Montreal Noir Read online

  Big Derek had a source for smack, one of the independents. Who knew which one? The Chinese or the Arabs. He’d tried to bring Simon on board, but Simon had done himself in while testing the product. Instead of telling Dave the truth, Derek had sent him chasing after Teddy Bear. Derek had always hated Teddy Bear. It was dicey, but Derek was a gambler. He’d waited for the war to end before making his bundle, and he didn’t want a new boss standing in his way.

  It all made sense, but only if Derek knew Dave was with the police. But he was smart enough to have figured that out on his own. The only thing you couldn’t know for sure was whether Derek had killed Simon by accident, passing him stuff that was too strong, or on purpose, to stop him from bringing Dave in on their plan to peddle the heroin.

  The Indian was furious.

  He spent the whole day brooding in his apartment, drinking O’Keefe’s. Around four o’clock, he called me so I’d go buy some more at the corner store and come drink with him. It must have been a hundred degrees in that apartment. The Indian was downing the beer in his living room and sweating like a pig. When he wasn’t talking to me, he kept repeating the same thing over and over, real low, between his teeth: “That fuck, that fat fuck, that fat fucking fuck.”

  I drank a couple with him. He ended up telling me the whole story and admitting, straight out, that he was a cop. He was drunk, so I asked him, “Are you sure it’s a good idea, telling me that?”

  He said his time around here was coming to an end anyway. He apologized in advance for the shit I’d be in, and I said: “Don’t worry. I’ve known worse.”

  Around seven o’clock he told me: “I don’t see any other solution. I’m gonna have to beat the shit out of Derek.”

  I asked him if he did judo or tae kwon do or something. He said no. He said it wasn’t so hard to fight a guy bigger than you. You can’t be intimidated; you have to wait for him to make a mistake. Tall guys and fat guys tend to put too much trust in their strength. Also, try not to hit them in the balls. The tall guys and the fat guys are used to people pulling that on them.

  “So your plan is: don’t be intimidated and don’t kick him in the balls?” I asked.

  I was skeptical. Derek was all fat and muscle, with skin as thick as walrus hide. I wasn’t even sure he’d fall on his ass if you fired a twelve-gauge into his chest. I told myself that I’d spend the next few days getting all that stuff out of Dave’s head, but when I asked when he intended to go and fight Derek, he eyed how much beer he had left in his bottle and said: “I’ll finish this, and we’ll go.”

  * * *

  You would have thought it was a big neighborhood fair.

  The Indian told whomever he met along the way that he was going to fight Big Derek. And they went to tell others, until almost a hundred people were gathered at dusk behind Sex Mania to watch the battle in the tobacco factory parking lot. It was up to me to go in and find Derek. I just told him, “Dave wants to talk to you outside.”

  When Derek came out, he saw the crowd and Dave in the middle of the circle, making his neck pop like Bruce Lee. “You kidding me, Dave? Go sober up at home, fucking Indian.”

  But Dave said he wouldn’t budge without a fight. Derek laughed and moved into the circle. Things looked really bad. Face to face, Dave and Derek didn’t seem to even belong to the same species. That must have struck Dave too, because the first thing he did was serve up a kick to Derek’s balls. Derek dodged it, fast for a guy his size, then he delivered a right hook with all his strength to the side of Dave’s head. Dave blinked and fell to the ground. I was sure he wouldn’t get up.

  “Had enough?” Derek taunted.

  “Not enough, no, you piece of shit.”

  Dave got up and charged Derek again. He did that about ten times, fighting like crazy. Derek always ended up grabbing him and throwing him to the ground with a punch or a kick. The tenth time, he socked the Indian in the stomach, picked him up in his arms, and heaved him into the Polish butcher’s dumpster. There was a long silence, and then we heard Dave scrambling around and cursing. Derek started back toward the door to the club, saying, “Everybody go home. The fight’s over.”

  “No, it’s not over,” Dave declared, climbing out of the dumpster.

  Derek didn’t react and kept on walking. Dave took his key ring out of his pocket and threw a fastball to the back of his head. That put a big cut in Derek’s hairy hide. When he turned around, you could see that the Indian had really managed to make him mad. I wasn’t the only one who began to wonder how we could stop the fight or whether Dave was going to be killed.

