Andrew Vachss - Strega

Max might be back in five minutes or five hours. In my life, time isn't important-so long as you're not doing it inside.

SOMETHING dropped onto the Plymouth 's hood from upstairs, waking me up. I glanced through the windshield-it was a new deck of playing cards, still in the original box. Max was telling me he wanted a rematch of our last game of gin, and warning me not to cheat.

I pocketed the cards and went through the downstairs door all the way to the back. We had a little table back there and a couple of chairs. The table held a big glass ashtray and a chrome ghetto-blaster some would-be mugger had donated to Max. A true liberal, Max never called the police, realizing that the young man needed rehabilitative services instead. He left that task to the emergency ward.

Max floated in the side door, bowed to me, and made a motion like he was dealing the cards. I opened the new deck and riffled them between my hands, getting the feel. Max reached into one of the cabinets and pulled out one of those thick telephone message pads they use in government offices-we used the back for a score sheet. We play three-column gin: 150 points a game, twenty-five for a box, double for a schneid in any column, and double again for a triple. The stakes are a penny a point-first man to a million bucks wins the whole thing. I looked through our stack of tapes, asked Max which one he wanted me to put on. He pointed to Judy Henske. I slammed the cassette home and put the volume on real low. I know Max can't hear. I used to think he listened to music by feeling the bass line in his body or something, but Henske's voice doesn't get real low. One time I slipped a Marie Osmond tape on the player. Max listened for a minute, pointed to me, made a face to say "You like that shit?" and hit the "stop" button. He reached in, pulled out the cassette, and crushed it in one hand. He threw the mess into a bucket we use for a garbage pail, folded his arms, and waited for me to display some better taste. I still don't think he can hear the music, but maybe he can feel how I react to it. Lucky there's no bluffing in gin.

We were about an hour into the game, with Max ahead for a change, when Immaculata came into the room from behind Max. Her long black hair was pulled back into a severe bun and her face was scrubbed clean of makeup. She was wearing a white jersey sweatshirt that must have belonged to Max-it was big enough for two of her. She bowed to me in greeting as she put one hand on Max's shoulder. Her long nails were lacquered a shade of purple so dark it was almost black. Max reached up to touch her hand, but he never took his eyes from the cards. The first time Immaculata had walked into our clubhouse like she belonged there, I felt a stab of something-but it passed. She did belong there.

"Hey, Mac," I greeted her, "we're almost done."

Max reached across the table and snatched the score sheet from in front of me. His score was under "X" and mine was under "O"-we'd started playing tic-tac-toe first, years ago, and Max wanted to keep the same identifications just because he won the last time-Orientals are superstitious people. He handed her the sheet. His meaning was obvious- it was me who was almost done.

That did it-being ahead was bad enough, but bragging about it was gross. I immediately knocked, going down with two aces and a deuce- four points. Max spread his cards: three queens, three fives, and three tens. The only other card was my missing ace-an under-knock-worth four boxes and fifty points and the fucking third column too. The miserable thug couldn't keep the smile off his face as he handed me the pencil to total things up. Mac went to the hot plate in the corner to make some tea for her and Max-there was apple juice in the refrigerator for me. Max had cut deeply into his ongoing deficit with that last score.

I made the sign of a man rolling dice with his eyes closed to show that it was pure dumb luck, and Max made the sign of a man playing the violin to show how sorry he felt for me and my dismal lack of skill.

Max stashed the score sheet and lit a cigarette. He used to light up whenever he needed only one more card for gin. As soon as he realized I'd caught on to it, he just plain stopped smoking while we were playing- a typical fanatic. Immaculata brought the tea and the apple juice on a little tray and lit a cigarette of her own. I made the sign of talking into a telephone, telling Max I needed to plug into the phone system of the architects who had the building next door. I started to get up and Max held out his palm in a "stop" gesture. He turned to Immaculata, pointed to me, and waved his hands in front of his chest, fingers curling back toward his face. He was telling her to get on with it-whatever it was.

"Burke," she said, "I'm having a problem with my work. Max insists you could help me with it," she said, in a doubtful voice.

"I'll do what I can," I told her.

"I'm not sure there's anything you can do," she said. Her English was perfect, the mixture of French and Vietnamese in her voice sounding exotic but not foreign. "When I interview abused children…about what happened to them…like you saw with the dolls?"

I just nodded, listening.

"Well, if they're old enough to really talk, what I have to do is get it all on tape. You can't take notes…you just distract them if you do…they want to know what you're writing down. And we may have to use the tapes in court. You understand so far?"

"Sure," I said.

"Anyway, for these children, what we're working on is something we call 'empowerment.' It just means that sexually abused children have no sense of power over their own lives…these children are always in fear-they never feel really safe. The goal is for them to eventually be able to confront their abusers, and feel safe while they do it, okay?"

"Okay."

"So they have to feel in control. They have to believe that they're on top of the situation-even when they're working with the therapist."

"How come they don't feel in control when the freak isn't in the room with them anymore?" I asked her.

Immaculata looked at me, two long dark fingernails against her cheek, thinking. "Wait here, okay? I want to show you something."

She patted Max on the shoulder a couple of times, probably their signal that she was coming right back, and went out the way she came in. Max leaned back in his chair, looked over at me, and moved his fingers on the table top to make the sign of a trotting horse. He looked a question at me. I nodded in agreement. Sure, I was still betting on the horses-what was I supposed to do, open a fucking IRA? Max made the sign of opening a newspaper and glancing through it, and looked another question at me. He wanted to know which horse was the latest object of my interest. I shrugged-I didn't have a paper with me. The bastard moved his two fists like he was holding a steering wheel-didn't I have one in the car? Okay. I trudged out to the Plymouth, snatched the Daily News off the front seat, and went back to our clubhouse. I sat down and opened it to the right page as Max drifted around behind me. I ran my finger down the page until I came to the seventh race, showed him Flower Jewel, and waited. The line of Flower Jewel showed 8-4-3 reading across from her name-she had finished dead last a week ago, fourth the time before that, and third before that. Max pointed to the "8," put four fingers on the table, and moved them like a pacer would run, the two outside legs forward, then those on the inside-that's why they call them side-winders. He paced halfway across the table, then broke into a gallop-the two front legs moving together. He looked a question at me. Yeah, I told him, the horse had broken stride in the last race. I held up my right fist to indicate my horse, started to move it across the table in a circle. Then I had my left fist cut in front, with the right veering off to the side. My horse had broken stride, but she had been interfered with by another-not her fault.