by Cleo Coyle
As I walked the men through the anatomy of the Gaggia machine, the heads, the control functions, the proper readings for the temperature and pressure, I got to know them a little better.
“Pressure and heat. Like brewing illegal hooch, eh, ma’am?”
This was Ed Schott, the senior member of our class. A pink-skinned man with a bald pate, pug nose, jutting chin, and perpetually clenched fists, he spoke in short, staccato bursts, like a military drill instructor (which he may very well have been, given the Marine Corps’ eagle and fouled anchor was tattooed on his meaty forearm).
“Let’s move on to the coffee itself. A good espresso starts with a good bean, so—”
“You mean espresso bean, right, ma’am?” said Ronny Shaw. “I’ve seen them in the grocery store. Is that what we should use?”
“There’s no such thing as an espresso bean,” I explained. “What you saw was an espresso roast. Any type of good Arabica bean that’s roasted dark can be called an espresso roast.”
“What about caffeine, Ms. Cosi?” Bigs said. I noticed he got up to stand beside his chair like a kid in Catholic school called on by his teacher. “Will I get a bigger jolt from espresso than, say, a regular cup of joe?”
“What’s the matter, Brewer? Worried you won’t be up for that hot date after your mutual?” Dino Elfante asked.
Bigsie’s smile was lopsided. “It’s just that I need a lot of energy. Pep, you know. My lady friends expect it. I got a reputation to uphold.”
Bigsby Brewer seemed so guileless it was difficult to see him as a cold-blooded fire bomber. But I had to consider that one of his many “lady friends” could be Lucia Testa. Sweet as he was, Bigs would be an easy mark to manipulate, especially if someone convinced him the fire would end up helping Enzo instead of hurting him.
Alberto Ortiz spoke up just then—I recognized him as Mr. “Puerto Rican Pride” in the Lucia photo.
“If you need pep, Big Boy, try a Red Bull. Or maybe that little blue pill if the situation is code red. But, dude, if you’re having real trouble with one of those Manhattan fillies, just send her over to me—”
A silver cross hung from Ortiz’s neck, and a thin gold band circled his ring finger, but outward symbols aside, Ortiz seemed as randy as the rest of this pack.
“Mr. Ortiz is right,” I cut in. “About gulping espressos, I mean. It’s not a very efficient way to perk up.”
Bigs frowned. “But I thought espressos had caffeine.”
“Of course there’s caffeine in an espresso. But espresso’s high-pressure, high-heat extraction process removes more caffeine than regular drip brewing.”
“In other words,” James said, “if you want a jolt, stick to drip, drip.”
Bigs poked his friends so hard James tumbled from his folding chair. “Ahhhh!”
“Snots don’t know how to behave,” muttered Ed Schott.
When things settled down again, I demonstrated the best way to grind the beans for espresso. “If you grind too finely, friction and oxidation from the grinder will ruin your dream of a perfect cup. Grind too coarsely and some of the flavor stays in the portafilter.”
I ground enough beans for a few shots and dosed a single into the basket. Then I showed them how to even out the grinds before tamping.
“Grip the portafilter handle with one hand. Using the other, gently sweep the excess grinds away with the edge of your finger. By moving forward, then back, you’re evenly distributing the grinds in the basket while you level them. Now it’s time to pack.”
I rummaged through my bag and produced the brand-new scale from my duplex closet. (Unfortunately, it was pastel blue with pink sea horses—Joy had picked it out a few years ago, and I’d never taken it out of its plastic until now.)
“We don’t have to weigh in to make coffee, do we?” Bigs asked.
“I’m not gettin’ on that girly scale,” Dino said, pointing at the pink seahorses. “It’ll make me look fat.”
The man laughed.
“What we’re going to measure is the amount of pressure applied as we pack coffee into a portafilter. This is the most important step in the espresso pulling process, and the one you’re all going to have the most difficulty mastering—”
“Why is that?” asked James.
“The grinds in this filter basket have to be perfectly packed and level when the hot pressurized water streams from the spout, or you’re facing disaster.”
