THE RUNNER SCREENPLAY, BRIAN R. LUNDIN [phonics reader .TXT] 📗

/> Alphonse remembers what happened to Margarita on the boat, how she looked, and how she looked at him with disgust. Shit, after that incident, she would not have anything to do with him and he never got the pussy. Even with the hard feelings he had for Pauli, it could be very dangerous attempting to take out a boss.

ALPHONSE
You ran this by the Commission?

VITO
Lying.

Yep.

ALPHONSE
What your plan?

VITO
We have already hit, Vincente Ramona and out next hit is going to be on Jimmy Noone, the new underboss.

ALPHONSE
You talked to GRISANI from the west side?

VITO
Nah, I doubt if he would go alone, his head is too far up Pauli’s ass.

ALPHONSE
How many shooters you got?

VITO
About 200 of my guys and I’ve got the word out for some more, maybe some of them tamale eating street gangs, them crazy mutherfuckers will do anything for a taste.
Alphonse was quiet while he calculated the risk against the benefits. If he joined Vito in his coup of the boss and loss, he was dead, but on the other hand, if Vito was successful, he might become his underboss. Furthermore, if he refused to join with Vito, he would never leave here alive.

ALPHONSE
I’m in.
Pauli and members of his Chicago Mob went to the mattresses as suggested by his former consigliore, Vincente Ramona he notified his capo regimes to come in with their crews, Grisani and his crew of 200 hundred soldiers joined Pauli at his home but Alphonse did not show up.

GRISANI
I Think Alphonse has joined Vito boss.

PAULI
I figured he would, he never got over me fuckin’ that little bitch,” what an ass hole to get all upset over a piece of ass.

Genco Grisani, Gaza’s West Side Capo lived on the 25th floor of a fashionable high-rise apartment building on the west side with his wife Isabella and their two twin daughters, 15 year old Wendy and Antonnete. The illuminated clock radio on the nightstand in Genco’s bedroom went out at 2:30 am. The appliances quiet electric hums and buzzes suddenly stopped. The bright whiteness on the twin’s television set was gone, replaced by a black ominous screen. In the lobby, the night doorman cussed the building’s out-of–date wiring system as the lobby lights flashed off and on. The hallways on all the floors were dark caverns, but a thin bright light of a flashlight illuminated Genco’s hallway. The light centered on the imposing dark wood door to Gecko’s apartment.

Two men dressed in dark clothing huddled together outside the door. Alphonse Philanti pulled a king ring holding several skeleton keys and inserted a key in the Atlas lock, one after another. Finally, one of the skeleton keys began to slowly turn in the lock; Alphonse gave a wry smile to his partner, Johnny Scalise as they quietly entered the apartment. Isabella Grisani was a light sleeper and awakened when she heard someone moving in the front room. She listened and immediately knew something in their apartment was different. She turned and looked at the darken clock radio and she heard footsteps and muffled voices. After a few minutes, her eyes adjusted to the dark. The sound of cars racing down Lake Shore Drive and the sounds of the late night street people drifted up from the street, but the apartment was quiet. She heard a floorboard creak as the footsteps slowly moved closer to the bedroom. She thought about her daughters and sat up, reaching out for her husband, but he was not there, where was Genco she thought. She felt a gentle hand cover her mouth and she looked into her husband’s eyes that were standing over her. Genco with a finger to his mouth motioned for his wife to get out the bed and go into the bathroom. Genco heard the light footsteps padding across the plush front room carpet; he could hear their shoes and the light brushing against furniture. Isabella had been an Outfit wife long enough that someone was going to die tonight, maybe her and her family or whoever had invaded their home. Genco calmly sat down in his favorite chair that faced the bedroom door. Isabella noticed the shotgun on his lap. Isabella was scared as her breathing became, labored.

Genco had the advantage it was his house; his bedroom and he knew they were there and they did not know he knew. Another floorboard creaked and then there was a loud click. The bedroom door flew open. Silhouetted in the doorway were the two assassins, their handguns pointed at the bed. Without saying a word, Genco fired one round from the shotgun. The pellets rammed into the chest of Alponse and Scalise. Scalise let out a blood-curling cry shocked by the unexpected ambush. The flashlight felled from his hand, silently falling on the carpet and cast an eerie glow on the ceiling as a series of ball bearing-like pellets tore through Scalise’s heart and lungs. Scalise was dead before he felled on the carpet. Alphonse blinded by the flash of the first shotgun blast, attempted to adjust his sight to find the shooter but the impact of another blast from the shotgun knocked him out the room, he fell face up on the deep brown carpet in the hallway, dead.

GENCO
Go check on the girls.
Genco wife ran out the bathroom, stepped over the two dead bodies and sidestepped the blood-splattered carpet. The twin daughters were sitting in a corner of their bedroom holding each other as their mother entered.

WINDY
What happening, mama?

Isabella sat beside her daughters and held them close as tears streamed down their faces. There was loud pounding on the apartment door and muffled sounds came from the hallway,

VO
Is everyone ok in there?