  Derek clobbered him one. Dave’s cheek was swollen, and he was bleeding from his right ear. I was worried about internal bleeding too, because Derek kept on punching him in the gut and the ribs. Dave’s skin had gone white, almost green.

  Finally, Derek lifted him up and squeezed. A bear hug, like in wrestling. The Indian bellowed.

  “Tell them what you are, Dave. Or I’ll crush you.”

  “Go fuck yourself.”

  Derek squeezed some more. We heard Dave’s spine crack.

  “Tell them you’re a cop.”

  Derek kept on squeezing. We thought he was going to break the Indian in two, but with all the blood and sweat, they were as greasy as a banana peel; Dave managed to slide his right arm out of the vise, and then raised his fist high in the air and slammed his elbow like a tomahawk into Derek’s eye. We learned afterward that some bone fragments had gone right into his cornea. Derek let Dave go and fell to his knees, his hand on his eye. He was squealing like a pig. Dave went up to him, pushed Derek’s hand out of the way, and threw a punch to his cheekbone as hard as he could. He said later it was like hitting cement, except the cement was hurting too. Dave struck three more blows and felt his joints give way, one after the other. He gave the fifth punch everything he had left in his fist and felt an electric jolt running up past his elbow to his shoulder. His hand was broken. Derek was swaying on his knees. The Indian stepped back five or six paces, then said in front of everybody: “Yeah, I’m a cop. And that makes him a fucking snitch.”

  There were two angles to his strategy that Dave hadn’t told me about. First, he knew that the big guys and tall guys had a tendency to drag things out. Second, he always wore shoes that looked like plain city shoes, but they had steel toes. He took a run, five steps, and hammered Derek right under his jaw, like he was punting. We heard the jaw split along its length like a wooden splint. For about ten seconds, Derek tried to shut his mouth, sucking at the air like a fish. Then he fell back onto his bent knees. His legs were shaking. Dave came up to hit him again, but he held back. Derek was spewing a huge pink-and-red geyser into the air. It took five of us to turn him on his side, and if we hadn’t had the idea, he’d have choked to death on his broken teeth.

  By the time we’d done that, the Indian had disappeared.

  * * *

  The next day, people honored an old Centre-Sud tradition.

  Early in the morning, they tossed twenty dozen eggs at the wall of Dan Quesnel’s triplex. It was their way of marking the houses of those who’d talked to the police. Dave didn’t even hear it. He was high as a kite from the painkillers he’d been given at the hospital. He’d been released during the night. They’d wrapped up his hand, put his face together a bit, and made him promise to come back right away if he started shitting or pissing blood.

  It was the smell of rotten eggs cooking in the sun that woke him at about ten thirty. The smell, and the pain that had returned. He went out into the street. Monsieur Quesnel and I were trying to assess the damage. Dave apologized to the owner of the house and gave me three hundred dollars in twenties and fifties to rent a pressure hose and buy him a forty-ouncer of Johnnie Walker and a bag of ice. He watched me work all afternoon, sitting in a folding chair on the sidewalk, with his Scotch on one side of him and the pail of ice on the other. He soaked his hand—all messed up with staples, scabs, and stitches—in the cold water, and from time to time he dipped his fing
ers in his glass to collect some ice cubes. All afternoon we heard police sirens in the Centre-Sud. It was the guys from the provincial police and the Montreal police coming to arrest Teddy Bear and his boys. They’d had to move the operation up because of Dave’s acting out, and they weren’t too happy about that.

  One day later the Indian left, and we never saw him again. Never saw Derek again either. When he got out of the hospital, he headed for the North Shore. We later heard that he had gotten himself arrested for forcing a thirteen-year-old girl into porn.

  On that day before Dave left, I finished cleaning off the wall at six o’clock, and he gave me more money. He told me to go and buy hot dogs for us to eat in the stands of Walter Stewart Park. He wanted to see Kim play softball one last time. The heat had let up a little, and we felt good.

  That night, for the first time, I decided to ask Dave if it bothered him that everyone called him the Indian. Did he find it racist or anything like that? Should we have called him something else?

