Mysterical-E

He Said, She Says

        Slim and Trim
                      By Larry & Rosemary Mild

“Buon giorno, Signore Slim,” the proprietor’s mournful voice greets me. Not great for customer relations and not at all like him.

I’m walking into Scalapini’s Barbershop across the street from the office. The one-chair shop belongs to Gepetto Scalapini, sort of a Papa Hemingway in appearance, complete with barrel chest and a grizzled facial bush.

Seated in the chair is a little geezer with a snow-white fringe surrounding bald mountain. I have to wait my turn. It won’t be long now, if you excuse the pun. I mosey over to a row of rattan chairs next to the mirrors, but I know better than to steal a look at myself. Not only do my ears need lowering, but my paunch as well. I’m stuck with my skosh too much nose and too-square Dick Tracy jaw. Still, not all bad for a thirty-eight-year-old. At least that’s what I keep telling myself.

I take off my windbreaker and leather holster and hang them on the clothes tree in the rear, where I can keep an eye on things. A Colt .45 automatic sits snugly in the holster. It’s inoperable, which means I don’t have to worry about someone else getting hold of my piece and creating mayhem with it. So why do I carry a weapon that doesn’t work? It’s my calling card and sends a pretty obvious message. Don’t mess with Slim O. Wittz, Private Investigator. Oh, the piece is registered, all right—as an antique, complete with filed-down firing pin. I get some of my finest business this way, and it’s a lot easier than buying business cards.

Voluptuous is my secretary and office manager. Yeah, Voluptuous. One gander at this platinum blonde broad with the Betty Grable gams and you see why she’s got the perfect moniker. Only she prefers to be called Vo. Says she’d rather be known for her brains instead of buns and boob size. And she’s got the whole caboodle, too—smarts and looks. Her two years of law school are useful in my line of work as a shamus. I’m here in this clip-joint because she gave me an ultimatum: she won’t loan me any more money ’til I get a haircut or learn guitar and join the Rolling Stones. You see, Vo takes charge of all incoming monies. It’s the only way she can be assured of getting a paycheck. She loans me my own money back as I need it.
The ancient geezer’s finished. Gepetto brushes off the chair and shakes out the striped cape before Velcro-ing it behind my neck. I’ve been bringing my wavy untamed locks here for years—not because he’s the best barber, but because he’s the cheapest. He’s generally a happy, chatty sort with an elephant’s knowledge of any sport you’d care to bring up. But today the man is quiet and sluggish. I try to start a conversation several times, but I’m getting one-word responses. He’s leaning on my shoulders and pulling hairs, and I’m not so sure the shears are at fault.

“What’s wrong, Gepetto?”

“Niente, Signore Slim.”

“Come on,” I shoot back. “You’ve never acted like this before. Something’s bothering you.”

“Pietro, he’s a my son.” Gepetto lets out a big sigh, and the buzzing on my head halts. “But he likes I call him Peter in American.”

“Well, what about Peter? Tell me.”

“He’s in a big a trouble with the policia.” Gepetto sets down the electric clippers and spins the chair around so we are face to face.

“Has the boy been arrested?”

“Si, Signore Slim.” His voice chokes as he blinks back tears.

“On what charge?”

“Murder, but he no kill nobody. Peter swear he don’t.”

“How old is the boy?”

“Nineteen last March.”

“Have you got him a good mouthpiece?”

“I can no afford a lawyer. The arraignment court, she appointed a Mr. Ginzberg from Legal Aid to help him.” Gepetto tells me Peter was bullied into joining a street gang called the Falcons six months ago. Last Thursday these Falcons got into a neighborhood rumble with the Barons, another local gang. Usually, both sides come away severely beaten with bruises, bumps, black eyes, bloodied noses, and a few surface knife slashes. This rumble turned out fiercer than most. Sixteen-year-old Manny-the-Snake was knifed to death. An unconscious Peter was found lying in the gutter with the knife, the murder weapon, in his hand and his shirt soaked in blood. The police believe that Peter was beaten in revenge for committing the murder. They’re guessing that the killing was some kind of initiation ritual.

I calm Gepetto down long enough for him to finish my haircut. It’s a pretty good job, except for one bald spot the size of a fifty-cent piece, where he skinned me when he talked about his son’s bloody shirt. He insists on a no-charge haircut. Fingering the landing strip upstairs, I decide to accept his offer.

