I worked on the turkey with gravy some more. In a little paper cup next to it was some pink applesauce- maybe.
'Smarter than you?' Susan said.
'No.'
'And did you and she dine at The Harvest?'
Hawk shook his head.
'Her place mostly. Sometimes we'd go to the Harvard Faculty Club, get some boiled food.'
'Were you impressed with the Harvard Faculty Club?' Susan said.
I knew she knew that Hawk was never impressed with anything, and I knew how much she was enjoying the image of Hawk eating haddock and boiled potatoes among the icons of Harvard intellection.
'Man asked me once what I did for a living,' Hawk said. His voice sank into a perfect mimic of the upper-class Yankee honk.
' `What exactly is it you do, sir?' man say to me. I say, `I'm in security and enforcement, my good man.' And the man say to me `How fascinating.' And
I say, `More fascinating if you the enforcer than if you the enforcee.' And he look at me sort of strange and say, `Yes, yes, certainly,' and he hustle off to the bar, order a double Manhattan. Two cherries.
I ate the dessert. It might have been vanilla pudding.
'But you weren't in love with these women?'
'No.'
'Think you'll ever fall in love?'
'Probably not,' Hawk said.
'You might,' Susan said.
'Maybe I can't,' Hawk said.
My eyes were heavy and I leaned back against the pillow. I heard Susan say, 'I hadn't thought of that.' And then I was asleep.
CHAPTER 31
PEARL was hurrying around my apartment, sniffing everything, including RichBeaumont and Patty Giacomin, which neither of them liked much.
'Can you get Pearl to settle down?' Paul said.
'I could speak to her, but she'd continue to do what she wants, and I'd look ineffectual. My approach is to endorse everything she does.'
Susan said, 'Come here, Pearl.' And Pearl went over to her, and Susan gave her a kiss on the mouth, and Pearl wagged her tail, and lapped Susan's face, and turned and went back and sniffed at Patty.
'Isn't that cute,' I said.
'Never mind about the damn dog,' Beaumont said. 'We got a problem here and we need to solve it.
He had helped himself to one of my shirts, which was too big for him, and he hadn't shaved. He looked a little seedier than he had in Stockbridge. He glanced once, uneasily, toward Hawk, leaning on the wall near the front hall entry. Hawk smiled at him cheerily.
'I mean, we can't stay here forever,' Beaumont said.
'I thought of that too,' I said. 'What's your plan?'
'I don't know,' Beaumont said. 'Can you help us out?'
'He already did that,' Paul said.
'Yeah,' Beaumont said. 'Yeah, sure. I know. I mean, shit, you got yourself shot helping us out. It's not like I don't know that and appreciate it.'
'We both do,' Patty said. She was sitting beside Beaumont on the couch, holding his hand. 'We both appreciate it so much.'
'I was you I'd go to the cops,' I said.
'Cops?'
'Yeah. You must have enough to trade them for protection.'
'Christ-the stuff I got is on the cops. Who we paid, when, how much. I wouldn't last a day.'
'I'll put you in touch with cops you can trust,' I said.
'And they'll have me guarded by cops they can trust, and so on. Sure. But what if they're wrong, or what if you're wrong?'
'I'm not wrong.'
'It's a big world,' Beaumont said. 'We got money to go anywhere in it. All you got to do is get us out of this city.' 'How about you, Mom?' Paul said.
