“You can’t be sure of that, Jerry,” she said, bringing the drink from the crescent-shaped white marble bar. “You don’t know it was that. It could’ve been an accident. Something went wrong with the heater or something.”
“Bullshit, I can’t be sure,” Fein said. “If there was a fire in that building, it was set. There’s nothing wrong with the furnace and there’s nothing wrong with the boiler or anything else. Why the hell do you think the cops’re coming, huh? You think the cops just automatically visit anybody that owns property when there’s a fire in it? The cops? Cops direct traffic and tag cars and stop guys from speeding, and now and then by accident they catch a crook. Firemen go to fires. When the cops come about a fire, it’s because they know damned well that somebody set it. And I know it just as well as they do. They aren’t telling me a single fuckin’ thing that I don’t know. I take a day off to play golf, and one of my lovely tenants puts a match to my building. Well, good luck to the cocksuckers. I’m out the first five hundred for repairs, but the hell with that. I hope they burn the place fuckin’ flat, and with them in it.”
MAVIS DAVIS SAT in Wilfrid Mack’s office at 8:45 p.m. and looked worried. “I hate to bother you, Mister Mack,” she said.
“It’s no bother,” he said. “I’m out of here most of the day. If I’m not in court, I’m in the State House. I expect to be here at night. It’s the only time I can see people, and after all, this job wasn’t forced on me. It’s just that I do have to tell you that I can’t represent Alfred unless I get a fee, and it’s going to have to be a substantial one.”
“Mister Mack,” she said, “Alfred hasn’t got any money and I sure don’t.”
“Look,” Mack said, “I know that. I know Alfred hasn’t any money and I know the trouble you had coming up with my fee a good many years ago, when everything was cheaper. But you have to understand: I don’t have any money either. I have to make a living too. If I don’t charge Alfred and everybody else I represent, I won’t be able to stay in business. I filed my appearance for him this morning for purposes of arraignment only because I can’t afford to go around taking cases for clients who can’t pay me anything. I just can’t do it, If Alfred wants me to try his case for him in court, Alfred is going to have to come up with a lot of money. Otherwise I am not going to be able to do it. And I won’t do it, either. Not that it’s going to matter much.”
“What do you mean?” she said.
“Mrs. Davis,” Mack said, “Alfred jumped a cop and tried to whap him around with a tire iron. As usual, Alfred was careful to make sure that there was another witness around. Another cop, to be exact. Not to mention his sister and probably some other folks that I don’t know about yet, but who know Alfred and could pick him out of a two-hundred-man line-up.”
“Selene,” she said, “they can’t make Selene testify.”
“Unfortunately,” Mack said, “they can make Selene testify. They maybe can’t make her tell the truth, but they can make her testify. If they choose to do so. Which I can’t imagine why they would want to, since if I ever heard of a case that was ironclad, airtight, gone for sure and over with, this is it. But if they decide that they want to hammer her, they can do it, and if she lies about recognizing her brother or her boyfriend, they will be in a position to do something to Selene. If they want to. Nope, they can haul her in. They have got the Davis family in a very tight corner.”
“Mister Mack,” she said, “we had a fire at Bristol Road today.”
“Oh, my God,” Mack said. “Was anybody hurt?”
“Nobody was hurt,” she said. “The only person in the building apparently was Alfred, and he was sleeping after he got home from court, but it was just smoke and stuff and he got out all right.
“Alfred,” she said, “Alfred was up all night. He didn’t get no sleep after they arrested him and he was scared and he just went home and he went to bed and he was sleeping.”
“Alfred was sleeping,” Mack said.
“Yes, he was,” she said. “He was sleeping. He told me he was sleeping so he’d be able to go to work tonight and help me get that money back that I paid for his bail there, and I believe him.”
“You believe him,” Mack said.
“He was all hurt, Mister Mack,” she said. “They beat on him something fearful, them cops. He was sore and he was hurt and he didn’t have any medical down at the jail there. Yeah, I believe him.”
“I don’t,” Mack said.
