Read Online The Devil's Redhead by David Corbett - Free Book Online

sidewalk Dominic took out a handkerchief and patted his bare head. He walked with a low center of gravity, gap-legged, with an arm-pumping swivel above the waist and his chin jutting out.
    â€œYour P.O.’s been calling, driving Nina nuts. I swear to God—wants to know your address, ETA, where you’re working, yadda yadda. I tell him, Look, I’m just the home monitor, you wanna talk to Daniel, he’s smart, he knows he’s gotta connect within twenty-four hours. You wanna talk to his boss, now or whenever, call Lenny Mannion.”
    Dominic turned toward Abatangelo.
    â€œYou should do that, too, incidentally. Call Lenny, I’ll give you the number. You can start whenever, he runs a little portrait shop. School pictures, families, babies, you know? It ain’t art, but it beats washing dishes and kicking back to some asshole for the privilege. And Lenny’s sticking his neck out. I mean, an ex-con, babies around, teenage girls. Know what I mean? No offense. But anybody finds out you been inside, he’s explaining till he’s dead.”
    Dominic turned face-front again.
    â€œAnyway, I tell this P.O. of yours, ‘Off my back.’ He still calls. Why? ’Cuz you’re not spending six weeks in some halfway house he’s probably got a piece of, if you know what I mean.”
    â€œI appreciate what you’re doing,” Abatangelo said. “And I’ll call him. Today.”
    Dominic shook his head. “I’m not doing this for you, you know. I’m doing it for your mother, God rest her soul.”
    He led Abatangelo three blocks through North Beach. Traffic sat stalled on Columbus, horns blared, the sidewalks thronged with bobbing crowds. Abatangelo found himself clutching his paper sack, a yardbird reflex.
    Dominic resumed: “Don’t mind Nina, okay? It’s just, I mean, not to make you feel bad, but near the end, your mother lived like a squirrel. And what there was to get, your sister got. Feds took your share. Agents came to probate court, served their papers, it was all written down, boom boom boom. Not that there was much to get. Bloodsuckers came out of the woodwork, their hands out, bills you wouldn’t believe. Poor woman. You coulda maybe thought about giving her a little of that money you made, know what I mean?”
    â€œShe wouldn’t take it,” Abatangelo said. “And by the time she was sick, I’d been tagged. They seized everything.”
    Dominic snorted. “Like you didn’t have a secret stash somewhere.”
    â€œNot secret enough.”
    Dominic studied him. “Some criminal mastermind.”
    They stopped in front of a grocery called the Smiling Child Market. Tea-smoked chickens hung in the window and Chinese matrons rummaged through sidewalk bins for dragon beans, lo bok, cloud ear mushrooms. Just beyond the door, the owner stood at the register, wearing a red cardigan and a wisdom cap. Behind him an ancient woman, dressed in black, sat on a dairy carton feeding glazed rice crackers to a cat.
    â€œJimmy,” Dominic called out, “Jimmy, dammit Jimmy, over here. This is the roomer I told you about. We’re going up, that good?”
    The grocer smiled an utterly impersonal smile. In the stairway, searching his pocket for the keys, Dominic told Abatangelo, “His name’s Jimmy Shu. He don’t know where you been, which is good. Never tell a Chinaman everything. He’ll never trust you again.”
    Upstairs, the hallway was dark and redolent of ginger and curry and chili oil. The clamor of North Beach filtered through the window at one end, Chinatown the other. Dominic fiddled with the keys in the dim light, holding them near his eyes, then opened the apartment door. They greeted a clutter of take-out cartons, ravaged napkins and tangled rags.
    Dominic said, “Hey hey, this was all supposed to be, well, gone, you know?”
    He kicked a welter of paper into a heap near