Cogan's Trade

by George V. Higgins

  “You know, Honey,” Mitch said, “some day some old bastard you just milked, he might decide to carve you up some, talking like that. How’d you like that?”

  “Jesus,” the girl said in the doorway, “I don’t know. You think I’d come?”

  “If you could, you might,” Mitch said. “Probably not, is what I think.”

  “Fuck you,” the girl said closing the door.

  “Which,” Mitch said, “is pretty much what I had in mind when I had her come up here. Christ you got some funny gash in Boston. I hadda practically talk her into it. That Polly, there? Same thing. Nothing but french. ‘For Christ sake,’ I say, ‘I wanna get laid. Isn’t that what you do?’ ”

  “No, it’s not,” Cogan said. “Any guy you asked could’ve told you that. I could’ve told you that.”

  “You didn’t, though,” Mitch said.

  “Well, you didn’t ask me,” Cogan said. “Wasn’t me that had her come up here. That broad I sent, she was all right, I assume? The guy said she’s all right.”

  “No more’n that,” Mitch said. “I couldn’t get over it. I said to her: ‘Whaddaya mean, french? I happen to like fucking. Who’s hiring who, here?’ Didn’t make no difference at all. You can feel her up, you can finger-fuck her, but you can’t fuck her. For Christ sake. A fuckin’ blow job.”

  “It’s supposed to be a great blow job,” Cogan said.

  “When you wanna get laid,” Mitch said, “there’s no such thing as a great blow job. She’s telling me, guys spend two, three hundred a night for what she does. Is that true?”

  “I guess it used to be,” Cogan said.

  “Yeah,” Mitch said, “well, you know what I think? I think you’re all nuts, letting broads get away with that.”

  “She’s supposed to be afraid of the clap,” Cogan said.

  “Yeah,” Mitch said, “well, okay. That line of work, I don’t think you oughta be able to say like that, but I didn’t have no luck with her. She, she still didn’t fuck anybody that I could tell you about. Her teeth fall out, boy, she’s gonna be the hit of the world. But not me. You know something? I’ll tell you something.” Mitch finished his drink. “I haven’t had a real piece of ass since I was in Florida.”

  “That was one fine-lookin’ broad you had down there,” Cogan said.

  “Sunny,” Mitch said. “That was Sunny. I suppose you fucked her too, after I was gone.”

  “Mitch,” Cogan said, “when me and Dillon got there that night, she was with you. When we left, you’re still there and, wasn’t she still with you? You’re there, what was it?”

  “Three weeks,” Mitch said.

  “Three weeks,” Cogan said. “And I was there five days, inna middle. How the fuck’m I gonna do that?”

  “I dunno,” Mitch said. He picked up the glass. “Empty again.” He got up. “Sure you won’t join me?”

  “Not late enough yet, either,” Cogan said.

  Mitch went into the bathroom. Cogan heard ice go into the glass. He did not hear water running. “Sammy did it,” Mitch said from the bathroom.

  “The guy from Detroit,” Cogan said. “Sharp-looking little ginzo.”

  “Sammy’s Jewish,” Mitch said.

  “Okay,” Cogan said. “I didn’t mean anything.”

  “No trouble,” Mitch said. “He looks like a ginzo. I wished he was. But he’s Jewish. All the years I known that guy, he still did it. The son of a bitch.”

  Cogan heard water running in the bathroom. Mitch emerged with a dark Scotch and water. He was wiping his mouth with the back of his left hand. “It’s my own stupid fault,” he said. “The night before I’m leaving, we’re having dinner and he comes over, I introduce them and everything. I don’t know why this bothers me, you know that?”

  “No,” Cogan said.

  Mitch sat down. He put the glass on the end table. “I mean, I know. When I’m there, I’m there and she’s with me. When I leave, you’re there, and she’s with you.”

  “She wasn’t with me,” Cogan said.

  “I didn’t mean you,” Mitch said. “I mean: any guy. Anybody that’s there, she’s with him. You leave, she’s not with you any more.”

  “Oh,” Cogan said.

  “See,” Mitch said, “that’s what I mean. I know that. I give her, well, last year, I’m down there, I was only there two weeks. No, three weeks. Anyway, that’s how many nights?”