“Because?”
“Because like all things under pressure, water can turn insidious . . .”
I heard someone shifting uneasily in his chair at that. I looked up to see who, but all the men appeared settled again, gazes expectant.
I cleared my throat. “It’s the barista’s job to create an even, consistent resistance to that streaming force. If there’s even one tiny crack or irregularity in your pack, the pressurized water will find that weakness and exploit it, gush right through, missing the rest of the grinds and completely ruining any chance you had at success.”
I handed the tamper to Al Ortiz and placed the full portafilter in the center of my bathroom scale. “I want you to press straight down on the coffee with that, giving the tamper a twist at the end to dislodge any coffee grinds that are sticking to the metal.”
“Sure.” Ortiz raised his shoulder.
“One more thing,” I said. “Watch the scale as you press down, I want you to use about forty pounds of pressure.”
“Okay,” he said, a little less sure of himself.
It took Ortiz several tries before he got the pressure right, and even his final result was anything but level.
“My turn,” Bigs declared. Avoiding the scale, he set the portafilter down on the edge of the espresso cabinet. Gripping the tamper, he pressed until the veins bulged on his sculpted arms.
A tremendous crack boomed as the edge of the particle-board surface broke away. Following a moment of stunned silence, the room exploded with laughter. Even Oat and the captain looked amused.
“Ya stupid mook!” James cried. “Oat just built that!”
Bigsie’s cheeks blushed redder than an Anjou pear. “Guess I don’t know my own strength.”
Ed Schott rubbed his chin. “Maybe you better warn your dates, Hercules.”
“My girls work in Manhattan office buildings,” Bigs replied with a cocky grin. “Believe me, after ten hours with smooth dudes in penny loafers, most of them are downright desperate for a guy who’ll pop their buttons—”
“O-kay,” I cut in. “Mr. Brewer, let’s give it another try—and this time use the scale.”
“Sure, Ms. Cosi, but where’s your tampie thing?” Bigs asked.
“It flew off somewhere,” Ortiz said.
“Can somebody look for it?” I asked.
“Why don’t we improvise?” Bigs suggested. “We can use my roof spike. It’s got a flat head like your tampie.”
“Tamper, and I don’t think your tool—”
But Bigs was already rushing off, retrieving a foot-long piece of stainless steel. “See, Ms. Cosi,” he proudly announced upon returning. “This is my roof spike . . .”
I stared at the thing. “Okay, I’ll give. What’s a roof spike?”
“When we vent the fire, you know, like you saw us do at the caffè the other night?”
I nodded. “You go up to the roof and saw holes in it?”
“Right, well, in case of an emergency, we all carry PSS—personal safety systems. It’s a rope with an anchor hook.”
“We didn’t always carry them.” The voice was Oat Crowley’s. It was the first time he’d spoken.
I glanced at the man. “Why not?”
“Ask the damn brass,” he said. “Back in ’05 two good men died because they weren’t carrying ropes.”
“Well, now we carry them,” James pointed out.
“And we got these roof spikes, too,” Bigsie said. “They’re new. We trained on them for two months, but none of us have actually used them in a fire yet.”
“Yeah, Big Boy, and you can thank your lucky stars about that,” Dino said.
I frowned. “What’s it for, exactly?”
“If you’re on the roof, venting the fire, and you can’t get off again by the fire escape or the building stairs, then you need to attach your escape rope to something to rappel down. But if you end up trapped and there’s nothing around to hook onto, then you use the roof spike. Here, Ms. Cosi . . .” Like a student eager to impress his teacher, he grinned with pride. “You want to hold it?”
“Uh . . .”
“It’s okay, honey,” Dino said. “You don’t have to be afraid of handling Bigsie’s spike. I hear the ladies all enjoy the experience.”
Oh, brother. I took the thing—at the very least to prevent more ribbing. It was heavy in the hand, like an espresso tamper, with a flat head (also like a tamper). Its girth was also the perfect thickness to hold comfortably. But that’s where the similarity ended. The spike was a foot long and, well, a spike, just as the name suggested.
