Chapter 2

 

Harold Ponci moved back up Christopher Street with the same steady, unhurried step, arriving at Sixth Avenue, where he paused again for the light – undisturbed by the panicked voices rising out of the park behind him, the air filled with outrage and fear he seemed not to possess.

When the light changed, he crossed the street, pushing through the crowds of tourists headed towards but still unaware of the murder scene ahead, and then on the east side of the street, he steered up Sixth Avenue to 9th street, passed the glaring lights of posh eateries and more subtle pale interiors of internet cafes, where people sat sipping lattes while blissfully unaware of the harsh happenings outside.

Half way up 9th Street, bathed in the deeper shadows of the West Village townhouses, Ponci paused, took off his sunglasses, and pealed back his cloth jacket to reveal his blood soaked shirt – his whole right side still moist, though crusted.  Slowly, with the forefinger of his left hand, he lifted the loose fabric sliced open by Billman’s shot, where the flesh showed the passage of the bullet across his side, but not deeply.

“The bleeding is the worst part,” he mumbled. “But I’d better get it fixed before I pass out.”

 

A middle aged woman wearing an old fashioned blue and white flowered kerchief hurried passed Ponci, eyeing him and his exposed wound with great suspicion.

But Ponci glared at her, having grown used to people looking at him that way, always thinking something odd about him, always hating when he talked aloud to himself or for some other reason.

“Go fuck yourself,” he growled after her, although not really loud enough for her to hear. “If you think I’m crazy now, wait until you hear all the voices going on in my head.”

He let the jacket flap fall back over the wound, and squinted into the dark thoughtfully.

What next?

One of the voices responded distantly.

“Get the brief case,” the voice said. “Isn’t that why you came?”

Ponci paused; other people passed, then angrily, he said, “Didn’t I just kill you? Why don’t you people ever stay dead?”

The voices always came back just after he killed them, fading away over time, yet not before they had made their point, not guilt – Ponci did not understand that concept – but some need of their own. This one would annoy him for a short time and fade into the background of murmuring voices he could not shed even in the loudest of places.

“You’re right. I have to get that brief case,” said Ponci, gripping the frigid metal stair banister to one of the townhouses, steadied himself, and with a grunt, started to walk ahead, heading east, in and out of the pale glow of street lamps and doorway lamps, the haze of winter almost erasing everything modern and casting him back to the late 19th Century. A handsome cab even chattered by, illuminated by two lamps on either side of the driver, and dimmer lamps near the faces of the tourists who had hired it for a special scenic tour.

 

Behind him, rising and falling in the direction of Sheridan Square came the sound of sirens, police and others rushing to the site too late to save the life of the man already condemned to Ponci’s rogues’ gallery, too late to do anything more than to comfort the shocked spectators still clutching their cellular telephones.

He did not hurry his step, approaching slowly the more illuminated 5th Avenue.

Perhaps the wound or just the general haze of the night, or even the cold left him a bit confused. He couldn’t quite remember the way back to the hotel. The arch on Washington Square glowed from two blocks south like an icon to some past triumph the city could not cease to celebrate.

Uptown, high towers with lighted tops stood in sharp contrast to a looming sky, thick black clouds that showed even in the dark, haunting and terrible undaunted by the unrealistic cheer of the Empire State Building and its green and red holiday glow.

 

 

“Fifteenth Street,” Ponci mumbled, finally remembering where the hotel was, and stunned by how far Billman had managed to run with the large bullet in him – a rare kind of bullet that Ponci knew most often killed on impact, large and long, causing as much damage at possible on its way in and often out.

But Billman’s military instincts had saved him, twisting him around and firing his own pistol that the somehow in the mix of noise and smoke, Ponci’s usual unerring aim had gone askew.

Ten blocks, the fool had run, a distance Ponci – although older – had barely been able to cross with only a scratch across his side.

With his hand pressed firmly against his right side, Ponci turned uptown, each step slower than the previous one, and less steady.

“I’m in shock,” he said. “That fucking nine millimeter! I wish I could have killed the fucker twice.”

