Oasis of Night

by J. S. Cook

  It was a sultry Wednesday in mid-July, and I had just opened the Heartache for the day. I poured myself a soda with lots of ice and went to sit at a back table where I could keep an eye on the door while I did some paperwork. I could have just as easily stayed in my office, but from this vantage point, I could see not only the entire cafe, but also anyone who might be loitering on the sidewalk, trying to work up the nerve to come inside.

  Chris was behind the bar, taking a quick count of the liquor bottles for me. We’d had an unusually thirsty group of customers the day before, and some of our supplies were running low. I told Chris to let me know if we needed anything and I’d go down in the basement to fetch it.

  Just then he called to me from across the room. “I think we might be running low on bourbon, Jack.”

  “Okay.” I laid my glass down for a paperweight and went downstairs. The basement was reached by a set of narrow stairs to the rear of the cafe. It was a damp underground space dimly lit by one light bulb dangling from a cord in the ceiling. I’m not a guy that takes fright easily but that damn basement gave me the creeps. Maybe it was the layout of the place, thin and narrow like the rest of the Cafe, the thick walls set around with whitewashed local stone. There was always a weird smell down there, not the usual sort of thing, but something acrid and faintly sweet, like medicine. It reminded me of Judy. It reminded me of that horrible dark alley, and the little room….

  She was still alive, that day in Philadelphia. He was gone, the fake doctor, and there was an awful lot of blood, and in the midst of it, she lay there on the table, naked from the waist down, her legs in stirrups like she was being tortured—like she was being murdered. She was still alive when I got there, and she held on to my hand and whispered something, but I’ll be damned if I know what it was. I’ve spent a lot of sleepless nights since then, trying to remember, and sometimes, just as I’m slipping into unconsciousness, I’ll get a thread of it, a whisper that sounds something like her voice, but then it’s gone.

  “Jack?”

  I turned so fast I nearly dropped the bottles I was holding. I could barely make her out, only the white curve of her cheek, the soft sweep of her auburn hair. “Julie? How’d you get down here?”

  She laughed and came toward me. “I parked around the corner and I saw the door. I thought it might be the back way into the Cafe, and suddenly I’m down here in this… labyrinth.” She was wearing a light summer dress and her hair was pulled back off her face. She was beautiful and rich and she knew it. “Thank God you got here in time. I thought I was about to start sprouting mushrooms.”

  “Julie, how’d you get down here?”

  She blinked. “I told you. I parked around—”

  “There’s no other door.”

  “What? Of course there is. Don’t be silly.” She took a couple of the bottles from me. “My grandfather was the original owner of this building, did you know? At the time, it was used to warehouse port. The company who leased it from us claimed that overwintering the port down here gave it a certain unmistakable bouquet that was impossible to produce elsewhere, even under similar conditions.”

  “You seem to know something about wine.” What else, I wondered, did she know?

  “Oh, Jack, don’t look so sour! Have I spoiled your party, showing up unannounced?” She reached up and patted my cheek. “I’m here to see Chris, and I’m sorry if I’ve ruined your little boys’ club. Next time I’ll call, okay?”

  “Julie, where’s the other door?”

  Just then Chris bellowed from upstairs: could I please bring up the bottles? I guess that was what saved Julie from having to answer me—lucky for her. I wondered what it was about her that repulsed me. Yes, I was jealous—it didn’t take a genius to figure that out—but there was more to it than that. There was just something… rotten about her, something dark and depraved and wrong. Knowing what I knew about the Fayre family and their affairs disposed me to dislike her even more. I didn’t want her near Chris; I didn’t want her to have anything to do with him. “Chris didn’t say you were coming by today.” I pointed her ahead of me up the stairs.

  “He didn’t? I guess it must have slipped his mind.”

  We emerged into the Cafe, and Julie made a beeline for the bar. A few people were beginning to filter in, and Chris was busy mixing and serving drinks. He drew off several pints of beer and set them up on the bar for Anita, one of the waitresses I’d recently hired to help cover the lunchtime rush, turned, and saw Julie. “Hey, Julie! What are you doing here?”

