Manhattan
CONNOR DRANK HIS DRAFT BEER and smiled at the foam.
What had he come to? Sitting in the middle of the morning nursing a beer in a First Avenue bar while he waited for a frightened jack rabbit to come skulking in. The man he was waiting for would have to be urged, nudged, wheedled into what Connor planned, but he was reasonably sure he could do it. Connor had done his homework.
Once, both long ago and not that long ago, Connor had commanded respect. He was a bloody bombing genius, first for the IRA and then for anyone who would pay for his expertise and daring. But fewer and fewer wanted his artistry. There were bombers and bomb makers all over the globe blowing everything up, including themselves. And these amateurs were called masterminds. There had been a time when if a group with a grievance had wanted something blown up, Connor was their boy. Only Connor hadn't been a boy for a long time and he'd had to fall back on his other profession, which paid him only slightly better in the long run than explosives.
Now he sat at a bar on a rainy morning, the only customer in a bar that still smelled of cigars, cigarettes and burnt burgers from the night before.
The Wheel and Wagon pub back home had always smelled of wax and whiskey and good beer and stout in the morning. At The Wheel, you could always expect to see someone you knew, not to mention the occasional visit by the police. Connor knew the police. Some of them even sat down with Conor to drink a pint and talk about how they were going to put Connor away again someday, put him away for good.
They never had, although he had almost put himself away two or three times. Had he stayed back home and nursed drinks and searched for new tales to tell at The Wheel, he could have counted on a relatively long life. But there was no longer a living to be made in Dublin. So Connor had packed one night and left a note for his brother. And he was gone.
Connor could have made a good living working for terrorists who seemed to be everywhere but the North and South Poles. And they would, he had no doubt, be up and down there too when the ice caps melted and the polar bears roamed down to Kansas. But Connor would not work for crazy people, and terrorists were crazy people. You couldn't trust crazy people with crazy eyes who didn't care who they killed. In Connor's book, you warned and cleared before you blew a place up. If you happened to kill, you regretted it and said a prayer for the dead and your own soul and a 'God Bless Ireland.' Then you put it aside. Nothing you could do about it when it was done. You put it aside and engaged in banter with friends old and new and acquaintances.
'Another?'
The bartender, a young man with a dark look that said he had known what it was like behind other bars, stood near him.
'Why not?' said Connor.
The bartender nodded and moved off to get a second beer for his only customer on a less than promising morning.
Reduced, Connor thought. Reduced to haggling with a drug dealer named DJ Riggs for a handful of detonators and an Afghan fence named Hamid for a half dozen sticks of badly stored and wrapped dynamite.
The door opened behind Connor. He heard the rain beating down behind whoever had entered. He felt a slight whoosh of warm wind on his back. The door closed. Connor didn't turn. The bartender placed a fresh mug before him. The foam waterfalled out and down the rim and Connor drank.
Someone sat next to him. He could smell the musk of rain on the man, but he did not look. There was a role to play. Connor had played it many times before.
'Are you…?' the man at his side said.
'That depends,' said Connor, 'on who you're looking for. Since I'm the only one in here besides the dapper barkeep, it's likely I'm the one you seek.'
With that Connor turned his head and looked at the man at his side. The man was wet and shivering, though the rain was warm. The man was about Connor's age but he was lean, wore an ill-fitting toupee and lacked fortitude.
'I just want to be sure,' the man said, looking at the bartender who was on the phone, his back turned.
'The name to conjure by is Terrence Williams,' said Connor. 'Though I doubt if that's his real name. He's less a Terrence than a Slobodon. You agree with that assessment?'
'I don't know,' said the man who bore a look that told Connor he was wondering what he had gotten into. 'It's got to look like an accident.'
'I know my business,' said Connor, suddenly serious and sober. 'Twenty-five thousand plus expenses.'
'Expenses?'
Connor shook his head and said, 'My room and board and the means of making and putting into effect the device. And how do I know this isn't some kind of trap, a sting? That figures into the expense, the risk factor. You need to make it clearer, show me evidence that you are who you say you are.'
The man grappled for his wallet. It was working. Connor had taken the initiative, questioned the mark before the mark could question him. The bartender approached.
'My friend will have the same,' Connor said, tapping his mug.
The bartender nodded and walked away.
The man finally wrestled the wallet out of his pocket.
Connor took it from his hand and opened it. Driver's license. Credit cards. Automobile insurance card. Blue Cross Blue Shield card. Savings and loan card. Eighty-four dollars and a tarnished Susan B. Anthony dollar coin tucked behind a library card.
Connor held up the coin.
'Good luck?'
'I don't know. I just carry it.'
Connor handed the coin and wallet back to the man.
'How do we-?'
'How do I,' Connor corrected. 'I've looked at the place. Not a great challenge. Half the money plus three thousand for expenses upfront. The rest when the festivities are over.'
'Cash?'
Connor put a hand on the man's shoulder and said, 'What am I going to do with a bloody check?'
'I'll make it out to cash.'
'And I'll have to endorse it. Stop the shuffle and come up with the cash or we part our ways and say no more, much to the loss of both vendor and vendee.'
'When will you do it?'
'No point in waiting for the full moon or a bright sun,' said Connor. 'The rain looks as if it will be with us for a while. Two days?'
'Two days,' the man repeated. 'Yes.'
'I think I'll sit right here, dry and in the good company of our loquacious innkeeper while you round up the cash and return.'
'How do I know-?'
'My reputation,' said Connor, leaning into the man's face, his voice menacing. 'My pride. You sense them?'
'Yes,' said the man.
'Good,' said Connor, sitting back, smiling and clapping his hands together. 'Now if you would go out into this gray and wet day and return with my payment, I'll buy you a drink.'
'I don't drink,' the man said. 'I'm a bartender, remember?'
'There's a law in the colonies against bartenders drinking? I wonder what the vintner drinks that's half so good as what he sells. Omar Khayyam or thereabouts.'
'I have a liver disease,' said the man.
