him to whisper, âYes I will,â and kissed his cheek.
âNo can do.â
Sleemanâs words over the telephone meant heâd done enough for McGuire. Four bottles of good Scotch could only go so far.
Behind Sleemanâs voice, McGuire could hear the murmur of conversation and a telephone endlessly ringing. âHeâs got a record, thereâs a picture on file,â McGuire said.
âTold ya,â Sleeman said. He dropped his voice. âVerbals Iâll help you with, Joe. Copies are another thing. DeLisleâs on one of his moral housecleaning trips again. And everybodyâs uptight over changes around here. Guys gettinâ transferred in and out, moved up and down. I mean, you gotta be careful. The toe you step on today might be attached to the ass you have to kiss tomorrow.â
âSo go get the mug shot and tell me what he looks like.â
âWhat, you want me to buff and cuff him too? Jesus, McGuire, weâre all up to our asses here trying to find that Hayhurst lowlife.â
âWhoâs that?â
âThe gold-tooth kid, the one with the Beretta, who tried to shake you down. I told you about him. Heâs working solo now, and heâs wired all the time, probably doing crack by the bucket load. Heâs one for the books. Been a bad-ass since grade school. He took two shots at a couple of old ladies, schoolteachers from Indiana, last night. He was so wired up he missed them both. One thing nobody around here wants is a couple of schoolteachers from little towns in Indiana getting their scrawny butts shot off by a hopped-up street hood, right? So now we got a task force and Iâm heading it. DeLisle wants Hayhurst and his Beretta off the street, with or without his gold tooth, and Iâm the guy supposed to do it.â
âTell me what you know about Myers,â McGuire said. He leaned back in his chair, his feet on a corner of the desk.
âMarried twice, no kids,â Sleeman answered. âCharged with assaulting one of his ex-wives, roughed up another guy who owed him money. Thinks heâs got muscle to use, I guess. Got himself probation on a weapons charge, too. Then he beat some heavy-duty embezzling charges that his partner took a three-year government vacation for, and did six months for income tax that the IRS said he didnât pay, on money the court said he didnât embezzle. Usual crock of shit.â
âSo youâre not making a copy of his mug shot.â
âSorry. Maybe your buddy Rosenâs got a picture of him. Myers and Rosen, they probably threw a big party when he beat the embezzlement charge, for which he was facing five to ten.â
âRosen?â McGuire sat up in his chair.
âHe was Myersâs lawyer.â Sleeman gave a dry laugh. âHell, McGuire, you can always threaten to introduce your knuckles to his beak again, he doesnât come through for you.â
McGuire muttered a goodbye to Sleeman and sat staring at the telephone. Then, as though his thoughts had flipped some switch within the instrument, it rang.
âI just wanted to thank you for lunch again,â Lorna said. McGuire could feel the closeness of her lips against the receiver and he pictured her a floor above him, maybe toying with her hair.
âNot necessary,â he said. âI enjoyed it.â
âPlease donât lose that telephone number.â
âI wonât.â He thought about Saturday night, about all the Saturday nights over the past several months he had spent in the house on Revere Beach, watching television with Ollie and Ronnie, and thinking of sand flowing in massive quantities through a narrow opening into darkness. âLook,â he said, hearing himself speak, almost eavesdropping on his own thoughts. âWhy donât we make it a sure thing? Is there some place youâd like to go for dinner? Somewhere you havenât been in years?â
He heard a sharp