Work Text:
Day 1
Wine--ten cases (red and white, or if there isn’t enough red, Frank, I’m sure we’ve got some food coloring around the place somewhere. They couldn’t possibly notice any difference at only 9%)
Champagne--five cases
Vermouth, sherry, port, madeira (assorted, I can’t go on)--one case
Delivery at 12:00 PM, 1334 York Avenue
“I’m gonna kill you,” the man growls, jabbing a meaty finger into his chest, and Frank looks down at it with extreme interest. He’s never actually seen knuckle hair that could be braided before. It’s got this springy quality to it that goes well with the inch-long yellow nails.
He takes a polite step back. “Sorry, friend,” he says, “but you’ve got the wrong fellow. I’m the liquor delivery man.”
“You’re Frank Doyle,” the man growls again. Frank adds this to his list of new experiences he’d happily forgo: people with only one vocal register. “You have something that isn’t yours. I’m taking it back.”
“Oh,” Frank says, enlightened. “This is about the trolley. Look--” he leans in, to seem companionable-- “I know that I should have checked with the auction majordomo before I wheeled it away, but the fact is, the one I came out here with just couldn’t be used for champagne. Not if you want anything but foam on the other side. It’s behind the van, if you--”
The man growls, again, and Frank mentally decides to stop giving the man the satisfaction of noticing. “I ain’t talking about the trolley, pal!”
Frank forces a wider smile. “No? What is it I can help you with?”
“Twenty-six days,” the man says. “Twenty-six days, and I’ll get what I’m after.” He shakes his fist. It’s a big fist. It makes its own supplemental point. “Don’t you play dumb with me. You know just what I’m talking about, and I will get my claws into it. Pun. Intended.”
A part of Frank, unprompted, says, Werewolf.
“And if I don’t,” the man continues, leaning in as punctuation, “I’m gonna get every claw, in order, into you.”
The same part of Frank says, Asshole.
“Have a nice day,” Frank says. “Try the red wine.”
Day 2
Bourbon--one case
Scotch--one case
Delivery not before 6:00 PM, 768 5th Avenue, Floor 20. The man asks that you leave it in the lobby. He gave six or seven reasons for it, but I’m afraid I stopped listening after his first one, which was something about wishing to avoid too much “street lint”. Please ensure that the doorman knows what to do with the poor abandoned things.
“Payday, Mr. Doyle,” says Sadie Knickerhouse, from behind her oak desk. She presents him with the envelope. “A little bonus this week, for that last job.”
Frank takes it, aware as always that they’re an envelope’s length away from each others’ hands, and also of the nauseous sensation of self-loathing which accompanies a whole lot of his idle hours. He still has a headache from the wallpaper at the last place. “Thank you, Ms. Knickerhouse. It’ll go directly into the rainy day fund.”
“Is that mostly in bottles of whiskey or gin?” Sadie inquires, lifting one of her elegant eyebrows. Her voice is, as always, silvered, her face as radiant as the dawn, etcetera, but she looks mostly tired. “I can’t decide which one I’d rather have around in case of sudden thunderstorms.”
“Well, I’ve tried to vary it, but for some reason I never seem to do much more than deplete the numbers.”
“What a criminal shame.” She props her chin up on her fist. “Do you think you could convince the public to donate?”
Frank, with loathing that is at least, at this juncture, externalized, pulls his flat cap out of his back pocket. “It’s a question of volume,” he explains. “It really won’t hold more than one of those little hotel room bottles.”
She laughs. “Frank,” she says. “I do like our talks. Almost as much as I like our profit margins, when we have them. New order, in Brooklyn of all places. Six cases of Courvoisier.”
He slips the cap on. “Right away, boss.”
This makes Sadie smile, as always, quick and unprofessionally sharkish. “Yes.”
The train rattles, one long judgmental sound overhead, and it drowns out any potential response. Frank slips the envelope in his pocket, and heads out to see if, this time, no one will threaten him.
Day 4
Cognac--two bottles
Delivery before 3:30 PM, 93 St. Marks Place
“Delivery for a Miss Planchett,” Frank says, to the person who answers the door. The person puts a sticky hand in his mouth and pivots, slightly. “Do you know her? Taller than you, I’m assuming. Probably more verbal. Better at keeping her shoes tied, if she goes in for laces. Is any of this ringing a bell?”
The boy shakes his head from side to side. He takes his hand out of his mouth. “I’m six,” he says, announcing a major accomplishment.
“Well done,” Frank says. “One less than seven.”
The boy’s eyes begin to water. As if by magic, an older woman appears in the doorway, and scoops up his initial greeter before the boy can erupt. Frank straightens. “Delivery,” he says. “Miss Planchett?”
“That’s right,” she says. “You can bring it through.”
The boy squirms out of her arms as soon as they’re in the living room, and runs for a tin car in the middle of the room. He winds it up as Frank unloads the cognac, and when he releases it, the little car whizzes out of his hands and bangs up against the nearest wall. It rolls itself back a little, and appears to try again.
“So,” Frank says. There are things you are supposed to say in this situation. He knows, suddenly and categorically, that he doesn’t know any of them. He tries, “I see he still has... all his fingers.”
