Chapter 17 Chapter Sixteen

Ordell took Louis to his apartment on Thirty Street in West Palm early Sunday night, introduced him to Simone, told her to treat Louis well, and said he would be staying here for a few days.Ordell pointed out to Louis the guest room, the Baletta nine in the drawer of the chest of drawers that he would take with him tomorrow, and then Ordell left, saying that he had to visit a friend in the hospital: "Morning See." This Sunday night was really informative. Louis thought the black woman might be Ordell's aunt.Simone asked if she would get him something to eat.Louis said you're welcome.She went to her room, and Louis sat down to watch "She Writes, Murder" on TV, thinking that Simone was in there all night, and that older people usually go to bed early.Next up is the "Movie of the Week" show.

At about half past nine, a completely different woman came out of the bedroom.The man who had gone in looked like Aunt Jamima in an old-fashioned matron's gown and a scarf around her head. The man who came out was twenty years younger.Her shiny black hair was coiled up, and a pair of dangling earrings hung down. She painted "blue eyeshadow" around her eyes and glued on long false eyelashes. High heels with back uppers.She told Louis she knew he was from Detroit.She said she used to meet a lot of white guys there, dated them at the Flame Show, at the Fun Tree, later at the Mozambique Watts Club, and went to those sleepovers when they were done.She asked Louis, "Have you ever been to those places?" He said sometimes, and he and Ordell met at the Watts Club.Simone said, "Honey, I'll take you home." The "Movie of the Week" was over, and the "Mood" music program was on.

On Monday morning Louis left early without waiting for Simone to get up, and had breakfast at Denny's.They agreed to meet in the parking lot of the Hilton Hotel on South Boulevard, not far from the Interstate.When Lewis arrived, he saw Ordell, wearing blue overalls, smoking a cigarette next to a van, next to his Mercedes.Melanie was listening to the radio in the car, shaking her head to the beat of the music.Ordell walked up to Louis' car and said, "Let me see what you have, so proud." Lewis opened the trunk and showed Ordell his gleaming guns, the Colt Python and Mossberg 500 with laser sight.The small Baletta pistol brought from the chest of drawers was also there."Bring it on," Ordell said. Louis pulled out a small Barletta and strapped it to his waist, his blazer just hanging down over it.

"And that Star Trek musket," Ordell said. "That fucking thing can knock a big guy over the head with one shot." Louis took the gun out, wrapped it in a roll of newspaper, covered the trunk of the car, and followed Ordell to the back of the van.Ordell turned to him and said, "Simone let you fuck her?" Louis looked innocent, and then smiled wryly. He knew that Ordell had waited for so long with his eyes on the gun, but he actually wanted to ask this question. "She put on a show," Louis said. "Yes, that's right." "She performed 'Baby Honey,' running out of expressions."

"She was choreographing," Ordell said. "Would you swear it was 'The Supremes,' huh?" "It's 'Supreme Chorus', there are words on the record." "I mean how did the woman move." "She played 'Stop! With Love'." "'Before you broke my heart,'" Ordell said. "She also learned acting from Gladys Knight." "With or without accompaniment? She will perform with or without accompaniment." "With accompaniment." "Has she learned from Seretta Wright?" "I don't know. Some of her plays I've never heard."

"Serita and Stevie Wonder are married." "She's amazing," Louis said. "I mean she pulls every little trick through." "Did she let you fuck her?" "She wants me to come to her room." "yes?" "She said she was going to massage her back after doing this for a while." "She also likes to massage her feet." "I told her, man, I'm exhausted and I've got a headache." "yes?" "I probably woke up in the middle of the night, and Simone was sleeping with me. She said: 'How's your headache, baby? It doesn't hurt, does it?'"

