The Death and Life of Zebulon Finch, Volume 1 (5 page)

VI.

L
ITTLE MORE THAN A YEAR
passed between Wilma Sue's disappearance and my offing, but oh, was it a fruitful time for Zebulon Finch. With Wilma Sue I had toyed with tenderness; in order to forget her, I mastered ferocity. What time was there to think of her, or where she might be, when there were so many lips to split and arms to break? Testa's fertile mind continued to bear bloodthirsty fruit, though as business accelerated, I saw less of the man himself.

His final, and most fateful, piece of advice came when he tagged along with Jonesy to question me concerning a roustabout from which I'd left with a busted lip. I attempted to collect the draining blood in a cupped palm while Testa repeated one of his favorite chestnuts, that so long as I insisted on entering into each confrontation as a dog bounds after a skunk, I would be no stranger to a spray of ass. He insisted that there was but one way to survive in this business.

“You don't need to show it,
bimbo
,” said he. “But you gotta have fear in your heart.”

It was a slip of advice I did not heed.

The job that winded the clockwork of my murder began in March of 1896. From out of the mist (so it seemed) had risen an enclave populated by good-looking immigrants from a tiny island off the heel of Italy. They lived at the elbow of two unremarkable streets
and had adopted a socialist lifestyle wherein each family took up the job most needed by the community. You need only visit the neighborhood on a Saturday to see these sturdy folk line their carts upon a wildflowered knoll and trade goods. Ne'er a penny changed hands.

We called them the “Triangulinos” because of the tattoos worn on their left biceps: a triangle made of triangles. This insignia lent the otherwise congenial immigrants the aura of a posse; one got the impression that they would be all too happy to die for their shared ideals. In short, they were not the sort of fraternity a man of intelligence would disrupt, which is exactly why the assignment ended up in my angry, idiot lap.

For days I strolled their borders, chewing jerky and spitting cigar butts and watching the insufferably handsome men tip their hats to their magnificent women. It would take a fine disaster indeed to bring down this bunch! I puzzled upon arsons; I mused over explosions; I considered the kidnapping of a beloved elder or some other such key figure. None of them sat right in my gut. The fires would be extinguished with awesome speed, the dynamite defused before damage was done, the kidnapped fellow eagerly self-martyred.

Jonesy claimed to sympathize with me but a man cannot sit on his hands forever. I delivered the Black Hand letter (the amount specified was extraordinary even by our standards) and waited the specified number of days for the Triangulinos to respond. Of course they did not pay, so that night I took up my club, waited in the darkened entryway of a bakery, and when one of their fine young men happened by, took out his knee with a good, swift blow. I muttered Black Hand boilerplate and made my exit.

The next day was spent urging my Excelsior to make the sun drop faster. At dusk I headed out with my club and busted an elbow.
Day, night: this time it was a rib. Sleep, wake: a collarbone crumbled. A Triangulino fell each night for two weeks. Could I extend it to three? Yes, I could: the snaps and pops of broken bones became my evening lullabies.

There was nothing innovative about my dark-corner thuggery, but the sheer number and regularity of the beatings began to bestow upon me the reputation of a phantom. Soon I came to identify this as the exact notoriety I'd for so long sought. What's more, I had achieved it without the management of Testa or the aid of additional muscle.

My experiment was closing in on a month when it came to a precipitous end. I was rambling along my now-favorite block, whistling and twirling my Excelsior, when a young man stepped before me with enough abruptness to bring me to a foppish halt. He wore his Sunday best though it was Wednesday, his hat freshly mended and his fingernails cleared of dirt. I prepared to deliver an admonishment (“I
say
, sir,” or something of the sort) when my eyes were drawn to the triangles-within-triangles inked into his biceps.

His arm shot forward. At last, thought I, it was my turn to experience a blade to the stomach! But the object from which I flinched was an envelope so thick with cash that it had been girdled in twine. My first thought should have been how glad Testa would be to hear of my overdue success. Instead I found myself disheartened, as if this immigrant had made an exceptional offer on a prize calf I had yet to raise to full maturity.

This barbaric business with the Triangulinos would end up being the worst thing I had ever done, or would ever do. And that, as you shall see over time, is saying a mouthful.

Within the week I graced two separate “Wanted” posters. I heard the news as I was about to dig my mitts into a basket of shaved pork,
and I left it for the flies so that I could rush out and see for myself. The first likeness made me look as if I had water on the brain, but the second lent me the lackadaisical glamor of a Jesse James or John Wesley Hardin.

