Hell's Gate (2 page)

“Now! Move!” Mike bellowed. He stood on the stern and grasped the sidewheel housing, pulling himself up, and setting his feet on the footholds built into it. One officer followed, two others climbed up the side. One man lay motionless in the launch. The sergeant groaned on his knees, trying to tie off a wound in his thigh. A pistol cracked from somewhere behind Mike as his head cleared the big ship's rail, throwing up splinters from the housing as he climbed. He turned and saw a dark form about twenty feet away on deck, saw a flash, felt a tug at his jacket. He brought the .38 around and snapped off three shots. He didn't know if he hit anything. He didn't stop climbing. A moment later, he dropped on the deck in a crouch. The officer hopped down at his side. There was a form sprawled on the deck just feet away, a black mass on the gray boards. Mike checked him. The top of the man's head was gone, from the eyes back to the ears.

“One of them,” Mike said to the cop. “Shotgun.”

The other patrolmen came over the rail. There was no more firing, just a ringing, black silence. There was no light aboard save for the distant glow from the city, which cast a tangled net of shadow from the masts, smokestack, rigging, lifeboats, and dozens of objects Mike couldn't identify. Mike signaled the men to go aft toward where he'd last seen the man who'd shot at him. With a twist of his head and a nod in the other direction, he went forward, the third officer close behind. They crept toward the bow, going from shadow to shadow. They were beside the massive structure of the walking beam engine when Mike kicked something soft and fell to one knee over a body. He put the Colt to the man's side as he pushed away. There was a groan.

“Who's that?” the officer said.

“Dunno.” Mike looked closer. “One o' the crew maybe.” He felt for the pulse at the man's neck, then went over the body, feeling for wounds, starting with the hands, wary that it might be one of the Hookers playing possum. “Blood,” he said. “Don't think he's shot though.” He shook the body and slapped the man's cheek. The eyes fluttered. “We're gonna get you some help,” Mike whispered. “Can you hear me?” He got a nod and a grunt in reply. “How many of them? Where are they?”

“Fi-six,” the man managed. “Fo'c'sle.”

Mike didn't know a fo'c'sle from a main yard. He exchanged a look with the officer, who nodded toward the bow.

“Okay,” he said. “We'll be back for you.”

The ship had a raised forecastle, or fo'c'sle as the seamen called it. A companionway door led down into a deeper darkness. The door hung open. They crept to opposite sides, careful of the noise their hard shoes made on the wooden deck. Mike took a quick look down the stairs. Only the top three steps could be seen. The rest was too black to make out.

“Lemme go first,” the officer whispered. “You don't know these ships like I do.”

“What's down there?”

“Crew's quarters, mostly. Should be another door not far from the bottom. Careful. Steps're steep.” The officer stepped into the door with Mike turning in just behind him. From the stern pistol shots cracked, followed by the booming of shotguns, coming so fast they were hard to separate. Mike turned and ducked. From somewhere in the blackness of the fo'c'sle companionway there came a rattling series of explosions. Mike could not tell how many shots there were or even if the patrolman had the chance to fire back. The deafening sound of the firing and the impact of the patrolman's body as it toppled back on him were almost indistinguishable events. He was knocked flat, his head hitting the deck. He thought at first that he must have been hit. A sickening panic swept over him as he felt a trickle of blood on his face and his head went fuzzy. He tried to sort out what had happened, but things were moving far too fast for rational thought. There were shouts and feet pounding up the stairs, then more shots, throwing up splinters from the deck and jerking the body of the patrolman sprawled atop him. Twisting, Mike brought the Colt around, saw shadows appear in the doorway. He fired until there were no more bullets. The shadows disappeared with a tumbling crash down the companionway. Mike rolled from under the body, found his service revolver, and emptied it down the companionway, firing blindly.

Mike reloaded the Colt, dropping as many bullets as he managed to load into the magazine. The sound of running feet brought him around, but he held fire.

“It's us,” one of the cops said. “We got the other one. Oh, Christ! Dickey! They shot Dickey!” the cop cried when he saw the body. The officer bent over his friend's corpse, which now had a spreading, black stain surrounding it, leaking into the joints of the teak and running in straight lines down the deck.

“Get outa there!” Mike shouted. “They're down there.”

Without a word, the other officer fired into the companionway while the first dragged the body back. The patrolman reloaded while the other checked on the body.

“Oh, shit,” Mike groaned. “Shit, shit, shit!”

