A Walk Among the Tombstones

Don't call anyone.



Who would I call?



He picked up the phone one more time and dialed a number he didn't have to look up. His brother answered on the third ring.



He said, "Petey, I need you out here. Jump in a cab, I'll pay for it, but get out here right away, you hear me?"



A pause. Then, "Babe, I'd do anything for you, you know that-"



"So jump in a cab, man!"



"- but I can't be in anything has to do with your business. I just can't, babe."



"It's not business."



"What is it?"



"It's Francine."



"Jesus, what's the matter? Never mind, you'll tell me when I get out there. You're at home, right?"



"Yeah, I'm at home."



"I'll get a cab. I'll be right out."



WHILE Peter Khoury was looking for a cabdriver willing to take him to his brother's house in Brooklyn, I was watching a group of reporters on ESPN discussing the likelihood of a cap on players' salaries. It didn't break my heart when the phone rang. It was Mick Ballou, calling from the town of Castlebar in County Mayo. The line was clear as a bell; he might have been calling from the back room at Grogan's.



"It's grand here," he said. "If you think the Irish are crazy in New York you should meet them on their own home ground. Every other storefront's a pub, and no one's out the door before closing hour."



"They close early, don't they?"



"Too bloody early by half. In your hotel, though, they have to serve drink at any hour to any registered guest that wants it. Now that's the mark of a civilized country, don't you think?"



"Absolutely."



"They all smoke, though. They're forever lighting cigarettes and offering the pack around. The French are even worse that way. When I was over there visiting my father's people they were peeved with me for not smoking. I believe Americans are the only people in the world who've had the sense to give it up."



"You'll still find a few smokers in this country, Mick."



"Good luck to them, then, suffering through plane rides and films and all the rules against it in public places." He told a long story about a man and a woman he'd met a few nights before. It was funny and we both laughed, and then he asked about me and I said I was all right. "Are you, then," he said.



"A little restless, maybe. I've had time on my hands lately. And the moon's full."



"Is it," he said. "Here, too."



"What a coincidence."



"But then it's always full over Ireland. Good job it's always raining so you don't have to look at it all the time. Matt, I've an idea. Get on a plane and come over here."



"What?"



"I'll bet you've never been to Ireland."



"I've never been out of the country," I said. "Wait a minute, that's not true, I've been to Canada a couple of times and Mexico once, but-"



"You've never been to Europe?"



"No."



"Well, for Jesus' sake, get on a plane and come over. Bring herself if you want"- meaning Elaine- "or come alone, it makes no matter. I talked to Rosenstein and he says I'd best stay out of the country awhile yet. He says he can get it all straightened out but they've got this fucking federal task force and he doesn't want me on American soil until the all clear's sounded. I could be stuck in this fucking pesthole another month or more. What's so funny?"



"I thought you loved the place, and now it's a pesthole."



"Anywhere's a pesthole when you haven't your friends about you. Come on over, man. What do you say?"



PETER Khoury got to his brother's house just after Kenan had had still another conversation with the gentler of the kidnappers. The man had seemed rather less gentle this time, especially toward the end of the conversation when Khoury tried to demand some evidence that Francine was alive and well. The conversation went something like this:



KHOURY: I want to talk to my wife.



KIDNAPPER: That's impossible. She's at a safe house. I'm at a pay phone.



KHOURY: How do I know she's all right?



KIDNAPPER: Because we've had every reason to take good care of her. Look how much she's worth to us.



KHOURY: Jesus, how do I even know you've got her in the first place?



KIDNAPPER: Are you familiar with her breasts?



KHOURY: Huh?



KIDNAPPER: Would you recognize one of them? That would be the simplest way. I'll cut off one of her tits and leave it on your doorstep, and that will put your mind at rest.



KHOURY: Jesus, don't say that. Don't even say that.



KIDNAPPER: Then let's not talk about proof, shall we? We have to trust each other, Mr. Khoury. Believe me, trust is everything in this business.



That was the whole thing, Kenan told Peter. He had to trust them, and how could he do that? He didn't even know who they were.



"I tried to think who I could call," he said. "You know, people in the business. Someone to stand by me, back me up. Anybody I can think of, for all I know, they're in on it. How can I rule anybody out? Somebody set this up."



"How did they-"



"I don't know. I don't know anything, all I know is she went shopping and she never came back. She went out, took the car, and five hours later the phone rings."



"Five hours?"



"I don't know, something like that. Petey, I don't know what I'm doing here, I got no experience in this shit."



"You do deals all the time, babe."



"A dope deal's completely different. You structure that so everybody's safe, everybody's covered. This case-"



"People get killed in dope deals all the time."



