continued from Stories collection three
Chicago farewell - a story in text
chapter 1.
sam's place had changed hands a couple of time in the last few years and was no longer frequented by low life's - it had gone respectable.
not sure what made me make my way there that day, I'd not been in for a long long time and not thought about Danny or marcie or any of that for a while.
but here I was, the usual jack in hand when I felt someone standing by my side and turned to see marcie standing there looking every bit the broad I remembered.
chapter 2.
'hey handsome' she said in her silky voice.
taken aback somewhat my reply wasn't the best line I could have come back with. 'marcie - not seen you in a while, when did you get out?'
'few weeks back, no place else to go so thought, hey Chicago and decided to look you up cos I need your help'
'hey doll, ain't no cop no more' which was true. I'd done my 20 and decided to move on.
'I know' she said 'I looked you up before I came found you'
chapter 3.
so she told me a story that she heard in the joint about a heist a few years back where the money was never recovered - I remembered it, big job, big money.
she saw this as her chance to make a new life and finally get out of here but she needed my help to find the loot.
of course if I'd still been a cop then it would have been a very short conversation. as it was I said I'd think about it.
chapter 4.
so next day I was walking down by navy pier trying to get my head straight about marcie, about me and about what she'd had to say.
and I must have walked for a couple of hours when I found myself back at sam's place without really thinking about where I had been going.
and I'd made up my mind that I had nothing to lose from going with her story, hell it might even be fun to go on a treasure hunt - loosen those cobwebs up top.
chapter 5.
so I called her, said I'd do it and she gave me a clue - the only clue she got inside and not much of a clue at that but I had a few thoughts and a few leads to follow up and told her to give me a couple of days then we could meet up, maybe over dinner or something.
she said 'sure thing handsome'.
chapter 6.
and so 2 days later we met at this fancy place down on the waterfront - she looked like a million dollars and me, well I looked like an ex-cop.
but we got talking, the wine flowed, we ate, the evening going just great when I asked what really happened that night with Danny.
must have hit a nerve - she went quiet, wiped her mouth on the napkin and excused herself to the restroom.
me and my big mouth don't know when I'm on to a good thing and to just keep my gob shut.
she never came back. I finished up, paid the bill and took a cab home.
chapter 7.
next morning I woke to a bangin' on my door. it was Marcie.
She demanded I tell her what I'd found out and I did. And when I'd finished she fished a key out of her pocket and held it up to the light.
everything I'd discovered pointed to a locker somewhere and here it looked like Marcie had the key.
but in a city the size of Chicago having a key to a locker don't mean much if you don't have a place to go with it - but I just might have an idea about that too.
chapter 8.
so mikey hunt was once the city's most infamous locks man - you needed to get in somewhere a house a safe whatever mikey was your man. these days an old man living out his days as a janitor for the white sox.
if anyone would have an idea about this key and the lock it opened mikey would.
and mikey did - he took one look at that key, nodded, looked back at me and simply said 'the old boxing gym on 31st and 14th, lockers in the basement'
'but that place has been closed down for a few years now' he added.
chapter 9.
so that's how we found ourselves at the gym. mikey had been right, place was buttoned up tight and didn’t look like anyone had been around in a long long time.
marcie and I made our way round to the back and found a way in. hell the inside was worse than the outside.
still we made our way down to the basement and if I'm honest I wasn't expecting much but there in front of us was a bunch of lockers, all open except one.
chapter 10.
we both held our breath as marcie turned the key, pulled back the door and reached inside...
...and dragged out a duffel bag. it looked heavy and when we opened it we knew why - $250,000 reasons why and I gotta tell you that's a lot of dough.
and marcie turned and planted one right on my lips and I kissed her right back and I knew there and then that it would be me and her and 250,000 reasons to get the hell out of Chicago and start again somewhere else, together.
The end.
Miami Summer - a story in text
Prologue.
most people would assume the story was over for Marcie an' me when we left Chicago but it seems there is one chapter of the story left to tell...
