Free Dirty Fire by Earl Merkel Page B

sufficiently functional to operate the tavern he had inherited from my grandfather in Bucktown, just off Armitage Avenue.
    He had been wildly popular with the clientele, largely policemen and firemen—in those days, there were few policewomen and virtually no women firefighters—from around the neighborhood.
    At least until his trial, if someone alluded to the circumstances of his dismissal, his reaction would be a devilish, if rueful, grin. As often as not, he would then launch into an unrelated story that soon had everyone within earshot convulsing in laughter. My father had accumulated a wealth of stories, most of then involving his experiences as a cop—cases that, in his tales if not in his life, never went unsolved.
    Gerald Davey was lively and entertaining and a devastatingly attractive man: that is, between the weekly binge blackouts, when his world turned into a dark and frightening place for those of us who inhabited it with him. It was during these periods that my father revisited those other cases—the ones where he had slipped the unmarked envelopes into his pocket, where he had bartered away whatever honor he had accrued along with his badge. He would relive every detail, his eyes burning with the intensity of a man trying to justify, or at least expiate, his past sins. He never could, not even at his most drunken moments; instead, he railed, lost in a helpless rage at his own weakness and guilt.
    By the next afternoon—occasionally a little longer—he would again be the Gerald Davey his friends and customers knew.
    He never fully remembered what he called his “episodes,” and neither my mother nor I ever told him the truth about what he had done or said. As a result, he thought it a trip he had taken alone, though nothing could have been farther from the truth.
    Tonight, as in so many nights over the past year, I lay in the dark and pondered both heredity and the definition of irony.
    Talking with Chaz Trombetta had done nothing to lull the demons that walked night sentinel in my mind. I had hoped for Trombetta’s assistance, expected it as a matter of course. But even more, I had needed someone to trust. I was on a dark road, and I had counted on Chaz to walk it with me. Now that was gone, too.
    “Maybe,” I said aloud to the dark room, “I ought to have another drink.”
    As if to answer, there was a quiet tapping at the door.
    I frowned. It was too late for a call by Jehovah’s Witnesses, and none of my neighbors had the appearance of people who socialized easily or well. I had half-decided to ignore it when a voice, low and tentative, spoke my name.
    I opened the door. Even in the dim light, I recognized the figure who stood there.
    “All the lights were off,” said a voice that had once been familiar to me. “I wasn’t sure you were here. I’m glad you’re still awake. Or have you started sleeping in your clothes?”
    “Hello, Ellen,” I said. “Come in.”
    Ellen was dressed in a blue oxford shirt that was too large for her slight form. I wondered if it was one of mine, though a darker corner of my mind suspected it was not. She had rolled the sleeves to just below her elbows. The shirttail was tucked into a pair of soft khaki trousers that emphasized her trim figure. Many women might have pulled their hair into a ponytail to match the gamine look of the outfit. Not Ellen: hers fell in a fine ashen cascade that emphasized the compact beauty of her face. It made me remember how soft her hair had felt beneath my hands.
    She walked directly to the sofa and sat in a way that invited me to sit beside her. Instead, I drew a chair from the dinette set. I settled across from her at what I hoped was a safe distance for both of us.
    We sat in silence for a long moment as Ellen surveyed my lodgings. Before she could speak, I did.
    “It used to be a motel,” I said. “A long time ago. Now they rent rooms by the week.”
    She nodded. I wondered if she had noticed the vodka on my breath.
    “I