CHAPTER 9
I was sitting on the back porch swing the next day wearing the Red's cap I had got at Crosley field and fooling around with my guitar. I had only had it for a few weeks, and I couldn't do much except make a C chord and a G chord. The F barre chord was way beyond me. I could play a little "Guitar Boogie" on a good day. It wasn't the greatest guitar in the world; the strings were pretty high off the neck, and that made it hard to play, anyway. Like, Duane Eddy didn't have anything to worry about. It was an old scratched up Harmony archtop that I had bought off a guy in my class for twenty bucks. He'd got a brand new Fender guitar like the guy in the Beach Boys played and he said he'd show me how to play and if I got good enough we'd put a band together. So I was working on the stuff he'd shown me and was hoping to impress him when I got back home.
But it was really slow going. I'd seen guys on TV playing and just wished like hell that I could play, too. I had a Mel Bay instruction book, but it was pretty boring, just exercises and chord fingerings. I wanted to play "Heartbreak Hotel" or "Johnny B Goode" or something.
Boy, did Shauna look fine last night, or what? Soft and warm looking. And those incredibly blue eyes. And then she hops up on that guy Roger guy and starts banging on his head. Damn, that was funny. Wonder how serious this thing is with this guy in the service? Like, is he going to come home on leave all of a sudden and marry her? Hope I don't run into Roger anytime soon; he looked like a crazy sonofabitch to me. Maybe I should wear my new blue shirt when I go to the Top Deck Friday. That's her favorite color.
"Hey, Cuz, let's hear a little "Rebel Rouser'." It was Ricky, coming around the side of the house, interrupting my reverie.
"I wish," I said. Boy, did I wish I could play that. My fingers were really getting sore, and I put the guitar down. Well, lots of people could play the guitar, so maybe I would get the hang of it eventually.
Ricky came up and sat down in the wicker chair next to the swing. He was wearing these really cool pants, tight at the ankles and with zippers on the pockets, and black pointed boots (like my parents wouldn't let me have) and a black short sleeve shirt with the sleeves rolled up a couple of turns to show his biceps, even though he didn't have much to show. He had a mouthful of gum and was blowing a gigantic bubble.
"How ya doin', Harold?" he asked, grinning.
"Harold?" My name wasn't Harold.
"Harold D. Swartz."
"Who's Harold D. Swartz?"
"You are, man."
"Since when?"
"Since I picked this up." He waved a piece of paper at me. I snatched it out of his hand and gave it a squint. It was a Kentucky drivers license for a Harold D. Swartz, all right. "What the hell is this?"
"Your ID, Harold," Ricky said, laughing.
"Huh?"
"You're gonna need it to get in to Vito's."
"Vito Siri's club?"
"Yeah."
"Holy shit! A fake ID? Where'd you get it?"
"Oh, I know this guy. Friend of Dover's. Lookit mine." He had one in the name of James Owens.
"Hey, James," I said as I read the vital statistics on mine. "Hey, this Harold was born in 1939. That would make me, uh, 24. I don't think this is gonna work, man, I don't look that old."
"Aah, no sweat."
"Shit, and this guy weighs 200 pounds."
"They won't care. Just so ya got somethin' to show 'em. Hey, at least it says you're a white male."
"I don't know...'
"Hey, it'll be great," he said, running a comb through his hair and smoothing down imaginary sideburns. "We've always wanted to go there, right?"
"Well, yeah, sure."
"Well, now we can. Tonight."
"That soon, huh?"
"Sure."
"How we gonna get there?"
"Kenny. Got him one, too."
"How do we dress?"
"Shirt and pants. It ain't black tie. Maybe we can getcha a fake mustache."
"Not a bad idea." This sounded pretty risky to me. What if the place got raided or something? What if somebody who knew my Grandparents saw me? What if...
"Hey, it'll be neat, Cuz. Girls, music, drinks..."
"What if Siri sees us?"
"We'll say hi to him. Ask him how it's hangin'."
