Sleepers. Part 42

"Not after this week," Michael said. "This count's on the dole now."

"What'd you do with all that buried treasure?" Tommy asked. "Gamble it away?"

"How do you think we paid off King Benny?" Michael said.

Carol stood in the entryway, her arms folded, laughing and shaking her head.

"What is this?" she asked. "A gay bar?"

We turned when we heard her voice. Her hair was freshly cut and styled, and she wore a short, tight black dress, a black purse hanging off her shoulder on a long strap.

"It was," was," John said. "Till you walked in." John said. "Till you walked in."

"You want us to hug you too?" Tommy asked.

"How about just a h.e.l.lo," Carol said.

"How about a kiss to go with the h.e.l.lo?" John asked.

"Deal," Carol said, coming around to our end.

"Hurry up," I said. "Before the waiter comes in."

"Yeah," Tommy said. "Then we're gonna have to kiss him too."

"I saw him on my way in," Carol said. "He's cute. I'd throw him a kiss."

"That's funny," John said. "That's what Shakes said."

We sat around the table, ordered our dinners, poured our drinks, and talked until night turned to morning.

We talked about everything we could think of, five friends with so many shared moments, afraid to let our time together come to an end. We talked about everything but the trial. And the months we had sworn never to resurrect with speech.

Carol let loose her frustration with city bureaucracy and the battles she lost each day.

John and Tommy talked about their lives of crime. They knew it was a fast lane that could end only with a bullet or iron bars. But it was the only way they knew to feel in control, to push away the demons that gnawed at them during their rare sober moments.

Michael was at peace with his decision and curious about where it would take him. He had saved enough money to live for a year without working and had already invested in a one-way ticket on a plane leaving for London the following weekend. He had made no plans beyond that.

I half joked that my career choices were narrowed down to two. I was either going to be a reporter or an usher at one of the theaters whose running times I knew so well.

Eventually, the beer, wine, and liquor took hold and we switched gears, laughing over simpler times, in the years before Wilkinson starved us of laughter. Over and over we recalled our many pranks, relishing the freedom and foolishness a h.e.l.l's Kitchen childhood allowed.

"You guys remember when you formed that stupid singing group?" Carol asked, pouring water into a gla.s.s.

"The Four Gladiators," Michael said, smiling. "Best quartet to ever hold a h.e.l.l's Kitchen corner."

"Remember what Shakes wanted to call the group?" Johnny said, lighting a cigarette.

"The Count and His Cristos," Tommy said. "Man, that woulda sent alb.u.ms flyin' outta the stores."

"We weren't that that bad," I said. "Some people bad," I said. "Some people wanted wanted to hear us sing." to hear us sing."

"That group from the deaf school don't count," John said.

"Why not?" I said. "They applauded."

"You guys were awful," awful," Carol said, laughing. "Kids cried when they heard you sing." Carol said, laughing. "Kids cried when they heard you sing."

"They were sad songs," I said.

"Fat Mancho was gonna be our manager," Tommy said. "And King Benny was gonna be the bankroll. You know, get us suits and travel money, s.h.i.t like that."

"What happened to that that plan?" Carol asked. plan?" Carol asked.

"They heard us sing," I said.

"Fat Mancho said he'd eat flesh before he put his name next to ours," John said.

"What'd King Benny say?" Carol asked.

"He didn't say anything," I said. "He walked back into his club and closed the door."

"We stole from everybody we liked," Tommy said, finishing a mug of beer.

"So what's changed?" Carol asked, watching me pour her a fresh gla.s.s of wine.

"We had enough cuts to make an alb.u.m," I said. "We ripped off Frankie Valli, Dion, Bobby Darin."

"The cream," Carol said.

"Only with us it was sour cream," Tommy said.

"Let's do a song from our alb.u.m," Michael said, leaning across the table, smiling. "For Carol."

"Don't you guys have to go out and shoot somebody?" Carol said, hiding her face in her hands.

"We always always got time for a song," John said, standing and leaning against the wall. got time for a song," John said, standing and leaning against the wall.

"You pick it, Mikey," Tommy said, standing next to Johnny. "Nothin' too slow. We wanna keep Carol on her toes."

"Let's do 'Walk Like a Man,'" Michael said. "Shakes does a good Valli on that one."

"Back us up," I said to Carol, handing her two soupspoons. "Hit these against some gla.s.ses when I point."

"Not too loud," Carol said, looking through the doorway behind her. "Some people might be eating."

"We sing better in men's rooms," Tommy said. "The walls there hold the sound."

"There's one downstairs," Carol said. "I'll wait here."

"This is like the Beatles getting together again," I said.

Carol just snorted.

The four of us huddled in a corner of the room, me in front. Michael, Tommy, and John each kept one hand on my shoulder, snapping their fingers to an imaginary beat. Carol sat back in her chair, looked at the four of us, and smiled.

She clapped her hands as we started to sing "Walk Like a Man" in our best Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons voices.

Then we all cupped a hand to an ear, fingers still snapping, and hit all the right a cappella notes.

Carol stood on her chair and slapped the spoons against the side of her leg, mixing in with the beat.

Three waiters stood in the doorway and joined in.

Two diners standing behind them whistled their approval.

The bartender drummed his hands against the counter and handed out free drinks to all.

An elderly couple, in for a late-night espresso, wrapped their arms around each other and danced.

It was our special night and we held it for as long as we could. It was something that belonged to us. A night that would be added to our long list of memories.

It was our happy ending.

And it was the last time we would ever be together again.

24.

