Read Online The New Mammoth Book of Pulp Fiction by Maxim Jakubowski - Free Book Online

Plus five thousand dollars.”
    I’d whistled softly. There was nothing cheap about this deal. I could see myself cruising the world in the
Ballerina
. She was a beautiful auxiliary sloop. I’d wanted her even before she’d been put up for sale. With the
Ballerina
and five thousand bucks I could live the kind of life I always wanted. I could work and play as I pleased. Manning of the
Ballerina
.
    That about clinched it. That and Shannon Macaulay. She’d been awfully good about my misunderstanding of her motives that afternoon and grateful for what I’d done.
    Look, I asked myself, what was with Shannon Macaulay? I didn’t know anything about her. Except that she was married. And her husband was on the lam from a bunch of mobsters. So she was tall. So she was nice-looking. So something said sexy when you looked at her body and her face, and sweet when you looked at her eyes. I
had
seen women before, hadn’t I? I must have. They couldn’t be something entirely new to a man 33 years old, who’d been married once for four years. So relax.
    I tried to relax walking back to the pier, but it wasn’t easy. I couldn’t figure the Macaulay guy. What was he mixed up with? Why was he so sure he could spot the plane? How did he figure he could shake this mob with something as easy to spot as this big beautiful blonde wife of his? I knew landing them secretly in a foreign country wasn’t legal. And I didn’t like the possibilities of tangling with Tweed Jacket and his buddy again, but those were risks I’d have to take.
    Relax? Hell, I’d wanted to drive her home, but I knew how stupid that was the minute I’d said it. She gave me her number and told me to watch what I said, to make it sound like a lovers’ meeting in case Tweed Jacket was tapped in. We’d arrange to meet once more to give me the money I’d need. Just before she drove away, she’d thanked me, saying, “You’ve got to help me, Bill, I can’t let him down.”
6
    It was about 10:30 when I walked up to the shack at the pier.
    Old Christiansen, the watchman, came out. “Fellow was here to see you, Mr Manning,” he said. “He’s still out there.”
    “Thanks,” I answered, not paying much attention. “Goodnight.” It was late for anybody to be coming around about a job. I entered the long shed running out on the pier. It was velvety black inside, and hot. Up ahead I could see the faint illumination which came from the opened doors at the other end. There was a small light above them on the outside.
    I started over toward the ladder to the barge and then remembered that old Chris had said somebody was waiting out here to see me. I looked around, puzzled. My own car was sitting there beside the shed doors, but there was no other. Well, maybe he’d gone. But Chris would have seen him. The gate was the only way out.
    I saw it then – the glowing end of a cigarette in the shadows inside my car.
    The door swung open and he got out. It was the pug. There was enough light to see the hard, beat-up, fight-hungry face. He lazily crushed out his cigarette against the paint on the side of my car.
    “Been waiting for you, Big Boy,” he said.
    “All right, friend,” I said. “I’ve heard the one about the good little man. A lot of good little men are in the hospital. Hadn’t you better run along?”
    Then, suddenly, I saw him holding and hitting her again and I was glad he’d come. Rage pushed up in my chest. I went for him.
    He was a pro, all right, and he was fast. He hit me three times before I touched him. None of the punches hurt very much, but they sobered me a little. He’d cut me to pieces this way. He’d close my eyes and then take his own sweet time chopping me down to a bloody pulp. My wild swings were just his meat; they’d only pull me off balance so he could jab me.
    His left probed for my face again. I raised my hands, and the right slammed into my body. He danced back. “Duck soup,” he said contemptuously.
    He put the left out