"Claws Against Gangdom"
May. 28th, 2022 09:57 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dochermes"Claws Against Gangdom"
3/22/1933
I.
"Cripes, just look at this headline! UNDERWORLD FIGURES FOUND HORRIBLY MAULED. And it's even got a picture, not of the bodies but showing the bloody floor!" Aldo Lombardi shoved the folded newspaper across his desk at the three gunmen who cringed whenever he started yelling like this.
"I knew them boys! They was all right. Ricci was at my wedding, he could be trusted with anyone's daughter. According to this rag, all four of them were ripped up, quote "evidently by the claws of some large unidentified animal." I don't believe it! There ain't no animals in New York that can tear up four grown men and you know they were packing serious firepower."
As he felt his boss was waiting for a comment, the oldest of the thugs cleared his throated and ventured, "It sounds crazy, Mr Lombardi, but I gotta wonder if maybe the cops brought in a bear or a tiger from the zoo? Kept it in a truck and let it loose?"
Lombardi swung his black soulless eyes over his employees. He insisted that they shave and bathe daily, that they wear conservative suits and ties, with properly blocked fedoras. He even checked them to see their fingernails were clean and their shoes polished. His theory was that, the more respectable they looked, the less likely the police would be to give them a suspicious eye.
As for Aldo himself, he was impeccably groomed and dressed in a tailored pinstripe suit that fit his wide blocky body well. The thick greying hair was swept back from a high forehead and kept flat with pomade. The broad sullen face with its flat nose and beartrap mouth could not seem genteel no matter what he tried; he had given up on trying to pose as anything other than a brutal mobster.
"You're right, Lou, it does sound crazy," Lombardi replied in a quieter tone. "But it's a crazy time we live in. It's damn certain no tigers or bears escaped from the Bronx Zoo, that'd be all over the radio. I don't get it." He stomped around behind his desk and dropped down heavily as it creaked in complaint.
The chair and the desk, like all the decor in this penthouse, was in the Art Deco style that was all the rage. Lots of chrome and glass, geometric shapes, open space, recessed indirect lighting. Not that Lombardi cared for this sort of style at all, he would have much preferred solid old-fashioned dark wood and maybe a stone mantle over the fireplace. But this was how the suite had been furnished when he had taken it over.
Lombardi opened a gleaming stainless steel box, removed a Havana and clipped its end with a tool designed to do nothing else. He paused with the Ronson in his hand and moved his frightening cold eyes over his three lieutenants. "You guys are a few steps smarter than the usual mugs I have to rely on. Give me some ideas. Tell me how this could have happened. Pietro?"
"Boss, I was wondering about these lunatics the papers call 'mystery men.' Mark Drum, Dr Vitarius. The Sting. I understand that the Monk has been active around Hell's Kitchen lately...."
"Holy Mary Mother of God, I hate hearing that name!" screamed Lombardi. "That maniac has been slaughtering guys in our line of business as if he's in a war. You know what I think? I think the Monk is working for some mobster, maybe over in Jersey, thinning out rivals so there's room to expand. That makes sense."
"That's what I figure the Sting is up to, boss," Pietro continued. "Every time he gets involved in a racket, the businessmen end up dead or in the slammer. Remember the Weissman brothers?"
"Yeah, sure, I remember. I warned them not to even talk to the Sting. He wiggled things so they turned evidence against each other. Listen, you fellows take five. Smoke out on the balcony if you want. Let me read this story again."
"Whatever you say, Mr Lombardi." Two of the big men gratefully lowered themselves onto uncomfortable modernistic chairs that seemed to be glass over bent aluminum tubing. It was past midnight and they had been attending Aldo Lombardi since dawn. The third dug a nearly empty pack of Lucky Strikes from his jacket pocket, pulled the translucent sparkly curtains aside and stepped out onto the semi-circular platform that overlooked the treetops of Central Park West.
