Shamrock Alley (28 page)

As he crossed the intersection, he angled his car perpendicular to the mouth of West 57
^th
Street, inhibiting the flow of turning traffic. More horns blared. Up ahead, he could make out the diminishing taillights of John’s Camaro speeding off into the darkness. And two cars over from Bill Kersh’s right was the Pontiac Sunbird, in as dead of a stop as every other car. The driver appeared calm, his face eclipsed by shadow. The two cars between them made it impossible for him to get the tag number.

“Sorry,” Kersh shouted from his open window. And since he’d be here for a while, he turned on his stereo and popped in an Art Blakey tape. A rattle of drums shook his speakers and caused him to breathe a sigh of relief.

“S
ORRY,”
K
ERSH SAID
. “H
OPE
I
’M NOT DISTURBING
anything.”

Surprised by the unexpected company, John opened wide the apartment door and gestured for the older agent to enter. “No,” he said, “not at all. Come in. Is everything all right?”

“Sure, sure. I was just in the neighborhood. That’s the saying at least, isn’t it?” Kersh shook himself off in the doorway—it had started to rain again this evening—and pushed his way inside. Clasped in his oversized hand was a bottle of Luna di Luna chardonnay; he appeared to be squeezing the life out of it.

They entered the kitchen, Kersh uncharacteristically coy. “Hon, you remember Bill Kersh.”

“Katie,” Kersh said, and nodded once.

“Of course,” Katie said, suddenly beaming. “How are you? I’m sorry the place is such a disaster. Maybe you can convince my husband to get some of his crap put away.”

“It’s really very beautiful,” Kersh said, admiring the craftsmanship of the wood paneling, the decorative tablecloth on the small table, the bric-a-brac Katie collected lined along the countertop and the windowsill above the sink. “Congratulations.” Then, as if he’d suddenly remembered, he held out the bottle of chardonnay to her. “Here. A housewarming gift.”

“Wow,” she said, taking the bottle and squeezing Kersh’s forearm with one hand. “Our first housewarming gift.” She set the bottle down on the counter.

“Not true. You’re forgetting Phyllis Gamberniece’s delicious brownies,” John said, “topped with a fine sprinkling of cat hair.” He went to the refrigerator and grabbed a couple of beers, set them on the kitchen table. “Sit down, Billy.”

“Uh … I didn’t think,” Kersh said to Katie, gesticulating at the bottle and still standing awkwardly in the kitchen doorway. “I mean, you probably won’t… or can’t … drink any of…” He hiked up his pants nervously. “The baby. John’s told me you’re due the end of February?”

“That’s the plan,” Katie said. She walked by her husband on her way to the sink and slapped him once lightly on the waist. Winked playfully. “Nice to know he remembered.” She tossed a dishrag into the sink. “Are you hungry, Bill? I’ve got some spaghetti, still hot.”

Kersh seated himself at the table with John, who twisted the cap off the man’s beer and slid it over to him.

“I don’t want to be any trouble,” Kersh said.

“No trouble,” Katie assured him. “It’s still here on the counter.”

Kersh took a small sip of his beer and shrugged. John noticed Kersh did not shrug well—that his shoulders were too large and too close to his head for the action to look natural. “Well,” Kersh said, “if it’s not any trouble …” He offered Katie another awkward smile, and it suddenly occurred to John that Bill Kersh was knowledgeable about a lot of things, but knew very little about women. So little, in fact, they apparently made him uncomfortable.

“One dish,” Katie said, “coming right up.”

“Look at this guy,” John said. “Comes to our house, drinks our beer, and eats our leftovers.”

“It’s good preparation for when you’re parents,” Kersh said.

John stood, went to the kitchen counter, and took the plate from his wife’s hand. “Go get your bath,” he said, “I’ll do this.”

“I can do it.”

“I got it.”

Defeated, Katie wiped her hands on a dishtowel. “Sorry to spoil the fun,” she told Kersh, “but I’m going to get ready for bed.”

Kersh stood and smiled. For one crazy moment, John thought the man was actually going to bow down, or kiss his wife’s hand. He had to fight off a chuckle.

In the end, Kersh opted for a simple, “Good night.”

Katie disappeared down the hall and into the bathroom. A moment later and the apartment shuddered as the water in the bathroom was turned on.

“Tell me something,” Kersh said as John crossed the kitchen and set the plate of spaghetti in front of the man. “How did you talk that girl into marrying an ugly, arrogant son of a bitch like yourself?”

