“No thanks.”
The woman nodded again and drank.
“Do you know where Lauren is?” Burke said.
“My daughter. She grew up into a very beautiful woman, don’t you think?”
“Do you know where I can find her?” Burke said.
“She’s with her husband.”
“Do you know where they live?” Burke said.
“She lives with him,” the woman said. “With Louis.”
“Where does Louis live?” Burke said.
The woman drank some more sherry. She gestured vaguely toward the window.
“Out there,” she said.
“Out there?”
“Yes.”
She drank again and refilled her glass. The wine didn’t seem to affect her. Burke wished that it would.
“You know I never go out there,” the woman said. “I can see it from here, and I like it. But I never go out there.”
“Do you know an address for Lauren?” Burke said.
“Do you go out there?” she said.
“Sometimes,” Burke said.
He glanced at the maid standing by the door. The maid gestured to him to join her.
“Excuse me, ma’am,” Burke said.
He stood and walked to the maid. She looked at him in the impervious way Negroes looked at whites.
“She don’t know,” the maid said softly. “She don’t know this address.”
“You know?” Burke said.
“How much?”
“I got another C-note,” Burke said.
The maid put her hand out. Burke took out the hundred and gave it to her. She folded it neatly and put it in her apron pocket.
“I write it down for you,” she said.
Burke went back to the woman who had once been beautiful.
“It’s been very nice talking to you, ma’am.”
“Oh,” she said. “Yes. Thanks for coming.”
She put out her hand; Burke took it for a moment. Then he let it go and straightened and left the room. On his way out the maid gave him a slip of paper with an address.
49.
THE HOUSE WAS IN Connecticut in the Litchfield Hills, maybe two hours from New York. Burke sat with Cash in the dark car looking at the sweep of the front lawn. It was raining hard again.
“Big house right there,” Cash said. “Top of the lawn.”
“No gate,” Burke said.
“Doesn’t mean no guards,” Cash said.
“Frank Boucicault will have guards,” Burke said. “We’re looking for the carriage house.”
“The happy couple,” Cash said.
Burke nodded without speaking. With the car engine off, the wipers weren’t going, and the rain had streaked the windshield. Burke rolled down his side window enough to see out, squinting against the rain, looking for the carriage house.
“If it was for carriages,” Burke said, “it would be at the end of the driveway.”
“Want to drive in?” Cash said.
“No,” Burke said, “too bold. We’ll walk.”
“Maybe rain will keep everybody inside,” Cash said.
“Maybe,” Burke said.
Burke rolled up his window and got out of the car. Both men wore raincoats and hats. Burke unlocked the trunk of the car and Cash took out a Thompson. Burke hadn’t seen one since Guadalcanal. Sheltered by the trunk lid, Cash put the twenty-round magazine in place, tapped the bottom with his palm to seat it, worked the action once to put a .45 round up into the chamber. He pressed the gun, muzzle down, against his thigh, the skirts of his coat partly protecting the gun from the rain. Burke closed the trunk and the two men started up the driveway in the darkness and the heavy rain. There were lights on in the big house. But no movement. As they reached the top of the low upslope, the drive turned a gradual right behind the house. They followed it, hunched against the hard rain. Ahead, among some trees, barely visible in the murk, was a two-story building with a cupola on top. There was a shapeless blur of light. When they got close they could see it was a seeping through some drawn curtains in a first-floor window. The entry door had been cut into the vertical planking of the big carriage house doors. Burke tried the handle. It was locked. He knocked on the door. A voice sounded inside.
Burke thought it might have said, “Who is it?”
“Your father,” Burke said, in a low voice he hoped would be hard to identify.
There was a moment and then Burke heard the dead bolt turn. The door opened a ways and Burke hit it with his shoulder. It burst open and caught on the security chain bolt. He pulled back. Cash joined him and they both lunged against it. The chain bolt screws tore out of the doorjamb and the door burst open. Wearing a Chinese silk dressing gown, Louis Boucicault had turned away from the door toward the heavy mahogany sideboard against the right-hand wall. Cash was in first. He put the muzzle of the Thompson up snug under Boucicault’s chin.
