by Parker
"Step away from her," Kragan said.
Tony looked at Ty-Bop, and a gun appeared in Ty-Bop's hand as if it had always been there.
"He show a piece," Tony jerked his head at Kragan, "kill him."
From his post in the hallway junior produced a double-barreled shotgun. The bartender showed a pump gun. Both shotguns were aimed at Kragan's companions. Kragan looked at Ty-Bop. Ty-Bop looked back at him without expression. He was suddenly motionless, as if the gun had stabilized him. His small eyes had the depth and humanity of two bottle caps. It was as if his life was in his gun. Kragan looked at him the way a huge crocodile might suddenly confront a small, very poisonous viper. In Kragan's face was the slowly dawning realization that this trivial boy could kill him. Him! Cathal Kragan! The restaurant was dead silent. The diners all hunched a little lower over their tables, trying to watch, trying not to get caught watching, hoping that if the guns went off they wouldn't get hit.
"You motherfuckers have a reservation?" Tony said.
Nobody said anything. Kragan couldn't seem to take his eyes off me. His desire to kill me seemed almost sensual.
"No?" Tony said, just as if Kragan had answered. "Then get the fuck out of my restaurant." Nothing moved.
"I say three, and you ain't moving," Tony Marcus said to Kragan.
"Then Ty-Bop going to shoot you in the head. One. .."
Kragan moved. Without a word he turned and walked out. The two backup men went out after him. The room was quiet for a moment, then someone began to clap and then somebody else clapped, and then everyone in the restaurant began to applaud.
"Join us for supper, Sunny," Tony Marcus said. "Later on I'll have somebody take you home."
"I couldn't eat," I said.
"How'bout this animal here, she like chitlins?"
"I don't think so," I said.
"Never liked them much either," Tony said.
CHAPTER 56
I was in a big round booth at the back of a coffee shop opposite the green in Taunton with three Burkes and two Antonionis. I was the only female. "I had heard that your son was divorced from this lady, Desmond." Albert Antonioni said.
"What's between them is not our business," Richie's father said. "Richie says she's still family."
He was thin--Irish-hollow cheeks, deep-set eyes. He had the look of Irish martyrdom about him, like some pale priest willing to starve to death for Ireland's freedom. His brother Felix, Richie's uncle, had once been a heavyweight boxer, and he bore the marks of it. There were scars around his eyes. His nose was thick and flat. His neck was short and his upper body was thick and slightly roundshouldered, as if the weight of all that muscle had begun to tire him.
"We have no problem with you," Antonioni said.
He had a white beard and a strong nose, and his dark eyes moved very quickly. His son Allie was beside him, bigger than his father and clean-shaven, but with the same nose, and the same quick eyes.
"You do, if you have a problem with Sunny," Desmond said.
At the next table were men who had come with the Antonionis. That made four on their side, and four on ours, including me. I was flattered. I knew that these things were worked out as meticulously as the seating at the Paris peace conference, and I had been counted as a full person. Before we'd come Richie had said to me, "Don't get feminist on me in this one. These guys live in a male world. We'll get what we want better if you are, ah, ladylike."
"Can I say fuck now and then," I had asked, "just to be one of the guys?"
Richie smiled.
"You will never be one of the guys," he said. "The less you say, the better it'll go."
I knew he was right, and now, on scrupulously neutral territory--about halfway between Providence and Boston, a little closer to Providence, to show Antonioni some respect, but still in Massachusetts, to show the Burkes respect--I was sitting beside Richie, letting Desmond Burke do the talking. Richie was as quiet as I was.
"I don't think we have a problem with Sunny that can't be worked out," Antonioni said. "We got some plans. We been careful making those plans, we don't interfere with your plans."
"I got no problem with your plans, Albert. There's too many lone cowhands in Boston since Gerry went down. Fast Eddie got Chinatown, Tony got the niggers, we got ours. You come in and organize the rest, it'll save me doing it. I don't want to do it. I'm happy with what I got."
