Baccano! - Volume 18 - Chapter 3

Chapter 3 No One Picks Up the Nobody When He Gets Out of Jail

The next day A city in New Jersey In front of the police station

“It’s an old cliché, and it’s probably pointless to say it to you fellas, but…I don’t ever want to see you back here.”

In the midst of a drizzling rain, a correctional officer was releasing two people he’d escorted from prison to the closest police station.

“…You and me both,” one young man answered, shrugging. Overall, he had a gloomy affect; his hair was dyed black, too, but his natural blond roots were showing. That said, he’d pulled on a cap as soon as he stepped outside, so at a glance, people would think the color was natural.

The other, a virile man with a healthy complexion and a left arm that hung limply, responded with a mix of sarcasm and provocation. “Yeah, you might not be the one who has the pleasure of my company. Next time I pull something, I bet I’ll land in a prison with gallows.”

After they’d said their good-byes, the two men turned their backs on the police station.

They’d done their time, and they were both free and clear. They should have been taking their first steps into new lives, starting out with the handful of money they’d earned from their prison labor, but the drizzle that seeped from the gray sky really didn’t seem to be blessing their futures.

“So what are your plans, pal?” the healthy man asked.

The man with dyed hair glanced at the other’s prosthetic hand, then restlessly scanned the area, paying an odd amount of attention to what was behind him. “Nah… Don’t have any.”

The tough man thought that behavior was strange, but he went on making small talk. “I didn’t see you in the pen.”

“…You probably just don’t remember. I’ve been seeing you around for a good long time.”

“Yeah? That’s bull. You get out of Alcatraz, too?”

Alcatraz.

The moment he dropped that name, the other guy stiffened.

So he’s back from “the island,” huh?

To ordinary convicts, it was a place to fear: a prison on an isolated island, where vicious criminals, even those who caused trouble while serving their time, ended up. In other words, the guy he was talking to had to be brutal enough to be sent there.

“…Sorry. I lied. I’ve just got a few things going on.”

“Nah, it don’t bother me. Everyone’s got a shady past. Especially if they were in the pen. Well, my fellow free man, let’s be pals until we go our separate ways, eh?” With an unexpectedly breezy air, the tough man raised his left hand, slowly, for a handshake.

When the man with the dyed hair saw the extended hand, his eyes widened as he focused on the rough prosthetic made of iron. The wet metal gleamed dully in the rain.

“The name’s Ladd. Ladd Russo. It’s a pleasure.”

Watching the two go from the window of the police station, the correctional officer gave a little sigh.

“Still… To think they’d release those two on the same day.”

He sensed some sort of fate at work, but he didn’t think it was anything important.

He didn’t know the details of Ladd Russo’s past, and although he’d been informed of the other man’s situation, they hadn’t told him all that much about it.

“Well, except for what they have in common.”

As if to say he’d lost interest, the officer stepped away from the window and started preparing to get back to work.

Because he turned his back to them, he missed something.

When Ladd Russo held out his left hand to the man with dyed hair, that man landed on his keister on the wet ground, then scrambled all the way back to the edge of the street, terrified out of his mind.

“Whoa, hey, whassa matter? Did I scare you?”

“D-d-did you say ‘Russo’…?”

“Ah.” Suddenly, the reaction made sense to Ladd. Smiling, he looked down at the man on the ground. This guy had to know about his Family. He might have even known the rumors about Ladd himself.

Still, he’s a little too spooked, ain’t he?

True, some people would fear him just because he was mafia, but it was pretty rare for someone to be this openly terrified.

Interesting. What’s this guy’s story?

For the first time, Ladd was deeply intrigued with this fellow. He folded his arms, fixed the man with a look, smiled thinly, and waited for his reaction.

“I—I see. You’re here…to bump me off, aren’t you?” the man stammered.

“Huh?”

“I never thought they’d send a hitman this way… Dammit! Did you slip the prison some dough? Or the cops? How much?!” He writhed on the ground, his legs flailing. “Okay, all right, I’ll do anything! You want money? I’ll pay any price you ask! Just don’t kill me! There’s somebody I have to find! N-no, I mean, there’s nobody! Nobody! I misspoke. A-anyway, even if you kill me now, it’s not gonna help anything! I’ll give you any intel I can, so lemme go!”

