"Destroyer - 009 - Murderers Shield" - читать интересную книгу автора (Murphy Warren)

"You know, as your leader, I could have you shot right now with incredible justification?"

Duffy shrugged. He didn't plan on living through the war anyway. McGurk must have sensed this, because he said, "Okay, we'll go cleaner in the future. Hell, I don't want to kill an American." McGurk staggered to his feet and offered his hand.

As Duffy reached forward for it, he kept going into McGurk's stomach. McGurk emitted a gasp. He backed away, putting his hands in front of him.

"Hey, hey, I meant it, friend. I gotta have someone I can't kill. Now, stop it."

"You can't take it, can you?" Duffy said arrogantly.

"Can't take it? Kid, I could wipe you up in a second. Believe me. Just don't come at me again. That's all I ask."

Either from youthful wildness or contempt, Duffy went for McGurk again. He remembered throwing one punch and he awoke with McGurk pouring water on his face.

"I told you I could take you, kid. How do you feel?"

"I don't know," said Duffy, blinking. Throughout the war, Duffy remained the one person McGurk could not kill. Despite logic and moral training, a deep affection grew in Frank Duffy for Bill McGurk, the man who could not kill him. He came to look upon McGurk's cold passion for death as a sickness and, as with any friend who was sick, he felt sorry for him; he didn't hate him for it.

Duffy became wary of picking up slights from anyone, lest McGurk find out about it and shred the person. After the war, it was the same way. When Frank Duffy was running for assemblyman, some hecklers began shaking the speakers' platform. McGurk, then a uniformed sergeant in the police department, formally arrested the offenders for disturbing the peace. Later, they were also charged with assaulting a police officer. On the way to the station house, out of sight of the political rally, the offenders did attempt with hand and fist to strike Officer McGurk about the head. The offenders were admitted to Beth Israel Hospital with fractures of the cranium, facial contusions, and hernias. McGurk was treated for bruised knuckles. McGurk was godfather to Duffy's boy. The two families even managed to get along well enough to share a cabin outside Seneca Falls, New York, where Duffy on this early autumn evening had landed with the dozen bottles of Jack Daniels and a very big problem.

Driving to the cabin in the stillness of the dark country road, the United States congressman opened one of the bottles, took a swig and passed it to the Inspector in charge of Manpower Deployment for the New York City Police Department. McGurk took a swig and passed it back to Duffy.

"I don't know where to begin, Bill," said Duffy. "It's monstrous. On the surface, it looks like a benefit to the nation but when you understand what's happening, you realize it is an incredible danger to everything America stands for."

"Communists?"

"No. Although they're a danger too. No. These people are like Communists. They believe the end justifies any means."

"Sure as hell does, Frankie," said McGurk.

"Bill, I need your help, not your political philosophy, if you don't mind. What's happening is this. A group of people are taking the law into their own hands. Massive vigilantes. Very thorough, almost military. Like those police in South America a few years ago. Trying to fight liberal politicians and lenient judges with bullets."

"Judges here are too lenient," McGurk said. "Why do you think decent citizens can't walk the streets? The animals have taken over. New York City is a jungle. Your district too. You ought to go down and talk to your constituents some time, Frankie, You'll find them hiding in their caves."

"Come on, Bill, let me finish."

"You let me finish," McGurk said. "We opened the doors to the ape house in New York and now decent people venture onto the streets at their own risk."

"I'm not going to argue politics or try to cure your racism, Bill. But let me finish. I think policemen are doing the same thing in America now that they were doing in South America a couple of years ago. I think they're organized."

"You got an informer?" asked McGurk. He took the bottle as he turned onto a dirt driveway. The car bounced over the dirt road as McGurk refused to be intimidated by the narrowness and unevenness of its surface.

"No," Duffy said.

"Then why do you think police are doing it?"

"Good question. Who's getting killed? The people that the policemen ordinarily can't touch. I recognized the name of Elijah Wilson. You told me about Big Pearl yourself. Remember years ago, you said the law couldn't touch him?"

"Yeah. Everybody knows Big Pearl."