The Digger's Game

Part one of a new crime novel

There were three keys on the transmission hump of the XK-E. The driver touched the one nearest the gearshift. The fat man, cramped in the passenger bucket, squinted at it in the moonlight.

"Back door," the driver said. "Three steps, aluminum railing, no outer door. No alarm. You got a problem of being seen. There's a whole mess of apartments back up on the place, and they got mostly kids in them and them fucking bastards never go to bed, it seems like. What can I tell you, except be careful."

"Look," the fat man said, "I'm gonna act like I was minding my own business. This is what you say it is, tomorrow morning nobody's even gonna know I was there. Nobody'll remember anything."

"Uh-huh," the driver said, "but that's tomorrow. First you got to get through tonight. It's tonight I'd be worried about, I was you."

"I'll decide what I'm gonna worry about," the fat man said.

"You got gloves?" the driver asked.

"I don't like gloves," the fat man said. "In this weather especially, I don't like gloves. What the hell, somebody spots me, the heat comes, I'm dead anyway. Gloves ain't gonna help me. You wait like you say you're gonna, nobody's even gonna know I was in there until everybody's been around handling things, and so forth."

"That's what I thought," the driver said, "no gloves. I heard that about you. The Digger goes in bare-ass." The driver pulled a pair of black-vinyl gloves out of the map pocket on his door. "Wear these."

The Digger took the gloves in his left hand. "Whatever you say, my friend. It's your job." He put the gloves in his lap.

"No," the driver said, "I really mean it, Dig. You want to go in bare-ass, you go in bare-ass. That's all right with me. But you get to that paper, the actual paper, you put them gloves on first, and you keep them on. OK?"

"I wouldn't think it'd help them," the Digger said. "So many people handling the stuff and all. I wouldn't think it'd make much difference, time they found out."

"Well, take my word for it," the driver said, "it does. It really does. Now, I really mean it, you know? This is for my protection. Gloves on as soon as you get to the paper."

"Gloves on," the Digger said.

"You get inside," the driver said, "you go left down the corridor and it's the fourth door. The fourth door. There's about six doors in there and they all got the company name on them, but this is for the fourth door." He touched the second key. "It says 'General Manager' down at the bottom, there, so in case you get screwed up, that's the one you're looking for."

"Can I use a light?" the Digger asked.

"Not unless you really have to," the driver said. "Near as I can make out, there's no windows anybody can look in and see you moving around, but you never know what'll reflect off something. I was you, unless I absolutely had to, I wouldn't."

"OK," the Digger said, "no light."

"I don't think you're gonna need one anyway," the driver said. "We got a pretty good moon here and all. You should be able to get along all right."

"Fourth door," the Digger said. "Must be some kind of suspicious outfit, got a different key for every door and all. They must be afraid somebody's gonna come in after hours or something and steal something."

"Well," the driver said, "I don't know that for sure. It could be, this'll open any door, once you get inside. But the offices're separate, you know. They haven't got any doors between them. So it's not gonna do you any good, you get into the third door or something, because what we want isn't in there. I'm just trying to save time is all."

The driver touched the third key. It was smaller than the first two. "ADT," he said. "Metal box right behind the door, just about eye level. The lock's on the bottom on the right. It's got the yellow monitor light, so you won't have no trouble finding it, anyway. Twenty-second delay before it rings. Plenty of time. Oh, sometimes they forget to set it when they lock up. If the yellow light's off, don't touch it. You do and you'll turn it on and then you're gonna have all kinds of company. I'm pretty sure it's on. So you turn it off. I told him, I said: 'Make sure that alarm's on. I don't want nobody coming in Monday and seeing the alarm's off and looking around.' He said he would. But just to be on the safe side, don't touch it if the light isn't on."

"Do I still go in if it's off?" the Digger asked.

"Sure," the driver said. "The important thing is, get the paper. I'm just saying, it'd be better if the alarm was on when you go in. And you shut it off and get what we want and then turn it on again and get out. You got another twenty seconds when you turn it on. Oh, and it's a cheapie. No puncher for when it's on and off, no signal anywhere it got turned off. Single stage, it all works off the key. If it's on, and you don't turn it off, it rings. But that's all it does."

"Chickenshit outfit," the Digger said.

"Well," the driver said, "it's really just for the typewriters and, you know, in case the junkies come in and start tearing the place apart. They don't keep any real dough there. It's just for intruders is all."

"Trespassers," the Digger said.

"Yeah," the driver said, "trespassers. Speaking of which, I assume you're not a shitter or anything."

"No," the Digger said.

"You know you're not a shitter, too, don't you?" the driver asked."

"Well, I'm pretty sure," the Digger said. "I never done much of this, but when I been in someplace, I never did, no."

"Well, in case you get the urge," the driver said, "wait till you get home or something. I had a real good guy that I always used to use, and he was all right. He could get in anyplace. You could send him down the cathedral and he'd steal the cups at High Mass. But Jesus, I used him probably six or seven years and I never have the slightest problem with him, and the next thing I know, he's into some museum or something they got out there to Salem, and he's after silver, you know? And he shits, he turned into a shitter. Left himself a big fuckin' pile of shit right on the goddamned Oriental rug. Well, he wasn't working for me or anything, and hell, everybody in the world was gonna know the next day he was in there, because the silver was gone. But that was the end of him as far as I was concerned, I didn't have no more use for him. The thing is you don't want nobody to know you been in there until you're ready, OK? So no shit on the desks or anything. Keep your pants on.

"The stuff we want," the driver said, "you go over to the file cabinets and they keep them in the third one from the window. The middle drawer, OK? In the back, behind the ledgers. They keep the ledgers up to the front, and then there's the divider there, and the books're behind the divider. There's three of them. The one they're actually using's on top and then there's two more, the reserve ones."

"You got a key for the cabinet?" the Digger asked.

"Usually not locked," the driver said. "If it's locked, the key's on the frame of the door you just came through. Up on the wood there, over the door. But it's probably not gonna be locked. If it's locked, unlock it and then when you're through, lock it again and put the key back. If it's not locked, just open it and take the stuff and then close it up again. OK?"

"OK," the Digger said. "You want some canceled checks, I assume."

"Don't need them," the driver said. "Somebody might go looking for something and then they notice they're gone. I got a way, I got something I can copy all ready."

"They don't use a check signer or anything?" the Digger asked.

"Sometimes they do," the driver said, "sometimes they don't. It's got a meter on it and they're pretty careful about that, anyway. It's only when the guy's away they use that, and I guess they must've had some trouble or something, because they keep that locked up pretty good and it's in another one of them offices, in a safe. So I'm not gonna bother with trying to get that."

"OK," the Digger said.

"Take from the first book," the driver said. "They're all numbered in sequence and they're about, they just started using the book they're using now. So they're probably gonna, by the end of the month they'll be getting down to where they'd be using it up. It's a six-across book. Take the last five pages. OK?"

"OK," the Digger said.

"Don't take no more'n that," the driver said. "You do and they're liable to spot it the next time they use the book." From the floor under the driver's seat he produced a razor knife. "Take them out right along the binder. Don't leave no shreds. Shreds can fall out and get somebody looking. Nice clean cuts. One page at a time. Don't use where it's perforated. Cut them out right along the binder. OK?

"Don't take nothing from the other books," the driver said. "The petty cash box, it's probably got about eighty dollars in it. Leave it be. No stamps, no currency if there's any, no nothing. Five pages of checks and that's all. You give (continued on page 122) digger's game (continued from page 78) them all to me. I want thirty checks and I don't want no more'n thirty checks taken. OK?"

"OK," the Digger said.

"The guy I got," the driver said, "it's gonna be important for him the checks went out sometime this month, because he's on vacation and he'll be able to prove where he was all the time. We get checks from one of the other books, they start coming in, he's not gonna be protected. OK?"

"OK," the Digger said. "How'd you meet him, anyway?"

"It was a business thing," the driver said. "He needed some money and this friend of his sent him around to see me."

"Jesus," the Digger said, "I don't know where the hell you'd be without us guys pressed for dough. You'd probably have to go out and work for a living."

"Some guys," the driver said, starting the Jaguar, "some guys need more'n they have, some guys have more'n they need. It's just a matter of getting us together, Dig, that's all it is."

"I'm thinking of changing sides," the Digger said. "If I get through this without doing time, I'm definitely gonna change sides."

"I recommend it," the driver said, "it's lots more comfortable. Still, it shouldn't take you more'n an hour, and you're fifteen hundred bucks ahead of where you were when you closed up tonight."

"Yeah," the Digger said, "one and a half down, sixteen and a half to go. Someday, my friend, I'm gonna get smart, and when I do, well, I just hope you can find another guy is all."

"Digger," the driver said as the fat man began to get out, "as long as they keep making women and horses, there'll always be a guy to find. I'll see you in the morning."

"You look tired, Dig," Harrington said. "You look like you been up all night or something." Harrington was a foreman at Boston Edison. He worked on Saturdays as a supervisor. He took the Dort Ave, bus home every night; he got off a block away from the intersection of Gallivan Boulevard. The Bright Red was on that corner and he stopped in for a couple of cold ones. Week nights he drank his beer and read the Record. Saturdays were quiet and he read the Record at work, his feet on the desk and a cardboard container of coffee growing cold beside the portable radio. Saturday nights he talked.