Miss Planchett pauses in the process of opening her wallet. “I’m sorry?”
“I said,” Frank says, but is spared the necessity of lying as a door creaks open and another piece of ambient noise resolves into a dog, thundering towards him. He freezes, like you’re supposed to do with bears, but the dog isn’t having it. It puts both its dog paws on his knees and furiously admonishes him.
Miss Planchett laughs. “What a scamp he is!” she says. “Down, boy!”
“Ha ha ha ha ha ha,” Frank agrees. “Down, boy! Sure is lucky that I’m not allergic. Down! Boy. Down!”
The dog finally drops, keeping a wary eye on him. “Good dog,” Miss Planchett lies. She passes him a ten.
The boy winds the car up again. This time it takes off for the molding on the living room door. Thunk. Ka-thunk. Thunk. It’s moving degree by degree towards the opening, and Frank, attention arrested, says, “Thanks.”
“I’ve always thought that if I wasn’t in childcare, I’d be in delivery,” Miss Planchett says wistfully. “You must get to meet so many interesting people.”
A final ka-thunk and the car is peeling for the kitchen. The dog barks, and goes barreling after it. Once, when he’d turned twenty, Frank had had a job in Buffalo, and he’d accidentally kicked a five year old, which had, in the eyes of the people in Buffalo, undone all of his hard work for some reason. He’d peeled out of there on the back of PJ’s motorcycle and thought, I am never going to ever take a job with a kid in it again. He’d been less of a stickler for adverb position in those days. He’d also thought at the time that, when you were in a hole, at some point the ladder descended.
“Dogs, too,” Frank says. “Ha ha ha ha ha. No? All right. That will be sixty-five without tip.”
Day 5
Rum--eight cases
Delivery before 2:00 PM, 36-42 Newark Street, Hoboken, New Jersey. Sam is sick, so you’ll have to take the van yourself. It can’t be that difficult, can it? Children do it.
Van. All right. There’s no reason he couldn’t drive a van. He has a drivers license, doesn’t he? No-- serious question. He digs his wallet out of his pocket. Frank blah blah Doyle, born etcetera, licensed to drive class A, commonwealth or whatever of New York. So, therefore, logically speaking, he can in fact drive this van.
He climbs into the driver’s seat. Pedals: check. Friendly looking knob: check. Steering wheel: present. Experimentally, he steps down onto the fat pedal, but nothing happens. Well, that’s it, then. It probably only responds to its master’s touch. Better leave it until Sam is back.
No. He’s not taking the train to Hoboken. It’s probably all muscle memory. He distinctly remembers someone else’s muscles being involved. He gets in again, and closes his eyes, the virtuoso pianist who has been cured by hypnosis, and the hand with the key drifts elegantly to the wheel pole and turns the car on. He opens his eyes, startled, in control of a monstrous beast of metal weighing easily ten tons, probably, and Sadie’s blonde friend, who has been standing in the doorway for the last ten minutes, begins to applaud. “I’ll thank you to keep your comments to yourself,” Frank grumbles. His foot eases onto a different pedal.
“Sorry, sorry,” the blonde says. “It’s just-- You do know you’ve got the parking brake on, right?”
“I assume,” Frank says, “from your tone, that that’s one of these buttons.”
“It’s the stick on your right,” she says helpfully. “You just push in the button on top and pull up, and bam! You’re all set!”
He tries this, and the van lurches forward a little. It would have been considerate of his muscle memory to include these details. “Since you’re evidently a car expert,” he says, “do you know if there’s a way to make this thing stop making that dreadful noise?”
“The engine?”
“No, but I understand the confusion.” He moves the lever, puts his foot on another pedal; the van stops inching ahead, and starts to crawl backwards, out of the garage. “The radio. The fellow who’s talking about outs. If there’s one thing I can’t stand,” stopping the van, “I’ll be very surprised. But I’m fairly sure radio broadcasts are on the list.”
“Button in the middle of the dashboard,” Sadie’s friend says, wisely.
Frank hits the button. Silence descends. “Donna, you have my infinite thanks.”
There’s silence from outside the van too. When he looks out, Donna says, a little cautiously, “I don’t know if we’ve actually been introduced, uh. Frank.”
“It’s possible I just remembered it from passing conversation,” Frank says, and then, immediately, “You’re right, it is absolutely not.”
“Definitely not,” Donna says. “...How do I know it’s...” She trails off, clears her throat. “Sorry. You need anything else about the car?”
“Not really,” Frank lies, bald-facedly. “Thank you so far.”
As he pulls out of the garage, he wonders if he should have mentioned that her fangs were out, or if that’d be untactful. She probably hasn’t even noticed.
Day 7
Gin--one bathtub, I assume. It’s for a speakeasy. They’ve asked that you bring it in unmarked bottles. I tried to plead the Twenty-First Amendment, but they just weren’t having any of it.
Delivery before 2 AM, 102 Norfolk Street
Frank wakes up to the touch of a cool hand on his face. He shifts, and the hand withdraws; then there’s a click as it sets down a glass of water next to his head.