“Senator,” she said, “the hell you mean by that?”
“Mrs. Davis,” he said, “I have talked with Alfred. I have represented Alfred. Alfred is the most difficult client I ever had in my entire professional career. Alfred does not lie all the time, which I guess is to his credit. But Alfred does not tell the truth all the time, either, and I never know what or which time it is when Alfred is talking to me.
“You’re in a different position,” Mack said. “You are Alfred’s mother. This is a terrible burden that was put on you, but I guess probably the Lord Jesus has His reasons for doing things like this to perfectly decent people. I suppose when Alfred says something, such as that he was sleeping, you are more or less obliged to believe it, for that reason.
“I am not Alfred’s mother,” Mack said. “There are some things in my life I would change if God gave me half a chance, but that is not one of them. I am very grateful that I am not Alfred’s mother. I would rather have a good case of malaria than anything that put me in a position where I was probably obliged to believe what Alfred said.”
“Mister Mack,” she said.
“No,” he said. “No, I won’t listen to it. You have to listen to Alfred, but I do not. I listened to Alfred today, when he had a bad case against a cop, and I spent the morning wasting my time in court because Alfred tried to do something about his dislike for that cop. Alfred did not pay me any money. I listened to Alfred the other day and then I listened to you, and as a result of doing that, I went to see Mister Fein and I talked to him about rats and things. I did not get any money for that, either. I did it because I wanted Alfred to calm down.
“I got Alfred out of jail this morning,” Mack said, “and from what you tell me—and I do believe you—Alfred went home. This is good. Alfred safely at home is a situation which is not likely to complicate my life the way my life gets complicated when Alfred gets out on the street and brings a tire iron and jumps a cop.
“Or so I would think anyway,” Mack said. “Now you tell me that Alfred tells you that he was asleep and a fire started in your building. And this is after Alfred and some other people have told me how nobody is very happy with anything that goes on there.
“Now,” Mack said, “I do not know what went on in that building today, while Alfred was supposedly sleeping in it. I am not saying that I do. But I am suspicious, and I will tell you that quite candidly.”
“Mister Mack,” she said, “that fire was set.”
“That is what I suspected,” Mack said. “Just keep in mind that you are the one who said it first. It was not I who said it first.”
“It was,” she said. “Somebody was in that basement and they set off a whole bunch oily rags, and the smoke just filled that house and it’s a wonder Alfred didn’t suffocate. My curtains’re ruined and so’re all my bed linens and everything else. That smoke just came right up the stairs and it got into every single one of the apartments and it ruined everything we own, practically. Our clothes and everything.”
“And Alfred was in there,” Mack said.
“Mister Mack,” she said, “Alfred did not set no fire. I would stake my life on that.”
“You may be doing just that,” Mack said.
DON ENTERED the Scandinavian Pastry Shop less than a minute behind Proctor. Proctor was sitting by himself in a booth. He was drinking coffee and eating a cheese Danish. It was another hot night and the moths collided regularly with the outside of the shop windows.
“Lemme have coffee and a cheese Danish,” Don said to the waitress, w
ho was studying the bugs.
“Haven’t got any more Danish,” she said. “How ya want ya coffee?”
“Guy over there’s eating Danish,” Don said.
“Got the last one,” she said. “Told ya, haven’t got no more Danish. Don’t gimme a hard time, all right?”
“Got any soup, or something?” Don said.
“Mister,” she said, snapping her gum, “you been in here before, right? You can probably read the sign and everything. Says it’s a pastry shop, you know? Means we sell the baked goods. We sell the doughnuts and the Danish and we sell the bismarcks and stuff with the whipped cream in them. We sell baked goods, mister. Soup and salads and sandwiches, you got to go somewhere else, you wanna get them.”
“How much coffee you bake?” Don said.
“We don’t bake no coffee, mister,” she said. “Ya don’t have to be a wise guy, you know. We brew the coffee, you know?”
“How much Coke you bake?” Don said. “You sell Coke and root beer and stuff like that, don’t you?”
