A Matter of Conviction

Five

The entrance to the candy store was on the right-hand side of the shop, its door opening on the three tightly cramped booths which sat alongside the wall there. A fountain with four stools was opposite the booths closest to the rear wall. A telephone booth stood against the rear wall next to a curtained doorway which led to the back of the store. A glass display case upon which was an assortment of chewing gum and a cash register was just inside the door, forward of the fountain and stools.

There was a combined feeling of shoddiness and hominess to the candy store. For whereas the place was badly in need of a paint job, whereas the leatherette of the booths was stained with hair oil and thumb smears, whereas the penny candy in the display case looked stale and unpalatable, the store exuded an atmosphere of relaxed comfort. Standing in the doorway, he could understand why the Thunderbirds had chosen the spot as their hangout. He walked into the shop just as the telephone rang. The proprietor went to answer it, and he remembered for a moment the days in Harlem when telephones were not to be found in every apartment. The owner of the candy store would answer the phone and then send a kid to get whomever the call was for. The rules stated that the messenger rated a tip — usually a nickel, sometimes a dime. The rules further stated that the tip had to be spent in the store. There was always a mad rush from the street whenever the telephone in the candy store rang. Today, on a similar side street in Italian Harlem, the kids barely looked up when the phone rang. Telephones were no longer a luxury. They were as essential to day-by-day living in Harlem as were television sets. The rooftops bristled with electronic antennas, irrefutable testimony to the effectiveness of installment buying.

The proprietor of the store held a brief conversation with whoever was on the other end of the line and then hung up. The four boys sitting in the booth closest to the phone did not look up as he walked back to the display case. He was a short man with a spotlessly clean white apron and a spotlessly clean bald pate. He walked with a slight limp, but the limp — rather than weakening him — seemed to give him a strength of character which was totally lacking before the limp was noticed.

“Help you, Mac?” he said to Hank.

“I’m looking for the members of a club called the Thunderbirds,” Hank said. “I’ve been told this is their hangout.”

“Somebody told you wrong, mister.”

“The somebody who told me was Detective Lieutenant Richard Gunnison of the Twenty-seventh Squad. He’s not a man who makes mistakes.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. Where are they?”

“And who are you?”

“Assistant District Attorney Henry Bell.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

The boys in the rear booth looked up. One made a motion to rise, but a second boy laid a hand on his arm, and he sat instantly.

“Well, well,” the proprietor said, “we never had a D.A. in this store before. I’m honored.”

“Where do I find the Thunderbirds?” Hank gestured to the rear booth. “Are those boys members of the gang?”

“I sure as hell wouldn’t know, mister,” the proprietor said. “All I do is run a candy store.” He extended his hand across the case. “Name’s Joey Manetti. Pleased to know you.”

Hank took the hand. “Mr. Manetti,” he said, in a voice which carried to the rear booth, “the lieutenant gave me a list of names and addresses of known members of the Thunderbirds. Now, I can have these kids picked up and brought to my office for questioning. I thought I’d save time if I could talk to them here — in Harlem. Which will it be?”

Manetti shrugged. “You’re asking me? Mister, I run a candy store.”

Hank turned to the rear booth. “How about it?” he said.

A boy with heavy shoulders and muscular forearms studied Hank with pale hooded eyes. He nodded imperceptibly. “Come on over,” he said.

Hank walked to the booth. The boys sitting there ranged in age from fifteen, he guessed, to nineteen. The one who’d called him over was the oldest of the group, and the biggest. He wore his black hair combed flat against his skull, the sideburns long. A silver identification bracelet dangled from his left wrist. There was a scar on the forearm, several inches above the bracelet. His brows were heavy and black, shading thickly lidded blue, almost gray eyes. When he spoke, his lips barely moved.

“Sit down,” he said. “Concho, get the district attorney a chair.”

One of the boys slid out of the booth and went through the curtained doorway at the rear of the shop. When he returned, he put the chair down at the head of the table and then took his position in the booth again. Hank sat.

