The Juror Page 22

  But screw this patty-cake shit. This is not really my game. I gotta get out of here.

  He opens the door, stumbles through, slams it behind him. Limps through the dark garage. They left the big sliding door open, good. But he can scarcely see, and the metal track for the door catches at his wounded shoulder. The overload of pain takes him out of who he is. He can’t remember why he’s leaving this party. Am I drunk? Where’s my date? Who’s taking her home? Jesus, look at this rain. Here’s my car where I left it, but I’m not sure I can drive—

  Then he feels a weight in his hand, and he looks down and there’s the MAC 10 and he remembers.

  He limps over to the Buzzard, and gets in. He finds the ignition key and the car coughs and starts.

  A figure appears at the garage door. He shoots. He tries to shoot again, but the clip’s empty.

  He throws the Buzzard into reverse and backs down the long driveway, through the trees. Pitch dark. A bullet hits his windshield. The whole sheet of glass flurries into webbing as he bumps onto the street.

  A pair of headlights flares up near the house he just left. Which reminds him: he switches on his own lights.

  But he can’t see anything in front of him: the spiderwebbed windshield is nearly opaque. As he drives, he bashes the butt of the MAC 10 into the glass. Smacks it again and again till he’s made a peephole in front of him. He drops the piece and claws at the crumbling glass, ekes out a field of vision.

  The wind rushes at him. He’s rolling now.

  He’s broken out of that cage and he’s still alive.

  Which means that that juror has a chance. And Sari has a chance. It even means Slavko Czernyk has a ghost of a chance. Did somebody say loser?

  But when he passes under a streetlight he gets a glimpse of his face in the rearview mirror, and it’s a horror moon of knobs and blue swelling and blood valleys. Puke bubbling down his chin. His chest wound is a sucking wound. His hip wound—oh E.R. hit the jackpot with that one—pays out blood all over the seat.

  But it’s OK, take it easy, just keep steady, stay awake, keep driving. You’re on Oak Road. You know this road. Bunch of houses coming up pretty soon, you’ll be surrounded by plenty of good people. Oh Jesus, and just a few miles down, the hospital. Right? St. Ignatius! Juliet’s hospital! Juliet! Juliet to heal me and comfort me and be sorry for all the unkind things she’s ever said to me. God damn, Slavko—and you thought that things were going bad for you tonight? This is the night of Slavko the Hero, this is like a grade school fantasy. Is this what E.R. meant by running with the Tao? Well, E.R., I got to hand it to you, you mother fuck. Except that I’m in excruciating pain, and I’m confused, and I believe I’m bleeding to death. But if I can send you fucks to prison? If I can save that juror? If I can die in her arms—no, wait a minute, I mean Juliet’s arms, don’t I?—I mean I’m confused, but the main thing is that you won’t be calling me a loser anymore, will you, E.R.?

  Conquistador, rather.

  Then those headlights show up again in his rear mirror.

  EDDIE’s behind the wheel, and his head is killing him. His head is still oozing blood from where Frankie’s wayward bullet nicked his scalp.

  He ought to be home in bed.

  Instead he has to be out on the road with Vincent, chasing down this dickhead.

  Sure-Knack’s car is a fuckin barge, but the man’s got no fear, nothing to lose, so he can do amazing things. He skids loosey-goosey through every curve, he keeps taking it within a finger of the ditch. And unless you’re another psycho you’d better concede him a little ass-room.

  Look at him now, driving down the wrong side of the road. A car comes the other way, but Sure-Knack doesn’t even blink. Like a fuckin battleship, he keeps steaming along. The other guy has to veer into Eddie’s lane, he’s got no choice. And Eddie, he figures he’s got no choice but to slam on the brakes and get off the road and bounce along the shoulder, ah shit.

  And by the time Eddie gets back up to speed? Sure-Knack is out of sight again.

  Vincent doesn’t seem distressed, though. He says calmly, “Eddie, do you have a knife with you?”

  Eddie digs in his pocket, passes him his penknife. Vincent has removed his jacket, and he sets it on his lap and cuts holes into the back of it. Two eye-shaped holes side by side.

  He asks Eddie, “What kind of tags have we got?”