“Mister,” she said, “you’re givin’ me a big pain. I mean, I hate to say it and everything, but you’re giving me a big pain.”
“Where?” he said.
“In the ass,” she said.
Proctor turned around. “Hey,” he said, “why’ncha leave the kid alone again, all right, Mac?”
“Mind your own goddamned business,” Don said. “Gimme a regular coffee and forget the lecture about how it isn’t cream, all right?”
Mickey came in from the parking lot and sat down next to Don. He ordered coffee.
Malatesta came in right after Mickey and joined Proctor in the booth. He ordered coffee. He looked at Proctor’s Danish and ordered a cheese Danish. “Haven’t got no Danish left, mister,” the waitress said. “Outta Danish. You’re too late. You want the Danish, you should come in here early. You been in here before. You oughta know that. How ya want ya coffee?”
“Jee-zuss,” Malatesta said. “What the hell did I do?”
“I had a hard day,” the waitress said.
“So’d a lot of people,” Malatesta said. “Just give me the coffee and I already know it isn’t cream. Regular.”
“I was down in Providence,” Mickey said. “Where’d you go?”
“Took a container up to Ludlow,” Don said. “Machine parts, said on it. Yugoslavia. I didn’t know we were getting stuff from them.”
“Oh, sure,” Mickey said. “All them Commie countries. Tools, cars, everything.”
“So,” Malatesta said to Proctor, “how’d it go? You hear?”
“Guys fell out of bed, got hurt less,” Proctor said. “Talked to Fein this morning. Happy as a pig in shit. ‘Guys fell out of bed and got hurt less,’ he says. That kid you sent over, see him? What’s his name, some corporal.”
“Grogan,” Malatesta said. “Well, I sent Caprio too, but I’m not sure Caprio can talk.”
“It was perfect,” Proctor said. “Whoever it was, it was perfect. Fein told me he just sat there and yelled about those niggers for about an hour, and the two guys sit there taking notes and then they thank him very much and they get up and leave and that is the end of it.”
“So he stuck to it,” Malatesta said.
“Sure,” Proctor said. “Fein’s a big asshole, but once he gets his story down, he tells it and tells it and tells it. See, they started looking for him when the rags went up, only he’s smart enough, he knows they’re gonna start looking for him, the rags go up, so he gives his secretary the day off and he goes out and runs around in the weeds all day, playing golf, and then he gets home and there’s his wife, all upset because there’s a fire in their building, and he puts on this great song and dance and she ends up helping him convince the corporals they been having all this trouble with the niggers that don’t pay their rent.”
“Good,” Malatesta said.
“Good?” Proctor said. “It was perfect, is what it was. Those two clowns told him he was lucky there was only one tenant in the building and he’s not usually there because he goes off somewhere before lunch.”
“He’d better not be in there when you do it,” Malatesta said.
“I heard you before, Billy,” Proctor said. “You don’t have to remind me.”
“When?” Malatesta said.
“It’s better,” Proctor said, “you don’t know too much. You know the address. Just sit tight.”
“I haven’t seen any money yet,” Malatesta said.
Proctor took three one-hundred-dollar bills from his pocket. “On account,” he said. “Just sit tight.”
CARBONE OPENED the discussion with Roscommon, Sweeney nodding affirmations as he talked.
“It’s Fein, all right,” Carbone said.
“Well,” Roscommon said, “you thought it was. That’s not news.”
“Not quite fair, sir,” Sweeney said. “We suspected it was one of Fein’s buildings, but we weren’t sure. Proctor’s got his own property, too. A lot of what he said, he could’ve been planning to light off one of those and he was just shooting the shit with Malatesta about Fein, confusing him.”
“Yeah,” Roscommon said.
“Thing of it is,” Carbone said, “we flagged every file that Malatesta’s handled, and the one they were talking about was that smoker over on Bristol that went up yesterday. So it’s one of Fein’s buildings, because he’s the guy that owns it.”
“Can we move on it?” Roscommon said.