  “It’s hard to answer, because where I come from, the word means two different things. If you say someone dead or gone is a real Indian, it means he’s brave. Someone who knows how to live and honors the ancestors. My uncle Robertson once said of my grandfather that he was almost an Indian. That’s the only time in my life I’ve heard that said about a white man, and I can’t imagine a bigger compliment. On the other hand, if you say of someone, behind his back or to his face, that he’s a goddamn Indian or a fucking Indian, it means he’s a drunk, a fool, or a hothead, a guy you can’t trust and who really doesn’t know how to take care of his people.”

  So I asked him again: “Well, do you mind that?”

  He grinned and said: “Nah. I’m good either way.”

  The Haunted Crack House

  by Michel Basilières

  Boulevard Saint-Laurent

  Ryan the Rat—Academy Award winner and cousin to Mickey Mouse (or so he said)—was red-faced and waving his arms, spittle flying, defending his turf. He shouted. He swore. He threatened to call the cops. But the bigger, burlier, toothless, bald-headed panhandler grabbed Ryan’s entire face with one fat hand and shoved him to the ground, beating him with a white cane.

  In the slush, Ryan twisted and crawled away. The victor leaned on his glinting white cane and faced the door of the restaurant, smiling at the customers shuffling in and out of the cold. Puffs of steam escaped the open door, carrying the smell of smoked meat, french fries, and beer across Boulevard Saint-Laurent and into the bookstore.

  I sat on a high stool behind a wooden counter, facing the display window. Every day I watched people line up, rain or shine, to eat at Schwartz’s. Whether it was broiling in the summer or freezing in the winter, the restaurant’s queue stretched for over an hour’s wait. Even after midnight you had to share a table.

  Ryan stood ten feet away from the interloper who had just beaten him, yelling still, but now looking for a gap in the traffic. Finding one, he made a break for it. He loped and staggered across the street, pulling himself up into the recessed entrance, and yanked hard on the handle. He stepped up across the threshold and jumped away as the ancient coiled springs slammed the wooden, glass-paneled door back to the frame. The bell rang.

  “Hi, Ryan.”

  He was twitching, his wire-frame glasses askew, his tattered cotton coat open. “Jesus fucking Christ. That fucker beat me. Did you see that?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Fuckin’ took my spot. That was my spot. Suppertime, that’s my spot.”

  “I thought you guys had a schedule.”

  “Yeah, we do. Now’s my time. Fucker took my spot, how am I going to make my money now?” He made his way to the center of the bookstore, took off his coat, and sat on the couch. “Can I dry my coat on the heater?”

  “Sure. Don’t let it catch fire.”

  It was a dark evening in late November and no customers were in the store. I was pricing a box of paperbacks I’d bought earlier. Across the street, Fucker was nonchalantly panhandling. He seemed to be doing well. Panhandlers come and go, but in this neighborhood they are mostly fixtures. Guys like Ryan actually lived, grew up, and fell apart here. This guy with the cane was new.

  “I don’t recognize him,” I said.

  Ryan took off his toque, shook out his head, walked over, and stood in front of my counter.

  “I don’t know who he is, either. I told him we got a system here, and that he wasn’t welcome in our territory.”

  “Gonna get your buddies together and talk some sense into him?” I asked. There were four or five of them, mostly spindly derelicts, but numbers count. And even though Cane Man—or Fucker—was big, Ryan’s closest ally on the street, Billy One-Eye, was a scrapper. I’d seen him hold off more than one cop at a time.

  “I ain’t seen anybody all day,” Ryan said. “Can I use the bathroom?”

  The toilet in the back room wasn’t for customers, but we often let our friends use it. Ryan was wet with dirty slush. “Go ahead. Don’t mess it up.”

  “No, I won’t. I promise. Thanks.”

  A few customers wandered in, browsed the rickety shelves, glanced over the tables, asked for titles or authors, wandered out. Ryan’s coat was still on the heater, but he hadn’t come back.

  I opened the door to the office, yelled his name. No answer. I went in, turned right between shelves stacked high with overstock, special items, books reserved for regulars, random stuff placed aside to be dealt with later. Around the corner, the bathroom door was open. Ryan was on the throne, pants around his ankles, head back like his neck was broken. Snoring.