He vaguely heard Billman’s laugh in the back of his head, and the general chuckle of all those more remote voices who got their giggles at the fact that one of Ponci’s victims had finally gotten over on him.

He stumbled on, blinking rapidly, squinting to make out things in the dark, blurring things he knew came from his own weakened condition, and, of course, the cold – that dreadful cold he hated more than almost anything.

What he wanted was a cab, and though he saw plenty of them rushing up the street, all looked occupied, and none slowed down as he lifted his hand.

But then, he lowered his hand.

“No cab, not yet,” he thought. “Maybe later when I get the briefcase.”

A brief case, he should have grabbed from the start, making this trip back unnecessary. But he had lost his head when Billman’s bullet grazed him, staring dumbly at the fleeing man instead of taking another shot, then rushing after the man in a panic instead of taking the case.

Lost it, thinking, what if someone in the hotel had heard Billman’s shot – an unsilenced nine millimeter roaring still in Ponci’s ears? And what if Billman went to the lobby and begged for the police?

All he could think of was killing Billman before he got anywhere, and that most likely panicked Billman, seeing Ponci behind him, too scared to even stop in the hotel lobby for help, fearing rightfully that Ponci would shoot him there, in public, in front of witnesses.

“Fucking fool!” Ponci thought. “I should have killed him quicker!”

He blamed the cold, and this insanity of winter he had mistakenly returned to, all because some fool had offered him three times his normal fee, and somewhere in the back of his head, he heard his own voice whispering: “One last job and call it quits. Retire forever in Florida or some place equally warm, never have to worry about winter again.”

A fool’s voice, he thought now, coming out of foolish past when he took chances his older self knew better not to take.

 

Step after slow step, he made his way uptown, slowing only when he saw the glow of the hotel ahead, but more telling, the police cars lined up in front of it. He slid into the deep doorway of an under-renovation building, the elevated scaffolding creating a tunnel around him. A sheet of newsprint clung to his leg with some headline filled with mayoral claims about how few murders the city had seen over the previous year. The doorway seemed to have served as a temporary home of some vagrant, with a pile of rags in one corner and several cardboard coffee cups with cigarette butts floating in them.

But Ponci looked only at the police cars parked in front of the hotel where normally a line of taxis waited, men in blue uniforms stood in the bright light, looking bored and annoyed, stamping their feet as they waited for some signal or another from within.

“I’m not going to get passed them unnoticed,” Ponci thought then saw a metal door open slightly nearer him and a man in a hotel uniform stepped out, lit a cigarette and slowly looked at the bored cops with an expression as if he was surprised at seeing them.

Ponci slipped out of the doorway and crossed as quickly at he could to where the hotel man stood, keeping quiet enough to keep him from turning until Ponci poked the barrel of his pistol in the man’s side.

“Don’t yell or you’re a dead man,” Ponci whispered in the man’s ear. “I mean it.”

Ponci poked the barrel into the man’s side for emphasis.

 

 

“I won’t yell, honest, Mister,” the man said, shoulders stiffening.

“Where does this door go?” Ponci asked, indicating the door with his free hand, his blood still evident on the fingers.

“Into the hotel,” the bellhop said, clearly noticing the blood.

“You mean as into the lobby?”

“No, this is the service entrance. It leads into the hall and elevators that bring good into the hotel.”

“You mean like the kitchen?”

“That’s one of the places.”
Ponci glanced passed the bell hop at the bored cops, who still stood like lazy jail guards at the front door, their faces dark under the brims of their hats, although the bright flood lights beneath the marquee illuminated their bags and their glistening silver buttons.

“All right,” Ponci said, “back inside.”

The man did not move.

“What are you going to do to me?” he asked.

“Shoot you if you don’t do what you’re told. Move.”

The man moved, as stiffly as Ponci did, but without the excuse of a wounded side, stepping out into a dim hallway beyond the door. Warm air flowed over Ponci’s face, but so did the scent of cleanser and beyond that, mildew from some deeper part of the building.