I walk the two blocks to the parking lot, where my car is in hock up to its dashboard, and notice that the lot attendant, Fish-Face Eddie, ain’t watching my ’93 Buick Regal. In fact, the ballbuster is nowhere in sight. The Buick runs okay, but let’s say it’s on number eight of its nine lives. The upholstery is wall-to-wall duct tape—in its early days it was leather, and you can see the road through the floorboards. I figure that’s a plus with no air conditioning. The once red-and-white paint job is in equal competition with the rust. I try to sneak off without Fish-Face Eddie seeing me so I don’t have to pay the back rent on my own car at two bucks an hour. I see him in the rear view mirror running out of the port-a-potty, holding onto his pants with one hand and brandishing a tire iron in the other. I’ll deal with him later.

I nurse my aging chariot into the street and chug down to the thirteenth precinct, where they’re holding the Scalapini kid. He’s sitting on a cot, cradling his bandaged head in his hands.

“Hello, Peter.”

My voice startles him. He jumps up and I’m face to face with six lanky feet of pure panic, scared dark eyes, and day-old chin scruff. The only way I can interview him is through the cell bars. Peter can’t remember anything after the first gang confrontation. He shows me a baseball-size lump on the back of his head that just might be the cause of his memory lapse. There’s a round, dark-red stain on the bandage the size of a manhole cover. I ask about the knife.

He protests, holding up his bruised bare knuckles for me to inspect. “I use my fists. I never carry a weapon into rumbles. The shiv ain’t mine and I don’t know who put it in my hand. Some S.O.B., that’s all I know.”
I learn that the whole rift is over Manny-the-Snake from the Falcons dating the sister of one Bully Mahone, the Barons gang’s boldest, most-feared leader. “What makes this Mahone cat so fearsome?” I ask.

“He’s all muscle—big and tall like man-mountain, and he bullies the other Barons into doing everything for him.”

Peter knows there’s no way his father can put up the kind of bail the court is asking, so he’s resigned to cold storage until the trial. I give Pietro una piccolo bit of hope. plus a couple of Snickers bars I keep in reserve for stakeouts, and leave the joint.

Sitting in my parked car outside the county hoosegow, I wonder how much the DA has on my client. I need specific information to work with. But where to get it?

Time to put in a call to my ex. She’s got a new job working in the county prosecutor’s office. Fawn and I split amicably because we ain’t revocably compatible. She sleeps during the day—I snooze at night. She likes chick flicks—I prefer shoot-’em-ups. Fawn eats weed-and-seed salads—I don’t eat sham food. She wears fancy duds—I’m comfortable in jeans and shorts. Fawn drinks shooters—I guzzle Bud. The only thing we agreed on was sex. You get the idea. Now she’s back living with her mom, who just happens to be more my kind of gal. Subtract fifteen years, and I’d marry the older broad in a Slim minute. I flip open my cell phone and stab in the familiar numbers.

“Hi, Mom, howzit?” I gotta ask that, but then I’m forced to listen. When she’s finished analyzing the neighborhood and world news and whether I’m getting enough to eat, I ask if Fawn is available. I can hear a squabble in the background through a muffled palm over the mouthpiece: “I’m not here, I don’t wanna to talk to him.”

Suddenly, Fawn is on the line. “Hello?”

“Hi, Fawn.” “Hear you have a new job . . . with the county prosecutor’s office. A receptionist even. Do ya like it? Uh-huh, nice people, eh?” I make like I’m truly interested, and we chit-chat for a bit before I get down to my real purpose for calling.

“Fawn, I hate to do this, but I need a professional favor.”

“What?” she snaps. “I thought you were calling to wish me luck in my new job. Now you’re talking favors.”
“Whoa, baby! You weren’t so shy to ask for a favor when Rocco Vinnelli was punching you around and riding rough on you. I rushed into that like a Boy Scout.”

“Some Boy Scout. You went after the wrong guy. You always rush in and mess things up. That’s how you screwed up our marriage, you bastard.”

I try to calm her down, but she goes on and on about my always stressing her out. I can hear the tears squeezing out all over the phone.

