Sleep with the Fishes Read online

  “Holy bejesus, Russ!” Big Bob smacked himself in the head.

  “Man, oh man!” Little Bob put a hand over his eyes.

  Russ suddenly found himself in a pastry shop, sticking his finger into slices of strawberry pie while the girl at the register—Penelope?—was distracted by a pink parrot, squawking “Light me, Louie!”

  Russ’s fainting spell lasted a minute or so. Long enough for help to arrive. Someone was pinching his nose. Pastries, parrots, and Penelope vaporized, and his neighbor Sid, wearing a red satin bathrobe, was leaning over him.

  “Congratulations, Smonig.” Sid grinned. “You, my friend, are a murderer.”

  “My way is the only way, believe me, Smonig. I know how to get away with murder.” Sid put a mug of instant coffee in front of Russ, who hadn’t made a peep since leaving the confectionary and entering Sid’s cabin.

  But Sid had been doing plenty of peeping, enough for both of them, and for the Bobs too. Sid wasn’t sure he was getting through to Russ, so he set it out for him again.

  “You got a blood alcohol level that’d get you busted for sure. Nothin’ you can do about that for maybe six hours. By that time, if you call the cops then, delayed like, they’ll figure something don’t smell good. And when they find out you was in a bar all night, forget about it. And who was this schmoe anyways? Do you know him? Well, as it so happens, I do know him. He’s a no-good louse—a crook and a rapist.”

  “Hey!” Big Bob snapped from a daze and struggled out of the musty plaid couch. “Russ, ya know who Sid is? He’s Sid Bifulco!”

  Russ just stared at the tabletop. Sid sucked his teeth and folded his arms.

  “Sure, he’s Sid Bifulco! Ya know, that guy!” Big Bob spun around and looked at the other drowsy Bob.

  “Don’t ya get it, he’s, like, a mobster. They called him ‘Sleep’ ’cause he put a guy out before killing him. Ya killed like, what was it?” Big Bob snapped his fingers at “Sleep.”

  Sid brushed at a lapel.

  “Convicted of ten murders.” Sid held up ten digits for all to see.

  “Ten guys! He killed ten guys! But he got outta prison ’cause he ratted—oh, sorry…” Big Bob bowed to his host apologetically.

  Little Bob came alive, jumping to his feet. “Yes, yes, that’s it—you’re right! I remember.” But when Sid glanced at him, Little Bob sat right back down like he’d spoken out of turn.

  It didn’t bug Sid that they knew his past. In fact, being a murderer engendered a special kind of respect, an esteem that he sorely missed. Sid reclaimed the stage.

  “There you have it, Russ.” Sid snapped his fingers in the Bobs’ direction. “A watchamacallit, a testimonial. As my lawyer Endelpo would say, ‘I have many years’ experience in these matters.’ Russ, listen t’me—that crumb you just crushed?—yeah, his name is Jimmy…eh…Spaghetti. He was the kinda lowlife you couldn’t avoid in my line of work.”

  “Spaghetti?” Little Bob jumped up. “His name was Spaghetti, like with meatballs?”

  Sid winced, trying to stay focused on his yarn. “So this Spaghetti guy was bad. A burglar, and a rapist when opportunity knocked. He liked coming out here to lonely cabins with old ladies in ’em. Jimmy had what you’d call a special fondness for old ladies. Not a pretty character, believe you me. BUT!” Sid pressed his hands together prayer-style, pointing them at Russ.

  “BUT…here you come with your truck and a snootful. Good thing or bad thing?”

  “Bad thing!” Little Bob threw up his hand from the sofa, but the teacher ignored him.

  “You actually done a good thing, Russ.” Sid chuckled, parting his hands as if revealing the truth.

  “Not only did you whack a real scumbag, but you saved the taxpayers an awful lotta money by puttin’ him in the flower bed. The trial an’ all, what would that cost? Unbelievable! We’re talking hundreds of thousands of dollars! Maybe millions. And all that green for a guy like that?”

  “He’s right, Russ.” Big Bob stepped up next to Sid. “Ya know it costs somethin’ like twenty-five grand a year to keep a guy in prison? And your average felony conviction costs somethin’ like a half million dollars or more. That comes outta our taxes.”

  “See, Russ, the big guy knows.” Sid patted Big Bob on the arm then crouched in front of Russ trying to catch his gaze.

