Hearts in Atlantis(150)

'That's okay,' Wheelock says at last. 'This time. But a new year's coming, pal, and your friend Jasper the Police-Smurf has a piece of land in upstate New York that he wants to build a little cabana on. You capeesh? The price of poker is going up.'

Blind Willie says nothing, but he is listening very, very carefully now. If this were all, all would be well. But Wheelock's voice suggests it isn't all.

'Actually, the cabana isn't the important part,' Wheelock goes on. 'The important thing is I need a little better compensation if I have to deal with a lowlife f**k like you.' Genuine anger is creeping into his voice. 'How you can do this every day - even at Christmas - man, I don't know. People who beg, that's one thing, but a guy like you . . . you're no more blind than I am.'

Oh, you're lots blinder than me, Blind Willie thinks, but still he holds his peace.

'And you're doing okay, aren't you? Probably not as good as those PTL f**ks on the tube, but you must clear . . . what? A grand a day, this time a year? Two grand?'

He is way low, but the miscalculation is music to Blind Willie Garfield's ears. It means that his silent partner is not watching him too closely or too frequently . . . not yet, anyway. But he doesn't like the anger in Wheelock's voice. Anger is like a wild card in a poker game.

'You're no more blind than I am,' Wheelock repeats. Apparently this is the part that really gets him. 'Hey, pal, you know what? I ought to follow you some night when you get off work, you know? See what you do.' He pauses. 'Who you turn into.'

For a moment Blind Willie actually stops breathing . . . then he starts again.

'You wouldn't want to do that, Officer Wheelock,' he says.

'I wouldn't, huh? Why not, Willie? Why not? You lookin out for my welfare, is that it? Afraid I might kill the shitass who lays the golden eggs? Hey, what I get from you in the course of a year ain't all that much when you weigh it against a commendation, maybe a promotion.' He pauses. When he speaks again, his voice has a dreamy quality which Willie finds especially alarming. 'I could be in the Post. HERO COP BUSTS HEARTLESS SCAM ARTIST ON FIFTH AVENUE.'

Jesus, Willie thinks. Good Jesus, he sounds serious.

'Says Garfield on your glove there, but I'd bet Garfield ain't your name. I'd bet dollars to doughnuts.'

'That's a bet you'd lose.'

'Says you . . . but the side of that glove looks like it's seen more than one name written there.

'It was stolen when I was a kid.' Is he talking too much? It's hard to say. Wheelock has managed to catch him by surprise, the bastard. First the phone rings while he's in his office - good old Ed from Nynex - and now this. 'The boy who stole it from me wrote his name in it while he had it. When I got it back, I erased his and put mine on again.'

'And it went to Vietnam with you?'

'Yes.' It's the truth. If Sullivan had seen that battered Alvin Dark fielder's mitt, would he have recognized it as his old friend Bobby's? Unlikely, but who could know? Sullivan never had seen it, not in the green, at least, which made the whole question moot. Officer Jasper Wheelock, on the other hand, was posing all sorts of questions, and none of them were moot.

'Went to this Achoo Valley with you, did it?'

Blind Willie doesn't reply. Wheelock is trying to lead him on now, and there's noplace Wheelock can lead that Willie Garfield wants to go.

'Went to this Tomboy place with you?'

Willie says nothing.

'Man, I thought a tomboy was a chick that liked to climb trees.'

Willie continues to say nothing.

'The Post,' Wheelock says, and Willie dimly sees the ass**le raise his hands slightly apart, as if framing a picture. 'HERO COP.' He might just be teasing . . . but Willie can't tell.

'You'd be in the Post, all right, but there wouldn't be any commendation,' Blind Willie says. 'No promotion, either. In fact, you'd be out on the street, Officer Wheelock, looking for a job. You could skip applying for one with security companies, though - a man who'll take a payoff can't be bonded.'

It is Wheelock's turn to stop breathing. When he starts again, the puffs of breath in Blind Willie's ear have become a hurricane; the cop's moving mouth is almost on his skin. 'What do you mean?' he whispers. A hand settles on the arm of Blind Willie's field jacket. 'You just tell me what the f**k you mean.'

But Blind Willie continues silent, hands at his sides, head slightly raised, looking attentively into the darkness that will not clear until daylight is almost gone, and on his face is that lack of expression which so many passersby read as ruined pride, courage brought low but somehow still intact.

Better be careful, Officer Wheelock, he thinks. The ice under you is getting thin. I may be blind, but you must be deaf if you can't hear the sound of it cracking under your feet.

The hand on his arm shakes him slightly. Wheelock's fingers are digging in. 'You got a friend? Is that it, you son of a bitch? Is that why you hold the envelope out that way half the damned time? You got a friend taking my picture? Is that it?'

Blind Willie goes on saying nothing; to Jasper the Police-Smurf he is now giving a sermon of silence. People like Officer Wheelock will always think the worst if you let them. You only have to give them time to do it.

'You don't want to f**k with me, pal,' Wheelock says viciously, but there is a subtle undertone of worry in his voice, and the hand on Blind Willie's jacket loosens. 'We're going up to four hundred a month starting in January, and if you try playing any games with me, I'm going to show you where the real playground is. You understand me?'