The morning news was still playing the tape of the Mister getting beaten up in front of the house, scurrying across the road on his back like a crab, kicking like a little baby, ripping his suit (which he threw away but which Clara rescued from the garbage, thinking she could easily mend the few tears and give it to her grandfather). Clara tried not to smile as she watched the Mister get beaten up.
She put on her coat and headed out the door to the health food store. The Missus had vitamins and exotic-sounding herbal supplements that needed to be picked up. She took them three times a day, the Missus holding the pills with reverence, closing her eyes before she swallowed them, as if she was praying. They were supposed to put her body in a state of balance. The Missus explained it once to Clara. The stress of daily life put her out of balance, and the vitamins and herbs helped put her back in balance. Clara wanted to say that maybe if the Missus cooked a meal or washed even a single dish or made her own bed in the morning, then just maybe she might not feel so out of balance.
Just before she got to Lexington Avenue she heard footsteps, moving quickly, clearly getting closer. She stopped and turned.
It was a tall young man, neatly dressed. His white, polished teeth glistened unnaturally as he smiled, as if lit from a tiny row of lights discretely hidden behind his lips. Children used to approach her this way before class when they’d forgotten their homework.
“You’re …” His hand made little revolutions as he tried to remember what he wanted to say. He scowled and quickly checked his notebook. “You’re Clara,” he said.
“Yes,” she said.
“I’m Roger. I’m a journalist.” He unfurled his teeth again for her.
He named a magazine Clara had never heard of.
“What do you want?” Clara asked.
“You work for the Gelmans, Clara, am I right?”
“Yes.”
“I was wondering if you wanted to tell your story.”
“Why would anyone want to hear my story?” she asked innocently.
“Oh you’d be surprised,” he said in an unctuous singsong voice, like she was a child, like he was going to tell her a fairy tale and tuck her into bed. “And believe it or not, Clara, my magazine would actually be willing to give you a little something for your perspective.”
“Thirty thousand,” Clara said, her voice all business. And suddenly Roger was all business, too, the boyish innocence clearly just an act.
“But only for an exclusive,” he said.
“I want half in front,” Clara said.
“You mean up front.’”
“Yes. Before I tell you what I know.”
“I don’t want the same pallid shit everyone already knows. I need buzz. Can you do that, Clara? Can you service me? Can you give me buzz?”
Rick put on his suit for the funeral as soon as he woke up. He put his gun in his side jacket pocket, but he could easily see its silhouette through the material. He switched it to the inside breast pocket, but then there was a large bulge by his shoulder exactly where a gun would be. So he wedged it in his pants in the small of his back like he did when he first got it and tightened his belt. The metal was cold against his skin. He wanted it with him, all day, all the time, right through the funeral—the gun, his pacifier.
He had purpose now. He could go to the funeral knowing he had a future, that he was not buried in the coffin along with his son.
It was rage when he went after Owen’s father. Now he was fueled with a kind of clarity. Rick felt light, moving easily, like a machine, like something riding on rails. It was an amazing feeling. Some people live this way all the time, he thought. With this kind of ease, moving smoothly from point to point on glistening rails laid out before them, directing them, moving them forward (people who rode on rails carried luggage!). And now Rick was getting a taste of it. Finally.
Maybe this was the future Rick, the real Rick.
He was going to see the video of the person—the cop—who killed his son. The man on the phone said so. Promised him. The man on the phone knew everything.
He buttoned his jacket, shifted his shoulders so his jacket hung properly. He turned to the side. The gun didn’t show.
He faced the mirror again. He felt good. He felt like he could sell a dozen sets of luggage.
Right after he was married, his father-in-law put him to work in one of the stores, so Rick could get a sense of the retail operation, to get a feel for the leather, a grasp of the clasps, a hold on the handles. Luggage humor.
Hah hah.
“I’m going to start you on the floor,” his father-in-law said, “but don’t worry. That’s just the beginning.”
His father-in-law told him to always refer to the merchandise as “luggage.” Never “a suitcase.” Never “a bag.”
“‘Suitcase’ is singular. One. A suitcase. The word ‘luggage’ is plural. It suggests a family. A larger need. A way of life. If you need a suitcase, you can buy one and be done with it. But a need for luggage can never be satisfied. There is always more to get.”
Suitcase. Luggage. It didn’t matter. Rick was a pitiful salesman. Despondent. He pasted a smile on his face, but even that didn’t last more than a few days. It didn’t take long for word to reach his father-in-law. After the first week Rick was called into the office.
“You have to believe in the merchandise,” his father-in-law told him, getting out from behind his desk, putting a hand on his son-in-law’s shoulder. “You don’t have children yet, but when you do you’ll think of them, each of them, as the most wonderful child ever placed on earth. You won’t see their flaws. (Hah!) It’s the same with luggage. Each matching set is like one of your children. Your progeny. You need to brag about them, Rick. You need to make the customer swell with an intense feeling of joy that they are buying this luggage, joy that flows from you.”
But when Rick returned to the store he was just as miserable. He could offer the customers no advice.
Are these good? the customers asked. Durable? Will this fit in the overhead rack? Do I need all six pieces?
It’s luggage, he said. (What else could he say?) You should be happy you have some place to go.
Then he’d furtively pick at his nails and his eyes would wander to some far away place and the customers would slowly edge their way out the door.
That’s when he was moved to the front office, so he wouldn’t spread his misery and weakness around the store anymore.
But now Rick had his son’s strength, could feel his son’s resolve keeping him focused.
And he had the gun.
He could be an ace salesman now. He could take on the world.
You don’t need a suitcase. You need luggage. And I know the perfect set for you. Exactly what you need. I love this luggage. I love this luggage like I love my son. But I want you to have it. A perfect stranger. So take it. No need to pay.
Just take the luggage and get out of the store. Pack it up. Go to the airport. Get on your plane.
Just leave the store.
NOW!
I’ve got to close up.
There’s something I need to do.
Something I absolutely have to do.
Then, together with his wife, Rick took the elevator down to the lobby and got into the waiting black limo to drive to the cemetery so he could watch the funeral of his son.
They were waiting for Bliss on the bench in the front lobby of the precinct. The three of them—Billy Dix Sr. and Jr. and one Marcello “T-Bone” Fuchs.
“The boys have something they need to tell you,” he said. “There a place we can go?”
Bliss found an empty interview room. Ward was at the funeral, watching what transpired, if anyone unexpected showed up. Someone connected with the murder. It sometimes happened at funerals. It was unlikely to happen today.
They went in, taking seats around the table. The two men and the two boys, like they were getting ready for some kind of family dinner.
Billy Jr. resembled his father. If he stayed out of jail, he’d probably become a cop. He already had the look.
His friend T-Bone was a big kid with formidable arms. Yet his skin was curiously smooth, almost babyish, skin that belonged on the face of a Sicilian schoolgirl. His lips were disarmingly red. T-Bone reminded Bliss of Sal Mineo, only taller.
Both boys looked sheepishly at the table. Billy Dix Sr. must have had them alone for a few minutes. But that was no guarantee they would now be telling the truth.
“We came to see you in school the other day, Billy,” Bliss said. “But you skipped out.”
Billy Jr. nodded.
“We had to go on a field trip.”
“Billy!” his father said.
“Sorry,” Billy Jr. said.
“So why’d you leave when my partner and I showed up?”
“We just panicked,” Billy Jr. said.
“What were you afraid of?”
Billy didn’t say anything. He stared at the table, scratched his cheek, stared at the table some more. Bliss tried the friend.
“T-Bone?”
T-Bone didn’t have much to say, either. He rubbed his arm. As he did, the sleeve of his T-shirt lifted and Bliss could see part of a tattoo. A pointed tail. Maybe part of a dragon. A devil. T-Bone unconsciously flexed his biceps, or maybe the muscle did it by itself, a mind of its own—perhaps the only mind T-Bone had.
They continued to sit. No one speaking. Just breathing. Then Billy Sr. stood up, lifted his chair, and slammed it into the floor. He did it again. Then one more time until the wood splintered and the legs separated from the seat.
This seemed to encourage Billy Jr. to reach into his pocket. When he pulled out his hand, a necklace was dangling between his fingers. He placed it on the table along with some earrings. A gold ring also dropped out. It rolled on the table in ever-decreasing circles until it fluttered and finally came to rest. The jewelry glittered, even in the dull light of the interview room.
“Is that everything?” Bliss said.
Billy Sr., grim-faced, standing because his chair was now kindling, reached behind him. Bliss feared Billy Sr. was about to get out his piece and blow his kid’s head off. Instead he took out his wallet. He pulled out a handful of bills and flipped them on the table. About a dozen twenties.
“He also found three hundred bucks,” Billy Sr. said, “which he spent. He and T-Bone. His friend. His best fucking friend.”
T-Bone didn’t like that remark.
“Hey,” T-Bone said, but that’s all he was able to get out before Billy Sr. shut him up with a hard slap to the back of T-Bone’s head.
“Shut the fuck up, Marcello,” Billy Sr. said.
T-Bone did as he was told.
Bliss gathered the jewelry and cash together. The Gelmans hadn’t mentioned anything about stolen jewelry. He and Ward would try to find a way to make the theft go away—say they busted a fence and the jewels just turned up. He wouldn’t say anything about the cash, somehow finding a way to get it back in Billy Sr.’s wallet.