I tore down one example of each and hurried home to award them proud positions within my scrapbook. It had ballooned since the days of Wilma Sue. Now that I slept alone, the collected posters of my fellow criminals had become my confidants. At night I'd whisper to them as though we shared a bunkhouse: “Good night, Butch ‘the Rat' Higgins. Sleep well, J.R. Baker, Murderer. Until morning, Clyde Landsness, for Whom a Mighty Reward Is Offered.”

The rise of my reputation did not escape the notice of the boss. “Testa sends his regards,” said Jonesy, handing me a shiny new bottle of bourbon. But the twist of his mouth said something else:
You did fine. Enjoy it. Just remember, this ain't about you, Finch.

In my mind, of course, it was. I came to view the Triangulino affair as a prime example of the major weakness of Testa's Black Hand. Namely, the extortion letters. They came from Jonesy sealed but I began to take peeks, only to find that they were just as I had feared: the novice jottings of the barely literate. I remembered that first meeting with Testa and how he'd mocked my offer to compose letters, asking if I thought I was Shakespeare. Well, next to these dilettantes, I was!

The first letter that I, if you will excuse the understatement,
revised
was for the prosperous entrepreneur butcher Salvatore Petrosino. What Jonesy handed me was claptrap: “Deny if you have Sufficient Courage this demand of $2,000 and risk all Future Happiness. Your Money or your Life is required at the following Day and Time and Location . . .”

It chagrined me as a fellow intellectual that savvy, successful Petrosino might read such solecistic drivel. I hid myself in the corner of a pub, withdrew a piece of paper, licked the tip of my pen for dramatic effect, and met the two in hopes that magic would alight.

Mr. Petrosino,

So you spear with hook your beef as it still kicks its hooves; so shall you kick when lifted by our beefiest men. So you slice your cattle from brisket to round with little thought of breath or soul; such operation to us is familiar, for we open bodies the same as we unbutton a shirt. So you collect innards within a fist; so we collect your TRUE innards, your loved ones, within ours, a fist much Blacker.

The price of meat today is high: $2,000 delivered this coming Sunday to a man with a yellow handkerchief outside of Molly's. Chew on this as would a child—quickly—and digest it rare if you can, for there is no time for the dithering of seasonings and peppers. We shall belch our gratitude.

Hungrily,

The Black Hand

To this day I know the paragraphs cold. Melodramatic? Yes, of course. You must agree, though, that it contains traces of genuine poetry! Proud was I to deliver it; prouder still was I to receive payment in full. Emboldened, I exercised my wrist in service of further flowery directives, for several weeks producing the most
imposing collection of extortion letters in American history.

Lesser drafts were flung to the floor at the invention of more expressive metaphors. It was inevitable that one of my jealous colleagues would collect this dropped evidence and present it to Testa. I can see it as if I had been there: Testa pacing among his despised sofas and durable lamps, clutching a newer gun prototype in one hand as he rifled through my discards, following not so much the meaning of my nimble prose but rather the insubordination that fueled them. A man who could make threats as well as carry them out was a potential rival he did not need.

Here at last we come full circle. On the morning of May 7, 1896, I received an anonymous letter that, despite its rudimentary penmanship, preyed quite cunningly upon my vanity. The letter expressed admiration for my abilities and the desire to discuss a proposition.
Recognition at last
, thought I. I dined on pheasant and potatoes and ale. On balance, I believe it was a good final meal. I walked with full belly to the lake, as I had been directed; I checked my Excelsior by the tapering dusk; by and by it was 7:44 and through my heart passed a single bullet, and all because I had ignored the advice of a man I'd stubbornly refused to acknowledge as my cerebral superior:

You gotta have fear in your heart.

It is not difficult, you see, to understand why I had to be killed. The more difficult question is why I, of all people, was brought back.

PART TWO

1896–1902

Containing An Account Of Your Hero's Assimilation Into A Lot Of Unsavory Characters And Affiliation With A Person Of Very Small Stature.

I.

M
Y NEXT MEMORY COMES TWO
days after my murder. I was seated inside a tent. A man entered from a corner, parting the frayed yellow fabric with a shark fin hand. He took a single oversized step and then held that bizarre pose, legs scissored, while one hand weaseled into the folds of his frock coat and procured a cigar. His other hand held a chicken leg, undercooked and drizzling pink liquid. Masterfully, he lit the cigar without losing the chicken. Puffing away, he loped closer and sat with enough spirit to flare his low-hanging hem, which flung grit from the dirt floor into my open eyes. Quite oddly, I felt no sting.