"I was," the Digger said. "You'd think a guy as old as I am'd learn sometime, you can't stay up all night 'thout feeling like hell the next day. Not me, I never learn."

"You out drinking or something?" Harrington asked.

"Nah," the Digger said, "I was down to the Market, I see this guy. I had something to do. I just didn't get around to going home is all. I guess I roll in about four. What the fuck, it's Saturday. It's not like it's the middle of the week, you hadda come in here and bust your ass, everybody gets out of work the same time. I can handle it."

"See, I was wondering," Harrington said. "You look like that, I see you looking like that, I was wondering, maybe you got that problem again."

"Martinis," the Digger said. "No, I didn't have that. That's a funny thing, you know? I think, I haven't had that kind of problem since the first time I was talking to you. Which was a pretty long time, I think. No, that much I learn, I don't drink no more of that stuff, that fuckin' gin. That stuff'll kill you, I know that much. No, it was something else."

"Broads," Harrington said. "You're a stupid shit, Dig, I always told you that. You're a stupid shit, fool around with the broads. That's dumb. I maybe grew up in Saint Columbkille's, I maybe don't know my ass from third base, I'm out here, the chocolate factory, I still know enough, I don't fool around with no broads. I know that much, at least. You're a dumb shit, staying out all night, fool around with broads. It don't change, Dig, you got to know that. The monkey is the monkey, a cunt is a cunt. Why you wasting your time? Oughta go home and sleep."

"I don't fool around," the Digger said.

"OK," Harrington said, "you're an asshole. You stayed up till four in the morning because you wanted to. You're a fuckin' asshole. I thought you had more sense. You're too old for staying out like that. No wonder you look like death warmed over. You stayed out because you wanted to. You're an asshole."

"I had a reason," the Digger said.

"Sure you did," Harrington said. "You wanted to get laid was your reason. You didn't get laid. You're an asshole."

"Look," the Digger said, "I went to Vegas the other week."

"So I hear," Harrington said. "All the high rollers going out to Vegas. 'Look, you dumb shit,' they say to me, 'you can't lose. Up front you pay a grand and they give you eight-twenty back in the chips and the plane ride and the hotel and everything. Broads. You never see the broads like you see the broads in Vegas. Got to fight them off.' So I say: 'OK. I believe you. How come I gotta tell them the name every bank I ever had an account, huh? It's probably, they want to make sure, I'm a nice fellow, don't want to give the money away, somebody doesn't need it or something. That's probably it.' Oh, no, that's not it. It's just to be sure, you know? They don't want no deadbeats. OK, that's what I'm saying. I'm gonna win, what difference does it make, I'm a deadbeat or not? No difference at all. So all right, I'm not going. They ask me that, the bank accounts, I think they think I'm not gonna win. They think I'm gonna lose is what they think. Now, they been at it a lot longer'n I have. I think I bet with the smart money this time. I think I'm gonna lose, too, and I can't afford to lose. So I'm not going.

"Well," Harrington said, "I dunno if you was around or not, but I take many kinds of shit. The wife won't let me; I don't have no balls; when am I gonna get smart?: all the rest of it. Then everybody goes, and it gets quiet. Beautiful. I actually enjoy coming in here, three or four days, although I think, them millionaires get back from Vegas, I'm gonna have to go down the parish hall, drink tea with the guild, I expect any peace and quiet.

"Then everybody comes back," Harrington said. "Funny thing, I don't hear nothing. Nothing about broads, I don't see anybody with the big roll, nothing. I start to wonder, what is it? Girls wouldn't do it? Nah, can't be that. All you guys talk nice, use the deodorant there. Steaks tough? Frank Sinatra goes there and the steaks're tough? Can't be that. Everybody got airsick? Nah, all you guys're over the Bulge, some of you were in Korea, every single one of you wins the Medal of Honor, at least in here. Beats me. I just can't understand it. See, I know you guys didn't lose no money. You're all too smart for that. You all told me so, a lot. So I finally decide, you're being nice to me. I'm Mickey the Dunce and you're all being nice. Out pricing the Cads with all the dough you won, you're just not telling me because you don't want me to feel bad. You guys, you're saints, you know that, Dig? Saints. I said that to my wife."

"You know," the Digger said, "your principal trouble is, you got a big mouth."

"My wife claims that," Harrington said. "She also says I hang around the wrong type of guys and it gets me in trouble, it won't be her fault. She says a lot of things. But then I say: 'Look, did I go to Vegas and win a million dollars? Not me. I'm too smart for that. Nobody fakes old Harrington into winning no million, no sir.' That shuts her up."

"She thinks I'm one of the bad guys," the Digger said.

"She does," Harrington said, "she has said that. But she don't say it no more. I said: 'Look, you like the stereo all right. You give me a lot of stuff and all, but (continued on page 146) digger's game (continued from page 122) the Digger gets that Zenith for a hundred and Lechmere's knocking them down for three-fifty, I don't hear no complaints from you.' See, I stand up for you, Digger."

"You interested in a portable radio?" the Digger asked.

"No," Harrington said.

"How about a nice color TV?" the Digger asked. "RCA, AccuColor, the whole bit."

"No," Harrington said. "I touch the stereo the other night by mistake and I burned myself. I'm gonna be sitting there some fine night, watching the ball game, and some cop's gonna come in. Besides, I can't buy nothing right now, I don't care if you're giving it away. The wife wants a boat. I'm supposed to be saving up for a boat."

"Look," the Digger said, "I need some dough."

"Jesus," Harrington said, "I could use some dough myself. You get ahold the guy that's passing out the dough, give him my name. I could use about thirty-five big ones, right this minute. I got to buy a boat. Get that? I had a boat. I had four rooms over to Saint Columb-kille's, I had a nice boat. She don't like that. We got to have a house. 'I can't afford no house,' I said, 'I haven't got the down payment, for God's sake.' She says: 'Sell the boat.' I didn't want to sell my boat. I didn't want to buy the house. I sell the boat. I buy the house. Nine years we had the house, eight of them she's been complaining, we should get another boat. I give up."

"I'm serious," the Digger said.

"You're serious, is it?" Harrington asked. "You think I'm just horsing around?"

"You're not serious the way I'm serious," the Digger said. "I need eighteen thousand dollars and I need it right away. Yesterday would've been good."

"Oh-oh," Harrington said, "you guys did take a bath out there, didn't you?"

The Digger nodded. "The rest of the guys, not as bad as me. But I went in right over my head."

"Jesus," Harrington said, "that why you're out all night?"

"Yup," the Digger said, "I take all kinds of chances and you know what? I'm not even close to even." From the end of the bar a customer demanded service. "Shut your fuckin' mouth, I give you a bat in the head," the Digger shouted. "I'll get to you when I'm damned good and fuckin' ready. Right now I'm talking to a guy." The customer said he thought he could get a drink in the place. "You can get a drink when I feel like gettin' you a fuckin' drink," the Digger said. "Right now I don't feel like it. Paul, 'stead of sittin' down there like a damned dog, come around and give the loudmouth bastard what he wants. Pour it down his fuckin' pants, all I care." At the end of the bar, a small man with gray hair got off his stool and came around to the spigots. He started to draw beer. "I got to get even," the Digger said to Harrington. "I got to find a way to get even and that's all there is to it."

"You're not gonna do it pushing radios," Harrington said. "You're not gonna do it that way, I can tell you right now. You, I think you're gonna have to find something a lot bigger'n radios to sell, you expect to make that kind of dough."

"Well, OK," the Digger said, "that's what I was thinking."

"Sure," Harrington said, "you're gonna have to sell the place, here."

"No," the Digger said.

"Whaddaya mean, 'No'?" Harrington asked. "You haven't got anything else you can sell. You don't dress that good, you can't sell suits. You got a car there, isn't bad, but you got to get around and you couldn't get more'n a grand for it if you sold it, anyway. What the hell else can you do, sell your house? Can't do that. Some guy make you a price on the wife and kids?"

"Well," the Digger said, "I mean, there's other ways of raising money."

"Not without taking chances," Harrington said. "That kind of money, you either got in the bank and you go in and you take it out, or else you got it in something else and you go the bank and you practically hand it over to them, or else you go the bank with a gun and you say: 'Gimme everybody else's money.' There's no other way, and that last one, that's risky."

"There's other ways," the Digger said. "Look, this place. You know what I hadda do, get this place? I hadda get up off the floor is what I hadda do. Johnny Malloy, I get out of the slammer and Johnny Malloy gives me a job and no shit. Me, I figured it's temporary, I got to have something to do. I never had any idea of running a barroom all my life."

"What's the matter with running a bar?" Harrington asked. "Nothing the matter with that. I wished I had a good bar to run."