“I don’t think so,” Carbone said. “Mickey doesn’t think so, either. Do you, Mick?”
“No,” Sweeney said, “no, I don’t.”
“They’re liable to kill somebody, the next time,” Roscommon said. “Then we’ll have shit up our nostrils for a month, turns out we expected it and we didn’t do anything.”
“Don’t think so,” Sweeney said. “Billy’s very strong on that—nobody in the building. That’s why the smoker. Drive people out. Besides, right now we can’t prove it.”
“You had a tail on Proctor, I thought I told you,” Roscommon said.
“So what?” Carbone said. “Proctor’s a handyman. There’s a lot of work in those buildings for handymen. We didn’t go in the basement with him and Dannaher. We watched them stop and we watched them go in and we watched them come out in less’n ten minutes and we followed them down Dort Ave and they have a hot dog and a beer and go off someplace else. That’s no arson. All they got to do is get up on their hind legs in court and say they went to fix something and they couldn’t fix it and they left to go get some lunch and some more tools and then they heard it on the radio that there was a fire there so they didn’t go back. Or maybe that they read it in the newspaper the next morning, when they were going back. That’s no case.”
“You got Billy taking money,” Roscommon said.
“John,” Sweeney said, “cop or no cop, the guy can borrow fifty or a hundred bucks off of another guy and that is not a crime no matter how thin you slice or how much bread you serve with it. That is baloney, and it stays baloney. If it was a crime for a cop to borrow money, we would probably all be in jail.”
“He’s got a girlfriend,” Roscommon said.
“He drinks coffee and he eats doughnuts too, when that lippy little broad at the pastry shop will let him have one,” Carbone said. “That’s no crime either. Fein owns a building and it’s no garden spot and he would probably like to get rid of it. Still, no crime.”
“We’ve got to catch somebody so red-hot he’ll have to talk,” Sweeney said.
“I was afraid you’d say that,” Roscommon said. “Good God, what chances we take with people’s lives.”
PROCTOR COULD HEAR Fein talking on the phone when he entered the reception area. Fein was laughing loudly in the conversation. Lois Reynolds grinned at Proctor and said, “He’s on the phone. Tackles. He won’t be long. Have a seat with Uncle Miltie.”
“Sounds like he’s in a good mood, at least,” Proctor said.
“Listen,” she said, “he is. But e
ven when he isn’t in a good mood, he’s in a good mood when he’s talking to Tackles because Tackles gives him a lot of business. Lou Black. Remember him? Played for the old Boston Yanks and then the Redskins when they moved down there. The only black football player who was white. Tackles Black.”
“Oh, him,” Proctor said. “Yeah. Runs the joint down there in Quincy.”
“Braintree,” she said. “Does an awful lot of business. We’ve had as many as three acts in there at once, and some of them were kind of shabby around the edges, you want the God’s honest truth. But Tackles had the joint packed every night. Had them coming out the windows on Mondays, when you could park your car inside most joints without asking any of the customers to move.”
“The food?” Proctor said.
“Doubt it,” she said. “All I’ve ever seen them serve is hamburgers and pastrami and steak, the sandwiches, you know, in those little straw baskets with some pickles and a small bag of chips. I guess on weekends you can get ribs and maybe spaghetti or something like that. Don’t think there is any dessert—never saw any, at least. Put it this way: you can go in there for a drink and if you get hungry, you can find something to eat, and the food’s okay but it’s nothing I’d call special. And it doesn’t cost a lot of money, but it’s not free, either. I don’t think it’s the food.”
Another burst of laughter sounded in Fein’s office.
“Big drinks?” Proctor said.
“Usual size,” she said. “Usual size, usual price. People’re wise to those one-quart martini outfits, where you get maybe two and a half ounces of booze and the rest is melted ice. No, what Jerry and I think it is is that people really like Tackles and when they go there the first time, he makes them feel like he’s really glad to see them and he will do the best he can to make sure they have a good time. So, and they like that and they come back and they bring either some of their friends or else they tell all their friends about it, and Tackles does the same thing with them.
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