Kind of world we live in.'
'You should have been a doctor.'
'Like my old man wanted. No, I don't think so. But maybe I should have been a counterfeiter. You meet a nicer class of people. At least I wouldn't have the fucking DEA on my back.'
'Counterfeiting? You'd have the Secret Service.'
'Jesus,' he said. 'If it's not one goddamn thing it's another.'
'THAT the laundromat? There on the right?' I said it was, and Kenan pulled up in front but kept the motor running. He said, 'How are we on time?' then glanced at his watch and the dashboard clock and answered his own question. 'We're fine. Running a little early.'
I was watching the laundromat, but TJ emerged instead from a doorway on the other side of the avenue and crossed over, getting in the back. I introduced them, and each claimed to be pleased to meet the other. TJ shrank back against the seat and Kenan put the car in gear.
He said, 'They get there at ten-thirty, right? And we're due ten minutes later, and then we work our way up to where they're waiting. Is that about right?'
I said it was.
'So we'll be face-to-face across no-man's-land about ten minutes of eleven, is that about how you figure
it?'
'Something like that.'
'And how long to make the trade and get out? Half an hour?'
'Probably a lot less than that, if nothing goes wrong. If the shit hits the fan, well, it's another story.'
'Yeah, so let's hope it doesn't. I was just wondering about getting back out again, but I guess they don't lock the gates until midnight.'
'Lock the gates?'
'Yeah, I woulda guessed it'd be earlier, but I guess not or you would have picked someplace else.'
'Jesus,' I said.
'What's the matter?'
'I never even thought of that,' I said. 'Why didn't you say something earlier?'
'Then what would you do, call him back?'
'No, I guess not. It never occurred to me that they might lock the gates. Don't cemeteries stay open all night? Why would you have to lock them up?'
'To keep people out.'
'Because everybody's dying to get in? Jesus, I must have heard that one in the fourth grade. 'Why do they have a fence around the cemetery?' '
'I guess they get vandals,' Kenan said. 'Kids who tip over the gravestones, take a shit in the floral urns.'
'You think the kids can't climb fences?'
'Hey, man,' he said. 'I'm not setting the policy here. It's up to me, all the graveyards in town'll be open admission. How's that?'
'I just hope I didn't screw up. If they get there and the gates are locked—'
'Yeah? What are they gonna do, sell her to white slave traders in Argentina? They'll climb the fence, same as we'll do. Matter of fact, they probably don't lock it before midnight. People might want to go after work, pay a late call on the dear departed.'
'At eleven o'clock?'
He shrugged. 'People work late. They got office jobs in Manhattan, stop for a couple of drinks after work, they have dinner, then they go to wait half an hour for the subway because they're like some people I know, they're too cheap to take a cab—'
'Jesus,' I said.
'— and it's late by the time they get back to Brooklyn and they say, 'Hey, I think I'll go over to Green-Wood, see if I can find where Uncle Vic is planted, I never liked him, I think I'll go piss on his grave.'
'
'You nervous, Kenan?'
'Yeah, I'm nervous. What do you fucking think? You're the one's gotta walk up to a couple of stone killers armed with nothing but money.
You must be starting to sweat.'
'Maybe a little bit. Slow down, that's the entrance coming up. I think it's open.'
'Yeah, it looks like it. You know, even if they're supposed to lock up, they probably don't get around to it.'
'Maybe not. Let's drive once around the entire cemetery, all right?
And then we'll find a place to park near our entrance.'