“At least listen to me,” I plead. “And if you don’t want to help. Just say so… No, not now! Wait ’til I explain. I’ve got this paying client whose son is awaiting trial for murder. It would help me a lot to know what your boss has on him. All I need is a quick look at the boy’s file.”

Her shrieks of anger assault my ears and, for that matter, the entire telephone system. “You mean the evidence. I can’t do that. You’re not even his attorney. My boss would fire me if I released that kind of information. It might even blow Mr. Browning’s case and cost him a win. I won’t have anything to do with it.”

“But what if the kid’s innocent?” I protest.

“You can’t know that until you see all the evidence, can you?”

I can’t come up with an answer for that one, so I thank her for listening and ask her to put Mom back on the line.

“Oh, no, I’m wise to you, Mr. Slim O. Wittz,” Fawn fires back. “You want to get Mom to twist my arm. You think I didn’t learn anything in the three-year-circus we called a marriage?” She ends the tirade with a Bronx cheer and hangs up on me.

I close the phone and try to think of my next move. At least I got Fawn to spill the beans on who is handling the case. I’d still like to know what ADA Howard E. Browning has on my client, but that will have to wait for now. He insists that everyone call him Howie! To hear him say it—it sounds like somebody’s stepping on his bare toes.

I decide to have a look at the crime scene. Before my car pulls out into traffic, I flip through the scribbling in my notebook and discover that the gang rumble took place on Pacific Avenue. Hmm, Pacific. Hardly a peaceful place for a rumble. Arriving on the scene, I find our illustrious deputy assistant fire marshal hooking a fire hose up to the local doggie-land’s message central. The marshal is still tightening the hydrant coupling, when I appeal to his better nature to let me examine the crime scene before he washes everything to smithereens and puddles.

“Listen, bub,” the pot-bellied crew-cut says. “I got orders from headquarters to clean up the street here. See?”
“Sure, but five or ten minutes later won’t matter.”

“I got a schedule to keep. There’s a gasoline spill on Church Street and an accident over on Planter Street and Ward.”

I offer up my last Snickers bar, and the guy scans the horizon before snatching it out of my hands. He peels back the wrapper, chomps down and, through chocolate-smeared teeth mumbles, “Okay. You got ten minutes, no more.”

Two separate bloody places mark the murder scene. The larger one is pooled, most likely from the victim’s knife wound. The other is a jagged streak on the curb. I figure it‘s where Peter hit his head. Or where the victim’s blood splattered from the attacker’s blow. A long splinter lies wedged in the grooves of a nearby manhole cover. It looks like it came from the side of a baseball bat. I pry it loose with my penknife and stick it in a brown paper lunch bag I’d left on the floor of my car. Scanning the macadam street, I also find a few muddy footprints.

Just as I attempt to remove a smelly sneaker hiding inside the storm drain, I hear, “Times up!” I look over at the deputy assistant marshal, who has a mile-wide grin. He’s turning on the water. The stream hits me in the gut, flips me onto my butt, and sweeps me into the gutter. His obnoxious grin has grown into a full guffaw. I can see his beer belly jiggling up and down to some unknown polka beat. I’m a mess—not only soaking wet, but full of mud and assorted gutter gunk. I swear I’ll get even with this fire department funnyman when I submit a cleaning bill to his boss. Even if they don’t pay, he’ll get a dishonorable mention with the city officials, and maybe they’ll dock his pay. I only wish.

I pick myself up and squeegee off as best as I can. Spreading the morning fish-wrapper on my Buick’s seat, I drive back to the office for a fresh set of clothes. I enter my illustrious establishment expecting to hear a friendly “Aw, poor guy” from my secretary. Instead, I find Vo giggling behind one hand and my ex-brother-in-law sitting on my Castro Convertible couch, hee-hawing away.

I give the stink-eye to Vo. She drops the smirking routine and returns to her typing. It’s gotta be her homework; I haven’t given her any dictation for days.

“What the hell are you doing here?” I crab at Elmer.

“Have I got deal for you,” he blurts out, while trying to morph into a believable dealmaker.

“What is it this time? No, don’t tell me. It’ll wait until I change into dry clothes.” I slip into what Vo politely calls the office powder room. Ten minutes later I emerge in gym shorts and T-shirt. Elmer starts laughing again, and this time he gets the stink-eye from me.

