the guard said.

“Special Agent Cabrillo, FBI,” Luis said, and flashed a silver badge with a gilt star, the gift of the Chief of Police of Caracas after Luis had donated generously to his re-election fund. “I am here, on the authority of Senator Joseph McCarthy's Senate Sub-Committee, to speak with an actor by the name of Max Webber.” He showed a long, brown envelope. “And you, sir, have a statutory duty under federal law to assist me. Where is Webber?”

This sort of thing had never happened before. “Well, now just hold on there,” the guard said. “You need a pass, I can't just—”

Luis showed another envelope. “This, sir, is a subpoena for you to appear before Senator McCarthy and answer why you obstructed the work of his Sub-Committee, if you so obstruct.”

“Shit … Third building on the left. Park at the back. Anywhere except the slot marked Kirk Douglas.”

Luis thanked him, quietly and soberly, and drove in.
Jesus Christ Almighty,
the guard thought.
I could have lost this job right there, in ten seconds.
It scared him so much that he gave Richard Widmark a really crisp salute as he drove out.

Max Webber liked Los Angeles. He liked getting paid, wearing new clothes, living in a roach-free house with a front door not made of sheet steel and four locks plus two bolts. He liked the sunshine, the palm trees and the endless, easy parking. Above all he liked being a working actor again. The angry hostility of New York, the looming shadow of HUAC—all that was behind him. Three thousand miles and three time zones behind. Max was sitting in the sun, reading his script, marking his lines, when Luis came and sat beside him.