“Don’t insult me,” he mumbles, still blinking, and his supervisor chuckles, but she doesn’t sound too happy about it. He wakes up the rest of the way.
“Frank,” Sadie says, “you can’t do that.”
She’s standing over him, her face shadowing the worst of the overhead light away from his. He’s at one of the desks at the dispatch office, and the empty bottle that brought him here is set on it, next to where he was asleep a minute ago. He wipes at his mouth and looks up properly.
“You haven’t said yes or no,” she says.
“No,” he says. “I know I can’t.”
She sighs, and combs her hair back. It’s always down, a long, fashionable fall, so he’s not sure why the sight of her knotting it expertly behind her head seems so-- “You’re staring, too,” she says, dispassionately.
“Sorry,” Frank says. He glances around. “What time is it?”
“Four,” says Sadie. “The security company called in an intrusion. I told them I’d asked an employee to come in late.”
He reaches for the water, but she covers the mouth of the glass, until he looks up at her again, this time probably with a somewhat different expression. She doesn’t look tired anymore. She looks exhausted; she looks like she’s been keeping all of her responsibilities and her plans pinned on with her nameplate. For the first time it occurs to Frank that they are both pushing forty.
“It won’t happen again,” he says.
“Well, no, Frank, I think it probably will,” she says. “But next time I’m going to have to fire you.”
“I know, Sadie,” he says. She lifts her hand away from the glass, and he downs it.
“How much of our liquor did you drink?” she asks, mostly in the spirit of scientific inquiry.
“Just this,” he says. He feels around at his feet, and finds the second bottle. “I hadn’t opened the accomplice yet.”
She unscrews it and pours herself a drink, downs it; pours herself another and sits down at the facing desk.
“You should go home,” she says, after he’s spent too long trying to think of the right thing to say. “Get a little sleep, Frank.”
“Yes, boss,” he says. He gets to his feet, brushes down his shirt. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
When he closes the door, she’s still sitting at the desk. Through the window, he can see her kick off her heels and put up her feet on the desk he’s vacated. She empties the glass. He turns off the hall light on his way out the door.
Day 10
Vodka--three cases
Delivery at 5:30 PM, 138 Delancey Street
Vodka--three more cases
Delivery at 8:00 PM, 138 Delancey Street, or “whenever Mr. Lansky and his friends run dry.” Mr. Lansky must not have many friends, mustn’t he? Be on call to repeat as needed.
Frank trips into the wall, knocks into the light switch, falls back into the light switch on purpose, sits down heavily on the bed. He leans forward. His feet are about a mile away.
Werewolf, says the back of his head, and he bangs that on the headboard. Mrs. Moskovitz from downstairs yells, “Keep down!”
It’s three a.m. There were better times for this to come back to him. Any of them, really. Plus, his feet are now the same distance they were originally. Rude. He tries again; struggles upright, struggles his chest down to his knees, rests his cheek on his left knee and gets a good look at his left shoe.
The thing about being this drunk is, he can acknowledge things he’d rather not think all the way through to the end, since he knows that the muffled remains of his train of thought won’t let him even try. That is a mixed metaphor. He is ashamed of himself. This shoelace feels like maybe it’s stuck, and he tries to apply his nails to the effort, discovering to his delight that they’re rough enough to get purchase. No manicure. Why would he have had a manicure? When has he had the... amount of money necessary to...
Left shoe off, with a thump. “Keep down,” Mrs. Moskovitz says again.
He knows he started drinking to forget. It’s just that he thinks it might’ve worked.
Right shoe. “The problem isn’t the werewolf,” Frank tells it. “The problem is the man who promised to kill me.”
That rephrasing has strangely not made him feel any better about the situation.
Frank’s attitude towards challenges was formed early, and hasn’t changed. That’s the power of habit. You get into a groove, and then one day you look up and you’ve worn the thing down into an actual trench, and maybe you’d be better off with a different one, but, well: this is the one you have. And yet he can’t remember what it is.
He’s a liquor delivery man. He’s never so much asked his boss what her real last name is. Mrs. Moskovitz is even now getting the broom because he lives alone in a flat with a floor made out of papier-mâché. The evidence suggests, really, that the way he deals with a problem is to put his head down, unplug the phone, and wait for it to go away.
“That doesn’t sound like me at all,” Frank says, and receives in return the thunderous applause of Mrs. Moskovitz banging on the ceiling.
Day 11
Beer, Frank, actual beer--three kegs (Kingsbury Pale, which is apparently a variety of the wretched stuff)
Delivery before 3:30 PM, Amsterdam and 72nd.
“Sadie Knickerhouse is the knuckleball from a forty-year-old washup. She’s the corkscrew on a Swiss army knife. She’s the Prospect Park stop on the BMT.”
Jones has been going like this for about ten minutes, if Frank is any judge of time, which it has to be admitted he is not, even a little bit, even when sober, which it also has to be admitted he isn’t. The PI has his face buried in a glass of the Kingsbury Pale, and it’s amplifying his rasp. There’s something half-finished about him tonight in general. Frank can’t really place it. Like he went out without his pants on, or his fedora at an angle. Something missing on his shoulder, at his heels.