I was getting more excited as the day went on thinking about our plans for the evening. Vito Siri's night club was kind of legendary, a place where every kid wanted to go when he got old enough. Nick had been there a few times and said it was a real boss place. Ricky said he heard about a couple of guys from Toledo who went there and got robbed in the parking lot. I'd heard Grandpa talk about it and he said it was a bad place, the kind of place he might have gone to before he was married. They had guys like Dean Martin and Tony Bennet there sometimes, and they had strippers in the back room. They probably had a lot of back rooms, from what I'd heard, with all kinds of things going on. It was supposed to be a big hangout for politicians and mobsters. Ricky said some of the Reds hung out there, too, but I didn't know if I believed him on that one. So, anyway, I couldn't wait to get there.
I took some extra pains with my hair that night, putting an extra dab of Brylcreem on it and slicking it back more than usual, trying to look older. It was getting kind of long; my Grandparents didn't send me off for a haircut every two weeks like my Mom did. I had been due for a haircut when I'd left Chicago and I'd been here about a week and I thought it was starting to look pretty good. In another week or so I ought to be able to comb the back in a DA, like Ricky and Nick, but by then I'd be back home and my Mom would send me off to the barber. My barber was a pretty nice guy, but when I would tell him how I wanted it cut it was like I was talking to the wall; he'd just smile and nod and then chop it all off the way he knew my Mom wanted it.
I shined up my cordovans and put on a pair of sharkskin slacks and my new button-down shirt with the fruit loop in back and I was ready for a big night. I told G&G I was going over to Debbie's for some dance lessons and I got out of the house quick, before they had a chance to ask questions, and went over to Ricky's.
Uncle Bill and Aunt Kathryn were over at Aunt Eva's having dinner with her like they did every Tuesday night. Aunt Eva was my Grandma's sister, and she was the aunt who cooked hamburgers at the drag strip. She lived alone with her dog, Sparky, in a house that had this tar paper kind of stuff on the outside that looked like brick. It was really a wooden house, though. Her husband, whom I had never met because he died before I was born, had been a railroad man and was killed in a train wreck.
Everybody in the family took turns visiting Aunt Eva because they all felt sorry for her living all alone like that. But she was pretty cool, really, and it seemed to me that she was doing OK with Sparky and her garden and her old scrap books and her bingo-playing friends. I think she kind of put up with all the family visits because she figured they needed to feel like they were doing something for her, even though she didn't really need it. When we went over there we would have fried chicken and then sit around her front room, which was decorated with souvenirs and knick-knacks from World's Fairs and Presidential elections and vacation spots that probably went back to the Civil War and reminisce about stuff that happened fifty years ago and when we got up to leave Eva would thank us for coming over.
Linda, Ricky's 17-year-old sister, had her boyfriend, Loren, over, and they were sitting on the couch in the living room eating popcorn and watching "Hawaiian Eye." Cricket Blake was my idea of a woman, and I sat down to watch a little of the show with them. Cricket was in trouble tonight and it looked like Tracy was going to have to rescue her again.
"What are you guys up to?" Loren asked suspiciously when Ricky came down from upstairs reeking of English Leather. Loren was a tight-ass, with horn rimmed glasses and a flat top haircut. I didn't see whet Linda saw in him, really. She was a boss-looking chick, looked a lot like Kathryn. He always thought we were up to something, which was usually the case, but he didn't have any reason to think so, most of the time. He was 19, and I don't think he liked anyone younger than he was. He drove a 4-door Plymouth with one of those knobs on the steering wheel that made it easier to make turns, and wanted to be a Civil Servant. He was a real L7, straight from Squaresville.
"We're headin' over to the shoppin' center to steal some hub caps," Ricky said, grabbing a fist-full of popcorn. We liked to tease Loren; he didn't have much of a sense of humor.
"I wouldn't doubt it a bit," he said, pushing his glasses back up his on nose.
"Yeah, and then we're gonna pick up some Puerto Rican girls down on Vine Street," I said.
"And after that we're gonna drop by Vito Siri's club and have a few drinks with him," Ricky said.
"What?" he said, pushing his glasses up on his nose.
