Butcher's Moon

Thirty-three

When Parker got back to Lozini’s house, two burly men in the front hall stopped their conversation to look at him. One said, “You looking for somebody, friend?”

Parker glanced at them. “Which one brought the army? Not Faran, not Simms, not Walters. You’re with Dulare.”

“You want to see somebody?”

“Not you,” Parker said, and headed for the living room. When they made a move at him he showed a gun. “Go in ahead of me,” he said.

They glared at the gun and frowned at one another. Slowly they started to raise their hands.

“I didn’t tell you to put your hands up,” Parker said. “I told you to go into the living room.”

They were reluctant to do it, to walk into their employer’s presence at the end of somebody else’s gun, but there just wasn’t any choice. Looking twice as tough as usual, hunching their shoulders so they looked as though they were wearing football equipment, they turned and went through the archway into the living room.

The four men in conversation over by the far window glanced casually, and then with curiosity and surprise, toward the new arrivals. Only one of them had a face Parker didn’t know, so that one must be Dulare. Talking to Dulare, Parker said, “Are these yours?”

Dulare, a tall tanned man with an autocratic manner, frowned deeply, saying, “What’s the problem?”

Frank Faran was suddenly grinning. “Mr. Dulare,” he said, “meet Mr. Parker. Mr. Parker, Mr. Dulare.”

“I know who it is,” Dulare said. “I want to know what he thinks he’s doing.”

One of the tough boys said, “We didn’t know who he was, Mr. Dulare.”

Faran, still grinning, said, “They braced him, Ernie, that’s what happened.”

It was clear that Dulare didn’t like any of this. He was mad at his bodyguards and mad at Parker, but he obviously realized he couldn’t say anything to either of them without somehow making a fool of himself, so he turned on Faran, saying, “I don’t need your help, Frank.”

Faran, offended, stopped grinning. After a second he shrugged and turned away and ostentatiously sipped from his drink.

Parker said to Dulare, “Send these two home.”

“They stay with me,” Dulare said. “And put that gun away, nobody’s showing guns around here.”

A pair of imitation Victorian chairs flanked an imitation Sheraton drop-leaf table on the opposite side of the room. Parker pointed the pistol toward them, saying, “Tell them to sit over there. I’m here to talk, not waste time.”

Frowning again, Dulare said, “Who called this meeting, you or Lozini?”

“I’m doing Lozini’s talking for him.”

Walters said to Dulare, “When I got here, Harold told me we were supposed to wait for either Al or Parker.”

Dulare hesitated, then made an angry sweeping gesture with his arm, telling his two men, “Go on over there, take a seat.”

They hulked away, aggravated and upset, and Parker put his pistol back out of sight. He said to Dulare, “How much do you know about what’s going on?”

“I know about you,” Dulare said. “You’re causing trouble. Where’s Al Lozini?”

Parker said, “Have you heard from Buenadella?”

“Dutch? What about?”

Parker looked at Faran, then Simms, then Walters. He said to Walters, “Doesn’t anybody tell this man anything?”

Walters spread pudgy hands. “We didn’t know, of course, if he, uh . . .” He gestured helplessly; it was intended to be a delicate motion, a subtle one, but with Walters’ ungainliness it came out as a kind of lumpish dance movement.

Still, Parker got the idea; Lozini hadn’t known whether he was being attacked by Buenadella or Dulare, so he’d kept them both in the dark.

Dulare had turned on Walters. “What’s going on. Jack?”

“Dutch is trying to take over,” Walters said.

“From Al?” Dulare sounded unconvinced.

“It’s true, Ernie,” Faran said. He seemed to take a vindictive pleasure in giving Dulare bad news. “Dutch has been setting it up for a couple years.”

Dulare frowned around at everybody, then said to Walters, “Tell me about it.”

“Let Parker tell you,” Walters said. “I think he knows more about it than I do.”

Dulare gave Parker a suspicious look. “All right,” he said. “What is it?”

Parker said, “The reform candidate, Farrell, is Buenadella’s man. The finish of the scheme is Farrell taking over as mayor from Wain. Buenadella already talked to some of the other people around the country that he needs okays from. I figured maybe he talked to you, too.”

Dulare’s attention had been caught; he was no longer irritable because of the defusing of his bodyguards. He said, “Who says Farrell belongs to Buenadella?”

“He does. I asked him.”

“And he just told you?”

“I had a gun in my hand.”

“Christ Almighty.” Dulare looked around at the other three. “What the hell is going on around here?”

Walters said, “We wouldn’t have known anything about it until it was too late, except for Parker and his friend stirring things up.”

Parker said to Dulare, “You’re sure Buenadella didn’t talk to you?”