“Easy,” he said, sitting across from Kersh. “A girl doesn’t say no to a guy with a gun.”

Kersh laughed. “I knew it couldn’t have been your charm.”

“You never came back to the office tonight,” John said. “I waited around for you. Something come up?”

“Traffic,” Kersh said, shoveling spaghetti into his mouth and raising his eyebrows. “Something
did
happen. I mean, I
think
so. Probably nothing. But you know me—better safe than sorry.”

“What’s the deal?”

“I think someone in a blue Pontiac followed you from the candy store.”

“Shit, “John said, “I saw that car pulling up along Tenth Avenue during the deal.” He remembered watching as it rolled past the Camaro.

“The car pulled around the block at least twice, from what I saw,” Kersh said. “Turned onto Fifty-third Street both times. Then, when you pulled out into the intersection, I noticed the car was following a few cars behind you. I turned up on Eleventh and came down Fifty-seventh Street, cut him off at the intersection where they had all that construction.”

“Are you sure he was following me?” The idea of Mickey O’Shay setting up a tail seemed absurd. “Could have been a million reasons the guy was driving around the block.”

“True, and I’m sure it was nothing, but I just wanted to play it safe just the same. And to let you know, too.”

It just didn’t sound right. “I don’t think it came from Mickey,” he said.

“You’re probably right,” Kersh agreed again. Yet he didn’t sound too convinced. “I just figured you should know. This spaghetti is excellent. I should marry an Italian woman.”

Cradling his beer in his lap, John leaned back in his chair. “You couldn’t handle an Italian woman,” he said, though he was still chewing on Kersh’s story, his mind elsewhere. “She’d break you down so fast it’d make your head spin.”

“You have such little faith,” Kersh said. That was when John noticed something else in the man’s eyes—something greater than the story he’d just relayed.

“What else?” John asked. “There’s something else …”

“There is,” Kersh said. “You mind if I pop open this chardonnay?”

Several minutes later, with two full glasses of chardonnay in front of them, Bill Kersh said, “I was on Mickey all night. He never left the store, not until you showed up. Not for a single second. Just like when Tommy was watching.”

Slowly, John shook his head. “Anybody else go
in
the store?”

Kersh explained about the children, but both knew it meant nothing.

“So he’s either got a stash in his apartment—”

“Or someone else’s apartment,” Kersh added.

“Or in the candy store,” John finished.

“Don’t know,” Kersh said. “You think they’re printing it? Him and Jimmy?”

“No—no way,” he said, shaking his head. “These are smash-and-grab guys. They’re not sophisticated enough to actually be printing the shit.”

“What about the store?”

“Guy working there must know the deal,” John said. “That’s Mickey’s business office.”

“You know,” Kersh said, “the Service isn’t going to let us sink much more money into this thing. We’re already down twenty-two thousand bucks and we’ve got nothing to show for it except this guy O’Shay. Soon, Chominsky’s gonna want us to bust him, see if we can roll him …”

Chominsky was the Special Agent in Charge of the field office. And John knew Kersh was right about him. Dejected, he said, “This guy’ll never roll on Kahn. Not in a million years.”

“You don’t know—”

“I
do, “he
said, pressing the tips of his fingers against the tabletop with enough force to turn them white. “I can smell it just by sitting next to this guy. He won’t say boo. And we need to nail Kahn. If we get them both dirty, then maybe they’ll cut a deal together, give up the source. But I’ll tell you now—alone, Mickey won’t cooperate even if he’s faced with a zillion years. The guy’s not all there.”

“Anyone can be persuaded,” Kersh assured him. “Loyalty only goes so far.”

“I’m not talking about loyalty,” John said. “I just think the guy’s mind is fractured. And I’m hoping Kahn is smarter.” Frustrated, he poured himself some more chardonnay and picked at the bottle’s label with his thumbnail. Damn it—if he could have just gotten Mickey to open up a little more … just a
little
. “Christ, I don’t know.” He looked up at Kersh. “So what do we do?”

“We think,” Kersh said. “Me, I’m spending more time in what you so respectfully refer to as ‘the pit.’ It’s like my own personal War Room.”

They drank some more, mostly in silence. It was a good feeling—John had not enjoyed the silence of an older man in a long time. Part of his mind was with his father in the little stucco house. He pictured the interior dark, his father’s restless shape beneath the covers of his bed. Another part of him remained right here with Bill Kersh, drinking Luna di Luna and liking it. It seemed that contentment and comfort rarely graced him with their presence—that he was always on edge, always moving from someplace to someplace else—but he felt both right now, and very strongly.

