"Brian," she called out, "you come in here now."

Her son looked at the cups of coffee he'd asked for and nodded. "Good, Ma, that's good and strong. But we've got to clean him out a little more. I need another big glass of hot soapy water."

Margaret placed herself firmly in front of the sink. "Brian, you'll not be forcing poor Francis to drink any more of that soapy water. For the love of God, what are you trying to do to him?"

Brian's face was flushed and damp and his eyes were glazed, but beneath the slightly thick speech and confusion, some glint of mischief came through. He caught her in a playful hug and lifted her from her post onto a kitchen chair. When he leaned over her, his mother caught the heavy whiskey fumes.

" 'Tis trying to save the lad his job I am, Ma. Sure you'll not want our Francis Kelly tossed off the job because he can't perform his tour of duty."

He was quick and she couldn't stop him from taking another glass of hot soapy water into the bathroom. The sounds were terrible; Brian's voice encouraging and insistent; Francis Kelly's, gasping and groaning; then the awful retching which the flushing of the toilet didn't altogether hide. Finally it was quiet in the bathroom; their voices became low. Then the shower was turned on.

After some fifteen minutes, Brian and Francis came into the kitchen. Francis wore a clean shirt of Brian's and he brushed tentatively at his trousers, which weren't any too clean.

"Hello, Mrs. O'Malley," Francis said sheepishly. His face was white as death and his fair hair was wet and plastered slickly over his forehead.

Margaret shook her head and clicked her tongue over the two of them. She poured two cups of fresh coffee, then put a plate of sandwiches in front of them.

Francis Kelly closed his eyes as he ate a few bites and Brian prodded him to eat more.

"Come on now, boy, line your stomach with something. There you go. You'll be as good as new." He looked at the wall clock. "Well, I sobered you up in thirty minutes. You still got an hour to get to work."

Margaret folded her arms over her chest and glared at them. "Where did you learn such goings on, the two of you? What kind of way is that to act in your own home, Brian?"

Francis apologized. "Gee, Mrs. O'Malley, it was my fault. I got to thinking about my wedding and Brian and me were toasting each other. I forgot I had to work a midnight. Gee, sometimes it gets a little confusing, even now, what shift I got."

"Ah, you're as bad as he is, Francis Kelly. The two of you should be ashamed. At least I'm glad your mother didn't see you in that condition. You had sense enough to bring him here," she added to Brian.

"I'd do the same for Brian, Mrs. O'Malley."

"Ah, for the love of God, you'd better not have to. That's all I'll say about it." She shook her head over the two of them. "All that terrible hot soapy water. How could you even swallow it down?"

Francis Kelly's hand clamped over his mouth and he swallowed the flood of saliva before he could speak in a low, muffled voice. "Please, Mrs. O'Malley, don't mention that right now. I can still taste it."

"A guy on the job told me about the hot-soapy-water treatment," Brian said. "You know, I thought the guy was just kidding me, but it really does work. You'll be fine, Francis."

"I'd like to take some soap to your mouth, Brian, coming home and carrying on that way, and young children in the house to be set a bad example."

Brian put his finger over his lips, winked at his mother, tiptoed to the hallway where he caught Kit. "Hey, look at the spy I found." He lifted her high, then seated her unceremoniously on the kitchen table.

Kit leaned forward and stared at Francis Kelly.

"Hey, Francis, you look terrible. What was Brian doing to make you sick? You sounded like you were gagging to death."

"Katherine O'Malley, you get yourself to bed this minute, because if I see your face once more tonight, you're goin' to feel the sting of that paddle!"

Even Brian was finally convinced of the intensity of his mother's anger. Her voice went tight and thin but her eyes glared and her chin went up with determination. Kit went back to bed without a sound.

"Hey, Ma," Brian said, "I'm just gonna walk Francis to the subway and then I'll come back and clean up in the bathroom. Look, don't you go in there. I'll be back in five minutes and clean it up, okay?"

Margaret gathered dishes together and finally said, "Don't you be telling me what to do in my own home. You should be ashamed, both of you."

"Good-by, Mrs. O'Malley. Gee, I'm real sorry," Francis Kelly offered, but she shook her head and dismissed the two of them as bad business.

