"I see BOI written down here everywhere."
"This has nothing to do with you."
He took the notebook with his good hand. His great chest slowly expanded. "A friend and me used to rob homes in San Francisco. I was watch; he was the window jockey. We robbed this woman once who was a piano player. This was her arm, that's why it's too short. And why the thumb and pinky," he held out the prosthesis, "are so spread apart. So she could hit the keys." He made like he was actually playing. "It was built by a gent in Northampton, England." He turned his wrist as if John Lourdes might like to see where it had been engraved. "It makes a fine club. But nothing compared to what I got here in my pocket."
He wedged the notebook between two prosthetic fingers. With his good hand he removed a short and shiny black billy stick. He slipped his hand through the rawhide strap. He started toward John Lourdes and let it hang down at his thigh so he could get a good look at it. Standing over him, McManus asked, "Does Rawbone know you're with the BOI?"
John Lourdes did not answer and the billy came down on his kidney. There was a blinding charge of pain up his back. He was asked again, and again his answer was silence. He was clinging to the bench with one elbow when he heard a whoosh of air. The next blow landed with flawless accuracy. A tide of bile came up into his mouth, but his mind was curiously clear.
"Does he know?"
John Lourdes's head hung down as he tried to wrench himself upright.
"Does he know?"
"Why don't you ask me yourself?"
Rawbone stood in the doorway with derby in hand, a burner of light behind his shadowed features.
"He's with the BOI," said McManus.
Rawbone entered the room, approaching so Emmanuel and that shotgun were always within his field of vision. He spoke directly to John Lourdes. "It looks like you didn't do as I told you back at the Mills Building. Where to keep those eyes."
The son picked up the leading tone in the father's voice and with a slight turn of body saw Rawbone had his pocket automatic concealed in the derby.
"Did you know he was with the BOI?"
"Of course, I knew."
"And you brought him into my life?"
"This has nothing to do with your life. And there was money for you in it."
"You lied to me about him."
"I thought it was the most practical solution, knowing you."
McManus flung the notebook at the father. It hit his face and landed on the wood floor near the son.
"You're a shill now for the BOL"
John Lourdes reached for the notebook. He gripped the bench to stand. Rawbone helped to get him upright.
"That's right. Get him up, dust him off. You're a Goddamn butler. A manservant."
The father looked the son over to see how bad the beating was. "By the way, Mr. Lourdes, you've had some luck tonight."
The son, at that moment, was not so sure.
"Your note. It had the effect on Mr. Hecht you wanted."
John Lourdes nodded and wiped at the blood that was running down his face and neck. "Pay your friend what it's worth. And let's get from here."
"What do you want?"
McManus turned his attention to Rawbone. "What have you become?"
"I'll need my gun back," said John Lourdes.
McManus disregarded him. "What have you become?" he repeated.
"Call your fee," said Rawbone.
McManus ordered, "Emmanuel."
The little man with the shotgun took a step forward, kicking away a bench that was in his path.
"I said, what have you become?"
"Don't do this," said Rawbone.
"What have you become?"
There was a furied determination to McManus about having that question answered. The son studied the father; he noted the slightest movement of the hand with the derby.
"We've been friends, how long?" said Rawbone.
"Answer."
"Alright. I came to this place as some would say, a common assassin. And I'll be leaving this place the same way. So now ... what's your fee?"
"What have you become?"
"Jesus, man. It's about survival, alright. My personal survival. And I don't want to hear you keep talking from the belt buckle down. What's your fee?"
"McManus!" shouted John Lourdes. "The BOI wants nothing with you."
McManus leaned into Rawbone and looked down at him and said, "You're the hole in the shithouse floor now."
"What's your fee?"
"There's more than survival."
"So you say. Now what's your fee?"
The man's head lolled to one side like a great bear, slowly, and the eyes grew small as vapor drops. "You're my fee."
"Aye, brother," said Rawbone. And just like that, before his derby hit the floor, he had wheeled about and fired his automatic repeatedly. The little man named Emmanuel had no business being behind a shotgun. He was driven back and crying out, jerked in half. The shotgun went off wildly. A gas lamp exploded, throwing stars of glass and sparks everywhere. The funeral drapes on the far wall were run with flames.
Before Rawbone could turn McManus plowed that slagheap of a body right at him and got a grip on his gun hand. He kept right on for the wall, churning his legs with Rawbone trying to break loose and the gun going off wildly. John Lourdes locked his arms around McManus's neck to pull him back, but he was too strong and using his shoulder flung the young man like he was nothing against the projector. The motor kicked on and there was the click, click, click, click, click, click of the turning sprockets and a rush of dusty light and Rawbone was battered right into the adobe.
An ugly sound came out of Rawbone as if he'd been staved clear through. He'd expended all his ammunition. The body of the dead Emmanuel lay a foot away. The shotgun angled upright across his corpse. Rawbone twisted and bent to try and get low enough to reach the weapon. John Lourdes again was right on McManus, this time bracing his arms up under the dense shoulders to pull him loose. McManus lost his footing briefly and Rawbone was able to score himself down the wall just enough for his fingers to crab around the barrel and take hold before McManus righted himself.
McManus began to yell out a pained and atavistic war cry. He used his prosthesis like a whip but he had Rawbone still in the clench of his one good arm and there wasn't enough space for a breath between them. The three were all tangled together now and they spun crazily, crashing over benches. The newsreel began to play and their shadows wraithed across the screen where President Diaz stood before an array of businessmen and dignitaries and generals and invited the viewer to come and see a burgeoning world.
The smoke from the drapes afire grayed the air. McManus now struggled backward. His boots clopped out a sidling but steady drum of steps. He was like a freight car to take down and the two men even together could not. Rawbone still had the shotgun in his grasp, working to edge his fingers down the barrel.
The three were entwined like some ancient statue from the shores of Troy within the light of the screen and across their bodies were flickering images of vast petrol fields on the Gulf and oil-slicked men with their tired faces and a lone train moving toward blanched and serrated mountains.
The drapes were a mural of smolder and flame. The men grunted like animals for each gasp of air. McManus now steadied himself and slammed John Lourdes against the adobe. He then leaned forward and the young man's boots scruffed along the wood. McManus slammed back again and the blood from the wound above John Lourdes's eye spattered over the side of McManus's face.
Rawbone gasped, "Mr. Lourdes, can you hold my friend a bit longer?"
"I can ... hold."
And now Rawbone drove the top of his head into that spur of a chin as he worked his hand down to the trigger. And John Lourdes got an arm around that bear of a head to wrench it back. And Rawbone snaked and squeezed his other arm across his body and finally he steadied up the weapon. McManus watched the barrel clock out inches till it was no longer if, but when.