The hall had doors along the right wall for as far as Ponci could see, dark indentations in the hall.

“Where do those doors go?” Ponci, asked, again pointing with his bloody hand.

 

 

One of the florescent lights flickered half way down the long corridor. When the hotel man didn’t answer right away, Ponci poked him with the barrel of the gun.

“Well?”

“Janitor’s closet, electric room, most of them are store rooms.”

“You have keys to all those rooms?”

“A master key.”

“Fine,” Ponci said pushing the man in front of him. “Open the janitor’s closet first, then one of the store rooms.”

The hotel man fumbled in his pocket for a ring of keys, hands shaking as he pressed one key into the lock, and when that didn’t work, fit another until the lock to the first door opened out. Ponci eased the man out of the way, but kept the pistol firmly in his back. With his blood stained fingers, Ponci flicked on the interior light, a dim watt bulb glowed just enough to illuminate several shelves along the right wall as well as buckets and mops along the left. Ponci looked closely at the shelves, until he saw a roll of duct tape. He picked this up.

“All right, now to the store room,” he said, pushing the man along the wall, letting the janitor closet door close with a click.

Voices sounded from somewhere farther down the hall, and Ponci halted the hotel man’s advance, peering passed him, cocking his ear to the clatter of footsteps. But no one materialized, and Ponci nudged the man to the next door, let him open it, then pushed him inside.

This space was about the size of a single car garage with a single florescent light fixture in the middle of the ceiling and gray metal shelving along the whole back wall. A small table with a few empty cups sat against the other long wall just left of the door. A gray uniform jacket similar to the one the hotel man wore hung from the back of one chair.

Ponci pushed the man down into the other chair, then taped his arms to the arms of the chair and his ankles to the chair’s front legs. Lastly, he taped the man’s mouth.

“I would kill you,” Ponci said. “But I already got too many of you in my head.”

The hotel man’s eyes widened as Ponci pocketed the ring of keys, then closed and locked this door.

 

 

Behind Ponci, glittering in the pale glow of the florescent lamps, the trail of blood showed, not heavy, but steady, one more curse to that moment upstairs when for the first time in a long, long career, another man had surprised him.

“Damn you, Billman,” he hissed, then stiffened as voices again rose from farther down the hall, from around some corner, but growing louder as did the clatter of footsteps telling Ponci more than one person approached.

He stuffed his pistol deep into the pocket of his overcoat and pressed his freehand tighter against the wound in his side, dull pain emerging from this as he halted and waited until the people – also dressed the uniforms of the hotel – appeared.

Ponci advanced cautiously, keeping close to the right hand wall for support, although the blinking florescent lamp above him painted the hallway with a surreal dream-like haze.

Three men, one with a gold earring glinting from his right lobe, strode down the hall towards Ponci, chattering among themselves, about someone who had been “a pain in the ass,” and “would not let off.”

Then, they stopped, and looked up at Ponci now only a few yards away. The man with the gold earring stared at Ponci’s cheek, and the long scar down it from another, ancient mistake he had made earlier in his career, when a victim with a steak knife had cut him open before Ponci’s finger could pull the trigger.

This time, Ponci’s finger stood ready on the pistol in his pocket, as he calculated how many of the three he could shoot before someone let out a scream or bolted.

“You’re not supposed to be here,” the man with the gold earring said.

“I know,” Ponci said, sweat breaking on his brow, although the passageway remained cool as drafts from some open window or door passed through it. “I don’t know exactly how I got in here – or how to get out.”

 

 

For a moment, the man stared at Ponci’s face, perhaps reading something odd in the look in his eye, or hearing something in the sound of his voice.

Ponci’s hand tighten even more firmly on the pistol, hating the idea of having to kill the three of them, not because he cared whether they lived or died, but because he didn’t want to have to drag the bodies into one of the store rooms when the brief case waited upstairs – and with it, the collection of the second half of his fee, and his long awaited dream of retirement to some place warm.