"Sure," the Digger said, "but that's it. Takes money, get a bar. I didn't have money. All I had was a goddamned record. Was all I could do, keep the probation looking the other way while I was working here. So, Malloy gets the cancer. He knew he had it. He says, there wasn't anybody else had the money, wanted to buy it. They're all laying off. He told me that. 'Wait it out and steal it off the wife, they got in mind. Bastards. I'll sell it to you for what it's worth. Not what I could get for it if I was all right and I just wanted to sell.

What it's worth. That's about twice what I'm getting offers for.'

"I said: 'John, I haven't got what the place's worth. You know that,' " the Digger said. " 'I'm working for you, for Christ sake. I shouldn't even be doing that. You're taking a chance with the license, I'm taking a chance with the probation, what the hell. I can't buy this place.'

"He says: 'You quit too fast, my friend. What I got in mind, you just keep on working for me, only I won't be here. You work for the wife. Only instead of me keeping what I got left after I pay for the stock and the lights and you and all, you pay for the stock and that, and pay her like she was working for you, and you keep what's left. You do that long enough, she's all right, the kids finish school, I don't have to worry about none of that stuff, because I trust you, and you end up with the place. Me, what the hell I want with money? Where I'm going, money's no good. What I need is somebody who's gonna pay money to Evelyn.'

"I said: 'John, OK, all right, sure. But the license. I can't get on no license. You want your wife onna license?' He says, no, he don't want that. Somebody'd take it away from her. He says: 'Look, why'n't you see what your brother can do, the governor? Try for a pardon.'

"So I do it," the Digger said. "I go see my holy brother and I ask him, does he know anybody. See, by then he's almost getting over it, I did time. Well, no, he don't know anybody, but then he's in pretty thick with Bishop Hurley there. Maybe Hurley knows somebody. So it's this way and that, and then I get this call from this Rep I never heard of before, will I meet him? Sure I'll meet him. So I meet him, and he's got quite a lot to say, how do I like the weather and what about the way the Red Sox're doing, all kinds of shit, and finally he gets to the point: He wants five hundred bucks. For what he don't say, why he wants it from me, but he knows me and he knows I want this pardon, which I didn't tell him, and he says: 'Running for office, it's very expensive. I got this printing bill.' Then he shows me this bill, it's all beat to shit. He's been carrying it around for probably two years, ever since he got elected, showing it to six or eight guys a week. That's how I could do it, boy, get even: All I need's one of them printing bills. Anyway, it's for five hundred and thirty bucks and he says: 'I dunno how I'm gonna pay it.'

"I come back to Malloy," the Digger said. "I ask him and he says: 'Hit him the five. That's cheaper'n I figured.'

"Now, I don't know this Rep from a hole inna ground," the Digger said, "and Reps don't give pardons, governors do that. But I do it. Two months later, (continued on page 238) digger's game(continued from page 146) the pardon comes through. And it's a good thing, too, because Malloy's got trouble hanging on. 'Now we got to get an appraiser.' he says. I say: 'What the hell we need an appraiser for? Tell me what it's worth. I'll pay it.' He says: 'We don't need an appraiser, you need an appraiser. You want to get on the license, don't you?' OK. He tells me, fifty-four K. appraised value. Now the appraiser comes in. He looks around. 'Fifty-four thousand,' he says. He was here probably twenty minutes. Two grand he charges. I thought that was kind of high. I said: 'You work pretty fast.' He says, old hundred-a-minute, 'I'm an expert appraiser. Been at it a long time, particularly bars and restaurants. Experience, that's what does it.' He leaves and Malloy says: 'Another thing that does it: His brother-in-law's on the Licensing. Now you're gonna get on the license.'

"I think Malloy was probably dead about a month," the Digger said. "He didn't last long after he got things taken care of the way he wanted. I go see my fat fuckin' brother. Just by way of no harm, he says: 'You might've thanked me, getting the pardon and all, you're doing so well now.' I said: 'Thanks? What the hell for? All you did was send the thief around. I paid the five.' He says: 'What five?' I tell him. Turns out he paid a guy a grand. So I ask him, is it the Rep? See, the same thing, I'm willing to go the five, he still shouldn't beat the brother out of the grand. No, indeed, he says, no such thing. It's another guy. That's funny, I think, and I tell him about the Rep, and he says: 'Well, I think probably I'm gonna check that out.' And he does.

"Now I get another telephone call," the Digger said. "The Rep again. Will I meet him? I meet him. I meet him inna Parker House. He says: 'I certainly want to thank you, the loan you give me, and now 1 want to pay you back.' Hands me this envelope. Five-thirty in it. I count it and I say: 'Here's thirty back. I loaned you the five.' He gets this dumb expression on his face. 'Oh, yeah,' he says, 'now I remember you, you cheap fuck.' "

"You should've called a cop," Harrington said.

"I could've," the Digger said. "I could also've called the ghinny Pope in his fuckin' bubbletop limousine, I could've done that, too. Would've done me about as much good.

"Now, you look at that," the Digger said. "The Rep, the guy with the brother-in-law, my fine fat brother. What does he produce? Every single month for fourteen years I been sending Evvie Malloy three-fifty. Gimme a few more years, I own this place, the way the deal finally worked out. 'The place took care of O'Dell,' Malloy said to me, 'it took care of me and it'll take care of Evvie and take care of you. Take care the place, Digger.' He was right. I took care the place. I worked like a bastard. I produced. My brother, he's just as big as me, he's got to eat a lot--you got to eat a lot, you weigh two-ninety--what's he done? I eat at home, what the wife cooks. He's throwing down the lobsters at the Red Coach. He's got a nice Electra Two-and-a-Q. I got to hump it around, find something used that J can afford. After I find it, I get hell for buying it. He's got the place down to Onset, his cottage, it's got eight or nine rooms, a couple baths up and one down, it's a cottage. I got three boys and a girl and I practically got to hock the Social Security to get half a bath in the. where the pantry was, I got a house. He's got a two-car garage, I got no garage at all; in the summer, I get the same view of Morgan's lawn, which he never cuts. I had in the winter. The snow and all, it looks better in the winter. In the winter, my fuckin' brother's down to Delray for a couple weeks, I see where he goes to Ireland in the fall. Now, what I want to know is this: How come them guys? How come them guys and not me?"

Harrington drank some beer. "You're pulling your joint." he said. "God's punishing you. Pretty soon you're gonna get hair on your hands and moles on your face and pimples on your ass. Every-body'll be able to tell. Don't do your brains any good, either. Keep it up, you're gonna turn simple, and you don't have far to go, either, you was to ask me. Three Our Fathers and fifty Hail Marys and a good act of contrition. Our Blessed Mother don't go for your filthy habits, you know."

"Fuck you," the Digger said. "I listened to you plenty of times. All I was doing was thinking out loud."

"You listened to me," Harrington said, "I was buying the beer. That's the rule: Guy that buys the beer does the talking. Now you know what I'm gonna do? I'm gonna go home. You're thinking the kind of thinking you do. I don't want to be around when you do it."

At 11:30, the Digger closed up. The small man with gray hair took a long lime locating his jacket and lunch box. "For the love of Mike, will you come on," the Digger said.

"Some son of a bitch stole my paper." the small man said. "I didn't even finish reading it. I think I had about half a beer since 1 get in here this after, and now some son of a bitch steals the paper."

"Paul," the Digger said, holding the door, "I'm not paying you. Got that? No money. Thanks for your help, but no dough."

"I was on my feet about six hours," the small man said.

"You were on the tap for six hours, too," the Digger said. "I loan you money and you don't pay me back. You're into me for thirty or forty bucks and I never asked you for it and you never paid me back. You come home from the track and you're tapped out and I stand you a couple beers and I listen to you. what horrible luck you got, and then I give you five, you don't have to ask the old lady for carfare, she's gonna know you lose. And you always take it. Now the thing for you to do is, shut the fuck up and go home."

The Digger drove to Copley Square and parked his car in front of the public library.

He entered the Boylston garage on the St. James side and took the elevator to the third tier. At row D, he found a mustard-colored Coupe de Ville with a gold-vinyl roof. It had Maryland plates.

The Digger tried his square-butted key in the driver's side door. It worked. It also worked in the ignition. He drove the Cadillac down the ramps to the exit. There was a sleepy kid in a blue Eisenhower jacket on duty.

"I lost my check." the Digger said. On the attendant's booth there was a sign: Lost ticket must show license and registration.

"You gotta pay the max," the kid said. "Three-fifty."

"Here," the Digger said. He presented a five-dollar bill. The kid gave him change. "That's a screwing," the Digger said. "I was only in here since six."

"Yeah yeah," the kid said, "read me the whole act if you want. I could make you get undressed and everything, you know."

"I know," the Digger said.

At Logan International Airport the Digger took the Arrivals lane and put the Cadillac into an empty space in front of the ground-level entrance to United Airlines. He got out of the car and locked it. At the top of the escalator, he turned left and walked toward the bar. He found a short, swarthy man seated at a table for two at the east windows. He sat down. He put the key in front of the man.

"Where is it?" the man asked.

"Right down to the meter," the Digger said. "Right down in front."

"You were supposed to put it inna regular garage." the man said.

"He didn't tell me that." the Digger said. "He said: 'Leave it in front of the United terminal and take the keys in. That's what I did."