I plop the sopping clothes on the floor next to Vo’s desk, to which the broad responds, “I don’t do windows or laundry, Slim, you know that! We agreed.”

“This time you owe me, Vo. You ridiculed me when I came in the door. Besides, I can’t go out on the street dressed like this. All I’m asking is that you take my things to Soo Fat’s Laundry around the corner.”

“But you look so cute in knobby knees and hairy legs. You should wear shorts all the time.”

“I’m warning you, Vo.”

“Okay, okay.” She doesn’t repent, but stuffs the lot into a plastic bag and heads out the door, chuckling all the way.

I turn to Elmer. “What do you want from me this time, you parasitic weasel?”

“My, aren’t we grumpy today.”

“I’ve got a right to be grumpy, the way my day is going.”

“Tell me about it,” he says. “Maybe I can help.”

“So now you’re an amateur psychoanalyst? Do you rent your couch by the day or week, you conniving chiseler.”

“Whoa thar, Trigger. I take it you’re still sore over the deal I got you on the new bed.”

“Some deal that was. The frame only had three casters. The box spring had sprung coils, and the mattress felt like genuine horse feathers.”

“I threw in a book just the right size for the missing caster, didn’t I?”

“You’re full of compassion and generosity, Elmer. No, I’m not still mad at you for that.”

“Then what’s wrong, Slim?”

I tell Elmer all about how Fawn turned me down in my hour of need.

He listens sympathetically. “Hey, Slim. I’ve got my own connection in the prosecutor’s office.”

“You having an In with one of the ADAs is about as likely as flying pork chops,” I reply.

“No. Someone even better than that.”

“Who, then?”

“Mimi Hedenbacher,” he says. “Just who you need.”

“And she’s a lawyer, a clerk, or a secretary?”

“None of those. But Mimi can unlock any door or cabinet you want in that office.”

“Just what does she do for that office?”

“She’s the building custodian, a janitor.”

“And just how is a damn custodian gonna help me?”

“She’s got the keys to all the doors.”

“What about the file cabinets?” I ask. “We gotta get into them to see Peter’s file.”

“Well, Mimi did some time for breaking and entry. She’s real good at picking cabinet locks, too. Been doing it for the two years since she got out of the slammer.”

“Whoa!” I say. “How does an ex-con get a job with keys to the prosecutor’s office?”

“By periodically doin’ some light snitch work for one of the ADAs. Don’t worry, Mimi won’t snitch on you—she’s got scruples.”

Elmer’s got an answer for everything. “How do you know she’ll do this for me?”

“For fifty small ones, she’ll unlock anything. Leave it to me. I’ll arrange everything. Tonight at ten, okay?”
“Yeah, but don’t tell Vo. She won’t go for anything illegal, and I won’t get the fifty from her to pay Mimi.”
* * *

I get to the George P. Frenklyn Municipal Annex Building on Main Street a few minutes to ten that night. Mimi is nowhere in sight, so I climb the steps to the big glass doors. The hall beyond is dimly lit. Suddenly, there’s a pair of eyes, big and bloodshot, staring out at me through the glass. I hear the lock jiggle, and the door swings inward.

Mimi is not what I expect. She’s a handsome woman in her late forties, but enormously overweight, with curly bottle-blond hair. Her uniform is denim coveralls with boondocker work boots. She smiles at me through a missing tooth. “Slim?”

“Mimi?”

“Yeah!”

She locks the front door behind me, and the next thing I know I’m being led to the elevator. On the third floor we step out into a hall, turn right, and we’re in prosecutor country. One glass-paneled door later, there’s a mop and pail sitting on a little wheeled platform outside the office of Howard E. Browning. She unlocks the door, flicks on the light, and rolls her cleaning gear inside. I head for the wall of filing cabinets and spy the one drawer marked S-SL. With a pair of probes she tinkers with the cabinet lock, and in two shakes, the drawer slides open. I run my Latex glove over the folders, and sure enough, there’s a tab labeled “Scalapini, Peter.” But there’s no file in the hanging folder. At that moment we hear someone in the hall. I can see the shadow approaching through the frosted glass door.

