Blaze

They went out and got their cab, and when the hackie dropped them on Lansdowne Street, John tipped him a buck. It was quarter to one and the scant daytime crowd was just starting to trickle in. The game was a thriller. Boston beat the Birds in ten, 3-2. Boston fielded a bad team that year, but on that August afternoon they played like champs.

After the game, the boys wandered the downtown area, rubbernecking and trying to avoid cops. The shadows were growing long by then, and Blaze’s belly was rumbling. John had gobbled a couple of dogs at the game, but Blaze had been too enthralled by the spectacle of the ballplayers on the field — real people with sweat on their necks — to eat. He had also been awed by the size of the crowd, thousands of people all in the same place. But now he was hungry.

They went into a dim narrow place called Lindy’s Steak House that smelled of beer and charring beef. A number of couples sat in high booths padded with red leather. To the left was a long bar, scratched and pitted but still glowing like there was light in the wood. There were bowls of salted nuts and pretzels spotted along it every three feet or so. Behind the bar were photos of ballplayers, some signed, and a painting of a barenaked woman. The man presiding over the bar was very large. He bent toward them.

“What’s yours, boys?”

“Uh,” John said. For the first time that day he appeared stymied.

“Steak!” Blaze said. “Two big steaks, n milk to go with.”

The big man grinned, showing formidable teeth. He looked like he could have chewed a phone book to ribbons. “Got money?”

Blaze slapped a twenty on the counter.

The big man picked it up and checked Andy Jackson by the light. He snapped the bill between his fingers. Then he made it disappear. “Okay,” he said.

“No change?” John asked.

The big man said, “No, and you won’t be sorry.”

He turned, opened a freezer, and took out two of the biggest, reddest steaks Blaze had ever seen in his life. There was a deep grill at the end of the bar, and when the big man tossed the steaks on, almost contemptuously, flames leaped up.

“Hicks’ special, comin right up,” he said.

He drew a few beers, put out new dishes of nuts, then made salads and put them on ice. When the salads were taken care of, he flipped the steaks and walked back to John and Blaze. He placed his dishwater-reddened mitts on the bar and said, “You fellas see that gent at the far end of the bar, sittin all by his lonesome?”

Blaze and John looked. The gent at the end of the bar was dressed in a natty blue suit and was morosely sipping a beer.

“That’s Daniel J. Monahan. Detective Daniel J. Monahan, of Boston’s Finest. I don’t suppose you’d like to talk to him about how a couple of hicks such as your fine selves have twenty to put down on prime beef?”

John Cheltzman looked suddenly sick. He reeled a little on his stool. Blaze put a hand out to steady him. Mentally he set his feet. “We got that money fair and square,” he said.

“That right? Who’d you stick up fair and square? Or was it a fair and square muggin?”

“We got that money fair and square. We found it. And if you spoil it for Johnny and me, I’ll bust you one.”

The man behind the bar looked at Blaze with a mixture of surprise, admiration, and contempt. “You’re big, but you’re a fool, boy. Close either fist and I’ll put you on the moon.”

“If you spoil our holiday, I’ll bust you one, mister.”

“Where you from? New Hampshire Correctional? North Windham? Not from Boston, that’s for sure. You boys got hay in your hair.”

“We’re from Hetton House,” Blaze said. “We ain’t crooks.”

The Boston detective at the end of the bar had finished his beer. He gestured with the empty glass for another. The big man saw it and cracked a smile. “Sit tight, the both of you. No need to put on your skates.”

The big man brought Monahan another beer and said something that made Monahan laugh. It was a hard sound, not much humor in it.

The bartender-cook came back. “Where’s this Hetton House place?” Now it was John he was speaking to.

“In Cumberland, Maine,” John said. “They let us go to the movies in Freeport on Friday night. I found a wallet in the men’s bathroom. There was money inside. So we ran away to have a holiday, just like Blaze said.”

“Just happened to find a wallet, huh?”

“Yes, sir.”

“And how much was in this fabled wallet?”

“About two hundred and fifty dollars.”

“Baldheaded Jaysus, and I bet you got it all in your pockets, too.”

“Where else?” John looked mystified.

“Baldheaded Jaysus,” the big man said again. He looked up at the scalloped tin ceiling. He rolled his eyes. “And you tell a stranger. Just as easy as kiss your hand.”

The big man leaned forward with his fingers splayed on the bar. His face had been cruelly handled by the years, but it wasn’t cruel.