They didn't water the booze and they poured a good drink. Wasn't that as much of a character reference as any man needed?
OUTSIDE, another cherry bomb exploded. It was farther off, a block or two away, and it didn't slam the door shut on any conversations. At our table, the CBS guy complained that they were rushing the season. He said, "The Fourth isn't until Friday, right? Today's what, the first?"
"It's been the second for the past two hours."
"So that's still two days. What's the hurry?"
"They get these fucking fireworks and they get the itch," BobbyRuslander said. "You knowwho's the worst? The fucking chinks. For a while there I wasseein ' this girl, she lived down nearChinatown. You'd get Roman candles in the middle of thenight, you'd get cherry bombs, anything. Not just July, any time of the year. Comes to firecrackers, they're all little kids down there."
"My partner wanted to call the joint Little Saigon," Skip said. "I told him, John, for Christ's sake,people'regonna think it's a Chinese restaurant, you'regonna get family groups fromRego Park ordering moogoogai pan and two from Column B. He said what the hell's Chinese aboutSaigon? I told him, I said, John, you know that and I know that, but when it comes to the people fromRego Park, John, to them a slope is a slope and it all adds up to moogoogai pan."
Billie said, "What about the people in Park Slope?"
"What about the people in Park Slope?" Skip frowned, thinking it over. "The people in Park Slope," he said. "Fuck the people in Park Slope."
BobbyRuslander's girl Helen said, very seriously, that she had an aunt in Park Slope. Skip looked at her. I picked up my glass. It was empty, and I looked around for the beardless waiter or one of the brothers.
So I was looking at the door when it flew open. The brother who kept the door downstairs stumbled through it and careened into a table. Drinks spilled and a chair tipped over.
Two men burst into the room behind him. One was about five-nine, the other a couple inches shorter. Both were thin. Both wore blue jeans and tennis sneakers. The taller one had on a baseball jacket, the shorter one a royal-blue nylon windbreaker. Both had billed baseball caps on their heads and blood-red kerchiefs knotted around their faces, forming triangular wedges that hid their mouths and cheeks.
Each had a gun in his hand. One had a snub-nosed revolver, the other a long-barreled automatic. The one with the automatic raised it and fired two shots into the stamped-tin ceiling. It didn't sound like a cherry bomb or a hand grenade, either.
They got in and out in a hurry. One went behind the bar and emerged with the Garcia y Vega cigar box where Tim Pat kept the night's receipts. There was a glass jar on top of the bar with a hand-lettered sign soliciting contributions for the families of IRA men imprisoned in the North of Ireland, and he scooped the bills out of it, leaving the silver.
While he was doing this, the taller man held a gun on theMorrisseys and had them turn out their pockets. He took the cash from their wallets and a roll of bills from Tim Pat. The shorter man set down the cigar box for a moment and went to the back of the room, removing a framedAerLingus poster of the Cliffs ofMoher from the wall to expose a locked cupboard. He shot the lock off and withdrew a metal strongbox, tucked it unopened under his arm, went back to pick up the cigar box again, and ducked out the door and raced down the stairs.
His partner continued to hold theMorrisseys at gunpoint until he'd left the building. He had the gun centered at Tim Pat's chest, and for a moment I thought he was going to shoot. His gun was the long-barreled automatic, he'd been the one who put two bullets in the tin ceiling, and if he shot Tim Pat, he seemed unlikely to miss.
There was nothing I could do about it.
Then the moment passed. The gunman breathed out through his mouth, the red kerchief billowing with his breath. He backed to the door and out, fled down the stairs.
No one moved.
Then Tim Pat held a brief whispered conference with one of his brothers, the one who'd been keeping the door downstairs. After a moment the brother nodded and walked to the gaping cupboard at the back of the room. He closed it and hung the Cliffs ofMoher poster where it had been.
Tim Pat spoke to his other brother, then cleared his throat. "Gentlemen," he said, and smoothed his beard with his big right hand. "Gentlemen, if I may take a moment to explain the performance ye just witnessed. Two good friends of ours came in to ask for the loan of a couple of dollars, which we lent them with pleasure. None of us recognized them or took note of their appearance, and I'm sure no one in this room would know them should we by God's grace meet up with them again." His fingertips dabbed at his broad forehead, moved again to groom his beard. "Gentlemen," he said, "ye'dhonor me and my brothers byhavin ' the next drink with us."
And theMorrisseys bought a round for the house.Bourbon for me. Jameson for Billie Keegan, scotch for Skip, brandy for Bobby, and a scotch sour for his date.A beer for the guy from CBS, a brandy for Eddie the bartender.Drinks all around- for the cops, for the black politicians, for a roomful of waiters and bartenders and night people. Nobody got up and left, not with the house buying a round, not with a couple of guys out there with masks and guns.
The clean-shaven cousin and two of the brothers served the drinks. Tim Pat stood at the side with his arms folded on his white apron and his face expressionless. After everyone had been served, one of his brothers whispered something to Tim Pat and showed him the glass jar, empty except for a handful of coins. Tim Pat's face darkened.
"Gentlemen," he said, and the room quieted down. "Gentlemen, in the moment of confusion there was money taken as was contributed toNorad, money for the relief of the misfortunate wives and children of political prisoners in the North. Our loss is our own, myself and my brothers, and we'll speak no more of it, but them in the North with no money for food… He stopped for breath, continued in a lower voice. "We'll let the jar pass amongstye," he said, "and if some of ye should care to contribute, the blessings of God on ye."
I probably stayed another half-hour, not much more than that. I drank the drink Tim Pat bought and one morebesides, and that was enough. Billie and Skip left when I did. Bobby and his girl were going to stick around for a while, Vince had already left, and Eddie had joined another table and was trying to make points with a tall girl whowaitressed at O'Neal's.
The sky was light, the streets empty still, silent with early dawn. Skip said, "Well,Norad made a couple of bucks, anyway. There couldn't have been a whole lot Frank and Jesse took out of the jar, and the crowd coughed up a fair amount to fill it up again."
"Frank and Jesse?"
"Well, those red hankies, for Christ's sake. You know, Frank and Jesse James. But that was ones and fives they took out of thejar, and it was all tens and twenties got put back into it, so the poor wives and weechilder in the North came out all right."
Billie said, "What do you figure theMorrisseys lost?"
"Jesus, I don't know. That strongbox could have been full of insurance policies and pictures of their saintedmither, but that would be a surprise all around, wouldn't it? I bet they walked with enough to send a lot of guns to the bold lads in Derry andBelfast."
"You think the robbers were IRA?"
"The hell," he said. He threw his cigarette into the gutter. "I think theMorrisseys are. I think that's where their money goes. I figure-"