“Let me see what we can do,” Bliss said.
“No!” Billy Sr. said. “I want them to go down for this. Both of them.”
Billy Jr. turned ashen.
“Dad,” he said, plaintively, sounding suddenly like a little kid.
“I want them booked. They’ll make a statement. Both of them. Get some paper. Get them each a pen!”
Billy Sr.’s voice started to crack. Tears were forming in his eyes, his face wrenched with pain.
“Dad,” Billy Jr. said.
“It’s too late for that,” Billy Sr. said.
T-Bone’s eyes were darting wildly in his head. He was just beginning to understand what was happening.
“But Mr. Dix …”
T-Bone covered his head as Billy Sr. drew back his fist. But the blow never came.
“Dix!” Bliss shouted.
Billy Sr. turned away, walked to the wall, stood there clenching and unclenching his fists.
“We can’t book them now,” Bliss said. “There’s been no report of a theft. The Gelmans have to identify it.”
“They say they did it,” Billy Sr. said.
“We need to wait,” Bliss said. “A day or two.”
Give Billy Sr. a chance to think this through. Meanwhile, they still had the issue of Ben’s getting dead. Just because these two robbed the place, didn’t mean they hadn’t killed Ben, too.
Bliss cleared his throat.
“T-Bone.”
“Yeah?”
“Your prints were on a dumbbell in Owen’s house.”
“I see some weights, I have to pick them up,” T-Bone said.
“Did you leave it where you found it?”
“Yeah.”
“Where?”
“In the bedroom.”
“Whose?”
“I don’t know,” he said.
“Owen’s?”
“I don’t know,” T-Bone said. “It had Batman on the bedspread. That’s all I remember.”
Holden’s room, Bliss thought. Which meant he hadn’t left it under Owen’s bed, where Bliss found it. He seemed to be telling the truth. Which meant another dead end.
Rubber Soul, as Ward liked to say. “Nowhere Man.”
There was more silence.
“What should we do now?” Billy Dix Jr. asked.
“You should go,” Bliss said. “Just stay somewhere where we can find you.”
“You won’t have to worry about that,” Billy Dix Sr. said.
They all stood up.
“Wait,” T-Bone said, “I got something else.” T-Bone reached in his pocket and pulled out an inch-thick stack of baseball cards held together with a rubber band.
“I took these, too,” T-Bone said. “There was a Mark McGwire card on top. I like him. Big Mac.”
Bliss had the feeling that Maurice of Flowers by Maurice would be reconsidering his decision about not sending young Marcello off to boarding school. That he and Mrs. Fuchs would probably be in the car tomorrow, driving to Connecticut to look them over, checkbook in hand, T-Bone’s suitcases already packed and in the trunk.
Rick stared at the coffin containing his son and thought how this funeral was not just for Ben, but for himself, too. He was burying part of himself in there. He held his wife’s hand. It felt limp and cold—dead—another door closed to him forever. But Rick wasn’t upset. He thought of Jasmine.
I took care of you, didn’t I, Jasmine? I didn’t hesitate.
I did what I had to do.
He had made love with Ellen last night in a way he never had before. Recklessly. Practically forcing himself on her, grabbing her mouth between his fingers, forcing her to kiss him, her husband, the man he knew she blamed for the death of her son. Then he took her from behind, not stopping until he’d had his fill, not stopping even when he heard her start to cry.
He wanted to tell Jasmine about it. He imagined Jasmine’s coy smile, impressed. Harriet’s knowing look, that Rick had finally discovered something they’d probably learned long ago.
Rick looked around at the people at the funeral, gathered solemnly around the grave. His in-laws, his relatives, friends he’d known for years, whom he’d gone to high school with. Teary-eyed. Sniffling quietly as the minister spoke. But they had no meaning for Rick. No history. Like the girl in college, like his son Ben, he had turned away, left them behind. They were not part of his life anymore.
The only one who mattered was the voice on the phone, the one who spoke to him last night. The voice of the man who understood what he had to do.
The coffin was slowly lowered into the grave. Ellen was crying freely now. His mother-in-law held her. But Rick was thinking he would not miss the part of himself that was in the coffin, being buried along with Ben.
Then it struck him that the coffin was like a big piece of luggage, and that that part of his life was being buried, too.
It was all fitting into place.
He felt strong.
He put his finger to his mouth, bit off a nub of flesh at the corner of his thumb.
He felt joyous, but made sure he wasn’t smiling.
That certainly wouldn’t look right at a funeral.
Bliss sat alone in the interview room with a strong premonition that T-Bone had done his share of bad things, but killing Ben Purdy wasn’t one of them. He and Billy Dix found some money and jewelry, which would cancel Ben’s debt, at least partially. Certainly enough to allay the feeling that they needed to kill him. Besides, T-Bone was too dumb to be a good liar. Bliss meant that, of course, had anyone asked him, in the nicest possible way.
So once again there were only two likely suspects—Owen and, if the surveillance tape ever played in local theaters, himself.
Garcia came in.
“How’s it going with Felix?” Bliss asked.
Garcia had done her hair differently, put some blond streaks in it. It didn’t help to lighten her demeanor, however.
“I went to the nursing home, showed Dom’s picture to one of the old men who used to live in Felix’s building,” Garcia said. “The poor guy’s in diapers. He couldn’t ID Felix. If I showed the guy a picture of himself, he probably couldn’t ID that, either. Who told Felix to come up from the deep, anyway? It’s much better in the water. Didn’t he see Little Fucking Mermaid?”
“I like the highlights in your hair, Garcia,” Bliss said. “Like brush strokes.”
Garcia didn’t exactly smile, but she made it clear that she wasn’t not smiling.
“The Polish super,” she said, “you remember him?”
Bliss nodded.
“He’s got a cousin. Also a Polish super. He recognized Dom right away. ‘Dum,’ he said. Just like his cousin. Then he thought maybe it wasn’t such a good idea, his remembering Dom right away like that. Then he got all hinky and said he didn’t recognize Dom at all. That it wasn’t Dom. ‘Nut Dum.’ Then he forgot he knew how to speak English.”
“Funny how that happens,” Bliss said.
“But I like Dom for Felix,” Garcia said.
“Dom’s a likable guy.”
“Though I don’t see why he needed to kill Felix to get him to move out of the building. Now that I’ve gotten to know Felix, I’m thinking for fifty bucks you could get him to do just about anything. Malhombre.”
“Andrej and his cousin aren’t going to be much help anyway,” Bliss said. “We’ve got no leverage. Nothing we can trade. We need Dom to make a statement. I killed Felix. Show us the knots he used to tie him to the cement block.”
Garcia didn’t say anything. She sensed Bliss was right.
“Fucking Felix,” she said, finally.
“My sentiments exactly,” Bliss said. He checked his watch. He was expecting another kid to show up. To talk to about the party. He was due there soon.
When he looked up, Bliss saw him, the tall, wiry frame of Malcolm Marcoux, resplendent in a lime green suit, looking like he was auditioning to work behind Gladys Knight as one of the Pips. The pants to the suit were just a tad short, allowing a full view of his boots, which were black with a square toe and a buckle, like the ones the Puritans wore. His hair was parted in a neat, straight line.
“Malcolm Marcoux,” Bliss said.
The boy bowed slightly from the waist.
“At your service, Detective.”
Dom drove the limo under the shade of a large tree. The cemetery parking guy had wanted him somewhere else, but Dom liked the look of this tree. He liked the shade. He didn’t want the front seat to be a hundred degrees later.
He got out, adjusted his shades, then went to open the back door for Owen. That’s when he saw Ward strolling toward him through the gravestones—a large, black specter. Ward’s stride was relaxed, his arms hanging loose, but Dom sensed this was anything but a casual, chance encounter.
“Kemosabe,” Dom said.
“Dom,” Ward said.
“I have to stay with the kid,” Dom said, gesturing to Owen who was focused on his Game Boy. “Because of the father the other day. Exploding like that. The threat of more violence.”
“I understand,” Ward said, his voice calm and even. “I just have to ask you a couple of questions.”
“Go ahead, Dom,” Owen said. “I’ll wait here.” He pulled the car door closed.
Ward must have seen that, Dom thought, the kid giving me directions like that. It didn’t look good.
“The surveillance tape from the Gelmans,” Ward said. “From the night of the party. It’s missing.”
“Uh-huh.”
“You installed the camera, right, Dom?”
“Yeah. Me and another guy. Gave me technical assistance.”
“You know anything about the missing tape?”
“No,” Dom said.
“But you knew where to find it.”
“Of course.”
He’s worried about his partner, Dom thought. Which means he knows about Bliss being in the house that night. (Twenty-two minutes. What did you do, Detective Bliss?) Ward is covering up. He’s complicit, breaking the law for his partner. Which means he’s vulnerable. They’re both vulnerable.
The only reason Bliss isn’t a suspect is because the tape hasn’t surfaced. And I have the tape.
Every fight tells a story.
“Sorry,” he said. “I wish I could help you.”
“You’ll alert us, should something come up,” Ward said. “You’re aware we got this Felix thing working, too.”
“Felix?”
“You know. ‘Felix Floats.’”
“Doesn’t mean anything to me,” he said.