Chapter 1.
it was a hot day in June '37 when Marcie and I climbed aboard a bus and said goodbye to Chicago.
just another couple in the crowd - a couple with a past and a couple with 250,000 reasons to look forward to the future.
Chapter 2.
a month later we arrived in miami - via Boston, new York, Washington, Philli.
the place was like nothin' we'd ever seen before with an explosion of colour and style - and just like with marcie I was hooked from the start.
I said to Marcie ‘ we found ourselves the place’ and we soon found ourselves a little club with space to live above it and in a good part of town - marcie even had a space to perform.
Chapter 3.
And before we knew it, one season became another became another and it was summer time in Miami again. And that’s when it all started to go wrong.
It was a Tuesday and we’d just got back from the market to find that someone had turned over the joint. Strangest thing of all there didn’t seem to be anything missing, but my cop instincts told me there was more to it.
Nothing else happened that week or the next.
Chapter 4.
And then bam – one minute I’m cleaning tables in the bar, next I’m waking up with a god-damn awful headache and tied to one of the chairs, and there in front of me is this guy who looks like the devil chewed him up and spat him out again.
And he didn’t seem the brightest kid on the block if you know what I mean.
But I remember from my days as a cop these kinda guys are usually the worse – will do anything and not even stop to think about it afterwards.
Chapter 5.
And he’s telling me ‘you got something of mine, in fact you got 250,000 of my things' he went on to say that if I wanted to keep my little bar and that fine looking broad safe I’d best make sure I give back those 250,000 little things.
I said to him ‘I ain’t got that kinda dough no more – most of it’s tied up in the bar’ which was the truth of it. But he didn’t seem to like that answer a lot as he smashed his fist into my face
‘but there’s $10,000 cash in the safe out back I can get you…'
‘well that will do as a down payment’ he said ‘I’ll be back next week to collect the rest’.
Chapter 6.
Marcie got home to find me out cold on the floor - bastard had hit me hard before he skidaddled.
And marcie looked scared which was nothing to how she looked when I told her what had happened.
'sounds like tony dale' she said 'but he's supposed to be dead'
the name seemed familiar and that's when it hit me - one of the crew in the original bank job was called tony - nasty piece of work but like marcie said everyone thought he was dead - did a lot of hitting for a deadman.
Chapter 7.
if tony was planning on coming back it was time to muscle up and get myself a piece - I was gonna be ready for him when he came back.
and back he came - mistake he made was to come back alone and I was ready for him.
'like I said Tony' he looked surprised I knew his name 'ain't got that kinda dough anymore, there's another $20,000 there for you and that's it'
'if you know what's good for you I'd get outta here before I have a word with my old cop buddies - they think you are dead and I'm guessing you'd like it to stay that way'
he didn't like it. 'it ain't over' he said as he left.
boy could I do with a stiff drink after that so I turned to my old friend jack.
Chapter 8.
don't remember much after that but I came to with an empty bottle on the floor and a lot of shouting and banging on the door.
'ok, ok' I said sliding back the bolt only to find myself slammed back against the wall, my arm twisted behind my back and a nice young detective telling me 'bad news for you billy - we got marcie's body in the morgue with a slug from a .45 in her and witnesses who saw you 2 arguing before you gave it to her'
Chapter 9.
and that's when my world fell apart - marcie was dead.
one thing for sure I didn't do it - couldn't have done I loved the broad too much but didn't have much by the way of an alibi, the cops had my gun and eye witnesses saying I did it. nice and easy case the way they saw it.
don't know how the bastard did it but he set me up good and proper and I was going down for murder 1.
Chapter 10.
they didn't even let me go to marcie's funeral and ain't never seen her grave and never will.
18 years on and i get to call florida Penitentiary home and will until the day I die - which won't be long now. I'm an old man but my memories of marcie are as fresh as that first day I saw her in sam's place.
knew back then she'd be trouble...
The end.
thespianCurious by invisibubble.com