“Aside from your horrendous sense of style, some woman somewhere must have fallen for you. How come you never married?” he asked Kersh after pouring them both another glass.

“Almost did,” Kersh said. He was leaning back in his chair, his tie undone, a thick fold of red flesh overhanging his shirt collar. There was tomato sauce drying on one sleeve. His glass of chardonnay was precariously balanced on the edge of the table, one of Bill Kersh’s thick fingers pressing down against the glass’s base. “It’s not a particularly original story. We fell in love, did the moonlit stroll through Central Park thing. We talked about marriage. She wanted children desperately, and I wanted nothing to do with them.”

John laughed.

“What?” Kersh said, cracking a smile.

“Nothing. It’s just you …” He waved his hand at Kersh. “Nothing. What’s wrong with kids?”

“Not a thing,” Kersh said. “They’re terrific. Wonderful. Long as they’re not mine.”

“You’re whacked.”

“I don’t dislike them; I just don’t
understand
them.”

Smiling, John ran a hand through his hair. Between him and Kersh, they had almost worked their way through an entire bottle of Luna di Luna. “Did the job have anything to do with it?”

“With what?” Kersh, too, seemed to be in a good place.

“With why you didn’t want to have children?” Yet even after a few drinks, he recognized the intent such a question implied. Suddenly, he wished he hadn’t said anything.

“No,” Kersh said. “Why? Something on your mind?”

“No. I was just curious.”

“Are you sure?” Kersh’s tone was relaxing, coaxing. It was the tone he used when interrogating people, John suddenly realized, and only now did he understand the full effect of such an approach. Perhaps it was the alcohol, but John didn’t think it was. “Look,” Kersh continued, “I’ve been doing this job for a long time. And in that time, I’ve come to understand that there’s really only one thing I need to keep inside my head every day. Just one thing that makes the job possible.”

“Yeah? What’s that?”

“
That it’s only a job.”
Kersh allowed the words to simmer in the air. “You remember that, keep that in mind, and everything else will take care of itself.”

He saw Bill Kersh as a preacher, outfitted in folds of black silk, embroidered gold piping around the sleeves and neck, standing before a throng of worshippers, all seeking answers for unanswerable questions.

“You,” John said after some time, “drank all the chardonnay.”

“You helped,” Kersh informed him.

“I got an idea.”

“About what?”

“About what to do with Mickey.” Setting his empty glass down on the table, he leaned forward in his chair and propped one elbow on the tabletop. “It’s a little unconventional, but we can pull it off.”

“
All
your ideas are unconventional,” Kersh said.

“Just do me one favor,” he said.

“Shoot.”

“Promise me you’ll agree to it before I tell you what it is.”

Kersh laughed, his head back, his enormous Adam’s apple vibrating in his throat. He looked astoundingly like some prehistoric animal. When the laughter finally subsided, he set his own glass back down on the table and looked at John with bleary eyes. “Maybe,” he said.

“No backbone,” John commented.

Kersh paused, rolled his eyes to the left, examined the molding that ran the length of the kitchen wall. Finally, he said, “All right. But it better be good. Now—what’s the deal?”

“This guy Mickey don’t trust me,” he said. “Don’t think he trusts anybody, really. I gotta do something that earns that trust, something that puts me in deeper, right on the line with this guy.” He twirled the stem of his wine glass between two fingers. “Something he won’t expect.”

“So what’s this brilliant idea of yours?”

“What do undercover agents always do?” he said, not waiting for Kersh to answer: “They
buy.”

“So?” Kersh said.

“They
buy, “
John repeated. “They never
sell.”

Kersh rubbed a rough hand across the lower part of his jaw. “I knew,” he said, “I shouldn’t have drunk all that wine.”

A
FTER KNOCKING OFF THE ENTIRE BOTTLE OF
Luna di Luna with Kersh, John made a telephone call to a young customs agent named Robert Silvestri at JFK International Airport. Silvestri had grown up in the same Brooklyn neighborhood as John, had even attended the same college. Like John, he was one of the few guys from the old neighborhood who managed to circumvent a life of street crime and privation. With Kersh watching him from above his empty wine glass, John explained the Mickey O’Shay situation to Silvestri.