6


WE WALKED SLOWLY to a coffee shop on Cambridge Street. If Quirk noticed that Hawk was shuffling more than he was walking, he didn't comment.

All he said was, "You back in the gym yet?"

"Nope," Hawk said. "But Ah has started to brush my own teeth."

"Step at a time," Quirk said.

We got coffee. Quirk took a thick manila envelope out of his briefcase and put it on the table.

"If I go before you do and forget this, and leave it lying here on the table, I want you to return it to me immediately. I only got two other copies. And under no circumstances do I want you to open the envelope and read its contents."

"Where my man, Bohdan?" Hawk said.

"In jail awaiting trial," Quirk said.

"Suffolk County?" Hawk said.

"Yep."

"Think he'll last till his trial?" Hawk said.

"He thinks so," Quirk said. "He thinks everything's hunky-dory with the other Ukrainians."

"You keeping him separate?" I said.

"Yep."

Hawk made a soft, derisive sound.

"Never going to make trial," Hawk said.

Quirk shrugged.

"And ain't that a shame," Quirk said.

"What have you got on the rest of them?" I said.

"The details are, of course, confidential police business, which is why I have them sealed up safe in this envelope. We been talking to the organized-crime guys, the FBI, immigration. We know it's a Ukrainian mob. Which means we are dealing with some very bad people. Even the Russians are afraid of the Ukrainians."

"They straight from the old country?" I said.

Quirk shook his head.

"We think from Brooklyn. They've set up around here in Marshport, up on the North Shore, which has got a small Ukrainian population."

I nodded.

"They come in, start small. Take over a book here and horse parlor there. Usually small-time black crime. The assumption being that the blacks have the least power."

Quirk grinned at Hawk.

"Which, from the looks of you, may be correct at the moment."

"Enjoy it while you can, honkie."

"Hey," Quirk said. "I'm a police captain."

"That's right, you is," Hawk said. "Enjoy it while you can, Captain Honkie."

"Anyway, pretty soon they have all the black crime, and are moving on the Asians. And so it goes. Sometimes they end up with the city. They probably got Marshport. Boston is their first big-city try since Brooklyn."

"They don't run Brooklyn," I said.

"Nobody does," Quirk said. "But they got a part."

"This wouldn't have happened," I said, "if the Dodgers hadn't left."

Both of them looked at me silently for a while. Then Quirk shook his head.

"Gotta go to work," he said.

He stood up.

"We're going to chase these guys until we catch them for something," he said. "But if someone gets there first…"

Quirk shrugged.

"Well, what's a poor cop to do?" he said, and turned and went out the front door of the coffee shop. When he was gone I picked up the manila envelope.

"Hey," I said softly, "you forgot your envelope."

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