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Poker Cop

What,” I ask, “does Vendetta! mean?”

“Revenge!” says Jake angrily.

“We must revenge Gyp’s death. You and I will work together. You will find Gyp’s murderer. I will kill him.”

I tell him, “I want nothing to do with any vendetta! My answer is no.”

“No!” he screams raising the shotgun.

“Jaco, Jake, Jackal! Wait! I…” Again he screams, “No!” aiming the shotgun.

I stare straight down the O of the shotgun’s barrel.

He says two words and fires. The two words are Get down!

Close-up the noise level of a crying baby measures 110, a chain-saw 120, and a jackhammer 130. A shotgun blast measures 170.

I’m so deafened I barely hear Jake say, “He was going to kill you.” I get up and walk down the alley where the third barroom shooter has been shredded from the neck up.

“Let’s get out of here,” says Jake.

“Not yet.” I take out what’s left of my “Lucky Deck.”

In the movies Frankenstein’s Monster always walks slow and stiff-legged. Jake, who is nearly the same size, runs easily. I, whose only exercise consists of watching for runner-runners, have a hard time keeping up. I yell, “Go left! To the right!,” directions. We go down side-streets, over fences, and across the tracks into Hell Town. The streets are full of bed-sisters, bellywashers, and junkers. The storefronts are tat-parlors, bike-bars, and bustout joints. Jake looks uneasily. I smile, happy to be home.

The Cat Flush is my favorite sawdust joint. It’s owned by “Thumbs” who, so the story goes, lost his thumbs for nonpayment of a gambling debt. He comes over and asks, “Of all the card joints in all the world, why have you walked into mine?”

I shake “Thumb’s” crippled hand and that Something’s wrong feeling returns. I’m suddenly reminded that the other poker room owner I’ve met tonight, Honey, was disfigured. I’m about to ask Thumbs if he’s ever heard of the House Of Cards when Jake says, “We must get out of sight.”

Instead I say, “Right now we need a place to hide. No questions asked.”

“Through that door,” says Thumbs. “There’s a couch in my office.”

The small windowless room is thin-walled. Jake immediately falls asleep. I sit awake all night listening to poker players “Call!” and “Raise!”

“Thumbs” walks in, hands me the morning paper, and walks out. The headline reads Headless Man At Topless Bar. The story says: Police have tentatively identified, through a deck of playing cards found on the body, the man decapitated by a shotgun blast last night in the alley behind “The Last Chance Lap Dance.” The headless man is Jack Thayer, a known card cheat, wanted for questioning in the recent poker room massacre that left four players dead. City Homicide Detective Sweeny reports, “The people of this city can rest easy. A ‘Mad Dog Killer’ has been put down.”

I, “The Mad Dog Killer,” put down the paper and quote Mark Twain, “The reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated.” Reading the story of my own exaggerated death leaves me uneasy. Again I get the feeling Something’s wrong. Something’s…”

“Something’s wrong,” I say to Jake, “Listen!”

“I don’t hear anything.”

“That’s what’s wrong! No ‘Call’ and ‘Raise.’ No cards being shuffled. No chips being riffled No…”

Jake grabs for his shotgun as the door is kicked in.

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