The brave, p.1
The Brave, page 1
THE BRAVE
THE BRAVE
By
GREGORY MCDONALD
BARRICADE BOOKS • NEW YORK
Copyright © 1991 Gregory Mcdonald
Published by: Barricade Books 61 Fourth Avenue New York, N. Y. 10003
First Edition.
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form, by any means, including mechanical, electric, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Mcdonald, Gregory, 1937-The brave / Gregory Mcdonald. p. cm.
ISBN 0-942637-34-8 I. Title.
PS3563. A278B7 1991
813’. 54-dc20 91-19312
CIP
Printed in the United States of America
098765432
“Must another Christ die in every generation to save those who have no imagination?”
—George Bernard Shaw
“Saint Joan”
“I have observed life carefully, and find it highly indicative.”
—Gregory Mcdonald
FOREWORD
THE AUTHOR believes the third chapter of The Brave, Chapter c, is an integral part of the story, that exactly what transpired between “the uncle” and Rafael in that second story loft must be reported fully.
However, the author realizes this chapter is particularly strong and repulsive as it has to do with both immediate, and planned, prolonged human cruelty.
He wishes he could have avoided writing that particular chapter.
The author also believes The Brave justifies the events and circumstances depicted in Chapter c and throughout the narrative generally.
Therefore, the reader is advised that not all will find it desirable or perhaps absolutely necessary to include Chapter c in their reading of this work.
a
“I CAME about the job.”
The blue eyes of the heavy young man sitting with his feet propped on the desk first studied Rafael’s eyes, then scanned Rafael’s thin body.
“Why?”
Rafael shrugged and looked away.
The young man at the desk put down the magazine he had been reading. He put his feet on the floor. A weak smile showed on his slack, gray face.
As if he had not just asked Rafael a question, he asked, “What job is that?”
In the light from the dirty window, Rafael looked around the small office, the single scarred wooden desk and chair, the dented, scratched metal filing cabinet, scuffed floor.
The sign on the frosted glass window on the closed door behind Rafael read: Enough Enterprises Productions Limited Incorporated. He had been told the office was up a single, unlit flight of stairs above a certain bar in a street lined with bars.
Rafael asked, “Is there more than one job?”
Still smiling sickly, the young man said, “Only one.”
“Are you the person I see about the job?” Rafael asked.
“Where did you hear about it?”
“What, the job?”
“Yeah.”
“Someone mentioned it to me.”
“Who?” The young man asked. “Where? When?”
Rafael shivered. “I’m not a cop.”
Again the young man scanned Rafael’s faded shirt, worn-out jeans, cracked boots.
“Who?” he repeated. “Where? When?”
“A week ago. About a week ago. Some bar. Some guy.”
“What bar? What guy?”
“Freedo’s.”
The young man nodded. “Just happened to be drinking there?”
“I drink there a lot.”
“So who mentioned the job to you?”
“I said: Freedo. The bartender. He’s called Freedo. Isn’t the place called Freedo’s?”
“So you just happened to be drinking at Freedo’s and the bartender tells you there’s this job?”
“The next morning,” Rafael said quietly. “I was still on the floor. He put me in the back room awhile.”
“Not the first time, I bet.”
Rafael said, “Not the first time.”
The young man asked, “You been drinkin’ this morning?”
Rafael wiped his dry lips with his thumb. “A little bit.”
“Of course you have,” the young man said.
“How much does this job pay? I was told twenty-five thousand dollars.”
“You got it about right.”
“I want thirty.”
“My uncle’s the one you see about that. I have to see if you qualify first. You workin’ anywhere now?”
Rafael shook his head. “Not for a long time now. Long time.”
“Why not?”
Rafael’s eyes smarted. “Can’t get a job.”
“Because of the vodka?”
Rafael spread his fingers wide. “There are no jobs.”
“Other people have jobs.”
“Yeah,” Rafael said. “You have a job. You have a uncle, too.”
“Haven’t you got an uncle?”
“I’ve got a uncle.”
“He hasn’t got a job, either, right? Your father hasn’t got a job. Your brothers haven’t got jobs.”
“There haven’t been any jobs in a long, long time.”
“What did you do when you did work?”
“Helped my brother on a truck.”
“What?”
“Helped my brother on a truck. A pickup truck.”
“So your uncle didn’t have a job for you, but your brother did. What happened? He lose the truck?”
“He still has the truck.”
“What he lost is his alky brother.”
“There’s no work for the truck. Not enough for both of us. There hasn’t been in a long, long time.”
“You ever have a real job?”
“I’ve had a real job.”
“I mean some place they provide insurance, that kind of thing. You ever paid taxes?”
Rafael exhaled. “I guess not.”
“You ever filled out forms, you know, name, where you live, that kind of thing?”
“I guess not.”
“Can you read and write?”
“Not real good.”
