"I see you're OK, Doc. Anything happen?"
"Nah."
"For a minute I was worried. I was listening to the VHF a minute ago; there was an explosion not far from here. For a second I thought you-"
"Where?"
"Some boat ten miles offshore from here. Blew apart and sank."
"Was her name Coquette?"
"How'd you know?"
"I'll bet you that blue and white boat we saw last night had something to do with it. Did anyone report seeing it'?"
He shrugged his shoulders and then asked what all the blankets were for.
"To cover the bodies, you dummy. Listen, thanks for calling for help. Can you make it back to Cape Ann alone? I gotta go home and rest. I've been puking and bleeding too much."
At home I hugged Mary hard and lowered most of myself into a warm bath. I sat there and soaked and poured a hot toddy into self, telling her everything. She stared wide-eyed at me, shaking her head slowly, murmuring. Then I crawled into bed and passed out. I awoke in late afternoon.
The phone rang. It was the Globe. They wanted the story on how I'd smashed the gun-running ring. I told them to speak with Brian Hannon. That would keep them busy. It rang again. It was a man with a husky voice and thick accent.
"Gott-damn good, Doc! You chop them up really good, eh!"
"Who the hell's this?"
"Roantis."
"Hi, Liatis."
"You chop them up real good. Nice"
"I heard you were in some kind of trouble. Tommy told me. You OK now'?"
"Hmmm. I got to go to trial. Dat's all."
"How's the uh, guy you hit?"
There was an uncomfortable silence. I heard him sigh in a resigned way.
"Well Doc. I gott some bad news I tink-"
"Oh God. You mean he's dead?" `
"No. He lived."
"Now c'mon, Liatis-"
"No dat's the bad news. He dint die. I'm getting too old to fight I tink. But other real bad news, Doc. The boy was killed with you, he was Tomrny's nephew."
I sat up in bed. I felt too weak to hold the phone.
"Liatis, don't kid me."
"ReaIly, Doc. It was Tommy Desmond's li'l nephew. The cops they found out it was Larry Heeney."
"I didn't know Tommy even had a nephew."
"I dint either. But he was."
"Tommy's gonna kill me, Liatis. But honest, I didn't-"
"No Doc. He's proud of you. Dint you know where those guns were going?"
"Uh huh. They were going to Ireland,. to be used against the Republic-"
"Yeah Doc. That's what Tommy told me. They been after this bunch for years now. And that man was with you, who was also shot?"
"Stephen O'Shaughnessey-"
"Yeah. He is with the Irish police I tink."
"Right. And who told you all this stuff, Liatis?"
"Ask Tommy; Desmond. But I tink you did real good, Doc. Nice job the way you chop them 'up."
"Thanks, Liatis. You've made my day."
I lay back in bed and stared at the ceiling. I wondered what Tommy Desmond had to tell me. How much had he known all along about the IRA's operations in America, especially in Boston and Southie? But I didn't have long to consider it because the phone rang again. It was Brian Hannon, telling me the press was all over him and his staff, and could I get down there, too, because I was in part responsible for cracking the whole thing. In part… "
"In part? Gee, Brian, I'm glad you saw fit to mention my name."
"Hey c'mon, haven't I always given you a fair shake?"
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
I finally had my brother-in-1aw right where I wanted him: in the rearmost booth of Frankie Caeserids Happy Landings saloon in Marblehead, Mass. We were busy killing brain cells. When I estimated the Body Count was to my liking, I was going to make a suggestion to him. The proverbial "offer he couldn't refuse."
It was three-thirty, peee emmm. The few sailing boats left in Marblehead Harbor rode on the gray slick outside the picture window of the Happy Landings. A bevy of local housewives were drinking and laughing up front, at the stand-up bar. They all had tennis outfits on, having no doubt just come from lessons given at one of the indoor clubs. They wore little skirts that flipped up when they wiggled their hips, and showed their panties underneath. Joe and I liked this, and kept our eyes glued on the set of thirtyish women, some with tipped hair, who shook and strutted at the old-time men's bar. We waited-like buzzards on a limb-for a glimpse of the curve of buttocks, the smooth sweep of inner thigh, the bounce and jiggle of bosom.
Middle age is a terrible, terrible affliction. Thank God Senility, Decrepitude, and Death put a stop to it.
"Another drink, gentlemen?" asked the cocktail waitress, who had a pretty interesting outfit herself.
"Gee…" Joe began, "I really don't think-"
"Sure, why not? I'm buying. Two more of the same."
She grinned and took the two tall-stemmed glasses back with her. She switched away from us, wearing an exaggerated (and, I might add, extremely abbreviated) eighteenth-century maid's uniform. It was sexist and tacky and revealing. It was extremely popular. I saw she was wearing the shiny pantyhose that I like so much. The ones worn by barmaids and stewardesses on the less-well-known airlines. The ones that catch all the shiny highlights of the legs, and feel slick to the touch if you happen to brush across them. The ones Mary maintains are cheap and tawdry. Yep, they're my favorite.
Via several longish talks with O'Shaughnessey, I'd found out a lot about the Kincaid/Schilling outfit during the past week. Some of the interesting stuff confirmed early suspicions I'd had. For example, the Laura Kincaid/James Schilling affair. Perhaps it was Laura Kincaid's expensive face 1ift operation and her desire-her fetish rather-to remain imperially slim that planted the initial seed of suspicion. Certainly it was remarkably parallel to Schilling's quest for physical perfection and eternal youth. Walter Kincaid had borne the affair for some time with an almost parental patience and aloofness. But finally his pride and possessiveness forced him to fire Schilling. The fact that his wife didn't file for divorce and follow her lover must have told Kincaid something, i.e., that she placed extreme value on her plush surroundings. To give up Walter Kincaid was to part with the fortune he'd made. So they lived together much as she had described when we first met, with her taking off for long-and not-so-secretive-weekends with Schilling while he spent his spare time aboard the Windhover searching for artifacts and treasure.
"So what made Schilling pull the disappearing act in Alaska?" asked Joe as he cradled his third whiskey sour, which had just been placed in front of him.
"Because he'd just made contact with an old army buddy of his who'd pulled the first of a series of armory heists. Schilling was attracted to breaking into armories for several reasons. One, it allowed him to hurt the army, which had given him a D.D. and hurt his chances for landing any decent job. The fact that Kincaid overlooked it, or didn't know about it, was perhaps the only reason he got as far at Wheel-Lock as he did. Second, one of Wheel-Lock's biggest contracts ever was obtained during the early Vietnam buildup. Wheel-Lock designed the complex locks and security devices for armories. Since Schilling knew the systems and locks, he knew how to get around 'em."
'And by disappearing he could be more mobile and invisible."
"Yep. And leave his wife and be with Laura. I figured he came back to New England shortly after his 'death' on the Kenai Peninsula to make contact with arms buyers. Right away he uncovered two hungry sources with lots and lots of dough: The French Separatists in Quebec and the Irish Republican Army. According to O'Shaughnessey he'd even trucked with the Mob for a while, but found that too risky, or scary. Dealing with foreign buyers was cleaner, safer. But there was one thing he needed badly to do it right: a boat. He didn't have the money for one big enough to range as far as he wanted."