  She laid the bottles on the bar. “Well! That’s a fine welcome.”

  Chris leaned over to kiss her cheek. “Hiya, baby. When’d you get here?”

  “I found her wandering in the basement.” I handed my bottles across the bar to him.

  “Yes, Jack was kind enough to rescue me. I parked around back and got myself lost coming in the wrong door.”

  Chris raised his eyebrows at me. “There’s another door?”

  Julie ignored the question. “Are you free for lunch, darling?”

  Chris stared at her. “Take a look around, baby—I can’t pick up and leave.”

  “Oh?” She smiled brightly at me. “I don’t think Jack would mind so much, would you, Jack? I mean, these girls are here, and Jack’s a big, strong man.”

  Chris mixed two whiskey sours and lined the glasses up for Anita’s pickup. A group of twelve or so government office workers filed in and arranged themselves around two tables near the window. “Naw, sorry, baby. Can’t do it right now. You’re welcome to wait for me if you want to.”

  “Maybe I’ll do that.” She saw an empty table by the wall. “Jack, an iced tea when you have a minute?”

  I forced myself to smile at her. “Chris, give the lady anything she wants.”

  “Jack, you darling!” She flounced off and settled herself behind the table.

  Chris caught my look and was quick to defend himself. “Jack, before you say anything, I didn’t invite her here. I never said a word. She just showed up.”

  Anita wiggled in beside me and laid her tray on the bar. “Four gin and tonics, three white wine cocktails, and five iced teas, Chris, when you’re ready.” Anita was maybe five feet tall and about eighty-five pounds soaking wet and carrying an anvil, with a mop of curly dark hair and big blue eyes. “You’re after raising the tone of this place, are you, Jack?”

  “What do you mean?”

  Anita nodded toward Julie, reapplying lipstick at her table by the wall. “She’s not the type usually comes in a place like this. What’s she, slumming or something?”

  “Thanks a lot,” I said.

  “Sure, where’d you dig her up to? Down the basement?”

  I blinked. “How’d you know?”

  “What the frig was she doing down the basement?”

  “Julie’s grandfather used to own this building,” I said. “He leased it out to someone else, though. They used to store wines downstairs in the basement.”

  Anita put one hand on her hip and treated me to the sort of look she usually reserved for drunken sailors. “Go away, boy. That what she told you?”

  I was more confused than ever.

  “Wish O’Dwyer owned this building, sure. His grandfather owned it before him. He used to make headstones—you know, for graves—and he kept a lot of his marble down there. Sure, the O’Dwyers have always owned this building—most of this street, if you want to know.” Anita picked up her laden tray and, with a final shake of her head, disappeared into the mass of tables.

  I went back to my table and sat, keeping an eye on Julie. Even if I didn’t trust Jonah Octavian, the things he had told me about the Fayre family business—and their manipulation of the Fort Pepperell job—rang true, and Julie’s weird behavior just now did nothing to allay whatever suspicions I might have had about her. What was she doing in the basement? I didn’t honestly believe she’d simply wandered in there, and gotten herself lost in the dark. Julie was hardly helpless. I wondered what would h
appen if she was cornered, good and proper—if, say, I got between her and something she really wanted.

  I went back to my paperwork, but something at the door of the Cafe caught my eye. Jonah Octavian, in a light-weight summer suit, wearing a straw panama on his head and mopping his face with a large white handkerchief. He spied me sitting in the back and started forward, and then a strange thing happened: Julie Fayre, still sitting at her table by the wall, saw Octavian at the same moment he saw her. It was like two strange cats meeting in an alley, all unsheathed claws and ruffled fur. Julie rose from her chair and fixed her gaze on Octavian, her eyes dark with something that looked an awful lot like rage. She continued watching Octavian as he strolled back to where I was, her top lip drawn back over her teeth in an unmistakable gesture of disgust, her head swiveling to follow his every move.

  “Mr. Stoyles, I hope you will forgive my unannounced appearance in your cafe.”

  “It’s open to the public.” I pulled out a chair for him. “You look warm and thirsty. Sit down, take a load off.” I signaled Chris to bring us a couple of Cokes.