"There's liable to be some fuckin' slate trooper watchin' it, I go out." the man said.

"That's your problem," the Digger said. "You should take it up with him is what I think."

"I don't give a fuck what you think." the man said. "Key OK?"

"Yup." the Digger said.

"OK." the man said, starting to get up.

The Digger grabbed him by the left arm and the man sat down again. "There's another thing he told me, he told me you were gonna have some money belonged to me."

"You get that from him," the man said.

"You can get your arm fixed over to the Mass. General," the Digger said. "They're open all night, they never close. Your face, too. The Boston City's open all night, too, they got an emergency room, but guys I seen afterward, I was to make a choice, if I was you I'd go the Mass. General. Get up five hundred and save the beef on the Blue Cross is my advice."

"Two hundred," the man said.

"Five hundred," the Digger said. "This was hurry-up, and it's not my usual line of work. I did it, I said I'd do it, the five. Gimme the five, I break your fuckin' nose so you know I mean business."

"You got to leave go my arm," the man said.

"I'll leave go," the Digger said. "You keep it in mind, I can move fast enough I caught you the first time. Nothing funny, the next time I get you, you're gonna need treatment." The Digger let go.

The man reached into his left-hand pants pocket and removed a few bills. He put them on the table and started to get up.

"Siddown," the Digger said.

The man sat down. The Digger counted the bills. "OK," he said, "you can go."

"Thanks a whole fuckin' bunch," the man said.

"Don't give me no shit," the Digger said. "I know who you are. I know what your fuckin' name is and I know what you fuckin' do. I got a dime or so and you tried to screw me. I decide I want to drop one of them dimes, call somebody I know in Boston P. I)., you're gonna need more'n one Cadillac to save your greasy ass."

"Fuck you." the man said. He started to get up again, warily.

"It's OK," the Digger said. "I'm satisfied. You can go now. Cheap ghinny pisspot."

"I could kill you, you know," the man said.

"I don't know any such fuckin' thing," the Digger said. "You ever made a pass at me, well, you better make a good one is all. You'd be lying inna window down to Tessio's before the sun come up, and I'd be having a beer on your luck. Fuck off."

The short, swarthy man left. The Digger beckoned a pock-faced waitress. "Wild Turkey," he said. "Double."

"It's almost closing," she said.

"Two Wild Turkeys," the Digger said. "I gotta ride the trolley, I might as well start off first-class."

In the floodlights on the apron of the terminal to the north, two priests escorted a large number of middle-aged people toward a Northeast 727. Each of them carried a TAP flight bag, white and red.

The waitress came back. She put the drinks on the table. "Three-fifty," she said.

The Digger put a five on the table. "Keep it," he said. "What's that?"

"Pilgrimage, most likely," she said, squinting. "Those're Portuguese Airlines bags. They connect with TAP in New York. Probably going to Fátima."

The Digger watched the passengers straggle aboard after the waitress had left. He finished the first Wild Turkey and raised the second to his lips. "Jesus Christ," he said to himself, "I think I'd rather take the trolley."

"Is that fuckin' paper here yet?" The Greek began talking as soon as he had shut the door of the sparsely furnished office of The Regent Sportsmen's Club, Inc., on Beacon Street, Boston. His black hair was shiny from recent washing; more black hair bloomed from under the collar of his white polo shirt.

"Greek," said Croce Torre, also known as Richie Torrey, "I meant to tell you before what a great thing you are to start off a week." Torrey had a belly. He was grinning.

"Look," the Greek said, "the start of the week's most of the week, in my end of things. I got today and I got tomorrow to get this new stuff squared away so I can take care my regular business. A week and a half's already lost. The longer I wait, the more shit I get. I finally go around. I mean, I can't hack around the rest of my life with this goddamned thing, you know? We're gonna do it, for Christ sake, let's do it."

On the other side of the office, Miller Schabb sat at a gray-metal desk and muttered into the telephone. "Yeah, Herbie, yeah, I hear you. I know, it's. . . . Yeah, the busy season. Well, there's another season, too, Herbie, isn't there, not quite so busy. You told me about that one yourself. Nobody in the world wants airplanes then. You get my point? I'm still going to be wanting airplanes. That's if I get my airplanes now. You can't give me airplanes now, when I want them, you're not going to see much of me later on, you follow me?"

"Look," Torrey said, "I don't run the U. S. Mail, you know? The stuff just got here. It come in, it was here the first thing. Must've, maybe it come in Saturday."

"Well," the Greek said, "OK. Let's have it so we can see what we got to work with here." He removed his blue-and-white-cord sports jacket. His biceps stretched the woven fabric of the polo shirt into a coarse mesh.

"How old're you, Greek?" Torrey asked.

"Forty-one," the Greek said. "Gimme the fuckin' paper, will you?"

"Miller's got the paper," Torrey said. "He wanted to look it over. He'll be off in a minute, so calm down, for Christ sake. You lived forty-one years, you look great, you can afford a couple minutes. Sit down and relax. Christ, I wish to God, I'm thirty-one and I wish to God I looked as good as you do."

The Greek rubbed his middle. It was flat. "You don't look like I do because you don't work at it like I do."

Schabb said: "That's right, Herbie. Now you're getting the idea: When you got airplanes up the gazoo, I'm going to be a nice fellow to know. No, Herbie, no, I wouldn't threaten you."

"The first thing I do, every morning," the Greek said, "over to the Y. I'm there when they open, seven o'clock. I play handball an hour. Swim half a mile. Forty laps. I take a little steam, then shower and I shave. I get dressed, I go over the diner in the square, bowl of Total and black coffee. Good solid meal and it don't put any fat on you, something happens and you haven't got time for lunch, you're still all right. Three years I've been doing that. See, you get older, you got to do something. I didn't use to have to do anything at all, keep in shape. Now I do."

"I couldn't take that," Torrey said. "You probably have to get up about six to do that."

"Six-thirty or so," the Greek said.

"Yeah," Torrey said, "well, see, I couldn't've done that today. Last night, Sunday night, OK? Nice quiet night. I was married, I didn't use to do anything Sunday night. Watch the tube or something. But last night, I'm down to Thomasina's there. White clam sauce. Few drinks, couple bottles of wine. Then we go up the Holiday, very good group up there. Pick up this girl, we go back to my place, she's got to make an omelet, OK? By now, two in the morning. Cheese omelet, little more white wine, time we finish eating the omelet, it's after three-thirty."

"Then you ate her," the Greek said. "Then it's almost four-thirty. No, you're right. You couldn't've got up with me."

"There ain't no calories in muffin," Torrey said. "I don't say I did it, you know, but if I did, that won't put any weight on you."

Schabb said: "No, Herbie, no Electra. You put an Electra out there on the end of the ramp, half my trip's going to see it and blow right away. 'Oh, no, Mill, not that coffee grinder. Them things come down.' They got a reputation. . . . I don't care what they did to them, they still got a reputation. You got to give me a jet, Herbie."

"Just kind of a degenerate is all," the Greek said. "You're a fuckin' degenerate, Richie. I dunno how you can look in the fuckin' mirror in the morning."

"My friend," Torrey said, "it was a good enough night, I can't. I can't even see the mirror. Last Wednesday, there, I go to the ball game. Then afterward we go to this club, all the college kids and secretaries go."

"Why'n't you hang around playgrounds or something?" the Greek asked. "Leave the kids alone, you fuckin' degenerate, you're giving them bad habits."

Schabb raised his voice: "Now, look, Herbie. You can think anything you want. The fact is, I bought three planes from you. I filled the one I had and the other two're going to be filled and if I don't fill the other two, I'm still good for the money and you know it. You try to get from the Knights of Columbus before they take off. You just try it."

"Yeah," Torrey said, "well, I can see you don't know much about kids anymore, Greek. I pick up this kid and we go back and you know what it was? Strawberry."

"You're shitting me," the Greek said.

"I am not shitting you," Torrey said. "Strawberry. They got that spray now. Now, you old fart, you tell me I'm teaching bad habits a kid's got strawberry in the beaver before I ever meet her. You just tell me that."

"I don't fuckin' believe it," the Greek said. "She must've been a hooker or something."

"She's a file clerk down to this insurance company," Torrey said. "She's no hooker, because I didn't give her no money. Hell, you look at her, you figure she walked in a bar by mistake, thought it was a church. You'd just be wrong, that's all. She likes getting it, nothing more'n that, Greek, huh?"

"You guys're gonna take over the world," the Greek said. "The next thing, guy wants to get blown, he's gonna have to taste like London broil."

"Sure," Torrey said, "she's having dinner, you're having dessert. That's a great idea, Greek."

"Yeah," the Greek said, "well, I tell you, I think I'm gonna get myself a nice place way the hell out in the country and go out there with the family and start a chicken farm. I'm not gonna bring kids up in a world, people walking around with vanilla pussy, hot-fudge cocks. This fuckin' country's going to the dogs, you know that, Richie? Guys like you."

Schabb said: "That's a hell of a lot better, Herbie. Yeah. Yeah. Seven-twenty-seven's fine, Herbie. Now, read it back to me."

