I let Pat take his time getting back to the questions again. They were all the same ones I had asked myself, but this time I had to give an answer.
"Why didn't you ever contact me, Mike?"
"I meant to, pal, I really did, but there was no urgency."
"Come on," he said softly.
When I looked up he was still watching me in that strange way. The expression was exactly the same as the one he had worn the last night he saw me in the hospital. It was my ninth day in the place, I was up and around, but still hurting like hell. Sleep hadn't helped any either...
...my head still full of the wild banging of handguns and the crazy booming of shotguns, echoing across the pier, flame belching right past my face and even though I didn't feel the impact of the slugs that took me down I could remember the numbness and the slow drifting away that began to smother me. The face was there, too, blood smeared across the Bonetti kid's mouth, tight in a mad grin as he poked the barrel of his .357 against my forehead and said, "Die, you bastard," as he started to squeeze the trigger but he shouldn't have taken the time to say it because the .45 in my fist went off and his finger couldn't make the squeeze because the brain that should have sent it signals shut off like a switch as Bonettis head came apart in crimson chunks like a target-range watermelon.
And now, a year later, I sat in a familiar restaurant with my best buddy and my pulse rate had almost doubled and my breath was caught in my throat.
Damn.
"I got tired, Pat," I said. "I got tired of the whole goddamn mess."
"That kid was a fucking psycho killer. But he did us a favor, losing his cool—or maybe you did us the favor by goading him into that play. Shit. We wiped out damn near half the Bonetti family that night."
"And what good did it do, Pat? Twice the volume of drugs has come into the States since."
"But apparently not the Bonettis doing it," he said with a shrug. "That still leaves five families. Used to be six, till you squeezed the Evello bunch out, ten years ago. Anyway, that's ancient history."
I took another pull at the beer. "Sure. And all the assholes who want to get noodled up on poppy juice make it profitable for 'em. More power to the pricks."
"No. No attitude problem for you."
This time I finished off the beer and put the mug down. I waved for a refill and the waiter took the empty away. "I'm just plain tired of the game, Pat. I haven't got an attitude problem. I haven't got an attitude. Period."
The gray eyes turned placid. He smiled just a little. "Good."
I frowned at him. "And before you ask, let me tell you something. I haven't lost my nerve. It's just that it's finally occurred to me that tilting at windmills doesn't matter a damn in this lousy life. Let somebody else do the dirty work—like you cops, for instance."
"I been waiting years to hear this. Don't stop now."
"I have stopped. I'm not in it anymore. I haven't got the slightest faintest fucking desire to get wrapped up in that bundle of bullshit again. I've done it, it's past me, I'm retired."
For a full minute Pat went on eating, then nodded sagely. "And maybe it's for the best."
It was his tone of voice that made me ask, "What're you not saying?"
His eyes came back to mine. "Right now there's relative peace on the streets. After you wiped out young Bonetti, everybody thought the old man would try to lay a hit on you, and if it didn't take, you'd come roaring back at him with one of those wild-ass shoot-outs that you were so damn famous for. Hell, that's why we kept you under wraps in the hospital ... until you slipped out on your own."
"Don't lay any blame on the uniforms guarding me—I'm still not that easy to babysit."
"I didn't. I don't."
"So what's Papa Bonetti think about it now?" My second beer came and I sipped the head off it. "Is there still a contract out for this old dog?"
"Not to our knowledge." He shrugged. "We took out so many of his men, and you killed his son—Alberto's a broken man. Sitting out his final years at his Long Island estate, and at that old social club. He's out of the business."
"Balls."
"Okay, so maybe he's not as retired as he says. I mean, somebody's distributing the stuff."
"But not the Bonetti family."
"Far as we know, they aren't major players in narcotics. They may still have some fingers in the racket, but their strong suits are loan-sharking and gambling. On the other hand, I don't think Alberto Bonetti's losing sleep over evening the score with Mike Hammer."
"You sound sure of that."
"I am. We went through some back channels and put the question to him. As far as he's concerned, the incident is closed. His boy Sal was a hothead who aimed higher than he could reach. The kid's dead, his pop's staying under the radar, maybe retired, maybe not. Either way, any more shooting would be bad all around."
I paraphrased the Capone quote I'd shared with Marty: "Lousy for business."
"And it would make our current administration very uneasy, as well."
"I'll bet," I said sourly.
We both went back to our corned beef, the noise around us building up as the bar crowd made its way back to the tables. It was a scratchy sound now, an irritant. I had been away from it too long, much too long, and a scene I once found comforting only annoyed. They sounded like a bunch of damn kids at a ball game, and Pat and I tried to cover it with our own grown-up conversation.
But there comes a time when the small talk fades and all you do is sit there looking at each other, wondering how to work up to the main event.
I said, "What happened to Doolan, Pat?"
His frown had a ragged edge to it, as if he didn't like the way it was going to sound. "I told you. He killed himself."
"Bullshit."
He lifted a palm, like he was swearing in at court. "That's what I thought when I first saw the report. Doolan was never the suicide type."
"Damn well told. There's no way you're going to make me believe that."
The gray eyes had a weariness now. "Suicide isn't really the right word, Mike."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
Pat sat back. "Physically healthy men who can't cope, and just plain give up and shoot themselves—that's suicide."
"So?"
"So a week ago Doolan had a final report from his doctor. He had a terminal cancer, and was about to go into the final stage. At best, he had about three months to live, and it was going to be a rough downhill ride all the way. He'd wanted to know the truth and the doctor pulled no punches—each day the pain would be worse and there was no way they could stop it."
I knew where Pat was headed.
He went on: "When the doctor confirmed what Doolan suspected, he went home and began putting his affairs in order. Got his will out of a lockbox and laid it out on his desk. His granddaughter gets most everything—the beach house, his insurance, and two fairly expensive paintings he'd bought years ago."
"Doolan buying paintings?"
"Don't laugh, Mike. Their value had gone up many times since their purchase."
"Who else was on his list?"
"The Patrolmen's Benevolent Association and a small bequest to an old buddy in a nursing home in Albany. From his desk, he called a cemetery on the Island and bought a short plot out there, and left a note to that effect attached to the will. It was dated the same day he died."
"Typed?"
"No. It was in his own handwriting and signed. No doubt about it being authentic."
"He did this on the day he died. And he left no other note?"
"No, Mike. But he shot himself, all right."
"Shot himself. And suicide isn't the right word?"
"Let's say it was deliberate self-destruction. Self-administered euthanasia." His shrug conveyed sorrow. "He was cutting out while he still had control."