“There was this German guy named Nietzsche who figured it all out, and for a Square-head he made a lot of sense. He said the important thing, the thing that makes a man superior, is his Will to Power. A man who wants to be on top, just for the hell of it, he’s the guy to be.”
He paused for a breath, and I finished my drink. “A smart guy,” he said. “I read every one of his books.”
He had told me this at least twenty times. “Every one?” I marveled.
“Every one. Every goddamned one.” He sat down heavily in his seat and let out a deep sigh. Evidently the performance had exhausted him.
“Joe,” he said, “I can’t let anyone get in the way. I gotta stay on top. I gotta keep every bit of my power, and that’s why Lucci has to die. Does that make sense?”
“Damn good sense.”
“You said it, boy. You said it.” He seemed almost relieved, as if he had expected me to argue with him.
“Look, Chief,” I said, when he didn’t say anything, “what do you expect from me? I mean, you don’t want me to gun him, do you? I will if you want, but I’m not a torpedo.”
“No, I don’t want you for that. I got a million guns. But I don’t want him gunned at all. Dammit, Joe, we can’t risk another shooting. We’ve had five already this year.”
“I don’t get it,” I said, because I didn’t. “Chief, you have the whole force in your pocket. If you give the word, every cop in town buries his head in the sand and stuffs cotton in his ears. What’s the worry over a shooting?”
He shook his head. “Sure I’ve got the cops. But the citizens don’t know this. The citizens don’t understand how the ball bounces. When there are enough unsolved homicides, they get upset. They switch mayors. They switch cops. They switch everything. And then where the hell am I?”
I nodded slowly. He was no moron. He had used his head to get where he was.
“I want to nail him sort of indirect,” he said. “But I’m not sure how. That’s why I called you. Figure a way.”
I closed my eyes and began stroking my chin with my left hand. This was one of the big reasons he tolerated me—he was convinced I was a thinker. He would have me come to his house and think until I told him what he had already said, and he knew then that I must be a genius.
I made him feel powerful, and he liked that. That’s the only reason he tolerated anyone. Ruthie made him feel powerful too. She would crawl on her belly to him, begging him to take her. The last girl he had didn’t crawl to him one night, and he got irritated and broke her back. So Ruthie crawls, and I can’t really blame her.
But she didn’t always crawl for him. There was a time when she would have crawled to me, and not because she was afraid of getting a broken back. But that was a long time ago.
So I stroked my chin like a baboon and thought. It was more difficult than usual, since I didn’t have the slightest idea what he wanted me to suggest. He seemed to want me to come up with an idea all on my own.
And I did. It was strange, for it was about the first idea I had ever had all by myself, at least since I started working for the Chief. But I had an idea, and the more I thought about it the better it sounded. I opened my eyes and looked up at him. He was waiting.
“I got it,” I said. “We’ll frame him.”
The Chief got a happy look in his eyes. He liked new gimmicks, and this sounded like a fairly new way to take a boy for a ride. “Go on,” he said. “Go on, Joe.”
“We’ll frame him for murder,” I said. “We’ll knock off someone, some Skid Row bum, and we’ll tie it to him. The cops will pick him up right away, because you’ll tell them to. And we’ll have thirty guys swear they saw Lucci kill the guy. And you’ll tell the judge to hang him, and he will.”
He hesitated, and I gave him the clincher. “You’ve got the power,” I said, reverently. “You can pull something like this off perfectly.”
That did it, of course. Power was the magic word to the Chief. “Yes,” he said, sliding the word over his tongue. “I could do it. And it would be perfect, wouldn’t it?”
I nodded.
“Yes,” he repeated. “Perfect.” He smiled a big, oily smile. “When do you want to pull it off?”
“Tonight!” I practically shouted the word. His enthusiasm was suddenly contagious, and this time it was my idea. I was all caught up in the beauty of it.
“Tonight?” He smiled. “Okay, Joe. Who do you think ought to gun the tramp?”
I thought a moment, and although I didn’t want to come up with the answer I couldn’t help myself. “I’ll do it,” I said, calmly. “The less people on to this caper, the better it is. I’ll fix it.”
He smiled wider this time. “Now you’re talking,” he said. “You’re starting to understand what power means, Joe. I’ll get you a gun.”
He vanished and came back in a minute. “Here you go,” he said, handing me a lightweight .38 automatic. “It’s clean, Joe. No registration, no nothing. Just wipe it off and drop it, and it might as well be Lucci’s as anyone else’s.”
I took it from him and fitted it to my grip. It felt good. I pocketed it and stood up. “Okay,” I said. “I’ll be right back, by nine-thirty at the latest. Wait up for me and we can talk over the next part, huh?”
“That’s the ticket,” he said. “I’ll be waiting right here. Of course,” he added, “I may have to go upstairs and spend a few minutes with Ruthie.” He winked. “She’d go nuts otherwise.”
