“I been thinking. About the way you broke it down and all. Something’s not right.”
“What do you know, something’s not right?”
“Solly, I have to be a fucking genius to see through glass? The five years are up. For me, I know. And for you, too, never mind that fairy tale about being down in Florida. Maybe you went, maybe you didn’t … but you didn’t stay. And, knowing you, I don’t think anyone could prove you even left the state at all.”
“Okay,” he said.
That surprised me, him giving it up so easy. I expected more, but I could tell—if I wanted more, I was going to have to ask for it.
“Okay, what?” I said to him.
“Okay, you’re right. So here’s what you’re thinking: even if this Jessop got popped tomorrow, and even if he wanted to roll, he’s got nobody to roll on. Except Big Matt, I suppose … but that’s his problem, not mine. Tell me if I’m wrong.”
“You’re not wrong.”
“Good. Then just listen for a minute. Listen good, Sugar. I’m not … I’m not responsible for this Jessop. Just for you and Big Matt. The guys I brought in. That’s the way it’s supposed to be. Now, Albie, he’s responsible for Jessop. Only, Albie, he’s not around.”
“So tell Big Matt—”
“Tell him fucking what? There’s a guy named Jessop who could maybe blow up his whole life? Tell him this guy could reach out from his past and destroy his future? I should tell him, maybe that baby he’s waiting on, that kid’s fifteen years old before he ever sees his father, except maybe on Visiting Day?
“I should tell him his wife’s gotta put the kid in some day-care place, go out, and get a job herself? ’Cause you know the law’s going to be sitting on her forever, waiting to see some sign of the money. Want me to go on?”
“No. No, I get it.”
“If you ‘got’ it, you wouldn’t be telling me you’re not a hit man. A hit man, that’s a guy who kills for money. Plenty of them around. But it wouldn’t cost me a cent, I wanted this guy done. One call to Big Matt and …”
“I know.”
“But it’s not that simple. This Jessop, he’s probably rock-solid. Wouldn’t even think about giving anyone up. No way he even knows where Big Matt is, anyway.”
“So why don’t you just let it go?”
“You wouldn’t understand.”
“I’m smart enough to follow orders, but not smart enough to understand them?”
He looked at me. Straight and hard, like he was boiling-over mad, but keeping a lid on it.
“Let’s look at it the way Albie would have. Can we do that? Yeah? All right. Try this: Albie doesn’t know you. Not even your name. So, if his guy, this Jessop, if he comes back, says it went fine, Albie wouldn’t expect him to hang around. But he’d know where to find him, he had to.
“Next thing would be, Albie gives me a call. Only, this time, there’s no answer. Then he gets the word. I’m dead. Not killed—that would be different—just, you know, dead. Natural causes. You with me?”
“Yeah,” I said, even though I wasn’t sure I was.
“Okay, so what does Albie do then?”
“I don’t—Ah, wait a second. You’re saying Albie, he’d have to go and find me. And Big Matt, too?”
“At last!” Solly said, just short of ranking me.
“Not find us to … do anything. Just to be sure we hadn’t done anything.”
“Now you’ve got it, Sugar.”
“So you, like, owe your friend?”
“My brother, more like. That’s how close we were. And I owe him the same as he would owe me, it went the other way.”
The girl came in so quiet I didn’t realize she was there until she said, “Uncle Solly, would you and Jerome, would you like some apple juice? You know it’s good for you, and—”
“That would be lovely, sweetheart,” Solly told her.
Ken’s daughter. I never thought of him having a kid. A house. Stuff like that.
Solly, he never stops thinking.
Only Solly, maybe he was more than just a thinker. If he hadn’t been lying about that war, he’d killed a lot more guys than any hit man I ever heard of. And not for money.
It was what he didn’t say that I heard the clearest. Some things, they just have to be done. Taking out this Jessop, that wouldn’t make me a hit man. It would make me what