ROAD TO PERDITION 513
losing fi nancial proposition. O’Sullivan and son thus begin their crime spree against
Midwestern banks and their dirty deposits from Capone’s and Looney’s gambling,
bootlegging, and extortion revenue. Looney increases the bounty on O’Sullivan’s head
to a quarter million dollars, and O’Sullivan provides Eliot Ness with a paper trail to
indict the elder Looney in exchange for permission to continue his eff orts to fi nd and
kill Connor Looney. When O’Sullivan burns and robs the mob’s riverboat gambling
operation, Capone decides that Connor Looney is more trouble than he’s worth and
hands him over to O’Sullivan, who gives him what he deserves. Unfortunately, in the
end, O’Sullivan also must pay for his sins, himself shot down by an assassin, who is in
turn shot down by young Michael.
Collins based his well-researched story loosely on actual characters and events: Rock
Island-area crime boss John Looney did have a betrayed lieutenant, and the riverboat
Quinlan did burn. Rayner’s impressively detailed black-and-white art depicts Ness,
Capone, and Frank Nitti, Capone’s right-hand man, with nearly photorealistic historical
accuracy. However, it is O’Sullivan and Michael, the most fi ctional of the book’s char-
acters, who bring the story to life. Following the murder of his wife, O’Sullivan wants
to drop off Michael at a relative’s farm in Perdition, Kansas, but mobsters are watching
the farmhouse. Neither can he entrust Michael to any law enforcement agency in the
Midwest; he tells Michael that all are corrupted by mob money: “Th ere are no police in
Chicago... just killers in blue uniforms” (121–22). Th e only way that he can make sure
that Michael is safe is to keep him near, and readers see both anguish and tenderness
in his face when he leaves Michael in the car while he tends to the business of retribu-
tion. Father and son develop a powerful emotional bond over the course of their violent
adventure, one that would not likely have occurred if their lives had not been disrupted
by violence.
Unlike Lone Wolf and Cub ’s toddler son, Perdition ’s Michael is nearly 10, capable of
helping his father achieve vengeance by driving the getaway car and sometimes handling
a gun, old enough to develop a deep relationship with his stoic father. O’Sullivan’s seri-
ous demeanor with Michael during their long car rides and hotel stays is frequently
tempered with displays of simple, genuine approval of his son’s behavior. When Michael
follows his instructions to wait until he returns, he says, “Good lad.” On the country
road where he teaches Michael to drive, he off ers supportive praise: “You’re doing fi ne.”
Never does he show anger or violence toward Michael. Neither does he wish that Mi-
chael follow in his occupational footsteps: “Be whatever you want—as long as it’s not
like me” (239). Unable ever to return home, Michael and his father are sealed off from
their former lives, and Rayner strategically emphasizes this psychological loss and emo-
tional distance when he shows the characters looking out through the car’s windows,
which refl ects the city or the countryside outside, one image superimposed upon the
other, neither complete. In the novel’s many action scenes, Rayner’s depictions of vio-
lence are both chaotic and beautiful; O’Sullivan leaps, lunges, and springs with the ut-
most grace, and his bullets do not miss. Th e angles of depiction are unpredictable, and
the choreography is elegant.
