Pagan Babies

26

TERRY WANTED TO RIDE IN front with Vito Genoa, maybe this time mention the cigarette business, try to get next to the guy and find out what was going on. Were they getting the check or not? But Vito said no, he had to ride in back. After that Vito pretty much kept his mouth shut. Terry did mention the cigarette business, but all Vito said was, "Yeah?" It was a quiet ride along the freeways, nothing to see.

Once they got to Fran's house it was a different story. Vito got out of the car to tell him face-to-face, "You gonna leave tomorrow, Father. I pick you up at nine and we go out to Metro. That means you gonna be right here."

"I told you," Terry said, "I don't have return flights."

"It's taken care of," Vito said.

"Do I leave without the check?"

"Don't worry about it."

"Does Debbie have it, Miss Dewey?"

"It's none of my business," Vito said. "I see you at nine."

"That won't give us time to deposit the check."

And Vito said it again, "Don't worry about it."

Fran let him in, Fran asking questions from the moment Terry stepped inside, and Terry said, "Let me get something to eat, okay?

I'm starving." Almost nine-thirty and he hadn't eaten anything since lunch, one of Mary Pat's famous minced ham sandwiches. Mary Pat was on the phone in the library talking to her mother, talking to her for the past hour. Fran said they talked two or three times every day; how could they have that much to say to each other? Terry had another minced ham sandwich, potato chips and a beer while he answered Fran's questions up to and including the photo session with Anthony Amilia and Debbie having to stay; he didn't mention being picked up tomorrow at nine. Maybe he wouldn't be here.

While they were talking two things happened at the same time: the front doorbell rang, and Mary Pat came in with the girls to say good night to Uncle Terry.

The door opened and the Mutt said, "I'm looking for Fr. Dunn.

You his brother?"

This kind of porky fella said yes he was and asked, "Is he expecting you?" Like he wasn't going to let him in otherwise.

"Yeah, I'm suppose to see him."

The porky fella hesitated like maybe he didn't believe him. He said, "By any chance did Mr. Amilia send you?"

The Mutt felt the right answer would get him in and he said, "Yes, sir, he did."

It opened the door all the way. The porky fella motioned, this way, and the Mutt followed him out to the kitchen. There was the priest in his black suit turning to look this way, and a woman and two cute little girls, the Mutt thinking, Shit. Now what'm I suppose to do?

The porky brother said, "This gentleman has something for you, Terry, from Tony Amilia."

This gentleman-the Mutt had never heard that one before. He just nodded.

The woman, their mom, was telling the little girls now to leave the pictures where they werea bunch of photos they were looking at on the high kitchen table-and kiss Uncle Terry good night. She said to the Mutt, "We'll get out of your way."

He said, "Much obliged." But shit, those little girls were going to make it hard for him to do the job he'd come for; he sure didn't want to have to shoot the mom and dad and their little girls. The priest got down so they could hug and kiss him. Then they ran out of the kitchen, their mom and dad shooing them and also leaving. It was the priest that spoke first.

Saying, "I want to thank you for helping me catch my breath the other night. I had all the wind knocked out of me."

"Yeah, you took a shot, didn't you?"

The Mutt could hear the little girls talking loud to their mom and dad, wanting something, their little voices saying please please please.

Shit. He didn't need that. The priest was finishing a sandwich, taking the last bite and wiping his mouth with a paper napkin.

This was when the phone rang. It rang twice and stopped in the middle of a ring, somebody in another room picking up a receiver.

The priest said, "You have something from Mr. Amilia? It wouldn't be a check by any chance."

"No, I don't have any check."

"Okay, then what's it about?"

The Mutt saw the priest looking past him and turned to see the porky brother in the doorway. He said, "It's for you."

"Debbie?"

"Your friend. He sounds like he's out of breath. Said he's been trying to get you but the line's been busy."

His friend, which gave the Mutt an idea who it was. He said, "Is that Johnny?"

The porky brother said, "Yeah, you know him?"

"I met him a couple times."

The brother left and the Mutt turned to see the priest with the wall phone, standing there facing the cabinets listening, like he didn't dare look this way. Well, there wouldn't be any surprise now, the priest getting the word from that son of a bitch Johnny, the priest acting like it was just any phone call from a friend, saying, "Uh-huh," saying,

"No, uh-unh," putting on an act. The Mutt slipped his hand into his leather coat to take hold of the Glock. He wondered if the priest would piss his pants when he saw it. Now the Mutt glanced at the pictures the little girls had been looking at. He saw a bunch of little nigger kids playing on hard pack. Some others digging what looked like yams. They'd have to be the orphans over there, the ones the money was suppose to go to help.

He was hanging up the phone now, taking his time to look this way.