"Oh, they're just kidding you," Linda said. "Aren't you?"
"Sure, sis," we both giggled.
We heard a horn honk. Kenny! "See ya later," we said, and ran out of the house.
Kenny had his old heap shined up, at least the bumpers, anyway, and had "Easier Said Than Done," by the Essex, blaring on the radio. He checked his hair while we piled in.
"Shotgun!" I hollered.
"Argh," Ricky grumbled, and crawled into the back seat.
"You got my ID?" Kenny asked.
"Right here, man." Ricky handed it to him and Kenny looked it over.
"William H. Pratt, huh? Twenty two years old, brown hair, blue eyes, 165 pounds. Sounds just like me."
"This is Harold D. Swartz," Ricky said, pointing at me.
"Pleez ta meetcha," Kenny said.
"How do, William," I said, laughing.
"Who's this guy?" Kenny asked, jerking a thumb toward Ricky.
"That's James Owens," I said. "Say hi, James."
"Hi."
"Well, now that we all know each other, let's GO!" Kenny said, jamming the car in gear and popping the clutch. His old Ford wouldn't burn rubber on dry pavement, but it could send up a cloud of dust and gravel and oil.
Vito's was across the river in Covington. Covington was supposed to be a pretty wild place, with lots of night clubs and gambling and live music. The cops weren't real strict, supposedly, and things were pretty wide open. Ricky knew a trumpet player who worked in a club and he told Ricky that Vito could get away with just about anything he wanted. He was supposed to have put up a lot of money to get certain guys elected to office and they were always ready to do him favors.
Ricky was giving Kenny directions, but he didn't know the streets as well as he thought he did, and we got lost a couple of times on the way over. But we found it eventually and we cruised by slowly, checking it out. Vito's was on a noisy street with a bunch of other clubs, next to a liquor store and across the street from a music store. Neon signs glared up and down the street, and the sidewalk was choked with people. A couple of cops sat in their cruiser drinking coffee from paper cups in the parking lot of an all-night donut place. They looked bored or half asleep.
Vito's was a long, low building with a set of double doors in the middle, over which a garish neon sign spelled out "Vito's" in ten-foot letters, and some tired-looking shrubbery on either side of the dirty red carpet that led up to the entrance. The windows were painted black so you couldn't see inside and there was a glass display case next to the doors with photographs of a singer and some strippers.
We finally found a place to park, two blocks down, and walked back to the club. A couple of girls in black leather leaning against the front of a closed drug store whistled at us and asked us if our Mommies knew where we were. Ricky asked them if their Mommies knew where they were. A greasy old gray-headed guy with a crooked red nose asked us for a quarter, and Kenny told him to fuck off. A group of drunk sailors weaved up the sidewalk, singing and whistling at the girls. Cars honked and neon signs blinked on and off.
When we got to Vito's we all lit Pall Malls and got our ID's ready. Shit, this was it!
"Ready?" Ricky asked, grinning confidently.
"Yeah, let's go," Kenny said, and then waited for Ricky to make a move.
"OK," Ricky said, and he pushed the door open and walked inside with Kenny and me crowding behind him.
Inside was a vestibule with a dark-eyed hat check girl leaning on the counter dragging on a cigarette and talking to a big dumb-looking guy in a too-small sport coat. It was the same guy we had seen with Siri at Ev's saloon Saturday. Shit, I hope wasn't going to recognize us.
"Buck apiece," he said, eyeing us. "Say, you guys got ID's?"
My heart was in my throat as I pulled out my ID and showed it to him. He barely glanced at it. Ricky and Kenny flashed theirs and he collected three bucks and we were inside.
So this was where Nick's sister had worked. It was a wide, low-ceilinged room done in red wallpaper, red carpeting, and lot of dark wooden beams and dark paneling. At one end was a long bar with brass fittings and plenty of mirrors. At the other end a five-piece band dressed in tuxes was playing a Fats Domino tune on a small bandstand. The place was only about half full, with an almost constant stream of people coming and going. Mostly guys in their 20's and early 30's, it looked like. A few had dates. Waitresses dressed in frilly little black things moved among the tiny tables serving drinks. The air was heavy with cigarette smoke. A girl with platinum hair and painted-on eyebrows came up to us and offered to show us to a table and we followed her to a minuscule table at the back of the room. She promised to send a waitress right over.
