The first thing I did was thank everyone for coming and then didn't waste any time but got right down to business.
"Okay," I said, "was anybody able to bring a gun?"
"I brought my Colt," said Captain Pierce. He held his gun up in the air to show it.
"Look at that thing," said Hal. "It's rustier than Sal's act."
"Does it even fire anymore?" asked Peewee.
"Haven't shot it since…," said the Captain, trying to remember.
"Okay," I said. "Anybody else?"
"I got my derringer," said Peewee.
"No need for personal confessions at a time like this," said Miss Belinda, and the crowd broke up. As soon as the mirth died down, Marge farted, a sound like she was sitting on a string of firecrackers. "I got a Gatling gun," she said. More laughter, and Jack Bunting faked passing out.
I had no choice but to wait. When things had quieted down, I asked Sal for the stick of dynamite. He stood and rather ceremoniously handed it over to me. "My wife's cousin is a foreman on one of the blasting teams working on the subway tunnels. He snitched this stick but said it's only a half of a real stick from an old batch and is probably pretty unstable to boot."
"Just what I wanted to hear," said Hal.
"A light touch is probably a good idea," said Sal retaking his seat.
I gingerly placed the dynamite down on the windowsill behind me. "So that's it on the weapons then," I said.
"I've got my knives, of course," said Pierce.
"And I've got a straight razor out in the car," said Jack.
"Don't discount the ferocity of my pigeons should I command them to attack," said Miss Belinda.
"Excellent," I said and then launched into my somewhat prepared speech about the dangers we'd be facing. I didn't get very far before Hal interrupted me.
"Diego, look, I told them all this stuff already. Save the gas. This loathsome fuck has Tommy, wants to take this fine young woman's blood"-he pointed to Morgan-"would have the likes of us either sterilized or erased, and worst of all considers himself a patriot. We understand, bullets, mayhem, whatever. We're determined to whack this guy and get Schell back. Case closed. Why get maudlin?"
There was a huge round of applause, and I wasn't sure whether it was for the fact that he'd cut short my oration or had done such a fine job himself. I noticed even Isabel and Antony were clapping, so I hoped it was the latter.
"Okay, Okay," I said. "Before I get to the particulars, I was wondering if you had anything to add, Antony?"
Antony looked at me and nodded. He stepped forward and addressed the crowd. "Besides the guns, one thing I wanted to warn you all about is when we're in the middle of this, if you happen to see a huge white guy charging at you, drop whatever you're doing and run your ass off."
"Shit," said Captain Pierce, "I've been practicing that my whole life."
"This guy's the whitest guy you ever saw," said Antony, "and he's got a head like a fucked-up Thanksgiving gourd with teeth. He could break your neck with his bare hands."
"Is he single?" asked Miss Belinda.
It was close to midnight by the time I finally could explain what I wanted each of them to do. The second I was finished, though, like some magic trick itself, they snapped to and set about the various tasks I'd assigned.
Isabel and Hal started making gasoline bombs out of old jars and strips of cloth. Sal Coots instructed Peewee and Marge in the fine art of papier-mвchй as he tore long strips from Antony's old newspapers. Morgan searched for a pair of scissors. Jack and Antony and Pierce planned a harness made of trouser belts for the spider boy. The house was a beehive of activity until well past four in the morning.
Once everyone had finally bedded down on the various couches and on blankets on the floor, I decided to go in and join Isabel for a few hours of sleep. Heading through the living room, I walked by the lounger that the Captain was sitting in. I thought he was asleep, but as I passed he reached out and tugged my shirtsleeve. He looked up at me with his clouded eyes.
"From one captain to another," he said, "when the battle is on, the only real enemy is Doubt." Having said that, he closed his eyes and leaned his head back.
It was crowded in bed. Besides Isabel on my right, lightly snoring, Doubt was to my left, tossing and turning, elbowing me in the ribs and talking in its sleep.
BREAK A LEG
It was midday and Antony and I sat at a table by the front window of a coffee shop that faced out on that main street that ran through the little town we now knew to be Fort Solanga. We were on a third cup of coffee each, silent as statues both, waiting for a sign. The street was empty save for an ancient Negro with a cane, sitting on a bench on the corner across from us, near the general store. We'd been there more than an hour, and the waitress was looking at us a little suspiciously.
"Here we go," Antony whispered.
I turned just in time to see a pigeon flutter down out of the sky and land directly on the head of the old man on the bench. It stayed perched there for nearly a minute before lifting off again. Then the man got up and headed west on the sidewalk. He was nearly out of sight when he passed a small shop. At that instant, an exceedingly heavyset woman, filling nearly the entire sidewalk, exited the place. She moved slowly eastward, stopping often for lingering looks in the shop windows.
A black Model A Ford appeared, heading west down the street. It stopped just past our coffee shop, turned around in the middle of the road so as to be heading east, and pulled up at the curb in front of the general store. Two men dressed in black suits got out of the car and went into the store.
The fat woman proceeded down the street toward the corner, still taking her time. There then appeared, passing by our window, a small disfigured fellow, a legless cripple. He was atop a makeshift dolly and pulled himself along the sidewalk, using his hands, heading west. Another man, with a scrawny physique and a bobbing Adam's apple, hat pulled down to cover his eyes, left a shop across the street from us, and passed the fat woman, heading east, his hands in his pockets, his lips pursed, whistling.
By the time the black-suited men exited the general store the heavy woman had reached it and was looking in its window. The two men got in the car, and the motor came to life. The thin man with the pulled-down hat turned around as if he'd forgotten something and began heading back toward the general store. As the Ford pulled away, the woman turned with a speed that belied her girth, took three steps, the last off the curb, and walked right into the front fender of the car. She went down with a thud that might possibly have cracked the asphalt. The car stopped, and the two men got out. The woman was lying in the road, writhing and screaming.
The woman's cries covered the rattling of the cripple's wheeled board as he crossed the street and headed for the scene of the accident. The two men in black, with a show of great exertion, helped the heavy woman to her feet. The thin man, who'd also come to the woman's assistance, reached down and picked up her pocketbook and hat. She put her hat on, took her pocketbook, and then, as if in answer to a question one of the men had asked her, nodded her head, drying her tears with the handkerchief she'd pulled from her purse. The thin man, seemingly satisfied that his help was no longer needed, broke away from the group and continued down the street.
By this time, the cripple had positioned his rolling board directly behind the Model A and lay down flat upon it. As the heavy woman stepped back onto the sidewalk, the thin man stepped down off the curb into the street as if to cross it, turned quickly, and with his right foot shoved the cripple on the dolly under the car.