“Still,” Cash said. “Really still.”
There was a table in the middle of the room with an ice bucket, some lemons, and a bottle of gin. Wearing a Chinese silk dressing gown that matched Louis’s, Lauren sat with a glass in her hand. Everything seemed to have frozen. There was fruit on the table, and some cheese and some sort of pâté and a silver bowl of crackers. Burke closed the door behind him and put his gun away inside his raincoat. He went to the sideboard and opened the top drawer and took out a nickel-plated, pearl-handled .32 caliber revolver.
“Cute,” Burke said and slipped it into his coat pocket.
Then he walked to Boucicault and patted him down. He stepped back and pointed at the empty second chair at the table.
“Sit,” he said.
Frozen with the muzzle of the submachine gun pressing up under his chin, Boucicault shifted his eyes to Cash. Cash grinned at him and moved the muzzle.
“Do what he tells you,” Cash said.
Lauren still had neither moved nor spoken. As time began to move at a more normal speed, Burke realized the radio was on, a big Capehart. They were listening to “The Life of Reilly.”
Louis sat. He drank some gin. Cash pulled an uncomfortable-looking ladder-back chair from the corner past the sideboard, and dragged it near the table, and sat with the tommy gun in his lap.
“How’d you get this far?” Louis said.
He was trying to keep his voice steady.
“Weather’s bad,” Burke said. “Can you call your father up at the house?”
“Yes.”
“Call him. Tell him your situation. Tell him he and I need to talk. Tell him if anything happens you go first.”
Lauren slowly raised her glass and sipped some gin. When she had drunk, she lowered the glass, but she did not put it down.
“You want my father to come down here?”
“Yes.”
“Now?”
“Yes.”
“What if he won’t come?”
“You’re dead,” Burke said.
Burke was aware of the radio. William Bendix. Laughter. The rain was hard on the windows. Carefully, Louis reached for the phone beside the table. He dialed and spoke into it and hung up.
“He’ll be right down,” Louis said.
Burke went to the door and opened it, the rain slanted in onto the polished floor. Cash got up and went to the corner of the room, between the sideboard and the wall, keeping the Thompson pointed at Louis.
“Lauren,” Burke said. “Go over there on the wall past the window. If anything happens, get on the floor.”
She didn’t move. Burke went to the table and put his hand under her armpit and pulled her up and pushed her against the wall and out of the line of fire. Then he went to the other side of the open door and took out the .45 and stood. The rain coming through the open door had begun to puddle and soak into the rag rug when Frank Boucicault came in. Without looking around him he walked to the table where his son sat and looked down at him. Burke closed the door.
“You got people with you, Frank?”
&n
bsp; Boucicault turned slowly to look at him.
“Of course,” he said. “They’re all around this building.”
He looked at Cash.
“Who’s this.”
“Man with a submachine gun,” Burke said. “Things happen, Junior goes first, you go second.”
Frank nodded thoughtfully as if Burke had confirmed his suspicions.
“Whaddya want to talk about?” he said.
“You know your kid’s got a deal with Gennaro Paglia?”
Frank looked at Louis.
“I’m a grown man,” Louis said. “I make deals with who I want.”
“You make one with Gennaro Paglia?” Frank said.
“Ask him,” Louis said. “He’s the one telling the story.”
“You gave Julius Roach your word that the kid wouldn’t mess with me.”
“I did.”
“I’ve heard,” Burke said, “that your word is good.”
“It is.”
“Paglia gave his word to Wendell Jackson, up in Harlem, that he wouldn’t mess with Jackie Robinson.”
“I know Wendell,” Frank said.
“So the deal is that Louis kills Robinson for Paglia, and Paglia kills me for Louis.”
Frank looked at his son.
“That the deal?” he said.
“He’s lying,” Louis said. “He’s a lying sack of shit.”
