Byrne couldn't remember.
But how could this be?
He remembered every punk he had ever arrested. Every single one.
He remembered the day his father bought him a slice of watermelon from a vendor on Ninth Street. He was about seven years old; the day was hot and humid; the watermelon was ice cold. His old man had on a red-striped shirt and white shorts. His old man told a joke to the vendor-a dirty joke, because he whispered it out of Kevin's earshot. The vendor laughed high and loud. He had gold teeth.
He remembered every fold in the bottom of his daughter's tiny feet on the day she was born.
He remembered Donna's face when he had asked her to marry him, the way she cocked her head at that slight angle, as if skewing the world might give her some sort of insight into his true intentions.
But Kevin Byrne couldn't remember Jimmy Purify's face, the face of a man he had loved, a man who had taught him just about everything he knew about the city, the job.
God help him, he couldn't remember.
He looked up and down the avenue, scanning his three car mirrors. The teenagers had moved on. It was time. He got out, grabbed the toolbox and a clipboard. He felt as if he were swimming in the overalls, due to the weight he had lost. He pulled the ball cap down as low as he could.
If Jimmy were with him, this would be the moment he would flip up his collar, shoot his cuffs, and declare that it was showtime y'all.
Byrne crossed the avenue and stepped into the darkness of the alley.
46
The morphine was a white snowbird beneath him. Together they soared. They visited his grandmother's row house on Parrish Street. His father's Buick LeSabre rattled gray-blue exhaust at the curb.
Time toggled on, off. The pain reached for him again. For a moment he was a young man. He could bob, weave, counter. The cancer was a big middleweight, though. Fast. A hook to his stomach flared-red and blaz- ingly hot. He pressed the button. Soon the cool white hand gently caressed his forehead…
He sensed a presence in the room. He looked up. A figure stood at the foot of the bed. Without his glasses-and even they did not help much anymore-he could not recognize the man. He had for a long time imagined what might be the first thing to go, but he had not counted on it being memory. In his job, in his life, memory had been everything. Memory was the thing that haunted you. Memory was the thing that saved you. His long-term memory seemed intact. His mother's voice. The way his father smelled of tobacco and 3-IN-ONE Oil. These were his senses and now his senses were betraying him.
What had he done?
What was her name?
He couldn't remember. He couldn't remember much of anything now.
The figure drew closer. The white lab coat glowed in a celestial light. Had he passed? No. He felt his limbs, heavy and thick. The pain stabbed at his lower abdomen. The pain meant he was still alive. He pressed the pain button, closed his eyes. The girl's eyes stared at him out of the darkness.
"How are you, Doctor?" he finally managed.
"I'm fine," the man replied. "Are you in much pain?"
Are you in much pain?
The voice was familiar. A voice from his past.
The man was no doctor.
He heard a snap, then a hiss. The hiss became a roar in his ears, a terrifying sound. And there was good reason. It was the sound of his own death.
But soon the sound seemed to come from a place in North Philadelphia, a vile and ugly place that had haunted his dreams for more than three years, a terrible place where a young girl had died, a young girl he knew he would soon meet again.
And that thought, more than the thought of his own death, scared Detective Phillip Kessler to the bottom of his soul.
47
The Tresonne Supper Club was a dark, smoky restaurant on Sansom Street in Center City. It was formerly the Coach House, and in its day-somewhere in the early 1970s-it was considered a destination, one of the tonier steak houses in town, frequented by members of the Sixers and Eagles, along with politicos of varying degree of stature. Jessica recalled when she, her brother, and their father had come here for dinner when she was seven or eight years old. It had seemed like the most elegant place in the world.
Now it had become a third-tier eatery, its clientele an amalgam of shadowy figures from the worlds of adult entertainment and the fringe publishing industry. The deep burgundy drapes, at one time heralding a New York City chophouse ambience, were now mildewed and grimed with a decade of nicotine and grease.
Dante Diamond was a Tresonne regular, usually holding court at the large, semicircular booth at the back of the restaurant. They had run his rap sheet and learned that, of his three trips to the Roundhouse in the past twenty years, he had been charged with nothing more than two counts of pandering and a misdemeanor drug possession.
His most recent photograph was ten years old, but Eugene Kilbane was certain he would know him on sight. Besides, in a club like Tresonne, Dante Diamond was royalty.
The restaurant was half full. There was a long bar to the right, booths to the left, a dozen or so tables in the center. The bar was separated from the dining room by a partition made of colored plastic panels and plastic ivy. Jessica noticed that the ivy had a thin layer of dust on it.
As they made their way toward the end of the bar, all heads turned toward Nicci and Jessica. The men scoped Kilbane, sizing him immediately, cataloging his position on the food chain of power and masculine impact. It was immediately clear that in this place, he was perceived as neither a rival nor a threat. His weak chin, destroyed upper lip, and cheap suit pigeonholed him as a loser. It was the two pretty young women with him who gave him, at least temporarily, the cachet he needed to work the room.
There were two stools open at the end of the bar. Nicci and Jessica sat down. Kilbane stood. Within a few moments, the bartender approached.
"Good evening," the bartender said.
"Yeah. How ya doin'?" Kilbane replied.
"Quite well, sir."
Kilbane leaned forward. "Dante around?"
The bartender gave him a stony look. "Who?"
"Mr. Diamond."
The bartender half-smiled, as if to say: Better. He was in his late fifties, trim and savvy, manicured nails. He wore a royal blue satin vest and crisp white shirt. He had the look of many years behind the mahogany. He placed a trio of napkins on the bar. "Mr. Diamond isn't in tonight."
"Do you expect him?"
"Impossible to say," the bartender said. "I'm not his social secretary." The man locked eyes with Kilbane, communicating that this line of questioning was over. "What can I get for you and the young ladies?"
They ordered. A coffee for Jessica, a Diet Coke for Nicci, and a double bourbon for Kilbane. If Kilbane thought he was going to drink all night on the city's dime, he was mistaken. The drinks arrived. Kilbane turned to face the dining room. "This place has really hit the fucking skids," he said.
Jessica wondered by what criteria a lowlife like Eugene Kilbane judged something like that.
"I see a few people I know. I'm gonna ask around," Kilbane added. He drained his bourbon in one gulp, straightened his tie, and walked into the dining room.
Jessica looked around the room. There were a few middle-aged couples in the dining room whom she had a hard time believing had anything to do with the business. The Tresonne did, after all, advertise in City Paper, Metro, The Report, and other venues. But for the most part, the clientele was hard-looking men in their fifties and sixties-pinkie rings, collar bars, monogrammed cuffs. It looked like a waste-management convention.