Mask Market

“I don’t like it,” the Prof said. “You never get too brave around another man’s cave, because…?”

“That’s the quickest ticket to an early grave.” I finished the rule, to show I hadn’t forgotten the first time he’d taught it to me, eons ago.

“You want to trap a weasel, you don’t look for his den,” the little man rolled on, unmoved. “What you do is, you set a trap in a chicken coop. You don’t need to know where a man lives…?”

“To know where he’s going to visit,” I said. “I know, Prof. But we’ve got no way to put the watch on Charlie, not in that neighborhood.”

“My main man Mole—”

“He got us the pictures, sure. But that was because he knows people who live around there. They weren’t watching for Charlie special; they just snapped off a shot when they ran across him.”

“What’d they take the pictures with?” he asked. From the way he turned toward Clarence, I knew the old man wanted to make sure his audience was in place before he hit me with a jab.

“One of those camera phones,” I said, playing along.

“Camera phone, you said, Schoolboy?”

“I get it, Prof. But it’s not that simple. Who do they call? They don’t know us. And the Mole doesn’t want them to know us. But let’s say he could get them to just ring a number when Charlie was in the street. Where are we going to be sitting in ambush? There’s no hotel close by. No poolrooms or gin joints we could hang out in. Not even a lousy OTB. And we could never rent a house in that neighborhood. So?”

“If my father—” Clarence started to say.

“Nah,” the Prof cut him off. “I never said Burke was wrong, just that I didn’t like it. We’re done, son.”

Max tapped the face of his watch, shook his head in disapproval.

“You, too?” I gestured. “We only get one chance, right?” I said to them all, holding up one finger. “And, from what Mole’s people told him, the window only opens at certain hours,” I went on, my hands saying the words to Max. “So there’s only one way I can see to make our move.”

The next morning, I woke up thinking about Loyal. That hadn’t happened to me before. I guess I stopped thinking of her as a party girl the minute she told me she was always afraid of ending up as one.

The newspaper had a make-you-retch story. Cop arrested for rape and sodomy. Too many counts to list, over too many years, because the victims were his daughters. The Queens DA put out the red carpet for the poor guy. They let him surrender himself at the courthouse, arraigned him in seconds, and cut him loose on his own recognizance, no bail. The paper said the DA wouldn’t identify the cop, because they wanted to “protect the alleged victims.” Nice.

At your age, this is supposed to be an annual examination,” my doctor said. He’s very tall for a Chinese man, good-looking enough to be a movie star, and a magazine survey I read last year said he was one of the top urologists in New York. With all that, his office is still down on Canal Street, his prices haven’t changed, and his receptionist still blinks when I tell her I’m a patient, not a salesman. Or a cop.

“Sorry,” I said, lamely.

“The outcome for prostate cancer is directly related to early detection,” he said, for at least the fifth time since I’d been coming there.

“I know,” I mumbled, holding up my hands in surrender.

“The lab is right around the corner, on Mott Street,” he said, unyielding. “This time, you call for the results, all right? The PSA test isn’t a perfect indicator, but it’s the best lab screen we have now. Last time”—he glanced down at my folder—“you got the test, but you never called for the results.”

“Sorry,” I said again. “What were they?”

“Three point seven,” he said. “That’s not a cause for concern, but anything over four is something we would want to follow closely.”

“Sure.”

“We would call you, but the number on your file never seems to be up-to- date.”

“I move around a lot.”

“Yes. Well, we don’t,” he said, sternly. “We’re right here. And our number hasn’t changed.”

The blood lab on Mott Street had the decor of the waiting room at a Greyhound terminal. I was the only non-Asian in the place. The Oriental flower at the receptionist’s desk took the paper I handed her, pointed at a row of plastic chairs, said, “Few minutes, okay?”

I settled in for the duration, but it turned out the girl was telling the truth. My phlebotomist was a burly Hispanic, with stress-pattern baldness. He wrapped a piece of rubber tubing around my arm faster than a junkie who hadn’t fixed in days, tapped the crook of my elbow to bring up a vein, slid the needle home.

“How many of these you do a day?” I asked him.

“Many, many,” he said, sliding out the needle and slipping a cotton ball over the entry wound in one motion.

As I left, I saw a sex worker waiting to be tested, a young-bodied, older-faced woman in jeans and a too- small stretch top. If she got the same blood-taker I’d had, she’d learn the real meaning of “quickie.”

By the time I climbed off the F train at the Van Wyck/Briarwood stop, spring had arrived, a light rain misting the streets. I walked over to the small branch library just off Queens Boulevard, spotted the Prof sitting on the steps enjoying a leisurely smoke, and strolled on past. I boxed the corner, crossed the boulevard, and set off to find the middleman.

I wore a brown leather jacket that I had picked out of a Goodwill bin, leaving a brand-new nylon one in its place. I hadn’t been looking for a bargain; I wanted something I might have to leave at the scene. Something with enough random DNA on it to confuse the hounds. A white jersey cable-knit, dark-green corduroy pants, scuffed brown work boots. In the pockets of the jacket, a pair of deerskin gloves and an orange wool watch cap.

No gun, no knife, no brass knuckles. I was coming in peace.

Charlie’s street was quiet, but it was time-of-day quiet, not the peligroso silence that falls in some neighborhoods whenever a stranger walks through. The kids were home from school—playing on their computers, not in the street. Working parents weren’t back yet; retirees were watching whichever one of the endless parade of “court” shows was on at the time.

It wasn’t the kind of neighborhood where you’d find basketball hoops nailed to telephone poles, or dogs running wild, but it still throbbed with the muted rhythms of life behind the well-maintained facades.

Charlie’s house was a stone-and-stucco job that looked vaguely British to me. Maybe it was the ivy that trellis-climbed on one side, or the small windows broken into even smaller rectangles by the copper-colored panes.

I went up to the front door like I was expected, pushed the little white button nestled inside a silver filigree, and stepped back slightly, hands clasped in front.

“Hello?” the woman said. She was medium height, with thick raven hair pulled back into a single plait, wearing a plain blue dress that was too good a match for her eyes to be off-the-rack. Her smile was open and friendly, showing perfect teeth. I figured her for somewhere in her thirties; would have laid good odds she’d been a swimsuit model or a pageant contestant earlier on.

Was Charlie playing the Benny Siegel role so heavy he got himself a gorgeous Sabra to flesh out the skeleton? I wondered, but I just bowed slightly, said, “Good afternoon, young lady. My name is Kolchan. Meyer Kolchan. I was hoping I could have a quick word with Benjamin….”

“Yes, sure,” she said, smiling again, some kind of Slavic accent in her voice. Not an Israeli, then. “Ben?” she called out, sweetly. “Mr. Kolchan is here to see you. Can you—?”

Charlie Jones stepped past her, grinning. “Go fix supper, woman!” he said, mock-commanding, giving her a swat on the bottom as she turned away, giggling.

“What can I—?” he started to say. Then he saw my face.

“No,” he said, very softly.