Sacrifice

I lit a smoke, thinking it through.

'You talked to them,' I said.

'We rapped across the gap, exchanged some ideas, like the UN.'

'They lean on you?'

'That's not the way they do— I thought you knew. Just asked me to talk to you.'

'Come on, Prof.'

'You took something of theirs. They say, maybe you didn't know whose it was, okay? They want it back. Said to bring it with you when you come.'

'Come where?'

'Man said they'll tell the dealer. Jacques. But you got to have it with you, understand?'

'Yeah.' Thinking of Wolfe. How to get it back.

'I'll call, every day. Once in the morning, once at night. You get it, leave word. I'll set up the meet. Better if it comes from us.'

'I'll try.

'Try hard, homeboy.'

92

It was still early. I rolled by Central Park, telling myself I was scanning Carlos. Practicing my lies. But the woman who said her name was Belinda didn't come by.

93

The white dragon was still on guard in the window. Always a dragon there— white for clear, blue for cops, red for danger. I drove around the back. The guys in the kitchen looked me over like they'd never seen me before.

I found my booth, waited. Mama wasn't at her register. No waiter came by.

A copy of the Daily News was in my booth. Five kids murdered so far this week. Separate incidents. Gunned down— cross-fire killings. The city's loaded with homicidal punks, and not a marksman among them.

If you wrote a book about it, the critics would say it was full of gratuitous violence.

Letter to the editor from some cop, arguing with a citizen who complained the police don't ticket off-duty cars parked near the precinct house. The cop said he put his life on the line every day— he was entitled to park on the house.

That was true, they should give cabdrivers free rent.

I turned to the race results.

94

'You not want soup?' Mama materialized at my elbow.

'I was waiting for you.'

'Cook not come out?'

'Nobody came out.'

'Cooks nervous— strangers in the basement.'

'Luke?'

'Luke not a stranger. Woman…Teresa…come every day.'

'I know.'

'Alone with the boy. Every day,' she said, eyes narrowing. Mama doesn't trust citizens.'

'I'll go talk with her.'

'Not now. She come up here, finished. Talk then, okay?'

'Okay. Could I have some soup, then?'

Mama smiled with a corner of her mouth, spewed out a torrent of Chinese with the other. One of the waiters came through the back door. Bowed, nodded, went away.

'You bet horse?' Mama asked, pointing at the open newspaper.

'Maybe. If I see something I like.'

The waiter came back with the soup. Also some hard noodles and a plate of dim sum floating in clear sauce with tiny flecks of green. Mama watched me eat, taking only token sips herself, tapping her long fingernails on the cheap Formica tabletop. I waited— she wouldn't say anything she didn't want to.

The waiter came back. Said something to Mama. She nodded.

'Woman coming up,' she said to me.

I stood up to greet her. Silver-streaked blonde straight hair parted in the middle, hanging down almost to her shoulders. Brown eyes, nose slightly off-center, small nostrils, tiny jaw at the bottom of an oval face. Dressed in a camel's-hair blazer over a silk turtleneck, wide dark blue skirt, sensible bone pumps.

'Hello, I'm Dr…ah, Teresa. You must be Burke— Lily described you.'