“My name’s Diablo,” the oldest boy said. “You know what that means?”

“It means devil,” Hank answered.

“That’s right.” He smiled thinly and then looked to the other boys. One of them nodded.

“Are you Spanish?”

“Me?” Diablo said. “Me? Cut it out, willya?”

“Diablo is a Spanish word.”

“Yeah?” the boy said, surprised. “I thought it was Italian. I’m Italian.”

“Diablo Degenero,” Hank said. “Your real name is Carmine. You’re the so-called warlord of the Thunderbirds.”

“That’s right,” Diablo said. “Boys, this is the district attorney. These are some of the boys. Concho, Nickie and Bud. What can we do for you?”

“You can answer a few questions,” Hank said. “Either here or downtown. It’s up to you.”

“We’ll answer them here,” Diablo said. “If we like the questions.”

“If you don’t like the questions, you can answer them downtown. With a stenographer present.”

“You got a lot of courage, Mr. District Attorney,” Diablo said. “Coming in here without an escort of bulls.”

“I don’t need any detectives,” Hank said.

“No?”

“No. Do you think I do?”

Diablo shrugged. “Mr. District Attorney, I would say—”

“The name is Bell,” Hank corrected. “Mr. Bell.”

Diablo was silent for a moment. “Mr. District Att—”

“Mr. Bell,” Hank said.

Diablo stared at him. Then he smiled again, the same thin mocking smile. He shrugged. “Sure. Mr. Bell. Whatever you say, Mr. Bell. What are your questions, Mr. Bell?”

“Is Danny Di Pace a member of your gang?”

“What gang, Mr. Bell?”

“The Thunderbirds.”

“The Thunderbirds ain’t a gang, Mr. Bell. It’s a social and athletic club. Ain’t that right, boys?”

The boys in the booth nodded. They did not take their eyes from Hank.

“Is Danny a member of the club?” he asked.

“Danny Di Pace, did you say, Mr. Bell?”

“Yes.”

“Danny Di Pace. Now, let me see. Oh yes, that’s right. He lives on this block, don’t he?”

“You know he does.”

“Yes, that’s right, so he does. A very nice kid, Danny Di Pace. But I hear he got himself into a little trouble. He went over there to Spanish Harlem and got himself jumped by some little spic bastard. Is that the Danny Di Pace you mean, Mr. Bell?”

“Yes,” Hank said.

“Now what was your question, Mr. Bell?”

Hank paused for just a moment. Then he said, “You’re wasting my time, hotshot, and my time is valuable. Either I get straight answers, or you get dragged into my office. Now take it whichever way you want it.”

“Why, Mr. Bell,” Diablo said innocently. “I am answering you as straight as I know how. I just forgot your question, that was all.”

“Okay,” Hank said, “suit yourself.” He shoved back his chair. “I’ll see you all at Leonard Street. We may keep you there a while, so don’t make any extended plans.” He turned and started for the door. There was an excited buzzing at the table behind him.

Then Diablo called, “Hey!”

Hank did not turn.

“Mr. Bell! Mr. Bell!”

Hank stopped. Slowly, he faced the table. Diablo was smiling, somewhat sheepishly.

“What’s the matter? Can’t you take a little joke?”

“Not on the county’s time. Are you ready to talk to me?”

“Sure. Come on, sit down. Don’t get excited. We clown around all the time. Makes life interesting, you know? Come on, sit down.”

Hank went back to the table and sat.

“You want some coffee, Mr. Bell? Hey, Joey, coffee all around, huh?”

“Now what about Danny?” Hank said.

“I can tell you this. If you give that kid the electric chair, you’ll be making a big mistake.”

“I don’t set the sentence for anybody,” Hank said. “I only prosecute the case.”

“That’s what I mean. Can I talk frank, Mr. Bell?”

“As frankly as you like.”

“Okay. Them three guys are innocent.”

Hank said nothing.