They walked along the Grand Concourse down to Burnside Avenue, then along Burnside to Jerome Avenue. At the foot of the Jerome Avenue el, Francis told Brian, "Don't come up to the platform, for Chrissake. I'm okay. I hope I didn't cause you any trouble at home."

Brian shrugged. "Don't worry about it. Well, bud, how do you feel?"

"I feel like shit but at least I'll get through the tour." He gave Brian a clumsy punch on the arm. "It was a helluva cure, but thanks." He started up the long iron staircase, then turned and came back to the sidewalk with a silly grin on his face. "Hey, Brian, in a few weeks, huh? I'll be getting married. I mean, Christ, me. Married. Jesus."

Francis Kelly bolted up the stairs two at a time and they called wild insults back and forth at each other, the way they used to when they were ten years old.

Brian stood for a while, heard the train pull in and then depart. He rubbed his hand across his chin over the rough stubble. His mouth tasted dirty and stale and sour. Watching Francis Kelly vomit buckets of soapy water hadn't done his stomach much good.

But that wasn't what was bothering him.

Brian dug his hands into his trouser pockets and walked slowly along Jerome Avenue with his head bent down. An odd pattern of shadowy tracks and pillars spilled along the gutter from the overhead el. For one odd fleeting moment, Brian stood absolutely still. He had the sensation of being lost, of being somewhere he had never been before without any idea of how he had come to be there.

He raised his face and tried to fight away the aching dizziness of too much whiskey and too much beer, both unaccustomed. He didn't particularly like drinking and generally kept to his modest limit.

He took a few deep breaths and let himself fill with it: They screwed him.

So they screwed him, so what?

His family had all been excited and impressed by all the publicity; his mother added his new clippings to the scrapbook filled with clippings about his father. Everyone had made a fuss over the collar; it was a damn good collar. And the captain had told him it was all set: a gold shield.

Then the captain was absolutely blank-faced. Told him he was going to get a Class A commendation, and the bastard had the nerve to congratulate him. Period. End of discussion, O'Malley.

Brian dug his feet at the cobbled section of Burnside Avenue, where the trolley tracks were sunk, and walked along, eyes on the shiny track. Sonuvabitching captain. And sonuvabitching Department. The whole goddamn Department was lousy. Someday. Someday he'd show them all. Screw them. Screw all of them.

The thing that rankled, that burned and throbbed, was the mystery of it all. Who the hell had screwed him and why?

The captain handed him the heavy package and he had a peculiar look on his thin face. Patrolmen rarely had anything to do with captains and it seemed a good rule to Brian. There were enough sergeants and lieutenants between to keep the captain a myth: the boss who was always teed off about something and to whom, in line, everyone was ultimately responsible.

When Captain Leary sent for him, there were two sergeants and one lieutenant who felt somehow offended. It certainly wasn't the captain who would be called upon to soothe their ruffled feathers. Brian felt the heft of the package and it did indeed seem heavy enough to contain two target pistols.

"Now I want you to get up to that address with them right away. It's been cleared with your sergeant and the trip up and back will just about take care of the rest of your tour."

What Brian wanted to ask was what the hell a patrolman in the New York City Police Department was doing acting as delivery boy, assigned to transport two target pistols which Captain Leary had obtained for Mr. Crowley up to Riverdale. He kept quiet for a moment, then under the slightly quizzical gaze of Captain Leary, he asked, "Captain, uh...who is Mr. Crowley?"

Captain Leary carefully nibbled on the cuticle of his right thumb, picked the tiny piece of skin from the tip of his tongue, studied it, flicked it away before he answered.

"Mr. Crowley is a very good man to have as a friend," he said softly. "And a very bad man to have as an enemy."

The house was even more impressive by daylight. What had been shadow now had substance. It was a tremendous handsome structure, with stained-glass windows set in high-rising splendor more suitable for a cathedral than a private residence. As he walked along the broad brick pavement, he studied the house so intently that he didn't see Crowley's daughter until he stepped on her hand and she cried out.

As he bent to comfort her, she started to rise and they crashed into each other, head to head. In an agony of confusion, Mary Ellen Crowley half knelt and seemed to wait for instruction.

