I Might As Well Because I Have No Choice Page 9

CHAPTER EIGHT

  There was no sign of Hobes Izumi in Newark or in New Jersey, although I covered the whole of it. Most of the time I listened and what I heard didn’t make me feel any better. It was less what I heard than what I didn’t hear. There were suddenly a lot of suspicious folks around town and a lot that wasn’t being said.

  A stranger coming to New Jersey would see the dusty main street with a row of false fronted frame buildings along either side. The signs mostly extended from the buildings to supporting posts on the edge of the board buildings to supporting posts on the edge of the boardwalk. Usually one of the Diamond R guys was standing in the street.

  A man looking along that street would believe there wasn’t much to it, but he would be wrong. In my time I’d been a sight of places and I’d call New Jersey a big state, big in the outlook of most of the folks who lived here. They had police here, but nobody paid them much mind. I mean, when trouble came nobody thought of going to the police about it, you handled it yourself. If somebody made trouble in the city, usually the police will haul them in and they’ll be bribed.

  Times where changing and there were new faces around, the neighborhood were cleaning and the government were toughening. The big pushers were loosing money and they didn’t like it. And that meant they would do something about it when they got to the point where they decided some action was called for an I had a hunch that time had come.

  As we were going along the street, Jaquan said to me, "You ought to get you a gig of your own, Pacino. A man will never get anywhere working for the next fellow."

  "A hide out and an apartment. It’s been ages ago when I had a gambling house. I started the gambling house from a few licks. The cops heard of the gambling house and raided it."

  "You were something. You need another place of your own. On one of them streets you been mentioning of."

  "Trouble is I said, those vultures every damn where on most of those and they wake you any night and loot at day and night."

  "You need to save your money and get yourself a front," Jaquan insisted.

  "A front?"

  "Somebody to give you some work, either some bread, and then get yourself some clothes, get yourself some new shoes, keep them polished, get yourself a new hat. Maybe a suit. You look like money, money will come to you."

  "A man I knew once, he figured that. Then got way over his head and they found him dead, hanging. He owed folks and he robbed folks to get it. And they weren’t too kindly either when they got to him."

  "Hung him?"

  "Everybody began to wonder where the man got the money from. They brought him to the bridge, wrapped a rope around his neck and lynched mobbed him. He fought like hell."

  "What you need to do is put the pistol to them," said Jaquan.

  "Arm robbery."

  "Arm robbery and murder them for the money. Put the pistol to them and cut the bullshit and get the money quicker than selling something and be done with it and get a large quantity of money at one moment. And then if the money isn’t enough after that, we put the pistol to them again once more."