Oasis of Night (6 page)

“Yeah.” What he said made sense to me, but something about it didn't ring true. “Yeah, I guess it does.”

“What's between us stays between us, huh, Jack?” He touched my arm, needing confirmation.

“Sure, Chris. It stays between us.” I moved to clean up the broken glass, and Chris followed me.

“Think Picco's going to find anything?”

“I don't know.” I tried to answer his questions, but my mind wasn't really on the things he said. I was too busy processing the feeling I had deep down in my gut—the feeling that something wasn't right.

 

 

I
T
TOOK
me a long time to get to sleep that night. Usually I slept with the bedroom window open, but now it seemed to amplify even the slightest noises from the street below and all the little creaks and groans the building made when the wind blew. Then I was too hot, so I got up to open the window again; then too cold, so I went to the linen cupboard to fetch an extra blanket. The events of the day kept going around and around in my head like some demented carousel, with people's faces and voices all mixed together while I drifted in that weird, in-between space that isn't quite sleep and isn't really waking. It seemed like Constable Picco was behind the bar, opening all the taps at once, and Chris was walking a beat outside the Cafe door, dressed in a cop's uniform and swinging a nightstick. Twice I woke up suddenly, convinced someone was standing at the foot of my bed, and toward dawn I could have sworn someone held me in their arms while I slept. They vanished as soon as I woke up.

There were dreams: the kiss replayed itself, over and over, from different angles and different points of view; Chris was holding me too tight, the tips of his fingers digging into my upper arms, hurting me; the Cafe was on fire, flames licking up the walls, liquor bottles exploding in the heat.

I turned over in my sleep and was on a boat, lying on the deck with my arm thrown across my face to shield my eyes from the strong rays of the sun. Someone else was there, another man. I opened my eyes and saw a slender figure, vaguely familiar to me, wearing sandals and a pair of shorts. I watched him haul on the ropes, the muscles in his back working as he unfurled the sails. His skin was smooth and tanned, and a bead of sweat was sliding down the valley of his spine; something told me it was a body I knew intimately, as intimately as I knew my own, and this made me happy. “We are sailing down the Nile, just as you wished.” He tied off the ropes and stretched out on the deck beside me. “The least you could do is pay attention.”

I took my arm down and smiled at him, reached for him, and pulled him into my arms. The kiss went on and on, growing more heated, more torrid, and my hands pressed flat against his back. I wanted to feel all of him against me. I wanted to press him into me, to join our bodies. “Yes,” he whispered, “yes, this is what I want as well as you.” A wild current of pleasure rose up from my belly and shuddered me apart, and I gave in to it, sobbing aloud.

 

 

I
T
WAS
full daylight when I again opened my eyes. The bedside clock said it was a little after nine. I lay there for a few moments, wondering what the hell it all meant, and just then the phone rang.

It was Chris. “Ricketts called you yet?”

“Ricketts? No, why?” Picco had said Ricketts was in Nova Scotia. Was that right?

“Just how much do you hate Picco?”

He wasn't making any sense. “What?”

“Ricketts is looking for you. He says he called your place, but you didn't answer. The upshot is, Picco's in some kind of trouble and Ricketts wants to see you.”

“He wants to see me? What for? I didn't do anything to Picco.” Maybe Picco blamed me for the dead vagrant. It wasn't beyond the realm of possibility. From what I'd seen of Picco, he wasn't too interested in doing me any favors.

“He just asked me to find you and get you down to headquarters.” There was a pause, and I could hear the smile in his voice. “You still in bed?”

“Yes, I'm still in bed.”

“You a man who wears pajamas, Jack?”

“Chris, you like working at the Heartache Cafe?”

“I sure do, boss.” He chuckled. “I sure do. Say, you want me to go down to headquarters with you?”

I thought about it for a moment. If Ricketts intended to ream me out, maybe having Chris along as backup wouldn't be a bad idea. On the other hand, if there really was something up with Picco, Ricketts was liable to close up like a clam when he saw I'd brought an audience. “Naw, I think I'll be okay. Listen, if I'm late, can you open up for me?”