The man kept digging his own grave until he finally reached the wall of a bar that stood by the road. Shaking all over, he braced his hands against it and got to his feet.

Ladd watched the pitiful display with amusement—but then, he noticed something. The man was waving his hands around in a panic, and Ladd had a sense that something was off.

The moment he realized what that something actually was, the smile on Ladd’s face twisted even further.

“Hey now, calm down. If you don’t, you’ll die.”

Using his right hand, Ladd hauled the other ex-inmate up by his collar. The man’s feet left the ground so easily, he might as well have been an empty cardboard box.

That strength was overwhelming.

Experiencing that pure, monstrous power immediately brought the man to a realization.

I can’t get away.

I’m going to die here.

The desperate certainty made his knees quake.

“P-please. Would you spare my life, at least? C’mon, I’ll do anything, okay?!”

“Yeah, sure, sure, don’t worry about it!” Thumping him on the shoulders, Ladd completely ignored the man’s fear and his pleas for his life. Instead, he asked him a question. “You got somebody coming to pick you up?”

“To p-pick me up? No… Nothing like that. Nobody would want to.”

“That’s what I figured. If you were a mafia big shot or something, a luxury car probably woulda pulled up to the curb for ya the moment you stepped out of the station.” Chuckling, Ladd slung an arm around the guy’s shoulders in an overly familiar way. “Look, in the Russo Family, I’m peanuts. The boss treats me like a good-for-nothing nuisance. See? The Russo Family don’t like either of us. So let’s get along, a’ight?”

In the man’s silence, Ladd continued.

“So, lemme ask you again… What’s your name, pal?”

The question was a simple one, but it took the man a little while to find his answer. Then, slowly, he told him.

“I’m…”

The name he gave was his real one. He didn’t hide anything. He could probably have given an alias, but he chose not to.

He’d realized that, in the face of the power in front of him, there probably wouldn’t be much difference between a lie and the truth. Also, he didn’t have a shred of the courage it would have taken to struggle against that overwhelming strength.

When Ladd heard the name, he thought for a little while. “It don’t ring any bells.”

“……?”

“You’re a lucky guy. I dunno what you did to the Russo Family, but for now, you don’t have to worry about me.”

“O-oh… Okay…” He breathed a sigh of relief, thinking he’d escaped with his life. “Then, sorry, but would you leave me alone…? I’m grateful to you for letting me go, but if I’m with you, I might run into other Russo Family men.”

The fear in his voice was obvious, and even as he spoke, his eyes darted around restlessly.

“I like it—the way you’re all spooked. You’ve got no clue when you might die. I can see it in your eyes; you understand just how little it would take. You remind me of Who.”

“Who’s Who?”

“Who’s who. My pal. He’s just as much of a coward as you.”

“I see… You’ve got friends. I’m jealous.” That hadn’t been sarcasm. Even through his fear, the other man lowered his eyes with genuine envy. However, possibly because his terror had finally eased up a bit, he regained just a little of his presence of mind and glanced at Ladd. “He’s not coming to pick you up?”

“Well, I dunno if he’s alive or dead. From what I hear, most of my buddies on that train died or had their elbows checked and got shipped off to other hoosegows.”

“Train?”

“You know the Flying Pussyfoot? I thought they buried the whole damn mess. Have you heard any rumors or anything?”

“The Flying…Pussyfoot?” Although it wasn’t as dramatic as it had been when he’d heard the name Russo, the man’s face changed.

“You sure look like you know something,” Ladd remarked.

“…N-nah.” He promptly averted his eyes and muttered, as if he was talking to himself. “I dunno a thing.”

“A minute ago, you said you’d tell me anything I wanted to know if I let you go, remember?”

He froze. It’s no good. The only impulse in his mind was the one telling him to give in.

It wasn’t as if he’d been hurt; Ladd Russo hadn’t threatened him in any way. Yet, he’d fallen into death’s abyss once, and he knew certain things on instinct.

Just like back then, the man in front of him reeked of death. He wasn’t the kind of guy a nobody like himself could disobey.

Respecting his instincts and coming to reason, he hung his head like a tame dog. “…All right, I’ll tell you. I’ll talk. Dammit, why won’t you leave me alone?”

“Well, I thought I might need to know about you.”

The man with the dyed hair tilted his head, confused and suspicious.