  “License tags? We’re good there. From Maxie’s chopshop. They can’t be traced or nothing. Ah shit, where does this guy think he’s going?”

  Says Vincent, softly, “St. Ignatius.”

  “The hospital?”

  “If you were shot, where would you go?”

  “I was shot,” says Eddie.

  “I’m sorry,” says Vincent. “That’s my fault.”

  Eddie glances at him. My fault? Not a thing you’ll hear Vincent say often.

  They come around a curve and there’s the maniac’s taillights again.

  Says Vincent, “Eddie, have you ever known me to so misjudge a man’s mood or abilities?”

  “Hey. It’s done.”

  “I never should have let him out of those cuffs. I knew it was too early. I knew he wasn’t ready. All I’d done was ignite his pride. I hadn’t begun to redirect it. But I was impatient, I was pushing, I was proud myself, I was reckless, I wasn’t thinking—”

  “Hey! So what?” says Eddie. “So you’re not thinkin so good. So you’re a little stressed out. You’re distracted maybe, don’t sweat—”

  “Do you think I’m distracted?”

  “I’m trying to drive here, Vincent.”

  “Distracted by what?”

  “By the fuckin trial. By this Annie woman, by—”

  Vincent smiles. “Do you think I’m in love with Annie? Do you think I’m full of desire?”

  Christ, thinks Eddie, I do not need this just now. I do not need Vincent’s dumping his crazy head all over me.

  Sitting there with that grin on his face.

  Sitting there cutting those holes in his jacket and grinning and waiting for Eddie to say something like Well, I don’t know, are you full of desire?

  But I’m not going to ask him nothing. I’m too busy chasing this crazy Sure-Knack all over the county, for one thing. For another, I don’t really want to know.

  SLAVKO turns in at St. Ignatius, roars down the circular drive. His left eye is swollen shut and his right eye is only a thin slit. He’s looking through his lashes. He leans forward, trying to see out through the hole he hacked in the windshield. A sign says “Emergency” and it’s got an arrow. This juror, she’s a doctor in the Emergency Room, isn’t she?

  Or, wait—that wasn’t the juror, that was Juliet. Right?

  You better wake up, Slavko. You’re driving across the lawn and you’re going too fast and you’re falling asleep and you better wake up.

  Well, here’s a nice stone pillar, this should wake me, right?

  The Buzzard smacks into it.

  But the jolt isn’t particularly rousing. If anything it makes Slavko more sleepy than he was before.

  But I gotta, I gotta, I gotta get out of this car. Get the door open. Good. But these legs won’t move. Oh shit, look at this blood, it’ll gross Sari out I bet. No no, she’s a doctor, don’t worry about it.

  Just relax. You always get so uptight before a date. This’ll be fun. Just lean to your left and fall. OK? That’s right, just topple.

  People are coming, white-jackets. Voices, commotion.

  He’s got his head on the asphalt but his feet are still in the car.

  Faces. Where is she? Where’s the juror? Oh shit, look at them, they’re hanging back, they’re afraid the car’s going to blow up.

  Crawl, Slavko.

  Crawl out of here. Come on, come on, move.

  He gets about four feet.

  A white-jacket (but it’s not Juliet the Juror) says, “That’s all right. Just lie there, sir. You’re all right. Don’t move.”

  They’re doing things to him. Good, but wh
ere is she?

  Where is she?

  It comes out of his mouth as “Way-o, us, shhh?”

  “That’s all right, just relax.”

  “Shhh, way-o, Yuli?”

  Four people around him now. Good. They’ll carry him to Juli. Is that her name though? Doesn’t matter. What matters is this deep cure he’s undergoing.

  Headlights coming. Fast, bearing down. Oh yes, the killers. Nearly forgot. The headlights stop and a man with a sort of hood on his head gets out of the car. Oh yes, he’s a killer. Probably E.R. Some of the white-jacket people go away. They’re afraid.

  But one nurse lingers.

  Tell her now. Tell this woman. You won’t see Juliet ever again because that’s the way it is but it’s OK, this woman, she’ll have to do.

  Force your tongue to work. Lips to nearly close.

  Tell her. It will save the juror’s life.

  “Og,” he says.

  He tries again. “The. Log. It’s at. Oak. And Holly. The… log.”