“You never know what you might suddenly remember,” Ward said.
Dom knew Ward wanted to hit him, wanted to land a haymaker to Dom’s jaw and end it right now. But the bell had rung.
Sorry, Ward. Can’t throw any punches after the bell. All you can do is go back to your corner and wait.
Dom smiled.
“By the way,” Dom said, “there’s this writer says she knows your partner. Her name is Mae. Tall. Black hair. Any chance you happen to know her number?”
Chantal sat in her room. Her dad was at work. Her mom was at some appointment. Avis was shopping. She didn’t mind being alone. She was happy not to have to talk about recent events. Her mother wanted to talk about it every second now. Like she suddenly realized Chantal was alive.
It occurred to her the funeral was about to start. Ben’s funeral. She couldn’t say she was glad he was dead. That didn’t feel right. But she was really glad she would never have to see him again.
She picked up Crime and Punishment, the book they were reading in English. Raskolnikov had just hit the lady over the head with the axe, crushing her skull. Her teacher wanted them to think about why he did it, what drove him to do the deed. Was it that Raskolnikov wanted to play God? Did he just want to see what it was like to take a life? How much guilt did he feel? How much remorse?
She wasn’t sure about the answer, but she knew she’d better come up with something. Mr. Glassman had an annoying way of making you think, even if you didn’t want to.
Then the phone rang. Not the real phone, but the one from the lobby. The doorman said Holden was on his way up to see her. He had a heavy Hispanic accent, so she made him repeat the name.
There was no mistaking it the second time.
“Holden,” the doorman said. “He say you ess-pecting him.”
She went to school with Holden for a few years before he left for Hollywood. He was nice enough, didn’t tease her like some of the boys. But why was he coming to see her? What was that about?
He arrived with flowers, a bouquet too large for him to carry, so he had the guy from the florist with him.
“Your room still down the hall?” he said, already moving that way, the guy from the florist trailing dutifully behind him.
Holden carried a wicker basket.
“I thought we’d have a picnic,” he said. “I hope you don’t mind.”
She remembered Holden had come over for a play date one time. They had played Lego together. This didn’t seem to be about Lego.
He directed the flower guy to set the bouquet on her window sill. Just told him to do it. Didn’t say please or anything. Holden put down the picnic basket, took a thick wad of bills out of his pocket, and handed the delivery guy ten dollars.
“For your troubles, my good man,” Holden said, acting suave. Chantal had the eerie feeling it was a line he had once said on his show, that maybe everything Holden said was lines from his show. The delivery guy nodded effusively.
“Adios,” Holden said, patting the guy on the back. “Amigo mio.”
Holden opened the basket and took out a blanket. It was brand new, still with the tag on it. The plates had stickers on them, too. The silverware was wrapped in a box.
“I figured you needed some cheering up,” he said, “so I came by. Your knight in shining armor. Let down your golden tresses.” He put on his endearing smile and paused, maybe for the canned laughter. “I’m here to rescue you.”
“Did you say that in a show?” she asked.
“Yeah,” he said, “but that doeasn’t mean I don’t mean it now.”
The food arrived a few minutes later. Delivered from a nearby gourmet shop. Platters of smoked salmon, pastries, exotic cheeses with thick, crusty rinds, breads of every shape and size.
“They kept giving me stuff,” Holden said. “The chef posed for a picture with me. To put on the wall.”
He arranged everything on the rug.
“You know what this is?” he asked, showing her a tin with a pretty decoration on top.
“Caviar?”
“Beluga. The best.”
He twisted open the top to reveal the glistening black eggs. She was immediately hit by the smell, like the ocean. Fishy, but fresh and clean.
“Some people get all fancy with chopped egg and sour cream, but I like it straight.”
He slipped a spoon into the glistening blackness of the caviar and handed it to her. Then he filled up a spoon for himself.
“You never had caviar?” His mouth dropped open in mock disbelief. “That’s all we eat in Hollywood.”
“That’s not true,” Chantal said.
“It’s Hollywood true,” Holden replied, slipping the spoon between his lips.
Chantal was still holding hers. She brushed her tongue against it. It tasted salty.
“Go ahead,” he said.
“What does ‘Hollywood true’ mean?”
“That if enough people believe something, it becomes true. Like Tinkerbell.”
She smiled and put the caviar in her mouth. She liked the texture, the way the eggs felt against her tongue. She wasn’t sure it was worth the two hundred dollars Holden said the container cost, but it was definitely different.
“You’re incredibly beautiful,” he said.
“Thank you.”
“No. I mean it. In Hollywood there are tons of girls who are supposed to be beautiful and when you look at them, I mean, they have a lot going for them, they’re in shape and everything, but it’s like they made a deal with someone to get it—their look. But you’re just beautiful. Just, like, on your own.”
She didn’t say anything. She wondered what this was about, why the attention, the lavish gifts. Had he heard something about her, from his brother? Heard she was easy? That for caviar and flowers he could get something in return?
Dostoyevsky knew the answer. She felt sure of it. Somewhere in Crime and Punishment was the answer to why people acted this way, what drove them to try to see what they could get away with, what they could take, how much pain they could heap on others, how much punishment they could carry around with them before they broke.
“Hey Chantal, you got any music?” Holden asked. “A little samba? Some bossa nova?” He kicked off his loafers and leaned back, making himself at home. “‘Girl from Ipanema,’ maybe?”
Dostoyevsky understood, the scary darkness that lurked beneath the surface. The hidden meanings. She was sure of it. She just had to read the book enough times and it would become clear to her, too.
Dom liked a good funeral. He stood between Owen and Douglas, feeling big in his shades and black suit, hands clasped below his belt, watching, studying the crowd, the different ways people dealt with death. A funeral was the flip side of a fight, where, from the ring, he could see the frenzied excitement on the faces in the crowd, desperate for blood and pain. But when an old fighter dies, in his memory, before a fight, they ring the bell. Ten times. They count him out. Down for the big count. And the crowd is quiet, saddened by the loss, but also thinking about their own mortality. It was surprisingly easy to get laid after a funeral. He wished Mae were here.
But Dom was thinking about his own mortality, too. Fucking Felix. Ward had been there to let Dom know they were getting closer to him, that Felix’s waterlogged finger was pointing right at him. It was almost like Ward was offering some kind of deal—the tape for Felix.
But Dom had something in mind.
Dom had Rick.
He looked across the grave and saw him, expressionless, eyes unblinking, looking down. No tears. He had a finger in his mouth and was nibbling at a nail. Guy should have had a snack before he came over. Dom tried to see if Rick was packing, but he was turned the wrong way.
“You keeping an eye on him?” Douglas whispered.
“I got him,” Dom said.
Dom was also supposed to watch Rick, in case he had another outburst. Some plainclothes cops were also in the crowd, probably for the same reason. But Douglas didn’t need to worry. Dom knew what was going on in Rick’s head.
Dom hoped the funeral didn’t last too long. He had a lot to do.
He felt his phone vibrating in his jacket pocket as the minister finished up his speech over the grave. He’d check the message later. Then Owen started to walk away.
“Where are you going?” Douglas whispered.
“I was just going to … I wanted to …” He gestured toward the Gelmans.
“Stay here,” Douglas said.
“Can’t I …?”
Douglas gave Dom a look.
“No,” Dom whispered, discreetly putting his hand against Owen’s chest.
“Then I’m leaving,” Owen said.
He turned and, before Dom could grab him, started walking fast away from the funeral.
They caught up to him about fifty yards away.
“You can’t leave,” Douglas said. “It doesn’t look good. Your best friend is dead. You should be at the funeral. You should mourn.”
Owen looked at him, must have seen something in Douglas that amused him, and started laughing.
“You’re a monkey on a string, Douglas.”
“I know what’s best,” Douglas said.
“Fuck you, Douglas,” Owen said, “Fuck my father and fuck you. I’m going to see my girlfriend. And if Dom won’t take me, I’ll get a cab.”
“When I found Chantal, her pants were on,” Malcolm said, “but they were unzipped. Also, her shirt was off.”
“She wasn’t wearing a shirt?” Bliss asked incredulously.
“No.”
Bliss played with this idea in his head, caught Malcolm looking at him, seeming to know what he was thinking.
“Is that common at parties,” Bliss asked, “girls in various states of undress?”
“Oh, you know,” Malcolm said. “A little more than Beach Blanket Bingo, a little less than Eyes Wide Shut.”
Bliss laughed, telling himself he was making the witness feel at ease, but really thinking the kid was funny.
“So Chantal was just wandering around the party without a shirt?” Bliss asked.
“She wasn’t wandering,” Malcolm said, disdain creeping into voice. “Chantal wouldn’t wander around the party without her shirt. She was upstairs. In the hallway. She looked lost.”
“Drunk?”
“Maybe,” he said. “But not gaily. Not devil-may-care. More solemn. Anyway, the party was already over.”
“It was over, but you were still there?”
“I lost track of the time,” he said. “I was in the library. The Gelmans have an amazing collection of books. I’m not sure the Gelmans have read any of them, but I like to. It’s one of the reasons I go to Owen’s parties. They have several Books of Hours—not the originals, of course, though they could probably afford them, but very fine reproductions. Also, they have all the books by Lynd Ward.”
“Who’s he?” Bliss asked.
