Yuletide Immortal (The Immortal Chronicles Book 4) (6 page)

The back door, which was mostly left open during business hours, had been closed since the bar shut down.  But now someone inside had opened it, and a few seconds later that someone was revealed as little Davey.

Santa gasped.

The kid looked more or less the same as he’d appeared in the store.  Different clothing, but clearly the same child.  And definitely corporeal, unless we also believe ghosts cast shadows.

The kid looked down along both ends of the alley—failing to spot us—then reached inside and turned the light off.  As our eyes adjusted we could hear the door being closed and latched.  The next time I was able to see him it was in the faint light coming from the street lamp at the far corner of the alley.  He was walking away from us.

Santa was ready to leap forward and probably embrace Davey.  I was more inclined toward strangulation, myself.  But neither of us much moved because it turned out another man was in the alley, on the other side of the Dumpster, who was also there to intercept the boy.

The ensuing conversation between them didn’t look friendly.  We couldn’t hear what was being discussed, but when the guy grabbed Davey by the shoulder in a way that looked painful, it was clear this was no social chat.

Santa toddled down the alley, not in any way sober at the time or formidable on any occasion, but also not about to let someone beat up a child in front of him.

“Here now, what are you doing with that boy?”

Startled, the man turned, but didn’t let go of the kid.  “This is none of your business, go on.”

I expected to recognize him from the bar, only because at this time of the night the only people lingering in the area were patrons.  But I had never seen him before.  He was large and sloop-shouldered, but in the light there wasn’t much more to see.  I couldn’t tell how he was dressed or anything useful like that.

“I’ll do just that the moment you unhand the child,” Santa said.

“Walk away, mister.”

I stepped into the light.  “How about if you walk away instead?” I said.

The man held onto Davey for another beat or two, possibly considering whether it was worth his trouble to deal with two full-sized people in addition to the half-sized one already in his grip.  Then he let go, his palms in the air.

“All right, fellas, he’s all yours.”  To Davey, he said, “Me and you, we aren’t finished.”

He walked out of the alley in a direction that didn’t require also walking past us. 

As soon as he was gone, Davey turned to look at his rescuers for the first time, and the thanks that was sure to follow died on his lips.

“Aw, geez,
you guys?
  This night just gets better and better.”

*   *   *

The all-night diner may be the greatest invention of the Twentieth century.  I realize the list of inventions to choose from is very long indeed, and I may be overstating my point somewhat, but it’s a reasonable conclusion to draw if one happens to be awake at one in the morning and in need of food and a place that’s warm and dry.  This is especially true for someone who only occasionally has a place to call home.

The ready availability of unspoiled food is really something taken for granted by most people nowadays, at least in the West.  I don’t mean that as a commentary on First World vs. Third World economics at all, only that it’s incredibly difficult to grasp how much of one’s day has to be devoted to obtaining food when the option of purchasing it in a store is taken away.  I was a farmer on several occasions, and spent most of my waking hours either tending to the food I was growing for myself or eating that food.  I had no time to
do
anything else. 

If you want to know why the great works of art and philosophy and science and history and religious thought were performed by the wealthy classes of the world, it was because they were the only ones with the requisite leisure time.

We were in one such diner as Davey attempted to defend himself.

“Aw c’mon, guys, it was just a joke,” he said, between bites of food.  Santa thought it would be best to ply the young man with the bribe of a full stomach, which was a better idea than mine, which was to pick him up by the scruff of the neck and drag him someplace where the lighting was worse.  Admittedly, my approach didn’t differ much from the one of the fellow in the alley, but moral equivocation wasn’t something I had the patience for at this point in the evening.

“If you would just explain yourself, that would be most satisfying,” Santa said.

“I can explain it,” I said.  “He heard us talking in the bar and decided it would be fun to play a little prank.”

The kid nodded.  “Yeah, pretty much.  I can hear most everything under that floor, you know.  And the walls are thin too.”

Santa continued to look befuddled.  “But you knew so much about the boy and the vase and—”

“Because he stole the vase himself,” I said.  “Would have worked better if you’d used the dead boy’s name.”

“I know!  Trouble was, never knew that kid’s name.  Never met him.  When he was alive I mean.  I saw the stiff when I nicked the jar.”

“You
stole
from the dead?” Santa said.

“Naw, I stole from his family.  Plus I felt bad about it, okay?  But then I heard you guys.  You think you’re Santa Claus, and this guy thinks he’s on his thousandth birthday, and both’a you were looking for someone to make happy so I figured, I know someone who could use some’a that.  Right?”

I had no reason to think there was anything remotely altruistic about his intentions, but my friend was swallowing it whole.

“Why didn’t you just tell us the truth?” I asked.

“How many reasons you want, champ?  You’d be askin’ about my parents in a hot minute, and next thing I’m getting walked down to Our Lady of the Wooden Rulers so you can feel better about yourselves.  Everybody who sees a kid on the street looks for the easiest story they can find to get out of worryin’ about him, and I gave you one.”

“And so instead of the truth you told the story that would best convince us to return the ill-gotten family heirloom,” Santa said.

“Yeah.  That sounds right, sure.  You guys seemed wacky enough to fall for it, so yeah.”

“I’d stick with the ghost story if I were you, Santa” I said.  “When you retell this one.”

“Oh no, you’re wrong, my friend.  This is a
much
better story.  A little thief, haunted by the memory of his crime, concocts a brilliant solution!”  He shoved a forkful of food into his mouth.  “Nearly perfect.  All it’s missing is the right ending.”

“Geez,” the kid said, looking at me.  “He always like this?”

“More or less.”

“Head injury or something?”