Putting an arm around his shoulders, Ladd smiled at him, almost as if he was a friend he’d known for years. Grinning, clearly enjoying himself, he whispered in the other man’s ear: “We’re being watched.”

“……!”

“Whoa, don’t go rubbernecking. Keep your head right where it is. Get me?”

He kept walking shoulder to shoulder with the other man and turned left at a random corner, putting the police station out of sight.

“There were two in a car and three more faking like they were jawing on the street corner. Five of ’em at least. There may a few that are sharper’n that around, too.”

“How…did you know that?”

“I took dirty jobs because my uncle asked. You get good at picking up on that stuff, whether you want to or not.”

Who’s his uncle? Is it Placido?

He wondered, but he couldn’t ask. Intensely fearful of both Ladd next to him and the mysterious watchers, the man with dyed hair kept putting one foot in front of the other and taking ragged breaths.

“…So,” Ladd continued, “I want to see whether those Peeping Toms are peeping me or you.”

They walked on, traveling farther and farther down empty streets. Then, stopping at a spot that was absolutely deserted, Ladd removed his arm from the other man’s shoulders.

“Well, still, y’know. I was thinking while we were walking. It just hit me—hard. Time changes people. If somebody goes a long time without killing people, it sands down all his sharp edges. If this is how it’s gonna be, maybe I shoulda beaten that little girl to death, even if Firo held me back.”

“…?”

Firo? Who’s that? he thought, not saying a word. Beat a little girl to death? No, c’mon, that’s not even funny.

He wondered whether his own instincts were extremely dull. In the threat he’d sensed in Ladd a moment ago, had he completely failed to account for insanity?

“Actually, I didn’t really care whether these guys were after me or you.”

“Huh?”

Ladd picked up a chunk of brick that was lying on the ground nearby.

It was just about the right size around which to make a fist, and Ladd began fiddling with it.

The next instant, a black car slowly poked its nose around the corner. The man with the dyed-black hair couldn’t see the driver’s seat. However, when he noticed how the car was moving, he was sure. This wasn’t an ordinary car that just happened to be passing through. Whoever was inside was definitely keeping an eye on them.

“That ain’t good,” he told Ladd. “Let’s duck into a bar or someplace for a minute and lose them.”

If they’re driving like that, they’re probably still amateurs at tailing people.

If that’s all they’ve got, and we slip into a crowd, it’ll work out somehow.

In that crowd, he’d part ways with Ladd, and maybe they’d go after him instead; he’d be killing two birds with one stone.

That was the plan he’d worked out in his head.

“It’s drizzling, but if we use umbrellas, we may be able to trick— Hey… Uh, hello?”

The man realized Ladd hadn’t heard a word of his idea. By the time he turned toward Ladd, the other guy already had his arm wound way up, like a baseball pitcher.

“I’ll shellac ’em first, and then I’ll either ask ’em straight out or kill ’em… Hup!”

He lobbed the chunk of brick. Traveling unbelievably fast, it smashed the car’s window.

The crash signaled the start of a crazy ruckus on that little street.

A city in New Jersey In front of the police station

“Let me tell you a sad, sad story…”

A voice that seemed to match the gray sky echoed in the street, where a steady drizzle was falling.

“Just a minute ago—which is practically now—my brother Ladd took off. They say he’s already gone! …I had no idea such a sad story existed! Even my sister didn’t tell me that one… Insane… Is this the limit of mankind? Does life hurt this damn bad?!”

“No, uh, why don’t we start by looking for him? He might be in a bar around here, and if he’s walking to the train station, we’ll catch up to him fast.”

In response to that disgusted tone, the man kept his sorrowful howls coming. “Oh… Why do people pass one another by this way? It’s because, in the end, we’re all lonely. We’re locked in the shells of our individuality. Air and water and walls and rain get between us, blocking our way! Dammit, if I were Ladd, I wouldn’t have missed him! Could there be a story this sad?!”

As the young man kept on screaming things that made no sense, the passersby hid their faces with their umbrellas to avoid making eye contact or detoured around him and got out of there.

It wasn’t because what he was saying had frightened them.

They’d felt something unsettling in the fact that he was standing—and screaming—on top of a car that was stopped in front of the police station.

Apparently, the car belonged to the man’s companion, who wore a cap and was slumped over the steering wheel as if he was dead tired. Several of their friends, who looked like delinquents, were standing around the car. They were listening to the soliloquy from the roof, and they hadn’t bothered with umbrellas.