“No,” Dulare said. Then he said, “I see what you’re driving at. No, he wouldn’t come to me in front. Dutch and I aren’t that close, and he knows I’m a good friend with Al. He’d come around afterwards, when Al was out and he was in and everything was set. Then I’d go along with him, because it would be stupid to start a war after the game’s over.”

“All right.” Parker turned to Simms. “How much has Buenadella got?”

Simms blinked at him, terror hiding behind confusion. “What?”

“He’s been skimming from Lozini’s take,” Parker said. “Plus my seventy-three thousand. He’s had expenses, with Farrell’s campaign and some of Lozini’s people he’s bought, so how much does he have left?”

“How should I know?” Simms jittered inside his dudish clothing like a dressed-up turkey.

“Because you went over to him,” Parker said. “He couldn’t have skimmed from Lozini without you.”

“That’s a lie!”

The others all looked at Simms, and Parker said, “Don’t waste time, Simms. How much does he have left?”

Faran suddenly said, wonderingly, “It’s that honey blonde of yours.”

Simms, as though grateful at the chance to concentrate on anyone but Parker, turned his head toward Faran, saying, “What? What, Frank?”

“What’s her name? Donna. You brought her around to the club a few times, Nate, you were happy as a nun with a new habit.”

“Frank, I didn’t—”

Dulare said, “Nate, if you tell another lie, I’ll have my two boys over there redeem themselves by walking on your head.”

“Ernie, you don’t think I’d—”

Simms stopped talking when Dulare pointedly turned toward the two burly men over on the Victorian chairs. There was a little silence while Simms worked it out in his head. Parker was impatient and angry, but this was a moment when it was better to hang back, let the group find its own pace, work things out for itself.

Simms said, in a small voice, “Ernie, I never would have—”

“For God’s sake,” Dulare said, “don’t give me excuses.”

“Reasons, Ernie. Not excuses, reasons.”

Parker said, “How much is left, Simms? What does Dutch have in the war fund?”

“Ernie,” Simms said, pleadingly, “just let me ex—”

“Answer the man,” Dulare said.

Simms hung fire, driven by the need to explain himself yet held by the requirement to obey. Finally, his voice barely above a whisper, he looked away from Dulare and said, “About forty-five thousand.”

“Not enough,” Parker said. “I came here for seventy-three thousand.”

“That’s not the problem,” Dulare said. His attention was still on Simms.

“Yes, it is,” Parker told him. “And it’s your problem, because Lozini’s dead, and now it’s a tug of war between you and Buenadella.”

They all stared at him. Dulare said, “Al’s dead? Since when?”

“He wasn’t sure,” Parker said, “if the guy climbing up his back was Buenadella or you. He went to Harold Calesian to find out, and Calesian killed him.”

“That cop?”

“The body is in Calesian’s living room,” Parker said. “Calesian and Buenadella are going to say that I did it.”

Dulare watched him carefully. “Where are you headed?” he said. “What’s on your mind?”

“My partner and I,” Parker said, “went to make a deal with Buenadella. When we were coming out, my partner got shot. I was sent a message that he was still alive and I could come get him. They’ll send me a finger a day to prove he isn’t dead.”

“Buenadella?” Dulare shook his head. “Dutch wouldn’t do anything like that. He wouldn’t even think of it.”

“Calesian,” Parker said. “Once things got rough, Buenadella folded. Calesian is running things.”

“Calesian can’t run anything except hookers,” Dulare said.

Faran said, “But by God, that sounds like his style, Ernie. A finger a day, that does sound like our Harold.”

“All right,” Dulare said. Back to Parker, he said, “So what do you want?”

“Seventy-three thousand dollars and my partner. You peopie have the manpower. I want you to send people with me to Buenadella’s. I’ll get my partner out, I’ll get my money, I’ll leave.”

Dulare shook his head. “No way.”

“Why not? You and Buenadella are in a war now anyway.”

“No, we’re not. I’ll call Dutch right now and tell him we’ll stay equal, him in his area, me in mine.” Dulare gave a thin smile, saying, “He won’t try anything with me. I’m not as old as Al, or as trusting.”

Parker said, “You’re not going to leave my partner there, and you’re not going to hold back my seventy-three thousand.”

“I’m not going to move a muscle,” Dulare said. “If Al’s dead, there’s no problem any more. I don’t give a damn about Wain, I’m just glad as hell to hear that Farrell’s already been bought. All you bring me is good news.”

“You’re making a mistake,” Parker said.

Faran, looking worried, said, “Ernie, maybe we ought to—”

“We do nothing,” Dulare said. Looking at Parker, his expression flat, he said, “Your problems are your own. And if you’ll take my advice, you’ll leave Tyler on the next plane. No matter where it’s going.”

“You’ve just lost a home,” Parker said, and left.