Lombardi drew deeply on his cigar and brought the newspaper into the circle of light from his gooseneck lamp. "These boys had nothin' in common," he said, mostly to himself. "One was running the jukeboxes on Coney Island, one was selling snow to the colored people in Harlem, the other two mostly ran cathouses. I wonder what they met to discuss?"
From the French doors leading to the balcony, an unfamiliar voice broke in, "Nobody get excited. Let's all stay calm, okay?"
II.
As the two thugs leaped up, almost falling over in their surprise, they drew big Colt 45 automatics from their waistbands. A tall thin man in a lightweight white summer suit came coming into the suite, drawing the sparkling curtains shut behind him. He was a grotesque figure only because he was wearing an over-the-head full rubber mask of a lion's head. At least it seemed to be high quality with animal or human hair for the mane.
"First, your pal out there is unharmed," the masked man announced. "He only received the lightest effective rap over the noggin that was needed. He should wake up soon."
"What the hell? Get your hands up! Right now!" shouted Pietro.
Instead of complying, the masked man did the exact opposite by sliding his hands into his trousers pockets. "Settle down there, gunslinger. This isn't the Old West. I have information your employer would dearly love to hear."
Lombardi had eased one hand under his desk to close around the butt of a .32 revolver which was held there with a single strip of tape. "First, I gotta ask. We're eighteen stories up. How did you get out on my balcony?"
"One clue. Once I got here, I had to put my socks and shoes back on."
"We ought to check on Lou," said one gunman.
"In a second," the boss told him. "Look, buddy, there ain't no candy here, take off the trick or treat mask, okay?"
The intruder slowly took his hands out of his pants pockets, holding out empty palms to show he was unarmed. "First, I see by that paper that you've already learned about the deaths."
"I'll tell the world! What's it to you?"
"The MESSENGER is a fine daily. Good reporters, even if they don't get paid much."
Lombardi tore the revolver free from under the desk and jabbed it at the lion-masked man. "Now I know you're soft upstairs. The squirrels hide your brains for winter. But I see we won't have to worry about you any longer."
Sensing movement behind him, the intruder had just started to swing around when the barrel of a heavy automatic cracked with murderous face at the nape of his neck. He fell heavily to his hands and knees, then stretched out full length on the plush white carpet. One of the thugs delivered an enthusiastic kick to the ribs which drew no response.
"That palooka can't hit worth beans," Lou sneered. "When I tap 'em, they go down and stay down."
"First, the mask," Lombardi ordered. When the rubber piece was removed, the bland face of a blond man with a long pointed nose was revealed. "Only a kid. I bet he's no more than twenty, maybe twenty-one. Any of you guys recognize him?"
"Nope."
"Never seen him before." Crouching, watching the dazed man for any signs of reviving, Pietro dug through the intruder's pockets and came up with a small notebook and pencil, keys, a ten and three singles and a subway token. But no identification.
"I suppose it doesn't matter," Lombardi grumbled. "He's going for a dive to the bottom of the East River anyway. What's that thing around his neck?"
Straightening up, Pietro held out an object on a fine-linked silver chain. It was a shiny black claw seven inches in length. "Wow, look at that."
"Lemme set it." The mobster held out a broad hand and received the talon. "Funniest damn thing I seen in a while. It's heavier than it looks. And hot. It's almost burning my hand."
"Hey boss, you think that claw has anything to do with the way your friends were killed? I dunno, maybe this joker belongs to a sort of...lion society or something?"
"I like this doodad," Lombardi said in a whisper. "Mebbe I'll keep it forever." He raised the chain up over his elegantly-groomed head and lowered it so that the black claw rested on his shirt front. "In fact..." Without warning, he was gasping and struggling for breath. His face turned purple.
"It's strangling the boss! Get it off!"
Aldo Lombradi frantically yanked the chain up overhead and threw the talisman away. The claw spun end over end... and was caught neatly in the intruder's suddenly upraised hand.
III.