"Yeah, but there's generally a reason. Number one, dealing with people you don't know. That's the killer. It looks good and it turns into a rip-off. Number two, or maybe its number one and a half, dealing with people you think you know but you don't really. And the other thing, whatever number you want to give it, people get in trouble because they try to chisel. They try to do the deal without the money, figure they'll make it good afterward. They get in over their heads, they get away with it, and then one time they don't. You know where that comes from nine times out of ten, it's people who get into their own product and their judgment goes down the toilet."



"Or they do everything right and then six Jamaicans kick the door in and shoot everybody."



"Well, that happens," Kenan said. "It doesn't have to be Jamokes. What was I reading the other day, Laotians in San Francisco. Every week there's some new ethnic group looking to kill you." He shook his head. "The thing is, in a righteous dope deal you can walk away from anything that doesn't look right. You never have to do the deal. If you've got the money, you can spend it somewhere else. If you've got the product, you can sell it to somebody else. You're only in the deal for as long as it works, and you can back yourself up, build in safeguards along the way, and from the jump you know the people and whether or not you can trust them."



"Whereas here-"



"Whereas here we got nothing. We got our thumb up our ass, that's what we got. I said we'll bring the money and you bring my wife, they said no. They said that's not the way it works. What am I gonna say, keep my wife? Sell her to somebody else, you don't like the way I do business? I can't do that."



"No."



"Except I could. He said a million, I said four hundred thousand. I said fuck you, that's all there is, and he bought it. Suppose I said-"



The phone rang. Kenan talked a few minutes, making notes on a scratch pad. "I'm not coming alone," he said at one point. "I got my brother here, he's coming with me. No arguments." He listened some more and was about to say something else when the phone clicked in his ear.



"We gotta roll," he said. "They want the money in two Hefty bags. That's easy enough. Why two, I wonder? Maybe they don't know what four hundred large is, how much space it takes up."



"Maybe the doctor told them no heavy lifting."



"Maybe. We're supposed to go to the corner of Ocean Avenue and Farragut Road."



"That's in Flatbush, isn't it?"



"I think so."



"Sure, Farragut Road, that's a couple of blocks from Brooklyn College. What's there?"



"A phone booth." When they had the money divided up and packed in a pair of garbage bags, Kenan handed Peter a gun, a 9-mm automatic. "Take it," he insisted. "We don't want to walk into this unarmed."



"We don't want to walk into it at all. What good's a gun gonna do me?"



"I don't know. Take it anyway."



On the way out the door Peter grabbed his brother's arm. "You forgot to set the alarm," he said.



"So? They got Francey and we're carrying the money. What's left to steal?"



"You got the alarm, you might as well set it. It can't be any less useful than the goddamn guns."



"Yeah, you're right," he said, and ducked into the house. When he emerged he said, "State-of-the-art security system. You can't break into my house, can't tap my phones, can't bug the premises. All you can do is snatch my wife and make me run around the city with trash bags full of hundred-dollar bills."



"What's the best way, babe? I was thinking Bay Ridge Parkway and then Kings Highway to Ocean."



"Yeah, I guess. There's a dozen ways you could go, but that's as good as any. You want to drive, Petey?"



"You want me to?"



"Yeah, why don't you? I'd probably rear-end a cop car, the way I am now. Or run over a nun."



THEY were supposed to be at the Farragut Road pay phone at eight-thirty. They got there three minutes early, according to Peter's watch. He stayed in the car while Kenan went over to the phone and stood there waiting for it to ring. Earlier, Peter had wedged the gun under his belt in the small of his back. He'd been conscious of the pressure of it while he was driving, and now he took it out and held it in his lap.



The phone rang and Kenan answered it. Eight-thirty, Peter's watch said. Were they doing this by the clock or were they eyeballing the whole operation, somebody sitting in a window in one of the buildings across the street, watching it all happen?



Kenan trotted back to the car, leaned against it. " Veterans Avenue," he said.



"Never heard of it."



"It's somewhere between Flatlands and Mill Basin, that area. He gave me directions, Farragut to Flatbush and Flatbush to Avenue N and that runs you right into Veterans Avenue."



"And then what happens?"



"Another pay phone at the corner of Veterans and East Sixty-sixth Street."



"Why the running around, do you have any idea?"



"Make us crazy. Make sure we don't have a backup. I don't know, Petey. Maybe they're just trying to break our balls."



"It's working." Kenan went around to the passenger side, got in. Peter said, "Farragut to Flatbush, Flatbush to N. That'd be a right on Flatbush and then I guess a left turn on N?"



"Right. I mean yes, right on Flatbush and left on N."



"How much time have we got?"



"They didn't say. I don't think they said a time. They said to hurry."



"I guess we won't stop for coffee."



"No," Kenan said. "I guess not."