“I know what you’re thinking,” Diablo said. “They killed a guy. And he was blind. But there’s more here than meets the eye, Mr. Bell. I mean it.”

“Like what?”

“Like, for example, there was a bop scheduled for that night. Now, I’m talking to you like a goddamn brother, giving you inside dope I don’t have to give you, right?”

“Go ahead.”

“I know we were supposed to bop because I set the thing up with this spic they call Gargantua. He’s their warlord. The Horsemen’s, you know? He takes dope. I happen to know that for a fact. Half the guys on the Horsemen take heroin. I think that’s even where they got the name for their club. Horse, you know? H. Heroin. One thing for the Birds, we don’t touch any of that stuff. We break a guy’s arm, we find out he’s on junk. Ain’t that right, boys?”

The boys nodded in self-righteous agreement.

“Anyway, it was me set up the thing. So I know where it was supposed to be, and all that. And we decided there wasn’t going to be no sneak raid or anything like that. We was supposed to meet like there’s a project on a Hun’ Twenty-fifth. Right there. And that was where we was supposed to have it out, you know? At ten o’clock.”

“What’s your point?” Hank asked.

“My point is this. You think it makes sense that three of the Birds would go into enemy turf looking for trouble when we got enough trouble scheduled for later that night? It don’t make sense, does it? They were out for a walk, that was all. Just out for a walk.”

“Why’d they walk over to Spanish Harlem?”

“How do I know? Maybe they just wandered over there by accident. Maybe they were looking for a little shtupie, you know? Lots of guys, they fool around with the Spanish girls. They’re very hot people, the Spanish.”

“So they walked into Spanish Harlem, just wandered over there,” Hank said, “and jumped a blind boy and stabbed him to death. And you say they’re innocent.”

“Not of stabbing him to death. Oh, they killed that little spic, all right.”

“Then of just what are they innocent?”

“Of murder,” Diablo said.

“I see.”

“This kid pulled a knife on them, didn’t you know?”

“So I’ve been told,” Hank said wearily.

“It’s the truth. I been asking around. I mean, there are some spies I know who are coolies, and really, you know, okay.”

“Coolies?”

“They don’t belong to no club.”

“Like Danny?”

Diablo did not answer. “I talked to some of these guys,” he said, ignoring Hank’s question, “and they seen the knife themselves. How about that?”

“That’s very interesting,” Hank said. “Did Danny belong to the Thunderbirds?”

“I’ll tell you something,” Diablo said, ignoring the question again. “It was self-defense for Tower and Danny. For Batman—” he shrugged — “well, Batman is a little pazzo, you know?”

“Crazy, do you mean?”

“Well, not crazy. But... slow? Stupid? You know, like he needs somebody to wipe his nose for him. He ain’t really responsible for nothing he does.”

And that was it. The nonlegal mind of Carmine (Diablo) Degenero had just, all unwittingly, provided Hank with the line of defense the opposition would use. For Batman Aposto, they would try to show mental incompetency. The boy simply did not know what he was doing and could not be held responsible for his actions. For Tower Reardon and Danny Di Pace, they would try to establish a case of justifiable homicide. The boys had killed in self-defense. They would try, in short, to get all of the boys off scot free.

Thank you, Diablo Degenero, Hank thought. I’m a little slow this morning.

“Do you want to help your friends?” he asked.

“Naturally. They’re innocent.”

“Then tell me a few things I’d like to know.”

“Go ahead.”

“Tower belongs to the club, doesn’t he?”

“Yes.”

“And Batman?”

“Yes.”

“And Danny?”

“What difference does it make?”

“It may make a lot of difference.”

“To your case, you mean? You mean you can send him to the chair quicker if he’s one of us?”

“If he’s guilty, he’ll be convicted,” Hank said. “And it has nothing whatever to do with whether he’s one of you or not. This may come as a surprise to you, but I’m only interested in the truth.”

“It comes as a surprise, all right,” Diablo said. He grinned. “In fact, it comes as a surprise whenever anybody connected with the law is interested in the truth. Around here, they’re only interested in beating hell out of you every chance they get.”

