Callahan took the meanest-looking of Costello?s mutts, squared off in a fighting stance, and as the
goon closed in on him, kicked him in the jaw. The toe of his sneaker was loaded with ball bearings, It
burst open like a squashed grapefruit, and steel marbles rattled all over the floor. Callahan?s target
destroyed a typing stand and landed in a corner, spitting out his front teeth.
The floor was covered with ball bearings. It looked like amateur night at the roller derby, everybody
dilly-dancing on the things like three-year-olds at ballet school.
Charlie One Ear, who had seemed a little overweight to me and far too elegant to mix it up with this
bunch, slid out of his tweed jacket, spun around on the ball of one foot, kicked a goon in the
diaphragm with a perfectly aimed toe-shot, slashed him across the temple with the flat of his hand,
and was hack on both feet before the goon hit the floor. A lovely little pas seul.
Zapata relied on nothing more than his fists, waltzing across the ball-bearinged floor and hitting any
and all targets of opportunity.
The Stick picked Drack Moreno and they went at it, Moreno outweighing him by twenty pounds and
outreaching him by three inches, a condition Stick quickly remedied by first kicking Moreno in the
kneecap, then pulling a handkerchief loaded with silver dollars from his pocket and swinging it
around and around like a bob. It caught Moreno more than once. Moreno?s face bunched up in pain.
„The Stick hit him in the throat. Moreno?s tongue almost hit the far wall. His eyes crossed. He gasped
for air. Zapata stepped in and flattened Moreno with a lovely one-two, a short jab to the face, followed
by a gorgeous right uppercut to the jaw.
The Stick?s silver dollars and Salvatore?s pool cue finished off Weasel Murphy, who made the
mistake of trying to get up off the floor.
Charlie One Ear gave another of his brief karate demonstrations and put another one away.
Salvatore held the last of Costello?s strongarms by the collar of his shirt at arm?s length and was
socking him, almost casually, in the face, over and over again, with his pool cue.
Dutch ended the melee with two shots into the ceiling.
All motion was suspended.
“Verdammt, Salvatore, drop that guy!” he boomed.
Salvatore opened his hand and let him go, the tough dropping face first into a typewriter that lay on
the floor.
Weasel Murphy groaned and slid down the wall.
The asshole with the mouse now had a pair of mice and no front teeth.
Drack Moreno?s face looked like Omaha Beach on June seventh.
To my knowledge, not one of the hooligans had suffered so much as a bruise, except for Cowboy
