Crook Manifesto (Ray Carney, #2)(30)
Munson pointed at the red-and-black ceramic imp and claimed to have a funny story about how it came into his possession. Carney had been correct—it was a souvenir of a big night out, in this case when Munson and Webb put the squeeze on a massage parlor in Chinatown. He tuned out the story, distracted by what awaited as morning approached.
“You want it?” Munson said. “Maybe sell it in your store as a decorative piece.”
Carney declined.
“I’d have to get my cut.”
“You take your cut, Munson.”
“You’re looking at me like, why all this tonight?” Given the night’s adventures, his face remained untroubled. “The money comes in, the money goes out. I have a boat. It is a very nice boat, keep it in Bay Shore and I can’t take it on the plane. You know how it is. You bought those two buildings?”
“Yes.”
“Heard about that. I had a piece of a building once.” Munson lit a cigarette. “They have a saying at the DA’s office: Detectives are poor in their twenties, rich in their thirties, and in jail in their forties. Which is a fucking insult, because I made plenty of money in my twenties.”
“There’s still the jail part.”
“We’re here to head that off at the pass.”
The bedroom door had been closed since Carney returned from El Charrito. The money was no longer on the table, so he assumed that’s where it went. How much did Munson take in tonight? Enough to find a hidey-hole and fix it up nice, and off the jewelry when he got settled. He noticed one of Munson’s guns on the rickety coffee table, next to two empty beer cans. Was the other one in the ankle holster? He couldn’t tell.
Munson rose to get a better view of the street. “That him now?” It wasn’t. “The view from our place—my place—on Fifty-fourth is something out of a postcard, but I’m starting to like this one better.” He yawned. “It’s not so lit up this late, so it’s like a person: getting shut-eye, looking peaceful after a long day.”
The snub nose of the building reminded Carney of the prow of a ship. The director’s chair wasn’t the helm but the crow’s nest, allowing a survey of the dark blue motion of the city night. Munson’s head dipped drowsily. Carney saw him fight it off. For all his bravado, the vicious front tonight, the detective was spent. The days when the streets were his streets and he swaggered through with rude and rowdy charisma were over. He wasn’t the same man he’d been ten years before. It was 1971 and the man and his city were versions of themselves, embers burying themselves in layers of their own ash.
“Here he is,” Munson announced. “Charging me an arm and a leg for the rush job and the schlep.” The Ukrainian rang the buzzer half a minute later.
Munson returned to the crow’s nest to stub out his cigarette. He lit another. “What I don’t get is, where’s the apostrophe?”
Carney gathered he was supposed to join him at the window.
“The DONT WALK sign,” Munson said. “It goes WALK, then DONT WALK comes on and they forgot to put in the apostrophe.”
“I assume it was on purpose,” Carney said. “To save space.”
“All this time I thought it was a mistake and everyone pretended not to see it.”
The Ukrainian knocked on the door and Munson padded over to let him in. It happened quickly: Notch Walker and two of his men thundered out of the hallway and into the living room. One of Notch’s men wrestled with Munson, the duo banging against the walls until they crashed into the center of the room.
Notch sidestepped the mayhem when they got close to his feet, mouth wilted in disdain. “This cracker thinks he’s Bruno Sammartino.” Notch’s other goon kicked Munson in the stomach until he capitulated.
One man covered Munson with a small pistol while the other frisked him. Frisked him with conviction and purpose—Munson would approve—and directed him over to the wall. The detective squatted next to the statue of the imp, arms crossed, sadness and fury in his eyes like a beaten junkyard dog.
Two young men joined the party, leading a gaunt, middle-aged white man into the living room. The Ukrainian. He didn’t look scared; more curious. His red wool hat had gone askew. He straightened it. Carney gathered that they’d put his face in the peephole for Munson to approve, and rushed in once the door opened a crack, Notch’s men collaring the detective.
From their mirthless features and military attire, the two young men herding the Ukrainian were not Harlem hoods, who usually perked up at a burst of violence. Berets were a neon sign these days: We are throwing off our chains. Not Panthers, cool and slick in black turtlenecks and black leather jackets. These guys were BLA, training for the coming war. Race war, class war—they weren’t picky, long as it got going toot sweet.
The next time Carney saw the leader was in the newspaper months later: Malik Jamal of the Black Liberation Army. The accompanying photograph came from a bank’s security camera. In person, he was tall and lithe, with a soapbox voice strong enough to drown out passing trucks and heckling drunks on 125th.
“It’s me again, pig,” Malik said, confirming that the detectives had robbed him last Friday. The second BLA soldier had the build of a heavyweight boxer and wore a tight black T-shirt and camouflage pants. The lenses of his sunglasses were very, very dark, but he found his way around okay.