"Wow! What a place!" Kenny said, gawking around. "But where's the girls?"
"Inna back room," Ricky said, nodding toward a door over in the corner by the rest rooms. There was a big barrel-chested guy with a shaved head and cauliflower ears in front of it with his arms folded across his chest. As we watched, two older men in suits walked up and gave the guy some money and he opened the door for them and they went in.
"Ah, ha!" Kenny said. "I see how it works, now."
"What'll it be, boys?" It was a blonde-haired waitress with legs up to here and eyelashes out to there. Seemed like she put a little too much emphasis on the word "boys."
"Gimme a cold Hudie," Ricky said.
"Sounds good."
"Me, too."
"Sure," she said, smiling sarcastically. "The coldest we got."
The band finished their song and went into a little vamp while the piano player introduced the star of the show.
"Direct from the Boardwalk in Atlantic City!" he said in this real fakey DJ voice. "Please make welcome to the stage here at Vito's " - drum roll - "Frankie Fortune!!"
The band went into "The Peppermint Twist" and Frankie came dashing out and grabbed the mike. He was a little short guy dressed in a tight three-button iridescent sharkskin suit with a white shirt and a skinny black tie. His black hair was greased into a huge pompadour that a fly couldn't have landed on and he wore black patent leather boots. He even looked a little like Joey Dee. Some girls seated close to the stage made a lot of noise at him and he swiveled his hips at them while he sang.
The waitress came back with our drinks and Ricky flipped some money onto her tray and told her to keep the change.
"I got this one," he said, dragging on his cigarette. Must have seen that in a movie.
"Thanks, big boy," she said, smiling sarcastically again and setting the drinks on the table on top of cocktail napkins with cartoons on them.
I was trying to just relax and enjoy my beer and listen to the band, but I was still kind of nervous. I felt like I had a sign on my back that said "Underage."
There were a couple of guys next to us wearing ties and drinking mixed drinks. In front of us were two guys with dates. There were a few unattached girls, but they were all in front of the stage drooling over Frankie Fortune. When he went into his next song, "Are You Lonesome Tonight," a few couples moved onto the dance floor.
The band was pretty good and everything, and Frankie was OK, but we were itching to see the girls, so after another beer we paid the gorilla at the door another buck and we went into the back room.
It was smaller than the main room, and darker, with colored lighting and music blasting from a jukebox. There was a small bar at one end and a stage at the other. On the stage was a girl with long blonde hair and heavily mascara-ed eyes dancing to "Stranger On The Shore." And, holy shit! all she had on was a G-string and a couple of pasties. Our eyes all bugged out and we stumbled over a table, nearly upsetting a couple of drinks.
"Look! Look!" Kenny whispered frantically, grabbing Ricky's arm. "Lookit those tits!"
"Yeah, yeah, I see 'em," Ricky laughed.
She had a set of hooters, for sure. She writhed about on the stage as they music played, caressing herself and giving the guys seated at the bar that ringed the stage some great shots. I felt myself getting real warm all of a sudden. I'd never seen anything like this before. She looked almost unreal up there in the spotlight. Like, bigger than life. We had come in at the end of her act, I guess; the rest of her clothes lay scattered across the stage, and she scooped them up and disappeared behind the curtain when the record ended.
"Wow!" I said reverently, mopping up the sweat on my forehead with a cocktail napkin. "What a woman."
"Yeah, boy," Kenny said.
"Hey, let's get a table," Ricky said, bringing us back to reality.
"Yeah, and more beer!" Kenny said enthusiastically.
