THE BAR IS STRAIGHT OUT OF
FAT CITY,
A NORTH PHILLY DIVE with a broken air conditioner, a grimy tin ceiling, and a graveyard of dead plants in the window. It reeks of disinfectant and old pork fat. There are two of us at the bar, four more scattered at tables. The jukebox plays Waylon Jennings.
I glance at the guy on my right. He is one of those Blake Edwards drunks, an extra in
Days of Wine and Roses.
He looks like he could use another. I get the guy’s attention.
“How’s it going?” I ask.
It doesn’t take long for him to summarize. “Been better.”
“Who hasn’t?” I reply. I point to his nearly empty glass. “One more?”
He looks at me a little more closely, perhaps searching for motive. He’ll never find it. His eyes are glassy, veined with drink and fatigue. There is something beneath the exhaustion, though. Something that speaks of fear. “Why not?”
I motion to the bartender, swirl my finger over our empties. The bartender pours, grabs my check, retreats to the register.
“Tough day?” I ask.
He nods. “Tough day.”
“Like the great George Bernard Shaw once said: ‘Alcohol is the anesthesia by which we endure the operation of life.’ ”
“I’ll drink to that,” he says on the tail of a sad smile.
“There was a movie once,” I say. “I think it was with Ray Milland.” Of course, I
know
it was with Ray Milland. “He played an alcoholic.”
The guy nods.
“Lost Weekend.”
“That’s the one. There’s one scene where he talks about the effect that alcohol has on him. It’s a classic. An ode to the bottle.” I stand straighter, square my shoulders. I do my best Don Birnam, quoting from the movie: “It tosses the sandbags overboard so the balloon can soar. Suddenly I’m above the ordinary. I’m competent. I’m walking a tightrope over Niagara Falls. I’m one of the great ones.’ ” I put my glass back down. “Or something like that.”
The guy stares at me for a few moments, trying to focus his eyes. “That’s pretty fucking good, man,” he finally says. “You’ve got a great memory.”
He is slurring his words.
I hoist my glass. “Better days.”
“Couldn’t be worse than this one.”
Of course it could.
He downs his shot, drains his beer. I follow suit. He begins to fish around in his pocket for his keys.
“One more for the road?” I ask.
“No thanks,” he says. “I’m good.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah,” he says. “I gotta get up early tomorrow.” He slides off his stool, heads for the rear of the bar. “Thanks anyway.”
I drop a twenty on the bar, glance around. Four dead drunks at the rickety tables. Myopic barkeep. We don’t exist. We are background. I’m wearing a Flyers cap and tinted shades. Twenty extra foam pounds around my waist.
I follow him to the back door. We step into the wet kiln of the late afternoon, emerging into the small parking lot behind the bar. There are three cars.
“Hey, thanks for the drink,” he says.
“You are more than welcome,” I reply. “You okay to drive?”
He holds up a single key attached to a leather fob. A door key. “Walking home.”
“Smart man.” We are standing behind my car. I open the trunk. It is lined with clear plastic. He glances inside.
“Wow, that is one clean car you’ve got,” he says.
“I have to keep it spotless for work.”
He nods. “What do you do?”
“I’m an actor.”
It takes a moment for the absurdity to register. He scans my face again. Soon recognition dawns. “We’ve met before, haven’t we?” he asks.
“Yes.”
He waits for me to say more. I do not offer more. The moment drags out. He shrugs. “Well, okay, good seeing you again. I’m gonna get going.”
I put my hand on his forearm. In my other hand is a straight razor. Michael Caine in
Dressed to Kill.
I flick open the razor. The keened steel blade shimmers in the marmalade-colored sunlight.
He looks at the razor, then back up into my eyes. It is clear that he now recalls where we met. I knew he eventually would. He remembers me from the video store, standing at the rack of classic films. Fear blossoms on his face.
“I . . . I have to go,” he says, suddenly sober.
I tighten my grip on his arm and say: “I’m afraid I can’t allow that, Adam.”
28
THE LAUREL HILL CEMETERY WAS NEARLY DESERTED AT THIS hour. Situated on seventy-four acres overlooking Kelly Drive and the Schuylkill River, it was home to Civil War generals as well as victims of the
Titanic.
Its once magnificent arboretum setting was rapidly deteriorating into a scar of overturned headstones, weed-choked fields, and crumbling mausoleums.
Byrne stood in the cool shade of a huge maple for a while, resting.
Lavender,
he thought.
Gracie Devlin’s favorite color was lavender.
When he regained his strength, he walked over to Gracie’s grave site. He was surprised that he found the plot so quickly. It was a small, inexpensive marker, the kind for which you settle when the high-pressure sales tactics fail and the salesman needs to move on. He looked down at the stone.
Marygrace Devlin.
ETERNAL GRACE read the inscription above the carving.
Byrne did a little landscaping around the stone, pulling the overgrown grass and weeds, brushing the dirt from the face.
Had it really been two years since he stood here with Melanie and Garrett Devlin? Had it really been two years since they gathered in the cold winter rain, black-clad silhouettes against the deep violet horizon? He had lived with his own family then, the coming sadness of his divorce not even on his radar. He had driven the Devlins home that day, helped at the reception in their small row house. He had stood in Gracie’s room that afternoon. He remembered the smell of lilacs and floral perfume and moth cakes. He remembered the collection of ceramic figures from
Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs
on Gracie’s bookshelf. Melanie had told him that the only figurine her daughter needed was Snow White to complete the set. She told him that Gracie intended to buy the final piece the day she was killed. Three times Byrne had returned to the theater where Gracie was murdered, looking for the figurine. He never found it.