“Was Danny a member?”

“Yes and no,” Diablo said.

“What kind of an answer is that?”

“It’s the truth. You said you wanted the truth. Okay, you got it.”

“Did he belong or didn’t he?”

“I told you. Yes and no. He wasn’t exactly a coolie, but he wasn’t exactly a Bird, either. He was like— I don’t know what the hell you would call him. Like if there was a fight, he went down with us. But sometimes he didn’t. And we never pushed him.”

“How’d he achieve this status?” Hank asked.

“Huh?” Diablo said.

“He sounds like somebody special. He enjoys the gang privileges, but he doesn’t necessarily abide by the gang rules. How’d he work that?”

“Well...” Diablo paused. “There are some guys you automatically don’t mess around with. I mean, especially if he’s one of you. Don’t get me wrong. We got heart, plenty of it. And like, if we wanted to bust Danny, we coulda. But we didn’t want to. I mean, like from the very first, he made himself clear, you know? So we respected it. Also, like I said, he was sort of one of us.”

“But not actually.”

“No. Like he never bought a jacket or nothing. We got these jackets we sometimes wear, but not so much any more because the Horsemen see you wearing them they get excited and the stuff’s on. And even the cops don’t like the jackets. Jackets make everybody nervous. We hardly ever wear them. But Danny wouldn’t even buy one.”

“Did you ask him to join the club?”

“Sure. Lots of times. I mean, he’s practically one of us already. But he ain’t. He just wanted to be...” Diablo shrugged. “I can’t explain it. He’s okay, though. A down cat. We knew that right from go. Right from when he first moved around here.”

“When was that? I thought he’d lived in Harlem all his life.”

“No, no, his mother was from here. And his father, too. But they moved out to Long Island when he was a little kid. His father worked in one of the airplane factories out there. Then he lost his job, and they came back to the city. This musta been about a year and a half ago, I guess. So they came back to Harlem.”

“Did you know Danny when he was younger?”

“No. He usta live on a different block. I only met him when they moved here from Long Island.”

“Can you remember what happened?”

“Sure. You know, he was a new kid on the block. Besides, that’s when he made himself clear. I mean, where he stood. So, sure, I remember. We all remember. Right, boys?”

The boys nodded.

“What happened?” Hank asked.

“Well, it was wintertime, I remember,” Diablo said. “We had a big snow, and the plows had come through and pushed all the snow up against the curb, you know? It was a big drag, man, like who needs snow? You couldn’t drive a car or nothing for a couple of days. We were real inactive. So we were sitting right here in this candy store that afternoon. I think it was these very same guys. No. Nickie wasn’t here. It was me, and Concho, and Bud, and a kid who ain’t here, we call him Botch. We were sitting right here, in this booth, having hot chocolates. I think we were talking about gash...”

DIABLO: Listen, I’ll tell you one thing. I don’t care how much you talk about Spanish girls when none of the debs are around. But I ever hear anybody mention a spic when I’m with Carol, and I swear to God, there’s a busted head. I swear to God.

CONCHO (He is a thin boy with deep-brown eyes and black wavy hair. He is very proud of his widow’s peak, which his mother has told him is a mark of distinction in a man. He has also been told about a famous male movie star who tweezes his widow’s peak to keep it well defined. He has been tempted to use tweezers on his forehead, but he is afraid the boys would find out and consider it unmasculine. He is concerned about masculinity because his father is a drunkard whose most masculine act is beating Concho’s mother regularly and brutally. Concho is disturbed by the fact that he’s skinny. If he were huskier, he would beat up his father whenever he came near his mother. As it is, he can only stand by in impotent anger while his father, a hulk of a man, commits the unmanly act of beating a woman. Concho’s real name is Mario. He began calling himself Concho after he’d seen a Western movie in which the marshal of the town, a man named Concho, cleaned out a saloonful of toughs with his bare hands. In a street fight, Concho behaves like a wild man. He never goes into a fight unarmed, whatever the terms laid down by the war counselors. He knows he has personally stabbed fourteen spies in various rumbles. He does not know that he is responsible for having torn to shreds the ligaments in an opponent’s right hand, rendering that hand forever useless. If he knew, he would boast about it. His speech is peppered with the pseudomusical jargon of the gutter. He dresses neatly and precisely and prides himself on the fact that he always carries a clean handkerchief.): What I mean is this. Can you feature anybody actually marrying a spic chick? I mean, this is insane.

