Back Bay (19 page)

His lungs screamed for air, but he would not let go. He would not leave the strongbox.

Air, more air. Go up and take a breath, then dive.

You’ll never find the tea set again if you leave it now. Hold on and pull. Too heavy. Use your other arm. But my other arm is hanging off. No it isn’t. Try to lift it.

Somewhere in the blackness, a familiar voice was speaking to him. Yes, lift it, Dexter. The box is light. You’re young and strong.

I need air or my lungs will explode.

It’s all right, Dexter. You can breathe. Yes, dear. Breathe.

The world grew bright. Dexter Lovell stood on the stern of the
Gay Head
. The sky was blue, the breeze fresh and fair. On the wharf, his dear Beatrice was waving. He jumped from the ship. They embraced. In the last hallucinations of a drowning man, Dexter Lovell found what he was searching for.

Pratt saw a body appear on the surface. He watched through his spyglass until he was certain that both men were dead. He gave the glass to his grandson. “The poor fool came so close.”

“What the hell happened?” asked Wilson.

“I don’t know.”

Young Horace took the glass from his eye. He had hoped to see real dead men floating out there. He saw only a few indistinct shapes. “What will we do now?”

Pratt did not hesitate or allow himself a moment of grief at Lovell’s death. He pivoted on his cane and walked back to the carriage. “We’ll let the tide take care of Lovell and his friend, and then we’ll figure out a way to get that tea set out of the Easterly Channel.”

T
he stairwell in Peter Fallon’s apartment building usually stank of stale onions and stray cats, but when he came home from the Museum of Fine Arts, he smelled cheap shaving lotion the moment he stepped in the door.

Danny Fallon, dressed in his only suit, was waiting at the top of the stairs. “Balled any students lately?”

“I haven’t balled anybody lately.”

“Well, as the old man would say, that’s better than ballin’ boys.”

“He’s still a philosopher, isn’t he?”

“He’s a Harp, and I never met one yet who wasn’t tellin’ you how to live your life.”

“While all the time tellin’ you that he wasn’t tryin’ to tell you how to live your life.”

Inside the apartment, Peter gave his brother the once-over and a whistle. “What brings you to Cambridge, all dressed up and smellin’ like a tout on Derby Day?”

“Kenny Gallagher’s wake.”

“Already? I thought they were holding the body.”

“They only kept him for thirty-six hours. Then Ma called the coroner and said, ‘I’m Kenny Gallagher’s best friend, and I know for a fact that he has no next of kin.’ No arguin’ with Ma. They gave her the stiff. All the boys down at the Risin’ Moon chipped in. Uncle Dunphy gave us a cloth casket, and we’re plantin’ him ourselves.” Danny followed Peter into the kitchen, which was only slightly larger than most closets. “Ma’s been callin’ you all afternoon.”

“I wasn’t here.”

“No shit. She figured you were lost or somethin’ and wouldn’t know about the wake. She starts bitchin’ at me to come over and get you so you won’t miss the Rosary.”

“I thought the Rosary was always the second night.”

“Hey, we were lucky to get the home for
one
night, and Pa had to twist Dunphy’s arm half off before he gave us that shitty casket.”

Peter popped open the refrigerator. Three cockroaches scurried away from the half-eaten piece of apple pie on the bottom shelf. “I can offer you a dish of plain yogurt and wheat germ, a loaf of week-old Bavarian bread—baked by a failing student—a piece of unsavory apple pie, or my last can of Narragansett.”

“You know, you live like a goddam nigger!” Danny exploded. “Stayin’ in a dump like this, with cockroaches in the icebox and crabs in the toilet. Why don’t you get the hell out of here? You can’t like this place. Sometimes I think you want to be a martyr or somethin’ and punish yourself because it feels good.”

Peter knew that his brother was probably right. In the last six months, his life as an academic had been something to get through and get behind him. The more painful it was, the better he would feel when he threw it all over for something else.

“Do you need money?” continued Danny. “I’ll lend you what I can. Just ask. Or ask Pa. But for Chrissakes, get the hell out of this hole.”

“I like independence, and right now, this is all the independence I can afford.” Peter held out the beer. “Last call.”

Danny gave up. “I’ll split it with you.”

