by James R Benn
Jake couldn’t answer right away. Remnants of fear still flooded his body, shame following right behind. The inside of his leg felt cold and clammy. Looking back to the oak tree, he wished the owl would come again so Clay could see it, and they could both feel the silent wings beating against air.
“Yeah. I’m okay. We gotta go around, way around. There could be other mines.”
“Right,” Clay said. “We’re probably going to run out of woods soon anyway. Those owls like to be near fields and open ground. We might be coming up on a farm or village.”
“It could be ours, you know.”
“Why?”
“Look around. The road set with anti-tank mines, under the snow. No other Germans around. Maybe they pulled out, left this here to slow down our tanks. Either way, at least we know there’s no heavy stuff in front of us. This is the only road around here. They had to have mined it after their vehicles pulled out.”
It made sense to Clay. Getting the others off the road, they looped around the minefield, skirting the road as widely as they could, staying parallel with it as best they could. The sun was low in the sky now, glimmering through a tiny break in the clouds right on the horizon. Jake knew everything was going to be okay. The owl had to be good luck, anything that majestic coming close to you had to be lucky. He watched the sunlight brighten the tree branches and remembered the soft air moving against his cheek. He felt alive.
Chapter Fourteen
1964
Friday night was the busiest night at Jake’s Tavern. It was a winning combination, folks getting off the job and not having to get up and go to work in the morning. By six o’clock, the place was packed, and Brick kept busy flipping burgers as Clay and Cheryl worked the bar and brought food and drinks to the tables. It was different on Saturday nights, people drifting in and out, on their way somewhere else or heading home. Jake’s wasn’t a Saturday night destination, but it was a fine Friday night way-station, a place to let the tension of the week drain away and to settle down for the weekend.
Friday night was a good numbers night too. The more folks drank, the easier the dollars came. Relaxing into the evening, all things seemed possible, dreams more achievable, fortunes more winnable, the numbers luckier. Tonight was a night like that, for everyone except Clay.
Nothing had gone right all day. The road crew outside was close to the Tavern, making a racket with all their tools, tearing up the roadway. There was no parking on Miller Street while they worked, but at least they’d started to lay asphalt down the other end, so it wouldn’t last long. But that was a mild annoyance compared to things at home. Addy hadn’t even let him finish when he told her he would be out of the numbers racket soon. All the things he could’ve said, should’ve said, ran through his mind, perfect in their logic now that it was too late.
“Don’t even make a promise to me, Clay. Just do it and tell me it’s over. I can’t be bothered with what you promise, I want to know what’s done.” With that she’d turned on her heel and walked out of their bedroom, as certain of what needed to be done as she had been seventeen years ago when Clay stammered out the beginnings of a proposal, stumbling over the words, hesitating and nearly retreating before she grabbed him by the lapels and said yes, of course, yes, I’ll marry you. Her determination was one of the things he loved about her. Her ability to see the outcome she wanted and make it happen, whether it was the supervisor’s job at the phone company or Clay saying I do, endeared her to him. What he loved was now focused on him full force, a line drawn in the sand.
She hadn’t said another word to him the rest of the morning. He’d worked out in the yard, weeding the garden, planting a holly bush in the back yard that he’d picked up at a nursery. When he stopped home after his rounds, she wasn’t there. He’d waited an hour, but it was getting late in the afternoon. Damn her, he’d said to himself as he walked out to his car, damn her all to hell.
But he couldn’t keep the epithet alive. He didn’t want her damned, couldn’t even work up a decent rage at her threat to leave. She was right, he knew. He’d brought them to this place, with his ease at lying and covering things up. It had been easy, so easy, except that he hadn’t known the hard part would come later, after he was caught up in barbed wire, in the thick of it, taking fire from all sides.
Clay ached for Addy, ached with the loneliness of a man who sees the woman he loves every day, but knows it might be the last. Watching the love drain out of her, replaced by pity. He didn’t want to fail, not at this, not now. To save his marriage, his family, he had to get everything right, figure out all the angles, use all the cunning he had to get out of the rackets. Use it all, then drop it like a bag of garbage on the side of the road and don’t look back. But first, he had some immediate problems to deal with.