DIABLO: What’s the difference? A chick is a chick. The Spanish guys marry them, don’t they?

CONCHO: Sure, but it must drive them nuts. They’re all nymphos.

DIABLO: How the hell do you know?

CONCHO: I know. Somebody told me. You can’t never satisfy a Spanish girl. They want more and more.

DIABLO: You can’t even satisfy your hand, you shmuck. What the hell do you know about Spanish girls?

CONCHO: Listen, I know. Don’t I know, Botch?

BOTCH: Sure. He knows. (Botch is seventeen years old and enjoys a reputation as a ladies’ man. He is a good-looking boy with a magnificent profile and a thick-lipped mouth from which the name Botch — short for “Bacia mi,” Kiss me — was derived. His father works in a restaurant in the Wall Street area. His mother is dead. His older sister takes care of the house. He also has a younger brother, and he is determined to “break both his arms” if the kid ever gets involved in gang-busting. His reputation as a lover is based on the fact that he went to bed with a young married girl on the block. The gang beat up the girl’s husband when he came around looking for Botch afterward. Botch has visited the girl regularly ever since. He thinks she is afraid to refuse him, but he has never told this to the gang. The gang considers him a man of the world, and he would not shatter this illusion for anything.)

DIABLO: You ever had a Spanish girl, Botch?

CONCHO: Look who he’s asking. The master!

BOTCH (with dignity): I don’t like to talk about what I had or didn’t have.

CONCHO: Anything that walks with a skirt on, this guy has had. He’s modest. He’s a gentleman.

BOTCH (with the same dignity): If you was a girl, would you like some guy telling what he done or didn’t do with you?

CONCHO: I wouldn’t, but thank God I ain’t a girl. Besides, everybody knows about you and Alice. Even that banana she’s got for a husband.

BOTCH: Little man, there are some things we don’t talk about. Inform him, Diablo.

BUD: Hey, talkin’ about bananas.

(He gestures toward the door with his head. Danny Di Pace has just entered the candy store. Bud surveys him with unconcealed and immediate malice. There is a marked difference in the appearance of the two boys, and perhaps this is responsible for the instantaneous antagonism Bud feels. For he is truly ugly, a boy who — at the age of sixteen — is already beginning to lose his hair. His face festers with acne. His nose is gross, the bones having healed crookedly after being shattered in a street fight when he was fourteen. He is short and squat, and at one time he was called Ape by the boys. He discouraged this by beating up three members of the gang. He is now called Bud, which he considers more dashing than Charles, his given name, or Charlie, his childhood nickname. He does not like to talk about sex. He has never kissed a girl in his life. He knows this is because girls consider him ugly. Looking at Danny Di Pace, who, at the age of fourteen, stands erect and tall in the doorway of the candy store, his red hair neatly combed, surveying the place with the secure knowledge of his good looks, Bud is glad the sex talk is ending, glad this smug intruder has come into their hangout looking for trouble.)

DIABLO (whispering): Who’s that?

BUD: Beats me. He looks like a banana.

BOTCH: That’s the new kid moved in at 327. Up the block.

DIABLO: Yeah?

BOTCH: He used to live over on the next street when he was little. He just moved back from someplace out on Long Island.

DIABLO: Where on Long Island?

BOTCH: I don’t know. Someplace where they got the plane factories. His mother knows mine from when they were kids. She was up the house the other day.

DIABLO: We got branches in some Long Island towns, you know.

