sells dope. I show him how. I show him the ropes and then he don’t trust me—me, his buddy—and gives me the boot.”
“Nice guy, big shot. He coulda just set you up for a hit. Save himself a trip back to Italy.”
The drunk got sly then and looked around like in a melodrama. “Not to me he wouldn’t do that, tourist buddy. I got powerful friends!”
“And they wouldn’t want you any deader.”
“That’s right, buddy, and Amir knows it. All the time I kept telling Amir don’t bend a hair on my head, Amir buddy, I got powerful friends here—”
“Okay, that’s enough.”
Charley pushed the bottle over, which interrupted the drunk. Number one was fine. Question number one was out of the way. Delmont had been in Cairo, maybe five years, and he wasn’t likely to run into that crowd over here. And when he came back he didn’t go through Customs.
“Number two,” said Charley.
“Two what, buddy boy?”
“Who’s Bantam?”
The drunk looked at the wall between here and the next room. There was mumbling and the sound of a bed.
“Rabbits,” said the drunk.
“Who’s Bantam?”
The drunk made a disgusted face. “Like I was telling you, buddy boy, he’s my powerful friend. He’s in business here, and what he says goes. He says no to Amir and Amir don’t operate. That’s who Bantam is, and he’s a buddy of mine.”
That’s who Bantam was, only the drunk had it backwards. Bantam was from the States and all he was doing was keeping up the contacts. He got paid from the States, he did what his bosses told him to do, and he was middle man for some of the syndicate’s business that went through Italy and maybe the Near East. If Amir was anything to Bantam, he was one of his suppliers. In that circle Bantam was small potatoes. To Charley he wasn’t. To Charley he was a man who knew Delmont.
“He’d give you his right arm, eh, big shot?”
“Sure. Haven’t seen old Bantam in maybe ten years, but we’re buddies. Always been.”
“Sure. You set him up in business.”
“That’s right, tourist buddy, that’s how it was. One day I meet Bantam—in Milano, I think—and being a countryman I take him in hand. He just got here. Green, I tell you, real green.”
“So you set him up.”
“Fixed him up. I show him this house where they got nothing but the best. High class from all over the world. You don’t just walk in there, buddy boy, and say ‘how about a jump?’ You gotta be introduced!”
“You introduce him.”
“Yeah. I show him the house. We been buddies ever since.”
“You get your cut, buddy?”
“Cut? This was friendship, you bastard. Like the other time. The other time—in Genoa, I think—I see him in that cafe there just by chance. I walk up to Bantam and say, ‘How’d you like some more of the same? Right here in Genoa?’ I don’t wait for an answer but run right over where I know this chick—I mean nice all around—and take her back to the cafe.”
“And Bantam is so horny since Milano he takes her right around the corner.”
“He wasn’t there,” said the drunk. “Been called away on business. That’s how big my buddy is. Sitting right there in that café—”
“That’s enough, big shot,” and Charley pushed the bottle over.
So number two was out of the way. Delmont didn’t know Bantam from Adam.
“Number three,” he said. This time he had to take the bottle away because Delmont had started to feel low. Delmont let go of the bottle but he almost fell off the chair, that’s how little he cared.
“And me that showed him the ropes, me—” Then he noticed the bottle was gone and turned mean again. “Look, tourist, get one thing. Nobody messes with Delmont, hear? Gimme that bottle, tourist.”
When Charley wasn’t fast enough the drunk spat in his face, from right across the table.
“You hear, tourist?”
Charley just wiped his face.
“I’m going downstairs now, tourist, and get that girl. Time those rabbits were off and gone, and when I come back you better be gone. I hate Peeping Toms, tourist.”
“I’m not, big shot. I’m not even making a peep. Here’s your bottle.”
“You wanna stay, huh? Wanna see how she screams, huh? I learned ways in Cairo, buddy boy, and I give no quarter!” He had started declaiming. “They mess with Delmont and they don’t even get a nickel!”
“Sit down, Casanova.”
“What did you call me?”
“Big shot.”
“Gimme that bottle.”
“Number three,” said Charley and he drank from his glass. His head was starting to pound, but that was better than the feel of pressure inside his chest, a pressure like any minute something was going to explode. Just a little while longer and then there would be no more of that ache, as if he were running without a breath but running to catch one.
“You got big friends,” said Charley. “You got any little ones? Just common-type people, like downstairs, like in Rome, in Naples—”
“Bastards,” said the drunk.
“Or Genoa?”
“Never been in Naples. Not since the place on Ischia.”
“In Thirty-five.”
“Before.”
“Don’t get around much any more, huh, big shot?”
“I get around. I get around plenty!”
“And make lots of buddies all over.”
“I don’t got the time, buddy boy. I don’t bother with small fry. Only reason I bring you up here is because you asked me. And I don’t often do favors, buddy boy, so watch your step.”
“That’s why you haven’t got any friends, big shot. You’re too big.”
“I got lots of ’em, boy. Don’t you worry.”
“But I do,” said Charley, and he smiled.
“Well, don’t. I don’t. Good riddance to those bastard friends.”
“What
