Kebar checked his rearview mirror, said,
“He’s been hanging around a schoolyard on the Lower East Side, getting ready to snatch another kid, they let this piece of garbage walk after two years, you believe it?”
I closed the file, the pictures of the kids he’d hurt were gruesome, I asked,
“What are we going to do?”
Kebar smiled, said,
“Gonna have a wee chat with him, isn’t that what you Micks do... chat?”
We got to the playground and sure enough, sitting on a bench near the school was a lone figure, huddled in an army coat. Kebar said,
“He’ll have a camera in that coat and candies.”
I had to know, asked,
“How are we going to handle this?”
Kebar, sliding out of the car, said,
“Head-on, like a collision.”
Casey watched us coming, his eyes considering flight, but he opted for defiance.
Bad idea.
Kebar said,
“They let you out, huh?”
He didn’t look like a monster, but then they rarely do. He was slightly built, more like a lower-level clerk than the freak who’d done what I’d seen in the file.
He looked at Kebar, said,
“I’m cured, took the therapy in the joint and I’m all well now.”
Kebar sat beside him, his body relaxed, no aggression showing, said,
“That so, then... how come you’re hanging around a schoolyard, huh, academic interest?”
Casey was staring at me, trying to gauge how much of a threat I might be, then said,
“Just proving to myself I’m cured, that I can come here and not be tempted to... you know?”
Kebar looked at me, said,
“He means, he won’t have to grab a kid and stick his dong in them, or what was your special gig, oh right, making a five-year-old suck your shlong?”
Casey looked offended, said,
“No need for such abusive... language, I was sick then.”
Kebar was almost smiling, real bad omen, and said,
“And the kids you fucked, you think they’re all better now?”
Casey hung his head, said,
“I suffer deeply for who I was then.”
Kebar reached in his jacket, took out the Glock, let it lie loosely in his lap, said,
“This here, it’s a hell of a piece.”
And Casey got smartass, jibed,
“You gonna shoot me, Officer?”
The mockery in his voice showed me the face he kept hidden most of the time.
Kebar said,
“You ever hear of a guy getting shot in the ankle? See, the beauty of that is, how could it be planned? Who shoots someone in the ankle? And guess what, the ankle never sets properly, you get to hobble for the rest of your miserable life.”
Casey was openly defiant now, looked at me, asked,
“This guy for real?”
Kebar shot him in the ankle, stood up, said,
“Better call the paramedics, ol’ Casey won’t be attending school today, tell you what, buddy, I’ll write you a sick note.”
Looked at me, said,
“Let’s roll, partner, our work here is done.”
We got back in the car and I said,
“Interesting approach.”
Kebar put the car in drive, said,
“My aim was off, I think I blasted his heel.”
I didn’t know what to say and Kebar laughed, said,
“Shitheel... huh?”
He was true to his demons.
Fourteen
I was still high from the shooting of Casey when Kebar said,
“Man, I’m hungry, let’s go grab breakfast.”
Like, I could eat?... You betcha.
We went to a diner on West Thirty-eighth and Eighth.
The waitress, who’d never see fifty again, greeted Kebar with effusivness, said,
“Hey, hon, where’ve you been?’
He smiled, said,
“Keeping the filth off the streets.”
She smiled in return, said,
“My hero.”
I let that slide.
She asked,
“So, what can I get you keepers of the peace?”
Kebar ordered:
Two eggs over easy.
Toast, rye bread.
Link sausages.
Mushrooms and tomatoes.
OJ.
And me:
The same, the shooting, it wasn’t a buzz like the necks, but fuck, cops can’t be choosers, I was cranked on the violence.
She gave me a look, then went to fill it.
Her neck was old, I hate that.
Kebar asked,
“Pedophile gave you your appetite?”
I wished I smoked, I’d have blown a cloud in his fucking face.
He changed direction, said,
“Lucia, you know, the damnedest thing, she has... had... like you saw, the mind of a child but one time, she heard Dylan sing ‘Sad-Eyed Lady of the Lowlands,’ man, she freaking played the song to death, that’s how I see her, like that song, guess she won’t be hearing it no more.”
Dylan had come to Galway when I was a Guard, and I pulled crowd control.
Beautiful sunny July day and no trouble.
What I remember is this wizened gnome, crunched in on himself, singing in a croaked twisted voice.
The crowd loved him, he was sixty and he had a charisma, small as he was, a kind of radiance, and after, when we were escorting him to his car, he mumbled something that only later I realized was... thanks.
You know, that impressed me more than his whole concert.
Our food arrived and we attacked it like it was our last meal.
My coffee was bitter and seemed right.
I said,
“There’s going to be a shitstorm about you shooting that guy.”
He was mopping up the egg yolk with the toast, didn’t look up, said,
“I’m going down, we both know that, so these last days I have, I’m going to get biblical on every sleazebag I can.”
I couldn’t keep the excitement out of my voice, asked,
“And I’m going to be with you, right, buddy?”
He reached in his wallet, laid out some bills and a very generous tip for the waitress, said,
“Tell you, kid, I don’t give a fuck what you do, long as you don’t get in my way.”
We were outside and I had to ask,
“That means what exactly?”
He got in the car, said,
“Means, shit or get off the pot.”
Cryptic, huh?
We took down a middle-ranking dealer in the Village, without violence, the guy knew who Kebar was, he wasn’t going to give any lip.
Rest of the day, we issued some parking violations, adrenaline hovering above us like bad prayer.
End of the shift, I let out my breath and Kebar said,
“I get some very mixed vibes offa you, kid.”
And I thought,
“If you could have seen me riding your retard sister...”
Before we could get into it, we saw McCarthy, the black guy, and three other cops approach.
McCarthy was smiling, said,
“You really screwed up this time, mister, the guy you shot, he lodged a complaint, get out of the car, slowly, you’re under arrest.”
Kebar got out and they read him his rights, he never looked at me, and they handcuffed him, I protested, went,
“Christ’s sake, that necessary?”
McCarthy said,
“Shut your fucking mouth, be thankful you’re not joining him.”
The black cop stayed as they led him away, and I asked him,
“What am I supposed to do?”
He was chewing his stick, spat it out of the side of his mouth, said,
“Get the fuck out of here.”
On the way back to Brooklyn, I stopped in a music store, bought a Dylan album, and on my third beer, I listened to “Sad-Eyed Lady.”