CHAPTER SIX
THE RAIN CAME EARLY
The address Tony Spada had given Danny belonged to a funeral parlor. Danny stood across the street looking at it. “That figures,” he said softly to himself.
It was a narrow three-story building wedged between a bakery and a store that sold religious articles. The sign over the door read:
ANGELOTTI & SONS
FUNERAL DIRECTORS
Somebody had thoughtfully put black curtains in the windows. Danny looked back. The Buick was half a block behind him. He crossed the street.
A little bell rang when he opened the door.
Inside, everything was quiet, carpeted and expensive. There were flowers everywhere. Roses, lilies, carnations. Enough flowers to make you wonder what they were trying to cover up.
A thin man in a black suit appeared from behind a curtain.
“May I help you?”
“I’m looking for Charlie.”
The thin man studied him. “Charlie who?”
Danny had been wondering that himself. “Charlie. Just Charlie.”
The man waited. Danny waited.
Finally Danny thought to say, “The rain came early.”
The thin man suddenly stopped looking like an undertaker.
“Okay. Who sent you?”
“Tony Spada.”
“Wait here.”
He disappeared through the curtain. Danny looked around.
There were three doors, two windows and a staircase. The front door opened inward. The window beside it had a brass latch. There was another exit somewhere behind the curtain because Danny could feel a draft.
He stopped counting. Normal people didn’t count exits. A minute later the thin man came back. “Upstairs,” he said.
Danny followed him.
At the top of the stairs was a hallway with four doors. The thin man knocked twice on the last one.
A voice said, “Yeah.”
The man opened the door. Charlie was sitting behind a desk eating spaghetti. Danny hadn’t expected spaghetti.
Charlie was perhaps fifty, heavy through the shoulders, with gray hair combed straight back. His jacket hung on a chair. His shirtsleeves were rolled up and there was a napkin tucked into his collar.
He pointed at the chair opposite him.
“Sit.”
Danny sat. Charlie wound spaghetti around his fork.
“Tony sent you?”
“Yes.”
“What did he say?”
“The rain came early.”
Charlie stopped winding spaghetti.
“That’s all?”
“That’s all.”
Charlie put down the fork.
“You know what it means?”
“No.”
“Good.”
Charlie wiped his mouth.
“What’s your name?”
“Danny Marino.”
“I know.”
That wasn’t good.
Charlie leaned back.
“You work for Rizzo.”
“Since yesterday.”
“Fast career.”
“I’ve always been ambitious.” Charlie almost smiled. “Tony says you’re useful.”
“I carried an envelope.”
“And lost five hundred dollars.”
“I didn’t lose it.”
Charlie looked at him.
Danny looked back.
“Careful,” Charlie said.
“I am.”
“No. You’re not. Careful people don’t correct me.”
Danny considered this.
“Then I lost five hundred dollars.”
Charlie smiled.
There was a knock at the door.
The thin man entered.
He bent down and whispered something into Charlie’s ear.
Charlie looked at Danny.
“The Buick?”
Danny said nothing.
Charlie nodded.
“How long?”
“Since Murray’s.”
“You get the plate?”
Danny gave it to him.
Charlie stopped smiling.
That was the first mistake Danny had made.
Not getting the number.
Remembering it.
Charlie studied him for several seconds.
“What’d you do before Rizzo?”
“Nothing.”
“Everybody does something.”
“I was unemployed.”
“You don’t look unemployed.”
“What does unemployed look like?”
“Usually hungrier.”
“I ate.”
Charlie stared at him.
Then suddenly he laughed. “Jesus Christ,” he said, pushing his plate away. “Okay, Danny Marino. Here’s what you’re going to do. You’re going downstairs. You’re going out the front door. You’re going to turn right and walk straight ahead.”
“And then?”
“Nothing.”
“Nothing?”
“Just keep walking.”
Danny stood.
Charlie picked up his fork again.
Danny reached the door.
“Danny.”
He turned.
Charlie was looking at him over the spaghetti.
“If the Buick follows you, don’t run.”
“Why?”