Snow White.
Since that night, every time Byrne heard the name
Snow White
his heart ached a little more.
He eased himself to the ground. The relentless heat was warming on his back. After a few moments he reached out, touched the headstone and—
— the images slam into his mind with a brutal and untamed fury . . . Gracie on the rotted floorboards of the stage . . . Gracie’s clear blue eyes clouded with terror . . . the eyes of menace in the darkness above her . . . the eyes of Julian Matisse . . . Gracie’s screams blotting out all sound, all thought, all prayer—
Byrne was flung backward, gut-shot, his hand exploding off the cool granite. His heart raced to burst. The well of tears in his eyes brimmed.
So real. My God, so real.
He looked around the cemetery, soul-shaken, his pulse thrumming in his ears. There was no one near him, no one watching. He found a small measure of calm within him, gripped it, held on tight.
For a few unworldly moments he found it hard to reconcile the fury of his vision with the peace of the graveyard. He was soaked with sweat. He glanced at the headstone. It looked perfectly ordinary. It
was
perfectly ordinary. The brutal power was within
him.
There was no doubt. The visions were back.
* * *
BYRNE SPENT THE early evening in physical therapy. As much as he hated to admit it, the therapy was helping. A little. He seemed to have a little more mobility in his legs, a little more flexibility in his lower back. Still, he would never concede this to the Wicked Witch of West Philadelphia.
A friend of his ran a gym in Northern Liberties. Instead of driving back to his apartment, Byrne grabbed a shower at the gym, then a light dinner at a neighborhood diner.
At about eight o’clock he pulled into the parking lot next to the Silk City Diner to wait for Victoria. He cut the engine, waited. He was early. He thought about the case. Adam Kaslov was no stone killer. Still, there was no such thing as coincidence, not in his experience. He thought about the young woman in the trunk of the car. He had never gotten used to the level of savagery available to the human heart.
He replaced the image of the young woman in the trunk of the car with the images of making love to Victoria. It had been such a long time since he had felt the swell of romantic love in his chest.
He recalled the first time, the only other time in his life he had felt that way. The time he met his wife. He recalled that summer day with a precious clarity, smoking pot next to the 7-Eleven with some of the Two-Street boys— Des Murtaugh, Tug Parnell, Timmy Hogan— listening to Thin Lizzy on Timmy’s shitty boom box. It wasn’t that anyone liked Thin Lizzy all that much, but they were Irish, damnit, and that
meant
something. “The Boys Are Back in Town,” “Jailbreak,” “Fighting My Way Back.” Those were the days. The girls with their big hair and glitter makeup. The guys with the skinny ties, gradient shades, and sleeves pushed up.
But there was never a Two-Street girl with more attitude than Donna Sullivan. Donna had on a white pin-dot sundress that day, the kind with the thin straps on the shoulders, the kind that swayed with every step. She was tall and noble and confident in her bearing; her strawberry-blond hair was back in a ponytail, luminous like summer sunshine on Jersey sand. She was walking her dog, a little Yorkie she called Brando.
When Donna got up to the store, Tug was already down on all fours, panting like a dog, asking to be walked on a chain. That was Tug. Donna rolled her eyes, but she smiled. It was a girlish smile, a playful grin that said she could go along with the clowns of the world. Tug rolled onto his back, working the gag for all it was worth.
When Donna looked at Byrne, she gave him a different smile, a woman’s smile, one that offered everything and revealed nothing, one that found its way deep into Kevin Byrne’s tough-guy chest. A smile that said:
If you are the man in this group of boys, you will be with me.
Gimme the puzzle, God,
Byrne had thought at that moment, looking at that beautiful face, those aquamarine eyes that seemed to bore right through him.
Gimme the puzzle to this girl, God, and I’ll solve it.
Tug noticed that Donna had noticed the big guy. Like always. He got up and, if it had been anyone but Tug Parnell, would’ve felt foolish. “This side of beef is Kevin Byrne. Kevin Byrne, Donna Sullivan.”
“You’re the one they call Riff Raff, right?” she asked.
Byrne reddened in a flash, embarrassed at the handle for the very first time. The nickname had always given Byrne a certain sense of ethnic bad-boy pride, but coming from Donna Sullivan’s lips that day, it sounded, well, stupid. “Uh, yeah,” he said, feeling even dumber.
“Want to walk with me awhile?” she asked.
It was like asking him if he had any interest in breathing. “Sure,” he said.
And thus she had him.
They walked down to the river, their hands brushing, never quite reaching out, fully sensing each other’s nearness. When they returned to the neighborhood at just after dusk, Donna Sullivan kissed him on the cheek.
“You’re not so tough, you know,” Donna said.
“I’m not?”
“No. I think you may even be sweet.”
Byrne grabbed his heart in mock cardiac arrest. “Sweet?”
Donna laughed. “Don’t worry,” she said. She lowered her voice to a honey whisper. “Your secret is safe with me.”
He watched her walk up to the house. She turned, silhouetted in the doorway, and blew him another kiss.
