Second acts in American lives.
His eyes drifted to the masthead. Somewhat surprised, he found it was already Friday.
Two weeks since Bayless Place? Two… weeks?
Searching his closet, he found a favorite suit, a J. Press spring-weight navy wool that had the feel of cashmere. The phone interrupted him as he picked through his ties.
“Frank? This’s Leon.” Janowitz had an upbeat of excitement in his voice.
“You’re up early.”
“Yeah. I was driving in, thought you might still be home. Mind if I drop by?”
“Got some coffee left.”
“I don’t know if I can handle that. Be there in five.”
Seated at the breakfast room table, Janowitz pulled out a folder, opened it, and handed Frank a booking mug shot.
“Who’s this?”
“Likely prospect for Gentry’s source.”
A good-looking African-American kid stared back at Frank. Strong mouth and jaw, but a hint of fear in the dark almond eyes.
“Martin Moses Osmond.” Frank read off the sign the kid was holding.
“Eleanor’s pulling his file out of inactive storage,” Janowitz said, “but here’s what I could get from the abstracts: born ’sixty-eight. Conviction grand theft auto, ’eighty-six. Three other guys tried for the same offense.” Janowitz paused for effect. “James ‘Skeeter’ Hodges-”
“Tobias ‘Pencil’ Crawfurd and Zelmer Austin,” Frank finished.
Janowitz nodded. Rapping the printout for emphasis, he went on. “All four together at Lorton. That’s where Skeeter made the connections that got him in tight with Juan Brooks. Skeeter, Pencil, Austin, and Osmond got out the same time, and got a franchise from Brooks. Osmond was picked up later, two charges possession intent to sell. Beat both. His P.O. noted that he warned Osmond about continued association with Skeeter and Pencil.”
“The P.O.,” Frank asked, “was…?”
“Arch Sterling.”
Frank knew Sterling. Too many parole officers got co-opted by what the PC establishment now called “clients.” Sterling still thought of them as parolees.
“What else makes Osmond a likely?” he asked Janowitz.
“Had access, had a history with Skeeter and Pencil. Didn’t quite fit one element of the profile, though.”
“How do you mean?”
“He’s dead, but it wasn’t ruled homicide. His grandmother found him in his car. M.E. ruled it a heroin overdose. Interesting timing, though.”
“Oh?”
“Died Monday night twenty-two February ’ ninety-nine… about two hours after somebody popped Kevin Gentry.” Janowitz sat quietly, watching Frank take that in.
Frank registered Janowitz’s expectant look. “You’ve got more, don’t you?”
Janowitz gave a low whistle. “I’m not going to play poker with you.”
“You’re an easy read. You wouldn’t be here if the profile was all you had. And besides, you got your hand ready to pull another rabbit out of your L. L. Bean bag.”
Grinning, Janowitz thrust his hand into the briefcase and came out with a yellow ledger sheet penciled with notations.
“I worked through the subcommittee’s administrative expenditures-a real rat’s nest. Anyway, starting in June ’ninety-eight, Rhinelander authorized Gentry to set up an account, something called ‘Hearing Research and Analysis.’ A lot of money went in, but no details of disbursements; no vouchers, no receipts. No documentation of any kind. Rhinelander closed out the account on twenty-four February ’ninety-nine-two days after Gentry bought the farm. No funds returned. Money disappeared.”
“How much?”
“Best I could estimate, hundred twenty thousand. More than I make in a week.”
“That’d be a nice payout for a source,” Frank said.
Janowitz was peering into the depths of the bag. “Ah, yes,” he muttered, pulling out a small manila envelope, which he handed to Frank.
Someone… Gentry?… had printed “Rch/Analysis” across the envelope flap. Frank shook out a key and a slip of paper.
“Receipt for a safe-deposit box at Riggs,” Janowitz explained.
“Opened June 15, 1998,” Frank said.
“Might be interesting to get a look. I checked the bank. We’re gonna need a court order.”
Frank returned the key and receipt to the envelope and slipped it into his shirt pocket.
Janowitz trailed a teaser, “Funny thing about Osmond,” he said softly.
“Funny ha-ha?”
“He lived on Bayless Place with his grandmother,” Janowitz said. “About half a block from where Skeeter bought the farm.”
From the rising inflection and the look in his eyes, Frank could tell Janowitz was holding on to yet another card.
“A small world, Frank… Arch Sterling’s background report on Martin Osmond? Martin and his grandmother were members of Jose’s dad’s congregation.”
Minutes later, Janowitz stood on the sidewalk, holding his overstuffed canvas briefcase, watching Frank lock up the house.
“Where’d you park?” Frank asked, when he had joined Janowitz.
Janowitz pointed down Olive, toward Twenty-ninth. “Just in front of you.”
The two had gotten midway down the block when Frank’s cell phone rang. He stopped to answer. It was Kate. He waved Janowitz on. Janowitz nodded and continued down the sidewalk.
“Catching the first shuttle out in the morning,” Kate said. “Dinner still on?”
Charlie Whitmire and Murphy appeared down the street, returning from Murph’s morning walk.
“I’ll pick you up at National, and dinner’s still on. You learn how Giuliani benched the squeegee men?”
“I learned that sometimes a mayor has to kick ass,” Kate said. “Take care of yours.”
Frank closed the phone and continued toward his car.
Up ahead, Janowitz had left the sidewalk and was in the street, stepping along the drivers’ side of a line of parallel-parked cars. He was just passing Frank’s.
On the sidewalk opposite, and farther down the block, Charlie Whitmire had stopped to let Murph sniff around the base of a maple.
Frank felt in his pocket for his keys, found them, pulled them out, and pressed the remote to unlock his car.
The world vanished in a blinding flash. A massive rippling sound, as if the earth had split under the impact of a cosmic jackhammer. A dirty cloud engulfed the street and shut out the sun.
For the thinnest slice of a second, Frank lost all orientation. Up, down, night, day, who he was, where he was, where he’d been going-all stripped away by the shock wave that threw him to the street.
Reflexively he struggled to his knees. A red blackness everywhere. Security alarms from nearby houses and cars screeched and warbled. Panicked by his blindness, he felt a wetness on his face. He wiped his eyes with his hands and cleared away the blood. The street blurred into focus.
Litter and leaves stripped from the trees pinwheeled lazily down through the dusty haze. An odor of ash and scorched fabric. A green and white canvas awning hung from its frame, swinging back and forth in the secondaries from the shock wave. Frank’s car leaned drunkenly nose first into the street, tires flattened, steel skin peeled back in all directions from the driver’s seat.
A dark figure lay crumpled in the middle of the street. Frank got up. Pressing his palm against the gash over his eye, he staggered toward what had to be Janowitz.
From the opposite direction, Charlie Whitmire was running toward Janowitz, Murph barking in chase. In the distance, sirens. Up and down Olive, people began opening doors and venturing out onto front steps.