The room was about three quarters full, mostly older gray-haired guys in suits. No women except the waitresses and the bartender. The big guy at the door poked his head in every few minutes and glared around. We found a table as close as we could to the stage and sat down and ordered beers from a sweet-smelling waitress with tits nearly spilling out of her sequined bra. Then a little wiry-haired guy with a big nose came out on stage and welcomed everyone to Vito's. He was dressed in a worn tux and had a New York accent. He started telling some of the funniest jokes I'd ever heard, and almost had Kenny rolling on the floor.
Like, how do get a nun pregnant? Ya fuck her! He said he had an uncle who lived over a bank, and his assets over a million dollars. Then he told a story about a race horse named My Dicky. "My Dicky is running..." he hollered.
We really thought he was funny, but he wasn't knocking anyone else out. "Ah, he stole those jokes from a Redd Foxx party album, man," Ricky guffawed.
When he got done he told us how lucky we were to be here tonight because it was the next girl's last appearance in the area until next year. She would be headed to New York for some fabulous bookings after tonight, but would be looking forward to visiting Vito's again because everybody had been so nice to her," and blah, blah, blah... "so give her a big welcome - for her last night at Vito's - to Edith Allan Poe!"
The stage went dark for a moment and when the blue spotlight came on there stood a tall girl with straight black hair down to her waist dressed all in black with a black bird perched on her shoulder. A raven, I guess, judging from her name. Eerie music (a Bach fugue, I learned years later) began playing and she started slinking around the stage as the crowd broke into applause and cheers. She was beautiful, with dark eyes and red lips and pale skin and a fantastic body outlined under the clinging black dress. It was really something to watch her take off her clothes, one piece at a time. At the end of her act, when she lay naked on the floor of the stage with the bird on her outstretched arm, my mouth was so dry I could barely swallow a mouthful of beer. Then the lights went out and when they came back on the stage was bare.
"Eerie bitch, ain't she?" Ricky said.
"Ha, I'd like to get her in the graveyard some dark night," Kenny giggled, poking me in the ribs. I think he was getting a little drunk. There was a graveyard in Bloomburg where kids went parking.
"Shit, I'd like to see you in the graveyard with her," said, snorting.
"Oh, wanna watch, huh?"
"Shit."
"Hey, look, you guys!" I said. It was the first stripper we'd seen, the blonde. She had come out from a door at the side of the stage and walked up to the bar. She had on a pink gown and was barefoot. She lit a cigarette and the bartender brought her a pink colored drink.
"Mmm, I wouldn't mind getting her in the graveyard," Ricky said, killing his fourth beer.
"Yeah, fat chance," Kenny said.
"Ya never know," Ricky said, grinning slyly.
"Oh, sure."
"Think I'll go say hi," Ricky said, lighting up another smoke.
"Oh, yeah, sure," Kenny guffawed.
"Watch me," Ricky said, standing up.
We thought he was going to the bathroom or something, but, holy shit! he walked right up to her and started a conversation.
"Lookit that!" Kenny said. "Goddamn, I don't believe it!"
Ricky came back to the table in a few minutes, all excited.
"Hey, you guys want some pussy?"
"What?"
"I got it all set up. Ten bucks apiece."
"You're shittin' us!"
"No, man, really. Ginger can fix us up, out back."
"Out back?"
"Yeah, she knows we're underage. She can't do anything in here, but if we give her the money she'll meet us in the alley behind the club and take us upstairs to the rooms the back way."
"Man, I don't know about this," I said reluctantly.
"Aw, c'mon. I'm goin'. So's Kenny, right?" He looked at Kenny.
"Yeah, sure, man," Kenny said, his face flushed, nervously lighting a cigarette. "I got ten."
"OK, you guys give me the money - here, under the table - and I'll take it over and give it to her. She's waitin'."
Ginger looked at us through her cigarette smoke, smiling. Did one of us get her? I wondered if she had known Carol Palladino. I had a ten dollar bill in my wallet. Shit, I hadn't counted on all this happening. But if Ricky and Kenny were going...
"OK," I said, digging out my ten.
"All right!" Ricky said, grabbing it.