“He made these novels in woodcuts. All pictures, no words. They tell a story.”
“Like a comic book?”
“More subtle than that. The drawings are dark and haunting. The stories are about the theme of the individual versus the cruel capitalist society. Lots about right and wrong. Vengeance. Selling your soul.”
“How did you get Chantal’s shirt on?” Bliss asked.
“One arm at a time,” Malcolm said.
Bliss smiled again.
“And then you walked Chantal home?” he asked.
“We went to my dad’s house. I thought it might be better if Chantal didn’t wake up at home. Her parents were in the Hamptons. I didn’t think she should be alone. I carried her, at least as far as the taxi. The stairs were the hard part. Or, actually, getting her out the front door was hardest.”
He’d rescued her, what Bliss was planning to do if he found Julia.
“Did she say anything?”
“Once she was in my arms she fell back asleep,” he said. “That happens to me a lot. Women either want to dance with me or fall asleep on my shoulder.” He sighed. “Ah, the lonely life of a boulevardier.”
“So she never said anything, about what might have happened?”
“Only when I was tucking her into bed later. She looked up at me with her Catherine Deneuve eyes and said very softly ‘my hero.’”
“Where was her shirt?” Bliss asked. “She wasn’t carrying it with her, was she?”
“No.”
“So where was it?” Bliss was trying to make this casual, waiting to see how Malcolm answered, how much credence there was to this story.
“On the floor in the bedroom,” Malcolm said after a moment’s reflection. Was he remembering or making it up? “She must have taken it off there.”
“Did you notice Ben in the bed?”
“He was sleeping. Wait. Did you say Ben?”
“She had intercourse with Ben Purdy that night,” Bliss said. “Presumably before he was murdered.”
“It wasn’t Owen?”
“No.”
Malcolm considered this for a moment.
“Not Owen,” he said.
Bliss watched him. What did he really know? In the future, they’d probably have some kind of electronic device that would access a person’s memory, project it on a screen. Then none of this questioning would be necessary. There would be no lying. No one would be able to lie ever again. But for now, Bliss could know only what Malcolm told him, could only wonder what it was Malcolm was leaving out.
“Well,” he said, “whoever it was that was asleep under the Batman bedspread, I didn’t want to wake them. I just tiptoed in and tiptoed out.”
Malcolm smiled, leaned back in his chair, and crossed his legs.
“Did you notice anything out of the ordinary at all?”
“Beside the fact that Chantal was wandering around with her pants unzipped and her shirt off?” Malcolm said.
“Yes.”
“Well, actually, I did notice there was a fair amount of blood on her hand.”
“Blood.”
“Yes.”
“On her hand?”
“Yes.”
“Anywhere else?”
“No.”
“Chantal didn’t mention that.”
“I washed it off the next morning,” Malcolm said. “After she got up to vomit. So she might not remember.”
“Was there any kind of cut there?”
“No.”
“Weren’t you curious where the blood came from?”
“I guess,” Malcolm said, “but I figured blood can come from all kinds of places, many of which I am not as yet intimate with, detective. And perhaps never will be.”
Bliss had to assume the blood came from Ben, that Ben was already dead when Malcolm found Chantal. It also could be a good alibi if they found any of Ben’s blood on Malcolm.
“Anything else, Detective?” Malcolm asked, his voice gentle and demure. “I’d like to be as helpful as possible.”
Was this eagerness on purpose? Was this Malcolm’s way of suggesting that there was no way someone so delicate, someone attuned to the finer things in life, who knew more about the books in the Gelmans’ library than the Gelmans did, no way could this person brutally smash in Ben Purdy’s head, first with a baseball trophy, then with a ten-pound dumbbell?
Clara took the check Adelaide gave her, the second half of her money, and put it in her pocket. Later she would add to it the check Roger would give her.
She waited until Adelaide had the recorder on, then told more stories, of overheard conversations, of things found in drawers, of women who came by in the late morning, while Owen was at school and the Missus was at the club and only Mr. Gelman was at home. She showed the photographs she snagged from the bottom of the photo box—Holden in his Little League baseball uniform, Holden as an Indian in the school Thanksgiving pageant, Holden dressed as a cowboy for Halloween. There was also a picture of Owen. He was dressed as a vampire, which struck Clara as somehow more than appropriate.
She had more photos that she was saving for Roger.
Clara described in detail what she found the morning after the party, the mess, the stains, the design made out of olives on the coffee table, but as she spoke, her mind drifted to the house, the one she would buy, her own house, how she and her children and her grandfather would all have breakfast together before they went to school and she went to teach and her grandfather went to the couch where he could rest, if he wanted to, for as long as he liked.
The detective seemed stumped for a moment, temporarily without questions.
“I’m afraid I’ve kept you from the funeral,” the detective said.
“I supposed I could have said something if I wanted to go,” Malcolm replied.
“How did you feel when you heard Ben had died?”
Malcolm sensed the detective was trying to catch him off guard. But Malcolm was always on guard. If he ever dared let anything show, the ridicule, the humiliation would have been unbearable. He heard something, it seemed, almost every day, walking past a group of boys, clustered together like conspirators. A whispered insult and then the low chuckling that followed, that held them together, the real reason they went to a fancy, private school—not to discover allusions in The Odyssey or how Western expansion has shaped the American character. No, they went to find fellow chucklers. And together they would chuckle themselves right down to Wall Street or some law firm, clustered together and chuckling for the rest of their lives, chuckling about the new secretary, about Knicks tickets they procured, Cuban cigars, a deal, another deal, or the faggot in the office. It wouldn’t change. Yahoos. Jockhoos. Chuckle chuckle. It would never change.
The detective would have to work a lot harder to catch Malcolm. He was considerably more practiced in keeping things hidden than they could ever possibly imagine.
“I had mixed emotions when I heard Ben had died,” he said. It was better not to try to hide his feelings.
“Did you know him well?”
“It’s a small school.”
“Did you like him?”
“Not my type,” Malcolm said
“No.”
“Not really.”
“So when he died, you weren’t really that upset.”
“Well, I was shocked that someone was killed at a party that I was at. That’s a little bit disconcerting.” Malcolm took a sip of the water. “What does your daughter think about it all?”
“Much the same as you, I imagine.”
“You haven’t talked to her?”
“Of course I have,” Bliss said, an edge to his voice. They were dancing, he and the detective. Doin’ da Bump. Malcolm guessed Bliss was not a very good dancer. But he sensed it would be better not to step on the detective’s toes.
They sat quietly for a moment.
“You think it might happen again?” the detective asked.
“No,” Malcolm said, maybe too quickly. He had to be careful not to protest too much. “I don’t think so.”
“So you don’t think whoever smashed in Ben’s head will do it again?” Bliss asked, looking right at him, letting Malcolm know he was on to him, that he would never get away with it.
“I haven’t a clue as to how that person thinks,” Malcolm said, his composure back. “So I wouldn’t even hazard a guess.”
“So you believe this was just about someone getting even with Ben,” Bliss said. “Something only the two of them knew about.”
“That would make sense to me,” Malcolm said.
“How much sense?”
“Oh, quite a bit, I would imagine. Otherwise the person wouldn’t have done it,” Malcolm said. “Maybe the person didn’t really want to kill Ben.”
“Maybe they just wanted to send him a message.”
“What kind of message?” Bliss asked.
“I don’t know,” Malcolm said, “something maybe having to do with Ben being a contemptuous person.”
“You think anyone hated Ben enough to want to kill him?” Bliss asked.
He didn’t answer right away.
“Malcolm.”
“Yes?”
“What do you think?”
“If what you say is true, then Owen’s girlfriend was sleeping with his best friend,” Malcolm said.
“Is Owen a violent person?” Bliss asked.
“He’s strong,” Malcolm said. “He works out, but he’s just naturally strong. He’s always been like that.”
“But do you think he’s capable of violence?”
“I suppose anyone is, to a certain degree. Look at Ben’s father, fighting with Owen’s father like that. It’s like what John Huston says at the end of Chinatown.”
“What’s that?”
“It’s when Huston basically confesses to Jack Nicholson that he slept with his own daughter. He says something like—given the right circumstance, Mr. Geddes, a person is capable of just about anything.”
They sat for a moment, the detective just looking at him. Malcolm wondered if his fate was being decided at that moment. The detective assembling clues, not from what he had said, so much, but how he answered. The slightest pause carrying more weight, more significance than his words. His words, he knew, were meaningless. It was everything else, all the hidden signals, the gestures, the seemingly insignificant movements of his eyes, shifting contours of his face he may not even have been aware of. The detective relying on some deep part of his brain, something maybe in his spinal cord, like the monkeys he’d read about in bio class, that had been bred in captivity, which had never lived in the wild, but they could tell the difference between a garter snake and a puff adder. The garter snake made them laugh, they’d catch hold of it and toy with it; the puff adder would send them cowering terrified into the farthest corner of the cage, screaming to each other about danger, that death was wriggling on the floor just yards away. That knowledge (if you could call it that) coming from deep in their DNA, seeing not just the shape of the snake, but a specific snake, the different markings—one signifying safety, one danger.
So what had the detective detected? What markings had Malcolm displayed in their conversation? Harmless garter snake or deadly adder?
Then the detective spoke.
