Deacon King Kong(27)

Deems nodded. Lightbulb was scared. He didn’t have the heart for the game. They both knew it. It was just friendship that kept them close, Deems thought sadly. And friendship was trouble in business. He looked at Lightbulb again, his Afro covering his oddly shaped scalp that resembled from a side view a sixty-watt lightbulb, thus his nickname. The beginnings of a goatee were growing on his chin, giving Lightbulb a cool, almost hippie look. It doesn’t matter, Deems thought. He’ll be shooting heroin in a year. He had that smell on him. Deems’s gaze shifted to the small, stout Beanie, who was quiet, more solid.

“What you think, Beanie? The Watches gonna try to move on our plaza?”

“I don’t know. But I think that janitor’s a cop.”

“Hot Sausage? Sausage is a drunk.”

“Naw. The young guy. Jet.”

“I thought you said Jet got arrested.”

“That don’t mean nothin’. You check out his sneakers?”

Deems leaned back on the pillow, thinking. He had noticed the sneakers. Cheap PF Flyers. “They were some cheap joints,” he agreed. Still, Deems thought, if Jet hadn’t hollered, Sportcoat would’ve . . . He rubbed his head; the ringing in his ear had now descended into a tingling pain, working its way down to his neck and across his eyes despite the medicine. He considered Beanie’s theory, then spoke. “Who was lookout on the roof of Building Seventeen and Thirty-Four that day?”

“Chink was on Seventeen. Vance was on Thirty-Four.”

“They didn’t see nothing?”

“We didn’t ask.”

“Ask,” Deems said, then, after a moment, added, “I think Earl sold us a bunch of goods.”

The two boys glanced at each other. “Earl didn’t pop you, bro,” Lightbulb said. “That was Sportcoat.”

Deems didn’t seem to hear. He ran through several quick mental checkoffs in his mind, then spoke. “Sportcoat’s a drunk. He got no crew. Don’t worry about him. Earl . . . for what we paying him, I think he double-crossed us. Set us up.”

“Why you think that?” Lightbulb asked.

“How’s it that Sportcoat could walk up on me without nobody calling it out? Maybe it ain’t nothing. Probably old Sport just lost his head. But selling horse is so hot now . . . it’s taking off. Easier to just rob somebody than stand out on the corners selling scag and smack in five-and ten-cent bags. I been telling Earl’s boss we need more protection down here—guns, y’know. Been saying it all year. And we need more love on the money tip. We’re only making four percent. We oughta be pulling five or six or even ten, as much shit as we move. I had all my collection money on me when I was shot. I woke up in the hospital and the money was gone. Cops probably took it. Now I got to pay that back, plus the ten percent Bunch charges for being late. He don’t give a shit about our troubles. For a lousy four percent? We could do better getting our own supplier.”

“Deems,” Beanie said. “We doing okay now.”

“How come I got no muscle to protect me then? Who did we have out there? You two. Chink on Building Seventeen. Vance on Thirty-Four. And a bunch of kids. We need men around. With guns, bro. Ain’t that what I’m paying Earl for? Who’s watching our backs? We moving a lot of stuff. Earl shoulda sent somebody.”

“Earl ain’t the boss,” Beanie said. “Mr. Bunch is the boss.”

“There’s a bigger boss than him,” Deems said. “Mr. Joe. He’s the one we should be talking to.”

The two boys looked at each other. They all knew “Mr. Joe”: Joe Peck, whose family owned the funeral home over on Silver Street.

“Deems, he’s mob,” Beanie said slowly.

“He likes money just like us,” Deems said. “He lives three streets over, bro. Mr. Bunch is just a middleman, from way out in Bed-Stuy.”

Beanie and Lightbulb were silent. Beanie spoke first. “I don’t know, Deems. My daddy worked the docks with them Italians a long time. He said they ain’t nothing to mess with.”

“Your daddy know everything?” Deems asked.

“I’m just saying. Supposing Mr. Joe is like the Elephant,” Beanie said.

“The Elephant don’t do dope.”

“How you know?” Beanie said.

Deems was silent. They didn’t have to know everything.

Lightbulb spoke up. “What y’all talking about? We ain’t got to mess with the Elephant or Mr. Joe or nobody else. Earl said he’d handle it. Let him handle it. It’s old Sportcoat that’s the problem. What you gonna do about that?”

Deems was silent a moment. Lightbulb had said “you” rather than “we.” He filed that thought for later, and it made him feel sad all over again. First he’d mentioned the ants and they’d hardly remembered. Protecting our building! That’s what the aim was. The Cause. Protect our territory! They didn’t even care about that. Now Lightbulb was already talking “you.” He wished Sugar were here. Sugar was loyal. And had heart. But Sugar’s mother had sent him to Alabama. He’d written to Sugar and asked to visit and Sugar wrote back saying “come on,” but when Deems wrote him a second letter, Sugar never wrote back. Beanie, Chink, Vance, and Stick were all he could trust now. That wasn’t much of a crew if the Watch Houses came calling. Lightbulb, he thought bitterly, was out.