The strange orator seemed to be in his early twenties. The coveralls he wore were a blue so vivid it seemed unreal; even in the drizzle, he stood out clearly.

His most striking feature was the enormous wrench he was toying with. He didn’t have a large build, and his wrench was about as big as a woman’s arm. It seemed more like a medieval warrior’s mace than a tool.

The man shook his blond hair, disheveling it to reveal the dull eyes below it, and kept yelling.

“Jun-Jun says that people are connected on an unconscious level. That’s ridiculous… Why ‘unconscious’? I mean, c’mon, if we’re not connected while we’re conscious, what’s the point?! In Asia, they say you can attain nothingness through Zen meditation… I see. Is that how Asians merge with one another? So that thousand-armed Kannon thingy is a statue of five hundred merged humans… Five hundred… Five hundred?! Whoa, Asians are truly amazing!”

That was when the man started spinning the wrench. The abnormal way he handled it created the illusion that his arms had actually multiplied. When it looked almost as though he’d become a thousand-armed Kannon himself, the guy’s melancholy face abruptly lit up…although his eyes were still dull and warped.

“This is fun… Let me tell you a fun story! Incredible, this is fantastic, Shaft! I’ve awakened to the mysteries of the East! Once five hundred people are merged, they know how to split just their arms… There’s not much point in splitting legs, but you can never have too many arms! Jun-Jun’s collective unconscious is so perfectly rational!”

The man shouted his ramblings as if they were the truth of the world. Meanwhile, Shaft stuck his head out the driver’s side window. “Uh, look, I don’t even know where to start demolishing this, but here goes. For starters, the collective unconscious isn’t something simple like ‘people being telepathically linked.’ And is Jun-Jun supposed to be Jung the psychologist? There’s no way you’ve met that guy, right, Mr. Graham? Maybe don’t use nicknames for people you’ve never even seen?”

These were extremely valid points, but the man—Graham Specter—seemed to have cherry-picked a new cause for excitement out of them.

“A nickname… That’s it! If we’re going to unite, we should start with our names! Okay, from now on, my nickname is Shaft, and my brother Ladd’s nickname is Graham! Yours is ‘my brother Ladd’! Excellent, what an incredible system. I just might have ended the old world and created a new one!”

“Hello? Come back to us, Mr. Graham. Mr. Graaaaaham!”

“A toast, Shaft! No, wait, Shaft is me! A toast, my brother Ladd! Okay, let’s hurry and go look for my brother Graham, whom we managed to miss! Wait, but Graham is my real name! I see, so I was here the whole time… Meaning I didn’t pass myself! Am I even supposed to be here?!”

“Definitely not. Let’s go find Mr. Ladd already.” Shaft was running out of patience, but he hung in there trying to talk with Graham.

Ladd Russo’s sworn brother, Graham Specter, led a band of delinquents originally from Chicago. However, due to Graham’s personality, the group’s members got yanked around on a daily basis, and every time, their subleader Shaft had to calm the situation down. That said, even if Shaft tried to live up to his name and become the axle on which the group turned, Graham was the engine. His torque was too great, and in most cases, it broke Shaft’s spirit.

Graham’s brain was running full throttle again today, and he didn’t seem to be listening to Shaft. “My brother Ladd is suggesting that we go look for my brother Ladd… I see! So this is a journey to find ourselves! Don’t worry, Shaft—I mean, my brother Ladd! If we make my second nickname ‘my brother Ladd,’ our search for ourselves will be completely—”

“Aaaaaaaaaaaaah, it’s hopeless. This guy’s been hopeless for a while now, and it never changes…”

Things were going the way they always went, and Shaft dropped his head onto the steering wheel again, ready to lose his mind.

Even so, the situation was a little different today.

“Graham,” said a clear voice.

It almost seemed to belong to the surrounding drizzle: It was quiet and gentle, and it slowly soaked into their hearts.

“If you let yourself get rained on…you’ll catch cold… Get into the car, please.”

A young woman was sitting in the backseat. She smiled softly.

“…Yes’m. Thank you, Miz Lua.” Nodding obediently, Graham sprang down from the car, opened the passenger-side door, and climbed in.

“Why do you always listen to Lua, Mr. Graham?” Shaft asked.