“So this can save your life?”
Bigs nodded. “See if you were stuck on the roof, you’d drive you ax into the roof itself, then you’d put the spike end into the cut, hammer it down with the back of your ax. It’s spring-loaded, like a switchblade, so you can trip these prongs to anchor it.” He hit a button and the spring-loaded tool snapped open. “Then you clip your rope to this ring and jump.”
“Well . . .” I touched the flat end of the tool. “I’m sorry to tell you. For what I need, this head’s too big.”
Dino snorted. “That’s a first.”
“What I mean is we’ll need that tamper to continue. So why don’t we all look for it?” I glanced at the men who just sat staring. “I mean it, guys. Let’s get down on our hands and knees and get it done.
“Okay, Ms. Cosi,” Ortiz said with a wicked grin. “You go down first and we’ll be right behind you.”
Now the men glanced at one another with smirks.
“Come on, guys! Give me a break!”
The men burst out laughing—and finally did what I asked. They found the tamper, I washed it, and we began again.
Thirty minutes later, two out of three attempts by each firemen resulted in a decent (if far from perfect) shot. Another half hour and the guys were producing passable espressos—far from Village Blend quality but a start.
“I feel like I’ve mastered something,” Ortiz said.
“You know the basics now,” I told him. “But you need to keep practicing. You still have a lot to learn. We’ve hardly touched on humidity levels, barometric pressure, heat or cold weather, the characteristics of different beans and blends, and the effect these things have on extraction.”
Ed Schott laughed. “She sounds like a fire-academy instructor.”
“Espressos, gentlemen, are a lot like life, the more you learn the less you know—and the quicker you surrender to not knowing, the faster you will progress.”
“Zen and the Art of Espresso Machine Maintenance by Clare Cosi,” James said with a wink.
“I’ll take that as a compliment.”
With class dismissed, the men crowded around to thank me, a few of them asking more questions. I pulled out a copy of an Espresso-making guide, one I gave to all of my rookies.
“Damn, even she’s got a manual!”
The men laughed.
“What’s so funny?”
“Are you kidding?” Ortiz gestured to a board filled with official notices on procedures and new equipment. “Welcome to the FDNY. Manuals ’R’ Us!”
I smiled, nodded, then quickly broke away and approached Captain Michael.
“Nice job handling the men,” he said softly.
I could tell he meant it. His expression was more relaxed now. Whatever I’d done tonight, it had impressed (or amused) him. His earlier anger at finding me snooping around his firehouse was obviously gone.
“Can we talk now?” I whispered. “Privately.”
“Can’t wait to get me alone, eh, darlin’?”
“Cut the crap, will you?”
“What crap?”
“You know what.”
“Ah, well, maybe I do . . .” His voice went lower and now his gaze was moving over me. “It’s just that when I see a lady such as yourself with so many feminine charms . . .” He flashed a grin, his gold tooth winking. “I can’t help myself.”
“Baloney, Captain, and let me tell you something. I don’t like baloney. It’s cheap and indigestible.”
“You’re reading me all wrong, dove. My nature compels me to reveal the truth of my heart. It’s just the way the Lord made me.”
“The Lord made trees. I sincerely doubt divine inspiration had anything to do with your cheesy pickup lines.”
Beneath the crimson trim of his Victorian mustache, the man’s patronizing smirk finally vanished. He chucked his thumb toward the heavens. “Upstairs.”
TWENTY-ONE
STRUGGLING to keep up with the man’s long strides, I followed Captain Michael across the kitchen, down a hallway, and into a narrow stairwell. We traveled north a level then moved along another industrial green hallway, passing an office door with a plastic plaque that read Lieutenant Crowley. The door was ajar and I heard papers rattling, but I couldn’t see the occupant.
The captain’s office was no fancier than mine although it was a great deal larger. A battered wooden desk dominated the room. There were two chairs, banks of metal filing cabinets, and an old leather couch. The dark, heavy office felt warm to me. I attributed this not to my hormones (or the captain’s, for that matter) but to the clanking, hissing radiator in the corner.
