“I went east to Greenwich and turned south on familiar cobblestone, heading toward the silver Twin Towers, their crowns hidden in low-lying clouds.”
That’s the last sentence of the penultimate chapter of Closing Time, Jim Fusilli’s debut as a novelist, and it resonates rather differently now than it did when he wrote it. The book was published on September 10, 2001, with strong early reviews in the trades and enthusiastic blurbs from Harlan Coben, Thomas Perry, S. J. Rozan, Nevada Barr, and Robert B. Parker.. The very next day, those towers came down.
Not the best possible time to publish a book, and the world found other matters of more pressing interest than the publication of Closing Time.
Nevertheless, he persisted…
Jim’s been a generous contributor to two of my earlier anthologies, Manhattan Noir and Dark City Lights. His story for At Home in the Dark is particularly noteworthy in light of his experience with Closing Time, as it takes place on a significant evening sixty years earlier. It’s not a very long story, but it packs a punch.
Here’s a taste of it:
THE EVE OF INFAMY by Jim Fusilli
The judge gave Billy Malone a choice: an 18-month stretch in a state prison, or the Army. Malone saw the offer as the light of good fortune. His play was drying up and his sinewy, green-eyed charm only went so far. He was thinking he needed a change.
It was coming up on 1941 and the marks had gotten wise. No one in the Bronx, Brooklyn or Manhattan would sit at a poker table with him, so he was reduced to taking down half-wit tourists. On top of that, the precinct cops were aware of his violent record as a juvenile so they were keeping a hard eye on him. They pounced when Billy Malone shattered the jaw of an auto-parts salesman from Akron who accused him of marking the deck with a thumbnail.
“Army,” Billy Malone told Judge Steigel in open court.
“I understand you are something of a card sharp,” said the judge who, to Billy Malone, looked like a walrus. “Wherever you go, let it be known.”
“Yes, your honor,” said Billy Malone, a man of few words. He had gotten what he wanted. Why agitate? He figured the Army would give him a free shot at the wide, wide world, a place littered with rubes.
#
Malone was stationed in Fort Irwin, out in the California desert, north of Barstow and about 150 miles from the nightlife in L.A. He figured his luck had run out, the sandstorms stinging his face, his throat parched from first call until he collapsed in his bunk. A 20-mile run under the scorching sun was a punishment far worse than prison back east.
He heard Los Angeles calling. After a while, he thought he’d go AWOL and lose himself in the big city. Slinging rocks or scrubbing a latrine, he dreamed of a place he’d seen only in the movies: the clubs, the broads, the action, all accompanied by palm trees and orange groves and the cool breeze off the Pacific. He heard the pounding of foamy waves, the seagulls’ caw. Fuck this, he thought, broiling in the sun, his blond hair trimmed to bristle. I’m gone.
Then his unit learned they were shipping out to Oahu.
Suddenly, Billy Malone took to Army life. What the fuck. Do what the screaming sergeant tells you to. Hump, dive, crawl, climb. Shoot, stab. A piece of cake in a climate out of Eden. Free room and board. Lie on the bunk and read the magazines as the scent of ginger and hibiscus wafted into the barracks. Listen to the wind humming through the trees.
On and off the base, the poker action was pitiable. It was theft. He had to bite his cheek to tamp down a smirk. He hung back but within months he’d cleaned out every man in the barracks including a corporal Malone sized up as weak. Next game, Malone threw him cards and the petty prick went to his rack up $600. A three-day pass ensued.
#
The club was less than two miles from the base. The first night, Malone in his floral shirt ran through a December downpour and played the Filipino card sharks straight. He managed to leave up a sawbuck and a half, more than enough for a taxi back to bed. Next night, he won $440, when a rubber trader from Guam dealt him a third jack on the night’s last hand.
The hatcheck girl took him home. Her name was Lailani. They spend the next day together too. She knew a secret cove. Someone had been there before: melted candles, discarded rum bottles. She lit the wicks and tossed the empties. Afterwards, she walked naked toward the sunlight at the cove’s edge. She returned with a small onyx pipe and a ball of hashish. He waved her off. He had plans, he told her. He was about to play for real dough.
She nodded discretely when Malone came back to the club. A man sat near him at bar. A conversation began, the man careful not to come on strong. Malone knew what he was up to, this Hawaiian glad hand, this bullfrog-looking fuck. Malone flashed 
his bankroll to pay for his drink. The man said no, on the house, and invited him to a private room. Bigger stakes. Saturday night brings in the chumps, he confided.
By midnight, Malone was at the table with a businessman from China; two GIs in blousy civilian clothes, one from Texas, the other was a skinny guy from the Deep South; and a Hawaiian, bloated, full of himself. The GIs counted their money before they anteed up. The Hawaiian, who hassled the hapless help, threw down bills like he owned a mint. Deep South beamed goofy when he won and Hawaiian stared at him with disdain. Malone looked ahead: he’d sit by while Hawaiian slow-played Deep South into poverty. The frog-faced brush had set up the GIs and the Chinaman.
Malone figured he’d been set up too. He had wondered why the rubber trader from Guam threw him the third jack last night, but now he knew. He was there to fatten the pot.
Soon the Chinaman was drained and Texas went in search of a back-alley blowjob. Eight hands in, the Hawaiian showed strong with two kings, but Deep South, who was dealing, raised and re-raised. The Hawaiian called with a boat – kings over sevens. Deep South had four nines. He giggled as he raked in $1,700. The Hawaiian sat stunned, his mouth flapped open…
THE EVE OF INFAMY BY Jim Fusilli is one of 17 stellar stories in At Home in the Dark. NB: Ebook and paperback editions are on sale now for immediate delivery. DON’T try to order the hardcover, as it’s sold out at the publisher, and while Amazon is still taking orders they’ll be unable to deliver.