Frank nodded. He looked at Lauren standing flat against the wall in the corner. She was perfectly still, still holding her glass of gin. Her face was blank, and very pale.
“That the deal, Lauren?”
The rush of the outside rain was the only sound in the room. Frank kept his gaze on Lauren. Louis turned to stare at her too. Cash watched the Boucicaults. Burke looked at nothing.
Lauren cleared her throat. In a small voice Lauren said, “That’s what Louis told me.”
Frank nodded. He didn’t look at his son.
“So what are you doing here?” he said to Burke.
“I want the girl,” he said. “And I want the three of us to walk out of here safely.”
“Frank,” Louis said. “They’re lying. Both of them, the sonova bitch is trying—”
“Take her,” Frank said.
“Frank,” Louis said. His voice was higher than it had been. “You bastard, you can’t . . .”
Frank turned and leaned over the table and pointed at Louis.
“Not a sound,” he said. “Not one more fucking sound.”
Louis opened his mouth, and met his father’s look, and closed it. His face was death white except for the redness that smudged his cheeks. Burke could see that he was breathing very hard. Frank turned and spoke to Burke.
“We need somebody dead,” Frank said, “we do our own killing.”
“You need any of us dead?” Burke said.
“I don’t like you much,” Frank said after a moment. “And I think she’s a fucking whore. But my word is how I do business. Louis will never, ever, bother you again.”
“Or her?” Burke said.
“Or her, or Tommy Gun over there. We’ll walk up to your car with you. You can drive away. No one will stop you.”
“Your word?” Burke said.
“My word.”
Burke looked at Cash.
“No harm keeping the gun on him while we walk,” Cash said.
“No,” Burke said. “Point it somewhere else.”
Cash nodded and let the muzzle of the Thompson drop. Burke put out his hand toward Lauren. Lauren didn’t move.
“Where am I going?” she said, her voice barely carried over the sound of the rainfall.
“With me,” Burke said.
“For how long?”
Burke paused for a moment, then smiled slightly.
“Until death do us part,” he said.
She stared at him a moment, then stepped away from her corner and took his hand. Still seated, Louis was pouring gin into his glass. Burke thought he saw tears. Then Frank opened the door and went out first, and they followed him into the downpour.
50.
THEY LAY ON the bed together at Burke’s apartment, smoking. He had an arm around her. She had her head on his chest. Soaked when they got there, they had both showered. Burke was wearing white boxer shorts. Lauren had on one of his shirts. There had been no sex. She touched one of the bullet scars on his chest.
“Scars are looking better,” she said.
“They calm down eventually,” he said.
“They’re really quite faint,” she said.
It was nearly dawn. Through the rain the gray day was beginning to show.
“You okay?” he said.
She nodded. He wasn’t looking at her, but he could feel her head move on his chest.
“Why?” she said.
“Why what?”
“Why did you come for me?” she said.
“Seemed right,” Burke said.
“Do you love me?” she said.
Burke took in a lot of smoke and let it out slowly and watched it twine with the smoke from her cigarette as it rose. She waited.
“Yes,” he said at last.
“How long have you loved me?” she said.
“Long time,” he said.
“So why now?”
“It was time.”
“I need to know,” she said.
Burke took in more smoke and held it in his lungs for a moment before he blew it gently out.
“I don’t know if I can tell you,” he said finally. “I . . . since . . . the war . . .”
Absently he touched the scars on his chest. When he did, she covered his hand with hers.
“I been scared since the war,” he said. “I got hurt too bad.”
“You didn’t seem scared.”
“I was scared of caring about anything.”
“Because you could lose it.”
“Because I could lose it,” Burke said.
“And if nothing mattered, you could lose it or not lose it and it couldn’t hurt you.”
“Something like that.”
“Even your life,” Lauren said.
“Yeah.”
“So you didn’t care about anything, you wouldn’t have to be afraid of anything.”
“I guess.”
“So what changed?” she said.
“It was no way to live,” Burke said.
Neither of them said anything. They lay still listening to the rain.