"Let me help you up," Brian said. Her hand in his was cold. "I didn't see you down there. Did I hurt you?"

She shook her head, pushed a lock of pale hair from her cheek. "I was trimming the grass along the edge of the walk. It has to be done by hand." She held the heavy scissors toward him as though in affirmation of the words.

"I was so busy looking at your house, I didn't see you. It's a great house."

Mary Ellen examined the house briefly and shrugged. "I guess. Does Daddy know you're here?"

Brian caught the slightly worried, uncertain tone, remembered the night she fled, all pink softness, up the broad stairs.

She didn't look like a storybook princess now. She looked real, and reality gave her a fragile, somewhat pale and puzzling expectancy. It was the first good look Brian had had of Mary Ellen Crowley and he studied her intently.

She was small-boned and delicate, with a long, sloping waist and sharp, narrow hipbones which jutted against the dark-green shorts she wore for gardening. Her firm neat breasts pressed against the starched white school blouse and she fingered the top button nervously, then touched again at the heavy pale hair which had slipped from the band of green ribbon. Her face, heart-shaped, was slightly flushed but the natural pale translucency of fine skin was evident. Her brows were dark in contrast to her light hair and framed her deep-blue, slightly slanted eyes, which were fringed with thick, long, upswept lashes.

Self-conscious, she faltered under his open appraisal, wiped her damp upper lip with a crumpled handkerchief which she then tucked into the waistband of her shorts.

She gestured vaguely toward the house but faced him. "Does...is Daddy expecting you?"

He nodded, then reached out toward her. "You've got a smudge on your chin." She reached up instinctively and Brian caught her wrist. "Hey, watch it, Mary Ellen, you'll cut yourself." The scissors nearly made contact with her face.

Startled by his touch, her mouth opened, then she blinked and regarded the scissors. "Oh. Oh, yes." She shifted the shears to her left hand. When she bit on her lower lip, a deep dimple appeared in one cheek. "I'm really a mess, aren't I?"

"I wouldn't say that." It was a softly appraising remark and she accepted it without comment.

"How's your boy friend?" Brian asked abruptly.

There was a slight flare of color and a show of spirit. "I told you he wasn't my boy friend."

"That's right, you did." Brian pushed his hat off his forehead, rubbed a finger along the pressure line from the hatband, then readjusted it. "But I bet you do have a boy friend. In fact, I'd bet you have a lot of boy friends."

Guilelessly, she said, "Oh, but they're just 'boys.'" She wrinkled her nose and shook her head. "The sons of my father's friends."

Unexpectedly, he said, "I'm not the son of your father's friend."

Stillness surrounded them, an intimacy created by the oddly intense meaning of his words. Mary Ellen's eyes sought the shears; her fingers investigated the sharp points, the cutting edge. She glanced up at Brian quickly, a small smile ready at the corners of her mouth to prove she understood his words were meant in fun, but there was no answering smile.

"How old are you, Mary Ellen?"

"Eighteen."

"You don't look it, you look younger."

"Oh, no, really," she assured him earnestly. "In fact, I'm nearly eighteen and a half."

"I'm twenty-two," he said, and again it seemed a great intimacy and she reacted with some confusion. Brian reached over and took the shears from her and ran his fingertips lightly over the blades. "You should be careful with these things. Don't want to cut yourself."

There was a sudden loud banging: wooden stick on glass window. The old man was summoning him to the house.

Mary Ellen turned quickly. The color left her face. "Daddy's calling for you. You'd better go. He might know how long you've been standing here."

Brian moved a hand casually toward the house and returned the shears to her. He readjusted his hat again, hefted the weight of his package and started for the house. He stopped and turned. She was kneeling, snipping tentatively at the grass. "Will Saturday night be okay? I mean, you haven't got anything on for this Saturday night that you can't get out of, have you? You see, I only get Saturdays once in a while. The next one won't come up for a month."

The banging at the window started again. Mary Ellen glanced past Brian, then back again. "Saturday? Me?"

Brian nodded. "Yeah. With me. You like to go roller skating? I got some passes for the rink on Fordham Road." He jabbed a thumb over his shoulder and said, as though it was the easiest thing in the world, "Don't worry, I'll clear it with your old man. Okay with you?"

