Grief Street

I struggled with tea. Four of the twenty-six guests of the house were busy preparing dinner out in the kitchen, the others variously attending to daily chores around the place.
    “I’m an actress,” Ruby said, “and I have a part in a new play that—”
    “So I’ve been reading in the paper,” Sister interrupted.
    I tried to picture Sister Roberta reading crime stories in the tabloids. Dear God! I might as well have tried tuning in a picture of a nun buying condoms.
    “Annie Meath, that’s the name of my character,” Ruby said. “She was a real-life woman, but not what you’d call a church lady. Maybe you know the legend of a Hell’s Kitchen gang called Annie’s Goons?”
    Sister seemed lost. I explained, “Annie Meath’s house was the place that gave the neighborhood its name.”
    “Oh yes, yes,” Sister said, nodding. “The Hell’s Kitchen house. That story I remember. The poor people, so hot in there.”
    “Forgive me, Sister,” Ruby said. “It was—well, a bawdy house that Annie Meath ran next door.”
    “A whorehouse? Yes, I suppose it was. Dear me.”
    “But was it the house to your east, or west?”
    “It’s the one with the two double windows,” Sister said. “A rather fancy house in its day, especially for the neighborhood.” She turned her veiled face my way. “Unless I’m very much mistaken.”
    “It’s what I’ve always heard myself,” I agreed.
    “What about these days?” Ruby asked. “Who lives there now?”
    “The place is officially closed down. Nobody lives there, so to speak.”
    “So to speak?”
    “Well, there’s the squatter.”
    “Oh?”
    “It’s what he calls himself, a wee joke between us couple of aging immigrants.” Sister’s voice filled with affection. “Mr. Monaghan is a fine gentleman, really, an old-fashioned charmer. Ruby, dear, do you know what is said of Irish charmers?”
    “What’s that?”
    “No siren did ever so charm the ear of the listener as the listening ear of a fine Irishman has charmed the soul of the siren. That’s my Mr. Monaghan, bless him. We have great long chats. That’s what he calls them—chats. The truth is, it’s me doing nearly all the talking.”
    “A charming squatter?” I asked. Like a cop I asked. “You’d never know by the looks of him. He’s clean, and beautifully dressed. Squatters don’t often grow silvery haired like my Mr. Monaghan.” Sister Roberta cut me a look that said she did not care for the suspicion in my tone. “And he’s beautifully spoken, when I give him the chance at speaking.”
    I suddenly remembered Lieutenant Rankin and how he wanted me on that Mickey Mouse stake up on Restaurant Row, duty which I escaped courtesy of Neglio’s clearance. Over to West Forty-sixth... Some con’s running the coronary scam.... Old but spry, and smooth... Talks like an Irishman who read some books.
    "Just how long has this Monaghan lived next to you, Sister?” asked.
    “Your police department's forever running poor squatters out from their digs. Now why are you wanting to be such brutes?”
    “What I do on my own, and what’s policy in the department—very often, Sister, that’s two different things.”
    “All the same, Neil. If it should happen you coppers make trouble for my gentleman neighbor, I’ll know it’s you was the snake in the grass that informed.”
    “Sister, please, give me a break.”
    “I’ll give you this warning fair: make trouble for my Mr. Monaghan and I’ll reconsider including your soul in my evening prayers.”
    So I dropped any further inquiry about Monaghan the squatter, though I made a mental note to ask a Midtown South cruiser to make some surreptitious pass-bys during the night, when squatters tend to come and go, and report back to me. Sister Roberta, meanwhile, amused Ruby by scolding me as a generally troublemaking schoolboy grown up to become a stranger to the old priests and nuns who loved him in spite of himself. She had lost nothing of her guilt-making skills.
    The three of us spent another half hour talking over small things. Then Sister and Ruby joined the crew in the kitchen. I was put into service lugging card tables upstairs from a storage bin down in the cellar and setting them into a long row together so everybody could sit around to a fine Easter dinner of ham and goose and carrots and string beans and Irish cockley pie and Ruby’s bread. There was wine, except for me, and ginger cake with whipped cream and coffee for dessert.
    It