Shovel Ready (20 page)

He forges on. A salesman. Knows when to engage. When to ignore.

It’s an enticing idea, isn’t it? Rebirth. Especially for a man like yourself. What you went through. I would think—well, you know. Memories. Regrets. They can form a toxic cloud of their own. A different kind of fallout, I imagine.

Milgram’s dressed in a navy suit. Red tie. Perfect knot. A politician’s uniform. He flicks at his lapel, brushing away some blemish only he can see. Wears a lapel pin. A tiny silver cross. Readjusts it. Turns back to me.

You must wonder from time to time. What if someone’s
wife had missed her train? Or what if her teacher had called in sick and the acting class was cancelled? Or—and these are just hypotheticals, mind you—what if her husband calls her back for one more good-bye kiss in the doorway of their apartment? So she sets off five minutes later. These troubling questions of timing—

Milgram, I’m going to cut you off right there—

I just mean it can all feel so random, so meaningless. That’s all we try to do, Mr Spademan. Bring meaning to people’s lives. Order.

Persephone told me what you like to do. For example, to her friend.

Rachel? Yes. A troubled girl.

Milgram looks away, out the window, like a shy little boy caught in a lie.

I like to believe she’s in a better place now.

I’m sure you like to believe that. Let me interrupt the sales pitch, Milgram. You, me, Harrow, we’re all of us a little bit sick. Some of us sicker than others. And I don’t see a way that any of us are getting out of this alive.

Well, that’s a very dark view of the world.

Not dark. Just a view.

Well, let me offer you an alternate view. We have asked something of you. To give us someone. We’ve made an offer in return, and it’s a good offer, and that offer stands. But let me add one more thing.

I don’t need a sweetener.

Hear me out. We have something else we can offer to you. Someone, actually.

Like I said—

Do you recall how many people were involved in the attacks that day?

I never read the papers.

There were six. That they know of. That they caught or were killed. The two in the van. The two they caught in Brooklyn who helped build the bombs. The one who supposedly left the first bag on the train. And the money man. The elderly one. So that’s six. The Dirty Half-Dozen, as they dubbed them.

Sure.

And then of course whoever coordinated those car bombs that came after.

They never proved those were related.

All chaos is related, don’t you think? In any case. Our Dirty Half-Dozen. The Times Square bombers. Do you know what always fascinated me about their plan?

What?

The precision of it. I mean, you really have to marvel. A subway bomb, then a second one, precisely timed, and then a van that drives down to Times Square all the way from upstate.

Sure. Very impressive. Gold star.

But do you truly believe that, in an operation that well-executed, that precise, you’d leave a bag to ride unattended on a train for—what? Half an hour? From borough to borough? Hoping no one spots it? No one gets suspicious? No one sees something, says something, as they used to say?

I don’t really care about logistics. Especially in hindsight.

They say the bag with the bomb on the train rode in alone all the way from Brooklyn. Just like your wife, Mr Spademan.

Your point?

There was a seventh man.

That’s bullshit.

A motorman.

That’s not true.

He worked for the MTA. Begged off his shift at the station right before the explosion. A half hour earlier than scheduled. Called ahead. Claimed to be nauseous.

So?

So there is one place you could leave a bag and no one would notice. Right at the front of the train. The motorman’s car.

Sure. But who would—

You leave the bag, radio ahead, complain that you’re ill. Replacement driver meets you, takes over, spots the bag, figures you left it, figures he’ll drop it off for you at the next stop. But there was no next stop.

If that’s true, if it’s even half-true, how come no one knows about it? How come the police never tracked this guy down? They put every fucking speck of every person from that day under a magnifying glass. Trust me.

I don’t know. What I do know, Mr Spademan, is that this motorman is out there. And no one’s asked him these questions yet.

He puts a hand on my arm. Pale as soap. Perfect manicure.

We thought you might be interested in asking him yourself.

Okay, Milgram. But why tell me now? Why not before?

For most men, the promise of the dream is enough. More than enough. They’ll happily make that bargain.

Milgram works past his habitual wince to an actual smile.

We understand that you’re different. Persistent. And ruthless. I must say, I thought we had you cornered. But what you did to the Chinaman? I almost admire it. I’m not even sure how you knew he’d turned.

You mean Rick? You fuckers killed him. Sent your errand boy Simon.

Milgram squints, as though I’ve just told him a joke he doesn’t understand. Then continues.

In any case, Mr Spademan, here is our proposal. You give her to us, we give him to you. I will drop you on his doorstep personally. Hand-delivered. Give you two a little privacy. Maybe you get to put that box-cutter to use after all.

Milgram’s presentation is over. He’s clearly pleased with himself. Folds his pearly hands in his lap. Leaves me to ponder. We ride in silence while I consider what he’s told me. No real reason to trust him, but then, this is too big a lie to be a lie. He’d never dangle this if he couldn’t deliver. Consequences would be far too grave.

A seventh man. Out there. Unpunished.

There’s no way I’ll ever give Milgram anything he wants. But I’ll admit it. I feel it. Temptation, I mean. Years ago, Mark Ray asked me if I’d ever been tempted by religion, and I told him that’s not the kind of temptation I have to worry about.

The limo’s circled back to my block. Milgram drops me at my door. A considerate date.

I get out.

Let me think about it.

He leans across the expanse of black leather.

Please do. Pastor Harrow’s in the city this weekend, as you know. He’d be happy to meet with you. In person this time. Assuming we can work something out. You have my card. Until then.

The limo drives off. I turn to head home.

On my doorstep, my box-cutter. The one they confiscated.

Red ribbon tied around it, like a gift.

I’m sitting with Mark Ray on the front steps of the library. Watching the lions watch the city.

This is the first day we met.

He’s finishing his story. The one about temptation.