“Because then they’ll know you’re afraid.”
“What if I am afraid?”
Charlie shrugged.
“That’s your business.”
Danny went downstairs.
The undertaker opened the front door for him.
“Have a pleasant afternoon.”
“I’ll try.”
Danny stepped onto the sidewalk.
The Buick was still there.
He turned right.
One block.
The Buick pulled away from the curb.
Two blocks.
It stayed behind him.
Danny passed a fruit stand, a shoe repair shop and two old men arguing in Italian.
He had walked three blocks. Nothing happened. He kept walking. At the fourth block a delivery truck pulled suddenly out of an alley and stopped sideways across the street.
The Buick hit its brakes. Two men came out of the bakery behind Danny. Another man stepped from a doorway ahead. The Buick backed up. A second car appeared behind it. Nowhere to go. The Buick stopped.
Danny kept walking.
That was what Charlie had told him to do.
Behind him, car doors opened.
Nobody shouted.
Nobody ran.
That simple fact didn’t calm him. It only made it worse. Danny reached the corner. Then he heard three sharp sounds.
Pop.
Pop.
Pop.
Not loud.
A woman screamed.
Finally, Danny turned.
The Buick sat in the middle of the street with its driver’s door open. One of the men was lying beside it. The other was gone.
Danny looked toward the funeral parlor. Charlie was standing three blocks away on the sidewalk. Even at that distance Danny could see him.
Charlie raised one hand. Not waving. Just one hand. Then he went back inside.
Danny continued walking. He had learned three things. The rain had indeed come early. Charlie had wanted to know who was following him. And somebody had just killed a man to find out.
Danny put his hands in his pockets and kept moving. There was one other thing he had learned. The five hundred dollars wasn’t missing.
It had bought something. But what?
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HOW TO WRITE A MYSTERY
Chapter Six Breakdown — The Rain Came Early
Chapter Six is about information. Almost nothing is explained, yet the reader learns a great deal.
1. START WITH A SURPRISE
Danny has been sent to an address.
It turns out to be a funeral parlor.
That immediately creates atmosphere and gives us a small joke:
“That figures.”
The location also quietly suggests death before anybody dies.
2. MAKE THE PASSWORD MEAN NOTHING
“The rain came early.”
Neither Danny nor the reader knows what it means.
That’s important. Don’t explain every mystery when you introduce it. An unexplained detail gives the reader something to carry forward.
3. LET THE CHARACTER GIVE HIMSELF AWAY
Charlie asks about the Buick.
Danny gives him the license plate number from memory.
That’s a tiny action with large consequences.
Charlie realizes Danny isn’t an ordinary unemployed kid. Danny has accidentally revealed a skill he shouldn’t necessarily possess.
This advances the hidden story without exposing it.
4. USE HUMOR TO KEEP THE SCENE HUMAN
Charlie is eating spaghetti.
Danny corrects Charlie.
“Then I lost five hundred dollars.”
The humor keeps the chapter from becoming melodramatic. These people aren’t walking around announcing that they’re dangerous. They’re eating lunch and talking.
That makes the danger more believable.
5. GIVE SIMPLE INSTRUCTIONS
Charlie tells Danny:
Walk three blocks.
Don’t run.
Nothing complicated.
Simple instructions create suspense because the reader knows something is supposed to happen but doesn’t know what.
6. DON’T ANNOUNCE THE VIOLENCE
The trap closes quietly.
A truck blocks the street. Men appear. Another car arrives.
Then:
Pop.
Pop.
Pop.
The violence occupies only a few lines. The preparation takes much longer.
That’s usually more effective than describing the shooting in detail.
7. END WITH A NEW QUESTION
At the beginning of the chapter, we wonder:
What does “the rain came early” mean?
By the end, we’ve partly answered that question—but created a better one:
What did the missing five hundred dollars buy?
That’s the engine of serialized mystery writing:
Answer one question. Create another.
And underneath everything is the larger question we’re deliberately refusing to answer:
Who exactly is Danny Marino?
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Here’s the Bardo bus now!!!
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See You At The Top!!!
gorby