  “Twenty-one,” Cogan said.

  “No,” Mitch said, “ah, anyway, I had her all signed up. It was fourteen nights. You know what that cost me? Three thousand dollars.”

  “Now,” Cogan said, “that really oughta do it. I wouldn’t pay no broad three thousand to do anything. I wouldn’t care what she could do. I wouldn’t pay it.”

  “I didn’t care,” Mitch said. “I was still with the union then, and the guys that had the jobs, they were always very nice to me. You didn’t have no wildcats or anything, well, see what I mean? I didn’t care. So it’s a lot. I’m not in love with the girl, right? I only give her for when I’m there.”

  “She’s still a great-looking girl, though,” Cogan said.

  “She is,” Mitch said. “That fuckin’ Sammy. The night you saw her, what’d she have on?”

  “Tell you the truth,” Cogan said, “I didn’t notice what she was wearing, so much’s what she was wearing it on. Some yellow thing or something. You could see quite a lot.”

  “There’s quite a lot to see,” Mitch said. “The night Sammy comes by, right? She’s got this gray thing on. It’s like silk, and it’s gray, and there isn’t any back on it and she’s got these mammoth tits, she’s really something. I could’ve beat up five guys with the horn I had on, and I, I had her all them other nights, right? So Sammy comes up and I introduce them, and how long am I there for and how long’s he there for, and I’m not really paying attention or anything, we’re having some wine and so I asked him to sit down. And pretty soon I got to go to the Men’s. So I go, and I’m gone a pretty long time, because I got this huge prong on and I gotta practically stand on my head if I wanna piss in the hopper and not in my own fuckin’ mouth, and still, I wanna be careful with it, you know? It was really big. I don’t think I could’ve blinked. I don’t think I had no skin left. She’s good, Sunny’s good about that. Sunny can’t get you up, you’re probably dead. But this’s the last time, and she’s not gonna have to. Because I’m all ready to go, I can ever get through dinner. My friend, I don’t care what you say, I seen every kind of ass there is, you know that?”

  “You’ve seen it this week,” Cogan said. “You been here, what, three days, what I hear you had a look at most of the ass there is in Boston.”

  “I like it,” Mitch said. “That’s what it is, I like it. It’s like, it’s a hobby with me, you know? I never do nothing when I’m home. Nothing. But that’s why, I go the races. Once a year, I go to the races, and I get laid. Only this year, probably I’m not goin’ the races.”

  “I couldn’t do it,” Cogan said. “I’d get all fucked out. You, I think you’re probably in good shape. I wouldn’t, I couldn’t fuck for three days, is all. I couldn’t do it.”

  “I was your age,” Mitch said, “I felt exactly the same way.”

  “Sure,” Cogan said. “I got work I got to do.”

  Mitch drank from the glass. “I used to think the same way,” he said. “Then, I dunno when it happened, I dunno why it happened. I just started doing it. I went down there, the very first time I went down there, I got the suite. I was having a terrible time with Margie, and she finds out about it and she’s giving me all kinds of hell about it, you asked her and she’d tell you she drinks because I go down there. Well, it was her or me. But I can tell you, boy, you want ass, get yourself a, there’s no ass inna whole wide world like a young Jewish girl that’s hookin’.”

  “I’ll keep it in mind,” Cogan said.

  “That broad,” Mitch said, “she was in Oberlin, she was in college, right? And she quit. Whaddaya think of that?” He drank.


  “You’re gonna be all right,” Cogan said, “tomorrow or the next night?”

  “I’m all right, right now,” Mitch said. “Christ sake. Lemme alone, willya? Well, she quit. And she took up hookin’. Now you get a broad like that, they really go right to work on it, you know? And they get so, they really know their fuckin’ business. That broad, Sunny, she’s not, she isn’t half my wife’s age and she knew things which, if Margie knew them she’d go down the station and turn herself in. She really would.

  “So, I come back the table,” Mitch said. “I finally get rid of that wine without pissing on my own fuckin’ chin and they’re both there and Sammy’s being very polite and all, and finally he leaves and then we finish and I thought to fuckin’ God, I can pole-vault up to the room with just what I got of my own, and we go up there and I want to tell you, three thousand bucks, it’s not cheap and I don’t care whether you got it or not, it’s fuckin’ expensive, but it’s worth it, it was honestly worth it. I give her three for the whole time and that night alone, it was worth it all. Only, I don’t tell her that, of course.”