EARLY ON THE morning of March 16, 1984, John Reilly's bloated body was found faceup in the hallway of a tenement on West 46th Street. His right hand held the neck of the bottle of lethal boiler-room gin that killed him. He had six dollars in the front pocket of his black leather coat and a ten-dollar bill in the flap of his hunter's shirt. A .44-caliber bulldog nestled at the base of his spine and a stiletto switchblade was jammed inside his jeans. morning of March 16, 1984, John Reilly's bloated body was found faceup in the hallway of a tenement on West 46th Street. His right hand held the neck of the bottle of lethal boiler-room gin that killed him. He had six dollars in the front pocket of his black leather coat and a ten-dollar bill in the flap of his hunter's shirt. A .44-caliber bulldog nestled at the base of his spine and a stiletto switchblade was jammed inside his jeans.

At the time of his death, he was a suspect in five unsolved homicides.

He was two weeks past his thirty-second birthday.

Thomas "b.u.t.ter" Marcano died on July 26, 1985. His body was found in an empty cabin in upstate New York, five bullets shot into his head at close range. The body lay undiscovered for more than a week, the heat of summer and the gnashing of animals rushing its decay. There was little in the cabin beyond a dozen empty beer cans, two bottles of Dewar's, and three fully loaded semiautomatics. There was a crucifix and a picture of St. Jude in the pocket of b.u.t.ter's crew-neck shirt.

Thomas Marcano was thirty-three years old.

Michael Sullivan lives in a small town in the English countryside, where he works part-time as a carpenter. On his infrequent visits to New York he has never returned to h.e.l.l's Kitchen. He no longer practices law and has never married. He lives quietly and alone.

He is forty-four years old.

Carol Martinez still works for a social service agency and still lives in h.e.l.l's Kitchen. She too has never married, but is a single mother supporting a growing twelve-year-old son. The boy, John Thomas Michael Martinez, loves to read and is called Shakes by his mother.

Neighbors all say he has his mother's smile and her dark olive eyes.

The rest of his features come from his father, John Reilly.

Carol Martinez is forty-three years old.

Father Robert Carillo is the monsignor of an upstate New York parish, where he still plays basketball every day. He keeps in touch with all his boys and is always there when needed.

He prays every day for the boys he lost.

Father Bobby is sixty years old.

King Benny lives in a home for the elderly in Westchester County, miles from his h.e.l.l's Kitchen kingdom. He still drinks strong coffee, hiding his stash from the duty nurses charged to his care. He still hates to talk and suffers from Italian Alzheimer's. "I forget everything these days," he says. "Everything except my enemies."

King Benny is seventy-eight years old.

Fat Mancho suffered a mild stroke in the middle of August 1992. It left his right hand numb and blinded him in his right eye. He pa.s.sed the bodega on to a nephew, but still takes half the profits. He divides his time between his three h.e.l.l's Kitchen apartments and a new house in Queens.

He still bets on stickball games.

Fat Mancho is seventy-two years old.

Sean Nokes was shot to death in a back booth in the Shamrock Pub on November 6, 1979. His killers have yet to be apprehended.

Sean Nokes was thirty-seven years old at the time of his death.

Adam Styler was fired from the New York Police Department on February 22, 1982, brought up on corruption and murder charges. He pleaded guilty and was sentenced to a twelve-year prison term as part of a plea-bargain agreement. He served eight of those years in a maximum security prison. He was transferred to a minimum security facility only after a fourth attempt on his life left him paralyzed from the waist down. He was paroled in the spring of 1991 and now lives in a New Jersey suburb in a home for the disabled.

Adam Styler is fifty years old.

Henry Addison resigned from his job as community outreach director working for the mayor of the City of New York in the spring of 1980. He found work in a downtown investment banking firm. After six months of impressive earnings, he was in line for a promotion. On New Year's Day, 1982, his body was found in a marsh off a La Guardia Airport runway. Autopsy reports indicated he was beaten and tortured to death.

His killer or killers have never been found.

Henry Addison was thirty-six years old.

Ralph Ferguson's wife filed for divorce soon after he testified at John and Tommy's trial, gaining custody of their only child. He quit his job and fled the state, fearful of being brought up on multiple charges of child endangerment and rape. He eventually settled in California and, under another name, opened a hardware business. A second marriage ended when his wife was informed of her husband's true ident.i.ty and hidden past. The business closed after a fire gutted it in 1989. He now works as a shoe salesman in the San Francisco area. He lives alone, is heavily in debt, and has trouble sleeping at night.

He was the man brought to me by King Benny in 1993 to beg my forgiveness. I lived for nearly a year afraid of his every move. He will live the rest of his days equally afraid of mine.

Ralph Ferguson is forty-nine years old.

In the fall of 1982, a board of inquiry impaneled by the New York State Department of Juvenile Justice looked into allegations of abuse at the Wilkinson Home for Boys. They were confronted by a list of forty-seven witnesses, including the parents of three boys who died under the care of the inst.i.tution and a dozen guards who were witness to a variety of a.s.saults. In a report condemning all past and present directors of the Wilkinson Home for Boys, the board of inquiry called for a complete and total overhaul of the system and method of operations at the juvenile facility. A new warden was appointed and video cameras were installed on every block. Inmate privileges were extended and the hole was eliminated. Even the cells were freshly painted.

Edward Goldenberg "Little Caesar" Robinson is serving a life sentence in a maximum security prison in upstate New York, convicted on charges of drug trafficking and murder in 1990. He will be eligible for parole in twenty-one years. He was never questioned in the murder of Henry Addison.

Edward Goldenberg "Little Caesar" Robinson is fifty-one years old.