“Jonesy,” Frank says, “I understand the metaphor you’re coming at, only bright spot in a waking hell, etcetera, etcetera, but do you not use the little magnifying glass in the Swiss Army knife?”
“Can’t stand it!” Jones barks. “Some things you don’t want to see up close! Plus the lens is way too tiny!”
“Fair enough.” Frank drains his glass, and lifts his hand for another. The bartender gives him the stinkeye. “I understand the confusion, but I didn’t call you here to cry over my supervisor.”
Jones frowns. “Then why’d you open the faucet?”
“Hurtful,” Frank observes. “No. It’s...” He shifts the empty to his other hand, then back. “A week and a half ago a gentleman told me that he’d come after me in twenty-six days. Fifteen days, now. He as much as implied it’d be curtains for me.” He sighs. “I think I need a hand.”
Despite Jones’ many good qualities, he’s all heart. He tilts his glass reassuringly towards Frank. “That’s what it says on the business cards. You want protection?”
Frank grimaces. “I hope not. I wanted to know if you might know why he was after me.”
Jones takes the time to think about it. “Not a clue,” he says, finally. “I haven’t been working anything that’d scare a guy up. I’ve got as much work as a show dog with a mohawk. You recognize him?”
Frank shakes his head. “Big man,” he says. “Yellow eyes. Snaggle-toothed. Plenty of muscles. And--I’m pleased to have the chance to use this--hirsute.”
“And he’s coming after you in two weeks?” Jones finishes his beer, and beats a pattern on the side of the cup. “What that sounds like to me is a werewolf.”
“I know!” Frank exclaims. “It really does, for some reason.”
“For some reason,” Jones agrees. “Only thing is, that puts you up a tree. And somebody’s kicked over the ladder.”
“Well, throw me a rope.”
“I got one, but it’s just enough to hang yourself with.”
“Better than hanging by a thread,” Frank says, and then, triumphantly, “Hah! Admit that was good. Never mind: don’t. What’s your idea?”
“His name,” Jones says, “is Bobo Brubaker.”
Day 12
Cider--three barrels
Delivery any time before 5:00 PM, 145 Bleecker Street.
Frank isn’t really given to mental descriptions of people he meets, in case it makes them stick in the mind, but for Bobo Brubaker he’ll make an exception. The man looks cheap: cheap haircut, cheap slacks, cheap tip shortchanging the bartender, cheap voice with a sort of laissez-faire attempt at good humor saying ‘Thanks’ for a cheap drink.
“Yeah, well, you’re the one wearing overalls, pal,” Brubaker says, turning around on his stool.
Frank brushes down his overalls, and takes a seat next to Brubaker at the bar. “I don’t think I said anything out loud.”
“You didn’t have to, man,” Brubaker says. “I can see right through you. You’re like a, like a window. Like a real clear window, made out of real breakable glass.”
“Thank you. The sentiment is mutual. Bobo, I’m curious, maybe it’s just me-- do you get a lot of people who punch you in the nose before they’ve had a conversation?”
Brubaker huffs. “No, man, people dig me. There aren’t enough cats who don’t dig me to fill a phone booth. I’m a groovy guy, you know?”
“I don’t know,” Frank says, definitively. “Also: don’t want to find out. I’ll take up as little of your time as is humanly possible. What do I do if I think I’m being chased by a werewolf?”
“Ohhhhh,” says Brubaker. Frank doesn’t like the sound of this. “Ohhhhhhhh ho ho.” Frank’s dislike intensifies. “Oh. So you’re being chased by a werewolf? You? God’s gift to man, huh? Chased by a werewolf. You.”
“Yes, we’ve established all of those facts,” Frank says. “What do I do about it?”
Brubaker leans back. This is probably supposed to look self-assured, but since he’s on a barstool, it just makes him look like he’s crunching his abdominal muscles too far. “Okay, sure,” he says. “Let’s say I do know something about this werewolf thing. Which I totally don’t. What’s in it for me, baby?”
“Well, you won’t be aiding and abetting,” Frank says. “There’s also the warm glow of helping out one’s fellow man, or so I’m told.”
“We’re not fellow men,” Brubaker says. “We--” The expression that comes over him is one Frank’s been seeing a lot of lately, and it makes his hangdog face more like a baffled Weimaraner than ever. He says, “I’m a great judge of character, okay?”
“...Sure,” Frank says, when it becomes apparent Brubaker thinks this is a real question.
“Yeah,” Brubaker says, with more confidence. “So the way you’re not on the level, it shows up on my radar, all right? So I know you’re not the kind of guy I ought to be helping out of a jam. Sorry, man. Can’t help it. Intuition. Radar.”
“All... right,” Frank says. “That’s just fine. Out of curiosity, when I’m, you know, murdered, can I send the cleaning bill for my viscera-covered suits to you? What’s your address-- Rikers Island?”
“Okay, that is uncalled for.”
“It really isn’t.” Frank reaches for Brubaker’s drink and takes a long, antsy swig. God, what is that, Wild Turkey? “How much?”
“A hundred,” Brubaker says. “Ten sawbucks. Twenty five-spots. A tenth of a large.”