No one had come for the pickup. He had everything from Thursday’s run, including the eight thou from Dom, plus today’s numbers take. Over twelve thousand bucks, not including tonight’s receipts at the Tavern. He’d called Mr. Fiorenza, and left a message, asking when he could expect a visit. Half an hour later, some stooge called and told him to sit tight, they were running a little behind.
Bullshit. Running scared was more like it. He wondered if Al were really that much of a threat to them. Were they scared of him, or had they gone to war, and maybe couldn’t spare anyone for a pickup run? Could be. It would be nice if Mr. Fiorenza just took care of that problem, eliminated it for him.
Or would it? That would only mean he was back under Mr. Fiorenza’s control. It didn’t really solve anything for him, far as Addy was concerned. But, it was his most pressing problem, a hair's breadth ahead of Addy, who was threatening in the home stretch. Compared to Al and Addy, Mr. Fiorenza was a long-term problem. Broken legs and a broken home trumped retirement from the numbers.
What Clay needed was a long-term solution to all three. He kept thinking it through, as he delivered two plates of burgers and pickles to a booth and collected the cash. It was the Town road crew chief and his wife, who apologized for the inconvenience, and said they’d be working through the weekend to finish the street by Monday. That’s one small problem solved. Now, back to the other. He had the advantage of surprise. No one would expect him to be anything but a delivery guy, a pickup man, a bartender. Everyone thought they could push him around, a guy past forty who didn’t make his living with a gun. But surprise, surprise, he used to.
He took six bottles of Schlitz to a booth crammed full of guys from the AMF Cuno factory who didn’t want glasses. Yeah, and the .45 was a surprise too. No one knew he had it. Only Addy, and she thought he’d thrown it away years ago. Maybe he’d have to get rid of it once he used it. He didn’t like the idea of throwing it away, like a piece of junk. He could bury it. Grabbing a tray and clearing empties from the tables, he came back with a damp bar rag to clean the spilled beer and crumbs off the lacquered wood. Yeah, maybe wrap it up real nice and bury it someplace, a place he could easily remember, but not connected to him. But that could wait. First things first.
He’d thought about it a lot, and it boiled down to three main questions. Where to do it? How to set it up? And most importantly, could he still do it?
He’d done it often enough. Sometimes at a distance, sometimes close up. Like that old man trying to climb up the gravel slope. Why didn’t he stop when they told him to halt? He still wondered about him. Or the sentry he’d killed, grabbing his jaw from behind and clamping it shut so he wouldn’t scream as he drove his knife in between shoulder blade and spine. The hazel green eyes of the German he’d killed with the .45 floated in front of him, looking past him to the trees and an unknown future.
He worked the register for a few minutes, totaling up tabs. Hitting the dollar and cent buttons, he worked the crank, made change, and watched the faces pass in front of him. Most were acquaintances, a few friends, some strangers. Most were happy, a few were showing their mean streak after a few drinks, and others straight-faced. Which of them could kill a guy face-to-face? Not t
he mean ones. They paraded their badness openly, wore it like a badge, not leaving any room for it to fester inside and eat away at them. The smilers, maybe in self-defense. But the ones with the tight lips, neither grim nor glad, they were the ones he’d put his money on. He knew about the cost of keeping secrets, how it blanked out your looks, protecting you from giving anything away.
Bringing dishes back to Brick, he gave him a brief roll of the eyes. Can’t believe how busy it is tonight. How much could he actually keep hidden? Sometimes he’d wonder if there was a limit to the secrets a man could keep stored away. Maybe this would be one thing too much, maybe it would show. Or maybe he could pull it off, shake his head when he read the paper, tsk tsk, a shooting, poor guy got killed. Maybe it was better not to say anything. Probably. Why draw attention?
