Ice Blues

"She'll be all right," I said. "Go ahead. We'll come up to the apartment in a few minutes."

Joan waved her away. "It's okay. I'll be okay. Go ahead. You go ahead."

Gail stared at us both for a long moment, looking hurt and abandoned, then turned and walked quickly into the building. Joan and I found a dry patch of grass under some eucalyptus trees and sat on it. I said, "I'm offering you a proposition. Either you tell Gail or I'll tell her."

She fumbled in her big leather bag, found a pack of cigarettes, and lit one.

"Tell her what? What is it that I'm supposed to tell Gail? You go around telling people how to run their lives. Tell me what I'm supposed to tell her."

"That you killed your husband, Dan Lenihan, eighteen years ago this month."

She didn't flinch. Drawing on the cigarette, she leaned back against the tree trunk, then exhaled mightily. She looked at me and said, "Yes, I killed Da

"No."

"Who did?"

"You did-with your irrational fear of Pug Lenihan, who's nothing but a vicious, cracked old blowhard. He's been holding this over you for eighteen years, making your life miserable every time the subject of Albany came up, threatening you, extorting cash to pay for his nursing care, using you as a lever against Jack after Jack made off with the famous two and a half million last October. You're so scared of Pug you can't even let him find out you're gay, for fear of the bigoted browbeating you think you'll have to take from him. The truth is, for eighteen years Pug Lenihan has been blackmailing you with his knowledge of your husband's death. Except, I don't quite believe it. What happened?"

"What happened? Da

"How did you go about that? I'm told Dan Lenihan was drunk and passed out in the street, where he froze to death in the middle of the January night."

A slight shake of the head. "No. Not on the street."

"Where?"

"On the front porch."

"That's not murder. That is horrible bad luck."

"No."

"He had gone out drinking, to Mike Shea's on Broadway. As he did-every night?"

"Every night. Yes, every single solitary night of the nineteen years of our marriage. Before Corrine was born, I went with him. Every night."

"And he left Shea's-when?"

"At three. He always left at three because Mike knew when to shut him off and Da

"And Mike called that last night, as usual?"

"Of course."

"And what did you do?"

"I went back to sleep."

"You mean you were exhausted and you dozed off."

"No. I mean I went back to sleep. I said to myself, maybe if I go back to sleep Dan will pass out on the front porch and freeze to death. It was the deepest, most restful sleep I'd had in years."

"Had he beaten you?"

"Every night."

"Before he went out?"

"No. When he came home. Every night at three in the morning I'd let him in and he'd hit me. He never hurt me much. He couldn't-he was too drunk. He could barely walk."

"According to the police report, Dan's body was found on the sidewalk near Sacred Heart Church, not on your front porch. He never even made it home that night."

Now she looked at me with no expression I could identify. Her face was set and grim but her eyes were full of tender sadness. "Early that morning someone found Dan on the porch and dragged his body down by the church. That's where they discovered him, but that's not where he died."

"This person who moved Dan's body must have been someone who understood what had happened and wanted to protect you. Who was it?"

Her expression did not change. "Hell will freeze over before I tell you that."

She flicked away the cigarette, which had burned down to the filter. "So now you know. Jack trusted you and now I've trusted you. Will you give me the money, please? So I can return it to Pug?"

"How did Pug know what really happened? How could he be sure?"

She shrugged. "Was there ever anything that went on in the North End that Pug didn't know about? I doubt it. He checked with Mike Shea, who told him I'd been called to let Dan in. He checked with everybody on Walter Street who he knew stayed up late or got up early and might have seen something. One of them had-Howie Fay, Mack's dad. He saw Dan's body being moved."

"And he never mentioned it to the police?"

"No, just to Pug. Pug told him to keep his mouth shut. Da

"His own family?"

"Wife. His own wife."

I studied her, and she looked away. I said, "So that's why you can't cross Pug-and why you tried to stop Jack from crossing Pug. I take it Jack did not know the true circumstances of his father's death. Otherwise he'd have been more careful in his dealings with Pug."

She nodded, watching me.

"Where the hell did Pug Lenihan ever pick up two and a half million dollars anyway? Or might I guess without trying too hard?"

A grunt of sour laughter. "From 1926 until 1974 Pug handled the finances for the Boyle brothers. Kickbacks, bribes, loans, gifts-it was always 'one for the party, one for me.' The Boyles must have gotten theirs too. They didn't die in big fancy houses in Latham, so you can probably assume that there are suitcases full of money under three other beds in Albany-or were. That's where he kept it, you know, under his bed. Mrs. Clert must have known about it, and old Howie Fay. I found out from Da

I said, "You told Jack."

She nodded. "Last summer I told him. In October Jack took the money out of Pug's house when he was working out there. He was going to give it back, he told me. To the people of Albany."

"I'm sorry."

"When Jack was out here last week to pick up the laundered money, I removed the cash and stuffed newspapers into the suitcases Jack was sending to you, and I did what Pug told me to do on the phone, which was to send the money to Mack Fay, who was Pug's driver. Mack was supposed to deliver the money to Pug. If I had told Jack the truth about his father's death and what Pug was doing, he'd have killed Pug. I know he would have.

He hated him enough to do it. We all did. Don't you see now what an evil man Pug Lenihan is? And why you have to return the money to him?"

"No, I don't. What can he do?"

"Why, he can have us arrested! And charged with murder! There's no statute of limitations on homicide cases. Pug told me that and I know it's true. We could go to prison!"

"Joan, listen to me. The Albany police know the whole story. They figured it out an hour after your husband's body was found. Only by using the most tortured legal logic can you be charged with murder in any degree. No jury could be found that would convict you. And in any case, the cops knew