“Bobo,” Frank says, “I don’t have a hundred.”
“Huh. Okay,” Brubaker says. “Here’s what a hundred will buy you. I’ll find out who you need to talk to, dig? A real expert. And I’ll, like, lay down for you who they are. And then we’ll never chitchat again. I mean, like, ever. That’s it. No refunds. And to, like, compare and contrast, here’s what no money will buy you: you’re gonna get eaten by a werewolf.”
“That’s fine. It’s been a pleasure,” Frank says, getting to his feet. “I warn you now, I will haunt your apartment, which is probably terrible, until you have to move to New Jersey.”
“Shows what you know,” Brubaker says triumphantly. “I already live in New Jersey.”
Day 13
Rye, Old Overholt--36 cases.
Delivery at 10:00 pm, 222 West 23rd Street, evenly distributed amongst the rooms to curb an outbreak of artistic temperament. I’ve brought the cases to the office so you can move them in shifts, and try to look nondescript or you’ll end up in a popular song.
“Sadie,” Frank says, “I can’t help but notice that you’ve purchased an adding machine.”
Sadie’s fingers pause in their tentative journey over the machine’s surface. “Taxes, Frank,” she says. There is a tone of loathing in her voice which he’s only ever previously heard in reference to mixers. “I’ve been informed that to ensure the smooth progress of this agency, I need to have some kind of record of its sales and intake and other abhorrent numbers--” she hits the add button with particular force “--in some arcane form that the Internal Revenue Service might understand. I had no idea they were so interested in my affairs.”
“Who wouldn’t be,” Frank says, sidling past with the first of the thirty-six cases. “Any way I can help?”
“No--” The adding machine vomits up its result, and Sadie frowns at it. “No. Not unless you can tell me what a ‘capital gains tax’ is.”
Frank lowers the case onto the trolley. “Well,” he says, thoughtfully, “a gain is an increase, and a capital is the political center of a state.”
“I tried that,” Sadie says moodily. “We haven’t gained any capitals. Or capitols.” She pronounces it with a long o, so that he can hear the distinction. “We’ve gained some capital, of course, but I don’t see how that’s different than income. And it’s all liquid.” She sighs, and pushes back her chair. “I’m at my wits’ end.”
“Understandable. What did you do last year?” Frank asks, sliding past her again.
“Last year, I...” Sadie says, and fumbles for the sheaf of paper. “Last year, apparently, I had... entirely different handwriting.” She turns the form sideways. “It’s very neat. I must have been keenly focused on my task.”
Both of those statements seem equally improbable. “Did you mark anything in the margins?”
“No,” she says, dubiously. “That wasn’t very kind of my past self, was it?”
“It’s a little heartless.” Frank puts case number two on a nearby desk, and comes to look at the form. Sadie’s perfume, generally a lingering creature, wanders over to keep him company.
He could explain the werewolf situation right now, he realizes, squinting at something that says Contributions paid. It probably wouldn’t even feel that out of place in the conversation-- menacing beasts of the outer world. He could ask her advice about Brubaker. Then he could explain to her that he promised a hundred dollars to a strange man because another man with hairy knuckles made some threatening remarks.
He says, at random, “I think it’s polite of them to make the text so small, so you know that you’re not supposed to actually read it.”
“Frank!” Sadie exclaims. “Of course!”
“Of course?”
“I couldn’t have filled this out with any attention,” Sadie explains. “Or I’d remember some portion of the experience. Therefore I must have filled it out automatically. I’m very skilled at automatic writing. I suspect.”
Frank smacks his forehead. “It seems so obvious when you say it now.”
Sadie closes her eyes, and extends her pen meaningfully above the form, and Frank places the second case on the trolley and wheels it out to the van.
“Come, you spirits,” Sadie’s saying, as the door shuts behind him. “Subtract me here.”
Day 14
Brandy--one case
Tequila--one case
Delivery not before 6:00 PM, 768 5th Avenue, Floor 20. Never mind; when I seemed inquisitive the man said that it was the Plaza Hotel, and we have a file on them the length of my arm, so I assume you know where it’s going. Do you? For some reason I didn’t recognize the order. He asked you to leave them in the lobby, and when I lodged a protest, he became very defensive. He told me that he was the boss around here [sic], so of course I informed him that I was the supervisor, which seemed to further stick in his craw. Do what the little man says, Frank, but this is really the last straw, probably.
Crespo’s actually in the lobby when Frank brings in the second case, waiting for an elevator. Against the striped wallpaper, he looks like a bad optical illusion. He jumps a little when he sees Frank, laughs, brushes back his slicked hair, shoves his hands in his pockets, says, “Heyyyy,” waits for Frank’s polite smile, and then, “Crespo. Wade Crespo. You know. That’s my hooch.”
“Mr. Crespo,” Frank says. He gestures at the trolley. “My supervisor said you wanted the liquor in the lobby?”
“Yeah,” says Crespo. “No-- I guess we might as well-- No. Wait. Hold on just a second.”
Frank waits, dutifully. Eventually he says, “The tequila’s reposado, Mr. Crespo. You don’t have to wait for it to age.”
Crespo’s back goes stiff. “I’m sorry?”