“Two kids,” the patrolman said. “Fuckin'…” He took up the shotgun he'd dropped when he moved the body, stepped to the companionway and started firing, letting loose three blasts before he stopped. “Body at the bottom o' the stairs,” he said. “Saw it in the muzzle flash.”

“There were two,” Mike said. “Certain of it. You see anything else?”

“Nah.”

Mike tried calling into the companionway. “Give it up! The rest're dead. Give up now an' we won't shoot.” He didn't get a reply. “Any way a man could get outa here, through the ship?”

“Not sure,” one of the patrolmen said. “Probably. These ships are all different. Coulda … got in the hold, engine room maybe. Big ship.”

“We need light; some lanterns. I'm not going down there without one,” Mike said. “None of us are.” The shock was beginning to set in. This was only the second time he had used his pistol in the line of duty and his first experience with carnage like this. He had thought he'd be ready when it came. He did his best to keep his voice from trembling. “I'll find a lamp,” he said.

“There's lamps in the boat,” one reminded him. Mike didn't want to take the time to climb back down to the boat, but at the same time he knew that someone should check on the sergeant and the wounded patrolman. The thought of searching the ship alone wasn't very appealing either. He just grunted a reply and walked back down the deck. He found the seaman he'd stumbled over minutes before. The man was sitting up, propped against the rail, his head in his hands.

“Hey. Doin' better?” Mike said. He got a groan in reply. “We'll get you some help soon. Listen, I need a lamp. Where can I find a lamp?”

Without looking up, the man raised a hand, pointed toward the stern, mumbling something. The only words Mike caught were
aft hatch.
He went quickly, taking a detour to the rail and calling down to the sergeant.

“I'm shot in the leg,” the sergeant called back. “Can't climb up. Purdy's pretty bad, too. Don't know. He's unconscious.”

“Hang on,” Mike called back. I think maybe we got 'em.” He turned back to the deck with its maze of shadows and went where he thought an aft hatch should be. He saw a lantern hanging on a mast. He saw the hatch half open, its cover slid to one side. Mike crouched as a flash erupted from the hatch with the crack of a pistol. From somewhere to his left another barked. He felt a bullet pass his face as he rolled for cover. More shots followed and he saw a shadow emerging from the hatch, firing as it rose. Mike brought the Colt up. The Colt cracked three or four times, so fast he couldn't be sure. A shotgun boomed behind him, another pistol too. Hard shoes pounded the deck. The man in the hatch was down, hands hanging, motionless. More shots from the running patrolmen. Return fire from behind the mast. The Colt came 'round, banging and bucking so he wasn't sure where the shots were going. The slide clanged open when the last bullet left the muzzle. He reached for his revolver, but it was over.

Mike got up and approached the man in the hatch. With one foot he pushed at the body, keeping the revolver ready. He bent and grabbed a handful of hair, pulling the head back. It was the Oysterman, with a black hole where his left eye had been.

“This one's still alive,” one of the patrolmen called, standing over the other body. Mike let the Oysterman's head bounce on the hatch. He straightened up quickly and as he did it seemed as if all the blood had run out of his head. His knees buckled and the deck started to spin. He took a step, but stumbled and fell to his knees. He didn't think he'd been shot, but now he wasn't so sure.

“You all right?” one cop called.

“Yeah,” Mike heard himself say. “Tripped on somethin'.” He shook his head and felt himself for any wounds. He took a couple of deep breaths and his head seemed to clear a little, enough so he set one foot on the deck and, after another pause, hauled himself to his feet. Tom had warned him that no amount of training could make this go away entirely. Though Mike had learned everything he could teach, Tom could never train away the shock of being shot at, or of taking a life.

Mike took another breath and made his way to where the cops stood. They both looked pale gray in the darkness and their eyes were as big as saucers. They were breathing hard and one grasped a length of rigging for support. Mike looked down at the man on the deck.

“Smilin' Jack,” Mike grunted. Jack O'Banion had earned the nickname when he got fish-hooked in a brawl at a rat pit many years before. The scar curved up his cheek, pulling his lips into a ghastly semblance of a smile. Nobody ever called him Smilin' Jack to his face, nobody who wanted to live, but he was leaking all over the deck now and in no condition to do anything about it. Mike knelt beside him. He could hear the sucking chest wound bubble.

“You ain't got long, Jack,” he said.

“Fuck you,” Jack wheezed back, his hand coming up, darting toward Mike's side. Mike slapped it away, sending a knife skittering across the deck.

