Neon Mirage by Max Allan Collins Page B

Uncle Jim. He’s been so good to me, Nate.”
    “What am I, chopped liver?”
    She kissed me; sweet and long.
    “You don’t taste like chopped liver,” she said.
    “Neither do you,” I said, and kissed her back.
    She pulled away, straightened her dress and said, “Those gangsters did this, didn’t they?”
    “Sure.”
    “What are we going to do about it?”
    “I’m going to try to keep your uncle alive, for the immediate future. And then convince him to sell his business to them.”
    The violet eyes popped open like windows whose shades got yanked. “Give in to them?”
    “Of course, give in to them. What else?”
    She shook a fist. “Well, fight them, of course! Like Uncle Jim!”
    “Yeah—just like Uncle Jim. Who’s on his back with his collarbone shattered and his arm mangled, throwing down transfusions like a drunk with a fifth of whiskey and a water glass.”
    She shook her head, shook her head. “I don’t believe you’re saying this. Surely you want to get the people who shot Uncle Jim—who tried to kill you! Don’t you think they ought to be brought to justice?”
    “What justice is that? They own the cops, or most of the cops, anyway.”
    “I don’t know…it just doesn’t seem right. We should do something.”
    “You should do nothing but give your relatives some moral support. I’m going to do my job and see if I can’t keep your uncle alive.”
    She sighed. She shrugged. “I suppose you’re right.”
    “But you’re disappointed in me.”
    “No. Not really.”
    “What happened to not wanting me to take dangerous assignments?”
    “This is different. This is personal. This is family.”
    “This is nuts.”
    “I just wish you…we…could do something, damnit!”
    “I’m not Gary Cooper, honey. Nobody is.”
    “Gary Cooper is,” she said, with a little pout.
    “I don’t think so,” I said. “I think his real name is Frank.”
    That made her smile, and she came over and gave me another hug. About then, Jim, Jr., came and found us.
    “Pop’s back in his room,” he said. He looked ashen. I think the sight of his wounded father had shaken him pretty bad. “He’s awake—wants to see Mr. Heller.”
    I walked down there. The little room was crowded. Ellen Ragen was standing holding her husband’s left hand, gently; a bottle of plasma was feeding that left arm some life, trying to put some color in the white little Irishman. A nurse was tending the plasma, while a doctor was writing something down on a clipboard. The doctor, a somber chap in his mid-forties, glanced at the three of us as we squeezed in, and said, “Everyone, including Mrs. Ragen, needs to clear the room. We’re going to be bringing in an oxygen tent momentarily.”
    “Give me a minute with my friend here, Doc,” Jim said, nodding—barely, but nodding—toward me.
    “No more than that,” the doctor said, sternly, and he went out, taking everybody but the patient, nurse and me with him.
    “They’ll try to kill me here, lad,” he said. His eyes, for the first time since that afternoon he hired me as his bodyguard, showed fear. “I’m a dead man, sure.”
    “Not yet you aren’t,” I said, and I quickly filled him in on my security plans. He smiled, narrowing his eyes in little facial assents to all of it.
    “Can you protect my family?” he asked.
    “You bet. I’ll put every op I have on this.”
    “God bless you. God bless you.”
    “What’s this about a statement to the State’s Attorney’s office?”
    “I thought that would warn the bastards off.”
    “Don’t think it worked, Jim.”
    “It should’ve. It should’ve. They know I made affidavits.”
    “Affidavits?”
    “I fuckin’ read ’em to Serritella! Three affidavits in my safe deposit box. Had my lawyer write ’em up.”
    “What’s in those affidavits, Jim?”
    He smiled his thin smile. “Everything. I name all the names, lad. Every dirty deed I’ve been privy to, and I’ve been privy to more than a few. Those