Genco got up off the chair, went to bedroom where his family was and casually called out “Everything’s, ok.

Things were going good for Jerome McLemore, the violence had stopped and his wheel and stations were making money, over $20,000 a day. Every day the Chicago newspapers ran editorials about Pauli Gaza and the Outfit harassment of the poor black people in Bronzeville. The editorial page demanded a federal investigation of the killings of innocent people.

TED
I hear that guinea Pauli and other old-line guinea members have a million dollar hit on Vinnie’s shooters.

JEROME
Yeah, that’s what I hear also, but Vito is not going to lie down, he’s going to fight. Everybody knows that Vito was the shooter, so I guess him and Gaza will be going after each other I hate to see it ‘cause it going to be a bloody war.

TED
You’re a good guy Jerome but I hope those wop bastards kill each other.

JEROME
I know but we have still got to be on guard and ready whenever or however this thing end.

The feud between Vito and Pauli gave Jerome McLemore time to coordinate and solidify the new organization with the other Policy Kings.

TED
I’ve setup a meeting tonight with Reverend James and a guy from the defender we’ll meet at the church at eight.

JEROME
Good, it’s time for us get or shit together.

Vito took the death of his two assassin’s matter-of factly.

VITO
Them two assholes couldn’t knock one man and a house full of bitches, good riddance. Now we’ve got Genco our ass, too. No more fucking around we’re going after the big guy himself.

JIMMY
That’s going to be tough, boss, you know he surrounded with heat. Are you going to go to Commission for an ok?

VITO
I’ve already talked with a couple of the guys on the Commission, and the word is the big boys are tired of the heat Gaza is bringin’. Every week, he’s in the papers or on television and the feds are all over his ass. A lot of people are concerned that he can’t handle the pressure.

JIMMY
Yeah, I read an article in the Sun-times about a possible indictment coming down on him for a couple of murders years ago plus the big guys think he’s responsible for giving the ok to fuck with them Nigras and I hear he has hired two shooters from the old country, but they can be bought off.

VITO
We’ve got a meeting with two of the big guys from New York tonight.

JOEY LUCHISI was an impressively handsome man, in his late sixties with a deep suntan, an exquisitely tailored suit and his wavy black hair was expertly barbered. Joey’s family emigrated from Palermo in the late 1800’s and settled in north Florida. His father Joseph over the years became involved in politics and soon joined the other town politicians who controlled gambling and corrupted the local police and judges. When Joseph was killed by a bunch of redneck Irish “Gavoone,” or hooligans, his son exterminated the killers. The politicians who were his father’s business associates were unprepared for Joey’s ferocity and eventually he became the Don of Florida. Joey opened ties with the corrupt government of Cuba and provided money for their pleasure resorts, Havana gambling houses and whorehouses that offered attractive all expenses paid junkets to American tourist and gamblers.

When he was forty years old he contracted polio and was confined to a wheel chair. A large man wheeled him into the rear room of Su Casa Restaurante in Riverdale, Illinois, pushed him to a table and ordered a glass of water.

INT. SU CASA RESTAURANTS

The Restaurante was furnished typically Italian with red-checked tablecloths and linen placemats over highly polished wood tables a flower stuck in a Tuscan pottery vase. Vito shook hands with Joey who surprisingly had a strong grip. The man gave Joey two pills that he took with shaken hand. Both men wore expensive grey shark-skinned suits, white shirts and dark ties. Vito was totally out of place wearing a bright orange sport-coat and green pants.

FRANKIE “SNUBNOSE” LUCA the Capo di Capi Re, or the “Don,” of one of the five families of New York. Frankie was sixty-five years old, tall, dark and had wavy white hair and a gaunt face. His powerful, muscular body spread nicely over his six foot three frame. He got his nickname because of the two Snubnose Colt .38 revolver he always carried. Unlike the suntanned Joey, who looked like he a salesman for expensive yachts and Florida’s waterfront homes, Snubnose was of the old Sicilian tradition and had the look of no-nonsense, a man totally void of vanity. Snubnose had some of the gambling in Brooklyn and some in Queens. He had some prostitution and he completely controlled Staten Island. He was involved in the illegal smuggling of Italian emigrates from Canada. Joey Luchisi and Snubnose were senior members of the Commission and well respected Dons. They were founding members of the Commission with Lucky Luciana in the old days.

Snubnose enchanted the attractive Italian waitress dressed in a perfectly starched white blouse covered with a black vest by ordering a bottle of Ruffino, pastic-cini di spinaci, fried artichoke, pollo in galantina and veal kidney in perfect Italian. The waitress poured everyone a glass of the wine. Frankie sniffed the wine and nodded his approval. To the customers in the restaurant they appeared to be successful businessmen having a business lunch. The Commission sent the two senior crime bosses to investigate the war between Vito and his boss, Pauli Gaza.
After dinner and a second cup of espresso the men relaxed.

SNUBNOSE
Now to business the