“Yes.”
“Well, nothing. I turned around and walked away.”
Samantha swallowed. Her hands bunched into fists at her sides, knuckles going white and wrists trembling. She looked away as a snarl wove through her face, and she moved as though she wished to leave. Then she suddenly stooped down and picked up a file and threw it at him with both arms. He raised his hands to protect himself and the folder burst open, pages flying out to twist and turn and rain on him like snow.
“Hey!” he cried. “What the hell are you doing?”
Samantha moaned in fury. She reached down and snatched another file and hurled it at him as well. It missed and thudded into the wall, bleeding papers over the bed.
“Stop, stop!” Hayes shouted. “Stop it, for God’s sake!”
“What am I doing!” she said through clenched teeth. “What am I doing! You little… you little oily shit!” She grabbed another file off the tabletop and was about to throw it when it fell apart in her hands. She gave up and rushed over and began slapping him about the neck and head. He covered himself with his hands.
“Sam, what the hell! Calm down!”
“You let him go!” she shouted at him. “You let him go! You let that man go after what he did, after what he did to those children! You dealt with him and then let him go!”
“I had to!” said Hayes, still covering himself from her barrage of slaps. “I had to use him!”
“But you let him go! You should have… you should have…” She trailed off, shaking her head.
“Should have what?” Hayes said, standing up. His face was a bright, angry pink. “Should have taken him to the police?”
“Yes!”
“And said what? That I followed him and found him buggering children off in Dockland? And that no, I don’t have any evidence? And that no, I’d be unable to testify? And that why yes, I’d done the work on the part of one of the most powerful men in the city? Is that what I should have done?”
“Something! You should have done something!”
“Like what, shoot him? Should I have burned down that place in Dockland? Freed all those boys? Given them all a dollar and said here you go, now you’re all good? Sam, have you ever even wondered how such a place is still open, and who they’re paying?”
“He was a monster!” Samantha cried. “A monster! And you used him and let him go!”
“I had to!” Hayes said savagely. “I had no choice. I needed those goddamn files and they’ve turned up gold, now haven’t they? Haven’t they? If we work this to the bone, won’t we get something good for you and Garvey? Something to set things right?”
“But those children were victims!” said Samantha. “Innocent victims!”
“We’re all victims!” Hayes shouted. “All of us! You, me! Garvey! Victims of McNaughton, of the Department, of Dockland, of this whole fucking city! You can’t save every single one of them, not when we can’t even save ourselves!”
“You’re as bad as Brightly. Using that man, that thing as you wish.”
“I’m not.”
“You are,” she said. “It’s all just an excuse to you. To just do as you please. To enjoy yourself.”
“It isn’t,” said Hayes. “It’s not.”
“You don’t even care, do you? This isn’t about any crime. None of this ever was, for you. It’s about paring people down, digging under their skin, and proving that deep down everyone is as weak and filthy as you. How odd it is that the one man who should by all rights know more about people than anyone else is so utterly incapable of being one.”
“Fuck you,” snarled Hayes. “What are you doing it for, then? For Garvey? Just for that?”
“No,” she said.
“Then what?”
She hesitated, then said, “For the boy.”
“Boy? What boy?”
“God,” she said. “You don’t even remember, do you? Skiller’s son. The little boy.”
“Him? Why?”
She faltered then, and some of the color drained from her face. “I just… I know it’s stupid to hope. A little boy on the streets of this city? How long could he last? But somehow I always hope that in following up all this union business I’ll find him somewhere in it. Maybe there’s a chance. After all, I’m probably the only one looking for him.”
Hayes stared at her. Then he looked away as though bitterly disappointed and shook his head. “Sometimes you make me feel so… so empty,” he said. Then he looked at the mess on the floor and said, “Here. Help me clean this up.”
They both stooped and began gathering the files, sorting them out as best they could and stuffing them back into their boxes. When they were done Hayes sat on the bed and Samantha on the floor.
“They’ll be looking for us more than ever now,” Samantha said.
“Yes.”
“This place is safe?”
“I hope so,” Hayes said.
She nodded, then asked, “How did you plan to use this to help Donald?”
“I don’t know. I thought maybe if I gave him a case good enough he could buy his way back into the Department.” He looked at her. “We still could, you know. Just give him this about Tazz and stop right there. Leave the rest alone and just walk away.”
“We could,” she said. “But we won’t.” She smiled grimly. “So goes the life of a career-minded young lady. I don’t miss it, though. I don’t know why.” The smile left. “Do you know where your old friend lives now?”
Hayes shook his head. “And there’s not many willing to help me right now.”
“We could probably get it from Donald,” she said. “He’d help.”
Hayes lit a cigarette, then drew deeply on it and leaned his head back and let smoke leak out of his mouth. “Yes. You’re right. He probably would.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
When Garvey woke up he was still drunk and the whisky in his belly was septic and rumbling. He rolled over and lifted his head and saw the cold light of morning drifting in. Then he buried his face in the pillow and shut his eyes and tried to ignore the thick cotton-dryness in his eyelids and mouth.
Eventually he rolled out of bed. He drank rust-tainted water from the sink, whisky bottles scattered on the counter beside like fallen soldiers. He stood. Took a breath. Then he doubled up and clutched the sink edge and vomited something orange-tan and frothy around the drain. When he was done he lay there with one cheek on the cool porcelain. He washed his mouth out but did not drink. Then he pulled on a pair of pants and smoked as he looked out the kitchen window at the little cement courtyard.
It was Tuesday, he remembered. He nodded to himself curtly, put on a nice suit, then went and got his old phonograph and loaded it into the back of his car. He stood looking at it on the seat, thinking, then checked up and down the street. It was empty. He shook his head and returned to his apartment and got his spare revolver out of his desk.
He sat on the bed, holding it, feeling its deadly heaviness. It had never been fired, unlike its brother, which had been confiscated by the Department. He snapped it open and looked at the six little brass eyes watching him from its cylinder. Then he sighed and closed it and replaced it in his desk. He did not want to bear that awful weight, not today.
When he returned to his car he saw that now there was a little figure leaning casually up against its side, scarf loosely tied, hands lost within the pockets of his coat.
“Hullo, Garv,” said Hayes.
Garvey stopped where he was on the sidewalk, looking at Hayes. Then he resolutely stared across the street