Mimi calmly begins to sing “Lambs to the Altar” in her soulful soprano voice, all the while shoving me behind her. She accomplishes two things using her enormous tuchus, One, she shoves me against the cabinet, forcing the drawer shut. Two, she provides a cover no one could possibly see beyond. I hear the door open. Mimi is still singing while swishing the mop back and forth over the vinyl tiles, using only her arms. Her hips, bulging like risen yeast dough, cover me, pressing me against the cabinet. Meanwhile, I get the shakes. What if the person comes in and takes a closer look? I could get five years in the can for this.

“Oh, it’s you, Mimi,” a friendly man’s voice says. “Keep up the good work. Goodnight.” The intruder leaves, and his shadow moves down the hall. A minute later, we hear the elevator doors open and close.

“Whew!” I utter. “That was a close one.” Then, I do an immediate handlectomy and remove the drawer from my stinging arse. I open the drawer and find the hanging folder again. “The file ain’t in there,” I say aloud.

“Try the big drawer on Browning’s desk,” Mimi offers. “It’s been my expert custodial experience that some people keep their more current goodies in their desk file drawer. She’s already there picking the lock for me. In thirty seconds the drawer’s open and, sure enough, the file’s there just like Mimi predicted. I lay the folder down on the steel desk, turn on the green study lamp, and peruse the first few pages of “boilerplate,” while Mimi skates through the office with her damp mop in a lick-and-a-promise mode. Then I come across the coroner’s report and a bunch of crime scene photos.

The report describes a wound made from the downward thrust of a knife; it fits the description of the knife discovered at the crime scene. The report uses a lot of medical mumbo-jumbo, but the gist is that the cause of death for one Manuel, aka Manny-the-Snake, Lopez is a short-term, massive bleed-out. It’s just what I expected, so I keep on reading. There’s a whole raft of photos stuffed in the back of the file. One, of Peter lying unconscious, catches my attention, but for the life of me, I can’t figure out why.

Another photo is a blowup of the supposed murder weapon. I examine it very closely and discover that the bone-handled blade has the initials P and G faintly scratched into it. I’m betting ADA Browning is assuming the P and G stand for Peter and some middle initial or nickname.

A half-hour later, I figure that I’ve seen and read enough, so I return the folder to the desk file drawer. I turn to Mimi, who is now emptying trash baskets. A swift but gentle potch-un-tuchas gets her attention. I pay her, and she stuffs the fifty smackers I’d weaseled out of Vo into her super-size bra, then plants a whopper of a sloppy kiss on my cheek. Armed with the few facts that I gleaned, I retreat from the Municipal Annex building in a hurry.

First thing the next morning, I pop into the jail where they’re holding Peter and give him the mixed news of my night’s adventure. He punches the air with his fist and a resounding “Yes! How soon do I get out?”

“Slow down, kid. Even if we’ve got something, it may take time for your lawyer to legally discover all this evidence.”

“But, Mr. Wittz, you know I didn’t do it. Can’t we show them the evidence we have?”

“No way. The court can’t know the tricks I used to peek at this evidence or I’ll get into a whole heap of trouble myself. I could go to the slammer for it. Your lawyer will have to wade through all the legal-beagle stuff. You gotta be patient. You can’t get around the legal discovery process.”

“That’s unfair,” he pouts, his shoulders slumping.

“I suppose it is from your point of view. By the way, do you know anyone else in the Barons whose first name begins with P?”

“Yeah. There’s Pasquale Gramaldi and … uh … Pauli Raphello. Why?”

“The knife most likely belongs to your friend Pasquale. Does he have it in for you, kid?”

“He’s no friend of mine! We went a few rounds last week over some name he called me. Pasquale gave me this scab over my right eye and I gave him a bloody nose, so he was still plenty pissed when a couple Falcons came and broke up our fight. He ran off screaming he’d get even. Say, how do you know the knife belongs to him?”

“The initials P and G are scratched into the blade,” I tell him.

“Yellow bone handle about so long?” He gestures, hands about eight inches apart.

I nod.

“It’s his all right,” says Peter.

“By the way,” I ask, “what’s your relationship with Manny Lopez?”

“The kook doesn’t have all his marbles. The nut case accused me of ratting him out to his parole officer that he was on drugs. I told him I wasn’t the squealer. We pushed and shoved for a few minutes, and then I knocked him off his feet. That was pretty much it.”