“That’s better. Less talk and more communication.” Peter took a dirty glass from the cupboard, rinsed it briefly under cold water, and half-filled it with beer. “The guest gets the glass.”

“No, thanks. I have enough problems as it is.” Danny grabbed the can. The beer was gone in an instant. “Now, c’mon. Some old priest from down the Cape is sayin’ the Rosary, and he’s startin’ at seven-thirty.”

“Do you think Ma would be pissed if I said I had too much work to do?” Peter wanted to start digging into back copies of
Hubcap
. He knew he shouldn’t miss Kenny’s wake, but he was thinking of it.

“Pissed? She’d come over here and get you herself.”

“What if I told you that I might be on the trail of some big money, and I needed every extra minute to track it down?”

“What kind of big money?” Danny was always suspicious when people started talking about big money.

“Buried treasure. A tea set worth two and a half million dollars.”

Danny looked at Peter for a moment, then began to laugh. “I’d say you were out of your fuckin’ mind.”

Peter realized how ludicrous he sounded. He began to laugh. “And you’d probably be right.”

The Kelleher Funeral Home was a handsome Victorian house on Dorchester Heights, the highest point in South Boston.

Small wonder that Washington chose this hill for his artillery emplacement during the siege of Boston. From Kelleher’s front porch, one could see the harbor, the downtown skyline, and the three-deckers and row houses which fanned out in every direction across Southie. Great spot for a funeral home, thought Fallon. Crowded dwellings all about, and a mansion right in the middle of it.

It often seemed to Fallon that among the Irish of Boston the three days after death were as important as a whole life. When he was feeling less cynical, he realized that the wake was among the most humane practices that the Irish had brought to Boston. Peter was always taught that when someone died or lost a loved one, he paid his respects. He shook the hand of the bereaved, he tried to offer whatever consolation he could, and he hoped that the Almighty would watch over the deceased, even if he wasn’t sure that the Almighty existed.

It didn’t matter that a person suffered through life pinching pennies in a three-room cold-water flat. When he died, his friends and relatives laid him out in the house on the hill and gave him a send-off fit for the mayor. It didn’t matter that a person never had had a good word for anyone in life. When he died, his clan gathered and said whatever good there was to say about him.

Danny opened the door, solid oak and beveled glass. The Fallon brothers stepped into the front hall. The door closed behind them on a hydraulic hinge, and they were soothed by cool, conditioned air.

Dunphy Kelleher, their father’s cousin, greeted them with a solemn nod. Of average height and build, he was distinguished by black hair recently gone gray at the temples. Although he now left the embalming to his employees, his lips were permanently
pursed, as though he were constantly holding his nose beside a dead piece of flesh. “Terrible thing about poor Kenny. Terrible. We know neither the day nor the hour. Neither the day nor the hour.”

“Save the sermon,” whispered Danny. “When he was alive, you wouldn’t give Kenny the steam off your shit. Where is he?”

Dunphy’s expression and tone did not change. “I’ve reserved the second floor for the Gallagher party.” He looked at Peter. “I haven’t seen you in quite a while, my boy.”

Fallon smiled. “Wakes and weddings bring us all closer together.”

“We should have them more often.”

The Fallons walked into the large, formal entrance hall. A leaded glass chandelier hung above them. A sign, white magnetic letters and red arrows on a black background, directed mourners to the left for O’Hara, the right for Lissel, and upstairs for Gallagher.

“Just like goin’ to one of those shopping-mall movie theaters that’s showin’ three different pictures,” cracked Danny.

The syrupy smell of orchids and carnations rolled into the hallway, but Peter looked neither left nor right as he walked past the O’Haras and Lissels. He didn’t enjoy the sight of dead bodies. It was bad enough that he had to see Kenny, all made up in heavy pancake and rouge, his face distorted from fluid, his mouth stuffed with cotton and wired shut, wax plugs filling the bullet holes so he wouldn’t leak, and Rosary beads, which he hadn’t touched in forty years, wrapped in his hands for eternity.

Halfway up the stairs, Fallon heard the familiar prayer. A single, strong voice, “Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with Thee. Blessed are Thou among Women, and Blessed is the Fruit of Thy Womb, Jesus.” And the mumbled response of thirty or forty voices, “Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death, Amen.” The Rosary had already started.