“You can go now, Malcolm,” the detective said. He continued to stare at him, watching Malcolm as he stood up, looking maybe for one last signal, one sign that Malcolm was his man. Perhaps someone had scrawled the letter “M” on the back of Malcolm’s shoulder, in chalk, where Malcolm wouldn’t notice, marking him, for everyone to see.
“I’ll call you if I need to talk with you again,” the detective said.
“Okay.”
Malcolm turned and walked out.
If there was anything written on his back, the detective didn’t say anything about it.
Owen walked into Chantal’s room and saw his brother Holden sitting on the floor, his back resting against Chantal’s bed, his shoes off, looking cozy. Chantal was sitting cross-legged on a chair, leaning forward, her elbows resting on her knees, her chin resting between her hands, listening to him, listening no doubt to Holden’s bullshit.
Between his brother and his girlfriend, on a blanket, the remains of a picnic. Caviar, shrimp, sparkling cider in a blue bottle with a French label. Owen had a weird feeling he’d seen Holden doing the same thing on one of his shows. Surprising a girl he liked with a picnic in her room.
But there was something else here, too, Owen thought. Besides the picnic. There was a feeling that the two of them were sharing something. That Holden was letting her in on one of his Hollywood secrets, all twisted around itself. Trying to dazzle her with the names of the famous people in whose pools he’d taken a dip, in whose blenders he had whipped up drinks filled with tropical fruits and health powders.
Chantal had her hair in pigtails, no makeup, just a T-shirt and shorts. She looked like a little kid. It was like Owen was seeing her for the first time.
She was just a little kid.
Holden jumped up when Owen walked in. Jumped right to attention. Not the star now. Just a kid brother doing something he wasn’t supposed to.
“Hey, man,” Holden said, smiling his perfect white smile that his agents gave him after his pilot was picked up.
Owen didn’t respond. He was still trying to take it all in. His brother and his girlfriend alone together, his best friend dead, lying in a coffin, about to be put in a hole.
“Caviar,” Holden said, holding out the tin. “Can you believe she never had any?”
“Let me see,” Owen said.
Holden walked toward him. “Fourteen and never had caviar,” he said. “Good thing I came along, don’t you think?”
Owen waited until Holden got close, then he slipped his foot behind his famous TV star brother and pushed him back, the way he used to do when they were kids. Holden fell over. The caviar flew out of his hand. But there was no canned gasp from the audience. No stunt man. This was actually happening. Owen wondered if his brother realized that.
Owen jumped on his brother and sat on his stomach, his knees resting on Holden’s arms, pinning him to the ground. He’d done this hundreds of times when they were little, after school, when no one was around.
Holden was yelling at him to get off.
“Phone Mom,” Owen said. “Go ahead. Maybe she’s at the club.”
Holden squirmed and wiggled, trying to push Owen off.
“Owen,” Chantal said. “C’mon, Owen.”
“This isn’t about you,” Owen said. “This is brother stuff.”
He eased up on one knee and quickly grabbed Holden’s wrist. He forced Holden to slap himself.
“Why you hitting yourself? Huh, little brother? Huh?”
“Cut it out,” Holden said, his voice starting to crack.
“I’ll tell you why. You feel guilty. You want to punish yourself for trying to get some play from a girl who, besides being your brother’s girlfriend, is too young to be hit on.”
“Dad’s going to kill you,” Holden said.
“No he’s not. You’re wrong. I’m protected. Dad doesn’t know I exist. So he can’t kill me.”
“Owen, cut it out,” Chantal said.
“This is not for you, Chantal,” he said. “None of this is for you.”
Then he made his fist rockhard and smashed Holden in the nose. He felt it crunch and when he pulled his hand away he could see Holden’s nose crushed to the side, flopping a little, like it was on a hinge. The blood was gushing and Holden was screaming like a baby and Chantal was screaming, too. And the blood was starting to fill up Holden’s throat and choke him and he was coughing and gurgling, struggling like crazy under Owen’s knees, gagging now, his eyes wide, like someone had a pump to the back of his head, savagely pumping more air inside, more air than he could possibly hold.
Then Chantal was pushing Owen, hitting his head and pushing him and then she ran into him with her shoulder and he keeled over. Holden lurched to the side and spit out a huge mouthful of blood, and then another, smothering the caviar, staining the carpet with a large red blotch. He was moaning now, huge great sobs and moans, crying with complete abandon, his arms flopping helplessly at his side as though some string had broken. Chantal ran in with a towel and put it to his face. Then Chantal was on the phone dialing a number Holden called out to her. His agents, probably. His handlers. They would know what to do. Where to take him, what plastic surgeon would need to be ripped from whatever operation he was doing to attend to their child star. The show would have to be shut down for a few weeks.
But then Owen was struck with the terrible realization that they wouldn’t shut down the show. They would work it into the script. They would put his broken nose into the episode. Make a joke out of it. A big white bandage. Or have him play a clown that week. Holden, take that red nose off right now! No, Mom, I want to make the world a happier place. I want to make people laugh! Like Patch Adams. And the publicity would be stupendous and more viewers than ever would tune in to see his little brother wink and smirk and pout his way to greater fame and fortune.
And then he knew his father wasn’t going to “kill him” as Holden said. No, the harsh truth was that Douglas would show up one morning very soon with the limo and escort him to boarding school where he’d finish his semester and then go to college and that would be that.
“Hey Holden,” Owen said, “I guess I won’t be getting a part on your show now, will I?”
Dom called Rick.
“Hello, Rick,” Dom said.
He could hear people in the background.
“Now?” Rick asked.
“It’s happening,” Dom told him.
“I have people here.”
“Rick.”
“Yes.”
“I’m holding the videotape that shows the man who killed your son.”
Silence.
“Rick?”
“Let’s do it,” Rick said.
Way to be, Rick.
Dom told Rick where to meet him.
“And you’ll bring the gun, right, Rick?”
“Yes.”
“Because now that we’ve gotten this far, there wouldn’t be any point to turning back.”
“No.”
Rick hung up.
Every fight told a story. Dom thought. And this one was most definitely his. Now, if only Mae would call again, everything would be going his way. He was feeling strong. He was ahead on points. He threw a quick left in the air. Then two more, then a combination. He smiled at his opponent was lying motionless on the canvas.
They were in Dom’s car, parked in a cul-de-sac on 84th Street overlooking the East River near Rick’s penthouse. Dom was holding a video camera, showing Rick the tape in the little screen that folded out. It was small, but there was no mistaking Bliss when he turned in the direction of the camera.
“That’s him, Rick. That’s your man.”
Rick was silent, a finger jammed into his mouth at an unnatural angle, nibbling at the nail like a squirrel on a stubborn nut.
“He did it,” Rick said between bites.
“It’s the only thing that makes sense,” Dom said, keeping the pressure on, keeping Rick against the ropes. “No one else came in or out all night but kids.”
“Anyone else see this?” Rick asked.
“I wanted you to have it all to yourself. We have to worry about the ‘thin blue line.’ You’ve heard of it, right?” Rick nodded. “Cops would find a way to cover this up, have the video disappear from the evidence room, a giant magnet somehow erase the tape—it happens all the time. But a child was killed here.”
“Look at him,” Rick said, watching the tape.
Rick brought a finger to his mouth.
“This demands a different kind of justice, Rick,” Dom said. “You know that, right?”
Rick worked on another nail. He’ll be down to the stubs soon, Dom thought. The bone. Guy should take up smoking.
“A different kind of justice,” Rick said, lost somewhere, eyes far away, in his corner before coming out for the last round, not listening to his trainer, not feeling the cut man ramming the swab of zinc into the gash under his eye, not really knowing he was in a fight. His body doing it all on its own. Just reacting. Exactly where Dom wanted him.
Dom rewound the tape and they watched the door open again and Bliss leave.
Dom heard a sound, grinding, or ice cracking and he realized it was coming from Rick, from his teeth. Jesus.
“Go back to the house,” Dom said. “Back to your guests. I’ll call you when everything’s set.”
Rick didn’t say anything. He was already somewhere far away.
“You hear me, Rick?”
Rick didn’t answer. He just walked away. Back up to the penthouse.
Jesus, Dom thought he’d better get Rick close to Bliss right away.
The guy was ready to pop.
He called Bliss.
“Lenny, howaya?” Dom said. “Listen, reason I’m calling, two things. One: I need to get in touch with that writer. Mae.”
“Yeah. Mae Stark. The one who was asking for you at the Gelman house.”
“You know her?” Bliss said, sounding astonished. Dom didn’t realize he was so proprietary with his writers.
“Yeah. I was talking to her. About the job.”
“You were talking to her?”
“Yeah?”
“In person?”
“On the phone. About the details. The nitty-gritty. Details are the most important part of a book, you know. I guess I’m more authentic than you. So I was thinking, maybe I could get her number. Call her back.”
“I don’t have it.” Bliss said, scolding him now.
He was lying, but Dom didn’t say anything. Dom was going to let Rick do the talking for him.
“Okay. Anyway, the second thing is I got a tape here I copped from the surveillance camera at the Gelmans’.”
Bliss didn’t respond to that.
“You hear me, Lenny?”
“We like you for Felix,” Bliss said. “The super gave you up. ‘Dum,’ he calls you.”
“So, looks like we can help each other out here,” Dom said.
