“You’re kiddin’ me?” I said. “That’s too bad.”
“I don’t think so,” Gil said. “I mean if the guy is really sick enough to steal money from his own father, who cares what happens to him?”
“Yeah, I guess that’s true,” I said. “But what I meant is it’s too bad for Frank. It’s just a fucked-up situation any way you look at it.”
Gil and I took a few more drink orders and then the crowd started to thin out. I was going to take a break, maybe get something to eat in the kitchen, when two cops came into the bar. They weren’t the same cops from the other day. One of them was a thin white guy, about my height. The other guy was short, black and heavy. I didn’t have time to think about what was going on. The black cop came right up to me at the bar and said, “Is Frank O’Reilley here?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “Why? What’s this all about?”
“It’s personal business. We need to talk to Mr. O’Reilley right away.”
Gil came over. “Frank’s in the office, in the back. Just walk straight back and it’s the first door on the right.”
“What do you think’s going on?” Gil said to me.
“Probably just more about the robbery,” I said. “Maybe they found the guy who did it.”
Gil went to take an order and I poured myself a pint of Sam Adams. I chugged half of it, but it didn’t relax me. I was trying to think of all the reasons why the cops could be here, except the one reason I didn’t want to think about. I hoped it had something to do with the robbery, but if it had to do with Debbie maybe it wasn’t as bad as I thought. Maybe Frank had just reported her missing. That would make sense, after he woke up this morning and she wasn’t in bed next to him.
I started to feel better. There was no way they could’ve found her so fast—not where I left her.
The cops returned from the back and left the bar without looking over at me. They looked serious, like they’d just told a guy his wife was found dead in some half-frozen swampland in Brooklyn. Then Frank came from the back, crying like he was at a funeral, and I knew I was right.
He had his coat over his shoulder and he was heading toward the door. I went over to him, cutting him off.
“What’s the matter?” I asked. “What’s going on?”
He looked at me. His face was ugly and tears were streaming down his cheeks.
“She’s dead!” he screamed. “She’s fucking dead!”
Blondie was singing “Heart of Glass” and it was so loud in the bar that only the people who were standing close by were paying attention to us.
“Who?” I said.
“Debbie,” he said crying. “I gotta get out of here.”
“What do you mean, ‘dead’?” I said. “What’s going on?”
“I gotta go,” Frank said, crying harder now. “The cops are gonna take me to ID the body.”
“Where?”
“Brooklyn.”
“What?”
“Lemme outta here.”
“This is crazy,” I said. “There’s gotta be some mistake.”
“It’s not a mistake!”
“How do you know?”
“She didn’t come home last night. She—just lemme get the hell out of here.”
Frank left the bar. Through the window, I watched him get into the police car with the two cops and drive away.
I knew I’d played it good. Frank was such a mess now, he couldn’t think straight about anything. Later on, when he started to calm down, he still wouldn’t suspect me. He’d think some guy she met in one of those personal ads killed her. And if he did suspect me, he’d remember how I’d acted when he was leaving the bar to go ID the body. He’d remember how I was just as surprised as he was, saying all the things that innocent people usually say.
When I went back to the bar, I told Gil what was going on. He didn’t believe me at first—I had to tell him three or four times. Then, his eyes starting to tear, he said, “Man, I can’t believe this. The poor guy. Jesus.”
“It’s so fucked up,” I said sadly, shaking my head.
Gil asked me if I thought we should shut down the bar tonight.
“I don’t think so,” I said. “Frank didn’t tell me we should do that and, besides, maybe that wasn’t Debbie’s body they found out there. Maybe she’ll walk right in here any second.”
I went into the kitchen. Rodrigo was there, talking in Spanish to the Mexican dishwasher. They shut up when they saw me.
“Excuse me, can I talk to Rodrigo alone for a second?” I said to the dishwasher.
The kid gave me a dumb look, like he didn’t understand English. Rodrigo translated then the kid left.
“What do you want for me?” Rodrigo said.
“From me,” I said.
Rodrigo started to leave.
“Hold up a second, all right?” I said. “I wanna have this out.”
Rodrigo stopped, waiting for me to go on.
“We both work here, right?” I said. “So what’s the point of going around, acting like we hate each other? I don’t know about you, but I think it’s a big pain in the ass. The way I look at it, we both made mistakes, so why not just clear the air and forget about it? I don’t know about you, but I’m not holding a grudge—I have no hard feelings. So what do you say, Rodrigo? Are we amigos?”
For a few seconds, Rodrigo just stood there, not saying a word. Then he said something in Spanish and walked out of the kitchen.
I was worried about Rodrigo. I didn’t think he’d rat on me and risk being deported, but I’d have to keep an eye on him just in case.
I cooked myself a couple of thick burgers, then I went back out front. It was starting to get busy again so I went up to the bar to give Gil a hand. Gil had obviously broken the news to Kathy. She was in bad shape, crying, and I told her not to worry—everything would be all right.
I knew that the police would be by the bar at some point tonight, probably after Frank ID’d Debbie’s body, but I wasn’t worried about it. It was bad luck that they’d found her so fast—at first, I had to admit, it scared the shit out of me—but now I knew it didn’t really mean anything. The police still wouldn’t have any idea who’d killed her because there was no evidence. Just to be safe, later tonight I’d clean the rest of the mud out of my car, and then I’d just keep on doing what I was doing and everything would work out fine.
I wasn’t even worried when the Eyewitness News truck pulled up in front of the bar and a female reporter I recognized from TV came inside with a guy holding a camera. Everybody was watching when the woman came up to me at the bar.
“I’m Marcia Cole from Eyewitness News. Do you work here?”
“Yeah,” I said.
“Did you know Deborah O’Reilley?”
“Sure I knew her.”
“Would you like to make a comment for our cameras?”
“All right,” I said. “Why not?”
Gil lowered the music and asked everybody in the bar to quiet down. The cameraman shined a bright light on me and said, “Rolling.” Then, sticking a big mike in my face, Marcia said, “Did you know Deborah O’Reilley well?”
“Not too well,” I said. “But we talked whenever she came into the bar.”
“Were you surprised to hear that something like this happened to her?”
“Very. I just can’t believe it—I just can’t. She always seemed so happy, like she didn’t have an enemy in the world. This is really a shock. It’s just a shock, that’s all I can say.”
“Do you think this murder has anything to do with the robbery of the Super Bowl money from the safe the other day?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “I don’t see how it would.”
“Do you think Deborah O’Reilley’s stepson, Gary O’Reilley, had anything to do with the murder or the robbery?”