know?
So here goes. Big Guy, Big Entity, Big Being, if you're up there listening, I suppose you will think what you like. But please forgive me. I need it tonight. I did what I wanted and now I am sorry as hell. We both know the truth: I have sinned, big-time. Tomorrow I'll have my stuff back. I'll be bitter and ready to stick it to everyone else. I'll be the apostate, agnostic, you won't cross my mind. But like me tonight, accept me one moment before I reject you, as I reject everyone else. If you can forgive infinitely, then forgive this, and have an instant of pity for your ragtag creation, sad Bess Malloy's boy.
TAPE 6
Dictated February 2, 9:00 p.m.
Wednesday, February 1
XXIV
A. Waiting for Bert
Brushy had an early meeting and went rushing off at seven, wrestling into her coat as she grabbed her briefcase, a jelly doughnut stuffed whole into her mouth. I was still in bed and lingered amid my lover's possessions. Brushy's apartment had an overcrowded urban air. She was on the first floor of a brownstone with nifty Victorian touches — raised moldings and patterned plaster, and those little breastlike caps in the ceiling where the gas fixtures had been removed. There were tall pine shutters on the street-side windows that ran floor to ceiling, and many plants, and walls of books, stacks of everything. No real art to speak of — a couple of tasteful posters, but strictly representational stuff, no more adventurous than a bowl of fruit. In the bedroom, where I would have expected maybe a mirror or a trapeze, there was little furnishing, except for a king-size bed and heaps of dirty clothing at the corners of her closet, laundry on one side, dry cleaning on the other. She looked, appropriately, like a person with a busy life.
About eight-forty, as I was getting ready to head out, the phone rang. Better not to answer, I figured. What if it was one of Brushy's pinup legion of male admirers? What if Tad Krzysinski was asking if he could slip her the big one at lunch? I let it go to the answering machine and heard Brush emphatically telling me to pick up.
'You better stay where you are,' she said.
'You're coming home for an interlude?'
'I just met Detective Dimonte.'
'Oh Christ.'
'He was looking for you. I told him I was your attorney.' 'He have a grand jury subpoena?' 'That's why he was here.' 'Did you accept service?' 'Told him I wasn't authorized.' 'Clever lady. What else did he want to know?' 'Where you were.'
I asked what she'd said, then realized the inevitable response and repeated it with her: 'Attorney-client.' 'I'll bet he was in a mood,' I added. 'You might say. I told him I'd have you get in touch.' 'When I'm ready.'
'He'll come looking for you, won't he?'
'He is already. He may even follow
'Could he get a wiretap order that fast?'
'Pigeyes doesn't know from court orders. He's got a guy at the phone company he caught buying cocaine or with his thing in a glory hole who he makes throw switches for him when need be.'
'Oo,' said Brush.
'Attractive guy, right?'
'Well, actually,' said Brushy. ‘I mean, you'd say masculine.'
'Don't do this to me, Brush. Tell me you're only saying that because he might be listening.'
She laughed. I took a moment to think.
'Look, I better cut out — just in case he got enterprising. I'm supposed to hear from a certain tall missing partner of ours today. Make sure Lucinda forwards the call to you. Don't get into any extended conversations over this phone. Tell him to give you the information I wanted on 7384.
Follow?' She assured me she did. 7384 was G amp; G's fax line. I looked forward to Gino listening in on that screech, the mating call of two machines. He couldn't tap that.
I gathered my briefcase, still packed with everything from Pico Luan, and walked down about three blocks, where there was another location of Dr Goodbody's. I knew I'd have to deal with Gino eventually. But only after I talked to Bert and figured out what I could say. I had plans — millions, in fact. Soon I'd have to choose.
I spent the day at the health club, hairy-eyeballing the gals in their leotards and playing with the machines. I've passed time like this before. After all those years in saloons, I just get this yen to be near people I don't know. With a towel around my shoulders, dressed in a pair of gray sweats, I hop on the stepper, punch in a bunch of numbers, and jump off shortly after the thing begins to move. I do some pulls at one of the weight stations. Eventually I find someone to talk to, one of those dumb little chats that a drunkard gets to like, where I can pretend to be someone who's never exactly like me.
Today I stuck pretty much to myself. Every now and then I'd try to think through all the alternate routes up ahead, if this, if that, but it was too much for me. Instead, I found myself oddly preoccupied with my mother, feeling as I did last night, punished and without too much hope. I'd made my big move, so why wasn't I happy? At times I sensed myself on the verge of laments I'd heard from her, all this stuff about life being hard, being bitter, barren choices, none of them good.
I called the office now and then. Brushy had heard nothing from Bert and instead ended up describing the intense local anxieties with Groundhog Day tomorrow and firm income down 12 percent from last year. When I called again at four, Lucinda answered Brushy's line. Brush was out at a meeting. There was still no word from Bert, but I had two other messages. Martin and Toots.
I phoned the old guy first. I knew just what was coming: he'd thought it out overnight and was going to back off the deal with BAD, he'd rather get clobbered, he was too old to change. The thought was excruciating.
'I love the deal,' he said first thing.
'You do?'
'I wanted you to know, on account of yesterday I might not a looked too happy, but I love the deal.
I mumbled something, just once, about how Brushy deserved credit too.
'You done me right, Mack.'
'We tried.'
'So listen, so you know: you need, you got. Call Toots.'
The Colonel was not the kind of guy who was hot air when he said he owed a favor. It was, in fact, quite a privilege. Like having a fairy godmother and three magic wishes. I could have a leg broken or get certain performers to sing if Lyle ever had anything like a wedding. This was the part of the practice Brushy was addicted to, somebody saying thanks for the help, not everyone could have done it. I told Toots at length how great it had been to represent him and, at the moment, meant it.
'Where are you?' asked Martin when he came to the phone.
'Out and about.'
'About where?' There was a new note here, a harsh tensile quality to his voice. I'd heard Martin talk like this to opponents, the man raised among tough guys.
'About where I am. What's up?'
'We need to talk.'
'Okay.'