He crossed a leg over a knee and bounced it; the scruff of his boot was slathered in cheap polish. He held his cigar with an actor's verve and with his other hand brought in the chicken leg, rotated it for best vantage, and took a rapacious bite. I guessed the man to be more than double my age and yet he gave off an impression of rakish good health. Beneath the scraggled beard his flesh was peach-hued; his lips were red, even too; the hair falling from under his top hat flowed across his shoulders in a womanish cascade. His pale green eyes were ringed with red, the kind that told of late nights and budget booze as much as it did the unshirkable responsibilities of morning.

I would come to know this man as the Barker.

He smacked his lips when he drew smoke.

“I'm a busy fellow,” said he. “So out with it. Who are you?”

Speech was a revolting memory. I burrowed back into my quiet.

The Barker spat a tendon and hovered the cigar before his lips.

“Indeed. Very clever. Hold your cards, reveal nothing. Force the interrogator to ask the same question of himself. Who am I? Who are any of us? It becomes existential. Ah, you're a cleaver, sir. You're the sharpest object in the drawer. Indulge me a revision. What is your
name
?”

Being addressed was a torture. Did this mean I was not, as I'd hoped, a ghost? Dull sensations began to seep in from great distances: coldness, wetness, a discomfort in my neck. Also came the first twinges of curiosity. Where was this tented location? How I had arrived there? What was the reason for my paralysis?

“No name.” He oozed smoke. “This, of course, opens up a host of possibilities. You're a thief, mayhap a feminine defiler, and what you seek is sanctuary. You realize that this changes our dynamic. If I lower myself—forgive me, sir, for the blunt words. But if I lower myself to deal with—ahem—Criminal Element, the only Christian method of proceeding is that I become the benefactor and you the benefacted. An awfully one-sided relationship, that one. No, it's better to be out with it. Tell me what it is you have done.”

At this point our twosome became three. Slinking through the same corner opening was a tabby in the most destitute of states: down an eye, patchily furred, and pregnant. Her legs were mud-crusted, her tail crooked. She threaded herself about her master's ankles, opening her scabbed muzzle to mewl for chicken.

The Barker's eyes grew redder as he squinted.

“My, my. It was a child, wasn't it? Who you . . . well, I don't care to voice such perversities. And since you see no need to disavow me of this assumption, I am forced to presume it correct. That's a foul
business, sir. Why, I could be jailed if I was found to be giving you asylum. Oh, no, sir. Heavens, no.”

He flung aside the chicken bone and inserted his thumb into his mouth all the way to the root, withdrawing it with a slurp as he sucked it clean. He held aloft the glistening digit as if imagining one of the aforementioned perversities. The cat, meanwhile, eyed the grass for sign of the bone but displayed none of the gumption necessary for scavenging.

“Apologies for wasting your time, sir,” said the Barker. “And I believe I shall stop referring to you as ‘sir.' It is a gesture I make to honor the poor abused child, you understand. Children—defenseless angels! We adults are obligated to protect them.”

He expelled a tragic sigh and brought himself to his feet. Despite the unfair scoldings, I longed for him to remain. I was a little boy—lost, confused, willing to cling to anyone possessed of orientation. The discomfort in my neck magnified.

The Barker had gone but two steps before he turned on a heel and jabbed the cigar in my direction.

“On the other hand, it is my belief that, as Jesus of Nazareth taught, we all deserve a bit of forgiveness. For who among us hasn't a sin tucked away in his darkest heart? Yes, by George. I believe an understanding can be reached between the two of us. Look! Even Silly Sally likes you. Don't you, Sally? Don't you, Silly Sally Kitty Catty?”

My lowermost vision caught the cat's matted tail as it swayed in the vicinity of my feet. Something about this creature's proximity upset me.

“You're a crackerjack listener, anyhow,” the Barker continued, “and if you are to work for me, that is an asset. For I, as benefactor, will tell you to do things. And you, I'm afraid, will be required to do them. Discussion poisons the rehabilitation process.”