BOTCH: Yeah, but this guy’s a coolie, I think. Look at him.

(Danny has purchased a pack of cigarettes. He tears off the cellophane top, rips the package open and puts a cigarette between his lips. He is lighting it when Bud walks over to him.)

BUD: Hey, got a butt?

DANNY (shaking one loose, extending the pack): Sure. Help yourself. (He smiles. He is obviously making a thrust at friendship.)

BUD (taking the pack): Thanks. (He strikes the pack against his hand, shaking loose one cigarette. He tucks this behind his ear. Then he shakes loose another.) For later. (He smiles, then shakes a half-dozen cigarettes into the palm of his hand.) In case any of the boys want one. (He is about to hand the pack back to Danny. He changes his mind, shakes another half dozen into his palm.) I got a very big family, and they all smoke. (He hands Danny the near-empty pack.)

DANNY (studies it for a moment; then, handing the pack to Bud): Here. Keep the rest.

BUD (smirking): Why, thanks, kid. Hey, thanks.

DANNY: And buy me another pack. Pall Mall’s the brand.

BUD: What?

DANNY: You heard me. I ain’t running a Salvation Army soup kitchen. Those butts cost me twenty-seven cents. You can just shell out the same for a fresh pack.

BUD: You can just go to hell, little man.

(He turns to go. Danny claps his hand on Bud’s shoulder and whirls him around, then drops his hand immediately, spreading his legs wide, bunching his fists at his sides.)

DANNY: I still ain’t got the cigarettes.

BUD: You touch me again, little man, and you’re gonna get a hell of a lot more than the cigarettes. Believe me.

JOEY (coming around the counter, wiping his hands on a rag): Cut that out. I don’t want no trouble in here, you understand? (To Danny) You get out of here, you little snotnose.

DANNY: Not until he buys me a new pack of cigarettes.

BUD (turning away from him): Don’t hold your breath, kid. I ain’t—

(But Danny clamps his hand onto Bud’s shoulder a second time. This time he does not spin him around. He pulls him backward, off balance, and through the open door of the candy store, hurling him onto the street against the snow banked near the curb. Bud strikes the snow and then leaps erect, bracing himself with the natural instincts of a street fighter. It is very cold on the street and, as a result, the street is almost empty. The two boys face each other, their breaths pluming from their open mouths. Bud is the first to move. He comes at Danny with his fists clenched, and Danny sidesteps agilely and — as Bud passes — clobbers him at the back of his head, swinging both hands, which are clenched together like a mallet. Bud feels the blow. It knocks him off his feet and to the pavement. He is still on the ground when the other boys swarm out of the candy store. Concho makes a move toward Danny, but Diablo stops him.

Bud is on his feet now. There is no anger on his face. All rage has been replaced by the cold deadening logic of the battle. He knows now that Danny is not a pushover. He knows, too, that he is being watched by the other boys in the gang, and that his honor is at stake. Without hesitation, moving intuitively and economically, he reaches into his pants pocket, takes out a switch blade and snaps it open.)

BUD: Okay, pal.

DANNY: You better put that away before I ram it down your throat.

BUD: We’ll see who’s gonna ram what where!

(He charges at Danny, the knife extended. He is kicked instantly and excruciatingly in the groin, the impetus of his rush adding to the power of the blow. He doubles over, the knife still clenched in his hand. Danny reaches down, seizing him by the collar, jerking him to his feet and slamming him up against the snowbank. The knife drops from Bud’s hand. Danny hits him once, a short sharp blow that drops Bud to the pavement again. He lies there very still as Danny picks up the knife, steps on the blade and snaps it off at the handle. He reaches down for Bud then, rolls him over and counts out twenty-seven cents in change from his pocket, no more, no less. The other boys watch. Danny gets to his feet and faces them.)

DANNY: Anybody else want to settle this now? Or do I wait for some dark night to get stabbed in the back?

DIABLO: What’s your name, kid?

DANNY: Danny Di Pace. What’s yours?