In the few seconds it took the mobsters to assure themselves that their employer could breath again, the intruder rose easily to his feet. He did not seem intimidated by the black holes of gunbarrels pointed directly at him. With the black claw hung around his neck, he seemed taller and more intimidating than he had before.
"Something new stalks the dark streets while the city sleeps," he announced. "Fangs will bite deep into the craven throat of Crime. Your kind will learn to tremble when the Lion Man comes."
In an instant, the man's body trembled, swelled up and transformed. A black-furred African lion standing on his hind legs, moving its front legs like human arms, took a menacing step forward. Four guns roared, painfully loud in the enclosed space but the bullets seemed to merely dent the ebony hide slightly before dropping away. Green eyes flashed. The weird creature plunged across the room faster than the gunmen could track, and the massive paws swiped left and right to rip open chests and bellies to the spine. In an instant, the three thugs were down on the carpet with their innards spilling out.
"Get back! Get back!" screamed Lombardi.
The feline jaws gaped wide to reveal gleaming white fangs and a curled red tongue. The Lion Man pounced, its huge head lowered and with a hideous crunching sound, Lombardi's head was ripped free to roll across the room.
Stepping back, tail lashing furiously, the strange creature glared about but saw no one else in sight. The monster shivered, dwindled, turned back into a Human again somehow wearing a lightweight suit. Jack Denver spat a few times to get salty blood out of his mouth. He had to hurry. There could not be long before those gunshots and roars brought the house detective knocking on the door. He scooped up the rubber lion mask and folded it into an inner pocket.
In a second, Denver would be back on the balcony and laboriously making his way down the outside of the building. The human fly trick took strong fingers and toes, and left him in pain for hours afterward. Before he had found the mysterious lion claw, he couldn't have done it. As he backed away from the scene of slaughter, he spotted the folded DAILY MESSENGER on the blood-spattered desk and he grinned sardonically. He'd rush to the office, bat the story out and hand in his copy way before deadline for the morning edition. LION MAN STRIKES AGAIN would be a perfect headline, he thought, and this time his name would be on the front page.
10/22/2020
3/22/1933
I.
"Cripes, just look at this headline! UNDERWORLD FIGURES FOUND HORRIBLY MAULED. And it's even got a picture, not of the bodies but showing the bloody floor!" Aldo Lombardi shoved the folded newspaper across his desk at the three gunmen who cringed whenever he started yelling like this.
"I knew them boys! They was all right. Ricci was at my wedding, he could be trusted with anyone's daughter. According to this rag, all four of them were ripped up, quote "evidently by the claws of some large unidentified animal." I don't believe it! There ain't no animals in New York that can tear up four grown men and you know they were packing serious firepower."
As he felt his boss was waiting for a comment, the oldest of the thugs cleared his throated and ventured, "It sounds crazy, Mr Lombardi, but I gotta wonder if maybe the cops brought in a bear or a tiger from the zoo? Kept it in a truck and let it loose?"
Lombardi swung his black soulless eyes over his employees. He insisted that they shave and bathe daily, that they wear conservative suits and ties, with properly blocked fedoras. He even checked them to see their fingernails were clean and their shoes polished. His theory was that, the more respectable they looked, the less likely the police would be to give them a suspicious eye.
As for Aldo himself, he was impeccably groomed and dressed in a tailored pinstripe suit that fit his wide blocky body well. The thick greying hair was swept back from a high forehead and kept flat with pomade. The broad sullen face with its flat nose and beartrap mouth could not seem genteel no matter what he tried; he had given up on trying to pose as anything other than a brutal mobster.
"You're right, Lou, it does sound crazy," Lombardi replied in a quieter tone. "But it's a crazy time we live in. It's damn certain no tigers or bears escaped from the Bronx Zoo, that'd be all over the radio. I don't get it." He stomped around behind his desk and dropped down heavily as it creaked in complaint.