Kenny Gallagher’s body lay in the bay window of what had been the master bedroom before Kelleher remodeled. The walls had been painted robin’s-egg blue, in keeping with the pastel motif, and the draperies were cream-colored. An enormous American oriental, about three inches thick, covered the floor.

“The Fifth Sorrowful Mystery, the Death Upon the Cross,”
droned Father Gerry Hale, an arthritic old priest hunched over the kneeler in front of the casket.

Behind him, the people knelt, sat, and stood wherever they found space. Fallon hadn’t known that Kenny Gallagher had had that many friends. The word had gone out from the Fallon household that one of their own, a good man with no family and a penchant for pouring an extra finger on every highball, was dead. Friends and friends of friends had come to say goodbye.

Fallon recognized Jackie Halloran and his wife; the Murphy family, all three generations; Harry Hourihan, the owner of the Rising Moon; the widows’ club, an unofficial army of ladies who materialized for every wake; and the Andy Capps, as Fallon called them, the Rising Moon regulars who seemed to be at the bar no matter when Fallon stopped by for a beer.

Fallon’s parents, Tom and Maureen, knelt near the casket and prayed loudly. Fallon’s aunts and uncles, most of whom had never met Kenny Gallagher, were there out of deference to Maureen. Danny’s wife, Sheila, sat in a corner with her three children and six others, and God help the kid who wasn’t saying his beads.

Peter stepped quietly into the room, nodded toward his mother, folded his hands in front of him, and stared at the floor. Danny stood in the hallway and smoked.

By the time the priest said the final Hail Mary, Fallon understood once more the power of the Rosary. He took no comfort in the words themselves, but their repetition, fifty Hail Marys separated into five decades by the Lord’s Prayer, was almost hypnotic. The rhythm of the words created concentration which led to contemplation and, ultimately, to serenity. Even people like Fallon, the agnostics and non-Catholics who stood silently at the back of the room, were held by the prayer.

“In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, Amen.” The old priest blessed the body and stood painfully.

It was several moments before anyone else moved. Then, Tom Fallon put away his beads and shook hands with Father Hale. Respects had been paid. Socializing began.

“Why, Petie Fallon!” It was Harry Hourihan. “I ain’t seen you in ages.” Harry pumped Fallon’s hand vigorously. His eyes were red
and his face looked puffy. He had been Kenny’s boss. “It’s such a terrible thing to happen, and what a thing for you to see.”

“We’ll all miss him, Harry,” said Fallon.

“That’s right.” Denny Murphy joined the conversation. “He made the best damn boilermaker I ever drank.”

“For Chrissakes, anybody could make a boilermaker,” said Hourihan. “It don’t take nothin’ to pour a beer and a shot.”

“But he poured you up a shot that hit like Marciano’s right.”

“That’s because he poured too much.”

“He got good tips,” said Denny.

“And cost me money doing it.” Harry was forgetting his grief.

“He was the best bartender I ever knew, and nobody could break up a fight faster,” persisted Denny.

“I can attest to that,” added Fallon.

Harry shook his head and looked at the floor. “I don’t know what I’ll do without him.”

Fallon clapped Harry on the shoulder. “I’d better get over and see my old man, Harry. Say hello to the wife for me.”

Fallon took ten minutes to get through the knots of people standing about the room. Every few paces, he was stopped by someone who recognized him and wanted to talk. He chatted with Harry Delehante, the barber who always cut his hair short with a part on the left, no matter what the instructions; Mary Donovan, his old baby-sitter, now thirty-five and looking forty with four kids of her own; Auntie Eleanor, who usually slipped five dollars into his breast pocket whenever she saw him; Benny Greene, his father’s old partner, who always counseled Peter to be a dentist; and Tom Hennessey, “with a booze named after me,” his father’s labor foreman and Peter’s first boss.

Fallon managed to smile through all the small talk, and he answered questions about his future as gracefully as possible without revealing too much. He had just about run out of good nature when he reached his parents. They were standing near the casket with Father Hale.

“Good evening, folks,” he said pleasantly.

“You missed most of the Rosary.”

“Sorry, Ma.”

“I’ll forgive you,” joked Father Hale.

Maureen Fallon introduced her son to the priest, who was well into his seventies and clearly suffering from the pain of his arthritis. When they shook hands, Fallon felt knots of bone grown thick around each knuckle of the old man’s hand.