Cold Service

27

IT WAS DARK and wet and grim in the Public Gardens when Hawk and I met Tony Marcus on the small footbridge that spanned the Swan Boat Lake. The lake was drained, and the swan boats huddled miserably against their boarding dock under the mixed drizzle of rain and sleet. Tony had on a big, soft hat with a wide brim. The fur collar on his tweed overcoat was turned up. His hands were pushed down into his coat pockets, and a big, long, black silk scarf wrapped around his neck and hung down along the button closure of the coat. At the Arlington Street end of the bridge, Ty Bop hunched miserably next to Junior, as if he was taking shelter from the weather. Junior was wearing a big fur hat with earflaps. It appeared to be the only concession he had made to the weather. Other than the hat, as far as I could see, he didn't know there was weather. At the Charles Street end of the footbridge was a guy named Leonard, who was Tony's number-two guy. It was hard to see him in the late-afternoon gloom, but I knew that Leonard was very black, with good cheekbones. He shaved his head like Hawk. He wore a moustache and goatee, and he always smelled of very good cologne. He wasn't as good a shooter as Ty Bop, and he didn't have as much muscle as Junior. But he was a very successful combination of both.

"The weather sucks," Tony said. "This better be worth it."

"I give you two words," Hawk said. "Jolene Marcus."

Tony showed no reaction.

"What about her?" he said.

"She married outside the faith," Hawk said.

"What about her," Tony said again.

"Whassup," Hawk said, "with her husband and Boots Podolak?"

I was wearing my black nylon raincoat with the cool zipper front. I had my hands in my pockets. In the right pocket was my Browning nine-millimeter. I kept my hand on the butt, my thumb on the hammer. I could cock it before it cleared my pocket. I'd practiced. There were people hurrying through the gardens on their way home from work, and some of them came across the bridge. But there were no casual walkers in the mean weather.

Tony looked at Hawk as if he were appraising him for auction. Hawk waited. I watched Ty Bop. Ty Bop was the shooter. Junior probably would have an Uzi, maybe a Bull Pup, under his coat. But it wasn't second nature to him the way it was with Ty Bop. Leonard would have a handgun, and he'd be good with it. But for Ty Bop, shooting was a part of his viscera. It was who he was. Ty Bop was the one to kill first.

"Whadya know?" Tony finally said in a soft voice.

"I know she your daughter with Veronica," Hawk said. "I know she married to a horse's ass."

"You seen them?" Tony said.

His voice was even softer.

"Yes."

"Where?"

"Rowes Wharf," Hawk said.

"You went to her house?"

I hunched my shoulders slightly.

"I did," Hawk said.

I could hear Tony breathe deeply through his nose.

"What did she say?"

I could feel the tightness begin to loosen in my trapezius.

"She don't seem to know nothing 'bout Boots," Hawk said.

"Brock?"

"He did," Hawk said. "Pulled a gun. Told us to, ah believe, get the fuck out."

"He pulled a gun on you," Tony said.

"Un-huh."

"You let it slide?"

"Un-huh. They started shoutin' at each other and me and my trusted companion here dee-parted."

Tony was silent. He glanced down the bridge toward Ty Bop and Junior. He looked the other way at Leonard. He raised his voice slightly.

"Go wait in the car," he said.

Junior and Leonard looked pleased. Ty Bop seemed disappointed. When they were gone, Tony took his hands out of his pockets and leaned his forearms on the bridge railing and looked down at the empty lake bottom.

"Her mother's no good, never was. I wasn't married to her. Just fucked her some. Knocked her up. When the kid was born, I took her. Jolene's twenty. I sent her to fucking Hampshire College. She's had two abortions."

He paused. I wondered if there was a connection between Hampshire and abortions. Hawk didn't say anything. The sleety rain drizzled down, not very hard and not very fast, but steady.

"Thirty thousand a year," Tony said, "and she's the old joke. Only fucked for friends, didn't have an enemy in the world."

It was hard language. If you told it tough, maybe it was less painful. Tony kept staring down, nodding his head softly, as if to himself.

"Then this honkie jerk-off comes along and she decide he the one. First time I see him I know what he is. But he what she wants. So she marries him. I set him up with a nice little book in the South End, easy living, no deadbeats. But he can't hack it. Refuses to pay off on a bet, smacks the customer around when the customer complains. Customer complains to the cops. We got to shut down the book for a while. I set him up someplace else… same long story. Asshole can't make a living. But she loves him. Somebody else, I have Ty Bop kill him, but…"

"So what about Boots," Hawk said.

It was dark now. The lights on Boylston Street were amorphous in the drizzle.

"Dumbass kid decides he's going to acquire new territory for us."

"You and him?" Hawk said.

"Yeah. Show me the kind of fucking criminal genius he is. So he decides to set us up in Marshport. Says it's a black population run by a few fucking Bohunks. Says they'll welcome us in, we get a foothold."

"And what did he think the Bohunks be doing," Hawk said, "while he getting this foothold?"

"He don't think, Hawk. He a fucking airhead. He think pumping iron and carrying a gun make him a tough guy."

"You weren't able to explain that it didn't," Hawk said.

"Jolene say I don't want him to succeed, that I, ah, repressing him. I told you she been to college."

"You let him use some soldiers," Hawk said.

"Sure, but I don't want no big war with Boots Podolak," Tony said. "For Marshport? What kind of business plan is that?"

Tony shook his head.

"So?" Hawk said.

"So I make a deal with Boots," Tony said. "He lets the kid grab a little piece of Marshport so Jolene can think he got a dick."

"And you let Boots grab a little piece of your enterprise," Hawk said.

Looking down at the empty pond bed, Tony nodded yes.

"And," Hawk said, "maybe you and Boots can designate who gets the short straw in your neighborhoods."

Tony nodded again.

"And Luther Gillespie gets aced."

Tony nodded again. We were all quiet.

After a time, Hawk said, "Known you a long time, Tony."

"Yeah."

"Don't want to give you more trouble than you got."

Tony nodded.

"But I got to even up for Luther Gillespie and his family, you understand that."

"And I got to look out for my daughter," Tony said.

"I got no interest in hurting her," Hawk said.

"She wants something, I do what I gotta do to get it for her," Tony said. "Right now she wants her husband to be a player in Marshport."

"I can work around you on this," Hawk said, "I will."

"I'll do the same," Tony said.

"If I can't…" Hawk said.

"You can't," Tony said.

"So we know," Hawk said.

"We know," Tony said.