Then the hotel man with the gold earring laughed, his voice carrying down the corridor.

“I get lost in these halls myself,” he said, “Come on, mister. I’ll let you out.”

Then to the others, “Go get changed. I’ll be back. But don’t leave without me. I don’t need any you getting drunk before I get my chance.”

The man moved ahead of Ponci down the corridor, and around the corner the three had previously come from, halting at the first door to the left.

“Here you go,” he said and held the door open for Ponci to slip through, and closed it firmly behind.

Ponci blinked at the glare, as the bright swash of lobby light washed over him after the dimness of the back halls. No third degree could have made his eyes water so much, and even squinting he struggled to focus at first, seeing shapes of people – some in hotel uniforms, some clearly tourists – rushing across the carpeted space toward a bank of golden brass elevator doors on Ponci’s right.

The glass doors to the exterior, filled with the still flashing police lights, stood open to the left, bringing in a cool breeze that made Ponci shiver. Directly across from the door through which Ponci had come stood the check in desk, a long counter with computer terminals and several women seated behind them – also in uniform.

A few people sat on cushioned seats in the room’s middle, suitcases near them, as they waited for a door man to flag down cabs for them.

If any body noticed Ponci, he could not tell. But his hand shook in his pocket, and he looked down to see the red stain on his coat and knew others would see it, too, if they chanced to look his way.

 

 

But the three gold colored doors remained shut even when he pressed the button with his bloodied fingers, leaving on the up button just the faintest trace of red. He glanced up at the clock-like indicator as a golden arm showed the location of each elevator, one on the eighth floor, the other on the third, one coming gradually down as the other rose.

When the door opened, he stepped inside the vacant car, but a woman stepped in right after him before he could hit the button to close the door. She pressed five. He hurriedly pressed six, trying not to look at her, although aware of her features: a well-dressed African American woman, moderately made up, very pretty, but not overly young – perhaps nearing 30 or just beyond. She glanced at him and smiled weakly, as if she had something on her mind, some dark secret she could not share with anyone, but needed to say something to someone, and so spoke to him.

“It’s pretty cold out tonight,” she said.

He nodded, and shivered.

“It’s better now,” he said, “in here. I’m used to Miami weather. My blood’s too thin to handle New York this time of year.”

The carriage stopped at the fifth floor and she stepped out, pausing to look back at him as the doors closed, her frown sticking in his mind’s eye even after the carriage rose and stopped again the next floor up where he – pressing his hand against his bleeding side – stepped out into the otherwise vacant hall.

The carpet had the same crimson and gold pattern as in the lobby, a kind of dizzying swirl that made Ponci feel drunk as he turned left and staggered in the direction of the rooms he had fled earlier when chasing Billman. He had to release his side to fetch the plastic card modern hotels used as keys, struggling to get it out of his pocket, his fingerprints in red all over it as he shoved it into the slot in the door.

To his relief, the lock snapped open. Management hadn’t yet changed the code, possibly not yet aware that a crime had taken place, and the police out front hadn’t come on his account, but due to some other call.

The rooms retained the tart scent of expended gunpowder from the brief exchange earlier, though the lighted interior showed no sign of struggle except for one knocked over lamp, and the hole in the wall where Billman’s shot ended up after grazing Ponci.

 

The brief case Ponci had meant to take sat on one of two end tables near the TV set in the front room where Billman had stood, a few newspapers littered the floor nearby, and the lamp next to the case sat on its side, still illuminated.

Ponci shuddered, even though the room felt warm enough. Winter had settled into his bones, and the sooner he got out of New York, the sooner he could shed the frost growing inside of him.

He crossed the room to the briefcase, stepping around a fallen chair. A few drips of blood tapped on the newspaper, adding a detail to the horrid headline of some other murder somewhere else in the city from the day before.

He grabbed the handle to the case and turned to leave, only to catch a glimpse of his own reflection in the large wall mirror on the far side of the room, and he stopped, frowning over the image of someone he might otherwise have mistaken for a homeless man; he looked that ragged. His whole right side showed the growing ink blot of blood, caking in places, causing the jacket between the overcoat to cling to him, fabric shimmering in the light as fresh blood continued to flow.