“You miserable shit!” Mike pulled his hand back and stood, looking at a stinging cut near the wrist. He shook the hand, flicking blood. “I'd fucking kill you for that if you weren't dead already, you piece o' shit!”

“Must be dead, I can't gut a half-cent pig like you.”

Mike wrapped his hand in a kerchief, feeling the lightness return to his head as he did. He stepped back beside Smilin' Jack and stood on his hand.

“Agh, me hand! Get off, goddamn you!”

“Oh, is that your hand, Jack,” Mike said without lifting his foot. “You won't need it where you're goin'.” He ground down with his heel and O'Banion let out a gasp. He tried to punch at Mike's leg with the other arm, but he only flailed weakly. “Now, do yourself a favor before I cut you up so bad your own mother wouldn't know you. Where's that knife?” he said to one of the patrolmen.

“But—”

“But nothin',” Mike said with an icy look. “Get the fuckin' knife.”

The man fetched it for him. Mike bent low over Jack, his face only a foot away. He put the tip of the blade under O'Banion's left eye. “Tell me who set this up? Who's getting a percentage? I know this wasn't just you. One o' the fuckin' bosses are in on it, Jack. This ain't your style.”

Jack said nothing. He closed that eye and tried to turn his head away. Mike poked the blade, drawing a small stream of blood from the lower lid. “This can be as painful as you like, Jack,” he said.

“Don' cut,” was all Jack managed. He was weakening as they watched, the eyelids beginning to flutter.

“Then who was it? Goddamn it, one fuckin' good deed before you die!” Smilin' Jack coughed, spraying blood, but Mike hardly flinched.

“Tell me an' you'll get a proper funeral, a big hearse an' everything, flowers, the works.” He'd heard how vain Jack was and thought a good send-off might appeal to him. Apparently it did because O'Banion said one word before he passed. Half gasped, it was a word for sure, but Mike didn't get to ask its meaning. He stood, the knife loose in his bloodied hand, his hair wild, and his skin pasty white. The two patrolmen looked at each other. Mike almost told them that he hadn't been about to cut O'Banion's eye out, but he stopped himself. “Did he say
bottle
or was it
bottler
? Could have been boodle too, now that I think about it. Don't make sense, but that's what it sounded like to me.”

“Bottler,” one patrolman cut in. “Definite it was bottler, whatever the fuck that means.”

“Bottle,” the other patrolman said. “I heard bottle for sure. The rest was just him gurglin'.”

Mike looked down on Smilin' Jack. “Never said a straight word in his life from what I hear. Why start now?” He looked around the shadowed deck. “C'mon, we've got work to do.”

2

“THAT WAS WONDERFUL, Harry,” Ginny said in her best dreamy voice. “You were so strong tonight. Have you been taking one of those tonics?”

Harry smiled as he put on his shoes, quite pleased with himself.

“Well, whatever it was, you just wore me out.” She rolled over and got up on her knees, hugging Harry, if that was his true name, as he tied his laces. It was close to six
A.M.
and Ginny Caldwell wanted nothing more than to push this paunchy, pale banker out of her bed. But she knew her trade and what the house required. Harry turned and kissed her with an appreciative, “Mmm.”

“You'll be back next week, won't you?” she asked as if she'd be counting the days.

“Oh, I'll be back,” he said. “Don't I always?”

He did. Ginny could have set a clock by him. She stroked his neck where it bulged over his collar. “You do,” Ginny said with a forced, but convincing smile.

Harry left her a generous tip, though Ginny didn't count it till the door was closed. She smiled for real as she pushed the bills into a high-topped boot under her bed. It was getting full again. She'd have to stop at the bank this week and make another deposit. Ginny was one of the more popular girls in the house and the money was starting to add up. If she'd been working for a pimp, or in one of the hundreds of low-class houses, she'd never have seen a tenth of the money she earned, but Miss Gertie was different, allowing her girls a healthier cut. Ginny figured she'd have nearly six hundred now and she'd only started saving a couple of months before. That was one thing she had Harry to thank for. The banker had given her some prudent advice along with his greenbacks. For all of the year before that, ever since her family threw her out, she'd spent every dime, but not anymore. Clothes, hats, shoes, and a bowl of opium now and then had left her flamboyantly dressed, forgetful when she needed to be, and broke most of the time. Now she had something put by, and maybe in another year or so, enough to open her own shop, not a whorehouse, but a proper shop.