  “Now look at me, for instance. I murdered ten guys—maybe a lot more, ones they never knew about. An’ I’m outta the joint. How long do you think this guy Jimmy…eh…Spaghetti would stay in the pen, if convicted?”

  “The average prison time served for a rapist is only like two years, Russ,” Big Bob agreed. “For burglary maybe less than a year on a first conviction.”

  Sid jerked a thumb at Big Bob.

  “Big Guy’s right. I’m right. Hey, you…”

  Little Bob, still cuddling his camcorder, rose and took small steps toward Sid like he was approaching the principal’s desk.

  “Yeah, I’m talkin’ to you. Whadda you think? Was getting run over by Russ too good for that no-good-bag-of-shit Jimmy or what?” Sid waved a hand in Little Bob’s direction.

  “Did you really kill ten people?”

  Sid turned his head and smiled directly at Little Bob. “Whadda you think?”

  “Wow. If, if as he says, Russ, the guy wuz like a rapist…Old ladies, Russ!” Little Bob winced, and took his seat.

  Sid focused back on Russ.

  “You see, Russ? It’s not a bad thing you done. Now I ask you: will the police see it that way? No, they won’t see it that way. All they know is you were DWI. And the shame of it all is you’d throw your life away on a scumbag like Spaghetti.”

  “Please shut up!” Russ slammed his coffee mug on the table. To Russ, a disaster like running down and killing Jimmy Spaghetti was the last straw. This was the final smashup in a life of roadway disasters. He had tried to break the cycle, tried to extinguish the fire of Sandra’s death, tried to flee doubting friends and family in Hartford. Russ had made a clean break by embracing the supposedly simple rural life. Somewhere along the line, though, somewhere during those ten years since Sandra’s death, the specter of the fiery ravine was supposed to have dissolved.

  It had been hand to mouth all the way. Russ was always one catastrophe away from ruin. He needed to win big for a change, to break free. But now freedom from his curse seemed utterly hopeless.

  Russ’s doom shadowed the room like an eclipse. Sid got up and walked out. In a minute, he came back dressed in slacks, windbreaker, and sport shirt. Over one arm was a drop cloth, some clothesline, and a coil of oily hemp rope he’d scavenged from the cedar closet. In one hand was a glass of water, and in the other hand were two white tablets. He pulled up next to Russ.

  “Here.”

  Russ took the pills, took the water. He hoped “Sleep” had struck again.

  “You guys watch him ’til he drops off. Then you can beat it. He’ll sleep on my couch for the night.” Sid went out the front door.

  First and foremost, the package was wrapped burrito-style in a tarp, preferably waterproof. Next, the package was bound tightly with rope to insure that there was no unraveling. These preliminaries served the purpose of containing incriminating fluids and fibers, loose personal effects, ungainly snagging limbs, and stray rotting tidbits down the line. It also facilitated handling, dragging, and dropping.

  But without assistance, getting the package into the trunk was problematic. Johnny Fest was a good 6'4" and 280 pounds. Sid could lift the feet, but not the torso.

  Sid was not without a few tricks of his trade. He dragged his package beneath a nearby tree and tossed a rope over a limb. One end was tied off at Big Bob’s front bumper, the other at Fest’s chest. The bumper groaned, the limb creaked, the rope stretched and frayed. Sid backed up Big Bob’s Bronco about eight feet and stopped. What with the stretch in the rope and the bending tree limb, Fest’s belly dangled only three feet off the ground. His toes touched dirt. But it was enough so that when Sid backed his white Ford LT
D up to him he could push on the soles of Johnny’s tarped feet and fold the package headfirst into the trunk.

  Just like old times. With Johnny in the trunk, Sid drove to a construction site he’d noticed where Route 241 passed over a swampy gorge about ten miles north of Frustrumburg.

  Pillars for the new Route 241 bridge had concrete foundations that extended some distance into the ground. These foundations were made by driving tapered steel cylinders into the earth and filling them with concrete. Pile drivers were used to pound these steel cylinders into the ground, and they were noticeable to Sid because of the height of their substantial derricks. And because they signaled a great place to dump a body.

