Read Online It's Superman! A Novel by Tom De Haven - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Tom De Haven
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have to wait till he’s governor. Or president. Or king. But you smokers, all you nicotine fiends? Your day is coming. Gum chewers, too.
Hooking three fingers around the edge of the film container, he pulls, first bending, then cracking the metal. He tears out the sprocketed acetate. Then he lights it with a match and tosses it through the open curbside window, watches it burn in the gutter. A tune starts playing in his mind and Lex hums it. Just a month ago, a columnist at the Mirror stuck in a jokey little item about Alderman Luthor’s “endearing” habit of humming half-aloud during soporific budget meetings—“When I Grow Too Old to Dream” was the tune the columnist specifically mentioned. That, and “Moonglow.”
Now he’s humming “Smoke Gets in Your Eyes.”
A panel truck with its headlights off noses slowly from the alley just ahead but stops before it rolls into Thirty-seventh Street. That would be all the punchboards, the slot and pinball machines. The driver sets the brake.
Paulie gets out of the cab’s passenger door smoking a cigarette. He walks over to the big Lincoln and smiles down at the still-burning tangle of film.
“All set, boss. The Ince brothers are in the back with the stuff, and that’s Frank Wrobble at the wheel.”
“All right,” says Lex, “here’s what you do. Tell Frank to go on up to Inwood without you—and remind him what I said about checking before just walking in there.”
“I’ll do that, boss.”
“Mr. Luciano might not be entirely finished with his little games tonight.”
“Is that who we’re dealing with?”
“It’s who I’m dealing with, Paulie. You’re dealing with me.”
“Sure, boss.”
“What about the second part of the effort?”
“Boss?”
“The bodies .”
“Just finishing up.”
“Who’s driving?”
“Stan Elder.”
“Make sure he knows he’s driving upstate.”
“Or Jersey, you said.”
“Or Jersey. And tell him to call the police from a pay phone just before he leaves the city.”
“Why would he do that?”
“Because he’s a good citizen. Because he saw something suspicious going on here and wants the cops should take a look. Make sure he knows the address.”
“Sure thing. Anything else?”
“Yes. Get rid of that cigarette.”
“Why, boss? It aids digestion!”
“What’d I just tell you?”
Paulie removes the cigarette from his mouth, looks at it almost quizzically, and pitches it away, down on top of the gummy remains of the Kodak film.
4
No such person as Lex Luthor was in the public record anywhere prior to September 1923. Before that he was, serially, Alexander Bankton, Clay Alexander Plenty, Douglas Alexander Little, Alexander Todd Biggs, then Lex Robbins, then, following the death of his father, Luthor Dunn—Dunn being his mother’s maiden name—and finally Lex no-middle-name Luthor.
When he registered at City College’s School of Civic Administration and Business, it was the first time he had ever used the name or dashed off the signature. His high school transcripts were impeccably bogus, and, with the exceptions of his height and weight and his address at the time (he’d taken a small apartment on Fifteenth Street, near Union Square), every piece of documentation and each filled-in line of every standardized form was a carefully considered, always plausible lie. He even claimed to be twenty, when in fact he was eighteen.
His father may have been a gross disappointment, foolish and finally unmanned, but by example he had taught Lex both the rudiments and the nuances of creating, maintaining, and—if necessary—sloughing off full-blown counterfeit identities. He, or rather the last fifteen years of his poisoned, fugitive life, also had taught Lex that violence without ruthlessness only made you vulnerable and weak, left you defenseless against self-contempt.
How could the dark-eyed gambler whose photographs Lex once discovered buried in a steamer trunk have turned into the
Hooking three fingers around the edge of the film container, he pulls, first bending, then cracking the metal. He tears out the sprocketed acetate. Then he lights it with a match and tosses it through the open curbside window, watches it burn in the gutter. A tune starts playing in his mind and Lex hums it. Just a month ago, a columnist at the Mirror stuck in a jokey little item about Alderman Luthor’s “endearing” habit of humming half-aloud during soporific budget meetings—“When I Grow Too Old to Dream” was the tune the columnist specifically mentioned. That, and “Moonglow.”
Now he’s humming “Smoke Gets in Your Eyes.”
A panel truck with its headlights off noses slowly from the alley just ahead but stops before it rolls into Thirty-seventh Street. That would be all the punchboards, the slot and pinball machines. The driver sets the brake.
Paulie gets out of the cab’s passenger door smoking a cigarette. He walks over to the big Lincoln and smiles down at the still-burning tangle of film.
“All set, boss. The Ince brothers are in the back with the stuff, and that’s Frank Wrobble at the wheel.”
“All right,” says Lex, “here’s what you do. Tell Frank to go on up to Inwood without you—and remind him what I said about checking before just walking in there.”
“I’ll do that, boss.”
“Mr. Luciano might not be entirely finished with his little games tonight.”
“Is that who we’re dealing with?”
“It’s who I’m dealing with, Paulie. You’re dealing with me.”
“Sure, boss.”
“What about the second part of the effort?”
“Boss?”
“The bodies .”
“Just finishing up.”
“Who’s driving?”
“Stan Elder.”
“Make sure he knows he’s driving upstate.”
“Or Jersey, you said.”
“Or Jersey. And tell him to call the police from a pay phone just before he leaves the city.”
“Why would he do that?”
“Because he’s a good citizen. Because he saw something suspicious going on here and wants the cops should take a look. Make sure he knows the address.”
“Sure thing. Anything else?”
“Yes. Get rid of that cigarette.”
“Why, boss? It aids digestion!”
“What’d I just tell you?”
Paulie removes the cigarette from his mouth, looks at it almost quizzically, and pitches it away, down on top of the gummy remains of the Kodak film.
4
No such person as Lex Luthor was in the public record anywhere prior to September 1923. Before that he was, serially, Alexander Bankton, Clay Alexander Plenty, Douglas Alexander Little, Alexander Todd Biggs, then Lex Robbins, then, following the death of his father, Luthor Dunn—Dunn being his mother’s maiden name—and finally Lex no-middle-name Luthor.
When he registered at City College’s School of Civic Administration and Business, it was the first time he had ever used the name or dashed off the signature. His high school transcripts were impeccably bogus, and, with the exceptions of his height and weight and his address at the time (he’d taken a small apartment on Fifteenth Street, near Union Square), every piece of documentation and each filled-in line of every standardized form was a carefully considered, always plausible lie. He even claimed to be twenty, when in fact he was eighteen.
His father may have been a gross disappointment, foolish and finally unmanned, but by example he had taught Lex both the rudiments and the nuances of creating, maintaining, and—if necessary—sloughing off full-blown counterfeit identities. He, or rather the last fifteen years of his poisoned, fugitive life, also had taught Lex that violence without ruthlessness only made you vulnerable and weak, left you defenseless against self-contempt.
How could the dark-eyed gambler whose photographs Lex once discovered buried in a steamer trunk have turned into the
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