Ordell said, "You fucked her, didn't you?" The back door of the van opened and a nigger in a black bandana put his head out and said, "Bread, here we go--shall we go or shall we not, man?" "Right away," Ordell said, "to the back of that." Then he opened the door wide so that Louis could see three niggers squatting there with guns in their hands—those guns that looked like It's the AK-47 - eyes wide open for Louis.Ordell said, "This is Louis, from Detroit, famous for robbing banks, did I mention that to you? Louis, these two guys are Sweetman and Snow, and the one who can't fucking wait Ugly dude named Sulu. They call me 'Bread,' huh? Short for 'White Bread.' Heck, y'all now come up with a name for my buddy Louis," said Ordell, and bang Closed the door.He said to Louis, "They all like me. You know why? Because I'm from Detroit, and that's the best fucking recommendation, man. You and these folks are from there, you're your own. "

Melanie quickly got out of the Mercedes-Benz. She was wearing a vest with shoulder straps and a frayed woven bag on her shoulders.She said, "Hello, Louis," without looking at him, just standing with her arms folded, when Ordell said he and Louis were going to get in the van to be with his buddies, and Melanie Follow them in Louis' Toyota.Louis asked why she was riding in his car?Ordell said, because he was coming back.As if that were the explanation.Louis said, "Whatever you say." They were about to turn off South Boulevard toward Roc Sahatche Road, and Ordell was talking about the gang so loudly that they could be heard from behind, and Ordell called them a fucking gang And ask them if they've ever heard of a pistolman?They are a group of Colombian brothers.Ordell looked in the rearview mirror and told them, "You get two million pesos for bringing down a government in Medellin, the drug city of the world. That means the drug addicts pay you 20 million pesos." $10,000. Makes you feel high after smoking that fucking stuff they call 'Besuco' that's made from cocaine, but holds you in even better. You wanna Come on, two hundred thousand bucks bro, you can buy your mother a private condo on that damn beach. If you kill one more government guy, you can buy yourself a car like mine and all your Clothes I want to buy. But you know, what else do you run into in there besides drug addicts and gunmen? You get all kinds of hooligans and scum shooting each other. You'll run into On the terrorists - you know what I'm talking about, the terrorists? You'll run into them and the others I mentioned, and you'll run into the Death Squad guys, and everybody walks around and kills each other .Do you know how many people were shot or killed by violence last year in the city of Medellin alone? Over five thousand, most of them your age, just starting a new life. You hear me What are you talking about? Even ten times more people have been killed in any past year in Detroit - tell you that the city is such a place. Do you know how lucky you are to live here in America?"

Louis glanced over at the brothers. They were three big boys, their heads and shoulders shaking with the jolt of the van.It was very quiet behind the dark car, and their faces were serious.If they were not holding Chinese-made guns, they would really look like seasonal workers being dragged to work. Ordell didn't say a word about what they were going to do this morning, and after a few miles past the prison on Rock Sahatche Road, he drove away from the South End, through an empty scrub forest, and they were all by themselves up.A dark line in the distance marked the beginning of the sugar-cane field, which stretched from here into Everglades, a full half a million pounds.Ordell looked in his rearview mirror.

"We're almost there now. Turn onto this dirt road. . . . The kid doesn't want anyone to get to his place easily." On the other side of a dilapidated canal, there is a road lined with bushes of Australian pine.After a few more miles of dust flying and stone bullets hitting the chassis of the truck, Louis saw a farmhouse among the trees: a neat red brick house with a fenced warehouse and tractor shed on one side and a farmhouse on the other. It is a semicircular prefabricated house made of corrugated iron panels.Ordell twitched the steering wheel as the pickup slid in and out of the tracks on the dirt road, Louis clung to the ring.