"I appreciate that," Antonioni said.
"But you can't be fucking with any of us, excuse me, Sunny." I smiled modestly.
"Didn't know we were, Desmond."
"Now you do," Felix said.
Felix had taken a couple too many punches in the neck. His voice sounded the way I'd always imagined a rhinoceros might sound clearing its throat. Antonioni smiled faintly.
"We ain't afraid of you," he said.
Neither Desmond nor Felix said anything.
"On the other hand we don't need no fucking two-front war," Antonioni said. "Begging your pardon, Sunny." I smiled modestly. No one else said anything. "So whaddya need," Antonioni said. Desmond nodded at me.
"I need the Patton girl safe," I said.
"She's witness to a murder conspiracy," Antonioni said.
"I need someone for the murder, too," I said. Antonioni sat back in his seat and looked at me.
"Who'd you have in mind," Antonioni said.
"Kragan tried to kill the girl and me. I assume he did the plumber."
Antonioni looked at his son. His son nodded. "Cathal zipped him," the son said.
"And Bucko Meehan."
"He did that on his own," Allie said.
"You want Cathal?" Antonioni said.
"Yes."
"You know why Cathal zipped the plumber?" Antonioni said.
"Pictures," I said.
Antonioni nodded slowly.
"You know our interest in that?"
"Governor," I said.
Antonioni smiled again. It was an odd smile, nearly invisible. But it was real. It was the smile of a man who had once been able to laugh.
"I like a quiet woman," he said.
He drank some coffee.
"Cold," he said, and handed his cup to one of the men at the next table. The man got up and went for fresh coffee. "How you going to take Cathal down without messing up what I got in place with Patton?"
"Maybe I can't," I said.
Antonioni's new coffee arrived. He sipped some and nodded once.
"Better," he said.
He put the cup down and looked straight at me. "We got a problem," he said.
"We didn't have a problem," Desmond Burke said, "we wouldn't be sitting here trying to solve it."
Antonioni nodded. Everyone was quiet. Desmond looked at me.
"Whaddya want to do, Sunny?" he said.
"I want the girl safe," I said.
Desmond looked at Antonioni.
"I can give you that," Albert said. "But I can't guarantee Kragan. Kid could bury him if she testified."
"I can put Kragan in jail," I said.
"But will he go quiet?" Albert said.
"You tell me," I said. "What about omerta and all that."
"Kragan's Irish," Allie said. "They don't have no vow of silence."
"Even if he was straight from Palermo," Albert said, "things are different than they was. Omerta don't look so good, you're facing fucking three hundred years hard time."
"Maybe I could leave Brock Patton alone," I said.
Again everyone was quiet. Albert blew on his coffee a little, then sipped some. He looked at Allie. They looked at each other for a moment.
"Maybe we could straighten things out with Kragan," Albert said.
"That would work," I said.
On the ride home, alone together in my car, Richie said to me, "They're going to kill him, you know."
"Kragan?"
"Yep."
"I sort of figured they would," I said.
Richie was quiet. I could feel him looking at me as I drove. "You're a pretty t
ough cookie," he said.
"Thank you for noticing."
CHAPTER 57
Allie Antonioni had called Felix and told him that Albert wanted him to tell Desmond that Kragan was decommissioned. Desmond told Richie and Richie had told me. I could go home. The long exile was over. I was back in my loft. Rosie was sleeping on my bed, nearly invisible among the pillows. Millicent was with Richie; and I was entertaining her mother at my kitchen table. We talked for nearly four hours. Occasionally she cried. When she did I waited. When she stopped, we talked some more. By the time her husband arrived I was quite tired. But we had a plan. "Tea?" I said. "Coffee?"
"I have no time for this," Brock Patton said to me. "I'm not running some kind of ma and pa store. What the hell am I here for?"
I poured some more tea for Betty Patton and for me and gestured with the teapot at Brock. He shook his head.
