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By Root 552 0

and they linked up nationally with gangs in Boston and D.C. and on the Coast. A few years ago they had made the mistake of asking Mama for a contribution. Since then Max the Silent had been their hero, especially after four members of their hit squad had been released from the hospital—the other one stayed in the morgue. The survivors told the police they had been hit by a train. When they weren’t spending their extorted cash on fingertip leather jackets or silk shirts or 9-mm automatics they haunted the kung fu movies. And when they moved out of the moviehouses into the darkness of Chinatown’s streets they would argue among themselves about who was the greater—the celluloid warriors on the screen or Max the Silent.

Max flipped the lever into reverse and we backed out of the warehouse. As he drove up the East Side Drive toward the Thirty-fourth Street exit I began a systematic search of the car—in the glove compartment, behind the sun visors, under the seats. I felt a tug on my hand, looked at Max and he shook his head to indicate the car was already clean. Good. The war-wagon moved over the potholes like a rusty tank—the gang kids didn’t maintain their cars, just their guns.

We found the block where the gunrunners would be waiting and Max drove carefully up to them—in his world, the insult Gunther had given demanded revenge. I couldn’t explain to him that in their world there was no such thing as an insult, just profit and loss. James and Gunther were standing where they were supposed to be. I opened the front door, let them have a look at me. They climbed into the backseat without a word and the war-wagon rolled toward the Hudson River. We were silent in the car—Gunther and James because they were acting like they were afraid of microphones, me because I had nothing to say to them.

When we got to the pier Max pulled the Buick in, turning it so it was parallel to the river about twenty feet from the pier’s end. The place was deserted. Gunther and James followed me out of the car. I reached in my pocket for a smoke, watching their faces. They didn’t react. They were relaxed—greedy, not frightened. Good.

“You said you had a proposition for us?” James opened.

“Yes.”

“Is this a good place to talk?”

“Why not?”

“What if someone comes by?”

I looked over to where Max was standing by the Buick, arms folded across his chest. They got the message.

“Here’s the deal,” I said. “I’ll be honest with you. I need some of the guns for myself, okay? And I need some men, about twenty experienced men who want to make some money. Short-term work.”

“Out of the country?”

“What difference does it make?”

“It’s just if you need them to go international there are items like obtaining good passports—”

“I see you know your business. Ever done any spot-recruiting?”

“Some, in London. Maybe we had the same client?”

“If so he wouldn’t want us to discuss it, right?”

“Right. You said a proposition?”

“I need two hundred full-auto long arms, preferably AR—16s, but I’ll take anything close. Only in 5.56 caliber, nothing bigger. A thousand rounds for each piece. And a bunch of other field supplies I could buy right here with no trouble, but I’ll let you handle it all if we can make it a package.”

“Like flak jackets, helmets, standard ordinance?”

“Yeah, and some fragmentation grenades, some plastique—”

“You can’t buy that stuff here.”

“Who can’t?”

“All right, we won’t argue. You’d pay cash?”

“On delivery.”

“To . . . ?”

“London’s okay.”

“Maybe to you it is—not to us. With all the IRA business, you can’t move a bloody thing in London. No good.”

“Two more choices, that’s it. Either Lisbon or Tel Aviv.”

“Lisbon’s okay—the kikes have the right idea on South Africa but I don’t like working with them, can’t trust’em.”

“Lisbon it is. You know the airport setup? The old Biafra runway?”

“I heard about it but I’ve never done it.”

“I’ll get you the papers,” I said, watching his eyes gleam and then quickly go flat again. Greedy bastard.

“What’s the timetable?”

“You get me the men lined up first, and I want the stuff ready to roll within three