DIABLO: I’ll ask the questions.

DANNY: Yeah? Ask some to your crumby friend on the sidewalk. I got better things to do than stand around with you. (He starts off down the street.)

DIABLO: Hey! Hey, Danny!

DANNY (stopping, turning): Yeah?

DIABLO (grinning): My name’s Diablo Degenero. (He pauses.) Why don’t you come have a hot chocolate?

DANNY (pausing, then returning the smile): Okay, I think I will.

“Why’d you let him get away with it?” Hank asked.

“I don’t know,” Diablo said. “Maybe ’cause Bud’s got a hot head, and the kid wasn’t really looking for no trouble. Ain’t that right, Bud?”

Sitting in the booth alongside Diablo, Bud nodded and said, “Yeah, I got a hot head. Danny’s all right. We got no bad blood between us.”

“But he beat you up,” Hank said.

“So? I tried to con him out of his butts, didn’t I? He had a right to get sore. I’da done the same thing.”

“Did he come in here for the hot chocolate?”

“Sure,” Diablo said. “We had a long talk. He told us all about where he was from.”

“Then what?”

“Then he went home. And that night we waited for him, and we beat the crap outa him. Just to let him know where he stood.”

“But I thought—”

“Oh, sure,” Diablo said, “we didn’t give it to him that afternoon. But this was a different thing. I mean, what’s right is right. Bud stepped out of line, and Danny had the right to clobber him. We only beat him up that night so he wouldn’t get the idea he could go around slamming a Thunderbird whenever he wanted to.”

“What did he do?”

“When? When we nailed him?”

“Yes.”

“Nothing. What could he do? He fought like a bastard, but we were twelve guys. We nailed him good. We almost busted his arms for him.”

“And then what?”

“Then the next day I went around to see him. I asked him to join the club. He said he didn’t want to join no club that was full of japs. I told him we were only trying to show him what was what in the neighborhood. I told him we realized he was a good man with his fists, and we’d like him on the club now.”

“What did he say?”

“He said we should shove the club. He also said that if ever we jumped him again, we’d better kill him. Because if we didn’t, if we only for example sent him to the hospital, he’d come around as soon as he could and kill the first Thunderbird he met on the street. You know something?”

“What?”

“I believed it. I told Dominick — that’s our president. Dominick said he sounded all right. He said we shouldn’t bother him again. So we never did. And, like I said, lots of times Danny’s come along with us when we go gang-busting. He’s all right.”

“Then, in effect, it’s true that he’s not a member of the Thunderbirds.”

“Yeah, that’s true. I suppose.”

“Then what was he doing with two of you on the night of July tenth?”

“You better ask him that, Mr. Bell,” Diablo said. “I guess he’s the only one who’d know.”

“I see. Thank you.” Hank rose and started to go.

“Ain’t you gonna wait for your coffee?” Diablo asked. “I ordered coffee, Mr. Bell.”

“No, thank you. I want to get back to the office.”

“A real game kid, Danny,” Diablo said. “Twelve of us beat the crap outa him. Twelve of us. And we were using bottles and everything. You know many guys who could take a beating from twelve other guys with bottles?”

“No, I don’t.”

“Think about it, Mr. Bell. It’s enough to give you the shivers. Twelve guys with bottles. Just think of it.”

“I will.”

“And you might start thinking about how innocent them three kids are. You might start thinking about that, too.”

“Might I?”

“Yeah.” Diablo paused, smiling. “It’s a shame you can’t stay for your coffee. I enjoyed the chat. It reminds me of the chat I had with Danny that afternoon — when I bought him the hot chocolate. You remember me telling you about that, don’t you, Mr. Bell? About buying him hot chocolate? And then about the twelve of us beating him up that very same night?” Diablo’s smile widened. “Boy,” he said, “it’s enough to give you the shivers.”

Their eyes met. Hank said nothing. Without haste, he walked out of the candy store.

Behind him, still smiling, Diablo said, “We’ll be seeing you, Mr. Bell.”