Columbus by Derek Haas

heard you lit out of here after the Abe Mann blam-blam. Went to Europe or some shit. I would’ve put you to work, man, but . . . .” He reaches into his refrigerator and pulls out a jug of milk before moving over to the kitchen table to sit across from me, never finishing the sentence.
    “Yeah? I’m splitting time.”
    He takes a pull straight from the jug, then wipes his mouth with the back of his hand.
    “Well, I’m sure you were sore ’bout the way the business was the business. But I was only following orders. And I paid your new boy Ryan triple fee. That may not make it all the way square but it puts some shape on the edges, I would say.”
    “I need some information.”
    Archibald smiles. “That’s what I do.”
    “That’s why I came to you. Someone put a hit on me.”
    I let him absorb this. I can see his eyes widen a bit as he calculates the ever-shifting leverage between us.
    “What’s Ryan thinking?”
    “Ryan’s dead.”
    “Shiiiiiit.” He lets this out low in his throat, like a growl. “So you want to know. . . . ”
    “I want to know who put the paper on me.”
    “Right. Right.” He rubs his chin theatrically, like he’s really stewing over the issue here, trying to figure out how he can help me. Archibald is the type who made gains all his life by convincing people he’s stupid.
    Finally, he nods. “Well, this is gonna take me a few days.”
    I stand. “Then I’ll see you in a few days.”
    “You come to my office on Friday. I’ll shake the trees and see what falls.”
    “Okay.”
    “You want the address?”
    “I’ll find you.”
    I can feel his eyes on me as I exit the room.
    I lie low until Friday. My mind keeps turning back to Risina, and that story I told her, the one about the boy in the silver wagon, the kid looking down at his dead father, the kid who didn’t know his name. When the walls start to close in on me I venture out from my hotel room to visit the Art Institute. I find myself standing in front of Magritte’s painting of a locomotive racing out of a fireplace, smoke billowing out of its smokestack as a clock on the mantle above it points to nine. I can feel that wave rising over me as I stare at it, transfixed. The juxtaposition of those disparate images hits close to home to a hired killer standing amongst tourists and students and art lovers in the quiet starkness of the museum.
    They think I’m just another patron, no different than them, in their world. They better hope their own clocks never strike nine.
    I arrive at Archibald’s office on Harrison, a former factory that must have manufactured an array of piping, based on the uncut aluminum lying around and the smell of stale air.
    Six dead-eyed security guards stand sentinel, eyeing me as I approach. I don’t have to say who I am, they know, they’ve been told, and they step aside as one shows me in to see the boss.
    His demeanor has changed. I was afraid of this, was resigned to it, but I guess I had hoped he still had a residual fear of me and was eager to stay in my good graces. But Archibald Grant, above all else, is an opportunist.
    “Here’s the what-for. . . . ” he says as soon as I sit down. “You ever see that movie The Replacement Killers? ”
    I shake my head.
    “Jet Li? Directed by a black guy?”
    I shake my head a second time.
    “Well, you should check it out, Columbus. Rent it on Netflix. You know, when the shit settles. Anyway, I got ears all over, including all the way over on the other side of the Atlantic. Here’s what you got staring at you down the other end of the barrel.
    “Three killers. An Irish Setter named Leary what’s got a beard and carries a blade.”
    “He’s dead.”
    “Yeah, that’s what I heard. Took two pops down in Georgia.”
    “You heard right.”
    “I told you I got ears. Here’s where the replacement killers come in . . . one didn’t do the job so your enemy hired two more.”
    “Hydra-style.”
    “Yeah, hydra-style, that’s good. Anyway, you