Michael felt the heat, too. He opened the room’s only window and gestured to his office door. “Close it if you want privacy.”
I did. Then I settled onto a chair opposite his desk. He leaned back on his creaky office throne and cradled his fingers.
“So, I’m guessing you want to know what the fire marshals are sayin’, right?”
“That’s an ongoing investigation,” I said with a straight face. “I’m a civilian, remember? It’s none of my business until it’s a part of the public record.”
Captain Michael blinked, obviously surprised by my answer.
“I have another matter on my mind.”
He smirked. “My love life?”
“No. The other fire. The one that happened on the very same night as the fire at Caffè Lucia.”
His eyes narrowed. “I wasn’t aware there was a second fire.”
You’re lying again. “It made the papers. A privately owned coffee shop in Bensonhurst, Brooklyn. Doesn’t that strike you as suspicious? Two coffeehouse fires the same night, at almost the exact same time?”
Captain Michael opened the top button of his pristine white uniform shirt, and then, almost impatiently, he waved the question aside. “This firehouse caught two bakery delivery van fires this morning. Does that strike you as suspicious?”
“No, but—”
“There are just about as many coffee shops in this town as bakery delivery vans. Two vans, two coffee joints. I’d call it a coincidence either way.”
“What if both fires turn out to be arson?” I asked. “What then?”
“Then the crimes will be investigated and it’s not your business, right? Isn’t that what you just said?”
I folded my arms. “Yes. I’m a civilian. But I have a coffeehouse, too. I want to know what you think is causing these fires if it’s not arson? I mean, considering the two fires, I’d like your opinion on fire prevention. As a civilian, I think that’s a fair question.”
We stared at one another for a few silent seconds. He was obviously considering how to handle me.
Your move, chum.
He finally made one—a dodge. “You may be a civilian, Clare, but I’ll give you this, you’re a big-hearted one. Coming out here tonight after a long day of work, helping out my guys. It was very kind of you.”
“I was glad to help.” I was, too. Even if
I hadn’t come to gather information for Fire Marshal Rossi, I would have come to help these men.
A phone trilled just then. It wasn’t the land line on the captain’s desk. It was a cell phone.
“Excuse me.” Michael didn’t bother checking the caller ID. He answered quickly, and when the other party spoke, his expression chilled, his lively eyes went dead. With an abrupt lurch, he swung the chair around until all I could see was the starched cotton shirt stretched across his hunching shoulders.
“What do you want?” he said.
He listened for another few seconds, then replied, “No, Josie, and this is the third time you’ve asked. Three strikes you’re out.”
Josie? I tucked that name away. I couldn’t glean much more from the conversation—just grunts and one word replies. It was also obvious Josie was a woman.
With the captain’s back to me, I decided to take advantage of the moment. Rising, I glanced around, looking for any sign the man might be seeing Lucia—a photo of her maybe? Whoever Josie was, she was clearly on the outs, and I found myself curious about the raven-haired woman who’d made the captain so happy in those photos from years ago.
One of the office walls was peppered with framed diplomas, citations, and awards. An “I love me” wall was what they called it in the military because every officer above a lieutenant has one at home or in the office (according to a former U.S. Navy SEAL I’d crossed paths with one summer). But in Captain Michael’s case, it was an “I love my little brother” wall. As I moved closer, I realized every single item posted had something to do with Kevin Quinn: from a faded high school newspaper picture in his varsity football uniform to more recent images of Michael bowling with Kevin at Sunnyside Lanes, shooting hoops on a Queens outdoor court, and fishing on the rocky banks of the East River. It was the kind of devotion and pride one usually reserved for a child, not a brother.
I’d heard someone mention Kevin at the Quinn St. Patrick’s Day bash. He’d just relocated to Boston this past fall. The most recent photos attested to this, showing Kevin with his family on Boston Commons, at a Yankees-Red Sox game at Fenway Park, hanging out near Plymouth Rock.