He drew two schooners of Pabst draft and served a couple at the bar. The guy put down a five-spot and Clay didn’t take it. He’d learned there was a better chance of a second order if you didn’t give change. Change was final. So he moved on, too busy right now to make change, no time for nickels and dimes. What would life be like when he was out of the numbers? Less money for sure, but there was time to be gained, he had to admit. Maybe he could make something more out of the tavern. Fix it up, maybe even get a loan and put in a real kitchen…
“Clay! Telephone,” Cheryl said, waving the receiver at the other end of the bar and setting it down. “It’s Addy.”
Clay glanced at his watch. Ten-thirty. Why was she calling now? He always worked late on Fridays, and she hardly ever called here even when they’d been on better terms…
“Addy?” He felt the tremble in his voice as thoughts of her suitcases packed flew through his mind.
“Chris is in jail.”
“What?” He couldn’t take in the words, couldn’t quite believe what she was saying.
“You heard me. He’s down at the station. Your friend Bob called, all apologetic. Said he was sorry, but there was nothing he could do.”
“Addy, what’s he in—” Glancing around the bar, Clay cupped his hand over the receiver. “For doing what?”
“Stealing a car. Looks like he’s getting a head start following in his father’s footsteps. You go down there and bring him home, right now!”
Click, and she was gone. Clay listened to the silence on the phone as the buzz of conversation and laughter flowed around him. Cheryl gave him a glance and a slight electric hum came out of the earpiece as he nodded, pretending his wife hadn’t just slammed the receiver down on him. He hung up, leaving his hand on the phone for a few seconds, making sure it wasn’t shaking.
“I gotta go, Cheryl,” he said, walking down the bar.
“What’s wrong, honey?” Cheryl yelled to his back as he shut the door to the storeroom behind him. Plenty, he wanted to yell back at her, plenty.
Clay knew the desk sergeant but it didn’t make any difference. He still had to sign in and be escorted upstairs as if he were a stranger or a suspect. He’d served the guy a hundred beers, saw him at ball games at Ceppa Field every now and then. Tonight, it was come this way, Mr. Brock, no acknowledgement of any bond at all. He’d strayed past the boundaries, fallen from grace, the father of a troublemaker, more to be pitied than befriended.
The cop’s heavy shoes click-clacked down the linoleum hallway, his keys and handcuffs clinking in time as they swayed from his belt. Clay’s movements were quiet, his soft shoes made for standing all day silent as he padded alongside the cop. He felt stripped bare, like a POW shorn of his weapons, helmet and gear, more ragamuffin than warrior, being led to the rear by an armed guard. He envied the cop his thick leather belt, snug around his middle, his steel-toed shoes, uniform and badge. It held a man together, let him know who he was. He looked down at his black slacks and white shirt, sleeves rolled up to the elbow, and sniffed, smelling stale beer and grease.
“In here, Mr. Brock,” the cop said. He opened door and gestured inside. Clay nodded and forgave him the distance he’d put between them. He knew his place, a barman, deliveryman, lousy father, worse husband.
It was a narrow room, three gray desks in a row against the wall, all strewn with papers, coffee cups and ashtrays. Bob leaned against the middle desk, talking on the phone. He covered the mouthpiece and whispered to Clay to have a seat. Clay stood, waiting for the conversation to finish, too full of nervous energy to sit. There was one other door at the end of the room, a small hand-lettered sign that read CELLBLOCK A taped on it.
He almost laughed. He’d been breaking the law for years, and this was as close as he’d ever come to a jail cell. The laugh choked in his throat. The sins of the father shall be visited upon the son floated through his mind, and he saw the trail of his father’s sins and his own leading right here, to this room and beyond the door to Cell Block A.
His son was in jail. Clay thought of his own father, but pushed the thought back down into the darkness of his mind, burying it deep. He had enough of his own sins to worry about. He was a killer, a blood-soaked fraud, a common thief, and here it was Chris who was behind bars. Chris, whose only faults were those of blood and youth, both inescapable, beyond his control. He wanted to cry out, sit down, hold his head in his hands, weep and pray.
He didn’t. He stared at a calendar from Pete’s Auto Body on South Broad Street. It was still on August, a girl in a yellow polka-dot bikini holding her own against the flow of time. He waited. Bob finally hung up.