“It’s a wonder the bellhop didn’t drag me over to the police,” Ponci muttered, blaming Billman, hearing some vague echo of denial from the already fading entity in his head. “I’m going to have to fix myself up before I try going through the lobby again.”

Luck and low lights had kept him from seeming too obvious before. Even the black woman on the elevator had seemed too preoccupied to notice much about him. This would not be the case when he tried to make his way out the front door and passed the police cars – whose purpose at being at the hotel still puzzled him.

Still carrying the case, Ponci crossed the room towards the bedroom, and found the bathroom door slightly ajar, a posh, mirror lined room with two sinks, a stand up shower, and separate bath. He wanted to shower, but couldn’t risk fainting in it, so went to one of the sinks, the mirror behind which showed him even more acutely in the scalding light than the larger mirror in the other room, his angular face showing the pain he had hadn’t completely acknowledged, his habitual squint worse than usual, especially when he removed his overcoat and struggled to slip out of the bloody jacket.

He laid his pistol on the marble surface next to the sink, and used both hands to peal away that portion of the jacket already attached to the wound, jerking with pain at the end, and again when he repeated the action to clear the even bloodier shirt from the area of the wound.

 

His hands trembled as reached for the white wash cloth hanging to the right of the sink, and when he turned on the hot water to moisten it, steam rising up into his face – an older race than he remembered, but clearly not so wise as he once thought, considering where he was and what he had to do, and chill he felt so deep in his bones that every part of his chattered not just his teeth. The scalding water that flowed over his fingers when he moistened the wash rag felt remote, as if the nerves had already started die inside of him, the winter frost cutting off circulation to distant part of himself in order to keep some core part of him alive – just as he had done from that first killing long ago, when he had cut off the screams of conscience to keep going.

He had to keep going, to never look back, to never think too much about what had happened only what had to happen next.

He wiped the wound with the wash cloth, carefully patting at it so that the hot water loosened some of the crusted blood and he could better assess the wound itself – a gash, a nasty one, but only a gash, less like a bullet wound and more like the slash a rapier might have caused. It bled less than it had earlier, but looked pale around the edges.

He opened the medicine cabinet, several bottles of pills fell out, sleeping pills and pills for pain. He put the second aside, and then took out a squeeze bottle of Benzine, a package of cause and medical tape as well as a packet containing a variety of band aids, one or two large enough to cover the width of the wound. He squeezed the Benzine onto the wound, cringing and gripping the counter until he had treated the wound from end to end, the pain almost as invigorating at the steam.

 

 

Then, he pulled open the box of gauze, spreading it into a thin sheet, and pressed this against a portion of the wound, the still oozing blood made the gauze stick, and slowly, he repeated this until he covered the whole wound, then he taped thicker pieces over this, and still pressing these against his side, he made his way back into the other room, and then into the bedroom, where he yanked open drawer after drawer until he found one with folded t-shirts – olive colored, military style with the imprint of “property of the United States Army” inside the neck line instead of “Fruit of the Loom.”

He unfolded the shirt, and then with more than a little pain, he put it on, and then patted the shirt against the bandage, a tight fit since Ponci had a larger frame than Billman, but it served to hold the bandage better. He put a second t-shirt over this, then went to the closet and slid open the door where he found a number of military uniforms hanging – several dress uniforms which he avoided in favor of the more mundane kaki shirt, of a button-down variety that lacked stripes or emblems of any kind. He put this on, and then found an old style army field jacket with lining, a practical item that took him a moment to make less obvious, using a scissor to remove Billman’s name from the pocket and the unit patch from one of the shoulders. He removed the captains bars and dumped them on the dresser where the mirror showed an odd figure who was too old for the uniform he wore, graying hair, a tanned face, but eyes filled with years of experience that Billman lacked, wars of the street fought over and over again, killings that hadn’t stopped since the first one, but which would cease once Ponci finished this deal and got the second half of his payment, and that required him to retrieve the briefcase – sitting on the table in the other room.

