I nodded. Hawk released his grip on John Porter’s hair and Porter straightened. He walked away from Hawk with his head down.
“You fucked yourself,” Major said without any particular emotion. “You dead, motherfucker.”
“Not likely,” Hawk said.
Major stood silently for a moment, looking at Hawk, then he looked at me.
“Enjoy yourself, slut,” he said to Jackie. And his face broke into a wide smile.
Then he turned and nodded at the gang. They followed him, and in a moment they were gone and all there was, was the two birds across the street, chirping.
CHAPTER I3
We were back in Hawk’s car. Jackie in back this time, Hawk and I in the front seat. Both of us had shotguns.
“Would you like to reprise all of that for me?” Jackie said.
“Kid’s playing a game,” Hawk said.
“The leader? Major?”
“Un huh.”
“Well, could you explain the game?”
Hawk grinned back at her over his shoulder. “Un uh,” he said.
“Well, I mean, is it turf?” Jackie said.
“Sure it’s turf, but it’s more,” Hawk said.
“I didn’t even understand half what he was saying,” Jackie said.
“Gangs have their own talk,” Hawk said.
“You didn’t understand it either,” Jackie said.
“Not all of it. Got the drift though.”
“I wonder if he’s trying to see how you’ll act?” I said to Hawk.
“He’s heard of me?” Hawk said.
Hawk considered everything genuinely. He had almost no assumptions.
“Maybe,” I said. I looked at Jackie. “I don’t want to hear any of this on The Marge Eagen Show. ”
“No,” Jackie said. “Unless I warn you, it’s background only. Okay?”
I nodded.
“Maybe Major has heard of you. Maybe you are a kind of ghetto legend, like Connie Hawkins was on the New York playgrounds, say, for different reasons…”
“Who’s Connie Hawkins?” Jackie said.
“Basketball player,” Hawk said. He kept his eyes on me. “Yeah?”
“So maybe Major wants to learn,” I said. Hawk nodded slowly and kept nodding.
“Learn how to handle trouble?” Jackie said.
“How a man behaves,” Hawk said. He kept nodding. “That’s why they haven’t just done a driveby and sprayed us.”
“Which is not to say they won’t,” I said.
“But if he want to learn, he will escalate slow,” Hawk said.
“And observe, and if it goes right for him, maybe he can win over his father.”
“Father?” Jackie said.
Hawk grinned again. “Spenser got a shrink for a girlfriend,” he said. “Sometimes he get a little fancy.”
“I try not to use any big words, though. I respect your limitations.”
“Limitations?” Hawk said. “I got no limitations. Why you think I’m a ghetto legend?”
“Beats me,” I said.
CHAPTER 14
“So what’s she like?” Susan said.
We were having a supper, which I’d cooked, and sipping some Sonoma Riesling, in the kitchen of what Susan now insisted on calling “our house.”
“Well, she’s brave as hell,” I said. “When the guns came out this morning, she hit the pavement facedown, but she kept her tape recorder going.”
Susan moved some of her chicken cutlet about in the wine lemon sauce I had made.
