He wanted the copper to focus on it, to worry about it, to watch it coming the way a rat stares into the eyes of a snake.

Hall frowned when the copper didn’t seem to notice it.

Rossett stepped away from Finnegan, then walked toward Hall up the aisle as if he were looking for soap on the shelves. He moved fast, but in a way that seemed casual, matter-of-fact, like he was already tired of the fight and just wanted to get it over with.

Hall stopped. Hall started to back up. Hall never backed up.

Hall started to wonder why he was doing it now.

“I’ll cut you!” He was surprised at the sound of his own voice.

He never shouted, not ever.

The copper kept coming.

“I mean it!” he shouted again. This time the pitch was so high, he was embarrassed by it.

The copper kept coming, faster, certain.

Like death, black coat open, black suit, black tie, black hair, black eyes.

Death was coming.

Hall swiped with the razor too early, missed, tried to swipe again with a backhand, then felt his forearm being gripped and pushed up into his face. He felt another hand against his elbow. The pressure almost smothered him as he tried to not fall backward onto the floor.

He failed.

He fell backward and cracked his head so hard, he chipped a tooth and bit through his bottom lip.

He couldn’t see what was happening, but the weight of the copper pressed down like earth on a coffin. Hall tried to turn his head to get out from under his own arm.

He couldn’t.

He tried to pull his other arm around to land a punch. He couldn’t. He was locked under, buried in darkness, gravity, death.

He started to panic.

He felt fingers wrap around his hand. Try as he might, he couldn’t hold the ivory handle of the razor. He twisted, desperate to get out from under the copper, as he felt the razor slide away from him.

The spare blade, he always carried a spare blade.

Hall struggled to get his free hand under his body and into his back pocket. He squirmed under the copper’s weight until he was able to draw his knife. His knuckles scraped on the floor as he slipped, then whipped it to where he thought Rossett’s face would be.

It wasn’t there.

Hall tried again, lower, and felt the blade dragging through the thick woolen overcoat Rossett was wearing. He pushed harder, trying to angle the knife from a slash to a stab.

Hall heard the slice.

It struck him as strange that he heard it but didn’t feel it.

Hall had never considered that having your throat cut wouldn’t hurt. He’d always assumed it would hurt like hell. But it didn’t, not at first; for a few seconds it just felt strange. Like his face was loose, and the skin around his jaw suddenly didn’t fit.

Icy, gasping breath filled his lungs as it washed in through the hole in his throat and then out with a chug of blood onto the floor.

Then, finally, it hurt.

Sharp, high-pitched pain.

Hall was dying. He knew it. He could hear gurgling and the sound of his heels banging on the floor. The pressure on his chest eased. He reached for his throat and felt himself leaking out.

He tried to roll onto his side, but the copper stopped him. Hall gripped at the blood and tried to keep it inside.

He tried to take a breath but felt like he was drowning.

He looked at the ceiling and noticed there was darkness at the edge of his vision. His eyes rolled; he caught a glimpse of Rossett, then the ceiling, then Rossett.

Hall was scared.

He wanted to ask for help.

The ceiling.

Rossett had blood on his face. He was trying to help him, Hall knew it.

Hall knew it was too late.

So dark now.

He wasn’t scared anymore.

The darkness became darker still.

He felt like he was sliding into a hole.

Frank Hall died.

 

Rossett sat outside the shop, feet in the gutter, a tuft of white lining on show at the top of his sleeve where the knife had sliced through. Finnegan was cuffed and facedown next to him on the pavement, trussed like a calf at a rodeo.

Rossett stared at the cigarette in his bloodstained fingers.

The paper was dirty red, almost brown.

It tasted bad as it shook.

He’d be sore later. He still wasn’t fit. The injuries of the last couple of years were starting to add up. It was getting more and more difficult to keep going to the well, draining himself a little deeper each time.

Maybe he’d come back to work too soon, but what else was he going to do?

Finnegan grunted and flexed at the handcuffs, turning his head so that he could look at Rossett.

“You are dead, copper. I swear to God, you are a dead man.”

Rossett ignored Finnegan and stared off into the distance.

Finnegan groaned and flexed again at the cuffs.