The chair and the desk, like all the decor in this penthouse, was in the Art Deco style that was all the rage. Lots of chrome and glass, geometric shapes, open space, recessed indirect lighting. Not that Lombardi cared for this sort of style at all, he would have much preferred solid old-fashioned dark wood and maybe a stone mantle over the fireplace. But this was how the suite had been furnished when he had taken it over.
Lombardi opened a gleaming stainless steel box, removed a Havana and clipped its end with a tool designed to do nothing else. He paused with the Ronson in his hand and moved his frightening cold eyes over his three lieutenants. "You guys are a few steps smarter than the usual mugs I have to rely on. Give me some ideas. Tell me how this could have happened. Pietro?"
"Boss, I was wondering about these lunatics the papers call 'mystery men.' Mark Drum, Dr Vitarius. The Sting. I understand that the Monk has been active around Hell's Kitchen lately...."
"Holy Mary Mother of God, I hate hearing that name!" screamed Lombardi. "That maniac has been slaughtering guys in our line of business as if he's in a war. You know what I think? I think the Monk is working for some mobster, maybe over in Jersey, thinning out rivals so there's room to expand. That makes sense."
"That's what I figure the Sting is up to, boss," Pietro continued. "Every time he gets involved in a racket, the businessmen end up dead or in the slammer. Remember the Weissman brothers?"
"Yeah, sure, I remember. I warned them not to even talk to the Sting. He wiggled things so they turned evidence against each other. Listen, you fellows take five. Smoke out on the balcony if you want. Let me read this story again."
"Whatever you say, Mr Lombardi." Two of the big men gratefully lowered themselves onto uncomfortable modernistic chairs that seemed to be glass over bent aluminum tubing. It was past midnight and they had been attending Aldo Lombardi since dawn. The third dug a nearly empty pack of Lucky Strikes from his jacket pocket, pulled the translucent sparkly curtains aside and stepped out onto the semi-circular platform that overlooked the treetops of Central Park West.
Lombardi drew deeply on his cigar and brought the newspaper into the circle of light from his gooseneck lamp. "These boys had nothin' in common," he said, mostly to himself. "One was running the jukeboxes on Coney Island, one was selling snow to the colored people in Harlem, the other two mostly ran cathouses. I wonder what they met to discuss?"
From the French doors leading to the balcony, an unfamiliar voice broke in, "Nobody get excited. Let's all stay calm, okay?"
II.
As the two thugs leaped up, almost falling over in their surprise, they drew big Colt 45 automatics from their waistbands. A tall thin man in a lightweight white summer suit came coming into the suite, drawing the sparkling curtains shut behind him. He was a grotesque figure only because he was wearing an over-the-head full rubber mask of a lion's head. At least it seemed to be high quality with animal or human hair for the mane.
"First, your pal out there is unharmed," the masked man announced. "He only received the lightest effective rap over the noggin that was needed. He should wake up soon."
"What the hell? Get your hands up! Right now!" shouted Pietro.
Instead of complying, the masked man did the exact opposite by sliding his hands into his trousers pockets. "Settle down there, gunslinger. This isn't the Old West. I have information your employer would dearly love to hear."
Lombardi had eased one hand under his desk to close around the butt of a .32 revolver which was held there with a single strip of tape. "First, I gotta ask. We're eighteen stories up. How did you get out on my balcony?"
"One clue. Once I got here, I had to put my socks and shoes back on."
"We ought to check on Lou," said one gunman.
"In a second," the boss told him. "Look, buddy, there ain't no candy here, take off the trick or treat mask, okay?"
The intruder slowly took his hands out of his pants pockets, holding out empty palms to show he was unarmed. "First, I see by that paper that you've already learned about the deaths."
"I'll tell the world! What's it to you?"
"The MESSENGER is a fine daily. Good reporters, even if they don't get paid much."
Lombardi tore the revolver free from under the desk and jabbed it at the lion-masked man. "Now I know you're soft upstairs. The squirrels hide your brains for winter. But I see we won't have to worry about you any longer."