  “Thank you.” He laid his hat on a nearby chair. “You are most kind.”

  “Not at all. What can I do for you?” I didn’t mention Julie’s odd reaction to him. I hoped he might tell me what it was all about himself.

  “It has come to my attention that you are looking for someone.” Octavian stowed his handkerchief in his pocket. “A young police constable.”

  “Okay—obviously you’re situated somewhere along the pipeline.”

  Octavian paused to light a smoke. “Whether I am or not is of no concern to you, Mr. Stoyles.”

  “Right. Did you pay him the five hundred, or was that a gift from one of your cronies?”

  Octavian stared at me incredulously and began to laugh. “Oh, Mr. Stoyles. Oh dear, me. You are such a literalist.” He looked up as Chris laid a cold soda down in front of him. “Why would I be handing large sums of money to the police?”

  “Good question. Why would you?” I took a long drink of my soda. The heat had invaded the Cafe like a living thing, and it was all the ceiling fans could do to keep up with it.

  “It must be, or else you wouldn’t have bothered mentioning it.” Octavian took a sip of his drink. “Mr. Stoyles, I have information. What you do with it is up to you.”

  “Why should I trust you?”

  “There is no reason why you should, except that you might recall my information has been good in the past.” He nodded toward Julie’s table. “Why is the Fayre girl in here, anyway?”

  “My cafe is open to anybody who can pay for the privilege of sitting at a table. I have no reason to keep her out.” Not strictly true, but I’d be damned if I’d let him know that.

  “And your bartender?”

  “Is none of your business.”

  “Ah.” He smiled faintly and applied himself to his soda. “So it is as I suspected.” He shrugged. “I cannot fault his reasoning. The Fayre girl makes a wonderful screen, but I would caution you, Mr. Stoyles, against keeping dangerous pets.”

  He was beginning to irritate me. “You got something to say, or did you just come in here to play word games?”

  “The young policeman, Constable Picco.”

  “Yeah.”

  “He is much closer than you think.”

  “So he’s still alive.”

  “Without a doubt, Mr. Stoyles. The… parties to whom he gave offense are merely keeping him out of circulation for a little while. For his own good, you might say.”

  That made me laugh out loud. “The last time I checked, Bull Parsons couldn’t lay hands on five hundred bucks even in his wildest dreams.”

  “I never mentioned Mr. Parsons.” Octavian took a look at his watch. “As a newcomer to the city, you probably don’t know about the caves that exist at various points in the Southside Hills. I can say nothing for certain, Mr. Stoyles, but if you chose to look there, it might lead you in an interesting direction.” He stood and put on his hat. “Good day.” He bowed once and was gone, weaving his way through the tables to the door.

  A shadow fell over my table: Julie Fayre. “Mind if I join you, Jack?”

  “By all means.”

  She eased into the chair and spent several moments arranging herself, moving her chair so we were sitting at right angles to each other and close enough to touch. “I can’t thank you enough for introducing me to Chris. He really is something, Jack.”

  I pretended not to understand. “Yeah, he’s a great bartender. I’m lucky to have found him. Most guys his age are overseas.”

  “Mm.” She leaned close to me, her hair brushing my shoulder. “You’re quite the fortress of solitude, aren’t you?”

  “I don’t follow you.”

  “Well….” She smiled faintly and stroked my forearm. It seemed to be her main party piece. “You work here in the cafe all day, you’re alone all night. I just think it must get a little lonely.” She laid her hand over mine and interlaced our fingers. “I’m not so bad once you get to know me, Jack.”

  “Is that so?” I pretended to scratch an imaginary itch on my neck—anything to get free of her.

  “You don’t like me very much, do you?”

  “Oh, I wouldn’t say that.”

  Her hand began stroking my leg, smoothing the fabric of my pants, crawling up my thigh. “You and I should be friends, Jack. After all, we have the same objectives.”

  “Do we—Miss Fayre, could you not do that?”