  “Mitch,” Cogan said.

  “So the next day I get up,” Mitch said. “I also get up, but I hadda twelve-thirty plane so it’s just a quickie. Just a quickie with Sunny’s about nine times better’n a whole fuckin’ date with another broad. And then I go down and I get some steam, and I come back up and I got to give her the rest of the money. See, you give them half when you get there and then when you’re through, down there, you give them the rest. So I say, I tell her, I really appreciate it, I know what this means, all that time right out in one chunk and all. And she tells me, see, she’s out of circulation and everything, she tells me: ‘It’s all right,’ there isn’t any problem, and I give her the money and everything, and she’s leaving, and, well, she’s gonna stay with Sammy the next two weeks and he’s hitting her four for it. That cocksucker.”

  “Look,” Cogan said, “this after, I’m supposed to meet a kid, all right? I think I got a guy that can take you around and all.”

  “I can’t go out,” Mitch said.

  “I didn’t mean fuckin’ around,” Cogan said. “You come up here to do something. For that. I was gonna talk to him and then if I’m satisfied, he can do something without having his brother hold his hand all the time, I was gonna bring him up here and talk about it with you.”

  “It’s all right with me,” Mitch said.

  “Well,” Cogan said, “I’m glad to hear that. Only, it’s not all right with me. Because you’re not gonna be able, be able to make it tonight, and I don’t want this kid thinking about things too long, he’s liable to go tell his brother.”

  “Aw right,” Mitch said, “where the fuck is he? Get him up here and we’ll set the guy up.”

  “You,” Cogan said, “I’ll tell you what you’re gonna do, right? You’re goin’ to bed.”

  “I’m not tired,” Mitch said.

  “You sure as hell look tired to me,” Cogan said. “You go to fuckin’ bed. And, it’s two-thirty now, you shit. I’m gonna call you at seven-thirty and I better wake you up, because if I don’t, I’m gonna drop a dime on a couple cops I know and they’ll take you back where you’re supposed to be.”

  “Yeah,” Mitch said.

  “No ass,” Cogan said, “no more booze, no nothing. You get yourself a shower and go to bed and I’ll wake you up and tell you where you gotta be, right?”

  “I don’t take orders from shits like you,” Mitch said.

  THE DRIVER TURNED OFF the ignition of the silver Toronado and waited for Cogan to cross the trolley tracks behind Cronin’s in Cambridge. When Cogan got in, the driver said: “You know, I hate to be a burden to anybody, but life’d be a whole lot easier for me if you could bring yourself to use a telephone now and then to talk about things. They’ve got pay phones now, anybody can use them. I bet I can even give you two or three numbers in Providence alone that’re pay phones, and if you wanted to call me up and talk to me about something, all you’d have to do is call me up and say which one. This running back and forth every time somebody gets a runny nose’s raising hell with me. My wife’s sick and one of the kids’s sick and my practice’s going to hell, and that isn’t even enough for you, one of the last good Saturdays we’re likely to see in a long time I think, and I had to give up nine holes to come up here and talk to you. That’s all I seem to do, lately, cancel appointments and drive up here to talk to you.”

  “You oughta talk to the man, Albert,” Cogan said. “Sounds to me like you’re the kind of man, deserves a raise. Tell him to get in touch with me. I’ll put in a good word for you.”

  “You’re all heart,” the driver said. “Okay, I’m here. Let’s have the latest bad news. What’s messed up now?”

  “Well,” Cogan said, “we seem to have a little problem.”

  “We’re not supposed to have any more little problems,” the driver said, “no little problems at all. I’ve talked to him and we’ve done everything you asked. No problems at all, big or little. Tell me one thing you asked for, that we didn’t go along with.”

  “Nothing,” Cogan said. “Only, there’s a couple things I didn’t know.”

  “Tell me about it,” the driver said.