“Were there any witnesses to that scuffle?”

“Yeah,” Peter mumbled. “At least half the Falcons were there. Can they use that against me?”

“I’m afraid so.”

I leave the kid in slightly lower spirits than when I found him. In the car once more, I use the cell phone to set up a meeting with Gepetto and Wilber Ginzberg, the court-appointed lawyer.

Three hours later, I’m sitting in the barber chair facing the two of them, who are seated in the rattan waiting chairs. Wilber’s neatly clipped, curly black hair, stern hazel eyes, and sharply pressed pinstripe suit just might prove an asset in Peter’s case. I present everything I’ve learned to the two men and answer a number of questions.

Wilber says he’ll file for immediate discovery of all charges and evidence the prosecutor possesses and, if all is in order, he will request a pretrial hearing with the judge. If that happens, he may be able to get the case thrown out before it goes to trial.

“I hope you will protect the source of this information, Mr. Ginzberg,” I impress upon him.

“For a $200 retainer I can take you on as a client, and all that you have told me becomes privileged attorney-client information.”

He sees the dumb Where did that come from expression on my face and starts to laugh. “Not to worry, Mr. Wittz. I’m joking. There’s no reason to believe your name would ever come up in a pretrial hearing. I’m entitled to full disclosure, which includes everything you’ve seen in those files. The discovery then becomes the source. Your somewhat dubious methods should achieve the desired result. Thank you.”
I like this young lawyer’s MO. His aggressiveness can’t hurt either.

* * *

It takes nearly three weeks for the prosecutor to get off his butt and schedule a pretrial hearing. It’s an open hearing, so I plop myself down in the first-row gallery close to the defense table. A couple of rows behind me I recognize some of the Falcons from my ’hood. I know some of them have been subpoenaed by the defense. From the looks of the collection of budding thugs on the opposite side of the gallery, I’m guessing they’re Barons. I see one that fits the description of Pasquale Grimaldi, complete with an old knife scar on his left cheek. There’s even one bozo in the bunch that could play linebacker for the Rams all by himself. I lean over the rail to ask, and Peter nods a Yes, it’s Bully Mahone.

The hearing begins with the coroner reading from her report, and she demonstrates the penetration thrust—downward. Then ADA Browning presents his crime scene evidence to the judge, stressing two photos: one with the knife in Peter’s hand, and the other, a close-up of the knife focusing on the initials. He emphasizes the P for Peter several times. Also, one Falcon and two Baron witnesses testify to a physical confrontation between the defendant and the deceased. Browning points out Peter’s recent wounds. The ADA is cleverly building a case for an internal beef—one not involving the Barons at all. Overall, it looks pretty grim for our side. Peter is scowling, and his arms are crossed over his chest, hands balled into fists. He’s trying to keep his cool.

While Browning punctuates his case, Wilbur is studying a photo that he has propped up in front of him: the damning photo of Peter holding the knife. I can see it as well. Suddenly, it hits me up the side of the head—why this photo is so significant. I lean over the rail and whisper in Wilber’s ear. He nods and releases the hint of a small smile.

Now it’s his turn to rebut. He takes a letter opener from his briefcase and asks the ADA to grip the opener in either hand in the manner of the first photo, that is, with the blade facing the same direction as the thumb. “Now, sir, try a downward thrusting motion.” Browning tries with first the right hand and then the left, but he can’t seem to turn the blade over more than forty-five degrees to stab downward.
“Then wouldn’t you say that the knife is a plant?” asks Ginzberg.

“Maybe!” replies the frustrated ADA. “But that still doesn’t mean he didn’t stab the Lopez kid. In the photo it looks like Scalapini is holding the knife in a defensive position ready to take on his next victim.”

Wilbur fires back. “His fingers are closely wrapped around the knife. Wouldn’t you think he’d relax his fingers some after being knocked cold with a baseball bat from behind?”

“Again, maybe,” the ADA grudgingly admits.

Next, Wilbur calls Pasquale Gramaldi to the witness stand and asks, first, for his full name and, second, for his initials. The stocky, pimply faced Pasquale complies. Then Wilbur asks Pasquale if he knows who the defendant is and gets a vigorous nod.