“Nothing, nothing,” Frank says. “My apologies.” He goes for the polite smile again. “Here, or up there, Mr. Crespo?”
“You can leave it here,” Crespo says. He hesitates, and pulls out his wallet; it is brimming with large bills. Frank watches as he picks out the most insulting denomination, which is apparently a fifty, and hands it over. A little counter in Frank’s head does its best to factor the tip out of that, and then tries, gamely, to multiply it into the rent. Is that five dollars towards the werewolf fund? Ten?
It isn’t until Frank’s outside that he gets that shrinking, itching feeling again, that tooth-humming uncertainty that says--
--that says--
--that says that he let Wade Crespo walk off with his stolen trolley. This will not stand. He rushes back into the lobby, and Crespo’s wheeling the thing to the elevator. “Wait!” he says. “Listen, mister, I need--”
“What?” says Crespo. He’s wide-eyed with terror. His fingers close over the handles convulsively, like he’s protecting a baby.
“All... right,” says Frank, backing away. “You know what? Keep it.”
Day 17
Amaretto, creme de menthe, Curaçao triple sec--do you think they’re making a pie?--one bottle each
Delivery at 4:00 PM sharp, 35 East 76th Street.
“A hundred bucks? You’re telling me a whole Benjamin?” Jones says. “That ain’t right.”
“You can say that again,” Frank says. “But please don’t.”
“Wouldn’t dare.” There’s a long, husky silence on the other end of the phone line, interrupted by some background rustling, and Frank shifts at his desk. The sun is slipping down outside. He’s got to go soon, before he repeats anything himself. Well, Frank, you probably will. ”How much have you got so far?”
“Thirty. But I think this might be--” Frank begins, and then a wailing noise begins on the other end of the line, which Frank thinks at first is an ambulance until it hiccups and begins again, at an even higher pitch.
“I can call thirty, but I can’t raise. I’m on stakeout,” Jones says. He evidently cups his hand over the receiver, because the scream dies down and his voice gets very muffled. “I got a hot tip on a shady doctor, so I pulled out my parasol and I made for the obstetrics ward. This isn’t like any case I’ve ever worked before. She’s one bad baby.”
“When are they ever not?” Frank says, and, “PJ, is that a metaphor or do you need my help to catch a newborn?” but the line goes dead halfway through. He puts the phone down, and gets to his feet.
Sadie’s left her automatic tax return on her desk. The boxes are still blank, but there's a message across its face in foot-high, Gothic letters. It says: CERTAINLY NOT.
Day 23
Ale--dark and light, and they’ve requested “all the cases we have”. You have to admire someone who doubles down on their mistakes. Don’t forget the loyalty Scotch.
Delivery at 5:00 PM, 15 East 7th Street.
“How was it?” Sadie inquires, as he makes his weary way back into the dispatch office. She’s straightening her desk, already in her coat and scarf and one black glove. She looks taller and more beautiful than ever, and she sounds extremely distracted.
He sets down his bag. He’d been in a room with fifty drunk Irishmen, next to a room with seventy drunk Irishmen, and they had explained that due to the vicissitudes of the market, they would not be able to tip him, but-- with a wink and a nod, for a son of a son of the isle-- they’d be happy to spot him a drink. Dark or light?
He’d accepted, of course, but still. “Boss,” he says, with a sigh, and knows it’ll be all right before he finishes the sentence, “I need an advance.”
“Of course,” she says. She taps her forms into an order, tax return on the top. “You can go into all the hock you’d like with me.”
Frank grins at her. “No questions?”
“Only about your harrowing night.”
“Worse than you could imagine.” He pulls out the Caol Ila. “They didn’t want the loyalty Scotch.”
“Didn’t want it?” Sadie exclaims. She stares at him, appalled. “Frank,” she says, “some people can’t be helped.”
“I know, I know,” Frank says. “Are we some people?”
“Heavens no,” she says. “Or-- well. I suppose-- drinking on the job. Driving, etcetera.” She sounds unconvinced. “No, I’m returning to my original answer. Pass me that bottle.”
He passes it over, and goes to get the tumblers, which he is not surprised to find that she keeps in her stationery drawer. “Do I have another job tonight?”
“Would you do it?” she asks, curiously. She measures out three fingers of whiskey expertly into each. His heart knocks in his chest. “Even after that Hibernian disaster?”
“If you sent me?” he says. “Even to Queens.”
She laughs, delightedly, and lifts her glass. The rings on her long fingers catch the light, and he reaches, instinctively, for his own. And brushes clean skin. He jerks his hand away. “Well, you’re in luck, Frank. I’m not sending you anywhere.”
“Then I’m definitely in luck,” he says, and it’s her turn to startle, her head tipping back. He’s thinking about retractions when she smiles. It’s that shark smile again. She really does have incredible teeth. And eyes: dark, and focused intently on him. And dimples. And an aspect, at the moment, of someone about to have dessert.
“Sadie,” he says, and she says, “Frank?”
Which is when the door bangs open, and Donna says, “Sadie, I am so sorry-- the train was just packed and I couldn’t get onto the first one at all, but I called the restaurant and I moved the reservation, so I think we can still make it. Honey, where’s your other glove?”