"Oh, shit, shit, shit!" Kenny said as we watched Ricky amble back to Ginger. Excited wasn't a strong enough word to describe Kenny. As for me, I felt somewhere between apprehensive and petrified.
"OK, all set," Ricky said when he came back and sat down. "Give her a few minutes, so it won't look too obvious."
Ginger disappeared through the door next to the stage.
"What are these girls gonna look like, anyway?" Kenny asked suspiciously. Like he could afford to be choosy.
"There's a bunch of 'em up there. Ya just pick the one you like."
"Shit, do I need a rubber?" Kenny asked.
"They'll take of that."
"How long do we get?"
"Well..."
"Do they take all their clothes off, or what?"
Kenny was sweating nervously, asking questions faster than Ricky could answer them.
"Hey, man, relax," Ricky said, laughing and patting him on the back. "Just go along with the program."
Kenny and I finished our beers and we got up to leave. Whew! I felt a little lightheaded when I stood up, and I grabbed the chair to steady myself. Ricky noticed and laughed.
"Good beer, huh?"
"The best," I said. I was OK. Shit, what's a few bleers? I felt like every eye in the place was on us as we walked across the room and past the big guy and out the door and into the other room. I bet the big guy knew what was going on; he grinned sarcastically at us. The band was on break, now, and we went on outside. The night air hit me hard. I laughed and punched Ricky on the arm.
"Follow me, men," he said.
We followed him down the sidewalk and down the alley next to Vito's and around to the back. There was an old guy in rags sleeping in a big cardboard box that we had to step over, and the place was littered with empty wine bottles and newspapers. I could smell garbage. An alley cat jumped out of a trash can and ran off.
"OK, here's the back door. She said to wait here."
We all lit up and waited for Ginger to appear. We smoked another cigarette. Then the realization began to sink in. At first we laughed.
"Oh, she probably had to pee or something."
"Maybe she got killed in a car wreck."
"Between the bar and the back door?"
"Maybe she's on her period."
"She's probably picking the best girls."
"Maybe she's upstairs shaving."
But we knew what had happened.
"Man, she ain't comin'."
"Shit."
We looked at one another morosely.
"Aah, it's only ten bucks. What the hell," Ricky said.
"Goddamn. Ten bucks is ten bucks," Kenny whined.
"Sorry, guys. It's my fault," Ricky said. I could see he was embarrassed, and it wasn't often that Ricky got embarrassed.
"Goddamn right it's your fault," Kenny said.
"Well, whaddya want me to do?" Ricky said.
"Let's go back inside and get our money back."
"Shit, man, we can't do that."
"I'm gonna get my money."
Kenny was really pissed off. It was kind of funny. I didn't see where he had much chance of getting a refund, but it might be fun to watch him try. Maybe they would ask him for his receipt.
"C'mon, you fuckin' wimpsticks, let's go get our money."
He started off back down the alley. Ricky laughed silently and shrugged. "Let's go, Cuz."
So we followed Kenny back to the front door of the club. He banged the door open and demanded to see Ginger.
"Ginger who?" the door man asked. He had his arms folded across his massive chest and was smoking a cigar. He towered over Kenny.
"You know Ginger who."
The door man moved a step closer to Kenny and blew a mouthful of smoke in his face. Ricky and I were backed up against the hat-check girl's counter. Ricky asked her how she was doing, and she smiled at him said she was doing all right.
"Ain't no Ginger here, little man," the door man said. "Now, why don't you just bug off?" This guy was huge, and getting mad. Kenny was drunker than I thought.
"Hey, I want..." Kenny said, trying to brush past him.
"What you want, is to get the hell outta here, little man," the big guy said, grabbing Kenny with one hand. He had his cigar in the other; I guess he figured it was a one-arm job.
A small crowd had formed to watch the action. Ricky was exploding with silent laughter. His face was red and his shoulders were shaking. I guess it was getting kind of funny. Kenny had to be nuts.