"Did you see that turtle? Shit, I didn't see him," Ordell said, looking in the rearview mirror. "You should keep an eye on it now, and pay attention to what we will encounter. Once we cross the bridge, we will enter that kid's territory." Ordell looked in the rearview mirror again as the truck jolted across a loose plank bridge that spanned the canal. "See that big tin house? It's called a corrugated iron prefab, and that kid keeps all his guns and military stuff in there. There's an M-60 machine gun in a jeep, and we're gonna be ready right away Drive it away. There's still grenades in there. There's a rocket launcher they call a LAW, and a bundle of rockets with instructions printed on them. That's a light anti-tank weapon. The rockets are all loaded into the launcher, ready to go Fire it, it's a weapon that can be used at will. The government guys chased him all the way to Medellin - boom, he's gone." "I reckon we'll find the kid alone," Ordell said. "I hear his wife is getting tired of checking and cleaning his weapons all day. Just leave him." He drove onto a gravel road. After the paved driveway, he said: "No, it seems that this kid has someone else this morning. There are two motorcycles over there..." In the driveway, the two Harleys were parked behind a minivan, and their van was parked behind the motorcycles, sandwiching the motorcycles. "They're on the shooting range over there," Ordell said. "See? Right behind that tin house?" About fifty yards from the house there was a long table covered by a flat roof.There are two people standing there.In the distance behind them there were targets on poles, and a high mound like a levee. "Those two guys on motorcycles are racists," Ordell said, "practicing to shoot us African-Americans when we go around their houses and make fun of their women." Man. You all bend down now, when I get out of the car with Louis, you're going to be quiet like mice, get it? Don't look out the window. If you hear us start firing in the house, that's the signal ...you just take out those two guys on the motorcycle. That's what you're doing in this operation, shoot cleanly, uh, hear?" They could hear the gunfire coming from the shooting range, from the field There were faint, short crackles and intermittent gunfire. "The shooting," said Ordell, "they drew ugly-faced niggers on the targets for them to practice aiming. One black person hit them with a machete—you know, the guy got shot. He deserves to be unlucky for not carrying a gun, who made him so stupid." Louis turned to look again.The boys were snorting cocaine, and they took teaspoon out of a little pouch, one serving each, and they sniffed it and wiped it clean with their sleeves. "We have our own gunners," Ordell said, staring in the rearview mirror again, then reached into the glove box and pulled out a gun that appeared to be a .45 Colt automatic.He cocked the trigger, inserted the gun into his overalls, and said to Louis, "Are you ready? Let's salute first and then fight." Louis pulled out the Mossberg gun wrapped in newspaper.He didn't know where to put the Barletta pistol. It was first inserted into his crotch, then pulled out from the waistband, put it on the seat, and closed the car door.Louis walked around to the front of the van to join Ordell.He looked back and saw Melanie getting out of the Toyota parked behind them, walking towards them with the woven bag over her shoulder, looking displeased. "There he is," Ordell said. He waved his hand up, and Louis looked at the farmhouse. "How have you been lately, big man?" Ordell, who had been grinning sincerely, lowered his voice and said, "Watch the fuck. Think of him as Adolf Hitler." Standing on a mound in the middle of the yard in front of them was a man wearing a pair of "Desert Storm" style tan camouflage pants and a GI khaki T-shirt, his feet in paratrooper boots spread apart , with his hands on his waist. "If you think I'm going to pester that guy, unless you're crazy," Melanie said. Ordell turned his head. "Calm down. All you have to do is wrap the man up as hard as you can." Then he turned and said, "Look who I brought to you, Gerald. Remember Melanie I told you about? Here she comes, man." Gerald hung horned animal heads and antlers on his scarred pine walls, and he had framed color photographs of various fish.He had brown leather furniture, a wagon-wheel chandelier, muskets crossed over the mantelpiece, a glass gun cabinet with trophies, a shotgun rack... and nothing in the room had anything to do with women. Ordell was telling Gerald how eager his friends were to see his place, and hoped he didn't mind their dropping in so casually, when Melanie looked around at the display, pouted. Ass leaned over to look, and Gerald's eyes followed hers. Louis stood with the Mossberg wrapped in newspaper, looked around, then went to a window to check on the two motorcyclists.They're still shooting outside. Gerald removed the cigarette from the corner of his mouth, threw it into an ashtray made of shell casings, and walked up to Melanie with a wince, telling her