“I’ll see ya, gents,” Charlie said, and rushed into the rain, running lumpily down the darkened slope of 11th Street to his home. Eddie followed, cutting sharply to his left. But Brendan did not move. He had seen the strangers in the black raincoats, glanced at them in the mirror for a while as he moved through the songs, saw them leave an hour later. And now he was afraid.
He looked up and down the avenue. The street lamp scalloped a halo of light on the corner. Beyond the light there was nothing but the luminous darkness and the rain.
“Well, I’ve got to lock it up, Brendan.”
“Right, George. Good night.”
“God bless.”
Brendan hurried up the street, head down, lashed by the rain, eyes searching the interiors of parked cars. He saw nothing. The cars were locked. He looked up at the apartments and there were no lights anywhere and he knew the lights would be out at home, too, where Sarah and the kids would all be sleeping. Even the firehouse was dimly lit, its great red door closed, the firemen stretched out on their bunks in the upstairs loft.
Despite the drink and the rain, Brendan’s mouth was dry. Once he thought he saw something move in the darkness of an areaway and his stomach lifted and fell. But again it was nothing. Shadows. Imagination. Get hold of yourself, Brendan.
He crossed the avenue. A half block to go. A ways off he saw the twin red taillights of a city bus, groaning slowly toward Flatbush Avenue. Hurry. Another half block and he could enter the yard, hurry up the stairs, unlock the door, close it behind him, undress quickly in the darkened kitchen, dry off the rain with a warm rough towel, brush the beer off his teeth, and fall into the great deep warmth of bed with Sarah. And he would be safe again for another night. Hurry. Get the key out. Don’t get caught naked on the stairs.
He turned into his yard, stepped over a spreading puddle at the base of the stoop, and hurried up the eight worn sandstone steps. He had the key out in the vestibule and quickly opened the inside door.
They were waiting for him in the hall.
The one in the front seat on the right was clearly the boss. The driver was only a chauffeur and did his work in proper silence. The strangers in the raincoats sat on either side of Brendan in the backseat and said nothing as the car moved through the wet darkness down off the Slope, into the Puerto Rican neighborhood near Williamsburg. They all clearly deferred to the one in the right front seat. All wore gloves. Except the boss.
“I’m telling you, mister, this has to be some kind of mistake,” Brendan said.
“Shut up,” said the boss without turning. His skin was pink in the passing lights of street lamps and his dark hair curled over the edge of his collar. The accent was not New York. Not Belfast. Maybe Boston. Maybe somewhere else. Not New York.
“I don’t owe anybody money,” Brendan said, choking back the dry panic. “I’m not into the bloody loan sharks. I’m telling you this is—”
The boss said, “Is your name Brendan Malachy McCone?”
“Well, uh, yes, but—”
“Then we’ve made no mistake.”
Williamsburg was behind them now and they were following the route of the Brooklyn — Queens Expressway while avoiding its brightly lit ramp. Brendan sat back. From that angle, he could see more of the man in the right front seat: the velvet collar of his coat, the high, protruding cheekbones, the longish nose, the pinkie ring glittering on his left hand when he lit a cigarette with a thin gold lighter. He could not see the man’s eyes but he was certain he had never seen the man before tonight.
“Where are you taking me?”
The boss said calmly, “I told you to shut up. Shut up.”
Brendan took a deep breath, and then let it out slowly. He looked to the men on either side of him, smiling his most innocent smile, as if hoping they would think well of him, believe in his innocence, intervene with the boss, plead his case. He wanted to tell them about his kids, explain that he had done nothing bad. Not for thirty years.
The men looked away from him, their nostrils seeming to quiver, as if he had already begun to stink of death. Brendan tried to remember the words of the Act of Contrition.
The men beside him stared out past the little rivers of rain on the windows, as if he were not even in the car. They watched the city turn into country, Queens into Nassau County, all the sleeping suburbs transformed into the darker, emptier reaches of Suffolk County, as the driver pushed on, driving farther away, out on Long Island, to the country of forests and frozen summer beaches. Far from Brooklyn. Far from the Friday nights at Rattigan’s. Far from his children. Far from Sarah.
Until they pulled off the expressway at Southampton, moved down back roads for another fifteen minutes, and came to a marshy cove. A few summer houses were sealed for the winter. Rain spattered the still water of the cove. Patches of dirty snow clung to the shoreline, resisting the steady cold rain.
“This is fine,” the boss said.