Mark had two friends. Beth and David.

Beth he’d known since middle school. David since diapers.

They grew up in the church together. Sunday school. Youth choir. Easter pageant. Wednesday-night volleyball, followed by prayer.

In their teens, Beth and David started dating. It seemed natural enough. Beth had blossomed into the belle of the congregation. Brunette. Hourglass. David plenty handsome too. Sandy-haired and smiling. They swapped chastity vows and promise rings.

Perfect couple. A billboard for God’s good bounty, bestowed on those He loves. On those who obey. They looked like Adam and Eve strolling Eden, pre-serpent.

Everyone said so.

Save Mark.

He couldn’t help himself.

He was gripped with lust.

He hoped Bible school would quell it. He got accepted to all of them, and chose the one farthest away.

At Bible school he walked the ring road on campus with other women, in among the chastely courting couples.

On your third walk around the ring road, you were allowed to hold hands.

Still, at night, alone, the lust found him.

Gripped him.

He lay in bed after lights-out. Gripped himself.

Then stopped himself.

Prayed instead.

For some kind of release.

He heard on Facebook that David and Beth had split up. Saw Beth’s status changed to single.

Started waking up joyful for the first time in months.

Put in for a job at his old church. Youth pastor.

The Prodigal returns. A fisher of men.

His first day back, unpacking books in his new office, Beth and David stopped in to surprise him with a welcome-home basket. Warm socks and hot cocoa. His favorite treat, or so she remembered. He used to clutch hot cups of cocoa on the sidelines when the youth group went ice-skating at the pond. Watching the two of them skate in lazy circles, oblivious to anyone else.

She didn’t know it had just been something to hold on to. An excuse to sit it out. Hot cocoa, slowly going cold. He always poured it out into a snowbank when it was time to head home.

They handed him the basket.

Standing hand in hand.

Welcome back.

He smiled.

We patched things up.

He smiled wider.

Great news.

A smile he’d practiced for years and would eventually perfect.

He worked with the teens, the youth. Went from Wednesday-night volleyball star to referee. Whistle at his lips. Later led the prayers.

All the girls formed crushes, naturally. Ray of Sunshine, they called him. Ray of Light. Told him he looked like that guy from the old TV show.
The Greatest American Hero
.

I’m no hero, he told them, American or otherwise.

The older girls liked to sneak up behind him, finger his curls playfully and in mock wonder, until he brushed them off like horseflies, told them to cut it out. They also liked to linger a little too long in the passenger seat of the car when he gave them rides home. Engine idling. Pregnant moment.

Nothing happened.

He was pure. An excellent pastor.

He’d drop them off and drive home alone. Stay up late reading in the lamplight. But it always found him.

Home, at school, back home, it didn’t matter.

Gripped with lust.

He turned out the lamp.

One day Beth and David stopped back at his office.

Hand in hand.

Good news. We got engaged.

Later, alone, David asked Mark to be the best man.

He said he’d be honored, of course.

I wouldn’t think of asking anyone else.

You’re a lucky man. She’s a catch.

A year later they stopped by his office again.

He looked up from his lesson plan. The story of Bathsheba.

What now? Pregnant?

No smiles. Beth’s eyes red.

We need to ask your advice.

By all means. Have a seat.

David was considering a missions trip to Mexico.

Mark grimaced. The only news from that region was of drug tensions and body counts. Both rising.

Not the safest spot on the globe.

David nods.

You go where you’re called to go.

Beth speaks up.

We’re also talking about starting a family.

I see.

David shrugs.

But that means if I’m ever going to go on a missions trip, the time is now. And it’s only a year.

She swats him.

Only?

Smiling. But nervous. Sick over this.

She’s grown into such a beautiful woman.

Mark clicks his pen.

Recalls school. The nights, mostly.

Clicks the pen again. Clickety-click.

Embossed on the side of the pen: the cross.

The old rugged cross.

Clickety-click.

Puts the pen down.

Looks David square in the eye.

Best friends since childhood.

Go.

Mark leaned forward. Elbows on knees. Hands gripped to whiteness.

Watching the lions. Watching New York. Where he wound up.

Confessing to a stranger on cold stone steps.

David never even made it to the guesthouse. The flight hit bad weather, got delayed, arrived past dark. They decided to risk it, which was stupid, of course. The stubborn gumption of the faithful, as my grandfather liked to say. Hit a road block. No doubt he tried to convert them, even to the end.

I’m sorry.

It’s not a story about temptation at all. Don’t you see? Not about lust, or love, but punishment. God’s wrath. How it follows you. When the Lord is displeased.

He rubbed his hands like he was trying, and failing, to get warm.

Said it like something he’d only just remembered.

But the thing David had done displeased the Lord
.

Sounds to me like you’re mostly punishing yourself.

Look at me. Playing shrink.

Well, if that’s true, I’m doing a terrible job. That’s why I called you. Failed even at that.

So what happened with her?

Beth? She was crushed, of course. Broken, really. Inconsolable.

You didn’t try? To comfort her?

No. I couldn’t even look at her. Not after that. So I ran.

But you loved her.

He looked at me.

Not her. Him.

I pull off the red ribbon, pocket the box-cutter, but don’t head inside. Not yet.

There’s a place in Hoboken where I like to go to when I need a moment to think. The door says
SOCIAL CLUB
, but really it’s just a bunch of old guys playing cards who know how to make you feel unwelcome. My first visit, they shunned me like they were Amish farmers and I was selling electric razors door-to-door. By visit three, I was getting good at shooting my own withering looks at any hapless strays who happened to stumble in. It’s the kind of place where an espresso appears at your elbow without asking and fistfights break out over checkers. Just try opening up a chess board, you’ll get cuffed upside your brainiac noodle.