Acceptable Losses

by Irwin Shaw

  “Not the way you put it, no,” Damon said.

  Manfred chuckled. “One of the reasons I always liked you,” he said, “is that you made sure I never got a swelled head, even the season when I hit .356 in my junior year. I’m glad to see you haven’t changed.”

  “I know another cop who was in the Marines,” Damon said. He realized that subconsciously he had been comparing the gentle old man across from him at the kitchen table who looked like everybody’s benign grandfather and the rasping, stone-faced Lieutenant Schulter. “Man by the name of Schulter.”

  Weinstein looked surprised. “I heard of him. We used to get fliers from him. Homicide, in New York.”

  “That’s the man.”

  “What the hell are you doing with a dick from homicide?”

  Damon sighed. “It’s a long story.”

  “We got all day. At least I have.” Now there was a hard glint in Weinstein’s eyes and for a moment Damon could see the gunnery sergeant, the big city detective, and guess that Manfred Weinstein had not been a pleasant man to deal with when he was on a case.

  “Well,” Damon said, “it started with a telephone call …” Then he went through the whole thing, Zalovsky’s threat, the message on the answering machine, the conversations with Schulter, the lists, leaving out his dreams, the encounter on the street with a man who had been dead for years, the boy with the baseball glove on Sixth Avenue and only minutes before swinging onto a bicycle just three doors down from the house in which they were sitting. Weinstein listened intently, searching Damon’s face as he spoke as if looking for clues, now giving a hint that although physically the two men were so different, psychically Weinstein and Schulter shared many characteristics. What the French called la déformation du métier. He remembered more French than he gave himself credit for.

  “Actually,” Damon said, “the people my wife and I have come up with as possibilities don’t amount to much as threats. They may dislike me enough to want to annoy me a little, but that’s all. I was just trying to dig up some names for Schulter. To tell the truth, Manfred, my feeling is that the whole thing is out of the blue,” he said, knowing that he was repeating himself. “I might just as well use a Ouija board or pick a name at random out of the telephone book. If this wasn’t the twentieth century, I’d try religion and ask for the Pope to exorcise the demon. Demon, Damon—that’s pretty damn close, isn’t it?”

  “What’s your gut feeling about it?” Weinstein asked. “I’d go by that.”

  Damon hesitated, thought of the dreams and apparitions of the days and nights since the first telephone call. “I think there’s somebody out there who wants to kill me,” he said.

  “That’s simple enough for me. How are you going to handle it when you get back to New York?” Weinstein asked.

  “I decided. The next time he calls me, any time of the day or night, I’m going down and meeting him. Get it over with, once and for all.”

  “Did you tell Schulter that?”

  “Not yet.”

  “Do you intend to tell him?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do you want to hear what he’ll say when you tell him?” There was a harsh note in Weinstein’s voice. “He’ll say just what I’m going to say right now—you’re crazy. Whatever else the guy is, he’ll be armed. And probably as nutty as they come, to boot. You’d be lucky if he just kidnapped you and stashed you away somewhere and waited for the ransom money, if it’s money he’s after. I don’t know what you’ve been doing or what you’ve been reading lately, but don’t you know that people are knifing and shooting each other all over America these days for a parking place, a dollar and some change, for a package of cigarettes, because somebody is white and somebody else is black … ?”

  “I’ve got to get it over with one way or another, Manfred,” Damon said. “It’s driving me out of my mind. I have the feeling I’m living in a haunted house and somewhere somebody is sticking pins into a doll in a voodoo curse and the doll is me.”

  Weinstein got up and poured some coffee into Damon’s mug, then into his own. He put the pot back on the stove, stirred some sugar into the mug, the small clinking of the spoon against the cup the only sound in the empty house. He put his head back and squinted worriedly at the ceiling as if he were deep in thought, trying to solve some complicated problem, and rubbed the side of his face, the stubble of his day-old beard making a rasping sound against the palm of his hand.