  Jagged cerise of sunrise tinged the horizon where the low clouds had started to break. Out of the night, icy raindrops beat a slow tap, then a drumroll on the plywood that covered the steel pile casing. Sid shoved the plywood to one side and looked down the casing. Bottomless to the eye. He left one end of the rope secured around his package, then tossed the other end over a steel pole above the casing, then tied that end to his bumper. He drove twenty feet forward, the rope pulled the package from the trunk, and he heard a dull thump. Stepping out of the LTD into a steady rain, Sid unfolded a pocketknife and looked down at Fest dangling in the gloom of the casing. He drew the blade across the rope, it snapped, the package dropped feetfirst. There was a sound not too unlike the snapping of ice trays when it hit bottom.

  “Couldn’t happen to a nicer guy,” Sid smirked, drawing a sleeve over his wet face. Several buckets full of gravel dumped in atop the package assured that nobody would notice it eighty-five feet down. Sid retrieved his rope, replaced the plywood cover, and drove home. All that was left was to deep-six Fest’s stolen BMW in the woods somewhere, and then Sid could catch some winks.

  The second week of May arrived the next morning with all horns blaring. A warm high-pressure front had rolled the cold air back to the north, stretching the sky in great flourishing streaks of stratospheric mares’ tails. Cool maroon shadows carpeted Hellbender Eddy; a hot purplish sky contrasted neon overhead.

  Though Russ awoke from a dreamless night to the smell of fried ham, coffee, and cinnamon rolls, and even though he actually felt well rested, he remembered what had happened the night before. He lay there on Sid’s couch, a blanket pulled up to his nose, staring at the ceiling: police should have been called, eternal irrevocable shame and doom averted. He could hear Sid knocking around the kitchen, whistling tunelessly as a Frank Sinatra CD played. The percolator slurped along, but out of sync with “One for My Baby.”

  As if he’d heard Russ’s eyes open, Sid marched into the living room, yanked on the curtain drawstring, and cranked open the picture window.

  “C’mon, get up. C’mon, c’mon—outside, c’mon…”

  Sid poked and jostled Russ out the front door, spooking a tizzy of skippers from the daffodils next to the cabin. They marched off the portico and into the side yard, where Sid planted Russ and squared his shoulders. Russ stood squinting uneasily at the river, wiggling his toes in tube socks wet from the grass.

  Many people would have liked to believe that men like Sid Bifulco were criminally insane, that they were, in point of fact, evil. Could sane, rational, emotionally balanced people murder? And yet there were model citizens who made a living crawling through sewers, eviscerating cattle, or performing autopsies on putrefied remains. Perhaps people could sanely do almost anything, irrespective of good or bad, revolting or repugnant, violent or vile, if it was suitably rationalized. For some, killing was not evil, rather the apotheosis of rationality, in that death is inevitable, final, and ultimately irrelevant.

  This was not to say murder came easily to an otherwise sane person. For Sid, it was difficult the first few times. But as death became familiar, it almost rationalized itself, a process often facilitated with some spiritual guidance. And in the insular world of wiseguys, there was often an old hand to point out the path to vindication.

  “Russ, look at the tree, the big, sticky, Christmas-type tree over my cabin. It’s alive, am I right? Now the cabin. What’s it made of, Russ? It’s made of logs, am I right? Now think about this: do the logs know they’re dead?”

  Russ just blinked. It was occurring to him that whenever Sid opened his mouth, Russ felt like he’d just smoked a joint.

  “Now think about this. Did you ever notice the logs was dead? No, you didn’t, did you? O.K., now look at the river. Look at it. What is it? I’ll tell you what it is. It’s a bunch of water rolling down the hill toward Trenton. Think about this, Russ. How long has this river been flowing? Long before Trenton was ever there, am I right? Long before you an’ me was born. Maybe before anybody was born, anybody at all. And I’ll tell you something, Russ. It’ll be flowing a long time after everybody dies. A long time after this cabin rots away. A long time after this big Christmas tree is nothing but mulch. And nobody—nobody, Russ—will even remember they was here. But they was alive once, and that’s the only thing that ever matters to the tree, and the logs back when they was alive. So let’s go have breakfast.”

  Russ stood in the side yard for some minutes after Sid had gone inside, a bit dazed and decidedly confused. Whatever Sid was on about, it sounded like it should make sense. Eventually Russ turned, went in, sat down at a card table on the screened porch, and ate breakfast in silence.

