"You know you never should have brought him in," I said. "The kid's a liability."
"The kid's a friend, Sam."
"Yeah," I said, "same thing."
Dumas, it turns out, was as good as his word — two weeks after our meeting at Mulgheney's, we got a call from the research group at Bellevue. They said that they had an opening in their program, and that Elizabeth looked to be a perfect match. She couldn't believe her luck. I hadn't told her that Dumas had promised to get her in, so worried was I that he wouldn't deliver. In fact, I hadn't told her much about the meeting at all — I didn't have to. She was so over the moon I'd found a job, she didn't care much what it was. Which was fine by me, since I couldn't have told her what it was yet if I'd tried. I hadn't heard a word from Dumas since our meeting, and were it not for the call from Bellevue, it may as well have never happened. In retrospect, I'm sure that was all part of his plan. Once he had Elizabeth to use as leverage, he knew he had his hooks in me but good — there was nothing I wouldn't do to get her well.
I got my first call less than twenty-four hours after they'd admitted Elizabeth to Bellevue. The assignment was simple enough: just pick up a package and drop it in a locker at Penn Station. I was given a car, an address, a time and date. The car was a '42 Studebaker. The address was on the waterfront. The time was 4am. I guess that shoulda clued me in that something was hinky, but those were different times. Least, that's what I like to tell myself. Sometimes, it seems to me the times haven't changed that much at all.
When I arrived at the pier, all was quiet. Though sunrise was still an hour away, the morning air was already stifling, and my clothes clung heavy to my skin. A cargo ship sat, moored and lightless, at the far end of the pier, a ramp jutting upward to her deck. I hobbled toward her, my progress tracked by a trio of crewmen who lounged smoking amidst the shipping crates that were scattered along the wharf.
By the flag flying from her mast, the ship was registered in Jamaica, but the crew mostly didn't look the part. Their appearance and the occasional snippet of Spanish that drifted to me through the still morning air led me to guess that Mexico had been this ship's last port of call. No one addressed me as I approached, nor did they object as, hesitantly, I mounted the ramp and limped upward toward the deck.
On the ship, I was greeted by a dark-skinned boy of no more than sixteen, who led me wordlessly to the captain's quarters, knocking twice on the open door before ushering me inside. The captain was a wiry man with eyes and skin of deepest brown, and an accent to match the flag atop the mast. He sat behind a massive wooden desk, scarred and pitted — and stacked high with books and charts. He didn't rise when I entered, and as I approached to shake his hand, he waved me off, instead nodding toward a worn leather suitcase standing just inside the door.
"I believe that is what you came for," he said. "Now take it and get the hell off my ship."
His tone was angry, to be sure, but the quaver in his voice belied the strength of his words. This man was afraid, I realized. Of me. Of Dumas.
Unsure how else to respond, I did as the captain said, retreating from his cabin without another word. The suitcase was heavy, and cumbersome as well. Twice as I descended the narrow ramp to the wharf, I stumbled, and nearly fell. But if the crewmen watching from behind the glowing embers of their cigarettes found my lack of grace amusing, they sure as hell didn't let on — there was nary a snicker or chiding comment to be had. It seemed the captain was not the only one who was frightened by my new employer. I was beginning to wonder if I ought to be as well.
It was just past 5am when I arrived at Penn Station, suitcase in hand. A far cry from the modern monstrosity now crammed like an afterthought beneath the hulking behemoth of Madison Square Garden, the old station was a soaring structure of glass and granite, its imposing colonnades oddly out of place alongside the deserted sidewalks of early morning. I left the car at the curb and wrestled the suitcase inside.
According to the board, the first train of the day — an overnight from St Louis — wasn't scheduled to arrive for another twenty minutes. Aside from an old man in coveralls, pushing a mop around like he didn't give a damn if the floor got clean, the concourse was deserted. A bank of lockers sat along the far wall, and I dragged my payload toward them, wincing as I heard my awkward, shuffling gait repeated back to me as it echoed through the vast empty space.
When I reached the lockers, it was clear I had a problem: with its stiff outer frame, the suitcase was just too damn big. No way was it gonna fit. But I wasn't about to blow my first assignment, so I decided to improvise. I'd just empty the contents of the suitcase into the locker, and drop the empty suitcase off when I returned the car and the key.
When I unzipped the suitcase, a sudden vinegar tang tickled my nostrils, and something else as well, earthy and unpleasant. It put me in mind of Mission Street out in San Francisco, where the hopheads used to beg for change to support their habits. The case was stuffed with paper bags, each dotted with oil spots and wrapped around something the size and shape of a brick. I took one out and looked inside. A compressed block of yellow-brown powder stared back at me, confirming what my nose had known all along.
Heroin. Musta been fifty grand's worth, maybe more. Whatever it was worth, it was more money than I'd see in a lifetime, that's for sure.
And there was something else for sure, too: no way was I gonna stand here in full view of anybody who cared to look and unload this thing into a locker. Which meant if I didn't figure out what I was gonna do with this shit and quick, I was pretty well screwed.
Footfalls echoed like gunshots through the concourse. I dropped the bag back into the open suitcase and wiped my hands off on my pants. Three bleary-eyed kids trotted past, dragged by their mother toward the platform, no doubt there to greet their father upon his return from St Louis. My eyes tracked them for a moment, but they never gave me a second glance. I zipped the suitcase and lugged it back through the station to my waiting car. I circled the terminal until I hit Eighth, and then I headed northeast toward Mulgheney's.
Dumas and I were gonna have ourselves a little chat.
The walls of the narrow corridor seemed to tilt and sway by the light of Anders' match-like reflections in a funhouse mirror. I followed behind him in the darkness, dragging one hand along the wall beside me to orient myself. The air around us reeked of moisture and rot, and the concrete beneath our feet was cracked and chipped — and littered with pots and pans and empty cans of God knows what, their labels faded to sallow obscurity.
Match burned flesh, and Anders cursed, dropping it to the floor. The match's flame guttered and died, plunging us into total darkness. My heart thudded in my chest as I remembered the eyes of the false WaiSun, their blackness so absolute it reduced all thought of light to the fleeting recollection of a half-remembered dream. I clenched my eyes against the panic and willed my heartbeat to slow.
We were three blocks and seven stories from the rooftop, in the basement storeroom of an abandoned restaurant. It looked like they'd ditched the place midrenovation; the stenciled storefront window read Molly's, but the lettering was only half filled-in, and the entire storefront had been papered over with yellowed pages from the New York Post, the headlines eight months old. The front door was chained shut, but Anders led me around back to a secluded alley, wheeling aside a small dumpster as far as its chain would allow, to reveal a sidewalk-level service entrance, one scarred and rust-flecked corner peeled skyward just enough to get a grip. Anders grasped the corner with both hands and jerked it upward. Rusty metal squealed in protest, and then gave. Once we clambered inside, he bent the door back into place, reducing the bright afternoon sun to a mere trickle, watery and insubstantial. By the time we rounded our first corner, even that faint light disappeared, and we were reduced to traveling by match-light.