  Damon watched him in silence, half-sorry that he had gotten out of his car to burden this accidentally rediscovered old friend with his problem, but relieved at the same time that he was sharing it with a man who had his survival at heart and who had spent his career dealing with criminals and putting them behind bars.

  Finally, Weinstein spoke, crisply and with authority. “No way,” he said. “There’s no way you can go meet whoever it is, alone. This is what we’re going to do. We’re going to New York together and I’m staying with you. Night and day …”

  “But …” Damon began to protest.

  “No buts.”

  “It may take weeks, months before the man calls me. Maybe never. I can’t take you away from your home, put you in danger …”

  “I got nothing but time,” Weinstein said.

  “It’s a small apartment. Sheila and I have a double bed. The only place I could offer you to sleep is on the couch in the little room I use to work in …”

  “I’ve slept on harder ground. Anyway, I owe you a favor after all those afternoons you wasted hitting grounders at me.”

  “Some favor,” Damon said ironically. “There wasn’t any chance of your being killed if I hit the ball the wrong way.”

  “Drink your coffee,” Weinstein said. “It’s getting cold.” He sipped at his own mug. “I’ve got nothing to do here. And I like the idea of getting one more sonofabitch off the streets.” He smiled, looking like a pleased child. “It’ll be a pleasure. If he makes any trouble, I’ll have my pistol on me.” He grinned evilly, as though he were promising himself a particular treat. “It’s about time I hauled my old ass off the shelf. I feel younger already. You better call your wife and tell her you have a house guest coming. It’s also about time I met the lady.”

  “Okay, okay,” Damon said. “If you want to act like a damn fool, I’m grateful.”

  “When do you want to go?” Weinstein asked. “You got any more errands to do here in town?”

  “Not really. I did what I came here to do,” Damon said, thinking of the lilac branches on the graves. “I was really only sightseeing when I spotted you.”

  “Thanks for nothing, old buddy.” Weinstein smiled. “All I have to do is shave and dress like a gentleman and oil the pistol. You check out of your room yet?”

  “No.”

  “If you come back for me in an hour, I’ll be ready. You sure you know the way back?”

  “If I get lost, I’ll ask directions, Manny,” Damon smiled. Nobody, Weinstein had made clear, could call him Manny instead of Manfred and Damon had only done it two or three times when he had been exasperated with his friend or was teasing him. Then he spoke more gravely. “Do you really think you’ll need a gun?”

  “This isn’t England, Roger. In the U.S. of A. cops use guns. If they left them home for twenty-four hours, it would be St. Bartholomew’s Eve all over again in every city in the country.”

  “Have you ever killed anybody?” As he said it, Damon regretted asking the question.

  “I was in the Marines. We weren’t there to play ping-pong.” Weinstein sounded amused.

  “I mean in civilian life.”

  “There’s no such thing as civilian life for cops. Two. I killed two men in what you call civilian life. All I can say is they deserved it. And I got a medal for each of the bastards. Don’t worry. I won’t shoot if I don’t have to. And I’ll try to keep the damage down to the minimum.”

  “One thing I’m glad of, old shortstop,” Damon said. “That you’re on my side.” He stood up and Weinstein stoo
d, too. “Listen, Manfred,” Damon said, “there’s something I should have asked you about before.”

  “What’s that?” Weinstein looked at him suspiciously.

  “How’s Elsie?”

  “She’s dead,” Weinstein said flatly. “She changed religion and became a Christian Scientist, and she wouldn’t go to a doctor and she died sixteen years ago. Any more questions?” His voice was harsh.

  “No.” One more dream, Damon thought, another shade in the procession. “Did she ever go to Europe?”

  “No. She married a shit in Boston who never held a job more than two weeks, and she had to support him. He was a half-assed writer and made a lot of noise about being an atheist and making fun of the Jews, who, he said, had imposed the blight of Christianity on the world—his words—Elsie had to hold me back from belting the sonofabitch more than once. I think she became a Christian Scientist because of him. The fucker’s still alive. Worse luck. Last I heard of him he was setting up those goddamn encounter groups, you know, where everybody gropes everybody else. The things people fall into once they stop believing in God. How about you, Roger?” he asked challengingly.