She looked down, nodded, snipped at the grass and cut her finger but held it hidden within the palm of her hand.

"I'll call for you at about seven, okay?"

There was a hard, shattering, crashing sound, followed by the harsh voice shrieking through the broken window, "Goddamn it, O'Malley, if you've come to see me, don't be all day about it!"

Mr. Crowley thumped himself around, thrust his head forward, squinted his eyes as though to test against an impostor. Finally, he nodded abruptly.

"Yes, yes. So it is. Yes." He stood absolutely still for a moment and the only sound was the soft tinkling of stained glass being brushed carefully into a dustpan by Mrs. Crowley. He shouted over his shoulder without looking at his wife, "For Christ's sake, aren't you finished with that yet, goddamn it?"

There was a soft flurry of quick brushing sounds as she hurried, then Mrs. Crowley rose from her knees and hushed apologetic words were aimed nowhere in particular. She left quickly and, with her departure, might never have even been present.

"Well, well, now, you've brought that package for me, have you?"

Brian extended the package but Crowley kept both hands on his stick and with a jerk of his head indicated where the package was to be placed. Brian hesitated for a moment, then moved carefully across the room and put the package on the huge leather-topped desk. He turned and watched Crowley struggle into his chair; he used more gestures and motions than seemed absolutely necessary, as though he enjoyed putting on a show for whatever purposes.

"Tell me something, O'Malley," the old man's voice crackled and the glittering eyes sought Brian's in a calculating, sidelong stare, "what the hell is it you find to talk about with her?"

For a moment, a split second, Brian drew a blank but the jerk of Crowley's head toward the broken window recalled Mary Ellen, the golden daughter, totally unmatched to either the whispering mother or the appalling father. It was a question asked with candor and apparent curiosity and it was unexpected and threw Brian off balance.

He debated a quick, smart answer, some fast, fresh wisecrack, but some sense of caution stopped the words in his mouth. Such an answer wouldn't be honest and the question had been.

"She's a very lovely girl, Mr. Crowley," he informed Mary Ellen's father.

Crowley raised his bone of a hand, a long index finger tapped lightly on the broad expanse of tight-skinned forehead. "Not too much up here, I don't think," he said confidingly.

Brian was surprised by the open confidentiality. "She'll do, Mr. Crowley," he said protectively.

Crowley regarded him for a moment, then said, "Ah, well, we'll see. We'll see. Well then, now, it seems to me that I've been reading something about you in the newspapers, eh? Is that right, eh?"

He indicated with a jerky wave of his arm that Brian was to be seated. The chair was several inches lower than Crowley's and the old man stared down at him. There was a slow, slashing exposure of white teeth, a wolflike grin cracked his face and Crowley nodded briskly.

"Yes, I read about your fine job in catching the murderin' bastards of the poor old man. Over a hundred was he, or thereabouts? What the hell, an old son of a gun and a damn, damn shame, yes."

Brian saw the knowing look, the easy, grinning triumph on Crowley's face. He wanted to leap from the chair and smash the grin right off his face. He grasped the wooden arms of the chair and leaned forward.

"It was you," he said softly. "It was you who shafted me!"

Crowley's smile stretched, then his lips sprang together and his teeth disappeared. "Well now, 'shafted' is your word, not mine." He struggled and fussed around with the walking stick, pulled himself to his feet and stood over Brian. "And how do you suppose," he asked in an innocent, wondering voice, "however in this whole wide world do you suppose that an old cripple like me could shaft a cute little bastard like you, O'Malley? Now why would I want to do a thing like that? Huh? Did you consider that, lad? Motivation. Certainly an important word for a police officer to consider."

"I don't know, Mr. Crowley. I'm listening."

Crowley peered down at him and nodded briskly, as though he was pleased, as though some previous judgment had just been confirmed. "Ah, I like a lad willing to listen and willing to learn. There are all kinds of lessons to be learned in this world, O'Malley. Yes, indeed."

Brian released the pressure in his hands, flexed his fingers and leaned back. He watched with an odd mixture of anger, curiosity and fascination.