“I like the guy. He stuck his neck out for me. I’m curious about someone who would do that for a stranger.”
The barman nodded his head at the Wall of Honor.
“Okay, you got my attention,” I said. “What about it?”
“Walk over and take a look. See if you can find Brandon Fitzgerald Flannery Jr. I’ll make sure no one steals your seat or your scotch.”
I walked over to the wall and found the name listed amongst the three hundred and forty-three members of the FDNY lost on 9/11.
“Flannery’s son?” I asked, retaking my seat.
“His youngest. His only son.”
“I’d drink too if I lost my kid that way.”
“That’s not why he drinks. He drinks because he blames himself. The kid didn’t want to follow in his old man’s footsteps, but Flannery pushed him. And you can tell by how he handled things the other night that when Flannery pushes, he pushes hard. The Flannerys have been fighting fires in this city since they stepped off the boat. They go back to before 1898, to before the job was the job and before the city was the city. No son of Flannery’s was going to turn his back on family tradition.”
“That guilt’s a lot to carry,” I said.
“More than he can bear and that man can bear a lot.”
“Thanks. I appreciate it.”
“You didn’t hear it from me,” he said.
“Here what from whom?”
The barman liked that and asked if I wanted another scotch on the house.
“No, thanks,” I said. “I’m not supposed to be drinking this one. But I’ll tell you what you can do.”
“What’s that?”
“That fireman who started up with me the other night, Hickey, what’s his story?”
“He’s too young to have a story. Leave it alone. I don’t need any trouble in here.”
“Fair enough.” I took a last sip at my Dewars and threw a ten on the bar for a tip.
Suddenly, I wasn’t feeling very well and decided that what I needed more than anything was an afternoon nap. Sleep, I found as I got older, was a much better retreat than the bottle.
FOURTEEN
The High Line Bistro was over in the West Village on Little West 12th Street in an area known as the Meatpacking District. The Meatpacking District had for many decades been the hub of the city’s commercial butchery. And, until the eighties, it had also been known for its many gay clubs. Some of the clubs were notorious for catering to the rough trade segment of the community. But the AIDS epidemic and the city’s insatiable thirst for real estate development remade the Meatpacking District into a chic neighborhood of exclusive shops and designer chef restaurants. Rising above the cobblestone streets of the district, north into Chelsea, was the High Line Park or, as it was more commonly known, the High Line: a long-disused stretch of elevated railroad track that had been converted into an elevated park replete with plantings, artwork, and great vistas on the Hudson River and the Manhattan skyline.
The High Line Bistro was in an old warehouse. The walls were the original brick and the interior post and beam construction was also original equipment. That’s where the quaintness came to an abrupt halt. The tables and chairs, made of train rails and ties, were more sculpture than furniture and each must have cost a small fortune. The walls were covered with historical photographs of the High Line when it was operational and trains were bringing meat to and from the butcheries. There were also original paintings of the High Line itself and of the views of the city it offered. The bar was simple and sturdy, no rails and ties here. But when I sat down on one of the barstools and looked at the wine list just to pass the time, I nearly swallowed my tongue. Their wine list was pretty extensive and absurdly expensive. A bottle of good old vine Zinfandel, which you could buy on sale at one of our stores for under thirty dollars, was listed at one hundred and forty bucks. At that price, I thought, the waiter should not only open the bottle and pour the wine, but hold the glass and pour it into your mouth for you. The lunch menu prices, while not quite as outrageous, were no bargain. I could only imagine what the prices on the dinner menu would be.
Something wasn’t right. I had that prickle on the back of my neck thing going. What were two EMTs doing in a place like the High Line Bistro for lunch? They’d have had to take out a loan just to walk through the door. Not to judge, but I didn’t see Alta or Maya Watson as two women who were going to take a quick lunch of frisee salad with lardon or Thai duck confit with tamarind and pomegranate drizzle, certainly not at these prices. But the media reports had been absolutely consistent about the fact that Alta and Maya had called into dispatch that they were taking their lunch break at this address. I looked around at the half-full restaurant. There were lots of tourists, business types in expensive lightweight suits, women in lovely summer dresses, and not a single person in uniform.
The bartender broke my concentration. She was the ultimate Manhattan stereotype: a beautiful early- twenty-something with rich dark skin, exotic features-vaguely Asian and Hispanic-speaking mildly accented English. She was thin as a blade of grass, but with some curves, and her makeup was flawless. A model or actress who, I guessed, hadn’t come to New York to work behind a bar.
“Excuse me, sir,” she said, “what may I get for you?”
I showed her my old badge and put it away before she could get a good look at it. Her youth worked in my favor because she would focus on the badge and what it represented, not on me or my age.
“A glass of sparkling water and lime and five minutes of your time.”
She looked around the bar for any excuse to get away from me, but I was her sole customer.
“Look,” I said, “what’s your name?”
“Esme.”
“Look, Esme, relax. Just get me the sparkling water and talk to me like I was any older man sitting at the bar hitting on you. I’m sure you’re pretty used to it.”
She smiled at that and what a smile: welcoming, sexy, shy, and warm all at once. I couldn’t imagine a camera not loving her. She used the bar gun to fill a tall glass, clipped a lime wedge over the rim, and placed it in front of me.
“What do you do, Esme, I mean besides tend bar? Actress? Model?”
There was that smile again. “Some of both, but I am a senior at SVA, the School of Visual Arts.”
“Really? What’s your major?”
“Film,” she said, seeming to be more relaxed.
I squeezed the lime, raised the glass to her, and sipped. “Thanks. Were you here in March when Robert Tillman died?”
She wasn’t smiling anymore. She looked gut-punched, in fact. “Yes.”
“Can you tell me what happened?”
“I can’t tell you very much because I was behind the bar here. It all happened over there around the other side of the bar by the kitchen entrance,” she said, her head looking down.
“Did you see the EMTs come in?”
“Yes, I noticed them right away.”
“Why would you notice them? Hadn’t they ever been in here for lunch before?”
Esme, still looking down. “No. We do not get many customers like them at the High Line.”
I played dumb. “Why not?”
She held the menu out to me. “I make good money and I get a discount and even I cannot afford food here. And each meal is always cooked to order by Chef Liu. People do not come here for a fast lunch.”
“But even if you didn’t see what happened yourself, people who work here must have talked. What did you hear about what happened?”
“People talked, yes.”
