Bugsy Malone. Alan Parker

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СКАЧАТЬ of spaghetti through his rather comic toothbrush moustache. His wife picked at her dinner. She never seemed to eat any – she just toyed a twirled her fork in the pasta. Her face was long and bored, which would normally have been the first thing you’d have noticed about her but for the ridiculous feathered hat she was wearing. The couple rarely spoke to one another except for the occasional, “Irving, would you please pass the salt,” or sometimes, “Irving, would you please pass the pepper.” This was the sum of their conversation. Irving would often make loud slurping sounds with his spaghetti, but very rarely did he speak. The violinist had little effect on either of them. He could scratch away at his Italian love songs until the strings of his violin wore through and snapped – it still wouldn’t have helped the conversation between Irving and his wife.

      But tonight the violinist was interrupted. Not by a clumsy waiter bumping into him or by a persistent customer asking for ‘O Sole Mio’ for the twenty-third time. He was interrupted by something far more important. In fact, the entire front window, on which was neatly painted ‘Mama Lugini’s Italian Restaurant’, shattered into a million pieces.

      The customers looked up from their dinners and the violinist almost, but not quite, stopped playing. He looked up from his violin and saw, standing in line on the sidewalk, Dandy Dan’s gang – their splurge guns gleaming in the lamplight. Irving stopped slurping.

      A passing waiter was the first to move. He panicked – and dropped an enormous plate of tacky spaghetti into the coloured feathers of Irving’s wife’s hat. Irving himself was less fortunate, because it was he whom Dan’s gang had come for. His puzzled stare demanded an answer. He got it. The splurge guns burst into action. Each one belched out its foamy white contents. Irving received the full blast head on, and immediately dropped into his spaghetti under the weight of the sticky onslaught. His wife, a bedraggled mess of spaghetti strands and loose feathers, started screaming. Her face wobbled up and down. In fact, the scream was some time coming, as her face seemed to tremble for an eternity before a piercing shriek escaped from her larynx. The other diners in the restaurant all ran for cover – so did the violinist. In fairness to him, it is true to say he kept on faithfully playing whilst he made his exit – ducking down behind the cheese counter.

      The hoods, their work successfully completed, made their getaway. However, one of their number wasn’t quite up to the slick behaviour of the rest of the gang, as they began to climb back into the sedan outside. It was Doodle.

      Doodle had never been the cleverest of hoods and was a little out of place in the immaculate company of the Dandy Dan gang. In fact, he was almost dumb enough for Fat Sam’s gang. He slipped in the doorway and the precious splurge gun he was carrying fell to the floor and slid across the tiles. The terrified diners stared in amazement. Doodle watched their inquisitive eyes move towards the secret gun lying on the floor. The gun he had been told to guard with his life. He was unsure what to do. He floundered in the restaurant while his worried little piggy eyes darted about behind his spectacles. One of the other hoods came back to pull him out.

      “Doodle, get out of here.”

      “But, Charlie, what about the splurge gun?”

      “Ssh.”

      “Dandy Dan said take care of the splurge gun.” He bent down to pick up the weapon. The hood grabbed Doodle very roughly and yanked him into the street. “You stupid idiot, Doodle. Watch your mouth, you fool.”

      Another hood took Doodle’s free arm and bundled him into the sedan. With a screech, they took off into the night.

      The customers in the restaurant crawled out from under the tables, not quite sure what had happened. The violinist returned from the safety of the cheese counter and, as if nothing had happened, went straight into his very best version of ‘O Sole Mio’.

      Dobbs, the crooked accountant, was on the same list as Irving, only he didn’t know it. He had been Fat Sam’s accountant for as long as Fat Sam had run the rackets. He wasn’t the fanciest accountant in the business. His office was his briefcase and his credentials were his two-year stretch in the State Pen. He hadn’t thought of going straight ever since he was caught cheating in his accountancy examination finals. His one-room apartment was a mess, with empty packets of tea, his favourite weakness, strewn amongst the sheets of paper on which he’d totted up a million crooked sums. His dishonest living never worried him. He always slept well. Always, that is, unless he was interrupted – like tonight.

      He first knew something was up when he heard the heavy feet of Bronx Charlie on the wooden staircase outside his door. He tried to open his eyes. This was difficult. He had been asleep for hours and his eyelids felt as if they were stapled together. He groped in the darkness for the switch on his bedside lamp. As it happened, this wasn’t necessary. Bronx Charlie kicked open his bedroom door and the light from the hallway swept across Dobbs’s bed. He blinked. His hair was a mess and his crumpled, dirty, blue and white striped pyjamas wouldn’t have looked out of place in the garbage can. He blinked only once, or maybe twice, before the splurge gun Bronx Charlie was carrying burst into action and Dobbs was well and truly splurged against the brass railings of his bedhead. Bronx Charlie returned the way he had come, his feet thundering on the wooden stairs as he made his getaway.

      BLOUSEY THOUGHT SHE’D shaken him off. She stood on the kerb outside Pop Becker’s bookstore and pulled on her gloves. But Bugsy was right behind her. Her face dropped. As she moved away, Bugsy quickly followed.

      “Can I give you a lift?”

      Blousey was determined to ignore him, but the offer of a lift was too tempting.

      “You got a car?”

      Bugsy couldn’t lie. “Er... no.”

      Blousey was not impressed.

      “So how you gonna give me a lift, buster? Stand me on a box?”

      “I thought we’d share a cab.”

      Blousey was even less impressed. “Forget it, I don’t share fares. I’m a lady. Furthermore, I’m broke.”

      Blousey quickened her pace, and Bugsy had to run to keep up with her.

      “Who said anything about sharing fares?”

      “No?” Blousey was curious.

      “Certainly, not. I thought you’d pay.”

      That was it. Not even if he turned out to be a Vanderbilt or a producer with the Ziegfield Follies would she give him any more of her time.

      Bugsy carried on undaunted. “Well, let’s walk, anyway. It’s a nice night.”

      Blousey splashed through a puddle and muttered under her breath. She was beginning to feel irritated by him.

      “You shouldn’t walk in the streets at night – it’s dangerous.”

      “We’ll be all right. We’ve got your baseball bat.”

      Blousey stopped dead in her tracks.

      “Quit the we, pal. You mean I’ll be all right.”

      She started walking once more, this time even faster. Bugsy’s little legs moved back and СКАЧАТЬ