"You oughta try it before you knock it, Greek," Torrey said. "You look good enough. You could still make out."

"I look good because I want to look good and I work at it," the Greek said. "Not because I want to go around like a goddamned pervert. You want to go around in them yellow things, shirts, pants, the white shoes, it's probably all right, you look like a nigger pimp. Don't matter to you. I got some self-respect."

"You're afraid," Torrey said. "You work so hard taking showers there, you probably don't think, you're not sure you can get it up."

"Also," the Greek said, "also, I need to look good. Your action, you can wear a fuckin' dress if you want. People're probably gonna laugh at you some, but that's all right. You take me, your average stiff borrows some, he thinks I collect my own, he doesn't pay. So, he maybe starts thinking about not paying, he kind of looks at me out there, he thinks: 'Son of a bitch can do the work himself, I don't pay.' So he pays. I'm up the hundred two hard guys cost me. Plus which, I don't get the kind of heat you get when you start moving guys around personal. Nice and peaceful is the way I like things."

Schabb said: "All right. That's fine, Herbie, you got a deal. Always a pleasure to talk to you." He hung up. He smiled. "I got the plane for Columbus Day." he said to Torrey. To the Greek he said: "Good morning, Greek."

"You know you got a degenerate for a partner?" the Greek said. "He's eating little kids."

"You eating kids. Richie?" Schabb said. "You ought to be ashamed of yourself."

"I can't help it." Torrey said. "You remember the other night, there. Everything goes black and then I did it again."

"Told you about the strawberry one. I guess," Schabb said. "Unbelievable, huh?"

"I don't believe it." the Greek said. "I should've gone in the Church like my mother was always after me to do. I can't take this kind of thing. You got some paper for me to see, Mill?"

"Yeah," Schabb said, "right here." He removed a thick packet of papers, check-sized, held together with a rubber band, from the desk. He tossed it across the room to the Greek: it landed on the second gray-metal desk. The Greek moved behind the desk and slipped the packet out of the band.

"You had some trouble," Torrey said to Schabb.

"Yeah," Schabb said. "You'd think we're trying to steal airplanes, 'stead of buying them, probably the best customer he's got. One more like this and we'll have to hijack the damned things. For a guy that's always griping about how lousy business is, he's sure awful tough to do business with."

"You count this stuff?" the Greek asked. He was sorting the papers into three piles.

"I looked at it is all," Schabb said. "There's quite a bit of money there. Maybe the boys didn't win the whole state after all."

"I make it one-eighty-eight K," the Greek said.

"That's quite a bit of money." Torrey said.

"What'd the plane cost us?" the Greek asked.

"Twenty-eight," Schabb said.

"Hotel?" the Greek asked.

"Three K, promo, free drinks and that stuffs, tips for the bells," Schabb said.

"Pretty high, you ask me," the Greek said. "We deliver the fish, we also got to pay to ice them down. How many guys we had?"

"Eighty," Schabb said.

"Eighty K in front from them." the Greek said, "sixty-six K, was it, we hand back in counters?" Schabb nodded. "What'd that cost us?"

"Twenty-two," Schabb said.

"Twenty-five K, counters and promo, twenty-eight for the plane," the Greek said. "Any other expenses?"

"You wanna count the rent and phone here?" Torrey said. "It's pretty steep, three bills, lights're extra, they do give you the air conditioning."

"Damned nice of them," the Greek said. "No. Fifty-three, expenses. One-thirty-five starting out with the paper, we collect it all."

Torrey said, "What is this shit, we collect it all?"

"Just what I said," the Greek said, "we collect it all, we got one-thirty-five here. We don't collect it, we got less. Plus the points, of course."

"Greek," Torrey said, "I don't understand this. That's what we got you for, you know, collect it all."

"I could use a coffee," the Greek said.

"Mill," Torrey said, "get colfee."

"Why should I get coffee?" Schabb said. "I don't even want coffee. I told you, anyway, we ought to get a pot and put it in here."

"That don't work," Torrey said. "I had one up to the place in Lynn there, somebody was always going home at night and leaving the thing plugged in. So you get one of two things. You got a pot that's practically welded itself together, all the coffee stewed away, and that's useless. Or else there's enough coffee, you come in the next day and you got a pot you're never gonna get rid of the taste of it. And somebody's always spilling it. It's easier."

"For a muffin man." the Greek said. "you're awful dainty. Richie. I never knew you're so neat."

"Never mind neat." Torrey said. "Mill, willya get coffee, for Christ sake."

"No," Schabb said. "I'm no errand boy. Call somebody up, you want coffee, have them bring it up. You're gonna do that, I'll have a cup myself, matter of fact. Large regular and a Danish."

"No calls," Torrey said, "I'm expecting a call. I don't want the line tied up."

"Richie." the Greek said, "this is just a waste of time, all right?"

"Looks like it." Torrey said.

"Mr. Schabb," the Greek said, "me and Richie want coffee. Richie and me, we're not going for collee. You're going for coffee, got that? Now, go for coffee. Get me two blacks. Get him what he wants. Pay for it yourself. Don't talk about it no more. Just do it, all right?"

Schabb looked at Richie.

"Don't look at me, Mill." Torrey said. "The man tried to tell you nice, I tried to tell you nice, you don't want to be told that way. Now you got told the other way. Get the fuck out of here and get the fuckin' coffee and just do it, all right?"

"I guess I am the errand boy," Schabb said, getting up.

"No," the Greek said, "you're just the guy that's nice enough to go out and get coffee for everybody and so me and Richie here can have a little discussion, just between him and me. You had a little more experience, none of this would've happened."

After the door closed, the Greek asked: "Is he all right?"

"He's a great guy," Torrey said. "The thing about him, he's perfect, you know? Because he still, basically he's still a businessman, you know what I mean? He still thinks like they do. He likes the pussy probably a little more'n the average married guy oughta, and he's kind of a wise ass, but he still, he's still a businessman. He tried to line up the Bar Association."

"Hey," the Greek said, "that'd be something."

"Wouldn't it, though?" Torrey said. "All them bastards with a license to steal, getting screwed themselves for a change."

"Wouldn't be bad for dough, either," the Greek said. "Some of those guys, you can really make out on them. They got good dough. The flashy ones in the knit suits and El Ds. Take them right over the fuckin' hurdles. They think they know fuckin' everything."

"He'd do it for nothing," Torrey said. "Miller hates lawyers. He thinks he should've beat that fraud thing."

"Well, shit," the Greek said. "I thought he got an s.s. out of it."

"Sure," Torrey said. "Myself, I think he made out beautiful. A suspended and a fine and he hadda make restitution. So a thousand the fine, thirty thou, I think it was, they got him for, he told me himself, well, he didn't actually tell me, but I could tell, you know? He got closer to seventy-five before they nailed him. So, forty K profit, he don't go the can, he's still mad as hell. 'I had the fix in,' he says. 'It was in the bag. I give, my lawyer tells me it's five for him and ten for the prosecutor and something for the judge, it's gonna be dismissed. No evidence or something. So I pay it over. Then, whammo, I get it right between the eyes. I got screwed.'"

"So," the Greek said, "big deal. He got fucked. I can understand that. But still, he comes out of it all right. I clouted a car when I was a kid and I done three months up the Lyman School. The guy got the car back, too. I would've taken his deal. I wouldn't care if somebody did blow smoke up my ass."

"That's what I tell him," Torrey said. "That's what I'm saying, he thinks like a businessman. He don't know is all. All he knows is he can't get bonded no more and he don't trust anybody that looks straight. I tell you, Greek, we got ourselves a fine fat gaffer in this guy."

"It's all right to talk about things in front of him, then," the Greek said.

"He is joined up," Torrey said. "I personally guarantee it. He is in. He knows about the man. He knows the guy in Worcester and he knows, he knows about, the guy in, how we got to send down to Providence. I put it right on him. I said: 'There's maybe some things you don't understand about this kind operation, the way it works, what you got to do, you know? So I'm telling you right now, your own personal information and nobody else's, because if I catch you telling anybody else, I'm gonna kill you, all right? A piece of this, we got to work this on the OK from Worcester, and we get that OK, there's a price on it. We got to pay the money down to Providence there, all right? You understand that? You're getting in this, you're gonna be connected is all there is to it. Because you can't do this, you're not connected. You understand that.'

"He says: 'You're not telling me anything I didn't know, I started talking to you. I was looking for you, for Christ sake. You think I went looking for somebody. I didn't know the guy I was looking for?'

"I say: 'OK, then, you're in. But you know, it's like getting married, it's like getting married in Italy, there, you know? We never had no divorce, we haven't got any now. You're in, you're in, and you stay in. That means you go out someday and you take your medicine, you go inna grand jury or something, OK, that's what you do. You go out and you take your fuckin' medicine. You don't, I come around and wreck you personally, because I have to. OK?'

"He says," Torrey said, "he says: 'OK. I told you, I don't have no objections.'