Ponci moved as quickly as he could to retrieve it and then made his way back out into the hall, feeling a lot more human than he had going in, although the few pills he’d gobbled up for the pain had not yet kicked in, and perhaps wouldn’t handle the pain of his wound when they did.

 

Four steps down the hall towards the elevator and Ponci halted, the bell ringing to announce the car’s arrival and the doors parted to reveal a pack of people piling out, some of which wore uniforms of the New York Police Department, and another man, a taller man with premature graying hair and thin, tan rain coat, as obvious as a police uniform even from a distance. A bell hop pointed down the hall in Ponci’s direction, although clearly not interested in Ponci but at some point behind him – a point, Ponci soon realized, was the apartment out of which Ponci had just come.

They started towards him, and Ponci staggered back, holding the briefcase against his chest as he retreated towards the glowing exit sign at the end of the hall which marked a doorway to the stairs.

 

 

 

The metal door groaned as Ponci shoved it open, sending its deep echoing moans down into the depths of the stairwell beyond.

The detective in the tan rain coat halted with the others in front of Billman’s apartment door, glancing in Ponci’s direction, gray eyes glinting in the hall’s flame-like illumination, a puzzled look flickering over his solemn face, sending a shiver of fear through Ponci, who pushed the door open more and hobbled down the stairs to the landing below, where he halted again, looked back and waited.

Imagined ticks of a clock went off in his head, as he tried to catch the sound of muffled footsteps indicating pursuit, his right hand lowered to his belt and his fingers inches from the butt of the pistol protruding from it.

But the sound he expected did not come and he took another deep breath before he started down the next flight to a door with a red lighted exit sign above it and a large white “Five” written on it at eye level. He took more care opening this door, so that it groaned less when he pulled on it, and not at all, when he closed it behind him. The hall looked the same as the one above except no one was in it, and each apartment’s door was preceded with the number five to indicate the floor he was on.

 

Ponci could feel the warmth of his wound through the palm of the hand his pressed against it, accompanied by a throbbing that was not quite pain – though he felt the ache of it, too. And he felt drunk, staggering down the hall towards the elevator when one of the apartment doors opened to his left. The brief case pumping his thigh as he walked.

His hand jumped from his wound to the butt of the pistol protruding from his belt.

The young black woman from the elevator earlier smiled at him, although her gaze had a troubled look Ponci could only guess about.

“You got some warm clothing on finally,” she said, taking his free arm and leading him towards the elevator as if they had come together. “I’m glad.”

He tried to speak, but only managed to grunt and nod, pausing at the elevator door until she stepped in. She turned and frowned when he didn’t follow.

“Aren’t you coming?” she asked.

He shook his head, and then the door closed between them, and he surveyed the hallway again, looking more than a little haggard, and maybe even a little scared, or at least, off his game.

Down the hall, along the right wall, another light glowed, a small sign indicating a second elevator. He hobbled towards it, and the found out it had no call button, but needed a key.

 

He patted his pockets with his left hand until he found the ring of keys he had taken from the bellhop downstairs. His fingers shoot as he struggled to find the key he needed, trying one, then another, until finally one slid into the slot, and he turned it. After a moment, the bell chimed and the doors opened onto an empty car.

The same key activated the buttons inside. He selected the button for the lowest floor, assuming it would bring him back out onto the back hallway he had taken earlier to enter the building. The carriage bumped roughly as it started down, the cables humming in the shaft above, somewhat remote, or was it the wound that was making him fade. He dared not fade yet. He had still too much to do. He glanced down at the briefcase he carried, seeing the conclusion of this matter, and a final act in a travesty he had not wanted to engage in, but needed to, if only to prove that he had spent too long in this business and that it was time for him to get out while he could. The brief case would provide him with his last installment, the second half of the payment he needed to retire on.

The carriage stopped as abruptly as it had started and the doors opened onto the same gray hallway as before.