  “Do what?” She tilted her head close to me, just as her hand closed around my balls, squeezing gently. Her tongue slid out to wet her lips. “Oh, Jack, I think we could be such close friends.” She was good with her mitts, I’d give her that. In seconds she had me completely unzipped and her hand was in my shorts. The tablecloth hid what she was doing, and it’s not like I could have moved, anyway. Every molecule of blood I owned had gone straight to my cock. “It’s important that we understand each other, you and I.” Her hand worked me, her thumb slipping over and under, spreading my body’s moisture.

  I ducked my head to hide my expression, the taut anticipation in my face. Come to think of it, I probably looked like Alphonsus Picco’s crucifixion picture right about then. “I don’t… mmm… follow you.”

  “It would be a shame—” Her mouth was close to my ear, and her tongue flicked out, spreading heat. “—if something horrible happened to Chris DuBois.”

  THE ONE question that kept going around and around in my mind had to do with Johnny Mahoney; why was he killed? It made sense that the Greeks would have knifed him in retaliation for the death of their shipmate, sure—but where did Bull Parsons fit into all of this? And what about Alphonsus Picco? It was likely the five hundred dollars was given to him as payment for letting Bull Parsons walk free, except that made no sense either. Picco was the kind of cop who would write a ticket if he saw you spitting on the sidewalk; it was highly unlikely he’d simply look the other way while Parsons walked. The only explanation was that Picco hadn’t looked the other way—that Picco might have been in the lockup when Parsons was brought in, but that he wasn’t there when Parsons escaped. I decided to pay a call on Billy Ricketts to get some further information.

  I found him standing near the water cooler in the Constabulary headquarters, refilling paper cups and downing the contents as quickly as he could. All the windows in the place were open, but there was hardly a breeze to stir the blinds, and the several electric fans in evidence were trying and failing to stem the heat.

  “I don’t know why people think this is a cold place.” Ricketts waved me ahead of him into his office.

  “Maybe because they’ve been here in February?” I couldn’t help grinning.

  “It’s hot enough to split the goddamn rocks out there today.” He mopped his forehead with his sleeve and collapsed into his chair with palpable relief. “What can I do for you?”

  I explained what I knew about Picco and the money, and I asked Ricketts point-blank,
did Picco seem the sort of officer to take a bribe in return for letting someone walk?

  “No. Don’t get me wrong, Stoyles. On his good days Picco would try the patience of a saint. He’s snotty, arrogant, and he thinks he knows better than anybody else. But he’s a good cop, and I don’t believe for a minute that he’d take money to let someone like Bull Parsons walk.”

  “So someone is trying to make us think that Picco is crooked.”

  “Might be.” Stoyles reached behind him and took down a thick ledger, which he spread open on the desk and turned so I could see it. “Picco has been on the force for five years. He’s had a fair few arrests. He keeps his nose clean and he’s always on time. Never misses a day, not for sickness nor nothing else.” Stoyles pointed to a ledger entry, his thick finger underlining where he wanted me to look. “July 24th of last year, we had an incident. Young fellow off one of the boats had too much liquor and climbed up on top of the courthouse with a loaded rifle. How he got up there, God only knows.”

  I’d seen the courthouse and I had to agree. “What happened?”

  “Few of my men spent the afternoon and a good part of the night staked out, waiting for him to come down. Must have gone on like that for hours. It was Picco who finally did what nobody else had the balls to do.” Ricketts shook his head. “He climbed up and talked the fellow down. I don’t know what he said. I asked him and he wouldn’t tell me. Went up and got him down, not even a shot fired. I offered him a commendation for that, but he didn’t want it.” Ricketts closed the ledger, and for a moment, perhaps not even that, I had the strange sense that he was close to tears, and it was weird. Ricketts wasn’t the kind who went in for theatrics, and the whole thing had that kind of feel for me, like he was putting it on. “He’s hard to get along with. He’s as stubborn as a mule. There’s times when I’d like to knock him arse over teakettle just for being such a bloody pain in my backside, and if he’s got a goddamn friend in the world, I’ve yet to meet him.” Ricketts sighed deeply. “He’s a good cop, Stoyles. I’d hate for anything to happen to him.”