You didn’t cry for him, either.
“I cried,” Carella said.
No!her hands shouted. Her eyes were flashing. He realized all at once that she was containing enormous anger.
“I cried inside,” he said.
Why are you still so angry with Henry?
“Oh for Christ’s sake, is heHenry already?” Carella said.
Your sister’s going tomarryhim!Teddy said.You have no right to make her feel guilty about it! She loveshim!
“Love!” Carella said.
Is that all at once a dirty word?
“He lost the case!”
Do you think he wanted to?
“He let the man who killed my father …”
Steve,she said, and put her hand on his arm.Sonny Cole is dead. You killed him, Steve. He’s dead. Let it go, honey. Leave it alone.
“Seems everyone’s asking me to do that these days,” he said, and shook his head.
What does that mean?
“Nothing,” he said. “Forget it.”
You never used to say Nothing, forget it.
Her hands stopped, the room went suddenly still. She looked at him for what seemed a very long time.
Steve?she said at last.Do you still love me?
“I adore you,” he said.
Then what is it? Is it the job?
He shook his head.
Is it?
“No. No, I love the job.”
She took a deep breath.
And in the stillness of the night, she asked him why he’d drunk so much at his mother’s house today, and at first he told her he hadn’t drunk that much at all, a glass or two of wine, and then he admitted he’d had at least a full bottle, but this was Christmas Day, so what the hell, she didn’t have to start talking to him as if he was some kind ofdrunkard, this wasn’t Tommy Giordano here sniffing his life up his nose in Santa Fe or wherever. Then he admitted that he was annoyed that his sister would evenconsider marriage to the man who’d let Sonny Cole walk out of that courtroom …
“Never mind that it ended with me shooting him, do you think that’s something Ienjoy doing?” he asked. “Gunning down a man? Do you think I became a cop so I could shoot people dead in the street, twenty yards from the house where my wife and my children are sleeping, do you think Ienjoy doing that?”
I think the job is getting to you, she said, and he told her Don’t be ridiculous, and she said I think the job is beginning to get to you, honey, you’re not the same since your father got killed, you just aren’t the same man I married, and she began sobbing into his shoulder. He told her Come on, nothing’s changed, Ilove the job. And Idid cry for my father, you don’t know how much I cried. I cried for Danny, too, hewas a friend, I know he was, he practically died in my arms! Jesus, Teddy, don’t you think Icare for people, don’t you think I have any feelings?
And suddenly he was crying again—or perhaps for the first time.
She moved out of his arms.
She sat up.
Listen to me,she said.
He nodded. His nose was running. Tears were rolling down his cheeks.
If it’s the job,she said,I want you to leave it.
He shook his head. No. Kept shaking it. No.
I don’t want to lose my husband to the job.
Tears kept streaming from his eyes.
I don’t want you eating your gun one day.
He kept sobbing.
At last, she turned out the light and went to bed with him cradled in her arms.
He fell asleep thinking that only two days ago, he’d seen a woman chewed to pieces like raw meat.