The Mutt said, "I'll tell you something I don't understand. You see pictures of skin'n bones starving nigger kids, they always have flies all over 'em. Not so much these, but what're flies doing there if there's nothing to eat?"

"Dead people," the priest said, "attract the flies."

He came over to where the pictures were, at one end of the high kitchen table, saying, "Let me show you," and reached into a canvas bag-the Mutt ready to draw the Glock and do it right then. But the priest's hand came out of the bag with a stack of pictures wrapped with green rubber bands he took off and then laid the pictures out on the table with the others, saying, "Over a half-million people were murdered while I was there." The Mutt looked and saw dead bodies, skeletons, some that looked like old dried-up pieces of leather, bits of cloth stuck to bones, all of 'em laid out flat on a concrete floor. He had never seen anything like this in his life, but for some reason it reminded him of prison, Southern Ohio Correctional. He heard the priest say, "I was there. I saw these people and about thirty more in the church that day. I saw them murdered, most of them hacked to death with machetes, like this one."

The Mutt looked up, saw the priest turn from the counter behind him holding a big goddamn machete, raising it and saying now, "This was used to kill some of them." He held it to one side like he was ready to slash with it and the Mutt wasn't sure he could get his gun out in time. Go to shoot somebody and get your goddamn head cut off. The priest surprised him then.

He said, "Tell me something. You're supposed to be a hit man-how many people have you killed?"

The Mutt, still holding on tight to the gun in his coat pocket, said,

"I've shot three.., no, four. And I shanked one."

"That must've been in prison."

"Yes, it was."

"Well, I shot four Hums with a Russian pistol," the priest said,

"one right after the other, like ducks at a shooting gallery."

"What're Hums?"

"The bad guys at that time," the priest said. "I wonder if I could've done it with this, hack them to death like they did these poor people in the church. You should've heard the screams."

"I bet."

The priest started hefting the weapon like he was feeling the weight of it, getting it balanced just right in his hand, ready to swing it.

The Mutt felt his shoulders hunch.

The priest said, "You know what? I believe I could use it if I had to."

"I'd have to be good and drunk," the Mutt said, "cut a man down like a tree. Why'd they do it?"

"The same old story," the priest said. "Poor people killed the ones that weren't as poor. They got juiced up on banana beer and went crazy."

"Banana beer'll do that, huh? Southern Ohio Correctional," the Mutt said, "we made shine'd give you the worst headache you ever had, turn you mean. There was a riot while I was there? V/hat you said reminded me. Six cons in L Block and a guard got killed, beaten to death. They set fire to anything'd burn and busted what didn't.

You wonder what gets into people, don't you?"

"They killed children, too," the priest said. "These orphans're some that are left." He looked up then, placing the machete on the table, and said, 'I'll tell you what happened, Mutt. I believe that's your name?"

"Yes, it is."

"I asked Tony Amilia if he'd help me feed these starving children.

Look at this one, picking through a garbage dump. Tony said yeah, he'd get the money from Randy. You probably know about that."

"You're right," the Mutt said, "and Randy didn't want to give it to him."

"But Tony made him, didn't he? Randy gave him two hundred and fifty thousand dollars that was supposed to be for these children, but Tony kept it for himself. I haven't seen one nickel of it."

It caused the Mutt to frown and squint.

"You understand what I'm saying?" "Yeah, but I already got paid."

"To get rid of Vincent Moraco, wasn't it? Johnny told me on the phone."

"No, I got half up front to hit Mr. Moraco. But it was him, Mr.

Moraco, paid me to hit you."

For a moment there the priest looked confused, but said, "To keep me from getting Randy's money, right?"

"Yeah…?"

"And I didn't. Tony's got it. You want to shoot somebody, go shoot Tony. You got no business with me." The priest turned to the pictures again. "Unless you want to give something to feed these poor orphans. Look at these little fellas here. Look at their eyes."

Fran and Mary Pat were on the sofa in the library watching television.

They both looked up as Terry came in, Terry wearing a white shirt now and jeans. "He's gone?" Fran said.

"Yeah, he left."

Fran said, "He has to be the weirdest-looking gangster I've ever seen. What'd he want?"

"He heard about the orphan fund," Terry said, "and stopped by to make a contribution." He saw Mary Pat giving him her cool appraising eye as he held up a wad of bills. "Five thousand dollars, cash."

"He had that much in his pocket?"

"I guess he just got paid," Terry said. "You never know where it's gonna come from, do you?"

Mary Pat kept looking at him, but still didn't say anything, holding his gaze as he stood there.

Fran said, "Will you please sit down and talk to us?"

"When I get back," Terry said.

He went over and kissed Mary Pat on the cheek.

"I got to go see Debbie."