“Well… Somehow, when I look at her, I start feeling bad. Like I’m getting excited and leaving everyone else behind. Oh, I’m terrible… I’m a lousy, awful, terrible, tactless jerk…”

Like a marionette whose strings had been cut, Graham covered his face with his hands and curled up in the passenger seat.

“It’s all right,” said the voice from the backseat. “I’m jealous…of all that energy you have, Graham.”

“No, uh, sorry, Lua,” Shaft said, “but you’re only making it worse. Don’t do that to him, please.”

“My… I’m sorry…” Her voice was gentle, but so faint it could have belonged to a fading ghost. Even so, it echoed strongly in their hearts. That was probably because she was so sincere, despite the volume.

With that thought in mind, Shaft examined the woman’s reflection in the rearview mirror.

Lua Klein was engaged to Ladd Russo, the man who’d been released from prison that day. She was also the person that homicidal maniac had publicly declared he’d kill last.

She was beautiful, certainly, and reminiscent of a fairy-tale princess slumbering in the depths of a lake. She seemed far too frail, but Shaft knew she had her own kind of strength, which was directly linked to her weakness.

This lady can accept just about anything.

Even as she watched Graham’s abnormal speech and actions, she’d stayed calm and remained true to her own view on life. Apparently, Graham wasn’t great with this woman. He often said that looking at her made him aware that he wasn’t reading the room. Shaft wished he’d have that same realization when he was dealing with him and the rest of the group.

However, Shaft had also noticed that Lua was a little different. Her fiancé was a murderer, and she was held prisoner by the mafia—but she accepted all those negatives equally.

Shaft had heard that she’d originally wanted to kill herself. It made him wonder just how bad a tragedy would have to be to make a woman like her consider dying.

It wasn’t as if she was desperate and self-destructive. She could accept everything, then face it squarely. When Shaft had casually complimented Lua by telling her so, she’d slowly shaken her head and said, “There are things that scare me, too. I realized as much on that train… That monster… The Rail Tracer… It wasn’t that I was afraid of the monster. I was afraid…that the monster would kill Ladd…”

Well, that’s damn romantic, Shaft had thought, but he also considered Ladd Russo, the one who’d inspired that intensity, to be pretty abnormal as well.

A woman who wanted to die and a homicidal maniac—the combination seemed like the theme for a comedy skit. Anyone who laughed at their relationship would end up wishing they’d never been born a second later, though.

At any rate, Shaft didn’t know what to do with a depressed Graham, so he wanted to reunite Lua with Ladd Russo on the double. Then they could head back to New York, where their group was currently based. “Well, I’ll head toward the station first. Even Mr. Ladd can’t be planning to hoof it all the way back to New York.”

“Naïve… That’s naïve, Shaft. Sure, Ladd probably won’t walk back…but he’s got even more screws loose than I do. He may be making his way using some method we’d never even dream of…” Graham muttered, his face still buried in his hands.

“Yes, yes. He’s probably flying there as we speak.”

Soothing Graham as if he were a baby, Shaft started the car.

The other members of their crew had taken the train here, and they set off for the station on foot. Shaft pulled out onto the broad avenue, heading from the police station to the train station.

But just a dozen or so seconds later, he spotted something weird.

Farther down the street, a car appeared around a corner and came toward them, weaving from side to side.

“Whoa, what the heck? That’s not safe. Is he drunk, or…? Huh?”

Then Shaft saw a peculiar sight. The windshield of the oncoming car was smashed up, and something was clinging to its roof.

Realizing that the clinging “something” was a person he recognized, Shaft grimaced.

Ladd Russo had punched through the car’s roof with his prosthetic left arm, then grabbed a slim man by the back of his collar with his right arm, hauling him up.

The iron arm that had slammed down right beside him seemed to have panicked the driver. Both he and the man in the passenger seat were yelling and trying to draw their guns, but just then, the arm abruptly withdrew.

As they tried to see what had happened, the car crashed into the gate around a house, and the impact knocked both driver and passenger unconscious.

Shaft was staring in shock at the nearby accident when Ladd, who’d bailed right before the crash, came over to them. He was dragging a man with his right hand.

He peeked in through the driver’s side window. “Hey, we’re trying to hitch a ride. Got any empty se—” At that point, Ladd’s eyes went to the backseat, and his words caught in this throat. “…Lua?”