 

Voices, echoing and not distinct, sounded down the hall to the right.

Ponci waited, but when no one appeared immediately, he hobbled in the opposite direction towards the door to the street.

The door needed no key from the inside, and he pressed the metal bar and pushed, the chill air hitting him in the face like a punch.

“I hate this fucking weather,” he muttered, breathing hard as the bite of the cold worked down into his lungs.

To the right, the hotel’s marquee glowed in the darkness, reminding him a little of the circus shows his father had taken him to see as a kid, lacking only the barker in front calling suckers in. A few hotel workers stood outside shivering as they sucked on cigarettes and talked to several police officers who stood near the door.

With briefcase gripped firmly in his left hand and his right hand gripping the butt of his pistol under the army field jacket, Ponci moved passed them, a slow, steady gait he hoped could draw no attention.

And they did not seem to notice. So that a moment later, he stood near the first taxi in a line of taxis, and tapped on the glass to wake the driver. A haggard older white man – unusual in a day when cab drivers usually came from other places where English was not their first language – rolled down the passenger side window, but only an inch.

“You wanna ride?” he grunted.

“Yes.”

“Where to?”

 

 

 

Ponci pulled out from his pocket a folded piece of paper and pressed it against the glass. The driver, leaning closer, studied the paper for a moment, then nodded.

“It’ll cost you fifty bucks,” he said, easing back behind the wheel.

“For a ride uptown?”
“A long way up town – out of Manhattan. It costs extra to go to The Bronx.”

Ponci shivered and glanced at the line of cabs, knowing he would get no better deal from the others in a world where everybody wanted a piece of the action, even when they had no idea what the action was.

The cold bit into him, too, and he ached to get out of the chill air.

Behind him, something stirred near the door, and he glanced over to catch a dark black car pull up at the end of the taxi stand, and two men in suits climb out, men with the unmistakable air of police.

“All right,” Ponci said, pulling open the rear door, then climbing in, the rear seat sticky and torn from god knew what. He settled into the least sticky spot.

“In advance,” the driver said.

“Just drive,” Ponci snarled, determined not to get taken by some two bit hustler. “You’ll get your money when we get there.”

The driver eyed him for a moment, thick gray brows dipping down with a suspicious glare. But finally, he shrugged, as if coming to the conclusion that Ponci was good for the money on the other end. He pulled the cab out into traffic.

The cab rocked a little as the driver steered it through a street narrowed by double-parked cars, trash cans and splotches of blackened snow, too solid for the city to remove with anything less than a blow torch.

“Can you turn up the heat?” Ponci asked, sucking air through his teeth as he leaned back, one hand holding his side.

“It is up,” the driver said.

Ponci shivered then laid out the briefcase on his lap, using his thumbs, he pressed on the latches.

But the case did not open.

“Locked?” he muttered.

“You say something mister?” the drive asked.

“Not to you,” Ponci snapped, then tried again with no better luck. “I should have checked that fucking soldier’s pockets for keys.”

“What?” the driver said.

“Nothing!” Ponci yelled. “Just mind your own business.”

The driver glared in the rearview mirror. “All right,” he said.

Somewhere in the back of Ponci’s head he heard the dead soldier laughing, a mocking Ponci had heard before but not often. Few men had gotten over on him during his long career as much as this soldier had, and Ponci wished he had killed the son of a bitch a little more slowly, making him suffer a little before begging to die.

But that was old news, and Ponci had other problems. He stuck his hand deep into his pants pocket and came out with a small folding knife, smaller than a Boy Scout knife, but just as sturdy. He unfolded the blade and  wedged it under on of the latches and pressed down on the handle until the latch popped open. He did the same to the second latch, and then before opening the case, he closed the knife and replaced it in his pocket.

Using both hands, he swung the top up.

“Son of a bitch!” he yelped.

“What is it?” the driver asked.

“How many times do I have to tell you, I’m not talking to you,” Ponci said, but his voice had lost some of its rage. He was too busy staring down in the case that was absolutely empty.