  Then he hears E.R.’s voice. “Get out of my way, ma’am.”

  E.R. is wearing a hood and carrying a pistol.

  The nurse doesn’t want to move, though. She’s frightened of what he’ll do to Slavko.

  Lady, there’s nothing but nothing but nothing to be scared of. This is the best part.

  E.R. scares her away, then kneels close and Slavko feels metal touching the bridge of his nose. He and the cool metal understand each other instantly, perfectly. You see? You do your work, that’s all. Simple. Why was it always so tough for him to understand? You do your work. Rescue people, or kill, it doesn’t matter: you do your work. While you’re working, if you work hard and well? You’re happy. You’re winning. When your work is done? Absolute victory. You’re a conquistador.

  In fact, once that bullet touches my brain, E.R., I’ll be even better than that, I’ll be a DEMON CONQUISTADOR, and I’m gonna haunt you and haunt you and haunt you, and hound your hairy ass ALL THE WAY DOWN TO HELL, E.R., and there’s NOTHING YOU CAN—

  11

  You can start scrubbing us out of your head now?

  ANNIE in the bottle-green prison of the jury room. Some of her colleagues are still hunched over their Styrofoam coffee cups, but Annie’s done with her coffee. She’s wide awake.

  She’s a tree of nerves.

  She’s contending with the man who works for OSHA.

  She says, “But you do admit that the Teacher exists? You’ll at least admit that he exists?”

  “I dunno,” says OSHA Pete.

  “You don’t know?” A little loud, but she’s pissed. So dense, this guy. She’d rather be arguing with the blackboard. She says, “Two people testified about the Teacher. He’s on the tape. And you don’t know if he even exists—”

  Says OSHA, “I just don’t know who he is.”

  “You don’t have to know who he is! You have to know how powerful he is! Can’t you see that? Didn’t that get through to you—”

  “Annie,” says Clarinet Will. “No need to raise your voice.”

  Annie turns on him. Sweet shaggy bear, maybe, but sort of dull-witted himself. “No need?” she says. “No need to raise my voice? Why? This isn’t important enough?”

  She lets her eyes linger on his for a moment—then she drops him. Turns back to OSHA. “Think of how they sounded when they said his name. ‘The Teacher.’ Almost whispering. That guy DeCicco, he’d say ‘the Teacher,’ and he’d be looking all over the courtroom. Scared to death—”

  “Oh bullshit!” says OSHA.

  “Hey,” chides the Forewoman. “Fella.”

  But Annie waves her off. “No, go ahead, let him say what he feels like saying.”

  She rises and moves down the table till she’s between the tree surgeon and the grandmother, right across from OSHA. She puts her hands flat on the table and confronts him. “Let it hatch. What?”

  He won’t meet her eyes. “I just, damn it, Boffano he’s the boss. He’s the boss. They work for him. They—”

  Annie snaps back, “They’ve got that deal with the Ndrangheta. They’ve got those Italians. They’ve got the government of Curaçao, they’ve got Jamaican runners, they’ve got this whole huge web and one spider sits in the middle of it, one guy scheming out the whole thing, and you think it’s Louie Boffano—”

  She shreds the name with a laugh.

  “He’s got advisers,” OSHA tries—but Annie is rocking and rolling now. She squats before him. Her face is a foot from his. She’s never been like this before. This hot quick fury, her thoughts whipping so cleanly around corners of logic. She’s starting to draw a sort of manic exhilaration out of her own performance. She scoffs:

  “Advise? Did the Teacher advise Louie to build a tunnel? Or did he instruct him: ‘I’m going to dig a tunnel to Salvadore Riggio’s house and I’m going to kill him—’”

  “But Annie,” Clarinet Will breaks in, “Boffano said OK. He said, ‘Kill that motherfucker.’ He gave his OK.”

  “Does that make him a murderer? Suppose, suppose I told you I was going to kill this guy here.”

  She points at OSHA Pete. Everyone laughs. Good, she thinks, get em laughing. Get em on my side. “Suppose I said, ‘I’m going to poison his coffee’? And you said, ‘Yeah, sure. Kill that motherfucker. Do whatever you want.’ Would that make you the murderer?”