"I say: 'I hope so. I hope you got it clear in your mind. I'm responsible for you, you come in. I got to be sure and you got to be sure, because I got to cover my ass. I been covering my ass for a long time. I know how to do it. I know, I bring a guy in, I'm taking a chance is what I'm doing. I don't take no big chances, I wanted big chances, I'd take my own goddamned tours. I don't. So you get him in the shit, I'm the guy gonna have to go down there, explain how come, and that I can't do. So I better not have to, Mill. There's a lot of guys'd like to have another crack at the man, they're not satisfied he's already doing time, they figure, they figure he's gonna get out someday. That they don't want. They're looking for guys like you that didn't always understand everything they said they understood. You better not be one of them. Because, you turn out to be one of them, I'll have to do something. And I'll do it, Mill, no matter how much I like you personally. I'll do it.' He says: 'OK.' He's OK, Greek. Now, what is this shit, if we collect?"

"Well," the Greek said, "I look at this stuff, all right? Three kinds of paper." He tapped the stack nearest his right hand with his right forefinger. "Jewish paper. Names I recognize. Easy stuff. Big sports with the fat-ass yachts and the golf carts in Newton. Every one of them drives the Cad. Used to playing, used to losing, used to paying. No pissing and moaning at all. I floated some of them a fast hundred K for a land deal now and then, it's a Sunday and they're inna hurry and the banks're closed. Only thing is, they're so used to losing, they don't lose all that much. I figure there's less'n half what we got here, there. What we oughta get off them guys, we oughta get a piece of what they pay the cunts to fuck them. Then we'd really make out."

The Greek tapped the middle stack. "Not one goddamned name in here I recognize. The addresses I do. Needham, Wellesley, Beverly, that kind of thing. Duxbury, Hingham, Sharon.

"Now I make a guess on that," the Greek said, "professional guys. Doctors, lawyers, guys that fix people's teeth and feet and that kind of stuff. Sweat their balls off twenty years and all of a sudden they're making thirty and they go right out of their fuckin' minds. Get their hair styled, all of a sudden they know everything. First thing they do, they go to Vegas and lose about six K apiece."

"They're guys Mill knew," Torrey said, "I dunno much about them."

"Just what I thought," the Greek said, "I left that out. First thing they do, they get themselves a smartass broker like him, and they lose about two K. That makes them feel so good, they go to Vegas and drop six."

"They got it, though," Torrey said.

"Most of them, yeah," the Greek said. "They just don't know they got it, it's in appreciation on a house or it's in what they can borrow from the bank. They got it, they just don't know they got it. So first you gotta convince them of that, that they got it. Then, the next thing, you got to convince them they owe it. See, they're used to getting things, they spend money, they get a new car or they get a boat or a trip or something. Furniture. They already had what they got for this. You got to convince them of that, too. Then, they're not used to a guy like me. They all, they all borrowed money. When they hadda pay the money, guy sends them a letter. They haven't got the money, guy sends them a piece of paper. Any banker inna world's gonna trust a guy, kind of job they got. So I gotta teach them that: I don't trust them. Few calls do it. I snarl at them. They pay. They read all them books. I'll get that."

"So where's the problem?" Torrey asked.

"Problem's this," the Greek said, tapping the pile on the left. "These guys I know. Digger Doherty's group, the guys hang around The Bright Red, there. I would have to say, I would have to say if somebody was to ask me, we got twenty-eight K in the Digger and them, and that's gonna be hard to get out. I don't think bringing in them jamokes was such a hot idea."

"We hadda fill the plane," Torrey said. "We had fourteen beds at the hotel, we're gonna have to pay for, at least one night, we don't use them, the whole three nights, they don't rent them to somebody else. Miller told me he was coming up empty, his other prospects. I said I'd see what I could do. So I tried the Digger."

"Richie," the Greek said, "you hang around the wrong type of guys. You know them guys?"

"Yeah," Torrey said, "I know them guys."

"You know them guys," the Greek said, "you don't know them too good. Those're hard Harps. They haven't got twenty-eight K in the one place since the day they're born, all of them put together. In addition to which, they are very tough guys. I used them myself, somebody got it in his head the Greek was running a charity here. I had very good results. The fuckin' Digger, he's got a machine gun. Most guys know the Digger, know he's got a machine gun, it's one of those things everybody knows. There's talk the Digger used the machine gun a couple times. I get the Digger personally, I call in the Digger, I get somebody else he sends around, he's tied up and he can't do that particular one, it don't make no difference. You get the same thing and you get it, too. You get one or two of them bastards from The Bright Red and you send them around to whale the piss out of somebody, they go around and whale the piss out of him. That could give me some trouble. Maybe they decide now, I go to see them, there isn't anybody big enough, come in and whale the piss out of them. Then what do I do?"

"Two things," Torrey said. "That's only if they welsh. I know the Digger a long time. I know Mikey-Mike Magro a long time. They're a couple of loudmouth micks is what they are."

"They can also deliver," the Greek said. "Never mind how much noise they make."

"You gimme a chance to finish," Torrey said, "that's what I'm saying. I know the guy and I don't like the guy, but I got to say, I never see the guy come up short on anything. So I don't think you're gonna need anybody, go in and whack him. His friends, either. They lose, they pay. I thought of that when I ask them."

"Still, maybe they don't," the Greek said. "Then who's got the problem? You got the problem? No, I got the problem. Which you give me. Which you didn't ask me, was it all right for everything, you're maybe giving me this big fat headache. See, Richie, that's what I don't like, you not asking me before. I don't want no more of that."

Miller Schabb opened the door after knocking. He carried a large paper bag that was wet at the bottom. "You guys through kissing and hugging?" he asked. "OK for the niggers to come in now?"

"Come on in, Mill," Torrey said. "Shut the fuckin' door and shut your goddamned yap, too, while you're at it. The Greek didn't know where you stood was all."

Schabb put the bag on a pad of white paper. "Look at that," he said, "goddamned stuff. Gets all over you, got to go out, it isn't even ten o'clock yet and I bet it's ninety already. I tell you something: Tonight on the way home, I'm stopping at Lechmere and getting a coffeepot."

"You get it," Torrey said, "you clean it."

"Sure," Schabb said, "sure, I'll clean it. I also sweep out and I clean the toilet, too. That's what I do, Greek, I'm on the shit detail."

"Willya come off it. Mill, for Christ sake," Torrey said. "Greek don't have nothing against you. He just didn't know. He's getting old, getting worried, he just wanted to be sure."

"Yeah," the Greek said. "See, Mill, somebody should've told you. You got, see, Richie's the kind of partner you got to watch. He gets himself all pissed off or something and then he goes out and does something, and then everybody else's got to run around and everything, trying to cover his ass for him. Richie's OK for a partner if you watch him real close and don't leave him go down the North End and start waving his arms at the cops or something. It don't mean nothing."

"It don't mean nothing," Torrey said, "long as you understand what it means, Greek. This is my business. Miller's in it and you're in it, because I wanted you guys in it. That's all. It's still my business. I can't work it with you guys, either one of you, I'll go get some new guys and run it with them. I can do it. I'm the guy with the OK, don't forget."

Schabb distributed the cups of coffee. "I dunno what I'm gonna forget," he said, "since I wasn't here and all. You guys mind telling me what this is all about?"

"The Greek's afraid he can't do his job is all," Torrey said. "He don't want to admit it, but that's basically what it is."

"I don't like that kind of talk, Richie," the Greek said. "I come in here, I been doing this more'n twenty years, putting money out and getting it back in again, and I'm as cold as a nun's cunt. You, you had a good idea, now you don't want to listen to anybody else, you want to start something, pretty soon you got the FBI putting three guys in white sedans out there and all. OK, don't listen. Be a big asshole. Then when you fuck it up good and everybody's good and screwed, you can tell everybody you screwed it up because you're just like a little kid and you wanted to, I guess." The Greek leaned forward, toward Richie. "Now you can do that, you want," he said, "you can. But I was here when you got here and I'll be here when you're gone, I still got my regular business. And you're not gonna fuck me up with it, clear?"

"What he's afraid of," Torrey said to Schabb, "he's afraid the guys down to The Bright Red'll tell him to go home and make him cry."

"I don't know those guys," Schabb said. "I was after some other guys, I know them from around town. You see them various places. I had about thirty of them, the movers that don't always go home at night like they're supposed to, I figured them for naturals. Except I didn't figure, I was talking the last two weeks in July, first week in August. That's when these birds take the family to the Cape and pretend they're behaving themselves. I got about four out of the lot and I was counting on twenty. We could've lost some serious money on that. So I asked Richie."

"Richie give you some bad advice, then," the Greek said. "I'll do the best I can with it this time, but I don't want no more of this. Next time, ask me, too, see what I got to say."

"OK," Torrey said, "ask him, Mill, is it all right, we got the Holy Name?"

The Greek said: "What?"

"Yeah," Schabb said, "Saint Barbara's Holy Name from Willow Hill there. Going to Freeport over Labor Day. Three glorious days and nights of sun, sand, excitement and luxury living in the glamor center of the Caribbean, a welcome daiquiri in the well-appointed Casino Lounge, a pineapple in every spacious room, a spectacular view of sparkling beaches and azure water from your own private terrace. Plus: a surprise gift for the ladies, an orchid corsage about the size of a quarter that we get for thirty-eight cents apiece. All for the incredibly low price of three hundred and fifty dollars a couple, including round trip by jet and transfers between the airport and the hotel. I cut the parish school in for five hundred to get the pastor to let me in the door, but I did it."