Sadie’s already wiped her face clean of whatever was happening. “Donna, I’ve absolutely no idea. I have scoured and scoured this room. Do you think I need to fortify my senses for the search?”
“I think you probably haven’t checked under the desk,” Donna says, knowingly, “because you didn’t want to get your nylons dirty.”
Sadie looks baffled. “Well, yes, of course not, but--”
Frank’s already on it. The glove is, as promised, under one of the desk pillars, and he hands it up to her, interrupting her explanation about poise and its components. Sadie takes it, and brushes it off, delicately, against her fur.
“Next time,” she says. “We’ll finish that drink.”
“Sure, Sadie,” he says, and Donna giggles, and drags Sadie out the door.
Day 26
Fernet--2 bottles.
Delivery “whenever, man,” 456 Bergen Avenue, Jersey City.
Bobo Brubaker answers the door when he rings the bell, but he keeps it on the chain until Frank counts his eighty-four dollars into his hand, individually. He sighs, exasperated, and unhooks the little slider and steps away, at which point Frank is confronted with a chest high ambiance of reefer smoke and hooked rugs. He comes cautiously inside, mostly so that he’s off the doormat, which says, HOLA.
“Wade and Aubrey Crespo,” Brubaker says.
“Thanks, Bobo. I always knew you had it in you to be...” Frank pauses, his coat half on. “I’m sorry, I thought you said--”
“Yeah. Those guys,” Brubaker says. His squinty little eyes sparkle. “What’s wrong? I thought you wanted a recommendation, man.”
Frank puts a companionable hand on his arm. “Bobo,” he says, “I’m not very good with names. Or faces. The folks I’m thinking of-- and I’m sure these are the wrong people, so just feel free to jump in at any time-- they live in the Plaza Hotel.” He waits expectantly. “Fashionable couple. Wade Crespo can’t get a sentence together to save his life. They leave their liquor on the ground floor where anyone can get at it. I was... really expecting you to cut in by now.”
“Nope,” Brubaker says. “Can’t cut in when you’re on the money. And you’re on the money. Like Andrew Johnson. Those Crespos.”
Frank has never had much to which he’s looked forward. It isn’t until now that he’s become aware that there’s a physical sensation when the last traces of hope leave someone’s body, like somebody’s gently pressing the air out of his lungs. “Oh,” he says. “They probably have... hidden depths.”
“Sure,” Brubaker says, agreeably.
“I’m going to die tomorrow,” Frank says.
After a moment’s thought he adds, “And I’m taking the second bottle as a tax.”
Day 27
Mike’s Hard Lemonade--one case
Cognac--one case
Delivery not before 6:00 PM, 768 5th Avenue, Floor 20. The Plaza Hotel, Frank, which we supposedly have a standing arrangement with. Do you recall anything about that? I’ve reviewed the files and I can’t think what I was doing. Frank, I’m putting my foot down, do not leave this liquor in the lobby. It’s just wrong. Whatever little hangups this gentleman has, he can have them on his own time.
The hangover is battering the back of his eyes when Frank arrives at the Plaza, and, unloading the van, for once in his life he does not do what Sadie tells him: he leaves the cases in the lobby. For one thing, he doesn’t have a trolley. Because-- because-- The idea goes slipping away from him. What was he even doing with a trolley in the first place? Where would he have picked it up? It’s hard to think of the answer to any question when it also takes all his focus to stay upright, not turn around, return to the back of the van, lie down until the remaining hours and, presumably, most of his organs also slip away. Then too there’s something about the stripes in the hallway wallpaper that seems to unsettle his insides.
The will o’ the wisp that haunts the Crespos’ apartment is smoking in the hall, and it tips its hat at Frank. Frank reaches up and remembers the cap with intense irritation. “Neither of us should be wearing these indoors, you know,” he says.
“It is always a pleasure to see you, Frank Doyle,” the wisp says.
“Why?” Frank asks, suspiciously.
“I, too, am lush. In the vocal sense,” the wisp says. “You presage great adventure for the Crespos, which, you know.” It coughs. “I’m into that.”
“Right,” Frank says. “Well, can you presage me inside? I don’t know how this works. I am rarely on the other side of these.”
“They’re still engaging in sparkling banter,” the wisp says. “Just a minute.”
Frank sighs, and turns fully to the wisp. “Look. You obviously know me fairly well.”
“Intimately,” the wisp says. It gives a disturbing wink.
“So,” Frank says. “Would I do something that could, theoretically, really annoy a werewolf?”
“Uh, wow,” the wisp says. It sounds a lot less lush. “I mean, yes. To be honest, frequently.” It hesitates. “Did you kidnap a toddler?”
“No.”
“Then it’s too difficult to narrow down.”
“Probably true,” Frank says. “Follow-up question: are you implying that I am the kind of person who would kidnap a toddler?”
“Your faults are many, Frank Doyle,” the wisp says. It puts out its cigarette and looks thoughtfully into his eyes. “You are lazy, thoughtless, self-satisfied and yet insecure. You confuse politesse with politeness, usually on purpose. You have closed your heart and your doors to the majority of mankind.”
