'Yeah? You reconsider my proposition?'
'I'm coming around.'
'That girl of yours – how's she feelin'?'
There was no point lying – the answer was written all over my face. 'Not good. Something's gotta give, and quick. You said you know a guy could use a little help?'
'That's right,' Johnnie said. 'He's gonna hafta meet you first, of course. A nice, upstanding fella like you is just the kind a guy he's lookin' for, though, so you don't got nothin' to worry about. Your old lady's gonna be just fine – you wait and see.'
'Set up the meeting – I'll be there. Just tell me where and when.'
For a moment, I thought I saw a flicker of black fire dancing in his eyes, but it was gone just as quickly as it appeared. 'All right, Sammy,' he said, extending his hand to me. It hung in the air between us for a moment, and then I took it. His grip was cold and hard as stone. Johnnie shook my hand like we'd just concluded some high-powered business meeting, no trace of humor or irony in his eyes. 'Looks like you got yourself a deal.'
It turns out when was 3pm Tuesday. Where was Mulgheney's, a tacky little gin joint on the Upper East Side, just a block north of Midtown. Mulgheney's was the kind of place that sprung up three to a block across the whole city in the years after Repeal, all chrome and neon and drunken good cheer. Problem was, at Mulgheney's, the chrome was just a touch too gaudy, and the neon lights a hair too bright, their harsh glare revealing that what appeared to be drunken good cheer was a perhaps a little desperate, painted-on. The cumulative effect was a place too classy for the guys who worked the loading docks across the street, and too coarse for the moneyed set that populated the surrounding blocks. All of which sounded just about right for a cohort of Johnnie's.
The place was quiet when I arrived: a couple old-timers, nursing drinks at the end of the bar. A working girl, dividing her time between sipping her gin and tonic and nibbling on the ear of her john, whose suit – a little loose on his frame, but well-made, and only slightly out of style – suggested banker, and whose glassy eyes read well past drunk. And in a booth in the back, a large, red-faced man in a dusty brown suit and a fedora to match sat flirting with the barmaid, a buxom brunette in a skirt so high and a neckline so low they damn near met in the middle. A shock of red tie hung around the man's neck, and the woman fingered it playfully as she laughed at whatever it was he'd just said. But then he spotted me standing in the doorway, blinking in the sudden gloom of the bar after the brilliant glare of the afternoon sun, and he waved me over, his massive chins bobbing up and down. I shuffled toward him, clenching my jaw against the pain in my knee and willing the limp out of my gait.
'Sam?' he asked, once I reached his booth. 'Sam Thornton?'
'That's me.'
'Good to meet you,' he said. 'Name's Dumas. Walter Dumas.'
He extended a hand. I shook it. Up close, I saw his bloodshot eyes, the gin blossoms that spread across his massive cheeks. It was pretty clear the guy was a few drinks to the good. He told me to have a seat, asked what I was having. I slid into the booth and said I wasn't thirsty. Dumas just shook his head and laughed.
'Nonsense! Dinah, bring the boy a shot o' whiskey and a beer, and what the hell, the same for me as well!'
'You got it, sugar,' she said. She tapped Dumas playfully on the nose, leaning in as she did so he could better ogle the vast expanse of cleavage that pressed upward from her blouse in brazen defiance of gravity and decency both. Up close, her perfume was dizzying, and the apples of her cheeks were pricked with red, from rouge or drink I didn't know. She flashed me a wink as she turned to fetch our drinks, and then retreated to the bar, Dumas eyeing her all the while.
'Fine piece a tail on that one,' he said. 'Got a husband, of course, but then that's no concern o' mine.'
I said nothing. Dumas just smiled.
'So, Japs or Krauts?' he said.
'Excuse me?' I said.
'The limp – Japs or Krauts?'
'Actually, neither. I've never served, though not for lack of trying. I enlisted back in '42, but they bounced me on account of my wife's condition.'
'Yeah, Johnnie mentioned she's a lunger.' At that last, I flinched and cast my eyes around the bar to see if anyone had heard. Once tuberculosis moved to the lungs, it was both deadly and highly infectious – if word got out about Elizabeth, they'd surely lock her away in some horrid sanitarium where she'd slowly waste away to nothing. I refused to let that happen. Lucky for me, not a soul in the place was paying us any mind.
Dumas said, 'You seem healthy enough, though.'
'Docs say I'm doing fine.' Of course, that was only half of what the doctors said. The whole of it was I'm doing fine for now. That living with Elizabeth, it was just a matter of time. The first few times, it didn't bother me – I mean, docs'll tell you all kinds of shit about eating your vegetables and laying off the drink, and that doesn't mean you listen to the letter. But you hear it enough, and eventually, it gets to you. I'd be lying if I said I didn't break out in a cold sweat every time I stifled a cough, wondering – is this the time my hand comes back flecked with blood? I'd be lying if I said I wasn't terrified. But I needed this job, and saying all that wasn't gonna help me none. Besides, the way Dumas was looking at me, I got the sense he already knew it.
Our drinks arrived, and Dumas clanked his shot glass against mine, sloshing whiskey across the