“It’s in his nature.”  To Santa I asked, “What kind of ending did you have in mind?”

“Orphan stories can only have one kind, Stanley.  The boy must be reunited with his family or adopted into a loving household.”

“No thanks, buddy,” Davey said.

“But you
are
an orphan.”

“No, I’m a freakin’ Martian.  The sisters said they found me on the steps of the place, that’s all I know.  If you’re lookin’ for me to shed a tear about how nobody loved me and I’m all alone and all that, you better just keep lookin’.  I got past it a long time ago.”

This was a rather worldly statement from a boy his age, but living on your own does have a maturing effect on a person. 

“Surely there’s more we can do!” Santa said.  “We can’t just let you walk off on your own, you’re a child!”

“I’m doin’ all right, mister.  This food’s great though.  Real nice of you.  But look, I got a steady job.  That basement under O’Shea’s place, I’m the only one short enough to stand upright down there, so that’s some real security, until, you know, until I get bigger.  And I got places I can sleep in the winter.  I got friends.”

“Does that include the guy shaking you down earlier?” I asked.

“Oh, him?”  His eyes darted to the window, and the street beyond, as if he was actively searching for the person in question.  “You boys don’t want to get involved in that.”

“If he means you harm, we certainly do!” Santa said.

“Nah, nah, I got that under control.”  He didn’t say it like someone who was at all confident that this was the truth.

“Look kid, you may as well tell Santa here everything or he’ll have to come up with his own happy ending.”

“I’m certain the nuns at your orphanage are worried terribly about you, Davey,” Santa said.

“Right, fine.  But it’s not a story for little kids, right?  It’s a gambling thing.”

“You owe him money?” I asked.

“Kinda.  The guy he works for thinks I owe
him
money.  We don’t agree about that.  What do you fellas know about horse racing?”

Santa and I looked at one another.  “I think the question, young man, is what could
you
possibly know about it?” Santa asked.

“More than you’d think from lookin’ at me,” Davey said.  It was a sentence that defined him more accurately than anything I’d heard up to that point.  He had just the right combination of knowledge and intelligence to be dangerous, and his age made it easy to forget that fact.

“So here’s the deal,” he continued.  “Down at the track the jockeys all know each other, right?  They ride for the horse owners and only make coin when they win, so they got lotsa incentive to win, but they’re also real friendly with each other most’a the time.  And they look out for each other, right?  So now and again, like if one of those boys are about to get canned or they’re hard up for a purse, they’ll get together and throw a race.  Not all the time, just here and there, mostly on weekdays when the action ain’t that much in the first place.”

“They’ll decide who is going to win ahead of time?” Santa asked, for clarification.

“Exactly.  Or place or show.  Anything with a purse, just for a pal.  So it helps to be in the room with the jockeys when they all decide to throw one.  That’s where I come in.”

“You’re secretly a jockey?” I asked.

“Naw, I hate horses.  I could be though, maybe.  No, I’m in the room only they don’t know it.”

“Hiding.”

“Yeah.  Thing about being this size, there’s lotsa places I can fit.  So my friend in the alley, he works for a guy who likes to place big bets on those horse races, but he likes to make those bets when it ain’t really gambling, right?  He likes it when he already knows how it’s gonna play out, I’m saying.  So for a little of his action I been spying on the jocks and tipping him off whenever there was a sure thing.  And it was workin’ beautiful for a long time.  That was until a few weeks back, when one of my sure things broke his leg on the back stretch. 
Now
the guy is sayin’ I owe him the money he lost on the horse.”

“Why that’s ridiculous!” Santa said.

“Sure it is.  But he won’t leave me alone about it until I cough up money it’s pretty obvious I don’t have.  I even offered to earn it back with more sure things, but he doesn’t want to hear it.  Which is a shame, because I’ve got a good one in a few days and he’s gone deaf.  That’s what we were really arguing about.  Me and the guy in the alley, I mean.  He came to tell me it was a no-go.  It’s a pickle, right?  I got this one-in-a-million set-up, just
perfect
, and I don’t have the money to take advantage.  And if I did, they don’t let kids bet on the horses anyways.  If I did, though, I’d have the money for Vito and then some.”

“His name is Vito?” I asked.

“Yeah.  Heard of him?”

It was a pretty common name in certain parts of the city, so it was hard to say.  However, were I to make a list of people not to enter into a business agreement with,
people named Vito
would be near the top.

“Does he have a last name?”

“Probably.  I don’t know it though.  Everyone just calls him Vito.  Why, you thinkin’ of paying him a visit?  I wouldn’t.  Me, he threatens.  You, he’d prob’ly just kill.  Or have one of his guys do it.  He’s that kind’a person.”

“What’s this sure thing?” Santa asked.

“Why?  It doesn’t matter.”

“Indulge me.  I’ve never heard of a sure thing before in gambling.”

“That’s because it doesn’t exist,” I said.

“Hey, now that’s unfair.  Sure, I’m in a bind because of a horse with a broken leg, but how often does that happen?  I can name every single one of my other sure picks for you if you want, you go back and look ‘em up in the papers.  You’ll see.” 

He turned back to Santa.  “So there’s a jockey by the name of Beautiful Pete.  Used to be a big deal for a while on the circuit, but he had this problem.  Women liked him too much, see, and that got him into jams, and some’a them jams were big enough that Pete needed help getting out of ‘em.  But Pete won regular, and that made all the difference because even if he was stuck under contract with the same guy that whole time, and the guy had to keep greasin’ wheels to get him out of trouble, he made more money than he cost. Pete also never made it as big as he could’a, because nobody wanted to take on such a wild card, even if he was one hell of a jock.”