I smiled nervously, shook hands with him, and walked down the long driveway to my car. It was a fine car, a new Pontiac, and while it didn’t measure up to his Caddy, it got me wherever I was going. It was one of the benefits of being the Chief’s lieutenant.
That, and a good apartment, and money in the bank. The only loss involved had been Ruthie, and I stopped caring about her after the first month or so. She was just a woman, and the world is full of them. There were other things that were much more important. Power, perhaps. The Chief and Nietzsche had something there.
I drove onto Clinton Street and down toward the waterfront. It was only a little way to Skid Row, the street of broken dreams and broken men. It was the place where nobody really cared about anything, and where everyone waited hopefully for death. Killing a wino would hardly seem like murder. The poor sonofabitch would neither know nor care what happened to him.
I drove slowly once I hit Halsey Street. I didn’t want to park the car and chase around on foot. I wanted one good shot from the front window. Then I would drive like hell for two blocks, then slow down and head back to the Chief’s home. It would be simple enough.
I circled up and down the Row a good four or five times, and I never managed to get off a shot. There were either too many lights or not enough light to see by, either a crowd of bums or no bums at all.
I was almost ready to give up for the night when I got another idea, an original idea. It was my second original idea of the evening, and I just couldn’t pass it up. It was a good idea too. So I drove partway back on Clinton and made a phone call at a drugstore.
I returned to the Chief’s place at 9:30, right on the dot. I rang the bell and waited for him. He took a long time answering, and he was panting slightly when he opened the door. It was easy to guess where he had been, but he had to spell it out for me.
“What a woman!” he oozed. “She goes crazy for me.”
I nodded and walked into the house. I sat down in the chair without waiting for an invitation.
“Joe,” he said, “I really didn’t expect you back so soon. How did it go, boy?”
“Fine,” I said. “Smooth as silk, Chief.”
“Good,” he said. “You’ve got a head on your shoulders, Joe.” He left the room, and came back with another pair of drinks. I took one, only this time I didn’t bother to sip it. I threw it right down.
“Now what?” he asked. “Do we just wait till a prowl cop tumbles to it?”
“Relax,” I said. “It’s all taken care of, Chief.”
He gave me a puzzled look, and I stole a glance at my watch: 9:45.
Just then the doorbell rang. He was right on time. The Chief started to stand up, but I beat him to it. “Stay there,” I said. “I’ll get it.” I went to the door and let him in.
He walked in almost apologetically, holding his hat in his hands. “Okay,” he said. “I’ll deal. Start talking.”
The Chief nearly hit the ceiling. “Lucci!” he screamed.
Lucci shrugged. “That’s the name,” he said. “You wanted to deal, right? Wanted to straighten everything out?”
I couldn’t wait much longer. I was afraid the Chief would have an apoplectic fit. I drew the .38 automatic from my pocket and pointed it at the Chief. I fired it three times, and the slugs hit him solidly in the stomach, chest, and head. He was dead in almost no time at all.
And just before he died he didn’t look powerful at all. He looked weak as a kitten.
I turned to Lucci, and he was utterly dumbfounded. I wiped off the .38 and tossed it on the floor. He looked from the gun to me and back to the gun. The fear danced crazily in his eyes.
“You’d better run,” I said. “You’d better run, Lucci.”
He ran. I drew slowly, and I fired my .45 just as he reached the door. I shot him three times, too. He died quickly.
Then I sat back and waited. I didn’t have long to wait. The prowl cop was right around the corner, and he heard the shots and came running. He took a look at the two men and let out a whoop.
“What happened?”
I pointed to Lucci. “He shot the Chief,” I said. “And I shot him.”
“Gosh,” said the cop. He was a new boy, and this was his first homicide.
“The Chief was cracking down on him,” I explained, “and this crumb tried to even things up a little.”
“Gosh,” repeated the cop. “It’s good you shot him. Nice shooting.”
“It was an easy shot,” I said. “Nothing to it.”
“Sure,” he said. “But it was a good thing you had your gun.”
“We’re all required to carry them twenty-four hours a day.”
He shrugged. “Not everyone does, though. It was still good work, Lieutenant.”
I smiled at the kid. “Thanks,” I said. “But it doesn’t bring back the Chief, does it?”
I smiled again, sadly. I felt almost like a father to the cop. He was young, but he’d learn.
I wondered if Ruthie was still awake.
I felt powerful as all hell.
YOU CAN’T LOSE
ANYONE WHO STARVES IN THIS COUNTRY deserves it. Almost anybody who is dumb enough to want to work can get a job without any back-breaking effort. Blindies and crips haul in twenty-five bucks an hour bumming the Times Square district. And if you’re like me—able-bodied and all, but you just don’t like to work, all you got to do is use your head a little. It’s simple.