“Clay, I’m sorry,” he said.
“Me too,” Clay answered, sorry for more than he could bear to be. “What’d he do?”
Bob looked at him and blew out his breath, looking very tired. He moved and sat on one of the office chairs by the desk. Rolling it back against the wall he stuck out his legs, planting his big black cop shoes on the floor to hold himself there.
“Stole a car,” Bob said, lifting his eyes to meet Brock’s.
“What, joyriding? Whose car was it? Can I see him? Get him out of there?” Clay gestured towards the cellblock door, rocking back and forth on the balls of his feet, wanting only to move, to take Chris out of here, to be home with his wife and son. Safe.
“Sit down, Clay,” Bob said. “Sit down a minute.”
Clay went to the cellblock door. It was locked. “Where is he? Is he hurt?”
“He’s fine. Sit down.”
Clay shuffled his feet toward the chair at the last desk. He sat, the middle desk separating him from Bob, the cellblock door separating him from Chris, secrets separating him from Addy, time and space separating him from everything else that had once held meaning for him. He hadn’t felt this alone in the world since when? Home alive in ’45? The fluorescent light above him flickered, then brightened, sending a flash of light against the window. Clay felt his shoulders tighten and he squeezed his eyes shut for a second as more flashes exploded against his eyelids. Opening them, he felt the faint sensation of concussion reverberate against his right side, an echo rumbling down the decades. He rubbed the scar under his shirt, massaging the feeling back down into that dark place where it lived.
He rolled his chair against the wall, as Bob had done, avoiding looking into his face. The phone rang, but Bob didn’t move to get it. After four rings it went silent.
“It’s serious, isn’t it”? Clay asked.
“Yeah, no getting around it. Grand theft.”
“But what happened? Did Chris and his pals take one of their parent’s cars without asking? I mean, it’s not like he’s a thief or anything, he’s a kid.”
“He’s a kid, and he hasn’t been in trouble before. That will help. But it wasn’t a parent’s car or a joyride. He boosted a ’63 Buick Riviera, for crying out loud!” Clay could hear the frustration in Bob’s voice, and the anger at the responsibility of bearing bad news.
“Chris? You mean he was in the car?”
“No, I mean it looks like he stole it, took some pals for a ride to show it off, and got nabbed. I know it’s a shock, but there it is.”
“
Bob, wait a minute. I know Chris has been hard to handle lately, but he’s not a bad kid. He’s not a car thief, that much I know. Let’s talk to him, we’ll straighten this thing out in no time.” Clay tried to sound upbeat, as if this were all a misunderstanding, a big mistake they’d laugh at later.
“We’ve talked to him and his buddies. They claim Chris picked them up in the car, bragged that he’d hotwired it. There weren’t any keys, and Chris was driving when they got pulled over. Chris said it was the other way around, that they told him they took it for a joyride and were going to get it back by ten o’clock.”
“Where—how?” Clay could barely form a sentence. There was something in Bob’s reluctant certainty that scared him. This wasn’t just a little trouble with the law. He would have been ready for a little trouble. At school, maybe a suspension. A speeding ticket, some drinking, any of the stupid things a kid with too much time on his hands could get into. He would have been ready for that, and angry about it. But this scared him. Sins of the father, after all.
“We picked them up on North Colony Road, coming off the Berlin Turnpike,” Bob said, “going about seventy.”
“Whose car?” Clay asked, trying to find a fact he could grab onto, make some sense of. He saw Bob shake his head and smile, as if he couldn’t quite believe what he was going to say.
“State Senator Grant Flanagan, while he was enjoying the veal scaloppini at Verdolini’s, as the guest of the Mayor.”
“You mean Chris stole a state senator’s car from Verdolini’s parking lot?”
“Apparently so.” Verdolini’s Restaurant on North Avenue was a favorite of local politicians. The absolute worst place to steal a car. The only thing dumber than stealing a car from that lot was to steal the one belonging to a guest of the Mayor.
“Jesus Christ.”
“Senator Flanagan was not happy about it. The Mayor was spitting bullets.”