“I thought Picco said to leave the place closed. What's he gonna do if he walks by and you're open?”

“Unless Picco's going to make up the difference in lost profits, the Cafe stays open.” A part of me relished the idea of going up against the flat-eyed constable. “He wants to get a court order, let him.”

“Okay.” Chris didn't sound convinced. “Will do. Call me if you need me.”

“Thanks, Chris.” I threw back the sheets and put my feet on the floor. My shorts were wet and sticking to me.

“Hey, Jack?”

“Yeah?” I pulled the cotton away from my skin. Obviously the things I'd dreamed had felt real enough for me to reach the ultimate conclusion. That hadn't happened in a long time—longer than I could remember. After what had happened in Philly, that part of me had just gone to sleep, seemingly for good.

“Was it a good dream?”

“Will you mind your own damn business?” I put the phone down, but not before I heard him laughing on the other end.

I got showered and shaved as quickly as I could, and dressed without bothering to eat or even have a cup of coffee. I half hoped Chris might show up early and have a pot waiting for me when I got back from headquarters.

I found Ricketts in his office, sitting behind a huge stack of file folders, which he was paging through in his usual, methodical way. He grunted at me when I came in and waved me to a chair, and I waited till he had finished whatever it was he was doing.

“Stoyles. Something wrong with your phone, is there?”

“Sorry about that. I didn't sleep well last night. I guess I must have really hit hard.” The remnants of my dream were still with me: the sun's heat, the man on the sailboat, and that cascading wave of pleasure that had flooded my body. “Thought you were in Nova Scotia.”

“I was. I'm not, now.” Ricketts huffed out an exasperated breath. “Well, I won't bother trying to dress it up, because what I got to say isn't pretty.” He handed me a pair of photographs, the usual mug-shot type familiar to police departments all over the world. “Seen either of them before?”

I studied the photographs carefully. The man on the left was almost certainly the vagrant who'd been knifed in my cafe the day before; I didn't recognize the other one. “Who are they?”

“The dead one was called Johnny Mahoney. Been hanging around Water Street as long as I can remember. His father used to fish up on the Labrador. Had a big schooner, the
Three Bells
, it was called.”

The face that stared out at me from the photograph was empty-eyed and sullen, the unshaven cheeks hollow with deprivation. “What happened to Johnny?”

“Got into the drink. Well, that would have been just fine if only he'd stuck to plain rum, but he didn't. People fell on hard times here in the thirties. Lot of these lushes like Johnny couldn't afford the real thing, so they started drinking whatever they could get.”

It was a story I'd heard all too often, and one I knew intimately. “Like what? Aftershave lotion?”

“Yeah, sometimes. Sometimes it was wood alcohol, or stuff they brewed up in the basement out of God-knows-what.”

I handed the photograph back to Sergeant Ricketts. “Who's the other one?”

“That's Billy Parsons—Bull Parsons, they calls him. Ever seen a mug like that before?”

Parsons was stocky, with a head shaped like a potato and no discernible neck. His nose had been broken, obviously more than once, and his thick, blubbery lips did nothing for his overall appearance. The expression in his eyes was pure, straightforward viciousness.

“No, he doesn't look familiar.”

“Bull Parsons and Johnny Mahoney spend their time downtown, pestering people for spare change. Once they got enough for a bottle or a few drinks in a pub, they're gone for the rest of the day. Usually they're on Water Street, and ever since you showed up, they like to hang around your place. Maybe there's a lot of foot traffic down that way, or maybe you're a soft touch.”

I had admitted to giving Mahoney the occasional hot cup of coffee in cold weather, and a few coins when I had it to spare. What was wrong with that?

“Parsons and Mahoney were doing great until Parsons got the bright idea that they could make a lot more money and buy a lot more booze if they took their little racket one step further.”

I didn't have to ask what he meant; Ricketts's expression told me everything I needed to know. “Armed robbery.”

“Armed robbery. Now, Stoyles, you know as well as I do that nowadays we got all kinds coming here—oh, present company excepted, of course.”

