I’d had the foresight to have the car wait for me. I got in.
What was I going to do?
Nothing. I wasn’t going to do anything. What was there to do?
My forehead felt like bent nails.
A few Scotches at the Wolf’s Lair would help, I thought.
I was right.
Four Scotches in, my cell phone rang. I didn’t feel like talking to anyone. I ignored it.
Thirty seconds later it rang again. I was about to pitch the phone at the men’s room door when I noticed the number: Dorita. Shit. What did she want now?
I answered.
Rick, she said, breathless.
I’m busy, I said.
Something’s happened.
I’ll call you back.
FitzGibbon’s dead.
Jesus Christ. How? What?
We don’t know yet.
Jesus Christ. Where are you?
There’s a meeting tomorrow morning. Be there.
Where?
The office. Ten o’clock. The real office.
The real office? I’m not allowed to go to the real office.
It’s a new and different world, Ricky. Be there.
Where are you?
There’s nothing to do right now. Be at the meeting.
She hung up.
I tried to make sense of the news. I couldn’t get my mind around it. I tried to remember why FitzGibbon was important to me. The fat blowhard. What did I care? Steiglitz, on the other hand, I couldn’t get out of my head.
I tried to stop thinking altogether.
I was more exhausted than I thought a man could be.
I staggered home.
I wasn’t sure I could negotiate the stairs.
I didn’t try.
I fell into the armchair. I slept.
The sleep was deep and dark and dreamless.
When I awoke the sun was streaming through the window. It hurt my eyes. I turned over. My head hurt. My back hurt. My right elbow hurt.
I heard Kelly come into the room.
Daddy? she said.
Yes my angel, I mumbled into the cushions.
What’s going on?
I turned my head. I squinted into the barbarous light.
Steiglitz. Shit. What was I going to do?
My instinct was to tell Kelly the truth. The whole truth.
So help me God, I thought.
I thought again. She was so abominably young. I couldn’t inflict this nightmare on her.
Nothing, I said, I just didn’t have the energy to climb the stairs.
Oh, she said. Okay. I’ll make some coffee.
You are so impossibly good to me, I smiled weakly.
I know, she said. Don’t get too used to it.
I dragged myself to my feet. Took a quick shower. Put on some clean clothes. Went to the kitchen.
Kelly was pouring the coffee.
I found myself enjoying the sharp rich stimulating scent of good Jamaican Blue. The quiet company of Kelly.
Maybe life was worth living after all.
The phone rang.
It was Dorita.
Get the hell over here, she said.
I looked at my watch. Shit. Ten o’clock.