McManus took the punch, and his head snapped back. His brimmed hat had already tumbled to the floor. The sting of the blow was immediate even though it hadn’t been the first. However, a dull throbbing now accompanied it. He had begun to grind his teeth in anticipation, and now it sounded like a wood rasp at work.
Since the crash of ’29, he’d had any and every job imaginable, digging ditches, working in an abattoir, and assisting Chao Kong Moon an illusionist whose real name was Al Bradley. The latest gig had included running numbers for Hy Sugarman. Of course, his resume also included prizefighting. Mostly, he’d been a glorified sparring partner; Hell, it was really just an excuse for those who still had some greenbacks to watch the disenfranchised beat each other senseless. As a result of his experience, he knew eyes naturally closed and muscles got tense in anticipation of the blow. It’s what causes the whole process to seem worse then it was. McManus lifted his head and winced. His right eye had practically swollen shut; the left wasn’t much better. His last scheme had been marathon dancing. He wondered if he shouldn’t have given it up so soon.
“All right, that’s enough,” Deacon, the man in the corner said; the boss.
Sawyer, the man who had been busy enjoying his work restructuring McManus’s face a little too much, gave Deacon a sour look. Deacon walked from the corner of the room into the circle of light cast from overhead. He had on a pinstripe suit and a bowler hat a few sizes too big. Deacon pulled a chair over, sat down, and lit a cigarette.
“Could I have one of those?” McManus asked.
Deacon chuckled, ignored the request, took out a handkerchief, and wiped some of the blood off of McManus’s face. McManus tried as best as he could to get comfortable in the chair to take his mind off the dull throbbing. It was difficult to make out every detail of the room since one of his eyes had lost its value. They were in a musty farmhouse just outside of the city. Sawyer had switched places with Deacon and was now in the corner whittling with his back up against the wall. He bit his lower lip as he scrutinized the blade guiding along the hickory he held in his other hand.
“Things could have gone smoother today,” Deacon said aloud, though, it was to himself.
McManus wanted to laugh but didn’t. He hadn’t heard such an understatement in a long time. In the beginning, things had gone very well for Boss Deacon and Sawyer the whittler. They had entered the bank, controlled the crowd like professionals, and dealt with the guards. Only one person tried to get out of line, and Sawyer had handled him. The two criminals weren’t greedy, and they didn’t waste time. The problem had been The Continental Detective who’d been enjoying a stroll outside of the bank. McManus had had the misfortune of entering the bank at the same time the criminals were exiting, so they grabbed him as a hostage and forced a standoff with the detective. The detective, the getaway driver, and a few civilians had been killed during the melee; Deacon and Sawyer had also lost some of the loot. Deacon extinguished his cigarette. The sensation had returned to McManus’s fingers and he could touch the end of the rope binding his left wrist with his pinky.
“Now, here’s the way that I see it,” Deacon said as he stood up. Sawyer continued to whittle.
“Do what you do best,” Deacon said to Sawyer and walked out from under the light. Sawyer approached McManus with the knife out.
McManus tilted his head so he could look past Sawyer to where Deacon had gone. In the far corner of the room, he could make out Deacon uncovering the money from its hiding place. McManus smiled. Sawyer wrinkled his brow. McManus’s hands were suddenly free from their bindings, and the derringer he kept near his groin was in his right hand. Sawyer had begun to open his mouth, but before he could make a sound he had already been shot in the throat. Brilliant flashes of light erupted from the muzzle as McManus shot Deacon in the back. McManus stood up. He was still woozy, and his balance compromised, so he took his time walking. McManus rolled the Deacon’s body over with the toe of his shoe.
“I guess we should have taken another hostage,” Deacon uttered.
McManus reached down and took the pack of cigarettes from Deacon’s breast pocket.
THE END
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Andrew Davie received an MFA in creative writing from Adelphi University. He taught English in Macau on a Fulbright Grant. In June of 2018, he survived a ruptured brain aneurysm and subarachnoid haemorrhage. His crime fiction novella Pavement was released in by All Due Respect Books. The follow-up Ouroboros is scheduled for December 2020 and his novella Dig Two Graves is scheduled to be released by Close to the Bone in September 2020. His other work can be found in links on his website: asdavie.wordpress.com