"For God's sake get on with it," he said. He was vibrantly impatient with female silliness.
"I think I can keep most of this secret," I said.
"Excuse me?"
"The womanizing, the Asian girls." I said. "The gang bangs. The picture taking, the voyeurism. Of course I don't have to keep it secret. If you annoy me, I can get even by blabbing to everyone."
"You have no evidence."
"I have talked with your wife and she's prepared to go public, if she needs to."
"That would be a very dangerous thing for anyone to do," Patton said.
"No, it won't be. I have talked with your owner, Albert Antonioni. He will follow my lead."
"I don't believe you."
I shrugged.
"My wife won't speak a word," Patton said. I looked at Betty Patton.
"Yes," she said. "I will."
"A wife can't testify against her husband."
"Depends," I said. "But in any case she can talk to the press."
"She'd be publicly humiliated."
"I'm humiliated now," Betty Patton said. "By what I've become. By what I've allowed you to turn me into."
"Oh, you didn't want to make it with every plumber and delivery man that came to the door. You didn't want me to become governor and maybe someday president, you weren't pushing me, pushing me, like Lady Macbeth. Big bad old me made you do all that."
"I started out wanting you to love me," she said.
"That was a while ago," he said.
"Yes, it was," she said. "And then I wanted at least to be able to love you. And then I wanted at least to get even, and then I wanted to get what I thought you owed me, even if we had no marriage."
"And now what, you want to destroy me?"
"I want to save my daughter."
"Oh God, motherhood," Brock said. "Isn't it a little late for motherly self-sacrifice?"
"If I can save her, maybe I can save myself," Betty said. Brock looked at me.
"Women!" he said. "Do you have any thoughts on how to clean up this mess?"
"I do," I said. "Thank you for asking."
I gave him my most charming smile. Some men sink to their knees when I give my most ingratiating smile. Patton bore up under it manfully.
"You and Albert can stay in business," I said. "And Betty will not say anything about you to anyone. Cathal Kragan takes the fall for Kevin Humphries's murder."
"Who's Kevin Humphries?" Patton said.
"Plumber from Framingham." I said. "Was passing out pictures."
"And when Kragan, as you so thoughtfully put it, takes the fall,"
Patton said. "What ensures his silence."
"I have Antonioni's assurance that Kragan will be quiet," I said. Patton looked at his wife. She didn't speak, but her head was up and she looked at him steadily.
"And what is required of me?" he said.
"You set up an irrevocable trust fund for your wife and daughter. With my humble self as trustee. Amount of the fund to come."
"So you can embezzle from me?"
"Once the fund was in place, I'd actually be embezzling from Millicent," I said. "The fund will be large enough to cover the cost of psychotherapy for Millicent and for her mother."
Patton stood and rested his hands flat on the tabletop and glowered down at his wife and me.
"Do you ... have ... any idea ... who you're ... dealing with?"
I nodded.
"I can have you killed, for Christ sake." I shook my head.
"Oh?" Patton said. "You don't think so?"
"Albert Antonioni suggested you call him when we got to this point."
"Are you kidding?"
I reached behind me, picked up the phone on the kitchen counter, and dialed.
"Mr. Antonioni please," I said. "Sunny Randall."
I waited. In a moment Allie came on the line. "This is Allie."
"I have Brock Patton here," I said. "One moment."
Patton's face was gray. But he took the phone. "This is Brock Patton," he said. He listened for a moment.
"You know this broad, Allie?"
He listened again. For several moments, nodding his head slightly.
"Right," he said. "Right."
He listened again.
"Sure, Allie," he said. "Absolutely."
Then he hung up. His face still looked gray, and his eyes seemed very tired.
"Okay," he said. "That's the deal. Have your attorney send me the trust agreement." He looked at Betty Patton. "What about you?" he said.
"I'm not coming home," she said.
"Fine," he said. "There's a hundred others just like you."
"I know," she said.
He looked at me.
"You're a smart little bitch," he said, "aren't you."
