Christopher Reich - The Runner

“Hello, Spanner. Long time.”

Mullins pulled him to his shoulder, whispering in his ear, “It’s Colonel Mullins, these days, if you’d be so kind. The boss is a bit of a stickler.”

Judge accepted the outstretched hand and gave it a firm shake. “Colonel Mullins it is, then.”

Mullins bobbed his chin, but failed to provide the expected wink. “Good to see you, lad. You did the right thing coming to visit.”

So far as Judge knew, Mullins had never set foot in the old country, yet there was no mistaking the lilting brogue. He wasn’t just tall, but big, and the twenty pounds he’d put on since Judge had last seen him gave him not only the girth of an oak, but the solidity, too. His hair was thinning, more salt than pepper, parted expertly and slicked into place with a handful of brilliantine. His complexion was ruddier than Judge remembered, the blue eyes a tad more suspicious. He was Irish at first sight, but God forbid you joked about his love of a good pint. From five generations of coppers, Mullins didn’t touch a drop. Not a teetotaler, mind you, just a man who appreciated control. And control was written all over him: in his uniform with the creases sharp enough to cut butter and the shirt bathed in enough starch to stand at parade rest; in his stride, the long, precise steps, each pre-measured, each perfectly executed; and most of all, Judge thought, in his posture, a bearing so rigid, so upright, that even standing still it conveyed its own kinetic aggression.

“I remember you joined up a couple years back,” said Judge, when Mullins had stopped pumping his hand. “What’s it been?”

“Three years and then some.”

“St Paddy’s Day, wasn’t it?” Mullins had thrown an Irish wake to mourn his leaving the force. Judge had received an invite but didn’t attend. By then, Brooklyn was off limits. “I wanted to stop by and send you off. I’m sorry.”

“Nonsense, lad. You had more important things to do than bid your old boyfriends farewell. I’ve been keeping track of you in the papers. Assistant United States Attorney Devlin Parnell Judge — Brooklyn’s very own ‘gang buster’. Tell me, Dev, what’s your streak up to these days? Twenty-six? Twenty-seven?”

“Something like that.” Actually, it was twenty-nine. Fifty-eight out of sixty cases won over a four year period. A career built on the backs of corrupt city officials, shady building contractors, and union thugs. He’d earned the moniker “gang buster” for putting away Vic Fazio, a small-time hijacker looking to muscle in on Lepke’s turf of “murder for hire” by accepting contracts to knock off total strangers, men and women outside the rackets.

“Fair number without a loss,” Mullins grinned suspiciously. “Not paying off the bench, are you?”

“What? And have you lose faith in me? Never.”

Mullins laughed, wagging a finger. “There’s my straight shooter. Just remember, I knew you before you converted.”

“Yeah, I remember,” said Judge. “You won’t let me forget.” He laughed, too, but less brightly, thinking it was the debts you could never repay whose reminder bothered you most.

Mullins draped an arm over his shoulder, steering him toward his scarred headmaster’s desk and the pair of wooden school chairs set before it. “Well, lad, I’m pleased to set eyes on you again. You waited a damn sight long to get into the game. Frankly, I was beginning to wonder.”

Judge chose to ignore the implicit chastisement, the hint of duty unfulfilled. It was a delicate issue, even now that he wore an olive drab uniform and a campaign cap. The fact was Thomas Dewey, Special Prosecutor for the State of New York, an appointee of the President of the United States, had asked him personally to stay on. The army needed bodies, he’d said. Not minds. And certainly not minds as astute as Judge’s. If he wanted to help his country, he should start at home. Clean up New York City. It had practically been an order.

Bodies, not minds.

The recollection of the words and the urbane attorney who had uttered them sent a proud shudder along Judge’s spine. For a kid raised on the streets of Brooklyn, it was the compliment he’d always dreamed of receiving. So he’d stayed. But as the war dragged on, year after year, as his promotions came faster and the cut of his suits improved, a voice inside him protested that he liked the size of his office a little too much, that he spent too much time adjusting the dimple in his Windsor knot, and that he grinned too eagerly at the sight of his name in cheap newsprint.

Judge settled into a chair, dropping his briefcase to one side. He explained about his appointment to the International Military Tribunal four months earlier, his more recent discovery that Erich Seyss was responsible for Francis’s death, and his push for a transfer to the unit looking into Seyss’s escape. “I hope you don’t mind me forcing myself on you.”

Mullins looked up from the nickel cigar he was unwrapping. “No, I don’t, lad. I don’t mind at all. And bully for you. You’ve got family to answer to. I imagine your wife’s proud of you. Teresa, wasn’t it?”

Judge laughed softly, surprised by the acuity of Mullins’s memory, then remembering that he’d been at the wedding. “Maria Teresa O’Hare. Italian and Irish split down the middle. A half-breed like me.” He smiled apologetically. “We’re not together anymore.”

Mullins struck a match and fired the cigar. “What do you mean ‘not together’?”

“We divorced two years ago.”

“Oh?” Mullins’s countenance ruffled behind a cloud of blue smoke. Divorce wasn’t in an Irishman’s vocabulary. “I’m sorry to hear that.”

“We were drifting apart for a long time before that. She wanted the job on Park Avenue, you know, white shoe firm, the athletic club, weekends in the country. I chose the other road — Dewey, the US attorney’s office, working weekends. It was the only law I knew.”

Mullins pulled the cigar from his lips and leaned his bulk over the desk, the inquisitive blue eyes not settling for an excuse when the truth was so close at hand. “Was it the boy, God rest his soul?”

“Ryan?” It figured that Mullins had the temerity to come right out and ask. Whether it was the gossip in him or the father confessor, Judge didn’t know. But he couldn’t deny the sympathy in his voice. For all his faults, Mullins cared for the men under his command as he would his own sons. “I don’t know. Yeah, maybe. When he left us, we couldn’t use him to patch over our differences any longer. Anyway, neither of us tried too hard after that.”

Mullins lowered his eyes, sighing loudly, then landing both fists softly on the desktop. “Aye, the polio. Nearly killed Mr Roosevelt, too. Poor boy, hardly stood a chance. He’s with the Lord now. At least we can take comfort in that.” He drew on his cigar and sat back in his chair. “I am sorry about Father Francis. He was the good egg, wasn’t he?”

And this time, Judge felt the barb. The good egg. He being the bad one: the violence-prone urchin on his way to the state reformatory until Spanner Mullins had intervened. His self-pity angered him until he recognized it for what it was. Mullins’s none too subtle way of letting him know who was in charge.

“Yes he was,” Judge answered equitably. “Francis was always the good one.”

“And this bastard, Seyss, you say he’s the man responsible?”

Judge patted the briefcase by his side, happy to be on the safe side of reminiscence. “Eyewitness evidence written in the German’s own hand.”

“I imagined as much. Else you wouldn’t be sitting here before me.”

Suddenly, Mullins was out of his chair, stubbing out the cigar, while circling the desk and motioning for Judge to join him. “Off your duff, then, lad. The Boss wants to say his hellos before his noontime ride.”