Motherless Brooklyn

“What’s the good of driving him around watching him make a phone call?” complained Pimples.

“Take it away from him,” said Pinched from the driver’s seat.

“Just punch him in the stomach,” said Indistinct. “Make him scared.”

“You got someone there with you?” said Loomis.

The four in the car had begun to chafe at seeing their faint authority slip away, devolve to the modern technology, the bit of plastic and wire in my palm. I had to find a way to calm them down. I nodded and widened my eyes to show my cooperation, and mouthed a just-wait signal to them, hoping they’d recall the protocol from crime movies: pretend they weren’t there listening, and thus gather information on the sly.

I couldn’t help it that they weren’t actually listening.

“Tell me the address,” I said.

“Okay, here goes,” said Loomis. “Got a pen?”

“Whose address?” whispered Chunky in my other ear. He’d caught my hint. He was schooled enough in the clichés to be manipulable; his compatriots I wasn’t so sure of.

“Tell me Ullman’s address,” I said for their sake. Man-Salad-Dress went my brain. I swallowed hard to keep it from crossing the threshold.

“Yeah, I got it,” said the Garbage Cop sarcastically. “Whose else would you want?”

“Ullman?” said Chunky, not to me but to Pimples. “He’s talking about Ullman?”

“Whose! A! Dress!” I shrieked.

“Aw, quit,” said Loomis, jaded by now. My other audience wasn’t so blasé. Pimples ripped the cell phone out of my hand, and Chunky wrestled my arm behind my back so I was wrenched forward nearly against the back of the driver’s seat, and down. It was like he wanted me draped in his lap for a spanking. Meanwhile, up front, Pinched and Indistinct began arguing fiercely about parking, about whether they’d fit in some spot.

Pimples put the phone to his own ear and listened, but Loomis hung up, or maybe just got quiet and listened back, so they were silent together. Pinched managed to park, or double-park-I couldn’t tell which from my strained vantage. The two up front were still muttering at one another, but Chunky was quiet, just turning my arm another degree or two, experimenting with actually hurting me, trying it on for size.

“You don’t like hearing the name Ullman,” I said, wincing.

“Ullman was a friend,” said Chunky.

“Don’t let him talk about Ullman,” said Pinched.

“This is stupid,” said Indistinct, with consummate disgust.

“You’re stupid,” said Chunky. “We’re supposed to scare a guy, let’s do it.”

“I’m not so scared,” I said. “You guys seem more scared to me. Scared of talking about Ullman.”

“Yeah, well, if we’re scared you don’t know why,” said Chunky. “And don’t guess either. Don’t open your trap.”

“You’re scared of a big Polish guy,” I said.

“This is stupid,” said Indistinct again. He sounded like he might cry. He got out of the car and slammed the door behind him.

Pimples finally quit listening to the silence Loomis had left behind on the cell phone, shut it down, and put it on the seat between us.

“What if we are scared of him?” said Chunky. “We ought to be, take it from us. We wouldn’t be working for him if we weren’t.” He loosened his grip on my arm, so I was able to straighten up and look around. We were parked outside a popular coffee shop on Second. The window was full of sullen kids flirting by working on tiny computers and reading magazines. They didn’t notice us, carful of lugs, and why should they?

Indistinct was nowhere to be seen.

“I sympathize,” I said, to keep them talking. “I’m scared of the big guy, too. It’s just you can’t throw a scare so good when you’re scared.”

I thought of Tony. If he’d come to the Zendo last night shouldn’t he have triggered the same alarm I had? Shouldn’t he have drawn these would-be toughs, this clown car loaded with fresh graduates from Clown College?

“What’s so not scary about us?” said Pinched. He said to Chunky, “Hurt him already.”

“You can hurt me but you still won’t scare me,” I said distractedly. One part of my brain was thinking, Handle with scare, scandal with hair, and so on. Another part was puzzling over the Tony question.

“Who was that on the phone?” said Pimples, still working on the problem he’d selected as his own.

“You wouldn’t believe me,” I said.

“Try us,” said Chunky, twisting my arm.

“Just a guy doing research for me, that’s all. I wanted Ullman’s address. My partner got arrested for the murder.”

“See, you shouldn’t have a guy doing research,” said Chunky. “That’s the whole problem. Getting involved, visiting Ullman’s apartment, that’s the kind of thing we’re supposed to scare you about.x201D;

Scare me, skullman, sang my disease. Skullamum Bailey. Skinnyman Brainy.

“Hurt him and scare him and let’s get out of here,” said Pinched. “I don’t like this. Larry was right, it is stupid. I don’t care about who’s doing research.”

“I still want to know who was on the phone,” said Pimples.