“What are you thinking, Dum?”
“I’m thinking we should meet. Talk things out.”
“Sounds like a plan.”
Dom gave him a time and a place.
“So are we good?”
Silence.
“Bliss. I’m wondering, are we good?”
“Yeah.”
He felt like Bliss was trying to stare him down. Dom wanted to tell him it didn’t work over the phone.
“Last round, Lenny. That means we touch gloves before the first punch.”
“Come alone, Dom.”
“No problem,” Dom said. “See you soon. Oh, and Lenny, it’s kind of dark and grainy, but I have to say, you look good on tape. You should think about doing some acting when you retire. And who knows, that day could come sooner than you ever possibly imagined.”
Bliss immediately called home. No answer. He left a message for Rachel to call him back right away. It was urgent. He couldn’t believe she was talking to Dom.
Then he left to meet Dom, to get back the tape, and do whatever else he needed to do to end this thing and get Dom out of his life.
Dom drove over the Brooklyn Bridge. Traffic was dense but flowing smoothly.
Rick, in the white Saab, was two cars ahead of them.
He had Mae on the phone. She had called him.
“Always try to keep at least one car between you and the mark,” he said, feeling authentic. “Two cars are better. But you need to watch out for trucks. And cargo vans. You let a cargo van get between you and the mark your vision is blocked. You won’t see his blinker. You could get caught by surprise.”
At that moment Rick put on his blinker and moved to the right lane. Dom was pleased to see Rick was following instructions.
“Where do you think he’s going?” she asked.
“No idea,” Dom said. “That’s the thing about tailing someone. You never know where they will take you.”
“Good metaphor,” she said, “I’m writing that down. Another authentic Dom moment. I’m definitely going to thank you in the the acknowledgments.”
“The guy who gave you the nitty-gritty.”
Of course Dom wasn’t really tailing Rick. He knew exactly where Rick was headed. But in Dom’s story, he was following Rick and he wanted to stick to the scenario.
“When you get really good at tailing someone, you go ahead of them,” Dom said. “The way a good boxer knows what punch his opponent is going to throw before he throws it.”
Silence. She must have been writing. Dom was starting to think maybe he should just write the book himself.
Rick was now heading under the bridge, down to the water. Everything was going according to plan. Dom had been worried that Rick would be too agitated to follow the directions, but he seemed to be keeping it together. He hoped Rick would be ready to explode when the time came, though Dom could always nudge him along a little if need be.
“I tried to call you,” he said. “You’re not listed.”
“I’ll let you know when the book comes out.”
“Okay,” he said. Mae didn’t like that, him trying to call her. He’d have his friend in the precinct find her number for him anyway.
“Hey, if you need an ending, I have one for you,” he said.
“An ending?”
That got her attention.
“Yeah.”
The Saab pulled over and Rick parked just where Dom had told him to.
“How can you give me an ending,” Mae said, “when you don’t know what my story is?”
A fence separated the street from a path that ran along the East River. The Brooklyn Bridge arched over the water, looking massive. There were a few people around. Not many, but enough to serve as witnesses, to corroborate.
“Dom?”
“Yes.”
“The ending?”
“I don’t need to know the story,” he said, “This ending is going to be so good, you’ll want to write your story around it.”
Rick got out of the car. He was holding the gun in his hand. Jesus, Dom needed to get over there. “Listen,” he said, “it’s all going to happen soon. I’ll tell you everything. We’ll talk about it over drinks. On my terrace. It looks out over Central Park. I’ll give you lots of nitty. More gritty than you’ll know what to do with.”
He hung up.
Dom tapped his jacket, feeling for the surveillance tape, just making sure it was there. Later it would be found inside Bliss’s pocket. Bliss going into the house, coming out twenty-two minutes later.
He got out of the car and walked quickly to Rick.
“Put that away, Rick,” he said. “We don’t want anyone getting nervous, calling the cops. They’ll come and take away the tape and you’ll never see it again and he’ll walk away.”
Rick nodded, his gaze somewhere far away. But he put the gun in his pocket.
To the right, through a gate in the fence, was a small park Dom used to come to when he was twelve, to smoke dope and make out with girls who would chew gum between kisses.
“It’s time, Rick.”
“Yes,” Rick said.
The bell rang.
Final round.
Rick bit his thumb. Dom noticed the cuticle was already rimmed with blood.
Bliss walked under the Brooklyn Bridge on the Brooklyn side, the span of the bridge arching majestically above him, the financial district just across the water. He had bungee jumped from the bridge a few years ago, a feat that was supposed to have catapulted him into a new frame of mind. But, like the yoga, it had only made him more certain he was beyond fixing, that ontologically he was a washed-up lounge singer playing a bowling alley bar in a tattered tux that was way too tight.
He followed the path along the water and, just as Dom said, he came upon a small park with a few benches and a rusted swing set. He walked over to one of the benches and sat down. It was a cloudy day. There were only a few people in the park.
He waited, thinking about what this encounter would bring. The whole thing was ridiculous. He felt stupid, getting into such a mess. Dragging his partner down as well.
Then he saw Dom, walking toward him. He looked calm. Bliss watched him closely, waiting until he was about twenty yards away.
“Far enough, Dom.”
Dom stopped.
“You packing, Dom?” Bliss asked.
“Not now,” he said smiling.
“I’d feel better if you took your jacket off,” Bliss said.
“It’s Canali,” Dom said.
“You don’t have to put it down,” Bliss said. “Sling it over your shoulder. Like the guy on Miami Vice.”
Dom complied. It was going too easily.
“The boy,” Dom said.
“What are you talking about?” Bliss said. He didn’t get where this was heading.
Dom slowly reached inside his jacket. Bliss moved for his piece.
“I’m just doing a little Warner Wolf,” Dom said.
Bliss knew what that meant. Let’s go to the videotape. Dom slowly pulled the video from his pocket. He wiggled it, as if to say “shame on you.”
“Why’d you do it, Lenny?” Dom said.
“First let’s talk about Felix,” Bliss said.
“This is not about Felix anymore.” Dom gestured with the tape. “This is the story now, Lenny. Once they see this tape, they’ll forget about Felix.”
Bliss kept his hand on his gun.
“Why’d you kill him, Bliss?” Dom asked, his voice sounding forced, like he was reading cue cards. “That poor innocent boy.”
“What are you talking about?”
Then Bliss caught sight of a man in a black suit entering the park. He was moving fast, straight toward him. It took Bliss a moment to realize it was Rick Purdy. Rick Purdy, holding a gun, his arm straight out in front of him, moving toward Bliss like a robot.
Bliss saw the smile edge along Dom’s face.
He’ll break his wrist if he tries to shoot like that, Bliss thought.
“He was seventeen, Lenny,” Dom said, his voice rising, spurring the other man on. “You took away his future.”
Rick was now about twenty yards away, closing quickly, his eyes wide and unblinking, the gun in his outstretched arm, like the gun was leading him, dragging him forward.
“You killed my son.” he said, his voice calm but intense, like an irate librarian.
“I didn’t kill your son,” Bliss shouted, his eye on the gun.
“I saw you on the tape!” Rick screaming now, gesturing with the gun. “I saw you!”
Rick walked past Dom like he wasn’t there. Rick was possessed. A zombie. A zombie with a loaded gun pointing right at him. Bliss realized he was going to have to take Rick down.
“I’m going to do it, Ben!” the guy shrieked. “I’m going to do it!”
Bliss pulled out his gun just as Rick fired. The bullet caught Bliss in the leg. He crumpled over, falling off the bench, his back to Rick, facing the wrong way. He tried to twist his body, to get off a shot. He had his gun in his hand and he was trying to twist his body around, but he couldn’t figure out which muscles were working and which weren’t.
Then he heard the second shot and he prepared to die.
Dom’s elation was short-lived. Bliss was hit, still moving, but down. All Rick had to do was shoot again. There were twelve bullets in the clip. He was bound to connect. All he needed was to pull the trigger. Walk up to the helpless Bliss, put the gun to his head, and pull the trigger.
But Rick wasn’t moving. Dom watched in silence as Rick lowered his arm that held the gun. No, Rick. Then Rick seemed to freeze, as if he was caught in the invisible force field of some invisible space ship hovering right above his head.
“Rick!” Dom shouted. Rick didn’t hear him. Instead Rick started shaking like a broken toy. Just fire the gun, Rick. Pull the fucking trigger and finish the story. Finish the story the way I planned it!
Then a wild kind of roar emerged from Rick. Dom couldn’t tell if it was the sound of victory or defeat.
Then Rick raised up his gun. Finally. Then he pulled the trigger. There was a loud pop, and Dom watched as the back of Rick’s head blew apart, because Rick had stuck the barrel of the gun in his mouth.
Shit, Dom thought. Now he would have to finish it himself.
Rick. What a loser.
Dom raced to Rick’s body. He’d fallen straight back, his head already swimming in a large pool of blood. Dom put his hand over Rick’s. It was still warm. He tried to maneuver the gun in Rick’s hand to aim it at Bliss, but it meant the elbow having to move the wrong way.
He wrenched the gun free. He’d pop Bliss and get the gun back in Rick’s hand. He’d deal with the prints later. That’s when he heard Bliss.
“Drop it, Dom.”
He looked across the ring. He saw Bliss on one knee.
