“Just trying to help. You know, it ain’t always like you think it is with me.” Recevo found Karras’s eyes. “Listen, Pete...”
“Stop it.”
“I know you hate my guts—”
“I don’t.”
“But I want you to know what happened that night.”
“I already know. I ran into Face one night at Casino Royal, and he told me how it was. I know and I don’t care. Because you should’ve stood next to me that night, Joey. You shouldn’t have driven off and left me in that alley. There’s nothin’ I wouldn’t have done for you, man, and you tore it right in half. I can’t get past that now, because in the end that’s all that matters. You might want to change it with your explanations. But you can’t change it, Joey. So forget it.”
“What I did to you I did because we were friends.”
“You did it because you were plain scared.”
“There was that. But there was the other thing, too. I was tryin’ to help you out, Pete. Back then, you couldn’t even see enough to get out of your own way. I was tryin’ to save your life.”
“That what you’re tryin’ to do for me now?”
Recevo looked away. “Yes.”
“So now I come back in and go to work for Burke. Shakin’ down immigrants and their sons for loan and protection money. Like these three years never went by. Like I’m not the cripple that I am. I just go on and forget about it, right?”
“I didn’t ask you to forget about it. But what other options have you got? What else you gonna do, Pete?”
Karras nodded slowly. “I guess you got a point.”
“Sure I do. You gonna flip hamburgers the rest of your life? Wear a goddamn apron? Is that what you wanna do? Come on, man, that ain’t you. You and me, we weren’t cut out for that.”
“That’s right, Joe. You and me have always been on the same bus.”
“That’s what I’m sayin’! Listen, you can leave that nine-to-five bullshit to your buddy Pericles and all those other altar boys we knew back when. I’m tellin’ you, Pete, the way you’re goin’ now, you got no future.”
Karras dragged deeply on his cigarette. “You know somethin’, Joey? I do believe you’re right.”
“Sure I’m right.”
Karras stared into the bar mirror, smiled sadly at his reflection.
And Karras said, “I’m gonna need your car.”
“My car? For what?”
“So I can deliver the girl.”
Recevo grinned. “You know you can’t drive for shit.”
“I’m gonna need it all the same. I can’t very well walk her across town, can I?”
“So she’s across town, is she?”
“Never mind where she is. I’ll bring her to you and Burke. But I’m gonna need the car.”
Recevo reached into his pocket, put his keys in Karras’s hand. Karras downed his rye, finished his beer in one swig. He stabbed his cigarette out in the ashtray. Recevo did the same. He put on his topcoat, put on his fedora, left a heap of ones on the bar.
“All right,” said Karras. “Let’s go.”
They went to the side door. Jerry Tsondilis gave Recevo a cool eye-sweep, patted Karras on his shoulder.
“Yasou, Pete.”
“So long, Kiriako.”
Then they were out on the sidewalk, moving along together smoothly, Karras keeping pace despite the limp, not out of synch, but in rhythm, like two halves of the same man.
They passed a cab idling at the curb. The cabbie leaned out the window. “You fellas lookin’ for a lift?”
“Keep it runnin’,” said Recevo.
They stopped at the Olds. Recevo leaned his back against the car.
“You sure you know how to drive it?”
“I’ll figure it out. This thing got any juice?”
Recevo nodded. “Overhead V-eight.”
“’Cause I wouldn’t wanna make you wait.”
“When should we be expecting you?”
“An hour, hour and a half.”
“Greek time or American time?”
“I’ll be there.”
Karras reached out, took Recevo’s fedora off his head. He flicked a finger into the crown, dented it right. Recevo took the hat, placed it back just so on his head.
“You and your crazy hats, Joey.”
“What about it?”
“Nothin’.”
Karras opened the door, dropped into the driver’s seat. He turned the ignition, put his foot to the gas, revved the engine. He revved it again until it screamed, sideglanced Recevo.
“Hey, what’re you doin’?”
“Just warmin’ it up.”
“Warm, hell. You’re gonna make it catch fire.”
Karras fitted a Lucky to his mouth, lighted it. He tossed the spent match at Recevo’s feet.
“Take care of my car, Greek.”
“Don’t worry, Joey. I won’t screw up.”
Karras pulled away from the curb. Recevo whistled for the cab.
39
Karras shifted the Olds into third. It went in smoothly, without a grind, the three-on-the-tree transmission easing into gear like a hot knife through butter. Karras ran a hand along the gray broadcloth upholstery, checked out the dash layout, the clock laid into the nacelle at its center. Recevo had gone for all the options, hadn’t missed a trick.
“You did good, Joey,” said Karras aloud.
And then he thought: You know, this car is swell and all that, but who needs it? You’re cooped up in one of these things, and you miss it all — the smells, the sounds, all of it. In the city, you’re cutting yourself off from everything like that, and with cabs and busses and streetcars going everywhere you’d want to go, you really don’t need a fancy sled like this to get around. You just don’t need it.
Karras rolled down the window a notch so the air would take the smoke from his cigarette.
He drove into Chinatown.
Karras parked at 6th and H, crossed the street to a pay phone situated on the corner there. He dialed Costa’s number, was relieved to hear Toula’s voice on the other end of the line.
Karras told Toula to get over to Florek’s room without tipping Costa, and to tell Florek and his sister to get ready to travel. He told her that he’d be there in fifteen minutes.
“Hokay, Panayoti. Tha kano tora.”
“Efcharisto, Toula. Kali nichta.”
Karras cut the line. He glanced down the block at the unmarked chow palace next to Cathay. Su was out on the street, leaning against his cab, his face close to another Chinaman’s, the both of them animated and rapid-firing words into the night. Karras lighted a cigarette, watched Su go at it. Su still seemed trim and energetic, and he probably would be for a long while. Su was a good Joe. A damn good little athlete, too.
Karras looked up at the building in which he had grown up. He looked at the window to his old apartment, the light inside yellow through the heavy curtains. He dragged on his cigarette.
Karras sunk a nickel in the slot, listened to the ring on the other end of the line. He looked up through the window, watched the stooped, heavy shadow of his mother as she crossed the room slowly to get to the ringing phone. He could see the bun, even in silhouette, done up on the back of her head. He thought of her hair when she had worn it long, when she had let it out at night, when she had run through it so many times with her silver-backed brush. He could picture himself as a boy, sitting on the edge of her bed, watching her pull the brush down through her long and beautiful hair.
“Hallo.”
“Ma, it’s Pete.”