  I kicked his foot. “Ryan. Wake up, for fuck sake.” I had to kick harder.

  Eventually his head came forward, his eyes opened, and he saw me standing there. Confusion. Recognition. He cleared his phlegmy throat. “Sorry.” He stood and pulled up his pants. I walked away.

  Back at the counter, Ryan asked, “You got any paper I could use?” He was an artist, had been a famous animator. He really did have an Oscar. Or had.

  I reached under the counter, pulled open the printer tray, and peeled out a few sheets.

  “Any pencils?”

  I shoved a dirty glass jar full of battered pens and pencils across the counter.

  “Thanks.” He sunk onto the couch and put pencil to paper. I finished pricing the books, set some of them out on the display table, shelved the rest in the new arrivals case. The phone rang, a regular came in and asked after the boss, a couple of arts students came and went, and Cane Man was still there, leaning hard on his cane, making a show of it, drumming up business. Snow fell, big flakes, slow and quiet, sucking up the noise of traffic.

  Ryan looked over. “Ah, shit. What time is it?”

  I glanced at the clock. “Ten.”

  “Shit. Ah, shit.” He shoved his drawings aside, stood up, and paced back and forth. “Fuck.”

  “What is it?”

  He hurried around the couch. “I’m late. I’m too late. Fuckin’ hell.”

  “Late for what?”

  “The mission. Closes at ten. Fuck. You gotta be there early to get a bed. Fuckity fuck.”

  Which meant Ryan had no place to sleep.

  * * *

  I took some twenties from the till, added up the day’s receipts, shoved a wad of cash where the boss would find it, washed the floor, donned my coat, and locked the door. Ryan was sitting on the stoop, staring at Cane Man, who was still at his post across the street.

  “I’ll buy you a beer,” I said.

  He jerked his head up. “Really? Thanks, man. That’s great.” He stood up, stamped his feet, and got out of my way. We walked south a block under the orange streetlights. Snow came down heavy and silent. The street was a mess of shiny rivulets and tracks in the gray slush. It was almost midnight. Taxis drove north past us.

  We went into Bar Saint-Laurent, really an empty retail space, no decor, shabby tables and wooden chairs. The kind of place you don’t want to see in the light. I ordered a che
ap pitcher of Boréale Rousse and poured glasses for the both of us.

  Ryan grabbed his and drained it. His eyes shone, a deep satisfied breath gushed from him. He leaned forward and filled his glass again. There weren’t many customers. Les Cowboys Fringants were thrashing from the speakers, a song about UQUAM girls on Rue Saint-Denis.

  “Can I crash with you?” he asked.

  “No.” I was only willing to go so far. Ryan knew a lot of people, but he’d burned them all. His parents still lived out on the West Island, but they hadn’t spoken to him for years, ever since the infamous mural incident.

  In his youth Ryan wasn’t so bad; as long as his alcohol and drug intake didn’t get out of hand, and as long as someone made him take his meds, he was fine. But when he got a little money, when his short films began to be taught in film schools, he moved out on his own and unraveled. He got a huge commission on the strength of his Oscar and an offer to paint a giant mural of whatever he wanted on the lobby wall of the new the National Film Board building in Montreal. He had carte blanche and worked on the mural in secret until the unveiling. The mural’s debut ceremony was posh, of course, with socialites, bankers, government ministers, and state-approved artists in attendance. They drew the curtain, and that was it. His career was over.

  The scene depicted Ryan himself, masturbating to pictures of his mother.

  His parents wouldn’t take his calls after that. No one would. Over the years people tried to give him some help, work, a place to stay, money, but it always ended badly. For years he’d been in and out of hospitals, jails, flophouses, missions. Now he begged for spare change. For a few months in the summer, a carpenter on Duluth had been letting him sleep in his enclosed yard with the lumber. It wasn’t indoors, but it gave him some safety and shelter from the wind and rain. But now it was too cold to sleep outside.

  “I had a place to stay last week,” he said.

  “Yeah? What happened?”

  He drank half the glass. “A guy offered me a place to crash if I knew where to score a rock.”