I tried hard not to laugh. “Skip it.”

“And some people who come here—especially by way of the waterfront—might not enjoy having two bloody stupid layabouts like Parsons and Mahoney sticking them up and taking all their money. You follow me?”

“Sure. So they got in over their heads and somebody stuck a knife in Johnny Mahoney.” Chances were, whoever had murdered Mahoney was long gone by now, back out to sea.

“Right you are.”

I was confused. “Sergeant, you called me down here because of something to do with Constable Picco.”

“I'm getting to that, just hold your horses.” Ricketts laid the mug shots side by side on his desk. “Parsons and Mahoney had a nice little racket going. Then Mahoney gets killed. Parsons was picked up the next night, walking down Queen's Road, dead drunk and completely witless. Grieving for his friend, he was—or so he said. Overcome with sorrow. Constable Picco happened to be in the lockup when Parsons was brought in, and the officers who booked Bull Parsons reported a really strange little incident.”

“I'm listening.”

“Have another smoke—do you good.” Ricketts lit it for me before continuing. “In order to reach the cells, Parsons had to walk past Picco, who was standing by the wall. Why he was down there, I have no idea. Anyway, Parsons and Picco looked at one another, and Parsons nodded.”

“So?”

“What I'm going to say to you, Stoyles, isn't for general consumption. So far I've managed to keep most of this out of the papers, but it won't last forever. Before I say anything, I need to know that you won't go around shooting off your mouth as soon as you're out of my sight.” I assured him I'd keep quiet. “What I got to say has to do with Picco.”

“Uh-huh.” Maybe Picco had complained about me. “What's he done?”

“Constable Picco is in trouble.” Ricketts's gaze was more intense than usual. “The worst possible kind.”

“I see.” Around here that usually meant he'd gotten some girl pregnant and would have to marry her, but with my history, I could hardly judge a guy for that. “Who's the girl?”

“What?” Ricketts stared at me like I was nuts. “What girl? Picco? You honestly think Picco's after getting into some girl's drawers?”

Probably not. “Well… what is it, then?”

“Picco…. Picco got mixed up in something… something well in line with his duties, but which makes it look like he's been involved in a certain… matter.”

“So don't you guys usually take care of that yourselves? I'm not a cop.”

“Yes, I realize you're not a cop, Stoyles, but that's not the point.” The tone of Ricketts's voice could probably peel paint. “If you'd keep your trap shut for a minute and let me get on with it?”

I sat back and folded my arms.

“As Bull Parsons passed by Constable Picco, he and Picco nodded at each other. Now, normally, that wouldn't bother me. Picco grew up on Brazil Street and so did Parsons, they're around about the same age, and I don't know, maybe they were pals when they were little boys. The point is, at a quarter to twelve last night, Bull Parsons walked out of the lockup as easy as you please.”

“You mean he escaped?” I was astonished. “What about Picco?”

“Picco's gone.” Ricketts got up from his chair and paced over to the window. His office overlooked the street with a view of the Narrows just beyond. The morning sun pierced the venetian blinds and laid paler strips of light against the dark tiles on Ricketts's floor. “At five o'clock this morning—no doubt while you were still sleeping the sleep of the just—a Greek seaman named… er, Pano-something-populous—I got his name right here—turned up dead. We found his body floating in the harbor, not far from the American docks.”

“But Picco… just gone?”

“He's disappeared. Didn't show up for duty this morning. Nobody's seen him since he left last night. Maybe he realizes what's after happening, and he's hiding away—or maybe the friends of that Greek merchant seaman think he's part of the reason why their pal was killed.” Ricketts lifted the blinds and peered through them for a moment, then let them drop back into place again. “His sister said he didn't come home, and she hasn't heard one blessed word from him since yesterday dinnertime.”

“When Mahoney was killed in my cafe.”

Ricketts turned his eyes on me with renewed interest. “In your cafe? You said he came in with the knife already in him—or are you after changing your story?” He lowered himself into his chair with an audible grunt.

I shook my head. “No, that's what happened. Dammit, you know what I mean.”