One. Two. Three.
Just like the Dominican.
Bliss was pointing his gun directly at Dom.
Six. Seven.
About to get to his feet. Dom had hit him with all he had and he was getting up.
Eight.
This wasn’t the story. This wasn’t the ending Dom planned. The wrong guy was out cold. The wrong guy was getting up from the mat. He tore the gun from Rick’s hand and swung toward Bliss.
Nine.
Then Bliss toppled over. He was back on the mat. Hah! Bliss was struggling to get up. But he wasn’t going to beat the count. Not like the Dominican.
Dom smiled. Dom aimed. Then, perhaps, a handful of neurons registered extraordinary pain for a minute part of a second.
Then Dom felt nothing.
Bliss limped to Dom’s body. Ward was standing over him, looking down at the large man in the fancy suit he had just shot dead.
“What a waste of worsted,” Ward said.
Bliss found the videotape in Dom’s coat pocket. He starting scrambling toward the water.
Onlookers had assembled at the entrance to the park. Bliss holstered his gun and pulled out his badge. He showed it to the crowd.
“Call 911,” he shouted. “I’m a cop. Call 911 and say an officer’s been shot.”
A guy ran toward a phone booth. Another took out his cell phone. No one approached him. Which was fine. He had stuff he needed to do. In private.
He felt Ward’s hand on his arm, helping to prop him up. Bliss pushed him away.
He limped to the edge of the river and sat on one of the benches, taking a moment to catch his breath. There was a gentle lapping of the water against the concrete wall that ran along the edge of the park.
Rick being there. Rick with a gun. Rick shooting at him. It was not making a lot of sense.
But he knew what he needed to do.
The East River flowed swiftly here by the Brooklyn Bridge. He discreetly dropped the tape in the water. No one saw. He hoped no one saw him. The tape floated briefly, moving with the current toward the harbor, out to the sea. Then it sank, hopefully forever.
He heard the ambulance in the distance, police sirens approaching. Then Ward was on the bench next to him.
“He shot you,” Ward said.
“He thought I killed his son.”
“You okay?”
“No,” Bliss said. “Cori is going to be very upset with me.”
He put his leg up on the bench. The bullet had passed through his calf. It was starting to hurt now.
“I’ll have to lie,” he said. “Tell her I was climbing a fence. You’ll back me up on that?”
“Why were you here?” Ward asked him.
The uniforms were arriving. The ambulance was driving over the curb and heading down the path.
“Partner,” Ward said.
“Yes.”
“Why were you here?”
“I’m not sure.”
“You have to be sure,” Ward said.
The pain was beginning to amp up. His leg felt on fire.
“I was following Dom,” he said, wincing as he spoke.
“Why?”
“I don’t know.”
“You followed Dom because you wanted to talk to him about Felix.”
“Okay,” Bliss said.
“Say it.”
“I wanted to talk to him about Felix.”
“Good.”
“But why did Rick shoot me?”
“Because his son died,” Ward said.
“But why did he shoot me?”
“He was deranged. He blamed you. But Rick’s dead, now. We’ll never know what he was really thinking, what demons were driving him, what evil was lurking in his heart.”
“Only the Shadow knows,” Bliss said.
“Yes he do,” Ward said. “Oh yes he do.”
Chantal lay in the hotel bed. Her mother was in the bed next to her.
“It’s like a sleepover,” her mother said.
“Yeah,” Chantal said.
It wasn’t anything like a sleepover. Her mother had stormed uninvited into Chantal’s bedroom, made her throw some clothes in a suitcase, and dragged her out of the house. Then they took a cab to a hotel. At the front desk, her mother told the clerk they would be staying a week.
“At least a week. Maybe longer.”
On the elevator, her mother finally confessed the purpose behind their escapade. At first Chantal thought it had to do with Holden’s blood that had pretty much ruined the carpet in her room. But her mother had larger plans.
“We’re starting over,” she said. She took Chantal’s hand. “The two of us.” Then she took a deep breath and looked at the numbers, slowly climbing, up and up. Just before their floor she said, “I’ve left your father.”
“Have you told him?” Chantal had asked.
The elevator door opened before her mother had a chance to answer.
Once in the room there was a teary session during which her mom confessed to being a terrible mother and that she never wanted to stay over Sunday nights in the Hamptons, that she never condoned that.
“It was Jerry’s idea. It was always Jerry’s idea.”
Chantal thought that was the first time her mother ever referred to her father as “Jerry.” He was no longer “Daddy.”
They had dinner sent up—room service, and for a few minutes it was actually fun, they were laughing.
“We’re free,” her Mom had said.
No, Chantal thought, we’re together. That’s what feels so good. But she didn’t say that, didn’t feel the need to rub it in.
They had watched a movie and now they were in bed, getting ready to go to sleep.
“Good night, Sweetie,” her mother said.
“Good night, Mom.”
She turned off the light. Chantal thought about how her mother had behaved that night, curled up on a hotel room floor, in her pajamas, nibbling at her room-service hamburger, giddy from having just left her husband (though Chantal knew they would all be back together again soon and, except for not staying Sundays in the Hamptons, things would be pretty much the same), but for some reason Chantal wasn’t feeling her usual anger, wasn’t feeling disdain for her mother’s transparent attempt to commune with her daughter, her youth, everything she left behind. She just felt kind of sorry for her.
Chantal turned in her bed and faced her Mom.
“You weren’t a bad mom,” Chantal said.
“Really?” her mother said.
“You really mean that?”
“Yes,” Chantal said.
“That … you’re saying that means …” She didn’t finish, and the words lingered in the air. Chantal turned away and closed her eyes. After a few moments she heard her mother whisper.
“Thank you,” her mother said.
Soon Chantal heard her mother breathing steadily, sound asleep.
But Chantal couldn’t sleep. The frenzy of the last few days had her mind reeling. She kept seeing Owen smashing his brother in the face. She wondered if that was some kind of apology to her, protecting her somehow. Or was it something Owen had wanted to do for years. Maybe both. Chantal remembered Owen leaving her room in the custody of the Gelman family lawyer, head bowed, dragging his feet, like a bad puppy. She actually felt some compassion for him then. That was the Owen she loved, the innocent boy inside him, the one that emerged after they had sex, who was quiet and vulnerable and desperately lonely.
But the other Owen, the before-sex Owen, was very different. She remembered the night Owen had tried to force her to go all the way. She ran downstairs but he caught her at the front door, apologizing like crazy, saying how much he loved her, was so crazy about her, begging her to stay. He led her to the couch and held her tight, stroking her hair. But then he was easing her under him and all of a sudden he was right back to where he was before. No, she told him. Have another drink, some E, a joint. She tried to leave again, so he said all right and settled for their usual way, not caring if it stained the upholstery. When he was all done, she left.
She hadn’t gone right home. She had stopped at a Starbucks, wanting a hot chocolate even though it was spring. She had just sat down and begun to collect her thoughts when she felt someone staring at her. She looked up. It was a guy in his mid-twenties, kind of cute in his V-neck T-shirt and khakis, like one of the mannequins in a Banana Republic window. He smiled, casually yet with purpose, then looked away, as if he didn’t care, slyly checking back to see if she noticed him.
She didn’t smile back, didn’t return the glance, just stared at her hot chocolate, wishing she hadn’t looked up in the first place, knowing already, at fourteen, that no stray glance ever went unacknowledged in New York City, that someone, some guy or girl was alert, on the prowl, looking to make a connection. She wished she were home, asleep.
She felt a presence above her, heard him clear his throat, knew it was the guy from the line. Why, she thought. I’m just fourteen, she thought. Doesn’t he know I’m just fourteen?
“Hi,” he said.
Don’t look up, she told herself.
But this one must have been used to getting his way.
“Is there anything I could say in the next two minutes that might win your heart?”
She looked up. He smiled in a well-practiced way, unzipping his lips to reveal his white, perfect teeth which he knew were very white and very perfect. The effect was supposed to be charming. His mother probably told him it was charming.
“Hey, how about giving me a chance? Whattaya say?”
All of a sudden she felt a surge of fury rush through her.
“Get away from me!” she screamed, all the pain and humiliation of being with Owen pouring out.
“But …”
“Just get away!!” Her voice even louder now because the rest of the shop had gone silent.
“Leave her alone, man,” came a deep voice from another table.
“Hey, I just …”
“You heard her.”
The boy turned, indignant now.
“Hey, I don’t need you telling me …”
“I’m just fourteen!” she shouted. “I’m only fourteen!”
She ran out of the store. She didn’t want to hear any more boy talk. She ran down the block and around the corner and then stopped and leaned against the side of a building, hands on her knees, trying to catch her breath. She wished she’d thrown her hot chocolate at him, right in his smirking face.
Chantal sat up in bed.
There was no way she would fall asleep now. She got up quietly, so as not to wake her mother, and went into the bathroom. She shut the door before turning on the light.
She looked at herself in the mirror. She studied her hair, her lips, her breasts. These parts of her seemed to lure her into trouble. Danger. Her breasts were her enemy. Her hair, conspiring against her. She needed to cover them up. Hide them. The only way she could get some peace. They all had to be covered.