  “Mitch,” Cogan said. “He can’t do it. I had things pretty well lined up for tonight. I know where Amato’s gonna be, and I’m pretty sure I can find out before dark where the kid that I’m sure of’s going to be. But at least we had Amato lined up. We could do a double, if things went right, or we’d at least get the Squirrel and he’s the big one anyway. But Mitch can’t do it.”

  “You asked for him,” the driver said. “You and Dillon both asked for him. You said you couldn’t do it, and Dillon of course can’t. We got you what you asked for.”

  “What I asked for,” Cogan said, “was, I didn’t know this, see? I wanted Mitch the way he was a year, a couple years ago. He’s fuckin’ worthless now.”

  “What’s the matter with him?” the driver said.

  “The first thing I heard about,” Cogan said, “he’s got this beef down in Maryland. He thinks he’s gonna do a bit for it and he’s scared of the bit because he thinks his wife’s gonna dump him if he does. Which, from what he tells me, she is, and even if she wasn’t, he hasn’t got any idea he’s gonna really enjoy doing the bit anyway.”

  “I don’t see what that’s got to do with this,” the driver said.

  “It don’t seem to, at first,” Cogan said, “except that he’s not supposed to go any place but Maryland without getting permission, and naturally he didn’t, come up here, so he’s afraid to go out and he stays inna room all the time. Because they’ll heave him in just for being here.

  “Anyway,” Cogan said, “he’s staying inside and he’s fucking everything that jumps.”

  “He said,” the driver said, “when I told him you wanted Mitch, he said it was all right, but it might be the best idea if you could find some way to keep the fellow locked in the bathroom all the time he’s here. Well, what is it? Won’t he come out?”

  “He’ll come out if we want him to,” Cogan said. “I don’t think we do. When he landed here he wanted me to get him a broad, and I thought, what the fuck business is it of mine? I thought he wanted a broad. I called up a guy, guy got him a broad. Beautiful. But what he did was get that broad to give him the names of some other broads, and these aren’t hookers in from Lawrence for the night, either. These’re girls that see a lot of guys and talk to a lot of guys, and they all know he’s in town by now, and that isn’t gonna help us. This kid I sent around, I asked for one that’s just getting started and doesn’t know anybody from a pisshole in the snow. But he also found Polly, he tells me, and there isn’t one guy in town doesn’t know Polly, and this silly bastard hadda fight with her, for Christ sake. That girl talks to cops.”

  “Has he lost his mind?” the driver said.

  “I think,” Cogan said, “I think there’s a limited amount of shit a guy can take, an
d Mitch went over his limit. When I met him he was drinking up a storm, and I said something to him and he told me, it scares the shit out of him when he’s got to fly and he can’t sleep the night before and he’s got to get something in him so he can sleep. So, okay, and I could see there’s a lot of things bothering him. Let the guy do what he wants.

  “Well,” Cogan said, “that was three days ago, and what he didn’t fuck in them three days, he drank. When I left him, he was drunk. Two-thirty in the afternoon, and he was finishing up a fight with another heavy cruiser he got from some place. Really drunk, talking and everything, he can’t remember what year things happened, for Christ sake, and I chew him out for it and he’s gonna go right out in his skivvies and do the job now. He won’t shut up.”

  “Have you talked to Dillon?” the driver said. “Is Dillon well enough to talk to?”

  “Told me he went out for a walk yesterday,” Cogan said. “Said he’s feeling much stronger, he had a good dinner last night and watched TV. Yeah. Dillon thinks what I think. This guy’ll blow the whole thing if we don’t do something. He’ll get another broad and another jug up there, and if one of the ones he had already didn’t get the word onna street, the next one will. We need that guy out of town yesterday, is what we need.”

  “Well,” the driver said, “you invited him up here. Send him back.”

  “He wouldn’t go,” Cogan said. “He’s hungry for the dough, said he really needs dough. Lost his job or something and everything. He wouldn’t go if I told him. I don’t think he’d do anything I told him, unless he was so drunk he couldn’t think of anything else to do. Which he probably is.”

  “I can’t get in touch with him today,” the driver said.

  “It’s nothing like that,” Cogan said. “What I got in mind, I’m gonna get him grabbed.”

  “Turn him in,” the driver said. “Won’t he talk?”