"I'm not so little," I said.
He turned and stalked out of my loft and slammed the door, which roused Rosie. She sat up among the pillows looking annoyed.
Rosie jumped down from the bed and came briskly the length of the loft and jumped up in my lap and began to lap my neck. Betty Patton folded her arms on the tabletop and put her head down.
"Oh God," she said.
"You did good," I said.
"I still have to face Millicent."
"I know."
"I don't know what to say."
"Tell her the truth," I said. "Tell her what you did and why you did it and how you are going to try and change and why. Don't talk down to her. Don't give her orders."
"I've forfeited any rights I had to order her around," Betty said.
"Brock is right, it is crazy now to try to be a mother."
"Don't aim so high right away," I said. "Maybe you can learn to be friends in a while. And then maybe you can be an older friend, one who is helpful, one who can offer guidance, one who can love her, one who seems to be sort of like a mother."
Betty raised her head.
"Do you have a wonderful mother, Sunny?"
"Not especially," I said.
"Then how do you know all this?"
"Remember," I said, "I'm a smart little bitch."
CHAPTER 58
I had never been able to do the same painting over again, so, since my Chinatown had been destroyed, I was working on a view of the old Charles Street jail. Rosie was lying on the rug near me, and Millicent was reading the paper in bed. We had agreed on no television when I was trying to work. It was a rule for me. I couldn't stand television and when I'm working I need to be able to focus. But there was a happy and entirely accidental by-product of the rule. She had started to read the paper.... Could a book be far behind? I was busy trying to get the right gray for the jail when Rosie sat up suddenly and looked at the door. I picked up my gun from the table next to me. The doorbell rang. Rosie dashed to the door barking and being fearsome, but her tail was wagging furiously, which meant it was probably Richie. I checked through the peephole. It wasn't Richie. It was Brian. I opened the door. Brian came in and closed the door behind him and leaned forward and kissed me lightly.
"I figured I better do that," he said, "or you might shoot."
I smiled and put the g
un on the table. Brian waved at Millicent. "I might have," I said. "Would you like coffee?"
"Sure."
Brian went and looked at my painting while I measured out the coffee and water.
"You decided not to paint Chinatown?" he said.
"I can't do the same painting again," I said. "Maybe later."
"Why is that?"
"I have no idea."
"Artistic temperament?"
"I suspect that artistic temperament is bullshit," I said. "Rembrandt and van Gogh were both artists, but I doubt that they had similar temperaments."
We sat at my counter. I poured coffee. We both added milk. I used Equal in mine, Brian put sugar in his. Rosie sat at his feet, ever hopeful.
"No donuts?" he said.
"I didn't know there was going to be a cop in the house," I said. We were quiet for a moment.
"Cathal Kragan turned up in Chelsea Creek this morning," Brian said.
"Dead?"
Brian nodded.
"Shot behind his right ear," he said. "At an up angle. Bullet exited in front above his left eye."
"Good," I said.
"You have any idea how that came to pass?" Brian said.
"Yes."
"But you don't want to share?"
"It's not something you should know," I said.
"Not you?" Brian said.
"No."
"You have anything to do with it?"
"I might have gotten the ball rolling," I said.
"Richie Burke?"
"No."
Brian paused for a moment and thought.
"Richie put you in touch," he said. "His family applied some pressure."
"Maybe," I said. "Are you sorry he's dead?"
"Hell, no," Brian said. "I'm just trying to figure out where to send the medal. You want me to call Framingham, let them know?"
"No," I said. "I'll call Anderson. He was a pretty good guy in all of this."
"Me, too," Brian said.
"Yes," I said. "Especially you, too."
Again we were quiet. Brian reached over and poured himself more coffee.
"So it's over," he said.
"Except for Millicent," I said.
"How about us," Brian said. "Is it over for us?"
I felt myself tense. I knew we'd have to have this conversation, but I didn't like it any better because I knew it was coming. I nodded slowly.