Gin Palace 02 - The Bone Orchard

used to that by now.
    I had my own life to get back to, my own problems with which to deal, so some time after midnight I lay out on my mattress and caught some sleep. When I awoke it was just after nine in the morning. I drank some rice milk and ate a pear, then showered and dressed and drove to Job’s Lane. I went around to the back of LeChef and found one of the owners, a thin Frenchman with black curly hair and frowning mustache. His name was Bernard. The other owner, whose wife I had known in college, was not in yet. The Frenchman interviewed me on the back steps leading to the kitchen. It was warmer than it had been the days before, a spring like chill in the air. The only cloud in the sky now was a menacing mass to the south, a dark bank of unfinished steel riding the low East End horizon.
    “You’ve washed dishes before?”
    “Yeah.”
    “Prep work?”
    “Yeah.”
    He looked me over, thinking about it. “Minimum wage and staff dinners,” he said flatly.
    “That’s fine.”
    “We cater, too, so there’s a lot of prep work.”
    “I know how to cut,” I said.
    “Can you work doubles on the weekends?”
    “Whatever you want.”
    “Do you speak any French?”
    “Yeah.”
    “How much?”
    “I’ll understand what I hear.”
    He eyed me closely. After a minute, he said, “I’ve seen you in the papers. I don’t want any trouble in my restaurant.”
    “I’m just a guy who washes dishes,” I said.
    He nodded as if that was what he wanted to hear. He seemed content with my assurance. “When can you start?”
    “Right away.”
    “Be here at six tomorrow morning. We’re catering a party for some real estate people. We’ll be busy.”
    “I’ll be there.”
    “Expect to stay till around midnight or one. If you have a problem with that tell me now.”
    “I need all the hours I can get.”
    “Don’t worry, we’ll feed you. We treat our staff like people. I started out as a dishwasher in Paris. They treat you like shit there, but I tell you there is no kitchen that wouldn’t fall apart without a good dishwasher. And who knows, maybe over time we will teach you to cook.”
    “When’s payday?”
    “Saturdays. Can you make it till then?”
    “Yeah.”
    “We’ll see you tomorrow, then.”
    I nodded. “Tomorrow.”
    I rode home with the driver’s door window half down. It must have been fifty degrees out. I didn’t need a jacket at all. The air that blew in smelled clean. But it was the air that rides ahead of rain.
    By four the rain began. One minute there was nothing, the next it was pouring heavy and fast. I sat at my window and watched the rain fall, listening to it drill through the leaves on the ground and patter off windows and spill from the leaky gutter. From above me I heard a deep and steady hiss of the rain falling on the roof. I watched the rain till night came and the streetlights came on. The drops that smashed onto the light covers burst into a mist that hung suspended in the air, creating a grainy presence that drifted down and then churned slowly under the bright white glow.
    I kept thinking of calling Augie. After a while I decided that I had to go back and talk things through with him, and I was on my way out, pulling on my sneakers, when someone knocked on my door. I answered it. George the bartender was standing in the dark hallway.
    “What’s going on?”
    “There’s someone here to see you.”
    “Who is it?”
    “Some guy.”
    “Did you get a name?”
    “Cory. Cor-something. He’s wearing expensive clothes, he’s clean shaven.”
    “Curry,” I said.
    “That’s it.”
    “What does he want?”
    “He just said he wants to see you.”
    “Is anyone else with him?”
    “No.”
    “Are you sure?”
    “It’s dead down there. Everyone else there I know.”
    “Did he say why he wants to see me?”
    “He said something about his daughter.”
    I didn’t say anything to that. I could feel George watching me.
    “Do you want me to tell him you weren’t home, Mac?”
    “No, send him up. Do me a favor though, wait five minutes and then give me a call.”
    George nodded. “Gotcha.” He left and I closed the door. I went to my living room window and looked down on Elm Street and wondered what it could be Amy Curry’s father wanted from me, or how he even knew about me, or where to find me.
    After a few minutes there was a knock at my door. I stayed with my back to the window. I said, “Come in,” and waited as the door opened. A man in a Brooks