"Per couple," the Greek said. "They're taking their wives."

"Sure," Schabb said. "One or two of them wanted to know if they could bring the kids, but I said I couldn't arrange it."

"Isn't that something?" Torrey said.

"It sure is," the Greek said. "It's a mess of shit is what it is. Those guys haven't got ten bucks to put on the table. What're you giving them, counters, how much you staking them?"

"Twenty dollars a couple," Schabb said. "I could've done a little better, it's a cheap plane ride, but I figured the twenty was enough. That'll get them inside at night."

"It'll get them inside the first night," the Greek said. "Daddy'll lose the twenty while the little woman watches. Then he'll lose six bucks more. Then they'll go back the room and eat the fuckin' pineapple. Why the fuck're we giving away pineapples, for Christ sake? Who wants a goddamned pineapple?"

"Everybody wants a pineapple," Schabb said. "They started doing that in Hawaii. Pretty soon the word got around. Now your average clown doesn't think he's been to a resort if there isn't a pineapple on the commode when he walks in the room."

"Yeah," the Greek said. "Well, this group, we probably ought to give one slice of pineapple. All night long the old lady'll be at him, dropping all that great American dough, gambling. He wasn't so goddamned stupid they could've stayed home and seen a movie on the six bucks. The next two days they spend getting the sun, on which we don't make no money, the way I get it. We'll be lucky we make expenses.

"We get unlucky," the Greek said, "it'll be worse. The silly bastards won't quit. They'll lose their fuckin' shirts and sign everything you put in front of them, and then I'll have to go out and take a lot of washing machines and secondhand cars to write the stuff off. Why in Christ you want them nickel-stealing hot dogs for, can you tell me that?"

"We're, they're not signing any papers," Schabb said. "The priest thought of that one right off, and I agreed with him. 'No, Father,' I said, 'nothing like that. No credit gambling. Just what they bring with them. We're not that kind of operation, Father, trying to victimize people. Basically, we're just a travel agency. Labor Day's a slack period in the package-tour business. Just a way to keep the airplanes going and the hotels full. Frankly, we expect to take a loss on this, but the hotels make it up to us.' "

"At least you didn't lie to a priest," the Greek said. "What are we gonna do with this?"

"We're gonna take pictures of them," Torrey said. "That first night, they're blowing the twenty, we're gonna, we got this guy with a camera. He's gonna take about eighty pictures of those jerks. Then he's gonna send them back and Mill's gonna make up a brochure."

Schabb grinned.

"I don't get it," the Greek said.

"It makes the flier," Schabb said. "I talked to the Philadelphia group the other day; they did that. They got a deadhead bunch and they made about sixty dollars on the deal. But then they put it on the brochure: 'The Holy Suckers' Men's Club, Satisfied Customers at Play in San Juan.' Ten pictures of fat guys and women. You should see the business it gets them. The used-car dealers and the appliance distributors and the Rich Kids A. C., the guys who really want to go and have the money we're interested in, they take the pamphlet home. How does the wife argue with them? You've really got something you can work with, then. A trip like this is just something you get through. Then it pays and it pays and it pays, and it just never stops."

"You see, Greek?" Torrey asked. "Now you understand. That all right with you?"

"That's pretty fuckin' good," the Greek said. "I got to admit it. That is all right."

"You never would've thought of that, would you, Greek?" Torrey asked.

"No," the Greek said. "Just the same as you didn't think how I was gonna get twenty-eight out of guys down in Dorchester there. Just like Mr. Schabb there, got himself all steamed up, he's gonna have some empty seats on the plane and he's gonna lose, maybe fifteen thousand, so him and you get together and now as a result, we got a pretty good chance of losing twenty-eight, instead. See, there was something you guys didn't think of in a million years, and another thing you didn't think of was to ask me if maybe I thought of something. I'm different than you, Richie," the Greek said, "I always known, I known ever since I got out, and that was a long time ago, I'm the kind of guy that's got to think about things, you know? Because there's certain things I can do and certain things that if I do them, I'm gonna get inna shit. You, I done all right, see? You, you don't."

The Digger got up at 11 and asked his wife for ten dollars.

"How come I got to give you ten dollars out of the house money?" Agatha Doherty asked. She was 39 years old. She was 5'3" tall and she had a trim figure. She wore a nine-dollar tan dress. "You don't give me enough as it is, and then you're always coming back and dipping into it. I've been saving up to get my hair done. I got to have it frosted again."

"I thought you were gonna quit having that," the Digger said. "You're always telling me how it hurts. And it costs, what?"

"Thirty dollars," she said. "It does hurt, it hurts a lot. They take a crochet hook and they pull your hair out through this cap that's got holes in it. I do it because I thought you liked it. You told me you liked it, you didn't care about the thirty dollars. Now I suppose you're more interested in what you can do with the thirty dollars'n you care how I look anymore."

"Oh, boy," the Digger said. He was eating four fried eggs, blood pudding and toast. "It does look good. I don't care about the thirty. You're a good-looking woman. You take care of yourself. I appreciate it. There's very few women I ever see, raised four kids by themselves and look as good as you do. I said that lots of times."

"It's nice to hear," she said. "I don't know as it's worth ten dollars to me, but it is nice to hear. You shouldn't eat so much, you know. That stuff's all full of cholesterol. You're going to get yourself a nice heart attack if you don't stop stuffing yourself all the time."

"Look," the Digger said, "I quit smoking, right? You remember that? I got off the butts. Well, that don't do the weight no good, you know? You're so worried, how much I weigh, why the hell is it I couldn't get a minute's peace around this house every time I light up a cigarette?"

"I'm not likely to forget you quit," she said. "It was like living with a regular bear. No, I know that helps. And I thought: Well, let him put the blubber on, he'll take it off later. Only you didn't. You just keep on, getting bigger and bigger. I bet you weigh two hundred and fifty pounds."

"I don't," the Digger said. "You want to think so, OK. But I don't."

"You don't," she said, "it's because you weigh more. You're probably up to two-seventy-five. You damned near crushed me, the last time."

"Hey," the Digger said, "quit that kind of talk. What if the kids hear you?"

"If you got up in the morning," she said, "you know, you'd know where they are. They all went over to the pool. Anyway, Anthony's fourteen."

"So what?" the Digger asked.

"I don't think he thinks the stork brings them anymore," she said.

"Of course he don't," the Digger said. "He's known different since he was six. He's the horniest little bastard I ever seen. That still don't mean he oughta hear his mother talking like a longshoreman."

"I don't see what difference it makes." she said. "He can hear the bed squeaking, you know. As much as you weigh, the whole house probably moves around. He knows about sex and he knows we do it."

"Look," the Digger said, "are you having your period or something? I ask you for ten bucks, you give me nothing but grief. You don't want to loan it to me, say so, I'll go cash a check."

Aggie Doherty took her handbag from the cupboard. "I'll loan you ten dollars," she said. "That means I get it back."

"Tonight," the Digger said. "When I close up tonight, I'll take it out of the deposit. You'll have it tomorrow morning."

"How come you didn't take it Saturday?" she asked, handing him the money. "You should've taken some money when you closed up Saturday, the way you usually do, so I don't know how much money you're spending."

"I did," the Digger said.

"Uh-huh," she said, "that's what I figured. Then last night after everybody else went to bed, all of a sudden you went out. Now today you need ten more dollars. Who'd you spend all your money on, Sunday night when it's the only night you can spend home with your family and all of a sudden you've got to go out? What can she do for you that I can't do?"

"Look," the Digger said, "you went to bed, nine-thirty. Matthew and Patricia went to bed before you. Paul right afterward. Tony come in about ten-thirty and he went to bed. See, I'm such a good father, I take my family the beach on Sunday, it's my day off. The traffic down and the traffic back, I buy practically every kind of hot dog there is in the world, everybody takes rides at Paragon Park, I even give Tony five, so he can go off and see what's female and breathing he can try to get in trouble. I come home with ten or eleven bucks left out of twenty-five I take Saturday night, everybody craps out on the old man by eleven. So I sit and I think and I watch the news, I'm still wide awake. I'm not used to your kind of hours. It's my one night off, for Christ sake, I'm supposed to spend it looking at the newspaper or something? So I go down the Saratoga, see what's going on."

"That's what I asked you," she said, "who was she?"

"I spent four bucks on some drinks," the Digger said. "I meet Marty Jay down there and we talk and I had the four drinks. A guy I know comes along, he's stiff, my big mouth, I told him, he oughta take a cab home. No dough. So I lend him five. I was there a long time, I didn't leave till after two, me and Marty we each leave the kid a buck, we take up the table all that time. So I got a buck and change on me now. I had four lousy drinks and I lend a guy five and now I been out all night in a whorehouse. You better get some fresh news, sweetheart: You can't make out nowhere on ten bucks anymore. All I did was have four drinks."

