Yet something in her doubted, and it seemed impossible to change that.
She knew what she needed. A new love. And luck with a new luster. The first would be easier than the last. She could fall in love—or something like love—easier than she should.
There was a flurry of activity up near the front of the diner. The background traffic noise was louder, then softer. Someone had entered. Others had stood up.
Darby Keen, sleek and muscular in jeans and a T-shirt (he certainly looked like he could dance), entered the diner. And right behind him, Seth Mander, his straight blond hair mussed by the breeze and dangling over one eye. He was wearing dress slacks, loosened tie, and scuffed moccasins. Betty stared at him, transfixed.
Hands were shaken, backs were slapped. The dancers in the front booth were standing up. Everyone was standing. Some were congratulating themselves.
“They’ve seen us,” Macy said.
Betty forced herself to raise her head and look.
My God! They’re coming back here!
32
Little Louie, as his fellow workers called Louis Farrato, was working the jackhammer today, breaking up already cracked concrete in front of the Taggart Building, the area that was to become the driveway of a portico. Louie, who was a few inches over six feet tall and built like an NFL linebacker, handled the jackhammer like a toy. He was following a yellow chalk line, where a concrete saw would neaten and emphasize the driveway, where it was projected it would encircle a fountain.
It took skill to use a jackhammer, alternating heavy and light touches, and it was a tool that had to be guided carefully. That was why Louie so diligently followed the curved yellow chalk line.
Louie had paused in his work with the other hard hats as the women they’d heard were Broadway dancers crossed the street and entered the Liner Diner. On a scale of one through ten, they were all tens, on the basis of their bodies alone. The little blond one they called Betty was particularly appealing to Louie. For whatever reason, he preferred small women. His wife, Madge, was only a little over five feet tall.
Not that she wasn’t a fireball. More of one than the blond dancer, actually.
Thinking of Madge, Louie smiled.
Which was why he almost missed seeing the guy in the battered yellow hard hat.
At first Louie thought he was looking at a kid roaming through the debris of the building. Then he saw that the guy had the bearing if not the stature of a man. He had on faded jeans and a tan shirt with a tie and was carrying a clipboard.
Louie looked around, and didn’t see Jack Feldman, the job foreman, or anybody else. Then he realized everyone was on lunch break. He hadn’t worn his wristwatch today because he didn’t want it subjected to the jackhammer vibrations.
He leaned the jackhammer at an easy angle against a pile of debris. Then he pulled a handkerchief stuffed in a back pocket and used it to wipe sweat from his face and the back of his neck.
Louie put on his own hard hat, with the company logo on it, and made his way toward the little guy.
He could see, as he drew closer, that the man was smaller and older than he’d seemed from across the jumble of debris, and the steel stacked near where the crane was systematically lifting it to be eased into position. Those involved in this delicate operation worked while the others were at lunch or otherwise off-site. Everything was done with extreme care. People had died working with high steel. People Louie had known. But he figured the pay warranted the risk, so here he was.
The crane, affixed to the twentieth floor, was preparing to lift a steel beam that looked small from this angle, up to where it would straighten its long, jointed arm and steel would be fixed to steel with rivets. The welders would follow close behind, making all but permanent what the riveters had done. And another piece of an empire’s giant toy would be fitted in place.
Some of the other workers were coming back to work now, after leaving the Liner Diner. The Broadway-star types were hanging around in front of the diner, the women casually bending and doing light exercises, well aware they were being watched.
The little guy in the hard hat looked over at Louie, looked back at his clipboard, and made a check mark. Then back at Louie. He smiled and said, “Safety.”
Louie noticed a line of faded black letters on the scuffed and dented yellow hard hat. So the twerp was here in some official capacity.
“I think we’re up to code here,” Louie said, though he had no idea. This guy, in washed-out jeans and a tan shirt with a tie, looked like management to him. A dress shirt and tie and a clipboard could add up to trouble.
“You want me to call the boss over for you?” Louie asked. Pass-the-buck time.
The little guy looked up at him, smiling. “I already talked with him. Give me a few minutes and I’ll get outta your hair.”
“Okay.” Louie gave a little wave and started back to where he’d left the jackhammer, along with half a sandwich from his lunch bag. Pastrami and mustard, with just the right amount of horseradish. He wondered, could any of those Broadway babes with the boobs and swinging behinds put together a pastrami sandwich like his wife Madge could?
He doubted it.
As he picked his way toward where he’d broken off work, he noticed the guy with the hard hat and clipboard over where the street had been torn up. He was making his way through piles of debris, stepping carefully, still making notations on his clipboard.
Louie heard his name called.
He looked over and saw Feldman, his boss, standing across the intersection, near the Liner Diner.
Feldman saw that he had Louie’s attention and waved him over.
Jack Feldman was a reasonable guy, but when he was mad he was a son of a bitch. Mistakes couldn’t be made here. There were few second chances, and no third. Louie had no idea what Feldman wanted. He started walking toward Feldman. There was a large lump in Louie’s throat, but he couldn’t figure out if he’d screwed up, or if Feldman was simply going to ask for a progress report on the removal of the portico concrete. Louie couldn’t think of any reason why he should endure an ass-chewing. He told himself that maybe he was going to get a promotion, and smiled at that one.
The sun had moved enough so that there was a stark shadow lying across the intersection where the Liner Diner was located. Louie realized the shadow was from the crane.
Feldman was standing in the shadow, which extended from the diner to beyond Louie.
Louie found it a few degrees cooler in the shadow of the crane, and walked toward Feldman, who stood with his fists on his hips, watching Louie.
There was a sharp, cracking sound from overhead.
Lightning strike was Louie’s first, alarmed thought. But the sky was a cloudless blue.
When Louie lowered his vision he saw that Jack Feldman was for some reason sitting on the pavement, as if he’d fallen. He was waving and pointing at the sky. Maybe he had been struck by lightning. Louie could feel his own hair standing on end.
Then he noticed there was something different about the deeply shadowed path on which he stood, leading toward Feldman and beyond. The shadow of the crane.
It was moving.
Feldman was struggling to get to his feet, where he had instinctively dived to the ground at the loud noise. Disoriented, he ran to his right, then back left, toward the crane’s looming shadow. The long shadow was moving in a greater arc now, back and forth, like a gigantic scythe trying to break free from whatever held it high.
Feldman waved his arms at Louie. He was shouting something Louie couldn’t understand.
Louie didn’t stop, didn’t think, running toward Feldman.
There was another loud crack! from above as the huge crane pulled away from its moorings. Somewhere a woman was screaming.