  “Fifty-fifty,” Damon said.

  “Better than zero-zero,” Weinstein said. “If I changed my religion, it would be to become a Catholic. They forgive sinners. We can all use a little of that. I talked myself blue in the face trying to convince Elsie that if she didn’t want to be a Jew anymore to go to the priests, it’s got form and rituals and a bone-deep history and at least the music is better in the churches.” He laughed sourly. “What made you and her break up?”

  “I’d rather not say.” You couldn’t tell a religious man that at the age of eighteen his sister had threatened to commit suicide because of the result of an affair with his best friend.

  “Well, you saved yourself a lot of trouble. She was a damn fool. In more ways than one. Now get out of here. And drive carefully. I don’t want you to break your neck and cheat me out of my fun. I’ll walk you to your car.”

  They came out onto the sunny street and Damon got into the car. Before starting the motor he looked thoughtfully at Weinstein, the lines of age, sorrow and violence etched deeply in his face, but the cold blue eyes youthfully clear. “You were such a quiet, peaceful boy,” Damon said. “I don’t remember your ever even getting in a fight. Who would have thought you’d turn into such a tough old bird?”

  Weinstein grinned. “Me,” he said.

  CHAPTER

  SIXTEEN

  BACK AT THE MOTEL Damon called his office and got Oliver on the phone.

  “Where are you?” Oliver asked worriedly. When he was nervous, as he was now, Oliver’s voice rose to a high squeak.

  “Out of town,” Damon said. “But not too far away. I’ll be in after lunch.”

  “How’s Sheila’s mother?”

  “The same. Sheila has to stay in Burlington at least till Wednesday.”

  “Will you stay with Doris and me tonight or do you want me to come to your place?”

  “Neither.”

  “Roger,” Oliver said reproachfully, “Sheila’s going to be sore at me. She’ll think I’ve let both you and her down. If anything happens to you, she’ll blame me.”

  “She won’t think anything and she won’t blame anybody. I’ve arranged for a friend to come in and stay with me.”

  “You’re not making that up, are you?”

  “Have I ever lied to you?”

  “Only sometimes,” Oliver said.

  Damon laughed. “Not this time.”

  “Proctor called. He wants you to phone him. He says it’s important. He has to make a decision before the weekend.”

  “Phone him and tell him I’ll call this afternoon. And stop worrying.”

  “I’ll try,” Oliver said wanly.

  Damon hung up, finished packing, paid his bill and drove to pick up Weinstein for the drive down to New York.

  When they got to the apartment, Damon was surprised to see the foyer piled high with cartons of books and records and the packages containing the fur coat for Sheila, the gifts for Oliver and Miss Walton, the corduroy jacket he had bought for himself, the two bottles of champagne he had carried home, now no longer cold. He had forgotten his buying spree and had neglected to leave instructions for the cleaning woman about what to do with the stuff.

  “Holy man,” Weinstein said, “what is this—Christmas morning?”

  “I bought a few things yesterday,” Damon said. Was it only yesterday? It seemed like months ago. “A few necessities of life. Books, records, things like that.”

  “What’s in that one?” Weinstein pointed at a huge carton.

  “That must be the phonograph I ordered.”

  “What’re you doing—preparing for a nuclear attack?”

  Damon laughed. “Not as grave as all that. I’ll be taking it up to our place in Old Lyme.” He had told Weinstein about the house on the trip down, as well as the reason why he wouldn’t be seeing Sheila that evening. “It’s for when I retire into the woods and I want to be reminded of what civilization was like back in the big city.”

  “Civilization in the big city would be a lot more bearable,” Weinstein said dryly, “if that’s all it was like.”

  They went through the living room, with Weinstein looking around appreciatively, and into the small room where Damon worked. “That’s where you’ll have to bed down, I’m afraid.” Damon pointed to the short, narrow couch.