But just as the door man had Kenny about six inches off the floor ready to toss him out, we heard a series of explosions from inside the club. Firecrackers, it sounded like, so I thought it might be gunfire. Every time you see someone on the news who's a witness at a shooting they say it sounded like firecrackers. The door man's eyes widened and he cocked his head, listening for a moment, and then let go of Kenny and ran inside the club. Kenny stumbled around the vestibule a little, to the amusement of everyone present, and finally regained his balance up against the counter. "What the hell?" he said, looking around in confusion.
In about two seconds people came rushing out of the club like it was about to sink or something. We got caught in the crowd and were swept outside along with the musicians, bartenders, hookers, and customers. A fat guy with a scared look on his face stumbled out, trying to fasten his pants and tuck in his shirt, and a wild-eyed blonde with smeared lipstick and a disheveled hairdo wearing only a man's overcoat that she was trying to button up was hot on his heels. Everybody was yelling and pushing. The guitar player from Frankie's band had his Stratocaster with him, hugging it close to his body. A couple guys had drinks they were trying not to spill. What the holy hell was going on? Then we heard someone shout: "Vito's been shot! He's dead!"
Holy jumpin' horseshit! A gangland killing or something?
In the hubbub I heard Nick's name mentioned, and I turned to Ricky. "You hear that?"
"Yeah," he said, a puzzled look on his face. "Somebody said somethin' about Nick."
Then we saw it, parked right across the street, gleaming and flashing under the neon signs. I hadn't noticed it before. Nick's '55 Chevy.
"Let's get the hell outta here!" Kenny said frantically. He was in a sweat, ready to panic, trying to make a path through the crowd to safety.
People were trying to get out of the club while others were jamming the doors trying to see what had happened. We heard sirens in the distance; the cops from the donut shop screeched up and hopped out of their car. We were shoved this way and that. I saw Ginger sneaking out, followed by the bouncer from the back room. I was looking around for Nick, but I didn't see him.
"Hey, there's Ginger, man," Ricky said. "Wanna ask her for your money back?"
"Fuck the money, the cops are comin'. Let's get outta here." Kenny said.
Sounded like a good idea to me. I didn't want a ride downtown to the police station as an underage witness.
"Let's just ease on over here," Ricky said coolly, finding a path through mob to the sidewalk where a group of passersby were standing around watching the show. "Nobody'll even know we were in the place."
He was right; nobody was paying any attention to us, and in about three seconds we looked like innocent bystanders. We all casually lit cigarettes and waited further developments. Most of the people from the club had disappeared down the street into cars or other clubs and we were left with the growing throng on the sidewalk.
"You see Nick anywhere?" Kenny asked. "There's his car."
"No," Ricky said. "Hey, maybe he can get your money back for you."
"Yeah, right," Kenny said dourly.
Then more cops showed up, two cars with sirens and lights going. They left two guys at the door to handle the crowd and the rest went inside. Then a plain car drove up and two guys in suits got out and went inside. A few minutes later an ambulance arrived and two guys in white rushed inside with a guerney. Cops directed traffic and cleared out the doorway to the club. Red lights blinked from their cars, reflecting off the startled white faces of the onlookers.
A TV crew drove up in a white station wagon just as the ambulance guys were carrying out a still figure on the guerney. The figure was covered with a bloody white sheet and wasn't moving, and we craned our necks to get a look.
"Vito?" I said breathlessly.
"Bet it is," Ricky said.
When they loaded the body into the ambulance they went back inside with another guerney.
Some other people from the club had the same idea we had, and had hidden in the crowd to watch what happened. We recognized our waitress and a couple others.
"Wanda said that greasy-haired kid just walked up and started shooting at Vito," our waitress said to a girl standing next to her. We moved a little closer to them.
"Jesus, that guy's gotta be crazy," the girl answered. "Then what?"
"Moe and the boys opened up on him. Dropped him in his tracks."
"Dead?"
"I guess."
"What about Vito?"
"Dead."
"Jesus."
What greasy-haired kid? What were they talking about?
Another body was carried out by the grim-faced ambulance attendants. I had stopped breathing. The sweat was cold on my forehead. There was an arm hanging down from under the sheet. On it was a tattoo of a cobra. It was Nick.