Sensing movement behind him, the intruder had just started to swing around when the barrel of a heavy automatic cracked with murderous face at the nape of his neck. He fell heavily to his hands and knees, then stretched out full length on the plush white carpet. One of the thugs delivered an enthusiastic kick to the ribs which drew no response.
"That palooka can't hit worth beans," Lou sneered. "When I tap 'em, they go down and stay down."
"First, the mask," Lombardi ordered. When the rubber piece was removed, the bland face of a blond man with a long pointed nose was revealed. "Only a kid. I bet he's no more than twenty, maybe twenty-one. Any of you guys recognize him?"
"Nope."
"Never seen him before." Crouching, watching the dazed man for any signs of reviving, Pietro dug through the intruder's pockets and came up with a small notebook and pencil, keys, a ten and three singles and a subway token. But no identification.
"I suppose it doesn't matter," Lombardi grumbled. "He's going for a dive to the bottom of the East River anyway. What's that thing around his neck?"
Straightening up, Pietro held out an object on a fine-linked silver chain. It was a shiny black claw seven inches in length. "Wow, look at that."
"Lemme set it." The mobster held out a broad hand and received the talon. "Funniest damn thing I seen in a while. It's heavier than it looks. And hot. It's almost burning my hand."
"Hey boss, you think that claw has anything to do with the way your friends were killed? I dunno, maybe this joker belongs to a sort of...lion society or something?"
"I like this doodad," Lombardi said in a whisper. "Mebbe I'll keep it forever." He raised the chain up over his elegantly-groomed head and lowered it so that the black claw rested on his shirt front. "In fact..." Without warning, he was gasping and struggling for breath. His face turned purple.
"It's strangling the boss! Get it off!"
Aldo Lombradi frantically yanked the chain up overhead and threw the talisman away. The claw spun end over end... and was caught neatly in the intruder's suddenly upraised hand.
III.
In the few seconds it took the mobsters to assure themselves that their employer could breath again, the intruder rose easily to his feet. He did not seem intimidated by the black holes of gunbarrels pointed directly at him. With the black claw hung around his neck, he seemed taller and more intimidating than he had before.
"Something new stalks the dark streets while the city sleeps," he announced. "Fangs will bite deep into the craven throat of Crime. Your kind will learn to tremble when the Lion Man comes."
In an instant, the man's body trembled, swelled up and transformed. A black-furred African lion standing on his hind legs, moving its front legs like human arms, took a menacing step forward. Four guns roared, painfully loud in the enclosed space but the bullets seemed to merely dent the ebony hide slightly before dropping away. Green eyes flashed. The weird creature plunged across the room faster than the gunmen could track, and the massive paws swiped left and right to rip open chests and bellies to the spine. In an instant, the three thugs were down on the carpet with their innards spilling out.
"Get back! Get back!" screamed Lombardi.
The feline jaws gaped wide to reveal gleaming white fangs and a curled red tongue. The Lion Man pounced, its huge head lowered and with a hideous crunching sound, Lombardi's head was ripped free to roll across the room.
Stepping back, tail lashing furiously, the strange creature glared about but saw no one else in sight. The monster shivered, dwindled, turned back into a Human again somehow wearing a lightweight suit. Jack Denver spat a few times to get salty blood out of his mouth. He had to hurry. There could not be long before those gunshots and roars brought the house detective knocking on the door. He scooped up the rubber lion mask and folded it into an inner pocket.
In a second, Denver would be back on the balcony and laboriously making his way down the outside of the building. The human fly trick took strong fingers and toes, and left him in pain for hours afterward. Before he had found the mysterious lion claw, he couldn't have done it. As he backed away from the scene of slaughter, he spotted the folded DAILY MESSENGER on the blood-spattered desk and he grinned sardonically. He'd rush to the office, bat the story out and hand in his copy way before deadline for the morning edition. LION MAN STRIKES AGAIN would be a perfect headline, he thought, and this time his name would be on the front page.
10/22/2020
