Deacon King Kong(64)

“Bumps got crippled from that. He was never the same. He got out the dope game altogether. He tried fooling around on the dock, smuggling, trying to make money that way. He didn’t last long. He was walking in the Elephant’s territory then. You ever heard of the Elephant?”

“I heard of him.”

“Yeah, well, that’s the last anybody seen of Bumps.”

Lightbulb paused, then reached for another piece of chicken and dipped it in the sauce. “That’s how Deems won the flagpole,” he said.

“Why didn’t somebody from Bumps’s crew take the flagpole plaza back?” Bunch asked.

“First of all, that ain’t the only thing Deems done, bro. Second, ain’t nobody smarter in the Cause than Deems.”

“So people are afraid of him?”

“Well, yes and no. The old folks in the Cause like Deems. He was a church boy. The church folks sit around the flagpole in the mornings and talk and bullshit. Deems stays out of their way. He don’t run his dope till the afternoons, when the church folks leave the plaza. He don’t allow it before then. He’s funny about them church people. He don’t wanna make the church people mad. Some of ’em’s old, but they can cause trouble. Some of ’em will shoot, y’know.”

“I do know.” Here Bunch glanced disgustedly at Earl, whose face was shoved so deep into his crossword puzzle he appeared to be cleaning the puzzle with his nose.

“Plus Deems was the star on the Cause Houses baseball team,” Lightbulb said. “That’s Sportcoat’s old team. Deems’s father wasn’t around. His mother drank a lot. Deems’s grandfather raised him. And his grandfather and Sportcoat was buddies. That’s why Sportcoat ain’t dead yet, I guess. Because Deems was on his baseball team and his grandfather was all for him doing that. He could play the shit outta some baseball. When his grandfather died, he left all that and went to selling the flour and rock. Good as he was in baseball, that’s how good he is at moving that dip. Deems thinks stuff out. All day long, he thinks how to move that powder. He’s to hisself too. He don’t chase girls too much. He don’t watch TV. And he don’t forget. If you cross Deems, he’ll let a year pass. Two years even. I seen him walk up to guys and choke them till they fall asleep for stuff they did to him two years before that they forgot all about. I seen him put a hot iron to a guy’s neck to get the name of somebody who stole from him so long ago ain’t nobody remembered it but Deems. He’s smart, bro, like I said. He ain’t been in jail since Spofford. He don’t carry a knife. Don’t carry a gun. He’s organized. He pays little-kid watchers to set on the buildings and watch out. He got watchers in the plaza. They got the weapons. Not him.”

“So what’s the matter with him now?”

“He’s too strict, Mr. Bunch. He wants to be a cop now. Before he became a punk and let Sportcoat shoot him, he would sell to everybody. Now he won’t sell to grandmothers. He won’t sell to little kids. He won’t sell to nobody from the church. He don’t want nobody smoking near the church, or robbing the church, or falling asleep in the door of the church, like that. And like if somebody beats up their girlfriend over something, he won’t sell to ’em. He wants to be telling folks what they should be doing. That’s why Sportcoat shot him, I think, because he got pussified, talking about going back to baseball and all this, ordering folks around, telling folks what to do instead of making that money. It ain’t gonna be long before the Watch Houses come take our territory. It’s only a matter of time.”

“What’s that I’m hearing about you saying Deems wants Joe Peck to supply him?”

Lightbulb glanced at Earl.

“Did I say that?” Lightbulb said.

“I’m asking if he said it. Did he say that or not?” Bunch asked.

Lightbulb paused. He had told that to Earl in confidence, a kind of extra carrot he’d dangled to Earl to get himself an audience with the boss. But he realized now, looking at Bunch’s operation for the first time, the brownstone, dilapidated on the outside and polished to a sheen on the inside, the busy factory a block away that Earl had shown him full of employees processing heroin, the large cars, and the fabulous modern furniture of Mr. Bunch’s dining room, that this man was a major roller. Bunch, Lightbulb realized, was a real-life gangster. He realized, too late, that he was in over his head.

A cone of silence enveloped the room as Bunch stared at him, unblinking. Realizing his response could be a death sentence for Deems, Lightbulb said, “I might’ve said it. But I don’t know if Deems really meant it.”

Bunch sat for a moment, looking thoughtful, then the tension seemed to ease out of him. He spoke softly. “I appreciate you coming by, young blood. I appreciate you letting me and my man here know you got our best interests at heart.”

“So I get the flagpole?”

“I’mma give you a break on that,” Bunch said, reaching in his pocket and pulling out a roll of crisp bills.

Lightbulb smiled, relieved, grateful, and felt a sudden burst of guilt. “I just wanna say: I like Deems, Mr. Bunch. We go back a long way. But like I said, he wanna be a cop now. That’s why I’m here.”

“I understand,” Bunch said calmly. He slowly, deliberately counted out four fifty-dollar bills and slid them across the table to Lightbulb.