"You told the girls I was Fr. Terry."

"Maybe for a moment I believed it. Then Debbie appeared, little sleepyhead trying to look innocent."

"Fran believes it."

"He wants to more than anything. Then he doesn't have to worry about you ending up in jail. But deep down? I'm not so sure." She said, "I loved little Debbie calling you Father. 'I'm taking Father to visit parishes so he can make his mission appeal, for the little orphans.' The bed still warm. You and the Deb are hot for each other?"

"That's where we are right now, yeah."

"You did do it in my bed."

"Only once."

"Five years in Africa, you come back-"

"Maybe twice."

"Terry...?"

"Another time where you're sitting." He believed he saw Mary Pat move her b.u.t.t on the love seat, squirm, just a little. "Once in the library, the other times at her apartment, and that's all."

"I admire your restraint," Mary Pat said. "Tell me, if you're not a priest, what are you?"

"I guess I'm back to whatever I was."

"Terry, don't act dumb, okay, or innocent- 'back to whatever I was'- you're a crook, admit it. You're gonna put on your Roman collar and con parishes into giving you money. Isn't that what you are, Terry, a con man?"

"That was the original idea," he said, serious, telling his sister-in-law of all people what she wanted to know and looking at it himself, hearing himself. He said, "But now we have a benefactor," Terry smiling just a little, seeing Tony Amilia sitting at that table in his warm-up jacket. Mary Pat might think that was funny, too, if he told her. And maybe not. She wasn't smiling.

She said, "We. Debbie's in it with you?"

"She's helping out."

"Con one person now, this benefactor, instead of a bunch of people sitting in church?"

He didn't have to answer that one. The girls were banging on the bedroom door, calling their mom. Mary Pat said, "Let them in, will you?" stubbing out her cigarette, then waving her hand in the smoke rising from the ashtray.

Terry walked over and opened the door and the girls looked up at him, hesitant. He started back to his chair and now they came in, Jane saying, "We can't find our backpacks."

"They're right there," Mary Pat said. "Uncle Terry brought them up for you." She said, "Girls, come here for a minute." They came over to their mother's side of the table, the six-yearold, Katy, pressing close to her and Mary Pat brushed the girl's hair from her forehead. "Tell Uncle Terry what you want to be when you grow up." She had to be coaxed. "Tell him, honey, he'd like to know."

"I want to be a saint," Katy said.

"Like the one you're named after," Terry said, "Saint Catherine?"

"Which Saint Catherine?"

He had to think. "Saint Catherine of Siena?"

"She's okay. She was a mystic and could see guardian angels. My favorite is Saint Catherine of Alexandria, virgin and martyr. They put her on a spiked wheel, only it broke? So they cut her head off."

Mary Pat said, "Katy loves martyrs."

Terry said, "You know what they did to Saint Agatha?"

"Is she the one, they cut off her b.o.o.bs and threw her in a burning fire?"

"Hot coals," Terry said.

Katy was edging around the table toward him. "Do you know any more?"

"How about Saint Sebastian?"

"He was stuck with arrows."

"Katy's into saints," Mary Pat said. "She picked it up from Jane who got most of them off the Internet-they're little cyber Catholics-but now Jane's into serious tennis, USTA compet.i.tion, ten-and-under age group. She started last year when she was seven, lost her first couple of matches and hasn't lost since. Jane's now regional champ," Mary Pat said, touching Jane now, fooling with her hair. "Aren't you, sweetheart?"

She said to Terry, "You know who I want to play? Serena Williams, she won the Open."

"Isn't she a lot older than you are?"

"Yeah, but when I'm her age? She'll only be like twenty-four or -five." She turned to her mom then. "How come you said he's Uncle Terry instead of Father?"

"I thought he became a priest," Mary Pat said, "but he really didn't. He was kidding."

Jane said, "Oh," and walked away from them. Katy caught up with her and Jane said, "You're not suppose to call him Father anymore," and Katy said, "I know." Mary Pat waited until they'd picked up their backpacks and were out of the room.

"You see how easy it is? No big deal. Uncle Terry isn't a priest. Okay. They think you're just a good guy who knows something about saints. Nothing wrong with that." She said, "Do you realize this is the first time we've talked?"

"Mary Pat, you could've been a good prosecuting attorney."

"I could've been good at a lot of things. I chose to marry your brother and have children and be a homemaker, and that's what I am. If you want to be a crook, Terry, that's up to you. I won't pry anymore or get in your way. I just want to ask you one more question. Maybe two."

"Go ahead."

"Does she really like the way I've done the house?"

"Debbie? She loves it. It reminds her of the home she grew up in. What's the other question?"

"Will she stick by you, Terry, if you f.u.c.k up?"

23.

THE MUTT CAME IN AT NOON. He stuck his head in Randy's office, said, "It's all set for tonight," and started away.

"Wait a minute-Mutt? What's all set?"

The Mutt appeared in the doorway again. "I'm gonna do both of 'em tonight. Mr. Moraco first."

"Where?"