"Martinis, I suppose," she said. "You drink too much, too. That isn't good for the heart. I could smell it on you when I woke up."

"You must've got your nose frosted instead of your hair," the Digger said. "I was drinking bourbon."

"It's no better for the heart," she said. "Just for my information, what's this ten for? You got another friend who needs a cab?"

"Gas for the car," the Digger said.

"Haven't you got enough gas to get to work?" she asked. "You could go to work and take it out of the till."

"I'm not going to work," the Digger said. "What I mean is, first I gotta see a guy. Then I'm going to work."

"Where's the guy live, you need ten dollars' worth of gas," she asked. "New York City?"

"The tank's almost empty," the Digger said. He pushed the plate away. "I'll have some coffee if it won't do my heart any harm."

"It won't help it," she said, pouring the coffee. "Of course I keep forgetting, the way that car uses gas you probably couldn't go more'n twenty miles on a tank, anyway."

"You know," the Digger said, "I could get ten dollars easier, I was to go over the Poor Clares and beat them out of it. And they haven't even got ten dollars, to hear them talk, although I see they probably got a hundred thousand dollars' worth of real estate. Jesus Christ, are you gonna start in on the car again?"

The Digger drove a 1968 Olds Ninety-Eight convertible. It was dark gray and had a red-leather interior. It had factory air conditioning.

"I'm just being practical," she said, "I don't think you need such an expensive car."

"I had that car two years," the Digger said. "For two years, you've been being practical about it. Two years and I haven't spent a dime on it except for tires and gas and stuff. Not one dime. I think that's pretty good. That's a good car. It's well built, just like you. No repair bills."

"It's still a great big car," she said. "It burns a lot of gas and you have to buy high-test. I drive it, the one day a year I'm lucky enough to get the car, it's very hard for me to drive. If you'd drive a smaller car, I could have a Volkswagen."

"It is a great big car," the Digger said. "As you just remind me for a couple hours, I'm a great big man. I need a big car. I can't get in one of them puddle jumpers. I get in, I can't move. They're not built for a man my size. I'd break the seat down in a week. Friday night, I was in one of them Jaguars. I couldn't move. I thought to God, I'm going to die before I get out of this thing and they'll have to bury me in it."

"Who do you know, owns a Jaguar?" she asked. "You told me you were working Friday night."

"I did and I was," the Digger said. "I went out, after."

"For what?" she asked.

"To see a guy," the Digger said. "I went down the Saratoga and this guy I know, he wanted to show me his new car is all."

"Jerry," she said, "you worry me. The weight's going to kill you. You spend way too much money. You drink too much. You got friends I never see, I don't know their names, this guy with a Jaguar. What'll I do, Jerry, with four kids in school? What'll I do if something happens to you?"

"Ride around in a big car every day and enjoy yourself," the Digger said. "How the hell do I know what you're gonna do, be doing when I'm dead? I'll be dead. Won't be nobody dipping in the house money, at least, which I notice is up around sixty bucks a week. I'm always dipping into my dough for twenty more around Thursday, after I go and give you the forty Monday. And do I give you a load of shit about that? I do not."

"Don't you talk to me about what it costs to run this house," she said. "If I spend forty-five dollars a week on food, most of it goes down your gullet. The kids go off to school on ten cents' worth of Wheaties, wearing cheap shoes I can get for them in the basement, and if Paul ever sees a pair of pants Tony didn't wear for a year first, he won't know what to do with them."

Her shoulders sagged. Then without facing him, she said: "Jerry, I do the best I can, I really do. I hunt around until I can get things on sale. But you come down here, you've got to have the eggs and the blood pudding I have to shop for special at the delicatessen, one-seventy-five a pound and it's really terrible for you, and you eat three pounds a week. Off you go whenever you like in your air-conditioned convertible big car. Can you understand, does that maybe make some sense to you? The trouble is that I'd do anything to make you happy. I love you. And you know it. That's what the trouble is."

"Lemme try it for the four hundredth time," the Digger said. "Let's see if you can get it through your head this time. I bought the car used. The air conditioning was in it. I agree with you, it's silly. You put the top down, what good's the air? You leave the top up all the time, what do you want a convertible for? The guy had the car before me. he didn't. He wanted the air for rainy days and the lop for nice days. OK, he was buying it, he could have it the way he liked. I didn't put it in. You take it the way you find it. I wouldn't've saved no money, I had the air taken out. It would've cost me money. So I leave it in. Although I think now, I knew how much music it was gonna cost me, I would've paid the extra dough to take it out."

"Anyway," she said, "the point is that money to spend on Jerry's just money, and Jerry'd got it. Something his family needs. Jerry wants to know right off, how come and how much?"

"Where'd you learn this?" the Digger asked. "You didn't know all these songs, I married you. I looked you over pretty good. I didn't hear nothing like this. Now you got that trap of yours working every minute. I wished I knew what the hell happened to you, made you different."

"Some things about you," she said, "changed a little in sixteen years. I used to be able to go to confession."

"You still can," the Digger said. "Two blocks down, three over. It's a church thing, you'll recognize it right off. 'Course, it don't sound the same, there's likely to be some hairy-looking bastard running around talking English like a Protestant, but it's right there. Every Saturday, confessions three to five and seven to eight-thirty, unless Father Alio-Lo's got tickets to the ball game. Then seven to seven-fifteen."

"I can't go to confession," she said. "I can't tell them what we been doing."

"Oh, for Christ sake," the Digger said, "wake up or something. Things've changed. Nobody pays any attention, that birth-control thing. That's just the ghinny Pope raving around. Them guys, they must feel like they're running a drugstore, everybody coming in, one way or the other. They're used to hearing it."

"I'm not used to saying it," she said. "It'll bother me. What if he asks me, Jerry, what do I say?"

"Look him straight inna screen," the Digger said. "Tell him: 'The foam.' Then you say: 'What difference it make? My husband don't like the rubber boots, you take the pill you're liable to grow a tail or something, and I ain't letting them put one of them things inside me.' Then ask him: 'This how you get your cookies, Father? Asking people?' That'll slow him down."

"Of course I'll also be telling him," she said, "my great Catholic husband don't want any more children. Doesn't believe in sex for that anymore. Just something he likes to do, like bowling or something."

"You can tell him that, too," the Digger said. "Matter of fact, tell him I tried both and I think it over, I hadda give up one or the other, it'd be bowling. I see the ghinny Pope coming around with a couple hundred a week, the next kid to eat and wear and go to school on, and some more for a bigger house so I can do what I like to do without the whole goddamned world looking on, well then I'll say: 'Thanks, Pope,' and maybe we'll think about having another kid. Otherwise, my way."

"If you didn't spend every cent on yourself," she said, "we wouldn't need the extra. I know lots of families that haven't got anywhere near what you make, and they live much better. Their kids're swimming in the ocean this week. Our kids're over the M. D. C. pool. They go to the Cape, the kids go to camp, and my friends're all nicely dressed. I never have an extra dime, and when I do, you come back and take it. You and your wonderful friends, that's where the money goes. You've got the big convertible. You're going to the track. You're going to New York, to see the Giants. We can't afford twelve hundred dollars for three weeks at the Cape, but you've got a thousand dollars to go to Las Vegas. How much did you lose out there, Jerry, in four days by yourself?"

"All of it," the Digger said. "Just like you said."

"How much more did you lose?" she asked.

"We been through all of this before," the Digger said. "I told you, I was taking a hundred bucks extra. I didn't bring no checks with me. That's all I took. So all right, I'm a bastard. Get off my back."

"Eleven hundred dollars," she said. "A hundred less'n we couldn't afford for three weeks. All on yourself. Oh, Jerry, I think that's selfish. I think that's very selfish. I thought it was the limit when you paid out eighty dollars for the season ticket to the Patriots, but at least that'll give you something for it. I would've been able to see it, even, if. you'd got more of them so you could take the boys once in a while. But this, this is the worst thing you ever did, Jerry, the absolute worst thing."

"Good," the Digger said. "That's about the twentieth worst thing I remember. Now maybe you'll just howl about Vegas all the time and give me a change from the car and the clothes and all."

"Those were the worst until this one," she said. "Now you've topped them. I hope you don't think of a way to top this. I don't understand it. I never will. How could you come from the same mother and father as Paul, and be so different? So inconsiderate and mean. That, that I will never understand."

"Paul is a great guy," the Digger said. "I agree with you."

"Couldn't you," she said, "couldn't you just try to be more like him? Couldn't you do that?"

"Well," the Digger said, "I could. 'Course, I'd have to get rid of you and them kids first, him being a priest and all, I don't think I could qualify. But I'll give it some thought, yeah."

"Think about us," she said. "Think about your family once in a while, instead of just yourself. What's happened to us, Jerry, think about that. If you figure it out, tell me, will you? Just tell me?"

The Digger stared at his coffee cup until after she had left the kitchen. "So far," he said to the cup, "so far it's really been a great day. I can hardly wait for the rest of it."

This is the first of three installments of "The Digger's Game." Part II of the novel will appear in the February issue.