“I think it had something to do with that colored baseball player.”
“Robinson,” Burke said.
“It did,” Lauren said, “didn’t it?”
Burke put his cigarette out in the ashtray on the nightstand, and shook another one loose, and lit it, and took a drag and lay back with the cigarette still in his mouth.
“Probably,” Burke said.
She didn’t speak, but he could feel her head nodding slowly against his chest.
“This will not be easy,” Lauren said after a while.
“I know,” Burke said.
“I’ve been rich too long with my father’s money. I have a problem with alcohol, with drugs, with sex, with men, with my mother, with my father . . .”
“But not with me,” Burke said.
“I have no money of my own, no place to live.”
“You can live with me,” Burke said.
“I can’t bear to go near my father’s house. I don’t even have clean clothes.”
“We’ll get some,” Burke said.
“And,” she said, “you’ve been in some kind of emotional hibernation since Guadalcanal.”
“Now I’m not.”
“How can you be sure?”
“Can’t.”
“But you’re hopeful,” she said.
“I’m willing to work at it,” Burke said.
“We will have to work hard.”
“We can do that,” Burke said.
It was full day outside Burke’s window, with the rain steady.
�
�I love you,” Lauren said.
“Yes.”
“Can you tell me you love me?” Lauren said.
“I already did.”
“Do it again.”
“I love you,” Burke said.
She put her cigarette in the ashtray and left it there still smoking. She turned her face up toward him and put her arms around him.
“I want us to make love,” she said. “I don’t want us to fuck. I want us to make love.”
“Now?” Burke said.
“Right now,” she said. “And hurry.”
Burke reached across her with his free hand and stubbed out her smoldering cigarette butt. Then he said, “Sure,” and put his face down to hers. Several times as they made love she gasped, “Hold on to me. Hold on to me.” He wasn’t sure if she was crying.
Bobby
I had gone to New York once before with my father. We took the train down, and stayed at the Commodore, and took the subway to Ebbets field. This time, just turned fifteen, I went alone.
I was visiting in Lynbrook, and took the Long Island Railroad into Penn Station. I lingered in Penn Station for a while, feeling the size and space. Feeling as if I were at the center of civilization with the throb of great engines animating the space. I smelled it: the steam, the peanuts, the energy. Underneath the vast high ceiling of the central room, I was enclosed and free, and small, and adult, and overwhelmed with confidence. Alone, fifteen, in New York City.
I was visiting alone. I’m not sure my parents ever knew.
I took the subway to Broadway and went downtown, reading the maps. I knew I probably didn’t have to come into Manhattan at all. I knew I was going a long way round, but it was the way I remembered going with my father, and my newly evolving self wouldn’t let me ask directions. The names of the stations were exciting. I’d heard them on WHN. I read about them in The New York Times: Astor Place, Bleeker Street, Bowery. This was New York. I was in its heart.
I can no longer remember how I went. I probably couldn’t go there now. Somewhere around Canal Street I changed trains, and somewhere around Prospect Park I got off and followed the crowd. Brooklyn wasn’t as tall as New York. But it was no less urban. It was late afternoon, before a night game with the Braves. The people were on the street selling programs and peanuts and hot dogs. And the crowd was already gathering. Fathers and sons. The fathers often wearing felt hats, dressed in suit and tie. The sons often with baseball gloves, often with baseball hats. There were women in the crowd and rarely, little girls. There was also a large mix of Negroes. I stood at the intersection of McKeever Place and Sullivan Place in front of the field. I could see the light towers above the stadium. The name EBBETS FIELD in white lettering built into the front at the top. The arches, the Palladian windows, the brick façade, the awning-striped canopy over the entrance. I went into the rotunda and bought my ticket and walked up the stairs and out into the interior grass, red clay infield, blue sky above, some white clouds, the players in their uniforms. The Dodgers in home white, blue lettering, blue hats; the Braves in road gray, red lettering, navy hats with red bills, on their chests a tomahawk.
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