“So you’re saying I’d kidnap a toddler.”
“I’m saying,” the wisp says gently, “you cannot entirely rule it out.”
The cigarette smoke lifts and fills the hallway, clearing away the lingering scent of Fernet on his shoes. It’s true: he knows hardly anything about himself. He remembers being young, and a blockhead, and then a heavy resistance to change, so he’s still a blockhead and no longer young, and to that he has added new faults, chief among them a tolerance for ale. He still hasn’t asked Sadie about her name. A man becomes a drunk, cuts all his roots, is too proud to get up, forgets how to put up a fight. It fits; it’s a compelling story.
On the other hand:
“I can definitely rule it out,” Frank says. “For one thing, thing A: childcare.”
“I don’t think you’re--”
“Childcare,” Frank says. “Caring for a child. Which I’ve kidnapped. Voluntarily. Absolutely not. Second, thing B: I am not a kidnapper. Or a murderer. Or an international terrorist.”
“Ah, but with your incomplete self-knowledge--”
“Are you saying that kidnapping a child is an edge case?”
The wisp looks shifty. “Is it not?”
“No!” Frank says. “Whatever metaphor you’re going for is extremely strained! And item three, C: I refuse to let you teach me a lesson about myself!”
“Actually--”
"Or whatever your malign purpose was with this Scheherazade impression," Frank amends. "I'm not interested! I know plenty about myself already--all right, no I don't, but I know one thing: I am not the man I was twenty years ago on some kind of-- of tape-delay. That man had a lot more muscle mass and a lot less savoir-faire. And don't think you can get around me with flattery!" The wisp having given up on trying to interject, he has to do it himself. "All that buttering me up about closing my doors. Well, it won't work. My door doesn't even lock properly and I spend most of my time knocking on other people's. I've got it down to an art. I happen to know that no matter how much you set up a barricade and try to give off an air of unapproachable solipsism, you always end up with house guests and solicitations and musical interludes. So for the last time, and-- I can't stress this enough-- without mentioning any kind of child abduction, would you cut off whatever agonizing banter is going on in there and let me in?"
The wisp knocks on the door. “So,” it says. “You’re probably not in the market for letting your soul slip peacefully into my clutches as you listen, mesmerized, to my cutting insights about your life.”
Frank folds his arms.
“Fine!” the wisp says, in a high sulk. And shoves him through the door.
There’s a moment of intense disorientation. There’s a moment of intense humiliation.
Frank clears his throat. “You have to help me.”
*
Day 28
He wakes up in darkness. Not total darkness; it’s two in the morning in Manhattan, and there’s enough light from the city to pick out the shapes in the bedroom. The bedside table, the swords on the wall, the cabinet standing ajar. Sadie to the right of him. She’s got hair in her eyes and her mouth, and she’s twisted the sheets all the way around her, so that--sorry, Jones--she looks like an ungainly moth halfway through a bad metamorphosis.
She’s blinking up at him now. “Frank,” she says, her voice blurry, and puts out a hand for his, or tries; it’s caught in the duvet cover. She frowns and tries again. Second time’s the charm. “Darling, did we dream that?”
“Which part?” he says, perhaps a little rougher than intended.
She yawns, and sits up a little, closing her fingers tighter. “Not that last part. Is your wrist all right?”
He flexes his other hand in the cuff. “Still comfortable.”
“Good,” she says. “Do you mind terribly if I keep you there till morning?”
In answer, he leans over to kiss her, pulling into the strain across his shoulder, and she kisses him back, a long, slow, Saturday kind, until he thinks he might be as forgetful as he was yesterday just on the strength of it.
“The hardest part to believe,” she says, afterwards, “is that I didn’t throw you down on the floor of that dreadful little operation on day one. But I suppose none of it really hung together.” Her nose wrinkles. “It was so full of these dizzyingly novel experiences. Did it seem that way to you?”
“No,” Frank says. He runs his finger over her collarbone. “The floor wasn’t very clean.”
“Frank,” Sadie says, again, and he chuckles a little. She smiles, stretches out on the bed. “I thought I was being so subtle about how much I liked saying your name.”
“You were,” Frank says. “You’re much subtler than me, and I always thought I was something of a hand in a velvet glove type of fellow. Did you really not know I adored you?”
“Only an inkling,” Sadie yawns. “I take it back, Frank! That’s the biggest hole in this entire improbable story.”
“Well, boss, in the future I promise to keep things straightforward.”
Sadie’s eyes flutter closed. “Oh, I miss that already. Let’s bring that back into our repertoire, don't you think?”
“Absolutely, boss,” Frank says, fervently, and bends down to her again.
*
George, I don’t know what to make of this. The guy called it in at four in the afternoon and said he needed it before lunch. I’m just putting the whole list down, you can sort it out.
768 5th Avenue, penthouse
- - Vodka: two cases
- - Rum: three cases (“assorted kinds”)
- - Gin: Caorunn: two cases
- - “Ice, probably”
- - Vaseline
- - Duct tape
- - Padlocks: two (“the door kind”)
- - “A delivery man not prone to stalking”
- - Scotch: Caol Ila