Hawk and I had walked peaceably into City Hall and up the elegant front stairway to sit with Tony Marcus and Brock Rimbaud in Boots's former office. Ty Bop and Junior stood silently in the hallway on either side of the door. I smiled at them as we went in. Neither of them seemed to notice. One of the big Palladian windows in the office was secured with plywood. The far corner of the big office was draped in polyethylene wrap. There were scorch patterns on the vaulted ceiling. The Gray Man sat behind Boots's former desk. Tony and his son-in-law sat in front of the desk.
"Mr. Mayor," I said courteously.
The Gray Man tipped his head.
"Things under control?" Tony said.
"For the nonce," the Gray Man said.
Hawk looked at me and silently repeated the word "nonce?"
"For whatever," Tony said. "Is it our city now?"
The Gray Man nodded.
"You going to run the town?" Tony said.
The Gray Man had his fingers tented in front of him, tapping his chin lightly.
"Until the mayor returns…"
Tony snorted.
"Or until a new mayor is duly chosen by the electorate."
"Or the city is in receivership," I said.
"But for now," the Gray Man said, and smiled faintly, "I am in control here at City Hall."
"So let's talk about plans," Tony said.
Sitting beside Tony, Rimbaud was jiggling his knee.
"You wouldn't be in City Hall," Rimbaud said, "wasn't for us."
Tony glanced at Rimbaud for a long, silent moment.
I did my always-popular Bogart impression.
"All the son-in-laws, in all the world…"
"What's that mean?" Rimbaud said.
"Means you need to be quiet," Tony said to him.
He looked back at the Gray Man.
"I want Brock to run the street business," he said.
Again, the Gray Man smiled fleetingly. Things amused him. But not a whole lot. He nodded.
"You met the supervisor?" Hawk said.
"You're so sure there is one?" the Gray Man said.
"You meet him?" Hawk said.
The Gray Man picked up the phone and spoke into it briefly.
In a moment, a door opened to the left of the polyethylene drapes and a tall handsome man came in, wearing a good charcoal-gray pin-striped suit. He had a nice short beard with gray in it, and his hair was longish and combed back over his ears.
"This is Mr. Johnson," the Gray Man said.
"A fine old Afghani name," I said.
Mr. Johnson smiled and walked to a couch to the right of the mayor's desk and sat down. He crossed his legs. He was wearing low black boots with silver buckles.
"It is a name which serves," he said.
There was no hint of any accent. He spoke English with the regionless precision of a television announcer. He glanced at the Gray Man.
"Like Mayor McKean's name," he said.
"Mr. Johnson," the Gray Man said, "represents our Afghani partners."
"My duties are consultive," he said. "Enhancing the product flow, one might say."
"How's it been flowing lately," Tony said.
"It has been a contentious time," Mr. Johnson said. "But the product has flowed."
"And keeps flowing?" Tony said.
"So far," Johnson said.
"Because of you?" Tony said.
"All of us have helped," Johnson said modestly. "I try to stay in the background, not call attention to myself. As you might well understand. I am not comfortable making myself known to so many people."
He looked around the room.
"But the mayor insisted," he said. "And the nature of the current situation…"
He made a small, graceful gesture with his manicured left hand, the nails gleaming, and dropped it back into his lap, where it resumed being motionless. Calm. There is calm that's dense, full of stuff kept motionless. Like Hawk's. And there's calm which is merely the absence of anything else. Like the Gray Man's. To me, Johnson seemed more like the Gray Man.
"The current situation is me," Tony said. "My son-in-law is going to run things for me."
Johnson's dark eyes rested silently on Brock for a time.
"Really?" Johnson said finally.
"Really, really, pal," Brock said. "This sucker's going to be a cash-fucking-cow."
Johnson nodded slowly.
"That's fine," he said. "Fine."
"So who do I see about product?" Rimbaud said.
"You would see me," Johnson said. "I'll have to modify the arrangement slightly." He smiled. "Change the locks, so to speak. Then I'll be back in touch with you."
As Johnson talked, Tony's eyes shifted back and forth from Rimbaud to Johnson to the Gray Man to me to Hawk and back to Rimbaud. Tony was far too cool to show anything on his face, but I suspected he wasn't comfortable.
"Then we're in business," Rimbaud said.
"We certainly are," Johnson said.
Rimbaud stood and put out his hand and Johnson took it. Tony looked at Hawk. Hawk didn't look back. Rimbaud pumped Johnson's hand for a time and then sat down, looking exhilarated.
"Will you be moving back into your office?" Johnson said, "on Naugus Street?"
"You bet your Afghan ass," Rimbaud said.
"Calloused, no doubt," Johnson said, "from so much camel riding."
"You fuckers actually ride camels over there?" Rimbaud said.
Tony looked up at the high ceiling.
"You'll call us there?" Tony said to Johnson.
"I will."
"Ask for me," Rimbaud said.
"Of course," Johnson said.
He stood and looked at Hawk and me thoughtfully.
"You gentlemen are not talkative," he said.
"No," Hawk said. "We not."
"The, ah, mayor, however"-he nodded at the Gray Man-"tells me you do good work."
"Yes," Hawk said. "We do."
"Well," Johnson said. "Here's to the new partnership."
"I'll drink to that," Rimbaud said.
Johnson nodded and smiled and walked out the way he had come in.
55
WE WERE ALONE with the Gray Man in the mayor's office. Tony had said not a word when Johnson left. He just jerked his head at Rimbaud and they departed. We all watched them go.
"Brock seems a lot more exultant about things than Tony," I said when they were gone.
"If this actually go down, then the Brockster be actually running it," Hawk said. "Tony knows he can't."
"But it's not going down," I said, "is it."
"I suspect Mr. Johnson understands Rimbaud's limitations," the Gray Man said.
"Ain't gonna see no more of him," Hawk said.
"Or you," I said to the Gray Man.
"Unless someone hires me to kill you," he said.
"Which one," Hawk said.
"Either."
"Hope they don'," Hawk said.
"As do I," the Gray Man said.
"Jesus," I said, "I may cry."
The Gray Man smiled his smile.
"I have no sentiment," he said, "and if employed to, I would kill you as promptly as possible. But I admire certain traits, and both of you have them in no small measure."
"Gee," I said.
Hawk said, "When you found Johnson, wasn't you supposed to kill him?"
"Ives had suggested that," the Gray Man said.
"Wasn't that why he gave you to us?" I said.
"I do speak Ukrainian," the Gray Man said.
"But you were supposed to use us to find the Afghan connection, and when you found him, you were supposed to ace him," I said.
"Yes."
"So," Hawk said. "You going to?"
The Gray Man shook his head.
"It would have ruined everything else if I did it sooner," he said. "And now"-the Gray Man shrugged-"he's gone again."
"And it pleases you," I said. "The way it's going to work out."
"It does."
"Hawk gets to clean up the people who killed Luther," I said.
"Except for Podolak," the Gray Man said.
"That will come," I said. "The city gets pretty well cleaned up of its, ah, criminal element, and Tony's kid gets to take over."
" 'Cept there ain't nothin' to take over," Hawk said. " 'Cause the Afghans have moved on, and when they come to ask you 'bout it, 'pears you done moved on, too."
The Gray Man said, "You sound like a minstrel show."