Read Online Police and Thieves: A Novel by Peter Plate - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Peter Plate
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I had to stop myself from getting on my knees and taking it. Maurice snorted at me, “What? You don’t want it? Give it back, then.”
He bent over to retrieve his money, getting hinky and cursingunder his breath. I took the opportunity to exploit his distraction by reaching into his holster for the automatic. My reflexes were good and my fingers were nimble; you put those attributes next to an ice-cold rage, and I was unbeatable. I had my fingers wrapped around the Colt’s checkered plastic grips before he could stop me.
Eichmann enjoyed the interplay that accompanied the turn of events, and he applauded me. “Bravo! Well done, Doojie!”
Maurice, no less theatrical than his enemy, narrowed his eyes, and affected a tough guy’s speech pattern, slurring out of the side of his mouth, “Give me back my gun!”
The price of punishing him for his bad manners wasn’t worth going to jail for. Maurice misinterpreted my resignation as an act of submission. His baby face lit up, regaining its peachiness. “That’s more like it,” he snickered, getting smart-alecky. “You ain’t got the balls to hurt me.” He got up from the chair and brushed a speck of lint from his red leather jacket, surveying the three of us. Then he snapped his fingers at me like I was his servant. “Give me the pistol.”
He’d stretched my patience as far as it could go without tearing. I pulled the trigger, and a bullet flowered out of the Colt’s muzzle with an orange burst. It zipped by Maurice’s ear, ricocheting off the floor, then up into the rafters, shaking the cobwebs. Dust fell on all of us, causing Bobo to sneeze. Maurice spun around like a top, flinging his arms in the air, mewling, “Don’t kill me!”
Eichmann took advantage of the commotion by slugging our guest in the ribs to pacify him. “Horatio Alger, huh?” A bleary-faced Maurice doubled up and landed on his side, winded. He wretched once, then collapsed into a fit of prolonged tubercular coughing. Eichmann squatted alongside him, relieving our foe of his Kenneth Cole boots, his silk Versace socks, and his cash. He briskly counted the money, yipping, “I’ll be damned!Look at this! Maurice has a hundred and ten bucks here!”
We didn’t discuss the backlash that would come from running off with Roy’s pound. We were being vigilant, but nothing had happened. Perhaps Roy was one of those Pacific Heights people who had so much surplus cash, he was dealing drugs to do something risqué. If he got his hands bloody, he’d move on to another sport, something less demanding, such as windsurfing. Eichmann had his calculator out on the kitchen table and he was hitting the buttons, tallying the numbers. He said to me with a concentrated intensity that could fry an egg, “We’ve got to sell this dope like pronto.” Then he proclaimed with no uncertain wisdom, “If we sell these bags at seventy-five apiece, that’s some beaucoup money. Are you ready for this?”
“Yeah.”
“Bobo? You?”
“Yup.”
“Okay, here’s the arithmetic. You guys, remember this. It’s important. Bobo, you got forty-three eighths to sell. You understand?”
“Uh-huh.”
“I got forty-three eighths, and Doojie … you get forty-two bags.”
“How come I get one less?”
“Oy gevalt, I don’t know. That’s how it worked out. Don’t ask me so many stupid questions.”
12
My sales route was a byzantine matrix that crisscrossed the Mission. I started on Shotwell, doubled back to Hampshire, then looped over to Dolores Street. Four hours later I sold my last bag to a long-standing acquaintance who told me Dee Dee was angry with us. The junkie was planning on making trouble. I acknowledged the warning, but my pockets were bulging with soiled five-, ten-, and twenty-dollar bills. Any fear I had about Dee Dee paled in the face of my earnings.
I met up with Bobo and Eichmann at the intersection of Twenty-first and Mission next to Si Tashjian Flowers. The sun was sinking behind
He bent over to retrieve his money, getting hinky and cursingunder his breath. I took the opportunity to exploit his distraction by reaching into his holster for the automatic. My reflexes were good and my fingers were nimble; you put those attributes next to an ice-cold rage, and I was unbeatable. I had my fingers wrapped around the Colt’s checkered plastic grips before he could stop me.
Eichmann enjoyed the interplay that accompanied the turn of events, and he applauded me. “Bravo! Well done, Doojie!”
Maurice, no less theatrical than his enemy, narrowed his eyes, and affected a tough guy’s speech pattern, slurring out of the side of his mouth, “Give me back my gun!”
The price of punishing him for his bad manners wasn’t worth going to jail for. Maurice misinterpreted my resignation as an act of submission. His baby face lit up, regaining its peachiness. “That’s more like it,” he snickered, getting smart-alecky. “You ain’t got the balls to hurt me.” He got up from the chair and brushed a speck of lint from his red leather jacket, surveying the three of us. Then he snapped his fingers at me like I was his servant. “Give me the pistol.”
He’d stretched my patience as far as it could go without tearing. I pulled the trigger, and a bullet flowered out of the Colt’s muzzle with an orange burst. It zipped by Maurice’s ear, ricocheting off the floor, then up into the rafters, shaking the cobwebs. Dust fell on all of us, causing Bobo to sneeze. Maurice spun around like a top, flinging his arms in the air, mewling, “Don’t kill me!”
Eichmann took advantage of the commotion by slugging our guest in the ribs to pacify him. “Horatio Alger, huh?” A bleary-faced Maurice doubled up and landed on his side, winded. He wretched once, then collapsed into a fit of prolonged tubercular coughing. Eichmann squatted alongside him, relieving our foe of his Kenneth Cole boots, his silk Versace socks, and his cash. He briskly counted the money, yipping, “I’ll be damned!Look at this! Maurice has a hundred and ten bucks here!”
We didn’t discuss the backlash that would come from running off with Roy’s pound. We were being vigilant, but nothing had happened. Perhaps Roy was one of those Pacific Heights people who had so much surplus cash, he was dealing drugs to do something risqué. If he got his hands bloody, he’d move on to another sport, something less demanding, such as windsurfing. Eichmann had his calculator out on the kitchen table and he was hitting the buttons, tallying the numbers. He said to me with a concentrated intensity that could fry an egg, “We’ve got to sell this dope like pronto.” Then he proclaimed with no uncertain wisdom, “If we sell these bags at seventy-five apiece, that’s some beaucoup money. Are you ready for this?”
“Yeah.”
“Bobo? You?”
“Yup.”
“Okay, here’s the arithmetic. You guys, remember this. It’s important. Bobo, you got forty-three eighths to sell. You understand?”
“Uh-huh.”
“I got forty-three eighths, and Doojie … you get forty-two bags.”
“How come I get one less?”
“Oy gevalt, I don’t know. That’s how it worked out. Don’t ask me so many stupid questions.”
12
My sales route was a byzantine matrix that crisscrossed the Mission. I started on Shotwell, doubled back to Hampshire, then looped over to Dolores Street. Four hours later I sold my last bag to a long-standing acquaintance who told me Dee Dee was angry with us. The junkie was planning on making trouble. I acknowledged the warning, but my pockets were bulging with soiled five-, ten-, and twenty-dollar bills. Any fear I had about Dee Dee paled in the face of my earnings.
I met up with Bobo and Eichmann at the intersection of Twenty-first and Mission next to Si Tashjian Flowers. The sun was sinking behind
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