about the pictures of the fish.You can get all of these different varieties from Lake Okeechobee.American catfish, coppernose sunfish, channel catfish... Gerald peeked furtively at Melanie's bare shoulders and over the front of her vest as he tucked his hands into two in the back pocket of her trousers, as if she was afraid they would touch her.Luis thought that such a big man could be shy.Gerald turned to Ordell and said they were going to the kitchen. "You're welcome in this room with him." Ordell picked up a grenade, which was now a lighter, and walked over to Louis, flicking the grenade at him. "The big man is not a normal guy, huh?" Louis turned away from the window. "What did you tell him about Melanie?" "I said she was coming to see the gun, and that's what I said." "So he wanted to give it a try and fuck her." "I think so. If you want to protect her, go in and shoot him." They looked at each other. "You knew you had to kill him in the end," Lewis said. "Somebody's going to do that," Ordell said. The two of them came back, Melanie holding a mug of coffee, the woven bag still slung over her shoulder.Gerald said, "Why don't you two go out on the shooting range? I'll load you two." Ordell said to Louis, "Show the big man your gun." Louis took Mossberg out of the rolled newspaper.He watched Gerald look at the gun, thinking nothing of it. "There's a laser sight on it, too," Ordell said. Gerald came over, took the gun from Louis, and returned to Melanie with the coffee.He said to her, "Should I be straight? I'm not going to hang that thing in my toilet." He was checking the gun now, and it rattled the trigger.He gripped the butt of his gun and took aim, pointing the red laser dot between the eyes of a white-tailed buck on the wall. "You still have to hold your weapon to prevent recoil. That red dot doesn't fucking work. Please forgive my French." He said to Melanie, "I'm going to use an old single that I got when I was young I can beat him with my Remington rifle, anytime he wants to. Bet some money on it and have a go." He handed the gun back to Louis and said, "Be careful now. , the bullet is loaded." He shook his head, and then said: "What's the use of this gun? It's all chrome-plated? I dare say, a ghost wouldn't take it to war." "It's not bad for grabbing a tavern," Lewis said. Melanie glanced at him rolling her eyes. Gerald shrugged. "The speed of the gun can only do this." At first, Louis thought this guy was suspicious, and he even seemed worried when he looked at Melanie.What are these people doing here?Perhaps Gerald was disturbed by such reasons, and therefore did not speak much.That's how Louis sees him now: This guy likes to be mean; he has to figure out a way to use his brains.Gerald was about fifty; Louis could punch him in the stomach, but probably not a hard hit on him.Louis had no doubt that Gerald looked smart in his Desert Storm suit, and he was convinced that there was nothing in Gerald's crew-cut head.This kind of person disgusted Louis.He looked at the guy with a hot, criminal thought that he knew he could control and tease the guy. Louis probed the guy's age and said, "Gerald, have you ever been in a war?" "I've been in tactical battalion," Gerald said. "In Georgia and here in Florida. I was training for 'Bay of Pigs,' and I didn't make it." "Have you ever seen a dead man?" "What's the meaning?" "War—what do you think?" "I've been in drills with real guns," Gerald said. "Ex-Marine scouts as fake enemies. Don't doubt it, I know what it's like to start a war." Louis hadn't actually been in a war either.However, he had seen two people shoot - one escaped from the labor team in Huntsville, the other climbed the fence at Stark prison - and he saw one stabbed to death, one set on fire, one shot Strangling someone with a drying rack, no doubt, that counts as something to experience.So he said to Gerald, "Bragging! That's not seeing someone die, that's a joke. Kid's stuff." Louis saw right through this standing in his combat boots in this room full of guns The stinky shit.Louis knew what was about to happen. Ordell walked away from the window just as he was about to join the action, saying, "Big man trained for a black revolution." "He heard us say we were going to win and knew it was going to happen." Louis had turned his head away, looking out the window.He was listening to Ordell, not to the sound of shooting outside.Shooting has stopped.He saw the two bikers at a long table on the shooting range, presumably reloading. "It's not like an 'Arab War' in the open desert," Ordell said. "Well, this black war is going to be street fighting. It's going to be against us locals, isn't it, man?" Ordell pissed off the guy, saying, "You think you and your racist brethren can handle this?" Gerald said, "Are you talking like you're in my house?" He scowled and got angry. "Why do you come here with your whore? Does your black ass need a beating? If you need it, I'll give it to you." Ordell zipped his overalls up to his waist and reached in.Something is going to happen.Ordell was going to shoot