Angels of Catastrophe: A Novel by Peter Plate

Author:Peter Plate [Plate, Peter]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Mystery & Detective, Hard-Boiled, Literary, Urban
ISBN: 9781609800536
Google: qgbZY71BdHcC
Publisher: Seven Stories Press
Published: 2011-01-03T18:30:00+00:00

Chapter Fifteen

Rats nested in the palm trees above the Lavadería Sandoval and the Iglesia de Diós on Mission Street. Durrutti heard them as he rambled toward the El Capitán Hotel. Billowing fog darkened the storefront windows of the Palacio Latino Restaurant, the Red Dragon Liquor Store and the An-da Jiang Acupuncture Clinic. The road was deserted, save for a lonely car turning left onto Twenty-third Street.

Having slept three hours in four days, Durrutti was seeing double. It took him a second to realize Zets had pulled up alongside him in his bullet-riddled squad car. The cop leaned out the driver’s window, aimed a flashlight in his eyes and cackled like an escapee from a mental asylum. His blemished face was ablaze with a policeman’s lust for small details. “Look who we have here,” he wheezed. “The shit himself. Where you going, you fucking midget?”

Durrutti got enraged when he was reminded how short he was. He froze in his tracks and didn’t breathe. He didn’t know if it was Halloween or just a nightmare. His sphincter twinged with fear; a trickle of sweat ran down his thigh. “I was going home. To the El Capitán.”

Zets was wearing his riot helmet; his wooden face was obscured by the helmet’s brim. His voice was moist and had more bass in it than a foghorn. “Where have you been?”

“Getting a doughnut,” Durrutti said. “You know ... at La Cabana.”

The answer didn’t quench Zets’s thirst for information. His irritation was overt. The distaste on his face was plain to see. “You don’t expect me to believe that, do you? Stay put. I want to have a word with you.”

The patrolman rocketed out of the squad car, maneuvering his bulk like a ballerina on steroids and swung around the front fender. The baton was in his arms. His blue combat overalls were a canvas of catsup stains, Pennzoil mechanical grease, chocolate chip cookie crumbs and lightning bolts of dried blood. The acne on his cheeks was three-dimensional, as if his welts were illuminated with high-grade track lighting.

Durrutti was frightened—Zets was the ugliest man on Mission Street. His face belonged in a museum of horrors. “What’s going on here? I ain’t doing anything.”

The Jewish cop’s eyes glittered off-kilter as he approached Durrutti. The air was fetid with rotting garbage. A car whizzed by the policeman, inches from his back—Durrutti prayed a passing driver would broadside him. Zets gabbled at him, “Don’t give me that shit. You got any identification on you?”

“What for?” Durrutti quailed. “You know who I am.”

Zets flicked the nightstick an inch away from Durrutti’s nose, testing his reflexes. “The law requires that you show proof of identity. Failure to do that will force me to arrest your ass.”

Durrutti was in a no-win situation and he didn’t bicker. He reached for his wallet and found a driver’s license, one that had expired two years ago. He handed the tattered document to Zets like it was a used condom. The cop turned the flashlight on it and griped, “Are you pulling my leg? This is worthless.

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