  He cut through two slabs of ham and three cinnamon rolls, and as he raced Sid on a third cup of coffee, the sun crested the opposite bank of the river, filling the porch from the top down with lemony spring light.

  Russ cleared his throat. “Where is he, Sid?”

  Sid was eating a cinnamon roll with a knife and fork. He didn’t even miss a beat.

  “He’s gone, Russ, plain and simple. I took him away where he’ll rest for all time. I took him to where only God can find him, and you can be damned sure he will too. Where he goes after God gets through with him?” Sid pointed his fork at the floor and winked at Russ.

  “Anyways, I figure we’d do a little fishing today. My idea—well, what I’d like to start with is smallmouth bass.” Sid lifted the percolator to fill their mugs. His parole officer, the guy who expected “bronze backs,” was sure to be his first visitor, and he knew it’d be important to impress upon him how well he was fitting back into society.

  “But what about—”

  “Your friends? Your friends are good people, Russ. They understand. Last night you hit a tree. See?”

  Russ pivoted, and through a hole in the bushes next to the pin oak on Ballard Pond he could see his truck, the front wrapped around a tree.

  “A tree?”

  “Sure.” Sid wiped his mouth with a napkin, sniffed, and scooted out his chair. “C’mon.”

  A leisurely stroll across the Ballard dam breast to Russ’s yard and driveway took them to where the truck was firmly pressed into a tree. The bark was torn and everything.

  Leading him to the passenger side, Sid wrenched the door open with difficulty and ushered Russ into the driver’s seat.

  “A tree,” Russ mumbled, almost believing—almost. After all, he hadn’t seen the actual collision. It could have been a tree, couldn’t it? The sun was as bright and blinding as the night had been dark and ominous.

  “You hit a tree, Russ. I think a mechanic’ll find that your steering box cracked when you turned the wheel and the gears locked, seized up, and was steered right into the tree. You’re a lucky guy. You mighta been hurt. Big Bob said he’ll send a truck over to tow this beast into the shop for repairs—on me. I can’t stand to watch you mess with that truck on such a beautiful day. Besides, you an’ me got a deal. I helped you with your problem. You help me with mine. Now let’s go fishing, huh, Russ?”

  Omer had his Karmann Ghia pointed back to New York when he stopped at a pay phone next to a general store whose side advertised “Mail Pouch Chewing Tobacco.” He hadn’t seen one of those since he hooked up with Arthur Bremer at a covered bridge outside Milwaukee in 1972. And to think with
four bullets Bremer couldn’t kill Democratic candidate George Wallace. Well, four more shell casings for Omer’s collection.

  “Hullo.” The background clatter was either that of a bottling plant or a bowling alley.

  “It’s Mr. Phillips. Good news. Johnny Fest is out of the game, permanently. Believe it or not, he had an accident—run over by a truck.” Omer pushed back his wool crusher and let the sun warm his face.

  “As long as it’s fixed, that’s all. Who did the job?”

  “A neighbor—name of Russ Smonig—ran him over with a truck when he came home last night. Fest was just approaching our Bifulco’s cabin, and I was in position to intervene…” Omer filled his nostrils with the heady fumes of warm morning grass.

  “What was the name again? Spell it.”

  “Who? The neighbor in the truck?”

  “Spell it.”

  “R-U-S-S S-M-O-N-I-G.”

  “I’ll call from another number, in a little bit. Don’t move.” The line went dead.

  Omer dangled the receiver by a single index finger before sending it home. The store was closed Sundays, but some loose change got him a Hires from a bottled pop machine. Been ages since he’d seen one of those. It reminded him of a cold Sunday in Harlem, a gas station, and a meeting with Talmadge Hayer. Now there was a fellow who knew how to do the job. He not only blasted Malcolm X with a shotgun, but then others stepped up with pistols and finished him off. The shells from that incident took up almost a whole shelf.

  Sitting on the edge of his blue sports car, he drank his Hires and didn’t think about what had made his employer nervous. Omer had learned long ago not to ask too many questions, even if only of himself.

  A crow plunked down on a crab apple tree across the road and surveyed the stranger with a jocular eye. Arching an eyebrow at his audience, Omer watched as the crow hopped to another branch, cocked its head at him, and stood on one leg. The bird’s beak was open, and its red dagger tongue flicked as though it was about to say something.