“Married?”
“Sure.”
“You got kids?”
“Two daughters. One son.”
“How old are you?”
“Twenty-one.” Rafael had figured out he had better say he was twenty-one. “Are you the guy I see about the job?”
“Take it easy. Certain preliminaries first.”
Rafael said nothing.
“So what about them?” the young man asked.
“What about them?”
“That’s why you want this job.”
Rafael looked at the closed door in the side wall of the office. “How long do you think I can stand here?”
“I don’t know,” the young man answered. “How long can you stand there?”
Rafael wondered if it would be all right with the young man if he went and got a drink and came back.
“How many brothers you got?”
“Four. One died.”
“Three brothers. All out of work.”
“One brother has the truck.”
“Any know any cops?”
“No. Not friendly-like anyways.”
“Were you in the service?”
“What does that mean?”
“Army?”
“No.”
“You’ve been in jail.”
“Sure.”
“What for?”
“Drunk.”
“What else?”
“Drunk.”
“Nothing else? No breaking and entering, mugging, car theft?”
“Drunk.”
“Alky your only thing?”
“What?”
“Alcohol.”
“Vodka.”
“No other drugs? Never been arrested for other drugs?”
“Drunk.”
“Where do you live?”
“Calls it Morgantown.”
“Morgantown. Guess you wouldn’t miss Morgantown, right? Any diseases?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, are you dyin’ of natural causes?”
Rafael looked at his fingertips. “No.”
“You stay right here.” The young man got up from his desk. “I’ll get my uncle.”
Rafael asked, “You mean I qualify?”
b
WHEN THE side door of the office opened, Rafael was leaning against the filing cabinet. From the sound of it, the way it felt against his arm, he knew the filing cabinet was empty.
The uncle came slowly, sideways through the door. His gray, balding head was lowered. He was looking up at Rafael from under heavy lids.
His stomach hung over his belt.
The heavy young man was behind him.
The uncle made a mouth noise, eruh, Rafael did not understand.
Rafael stood straighter.
The uncle began to go back through the door. He brushed the young man aside with his forearm.
The young man said to Rafael: “Go with him.” Through the door, Rafael found himself in a huge, dark space. There were small windows along the front and back walls. The windows were so dirty the morning light that came through them was dirty, too.
At a good distance from Rafael, some of the windows along the back wall were covered by black wood or heavy cloth.
In this darker area of the loft he saw a heavy square chair. And there were silhouettes of things each standing on three slim legs.
The uncle was in a glassed-in, lit area in the rear, near corner of the loft.
When Rafael stepped into this area, the uncle looked at Rafael’s face. To Rafael, the uncle’s eyes, and nose, and lips seemed enormous, all bulging.
“You get a good-looking male Indian, you get a really handsome boy. Man.” The uncle looked inside a plastic coffee cup. “You an Indian?”
Rafael did not know how to answer.
The uncle shook a little black coffee from the cup into the metal wastebasket beside his desk. Leaning over with difficulty, he took another plastic cup out of the waste basket and shook it dry, too.
“Alky’s your thing,” the uncle said. “Trouble with you alkies is you ain’t got no asses.”
He took a quart bottle of vodka from his desk and poured into the two plastic cups.
“How old are you?”
“Twenty-one.”
“Eruh.” He handed Rafael the cup he had taken from the waste basket. “You could pass for twenty-seven, eight.”
Rafael tossed the drink down his throat. He put the empty cup down on the metal desk.
The uncle lowered his fat body onto a wooden chair with a semicircular back. The chair was too short for the desk.
“Siddown.”
Rafael saw there was a stained, sprung sofa behind him. He found a place to sit on it.
“Can’t beat it, huh?” the uncle asked. “Pretty young to know that. Who’s to say?” From where Rafael sat, the uncle’s head looked much too close to the surface of the desk. “Had any schoolin’?”
“I went to school.”
“Lemme see. Quit in fourth grade.”
“I was in fifth.”
“Drunk even then.”
Rafael said nothing.
“Married before you knew it.” When the uncle drank his lips seemed to embrace the lip of the cup and draw the vodka out of it. “Did you even know you were married? Suddenly you found yourself married. What is it, three kids? You’ve been married always, right?”
“I was married by the priest,” Rafael said.
“Sure,” the uncle said. “They’ll always marry you.” His lips drew more liquor from the cup. “I agree. It all looks pretty hopeless.”
The uncle smiled, then frowned, then looked pleasantly, perhaps happily, at Rafael.
The drink had revived Rafael a little. He was no longer cold and sweaty.
Still he was breathing more rapidly, shallowly than usual, as if he were getting ready to fight, or to run away.
The uncle asked, “Is this somethin’ you’re thinkin’ of doin’ right away? I mean, right now? Is that what you’re thinkin’?”
“A few days. A few days from now.”