I felt the cat's fangs tugging at my ankle. Through benumbed senses, I catalogued the quick, violent actions necessary to rid myself of this animal. But I could no more act upon them than I could form words or lift my chin from my chest. Oh, but this frightened me! Was this waking slumber the penance of the damned? Was this man Mephistopheles, this tent an antechamber of Hell?

“They tell me,” said he with a simper, “that they fished you from the lake.”

The man had called me a gambler but it was he who knew when to turn his best card. The bottom of the lake—yes, that's right, I had witnessed it! I had lain upon pebbles, blinked stupidly at the remains of a sunken boat, been kissed by a passing school of fish. Sand had shifted in such volume that the lower half of my body had been covered, then uncovered, then covered again. How long had I lain down there bereft of air? It had to have been hours. It was then that I remembered my murder.

Remembering it was worse than the act itself, I assure you.

The truth was, to say the least, difficult to accept. I was a corpse. I could feel the stagnant weight of internal organs no longer quickened by lifeforce. A bullet had pierced my heart—warm spring air now passed through the wound!—and I had suffered a hundred drownings. I believe I would have lost my marbles right there in that tent had I not heard the Excelsior ticking away inside my pocket, unfaltering despite its recent dunking, my steadfast beating heart.

The Barker observed my reactions with a biologist's dispassion. The cigar rolled from one end of his mouth to the other, a pendulum.

“My initial interest in you stemmed from a report we received from a satisfied customer of ours residing south of Chicago. It would seem that this gentleman, a Mr. Avery, hoping to catch breakfast,
borrowed a hook and rod and obtained himself a rowboat. On this particular morning he hooked a big one. He hooked you.”

The Barker pointed.

“The webbing between your finger and thumb. Right hand. Take a look.”

It was my first willed movement. My eyeballs, devoid of moisture, skipped across tacky sockets, and my elbow scuttered like machinery desperate for lubricant. A hand that looked very much like my own rose shakily from its dangled position. Carefully I rotated it.

There was an ugly hole ripped clean through the flesh exactly where the Barker had said. I brought the hand closer. The visible meat was a dull gray-pink. Blood failed to pump, even when I clenched and unclenched the fist. For a moment there were no sounds but the popping of my finger bones.

“Twenty years now I've fielded cockeyed stories from desperate milksops,” said the Barker. “So when Mr. Avery returned to our grounds demanding an audience in regards to a man who breathed underwater, I motioned to have the sot escorted away. But then he mentioned the other thing and I knew I had to see it.”

My expression was fixed, yet must have conveyed puzzlement.

Up went the Barker's eyebrows. “You don't know? Oh, my. My, my. I don't know how to say this.” He winced and pointed with the cigar. “There—right there. On your—yes, right there.”

I spider-walked my fingertips across the shirt slicked to my deadlocked chest, in and out of the collarbone hollows that no longer throbbed with pulse, and onto my cold neck, where I discovered something that was not flesh. Panic reared and I counted along to the Excelsior to calm myself. So
this
was the cause of my neck discomfort.

An iron fisherman's hook the size of my forearm was implanted
deep into my jugular. I swallowed and there was a metallic
clink
. I probed with my tongue and tasted rust. With great effort I fiddled around and found two inches of iron pushing from inside my neck like a goiter. I took the hook's handle with fantasies of extraction but I was far too weak. Silly Sally, who continued to work my ankles, cocked her head in an inquisitive way. The weight of the hook pulled my head to the right, giving me, I imagined, a similar expression.

“I would be cross with Mr. Avery for gross mishandling had he not sold you to me for nothing more than what he'd lost at our Boardwalk the previous night. For this business, as you shall learn, is all about acquiring the New.”

The Barker tossed his cigar and approached, frowning at my impalement like a doctor, which might have been comforting if not for his playful, mincing steps. He wiggled his fingers as if to limber them and spoke in the barest of whispers.

“When a man of my talents meets a man of yours, there are few limits. Of course, this grappling hook will have to be removed. We can't tip off the audience prematurely. Ah, that reminds me, I've already chosen for you a name, as you do not appear to own one yourself.” He made a theatrical gesture. “‘The Astonishing Mr. Stick.' What do you think? Handbills are being printed as we speak.”

I felt him take hold of the hook's handle. The pressure inside my neck thickened and I braced for decapitation. His touch, though, was gentle. He of all people did not wish to see me further mangled.

His right foot kicked. Silly Sally moaned and waddled away from my ankles.

“Filthy cat. Adores dead things,” said he. “But that does not stop me from loving her.”