‘The matchbook?’ She keeps her voice low but he still winces as he nods. That smell – it’s kerosene – under the fug of smoke. Kerosene and something else – cloth or paper. Maybe wood. The stench of a life’s work taken and destroyed.
‘You have something of theirs. I heard them. You’ve got to give it to them.’ His words come in gasps, his breathing rough as he looks around. ‘Please, Care.’
‘I can’t.’ Care’s words are gentle but the man starts back as if she’s hit him. ‘You knew him, the old man,’ she explains. ‘There’s something in it if they want it that badly. Something that could explain why he was killed. If I can just decipher it—’
‘Decipher?’ He looks at her as if she is speaking an unknown tongue. As if he were the beast, not I.
‘The sequence,’ she says. ‘Fat Peter had everything in order, so I think they’re straightforward. Only one is missing.’
‘That’s it – that’s the one!’ He’s excited. He reaches to grab her hands.
‘Can you read it?’ Care picks up on this, color rising to her cheeks. ‘Can you read the ledger?’
‘Ledger? What ledger? You mean Fat Peter’s? What does Fat Peter’s ledger have to do with anything?’ Care is staring, confused. The man leans in, all sweat and desperation. ‘It’s the marker they’re after. You’ve got to give them the marker. Then you’ll be able to get away. They’ll let you go, I think. Now that the old man’s gone, they’ll let you go.’
‘No, wait.’ Care shakes her head, her hand going into her pocket. ‘I tried – they don’t want the ticket—’
‘It’s not a ticket.’ He spits the word. ‘It’s the marker! The marker they’re after. They need it for the deal.’
‘The deal?’ Care examines his face, leaning in despite the stench, despite the way he has begun to shake. From my vantage point I see the cords on his neck. See as well how he swallows once and then again. ‘Jonah, is that what happened to you? Did you try to do a deal with Bushwick? Because the old man and I, we thought we’d set you up. This city, it’s hard on people, but we thought …’
‘No, no.’ His head hangs down as he shakes it – weighted, it seems, by sadness or by memory. ‘No, I kept it straight. I refused. I thought I could protect him but now there’s only you.’
Down the street, an engine growls and male voices shout. The man jerks back, a puppet on a string, and turns. The light coming in from the alley’s mouth illuminates his eyes, the cracked lips that he keeps licking. He cranes his neck and then turns back.
‘Give them the marker, Care.’ He takes her hands once more in his. Squeezes them tight, a father or a teacher imparting words of wisdom. ‘Give it up, and then run.’ A quick glimpse back toward the noise. The engine. Shouting. ‘Run as fast and as far as you can.’
He steps back into the street, a look of grim determination on his face, and is gone.
TWENTY-FIVE
‘Where’s Tick?’ She spins around, eyes wild. The man’s disappearance has spooked her.
I watch, unable to explain. The man, more scarecrow than live threat, had frightened the boy when he reached for her. She heard the boy’s yell, his warning shout. That she did not notice him backing away was a lapse. Now he has run, though to safety or to her enemies I cannot tell, as she turns again, locking her eyes on mine. ‘Blackie, did they get him?’
That is the wrong question, as foolish and one-sided as asking that frail man whether he had given in to temptation. Though he, at least, explained that it was his reluctance to act that ruined him rather than some desperate gesture. I would that the boy were as unwilling, but I cannot in good conscience vouch for him – for either his intentions or his moral strength. I lash my tail, once back, once forth and hold her gaze, willing cool by example. Willing her to consider.
She slumps back against the wall. I have failed. ‘Damn it, Blackie. I don’t know what Tick heard – or what he’ll do.’
Unable to offer counsel, I rub against her ankles. This seems to calm her, and for a moment we are at peace. The shouting has died down, the truck has left. The thin man either back at his labors, or silenced for his trespass, I do not know. It is interesting, this absence of sound. Like the absence of an action, it may have a meaning, as the lack of something – of a marker – means a life.
I am pondering this as the girl pushes herself off the wall to stand upright. ‘Blackie.’ She brushes off the red brick dust. ‘It’s time for me to take control.’