“How do we know you’ll come back?”
“I’ll come back”
“You’ll go get drunk. Stay drunk.”
Rafael shrugged.
“We can set things up for you to do it today. This afternoon. All you need is a hair cut. Wouldn’t you rather face it, get it over with, do it now?”
“I want thirty thousand dollars.”
The uncle said, “You’re only worth twenty-five.”
“Thirty.”
“Twenty-five is what we pay for this particular job. We’ve never paid more than twenty-five.”
“Thirty.”
“We can get someone else for twenty-five.”
Rafael hesitated. “I don’t see anybody else sittin’ here.”
“We’ve got time, enough time.”
“Then I’ll do it in a few days. Not today. And I want thirty.”
The uncle stared at him.
“I heard about this job weeks ago,” Rafael said.
“Someone’s been tellin’ me to think about it for weeks now.”
“Freedo.”
“You want me, it’s thirty. In a few days.”
“You’ve never even seen a thousand dollars in your life,” the uncle said.
Rafael said, “Thirty.”
“I don’t know if I want you yet. I have to see your body.”
“My body’s okay.”
“We don’t even know if you can get it up.”
Rafael said, slowly, “I can get it up.”
“Not if there’s nothin’ in your body but booze days on end.”
Rafael knew that was true. “What am I sellin’ here?”
“Don’t know yet. Haven’t looked. You’re no good to us unconscious.”
“I want a few days to deal with the money.”
“What money?”
“The thirty thousand dollars.”
“Oh. That’s not how it works. You think just because you walk in here and take off your jeans we’re gonna give you thirty thousand dollars? That you’re gonna walk out of here with thirty thousand dollars in your pocket promisin’ you’ll come back some time? You think we’re crazy?”
Rafael stopped. That was what he had been thinking, more or less.
He thought about it.
“How does it work?”
“Larry will take you to a bank.”
“Who’s Larry?”
“My nephew. You met.”
“What’s your name, anyway?”
“McCarthy,” the uncle said quickly. “See, Larry will take you to a bank. Ever opened a bank account?”
“No.”
“I didn’t think so. Ever been in a bank?”
“No.”
“Larry will help you. He’ll take you to a bank. Help you open an account. In your own name. He’ll put two hundred and fifty dollars in your account, in your own name, right in front of you. Cash money.”
“Three hundred.”
“You get the rest later.”
“Later?”
“Afterwards.”
“How will I know you’ve done it? I mean, put the rest of the money in.”
The uncle slammed open a desk drawer. He took out a piece of paper and slapped it down, hard, on the desk. He grabbed up a pen and sat poised to write. “Because we’re gonna sign a contract, you and me.”
Rafael said, “Oh.”
“And it’s gonna say that if you take this job that after it’s over we’re gonna put twenty-four thousand, seven hundred and fifty dollars in your bank account.”
Rafael could not think what thirty thousand minus three hundred dollars is. “Wrong amount,” he said.
“What else can we do? We can’t pay you before we do it. You know what a contract is?”
Rafael didn’t answer.
“It’s binding!” the uncle said. “That means that if we say something, write it down on this piece of paper, and sign it, and you sign it, that means you’ve gotta do it and we’ve gotta do it! That’s the law! What’s your name?”
“Rafael.”
The uncle wrote something on the piece of paper on the desk. “Rafael…” He slapped the paper and sat back in his chair. “Whadda ya think?”
Rafael did not know what to think.
“You think we’re some kind of nuts?” the uncle asked. “We can’t pay for a job until it’s done. Nobody does.” The uncle’s voice lowered. He fixed his eyes on Rafael’s. “I can already tell from talkin’ to you you’re a smart boy, Rafael. And a brave one, too, or you wouldn’t be thinkin’ of this. You tell me: what else can we do? Tell me that.”
Rafael had no answer.
“You want the money, don’t you? Sure! God!
You wouldn’t be here if you didn’t want the money. You want the money for your family, your wife and three kids. Somebody sick? Listen, Rafael: this is how you get the money for your wife and three kids. What else can we do?”
Rafael stood up. Gently he put his fingers around the empty plastic cup on the desk. He looked at the uncle in the low desk chair.
“Sure.” The uncle pulled the bottle from the desk drawer and poured Rafael another shot.
Rafael took the liquor in one swallow.
He looked the uncle full in the face.
“Thirty thousand dollars,” Rafael said.
“Damn!” The uncle slapped the desk with the palm of his fat left hand. “You’re smart! You drive a hard bargain, boy!”
“And three hundred dollars at first.”
“You mean: up front. In the bank.”
“Before.”
“I’ll be a son of a bitch,” the uncle said. “I’ve never dealt with anybody as tough as you are, boy. As tough and as smart.”
Standing there, Rafael felt the fat, bald man was looking at Rafael’s body the way some women did.