the guy.Louis sensed that if Ordell was going to make a move, he needed to be on his heels.Louis was a little worried—he had to take a quick look out the window to keep an eye on the two motorcyclists. They were leaving the shooting range when two pudgy fellows came along with pistols and rifles. Louis turned away from the window."Here are the two guys," he said, trying to keep his cool and let Ordell know there was nothing to lose. Still, Ordell panicked, stopped and glanced back, his hands still in his overalls. Now Melanie yelled, "Kill him!" Louis saw Melanie just pull the woven bag off her shoulder, and turned his Mossberg gun on Gerald, aiming at him, while the guy walked up to Ordell and pointed at him Punch hard.The punch sent Ordell crashing into a leather chair, the Colt Automatic pistol exposed and held in his hand, from which Gerald took it. , first punched him on the mouth, then twisted the gun in his hand, snatched it, and threw it on the sofa out of reach.Then he squatted down again, hooked Ordell's face, followed by another punch with the other hand, knocking Ordell's head against the leather pad. Melanie yelled again, "Kill him!" Gerald paused, dropped to one knee, as if to rest, and looked back. Louis thought he was watching Melanie.But the guy was looking this way, right at him, staring.Louis gripped the handle of the gun tightly and saw the red laser dot land on Gerald's forehead.Gerald grinned at him. "Have you the guts? You ask me if I've ever seen a dead man. Damn, you've never been in a war, have you?" Melanie's voice said, "What are you waiting for?" Gerald turned around enough to see her. "He's got buckshot over there, baby. He's trying to hit me, how can he not hurt his nigger friend?" .” Louis walked over to Gerald, held the Mossberg up to his head, aimed at the crew, and hit the guy on the shoulder.Gerald stood up in his GI T-shirt, and with all the strength of both arms he grabbed the cap and twisted it, and Louis clung to the gun and fell. On the chair, on top of Ordell.Louis slipped and swayed out of the way of the guy for a moment.Standing up... Gerald was standing with his back to him. Gerald and Louis watched as Melanie pulled a stubby blue steel automatic from her woven bag.Gerald said: "What's that you're holding, some sort of cheap lady's pistol?" Melanie holds the gun in both hands, arms outstretched, and takes aim at Gerald. He raised the musket suddenly, threw it on the couch, looked at Melanie and said, "Come on, baby, you put that thing down, I'm not going to run at you." He was too confident in his words , it seems that saying this will solve the problem. Melanie said nothing.She hit him. Louis was taken aback—the sound of gunfire was so loud in this closed room.He looked at Gerald, the guy didn't move; he stood there. Melanie said, "I'm not a bitch, you big fool." God, she shot him again. This time, Louis saw Gerald clutching his side, as if stinging. She shot him again, and he felt his chest with his hands, his knees began to bend as he moved toward her, and she shot him again.The room filled with guns and animal heads echoed with gunfire until it faded away and the guy lay on the floor. Ordell barely moved his bleeding mouth, and said with difficulty: "Is he dead?" "You can believe he's dead," Melanie said. Ordell asked Louis, "Are they coming?" and to Melanie, "Girl, where's that gun you got?" Louis was standing by the window. He saw the two bikers holding their rifles, shoulders hunched, hunched over, looking this way, a little closer to the house now than to the shooting range.He saw them emerge cautiously from the darkness.The two of them were also seen turning to look up the driveway and raising their rifles.Louis heard the sound of an automatic weapon, not that loud, like anything he'd heard in the Ordell showing of guns, or any movie he'd ever seen.He saw the two bikers go down where they had just stood, before firing a shot, and the sound of automatic weapons continued until the end of the fight.A moment later, the boys showed up, with their Chinese-made guns loaded with curved, banana-shaped magazines, and they looked at the two men on the ground, then walked towards the house. Louis wondered if that was what fighting was all about.If you have a place to sit, you can watch this fight. He heard Ordell say, "Did they shoot the biker?" Louis nodded and said, "Yes." He heard Ordell say, "Man, my mouth hurts when I move it. I think I need to go to the dentist." He was also heard saying, "Now I've got to get those boys to load up the van. We'll go home in Louis's car, if that car will fit." And he was heard saying, "You've shot person?" He heard Melanie say, "No." He watched the boys poking at the two bikers at gunpoint.Then Ordell appeared, walking toward them, which surprised Louis; he didn't hear Ordell leave the room.Turning from the window, Louis saw Melanie sitting on the sofa, still holding the pistol. She said, "Why didn't you shoot him?" Louis said, "You did a good job." Melanie looked at Gerald on the floor and said, "I didn't mean him."