  “Oh, Jesus!” OSHA throws up his hands. He stands up across the table from Annie. “I don’t believe this. I do not believe you. You think we should let him go? You want us to let that greaseball go free?”

  And though Annie doesn’t smile, though she meekly shrugs, she figures that right there OSHA Pete just lost the old grandmother with the Italian name.

  That’s one, she thinks.

  She thinks, One by one by one.

  FRED CAREW, Senior Investigator with the New York State Troopers, sits atop the desk in Slavko Czernyk’s office and studies a yellow legal pad. Two uniforms look expectantly over his shoulder.

  A scrawled note in the upper left-hand corner:

  2 k

  k 42000 primo

  $84000

  J the face Tuesday 7:00

  Carew wishes the unies would quit staring at him. It’s too crowded in here, in this tiny office.

  At Carew’s feet his partner, Harry Beard, is sitting on decedent’s mattress, going through decedent’s files. Shaking his head, making faces.

  “So what do you think?” says one of the unies.

  “I think it’s too god damn cold in here,” says Carew.

  Says the unie, “It’s Jimmy the Face, huh?”

  Carew calls out to the hall, to where the landlord is waiting patiently on a little three-legged stool. “Hey, mister.”

  The man appears at the door. “Yessir?”

  “You always keep it this cold?”

  “No sir. It seems there’s some mechanical difficulty with the heating system.”

  “Yeah. It seems,” says Carew.

  Seems perfectly clear that this murder is the handiwork of Jimmy the Face.

  Here’s this legal pad they found in Slavko Czernyk’s desk. And right here in front of Carew’s nose are these quickly jotted numbers. 2k, that must mean 2 kilos of heroin. 42000 is the wholesale price per kilo, a little high, but then it’s primo quality. $84000, that’s the total for the transaction.

  And J the face? Must be Jimmy the Face of the Gambino clan.

  Therefore: Czernyk was muling dope for Jimmy and something went awry.

  ABC. Spelled out in bright red ink on a yellow background.

  “Prints?” Carew wonders aloud.

  “Nothing yet,” says one of the unies.

  “Anybody tried to roust up Jimmy?”

  The uniformed troopers look at each other.

  Ah Christ. Carew puts his tongue between his teeth. A visit to Jimmy the Face. What fun. “I guess,” says Carew, “I guess I’ll see if I can’t find him.” Then he asks Harry, “What’re you looking at?”

  “Noth
ing. These are just Czernyk’s Reports of Surveillance.”

  “Are they interesting?” says Carew.

  “Nope. This one is from two years ago. Some guy’s wife was spending a lot of time at the house of some other guy.”

  “Oh, my goodness,” says Carew. “Were they… was she… ?”

  “It doesn’t say. Perhaps they were sharing Bible study together.” Harry yawns. “You want to look at it?”

  “Nope. Are they all like that?”

  “We’ll see. We shall fuckin see.”

  Carew calls out to the landlord, “Hey, mister, can I ask you something?”

  Whereupon the officious sparrow pops his tiny face in the doorway again. “Yessir?”

  “When you evicted this guy, why the hell didn’t you toss this shit?”

  “I will right away. Yessir.”

  “Nosir,” says Carew. “No you sure as shit won’t. Not till we run down every last god damn name in that file cabinet. Monumental pain in the tush.”

  He sighs. The landlord tries to look penitent.

  “Well, tell me this, then,” says Carew. “You got a holly tree around here?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Or an oak tree? Or a log or something? It’s something the victim said before he died.”

  “We don’t have any trees at all,” says the landlord. But he keeps working at it in his head. He works on it so hard he gets a little cross-eyed.

  “Ah, forget it,” says Carew.

  Meanwhile the unies are still staring at him. Still waiting.

  One of them says, “Well?”

  Says Carew, “Well, what?”

  “It’s there, isn’t it? It’s a drug deal gone sour. Can there be any other conclusion?”

  Carew stares at the legal pad. Puffs his lips out. “Hey, that’s right, open and shut, what do you know? I guess we’re a pretty lucky bunch of investigators, huh?”

  But he glances at Harry and Harry glances at him and both their faces are saying the same thing:

  This stinks.

  ANNIE puts a dull chemically crisp salad on her tray. She navigates around the long table of jurors and slips into a seat at one end. Right across from Clarinet Will.