"I don't know yet. I'm waiting to find out where to meet him. You know, so he can gimme the gun and my money."

Randy was standing at the desk in his shirt sleeves, dark shirt, light-colored tie. He sat down. "You don't have a gun?"

"I guess I didn't tell you. Mr. Moraco's giving me twenty-five to do the priest and he'll furnish the gun. That's the deal. So I'll have me one by then."

Randy said, "To do Vincent."

"Yeah, once he gives it to me."

Randy took his time. "You're gonna use the gun Vincent gives you to do Vincent."

"I may as well, huh?" And said, "Well, I'll see you" as he started out.

"Wait."

The man's simplicity was overwhelming: this little Hoosier, bless his heart, standing there with his muscles and scar tissue waiting now to be dismissed, hat in hand-Randy was thinking-if he had a hat.

Randy said to him, "Mutt? Be careful."

Midafternoon Johnny Pajonny was waiting for him at the bar. The Mutt had called saying he wanted to talk to him. Johnny asked what about, and the Mutt said, "You know. Remember what you mentioned the other night?" He wouldn't say more than that on account of the phone might be bugged. It was pitiful the way this guy's mind worked. Johnny a.s.sumed it was about the wh.o.e.rs. After the Mutt had fixed him up with Angie, Johnny said he'd be interested in trying some of the other girls. He had a deal going: he'd told Angie he was a mob guy and expected the usual mob discount on the three hundred she ordinarily got, so he only had to pay her a bill and a half- There he was now, the Mutt coming out from the back of the restaurant, but then the bartender said something to him as he was going past and the Mutt went back to the other end of the bar and picked up the phone. After a minute he was waving to the bartender-he needed a pen. Now he was writing something down- back at the end where the waiters got their drink orders filled.

Johnny was pretty sure Angie liked him and didn't mind the discount. She was so good it was quick anyway. He could always go back; but why not try another one of the wh.o.e.rs and go for the mob discount? That's what he thought this was about.

The Mutt walked up to him and said, "I'm gonna take you up on your offer."

Johnny hadn't offered him anything, so he wasn't sure what the guy meant. He said, "Yeah...?"

"You offered to drive for me."

Johnny said, "Lemme get a drink," and ordered a vodka tonic, giving himself time to readjust his mind, switch from thinking about wh.o.e.rs to contract hits, and talk to a guy Johnny believed might never've even fired a gun before outside of a single-shot .22 down on the farm, shooting squirrels and chipmunks. He would accept the Mutt having shanked some con in the yard, and maybe, just maybe, he might've shot a guy in a bar fight as they tussled. But a real contract? Look at the guy. It didn't seem likely.

"You're saying to me you have a contract to make a hit and you want me to drive the car."

"Two," the Mutt said.

"Two what?"

"I got two contracts, both for tonight."

Johnny got his drink and took a good sip. "You have a car?"

"Don't the driver supply the car?"

"You think I'm gonna drive mine? No, the way it's done, the hitter supplies the car. Otherwise it doubles the risk for the driver. First, for boosting a car, and second, I could go down as an accessory. No, I'm sorry, I can't help you."

"All right, I'll get a car," the Mutt said.

Now Johnny hesitated. "Say you do, where you want to go?"

The Mutt took a c.o.c.ktail napkin from his shirt pocket, unfolded it and looked at his handwriting. "Franklin Street between St. Aubin and Dubois. You know where that's at?"

"Yeah, but there ain't nothing there, it's all warehouses and old empty buildings. Let's see, outside of some bars, the Soup Kitchen's close by there."

"He said that, the Soup Kitchen was on a corner down there, not too far."

"What's the guy gonna be doing, sitting in his car waiting for you?" It didn't make sense.

But the Mutt said, "I guess."

"What time?"

"Eight o'clock. He said sharp."

"The guy that gave you the contract."

"Yeah. You want to drive me?"

Johnny gave himself more time saying, "It depends on what you're paying."

"Well, I'm not sure, tell you the truth."

This guy had no idea what he was doing. Still, it didn't sound like he was making it up, so Johnny pried some more. He said, "You want to negotiate driver pay based on what you're getting? That's one way it's done."

"They're paying twenty-five each-"

"That's right, you got two contracts."

"Twenty-five hunnert for one, twenty-five thousand for the other."

Johnny said, "Uh-huh." This guy was pure idiot. Get him to explain that. But then thought, No, don't. Ask him . . . Johnny said, "You get half down?"

"The twenty-five hunnert I'm getting up ahead, the whole thing. But I haven't got none of the other one, the big one."

Johnny said, "Mutt, the way it works, the only way it works, you get half down or you don't do the job. Otherwise you could get f.u.c.ked over real good. You know what I mean? No, the first rule of this kind of business, Mutt, you gotta get half down."

The Mutt said, "Okay then."

Johnny took time to light a cigarette and sip his vodka tonic. "All right, here's the deal. I come by here...No, I better not. Lemme think . . . Where you have to go for the other one?"

"I don't know yet."