She would start with her hair. Let down your golden tresses, Holden had said. Her hair was clearly wicked, shimmying and wiggling in some sordid dance without Chantal knowing it, giving the boys the totally wrong idea. Her hair was never quiet. She knew that now.
So she’d start there.
She found a small scissors in her mother’s cosmetic bag. She could cut only a few strands at a time, but it didn’t matter. She had all night. She started cutting. She could hear the cries of protest from her curls as they landed on the floor, in the toilet, but she didn’t stop. She was sick of being betrayed. She wanted it to end.
When she’d gotten most of it off she stopped and looked at herself in the mirror. Her head was now an uneven, ragged mess, like starving insects had gorged there.
It looked ugly. Her hair looked ugly. She liked it ugly. Because it was quiet now. Its coy teasing stilled.
She smiled.
There was a phone in the bathroom. She picked it up and called Malcolm on his personal line, wanting to tell him about what she’d done, thinking he’d be the one person who would understand. But there was no answer. She wondered where he was so late at night. She left a message with her room number and told him to call her tomorrow.
Then she turned off the light and went back to bed and fell immediately into a deep, untroubled sleep for the first time in a long while.
Rachel and Julia stood on one side of the hospital bed, Cori on the other. Cori held her father’s hand.
“I shouldn’t have tried to climb over that fence,” he said. “I’m too old for that.”
No one said anything.
“I was never good at fence climbing,” he said.
More silence.
Then Julia coughed decorously.
“We already spoke to the doctor,” she said. “He told us what’s going on.”
“Oh,” Bliss said.
“The bullet went through your leg,” Julia said.
“Clean through,” Cori added.
“No souvenirs,” Bliss said. “But I guess I’ll have the memory.”
“That man,” Rachel said, “Rick. What was he thinking?”
“He was babbling,” Bliss said. “Incoherent. I don’t know why he came after me.”
“He must have been in great pain,” Rachel said. “Losing his son.”
“It’s better not to think about it,” Bliss said, thinking about it, holding Cori tighter.
Anton entered, moved to the bed.
“Lenny,” he said. He was dressed in a tuxedo, probably just coming from a fundraiser. “Just heard. A bullet. Where?’
“In his leg, Grandpa,” Cori said.
“The leg. Lenny. My fault. I should have told you. Stay away from bullets.”
The kids laughed. Rachel, too. It was a good line. Something for the novel. Stay away from bullets. Mae’s partner might tell her that. Rock, or whatever she was calling him now.
“Lenny,” Anton said. “Maybe now. The job. This injury.”
“It’s not serious,” Bliss said.
“Still. A bullet. The job. It’s there. Waiting. Lenny. Security. Now more than ever.”
The doctor came in, checked the wound, and assured everyone Bliss would be fine, would be walking with a cane or crutch by the end of the week. Then the doctor thought it best if everyone left, so Bliss could get some rest.
They kissed him and said good-bye. Rachel looked at him lovingly. He smiled. She took Cori by the hand and they all left together.
A moment later, Julia came back in, walked close to him, and pressed a piece of paper into his hand.
“Maybe it will help you,” she said, “next time you have to climb over a fence.”
He looked down and saw he was holding in his hand the coupon for the yoga.
Malcolm leaned his bike against the massive support of the Tri-borough Bridge. He could hear the unearthly whirring of the cars on the span thirty stories above, a steady stream of traffic even at dawn. Birds filled a small tree bordering the many baseball diamonds wedged into this corner of Wards Island. They chirped madly, in defiance, claiming those few, meager branches as their own.
The East River flowed quietly, slowing as it divided around the island. LaGuardia Airport was just a mile beyond the water. To the west was Manhattan. It was a pleasant bike ride in the morning, one he took often along the promenade adjacent to the FDR Drive, over the East River pedestrian bridge at 110th Street, a few loops around Wards Island, and then back home. In all it was about seven miles. A good workout.
If it were the weekend, carloads of kids and parents would be arriving for little league. Younger kids playing T-ball, older ones playing hardball in full uniforms, wearing cleats and those high socks, the brims of their caps set in a rakish curl.
Malcolm did not have fond memories of Little League. His career, mercifully, lasted only one game. He kept missing the ball when he was at bat, even though the ball was sitting on a tee and they gave him far more than his allotted three strikes. He remembered the extra swings making his humiliation even more acute. The kids in the field, waiting for him to make contact, kicked dirt with their toes or stared up at the bridge. Some just sat down and picked at the grass. Finally he hit the ball, listless tap that dribbled down the first base line. He prayed it would stay fair, so he wouldn’t have to bat again—ever again. He jogged to first, slowing down so the first baseman could tag him out. His coach patted him on the shoulder as he trudged back to the bench. Everyone breathed a sigh of relief.
Then he had to go out in the field and play defense. They stuck him in as remote a spot as they could, a bald patch of the dirt in the outfield surrounded by goose shit and cigarette butts. Somehow a ball made it through the legs of two other players and wound up in his glove. He had no idea what to do with it. The other kids screamed at him—throw it! Throw it, you idiot! but he was frozen. Afraid to do the wrong thing, he did nothing at all. Finally, one of the junior jocks-in-training ran over and ripped the ball out of his glove and threw it back to the infield. Jerk, he said. Faggot.
The next day his father bought a shiny new glove and ball and they went out to Central Park to have a catch. His father turned out to be as wretched at baseball as he was. His dad would make a bad throw and Malcolm would lunge for it and miss. Then he’d chase down the ball and throw it back to his dad, who would make his own spastic lunge and also miss. Malcolm’s glove was still so new that on the rare occasion when he did manage to catch it, the ball would pop out, almost as though it was mocking him.
After one errant throw, the ball rolled to a young couple lying on their blanket reading the Sunday paper. The guy grabbed it and with great fervor, jumped up and got ready to toss it back to Malcolm. As soon as he went into his windup, Malcolm knew he was in for trouble—that this guy, seeing a kid with a glove, must have assumed Malcolm had played catch before, that his dad had been out with him every spare minute, working on their grounders and pop flies. Malcolm wanted to say, Can’t you see my glove is brand new and my dad’s an artist and we’ve never played catch before—and that I’m a jerk and a faggot and I can’t catch and I can’t throw and I can’t hit the ball even when it’s not moving?—can’t you see? But the guy couldn’t see, maybe because he was too busy showing off for his girlfriend or maybe because (and this was something Malcolm was now beginning to understand in a deeply profound way) guys like that never see anything different from themselves. So the guy made an exaggerated wind up and threw the ball at Malcolm. Hard. He had tried to stop it with his glove, not even catch it, just knock it down, or protect himself. Something. But he missed and the ball hit him squarely on the cheek.
He dropped to the ground, curled up and started wailing. The guy ran over and his dad ran over and even the guy’s girlfriend ran over. His father picked him up and told everyone it was all right. Through his tears, Malcolm could see the guy who threw it looking all fearful and his girlfriend was calling him an idiot and whacking him on the arm. He clung to his dad who brought him to the shade of a large tree and set him down. It was one of those soft baseballs they’d been playing with, the kind little kids use, so the pain was subsiding and there was no real damage done. His dad brushed away his tears and when he calmed down, took him to get a soda and hot dog from the vendor in the park. They walked around together, his father taking some pictures, and then wound up on Fifth Avenue across from the Frick Collection.
Suddenly his dad’s spirit’s lifted and he hustled Malcolm across the street and into the most magnificent home he’d ever seen. Only it wasn’t a home anymore, it was a museum. His father passed one room after another, knowing just where he wanted to go, striding along the marble floor with ease and lightness. Malcolm couldn’t help but be swept along. They didn’t stop until they’d arrived in a little room in the back where there were only a few paintings, one of which was of a woman sitting by an open window. Look at that, Malcolm, his father said, a tremor of awe in his voice. Look at the light. Malcolm was immediately drawn into the mystery of the painting, the way the sunlight leaped out from the canvas, the softness of the woman’s face. They stood like that in silence and his father gently took his hand and held it.
They walked through the rest of the museum and it wasn’t until they were outside sitting on a bench and eating a Good Humor that Malcolm realized they had left their gloves and their baseball in the park. He didn’t say anything about it. Neither did his father.
* * *
Malcolm walked to the edge of the river and took off his backpack. He unzipped the main compartment and took out a trophy. There was a bit of blood on the fake marble base. The name on the brass plate read HOLDEN GELMAN. The figure on the trophy was in the process of hitting a baseball.
He reached back and threw the trophy as far as he could into the East River. It made a small splash and disappeared.
Malcolm got back on his bike and headed home.
His life had irrevocably changed. He understood that there was unfairness in the world, that delicate things—delicate people—like Chantal, would always be treated unfairly. Violated. And that the only fairness there was, was what you made yourself.
He also knew this was wrong. That once you start making big moral decisions that are for your own good and not society’s, then bad things happen, like gay boys being beaten and tied to fence rails and left to die. Or abortion doctors getting shot through their kitchen windows.
He thought about the trophy, now at the bottom of the river. It would stay there. Hidden. A dark secret he hoped to somehow completely forget. He wondered if it was possible to completely forget.
But as he rode back home, the morning sun reflecting off the water of the East River, he saw once again in his mind, in a kind of slow motion, the golden boy of the trophy sailing in a gentle arc and landing in the water. And he thought that for a jerk, for a faggot, it wasn’t such a bad throw.