  “It’s a lucky thing I never grew to my rightful height,” Weinstein said. “It’ll do. I warn you, I snore.”

  “I’ll close my door.”

  “My wife used to say that my snores could be heard in Poughkeepsie. A door is a mere trifle,” Weinstein said. “By the way, I see you have two locks on your front door. The upper one is new. You just put it in?”

  “Since the first call.”

  “How many people have keys?”

  “Just Sheila and me and the maid.”

  “Maybe it would be a good idea if I talked to the maid.”

  Damon laughed. “She’s a big fat black lady with a great contralto voice. She sings in her church choir up in Harlem. We’ve gone to hear her several times. She’s worked for us fifteen years and we leave money around the house, Sheila’s jewelry … nothing’s ever been touched. The only wrong thing she may have done in her life is hit a flat note when she’s had a cold.”

  “Okay,” Weinstein said. “Cross off one contralto. Still, don’t depend too much on locks.”

  “I don’t. That’s why I’m happy to have you here, even if I can’t get any sleeping in.”

  Just then the telephone began to ring on both lines, the one in the bedroom and the one in the living room. Weinstein looked at Damon questioningly. “You going to answer it?”

  “Of course. My friend from Ma Bell never calls in the afternoon.”

  It was Sheila. “I phoned the motel in Ford’s Junction,” she said, “and they told me you’d checked out. I guessed you’d be home by now. Is Oliver with you?”

  “No.”

  “You promised me you wouldn’t stay in the flat alone,” she said, rebuking him.

  “I’m not alone. I have an old friend with me. You remember Manfred Weinstein, from Ford’s Junction. I told you about him. When we were kids together. It turns out he’s a retired detective and he’s kindly offered to cling to me like a leech, for old times’ sake. And he’s heavily armed.” Damon spoke lightly as though having a house guest who wore a shoulder holster with a snub-nosed .38 caliber pistol in it was an amusing bit of whimsy.

  “Are you making this up?” Sheila asked suspiciously. “To keep me from worrying?”

  “I’ll let you talk to him. Manfred,” he said, “come and talk to the lady of the house.”

  “Ma’am,” Weinstein said into the phone, his voice booming as usual, “please let me thank you for your hospitality.”

  If volume was reassuring, Damon thought, Sheila must be reassured. Weinstein sounded like a
two-hundred-and-twenty-pound basso.

  Weinstein listened for a moment and Damon, who was standing next to him, could hear the anxiety in Sheila’s voice even though he couldn’t make out the words.

  “Don’t you worry, Ma’am,” Weinstein said, “he’ll be as safe as a baby in its mother’s arms. I hope I have the pleasure of meeting you real soon.” He handed the phone to Damon. “She wants to talk to you.”

  “Roger,” Sheila said, “it’s very nice of Mr. Weinstein to offer to take care of you, but I wish I could come down right now and see for myself. But I can’t. Mother’s still the same. Comatose, the doctors say, whatever that really means. There’s a big specialist coming up from Boston on Tuesday and I’ve just got to stay here at least until he examines her. I called the school and they say they’re getting along fine without me. It’s nice to know you’re not indispensable.” She laughed ironically.

  “You’re indispensable to me.”

  “What do you think you are to me?” Sheila’s voice had sunk to a whisper. “Mr. Weinstein’s not going to do anything reckless, is he?”

  “All I can say is that he was very careful as a boy,” Damon said, trying to joke, “and he’s hardly aged at all. Don’t rush back on my account. I’m all right. As Manfred said, like a baby in its mother’s arms.”

  “I wish I could believe that,” Sheila said distractedly. “Anyway, don’t get drunk with your detective friend.”

  “He only drinks coffee.”

  “Don’t drink too much coffee.” It was a sad little joke.

  “And don’t you act like a Jewish mother,” Damon said, an even sadder joke. But Sheila laughed, not very convincingly.

  “Stay well, dear,” she said. “And call often. It’s the only ray of light in the darkness here.”

  “I hope the specialist from Boston helps.”