“Yeah,” Pasquale says, “We butted heads a couple a times, had some classes together, too.”

“Do you know his full name?”

Pasquale replies, “Pietro Scalapini, but they call him Petey.”

“And his initials?” the lawyer pushes.

“P.S. just like in letters,” Pasquale replies with a smirk.

“P.S.,” Ginzberg repeats. “Then this knife is more likely to be yours than Peter’s. Isn’t that so?” He shoves the evidence bag containing the knife right under Pasquale’s nose.

“Yeah. It’s mine, all right, but I didn’t cut nobody, and besides, I ain’t seen that shiv since last Wednesday night.”

“Then you’re claiming someone stole it?” asked Wilbur.

“Naw!” Pasquale mumbled. “I lent it out.”

I can hardly hear Pasquale on account of the rising din generated in the right rear gallery. Out of the ruckus, a bellowing voice bursts out: “Keep your mouth shut if you know what’s good for you.”

The judge slams the gavel down like it’s a sledgehammer. “One more outburst and I’ll clear the courtroom.”
I doubt that the judge heard the threat or he would have emptied the joint already. Wilber continues unshaken.

“Who did you lend the knife to?”

An uneasy shuffle ferments in the right rear gallery, but subsides as soon as the judge picks up his gavel and glares at them.

“I don’t known,” Pasquale whispers.

“You don’t know or you won’t tell the court?”

“I can’t tell.”

“And why is that?”

“I’m a dead man if I tell.”

“You’d rather do time for murder or conspiracy to commit murder than tell who you lent the knife to?”
Beads of sweat pop out on Pasquale’s upper lip. His Adam’s apple does a dance in his neck. “I didn’t cut nobody. I don’t want to do time. He did the cutting. He killed Manny-the-Snake. At first, I didn’t know why he wanted my knife. He practically took it from me so’s he could do the cutting. He said his sister was dating a Falcon—it was his honor at stake. Pretty bone-headed reason to off someone, if you ask me. I had nuttin’ to do with this killing.”

“You rat-fink-bastard. I’ll get you for this!” A Godzilla of a figure leaps up from the gallery and charges for the door.

“It’s Bully Mahone!” Peter cries out.

“Y’er a dead man, Gramaldi,” booms the retreating mountain over his shoulder.

“It’s Bully Mahone” repeats Pasquale, “and I’m a dead man.”

“Stop him!” yells the judge. Two uniforms appear at the door and attempt to apprehend Bully. They only manage to slow down his bull rush. It takes a third uniform to restrain and cuff him. They take him away.
ADA Browning finally announces that he no longer has a viable case against Peter Scalapini. Upon hearing this, the judge dismisses the case and orders Peter’s immediate release.

At sentencing, twenty-eight-year-old Bully Mahone becomes the guest of the state for the next twenty-five years. In a separate plea agreement, Pasquale gets a five-year sentence, suspended, for conspiracy; the suspension is for his cooperation in convicting Bully. He is also given a free train ticket to anywhere in the country that he chooses. Peter learns from Pasquale’s parole officer that Pasquale is the one who ratted Manny out on the drug charge. A pretty gutsy guy, if you ask me.

* * *

The Scalapini family, Wilber, and myself celebrate the victory in the Scalapini apartment upstairs from the barbershop. Vo is invited and shows up, too. Wilber accepts a lifetime of free haircuts as his fee and, reluctantly, so do I. Peter announces that he got a job at a local hardware store, and has renounced his membership in the Falcons. Everyone cheers but Vo.

“What’s wrong?” I ask her.

“Since you accepted haircuts for a fee, how am I going to get a paycheck out of that?”

“Vo, how much do you spend on your hair every month?” I ask.

“Between fifty and sixty dollars. Why?”

Gepetto, now back to his jolly self, interrupts. “I do that for free. I color. I style. I cut and I trim. I do good job. Ask anybody.”

Vo’s scarlet lips shift from a pout to a smile. “Well, okay then. I guess I’m stuck with Slim and trim.” She waves goodbye with her lacquered nails and disappears out the door.

I sidle up to Gepetto. “Hey, friend, I didn’t know you do all that stuff for the ladies.”

Gepetto breaks into a guilty grin. “I don’t. But for the bella lady I make a special “do.”