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Authors: Reed Farrel Coleman
Tags: Mystery
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real relic. You didn’t quite need a crane to lift up the receiver. I buzzed Sam and asked for an outside line.
“Would you believe me if I told you all the outside lines were busy?” he wondered.
“No.”
“Good. I’ll patch you through.”
I dialed the Maloneys’ number. Katy answered. The sound of her voice made my heart sink. I was suddenly very lonely. My cells, I think, were remembering just how empty my life had been before I met her. She asked me how things were going. I told her about Sam. She thought he sounded like fun. Katy held the phone up to Sarah, who talked at me some. Katy said Sarah smiled when she heard my voice. I promised to call the next day, said I loved them both probably one too many times, and hung up.
When I turned the TV on, I decided to downgrade my assessment of the room. There was more snow on the screen than on the collapsing roof.
Chapter Six
November 28th
The phone was ringing louder than I’d heard a phone ring in quite some time. Given what Sam had said about the average age of his clientele, loud was probably good. Still groggy, I reached for the receiver and promptly dropped it on my forehead. Believe me, with how much the thing weighed, dropping it on your head was either going to snap you completely awake or plunge you into a persistent vegetative state. I escaped with only a mild concussion.
It was dark when I trundled down to meet Sam in the kitchen. I wasn’t thrilled about the hour, but I had asked him to breakfast, and it seemed we were going to do it on his terms. I told myself that this was a good thing, that I’d get an early start. What I was getting an early start with had yet to be established. Hammerling wasn’t going to be back till Monday morning. I hoped Sam might have some insight. Maybe he could point a blind detective in the right direction.
I still had trouble thinking of myself as a detective. Not because I’d never officially worked a case since getting my license. It had more to do with my never getting a gold shield while I was on the job. I’d spent my whole ten years in the bag, in uniform. My buddies thought finding Marina Conseco would have earned me my shield. It got me a medal instead. I had almost convinced myself that I didn’t want to make detective because of dumb luck or on the back of a little girl’s suffering. Sometimes I still believe that.
Something smelled delicious but completely out of place in the Swan Song’s allegedly kosher kitchen: frying bacon, God’s quintessential torment. With bacon you were fucked either way. Even if you were an observant Jew and disdained pork products, there was no prohibition against breathing. And one sniff, one breath that contained that sweetly smoky aroma, could torture the most devout rabbi. If, on the other hand, you were, like myself, a bad Jew, or someone unconstrained by five-thousand-year-old dietary laws, you were still screwed. Bacon was cholesterol’s perfect delivery system. Bacon-egg-and-cheese sandwiches had killed more cops than all the cheap handguns ever made.
“Tsk, tsk, Sam.” I shook my head in mock disapproval. “This is gonna cost you a dozen mitzvahs. If there was a hell …”
“What’d’ya mean, if? This is hell! Sit down, Mr. Wise Guy, and eat. The bacon’s from my own private stock. Once the natives stir, we’re all of a sudden kosher again.”
“Can’t they smell it?” I asked.
“Most of my guests are beyond breathing, let alone smelling.” Sam waved, shoving a mouthful of eggs, potato, and bacon into his trap. “And if they do smell it, they forget before they complain.”
I did as the man said and sat across from Sam at a two-top table set up in the back of the kitchen. We could make out the first rays of daylight through a big window that gave new meaning to the term “stained glass.” The windows were so thick with accumulated grease that the world appeared in sepia tones. You could see the hole in the ground that used to be the
“Would you believe me if I told you all the outside lines were busy?” he wondered.
“No.”
“Good. I’ll patch you through.”
I dialed the Maloneys’ number. Katy answered. The sound of her voice made my heart sink. I was suddenly very lonely. My cells, I think, were remembering just how empty my life had been before I met her. She asked me how things were going. I told her about Sam. She thought he sounded like fun. Katy held the phone up to Sarah, who talked at me some. Katy said Sarah smiled when she heard my voice. I promised to call the next day, said I loved them both probably one too many times, and hung up.
When I turned the TV on, I decided to downgrade my assessment of the room. There was more snow on the screen than on the collapsing roof.
Chapter Six
November 28th
The phone was ringing louder than I’d heard a phone ring in quite some time. Given what Sam had said about the average age of his clientele, loud was probably good. Still groggy, I reached for the receiver and promptly dropped it on my forehead. Believe me, with how much the thing weighed, dropping it on your head was either going to snap you completely awake or plunge you into a persistent vegetative state. I escaped with only a mild concussion.
It was dark when I trundled down to meet Sam in the kitchen. I wasn’t thrilled about the hour, but I had asked him to breakfast, and it seemed we were going to do it on his terms. I told myself that this was a good thing, that I’d get an early start. What I was getting an early start with had yet to be established. Hammerling wasn’t going to be back till Monday morning. I hoped Sam might have some insight. Maybe he could point a blind detective in the right direction.
I still had trouble thinking of myself as a detective. Not because I’d never officially worked a case since getting my license. It had more to do with my never getting a gold shield while I was on the job. I’d spent my whole ten years in the bag, in uniform. My buddies thought finding Marina Conseco would have earned me my shield. It got me a medal instead. I had almost convinced myself that I didn’t want to make detective because of dumb luck or on the back of a little girl’s suffering. Sometimes I still believe that.
Something smelled delicious but completely out of place in the Swan Song’s allegedly kosher kitchen: frying bacon, God’s quintessential torment. With bacon you were fucked either way. Even if you were an observant Jew and disdained pork products, there was no prohibition against breathing. And one sniff, one breath that contained that sweetly smoky aroma, could torture the most devout rabbi. If, on the other hand, you were, like myself, a bad Jew, or someone unconstrained by five-thousand-year-old dietary laws, you were still screwed. Bacon was cholesterol’s perfect delivery system. Bacon-egg-and-cheese sandwiches had killed more cops than all the cheap handguns ever made.
“Tsk, tsk, Sam.” I shook my head in mock disapproval. “This is gonna cost you a dozen mitzvahs. If there was a hell …”
“What’d’ya mean, if? This is hell! Sit down, Mr. Wise Guy, and eat. The bacon’s from my own private stock. Once the natives stir, we’re all of a sudden kosher again.”
“Can’t they smell it?” I asked.
“Most of my guests are beyond breathing, let alone smelling.” Sam waved, shoving a mouthful of eggs, potato, and bacon into his trap. “And if they do smell it, they forget before they complain.”
I did as the man said and sat across from Sam at a two-top table set up in the back of the kitchen. We could make out the first rays of daylight through a big window that gave new meaning to the term “stained glass.” The windows were so thick with accumulated grease that the world appeared in sepia tones. You could see the hole in the ground that used to be the
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