Pete Hamill - North River

Or it could be about someone else, a patient, an acquaintance, a politician. He had no obligation to talk about what happened with patients. He was, in that sense, like a priest. He had been taught long ago that many secrets were passed in the office of a doctor, and none of them must leave. Still: the FBI? He must warn Zimmerman. And then had a sudden thought: It must be about Grace. He opened his door.

“Yes?” he said.

A young man stood up, holding his hat in his hands, and his coat draped over his forearm. His dark blond hair was cut short. He had pale eyebrows, pale blue eyes. About thirty. The young man moved past Monique.

“Dr. Delaney?” he said.

“That’s me.”

He flashed a badge.

“Edward Callahan,” he said. “FBI.”

Delaney gestured for Callahan to pass into his office, then closed the door behind them.

“Have a seat,” Delaney said, moving into his own chair. “What’s this all about?”

“Excuse me for intruding on your busy day,” the agent said, sitting with a kind of performed ease in the chair reserved for patients. He placed a notebook on his knee and took a pen from his breast pocket. “Let me get straight to the point: I’m looking for your daughter.”

So that was it. I was right. Not Eddie Corso. Nor Rose. Grace.

“I don’t know where she is,” Delaney said.

“We think you do,” Callahan said, smiling in a knowing way, his voice dropping into a deeper tone. “You received a letter a few days ago. We think it was from her. From Grace Delaney Santos. It was postmarked Barcelona, Spain.”

“I assume you have a court order to snoop through my mail,” Delaney said.

“The letter wasn’t opened,” he said, trying to sound reassuring. Delaney noticed that his fingernails were perfectly trimmed and polished. His dark blue suit was well cut, almost as severely as the clothes worn by Mr. Cottrell. “Besides, we’re not specifically looking for your daughter. We’re looking for her husband.”

“I don’t know where he is either,” Delaney said. “I’ve never even met the man.” Callahan scribbled on a pad, taking notes. “I do know he’s a Mexican citizen. Beyond that —” He shrugged. “Why is the FBI interested?”

“We’ve had inquiries from the Mexican government,” Callahan said. “Mr. Santos is a member of the PCM — the Mexican Communist Party.”

“And?” Delaney said. “Is that a crime?”

“No, but bombing is. The Mexican government believes Santos was responsible for bombing two government office buildings in Guadalajara.” His tone was level. “They want to locate him before he bombs anything else.” He gestured as if he believed this was a bit of a stretch, but went on gravely: “They have reports he went to Spain, where all sorts of unrest is in the air. Or maybe even to Moscow. And that gets us back to your daughter, Grace. If anyone knows where Santos is, she should.” He smiled. “For all we know, he could be in the Bronx.”

“Or Brooklyn.”

Callahan laughed. “Worse — New Jersey!”

He stared at Delaney, as if hoping he would fill the void with words. Delaney stared back.

“So?” Callahan said.

“I’ve told you all I know. Which is virtually nothing.”

Callahan took his coat off his lap and laid it on the floor.

“Dr. Delaney, we might be able to help you with something. If you help us.” Delaney looked at him blankly. “We know you have your grandson here. We know you are, what’s the best way to say this? Under siege. From the Frankie Botts mob. We can do something about that.”

Delaney stood up. He noted Callahan’s dark brown brogans and their high polished sheen.

“Thanks for stopping by, Mr. Callahan.”

Callahan didn’t move. He stared at Delaney, absorbing his own dismissal. Then he closed his notebook and reached down for his coat.

“Think about it,” Callahan said, and stood up to face Delaney. He smiled in a practiced way. Then handed Delaney a card. “Think about it.”

He went out, thanking Monique as he left. Delaney looked at the card, then placed it under his blotter beside the card of Harry Flanagan, the judge. Yeah, he thought: I’ll think about it, you son of a bitch.

Twenty minutes after Callahan left, Carlito rushed into the office and climbed onto his lap.

“Hot dog!” he said. There were still no verbs. “Hot dog, Gran’pa.”

Another advance: Ga’paw was now Gran’pa!

“You want hot dogs?”

“Hot dog.”

“Say: ‘I want hot dogs.’ ”

“I wan’ hot dogsss.”

His first verb. The verb “to want.” Everybody’s first verb.

Rose came to the door, smiling, her hair loose across her brow, cheeks still flushed from the February cold. She told him lunch was ready. He thought: Where does she go on Sunday?

Rose lifted the boy and took him past the planks of the carpenters, the sawhorse, the toolboxes, toward the kitchen. There was an odor of cut wood in the air. The worker named Mendoza laughed and said, “Buenas tardes, niño,” and Carlos answered, “Bey-nas tardes.” The other workmen were gone, but Mendoza was eating a sandwich, sitting on the stairs. “Hello, Doctor,” he said. “Pretty busy here today.” Delaney told him it was always busy on Monday. Thinking: We even had a visit from the G-men. He asked Monique to try to find Zimmerman at St. Vincent’s and then walked into the kitchen.

“This kid wants hot dogs!” Rose said. “I gotta nice sandwich for him, un panino, and he keeps saying he wants a hot dog. He did the same up Fourteen’ Street. Hot dog, hot dog…”

Delaney smiled. She put the sandwiches before them, along with glasses of lemonade. Carlito’s sandwich was cut into quarters.

“I want hot dog,” the boy said. The verb. That verb. Rose ig-nored him.

Delaney thought the panino was delicious, and so did the boy; he held each piece in two hands and took small, methodical bites. The memory of hot dogs fled the kitchen. Monique poked her head into the room.

“I got Zimmerman for you.”

Delaney excused himself and took the call in his office.

“Everything okay?” Zimmerman said.

“Yes, but —”

“But what?”

“A guy from the FBI was here a little while ago. In case he comes poking around the hospital, you don’t know anything about my personal life, especially my daughter. I’ll be at rounds tomorrow and explain everything.”

“You just did,” Zimmerman said. “I only know you from the halls of St. Vincent’s.”

“How’s it going there?”

“I want a vacation. Just one hour. Or two hours, go see a movie. I hear they’ve got sound now.”

“We’ll talk tomorrow.”

Back at the table, Delaney finished his sandwich and sipped the lemonade. Thinking: How did Rose find lemons in February? Then she pointed at Carlito’s feet.

“Look at what I got. On sale, one dollar, off a pushcart. Buster Browns!”

Carlito held up his left foot and pointed at the shoe.

“Hoo-shine!”

Delaney wrote a quick note to Grace, telling her about the visit from Callahan. His tone was flat and cold. Don’t mail any important letters to the house. I’ll send you an address that’s safe. You can blather away about simple stuff, the cathedrals, Goya. Just nothing that you don’t want to share with the FBI. He asked Monique to mail the letter, but not from here in the neighborhood. She gave him a knowing look. It wasn’t necessary to mention the FBI. Then Delaney went off on house calls, and his rage began to build.

As always on Monday, his last stop would be on Mott Street, in Chinatown. From a pay phone on Canal Street, he called a lawyer named O’Dwyer, who confirmed that he didn’t need formal paperwork to have Carlito living with him. If the boy stayed six months, Delaney could apply to become the legal guardian. So he knew that the FBI could not use Carlos to force him to take the king’s shilling, as Big Jim used to call it. Later, at Angela’s, he would arrange an alternate address. He called Rose too, said he would be a little late, but that they would all go to Angela’s. “Good,” Rose said. “I’ll make the boy take a nap. And hope he don’t dream about hot dogs.”