Lullaby Town

'Whattaya talking about? That's horseshit.'

Sal hit Charlie with the back of his right hand so hard that Charlie staggered backward. Vito looked at Ric, and Ric made a little head move, saying he wasn't in it, and Vito nodded.

Charlie was taller than Sal, and younger, but where there was something flabby and mean about Charlie, in Sal it was hard and vibrant, even at sixty-five. The Rock. 'You're a piece of shit, Charlie.' What Charlie had said to Joey Putata. Charlie tried to cover up, but Sal slapped him again and again, steady, rhythmic shots. Sal held my Dan Wesson in his left hand and slapped with his right. 'You double-crossed the fuckin' Gambozas. You made the family into liars, and you ain't even got the balls to admit it. Be a man, Charlie. Face me and tell me that you've done this horrible thing.'

I looked at Ric again, but Ric didn't seem to be watching or hearing. His eyes were flagging closed and his head was gently bobbing in time with some dark music.

Charlie stumbled into a chair, trying to get away. His face was purple and ribbons of snot leaked down across his mouth. 'It's not true. I dint do nothing. I swear I dint.' Like a little kid.

Sal said, 'I gave them my word, Charlie. This family made peace with the other families and you've broken it. You understand that? You know what that costs?'

Charlie scrambled away from the chair and covered up against the wall. He said, 'Please, Daddy.'

Sal grabbed Charlie by the throat and shook him. 'I keep hoping you'll come around, but that day is never going to come, is it? I put you in business, I make it easy for you, but you're always gonna be a fuckup.'

Charlie slipped out of Sal's grip and fell to the floor, then tried to crawl away. Sal hit him harder, grunting with every blow.

Vito looked embarrassed and Angie looked confused and I wished I wasn't there seeing it. Sal followed his crawling son around the room, hitting him until Charlie ended up on his side, curled into a ball behind a heavy leather chair. Sal stood over him, breathing hard and hitting and saying, 'Be a man, be a man,' until finally Vito said, 'Jesus Christ, Sal,' and went over and pulled him away, lifting Sal DeLuca off his feet and talking to him and calming him down. Moving the Rock.

Then it was over. Sal stood in the center of the room, the Dan Wesson at his side, breathing hard and watching his blubbering adult child for what seemed like forever. Maybe violent insanity ran in the family.

He shook his head and seemed to see me again, as if for a time I was gone but had now returned. 'Okay,' he said. 'Karen Lloyd walks. Is that what you want?'

'Part of it. There's something else.'

'What?'

'The woman who died in Brooklyn.' I looked at Ric. 'He pulled the trigger. I want you to give him up to the cops.'

Ric moved the steel-girder shoulders and peeled himself away from the bookshelves, the leather jacket falling open.

Sal looked at Ric and then looked back at me. 'I ain't never gave one of my people up to the cops and I never would. My guys know that.'

Ric made a little smile.

'That's the deal, Sal. Take it or leave it.'

Sal the Rock DeLuca shook his head. 'No cops.' He raised the Dan Wesson, aimed it between my eyes, then turned and shot Ric once in the chest.

Ric saw it coming and yelled, 'No!' and tried to move, but the slug caught him. It pushed him back into the bookshelves and then his heels slid out from beneath him and he fell to the floor.

Charlie made a gargling sound and whimpered.

Ric tried to get up, but his feet kept slipping.

Sal shot him again.

Ric clawed under his jacket and came out with his gun.

Sal shot him twice more, smoke from the caps rolling across the room like smog spilling through the Glendale Pass into the San Fernando Valley.

There were shouts in another part of the house and the sound of men running and then someone was banging on the door. Freddie came in first.

Sal was as calm as if he had taken out the trash. 'Freddie, get a couple of those big plastic bags and take care of this.'

Freddie swallowed and stumbled backward out of the room.

Sal looked down at his son and then looked at me, his eyes empty and bottomless. 'Good enough?'

I nodded.

'Okay, you got what you want. Now I get what I want. The Gambozas must never know. What we speak of here stays here, buried forever. Will you bury this? Will you keep my kid safe?' Sal and Karen Lloyd, each worried about their children.

I nodded again. 'We bury it. We keep everyone safe.'

Vito said, 'We got loose ends, Sal. Other people know.'

Sal said, 'We'll take care of the loose ends, Vito.' He looked back at me. 'You want anything else?'

'No.'

'Then it's a done deal. Get the fuck out of my sight.'

CHAPTER THIRTY SIX

I walked out of Sal DeLuca's brownstone to a fine powder of snow on the streets and the sidewalks and the cars parked at the curb. The air was cold and the Manhattan skyline to the east was clear and pink in anticipation of the rising sun. To the west and the north, though, the clouds were still heavy and dense and promising more snow. The drunk was gone, but the little cardboard house remained, quiet and white in the early morning light. Cars belched fog-breath out on Fifth and 62nd, and men and women in heavy coats walked fast along the sidewalks, leaving gray trails. Somewhere there was music playing, but I didn't hear the notes clearly and couldn't make out the song. I slipped a twenty-dollar bill into the little cardboard house and went back to the Taurus.

I drove across Central Park, then up through the city and the Bronx and Yonkers and White Plains. I drove slowly and listened to a pretty good classic rock station that played a lot of John Fogerty and CCR. Run Through the Jungle. Nothing like a little Creedence Clearwater Revival at six in the morning after spending the night with the Godfather. Four miles above White Plains, I pulled into a rest stop overlooking a lake and started to shake. I shook for what seemed like hours but was probably only a couple of minutes. I let the motor run and the Taurus's heater pump on high, but I wasn't shaking from the cold.

A tan and white RV was parked broadside to the view, and had probably been there all night. A man and a woman in their sixties came out with coffee cups and went to the rail, looking out at the lake. They watched the lake for a while and sipped the coffee and held hands. When they turned and came back to the RV, the woman gave me a friendly smile. The license plate on their little mobile house said Utah.

At a quarter to ten I parked on the street in front of May Erdich's house. Toby and Joe Pike were standing in brown leaves and snow, tossing a beat-up Wilson football, and Peter was sitting on May's front step, watching them. Peter looked cold.

Karen Lloyd came out of the front door as I went up the walk.

I said, 'It's over.'

She shook her head, like maybe I was lying. 'You got Charlie to go along?' Pike and Toby stopped throwing the ball. Toby ran over to stand by his mother.

'Sal. Charlie doesn't have anything to do with it anymore. It's Sal, and Sal says you're out of it. Charlie will do whatever Sal says.'

She gripped one hand with the other. 'I can stay at the bank?'

'Yes.'

'No more Charlie? No more deposits?'