Oh, good, he noticed.

Ladd couldn’t believe his eyes. Shaft kept his silent relief to himself.

Phew. And actually, I guess he didn’t recognize me.

“…Ladd?” Lua also seemed startled by the encounter, which had been far too abrupt—but Shaft didn’t have time to let them have their touching reunion.

What was the deal with that accident? Who was the man Ladd was dragging? Shaft had a ton of questions, but for now, he decided the first thing he needed to do was get Ladd into the car and scram.

“Yes, yes, Mr. Ladd, Miss Lua, save the reunion for later, okay?! Let’s beat it before the cops…get…here?”

Even as he was speaking, Shaft saw something completely insane.

Before he was aware of it, Graham had gotten out of the passenger seat and was now in the act of bringing that enormous wrench down on Ladd.

What the hell is he doing?!

“Laaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaadd!”

The wrench swung down, accompanied by a scream. However, just before it made contact, Ladd turned back, let go of the man he’d been dragging, and caught the weapon firmly with his right hand. As the wrench trembled with tension, Ladd checked to see who was holding it, then gave a startled laugh. “Whoa… Whoa-ho-hooooaaa! If it ain’t Kid Graham! Man, it’s been forever!”

“How fun… I’ve got a fun story for you…! It’s really you, Ladd! You stopped a lethal attack easily! One-handed! You really are the genuine article!”

“Wow, hey, if you’d had the wrong guy, he’d be dead.” Laughing merrily, Ladd pulled his right arm back, then began turning around, right in the middle of the road.

Graham didn’t let go of the wrench, which meant he began traveling in circles, in a move like a giant swing. Ladd’s power was monstrous.

“Ha-ha-ha! This is fantastic! My man Ladd really is somethin’ else, huh, Shaft!”

“Shaft…? Oh, right! Shaft, Shaft! The fella in the driver’s seat!”

Still smiling, after a few more rotations, Ladd gave Graham an extra boost of momentum and let go. Graham flew all the way to the roof of a single-story house by the side of the road, but he flipped nimbly, made a clean landing, then began yelling and brandishing his wrench.

What is this, a circus? Shaft was thoroughly disgusted, but he’d also been reminded why he was afraid of Ladd’s strength, which hadn’t changed a bit.

This bizarre sight had turned the knees of most of the people on the street to jelly, but as Lua slowly got out of the backseat, she was as calm as ever. She’d never doubted Ladd would come home safely, and as always, she’d accepted everything. The ridiculous scene that had just played out and the way Ladd seemed completely unrepentant even after doing time—Lua had accepted it all.

With a weak smile, she spoke as if they’d only been apart for a day. “Welcome home, Ladd.”

“Sorry to keep you waiting, Lua.”

Ladd pulled her into a tight hug, confirming that she wasn’t an illusion.

As long as you didn’t think about what was going through their heads, you could have called it a beautiful reunion, but all Shaft wanted was to get out of there—now.

Just then, Shaft spotted the blue coveralls again. Graham had gotten down from the roof while everyone’s attention was elsewhere, and he was poking at the man on the ground with his wrench. “Hey, Ladd? Who the heck is this guy? What’s his story?”

“Hmm? …Oh! I totally forgot. That’s my new pal. We got out of the clink together. We hit it off.”

“Uh, sure, but his eyes are rolled back, and he’s out cold…” Thinking he’d load the guy into an empty space in the car, Shaft climbed out of the driver’s seat and took a good look at his face.

Hmm?

Then he noticed something.

The man had worn flesh-colored makeup on his face, but between the rain and the impact, it was nearly gone. From beneath it, old, faint burns had emerged. From the look of those burns and his scars, he might have been caught up in an explosion at one point.

On top of that, his right hand appeared to be a prosthetic. It wasn’t a rough one like Ladd’s left arm, but when he examined it closely, it was obviously a false hand.

The man’s face seemed vaguely familiar. As he examined it, Shaft went still for a little while, but then—

From behind him, Graham asked the question straight-out. “So what’s this guy’s name, Ladd?”

Ladd answered easily. The name he gave was one Shaft knew, in a sense.

That said, he didn’t remember it as he heard it, and it would be a little while before it all came back to him.

“This guy’s Nader. Nader Schasschule.

“It sounds like he’s an enemy of my uncle Placido, so I’m gonna hide him.”