Shame the Devil (15 page)

“Stop there, Dimitri,” said James Posten. He dropped three burgers on the grill. “Cheddar medium, provolone medium, bacon
cheddar, medium rare.”

“That’s right.”

“Go ahead, man.”

“A chicken steak, no cheese, everything.”

“Got it. Here comes your hot pastrami, buddy.”

Maria Juarez was humming as she halved an egg-salad sandwich on white and put it on a plate. She slid it onto the shelf just
as James delivered his pastrami. Karras garnished both sandwiches with chips and pickle spears, pulled the corresponding ticket
from the lipped shelf, and placed the two plates on the reach-through. He rang the hotel desk–style bell there with a strike
of his palm and said, “Order up!” into the space.

Mai put her head in the space, slapped a ticket on the wood, picked up her order, and carried it away. Karras took the ticket
and put it in the back of the line on the lipped shelf.

“Another special,” said Karras, reading the ticket. “Darnell, your meat loaf’s really moving today. Looks good, too. I know
what I’m having for lunch.”

“Don’t get your heart set on it for lunch.” Darnell stood over the soak sink, his back turned to the rest of the kitchen.
“How many you think we served?”

Karras checked the hash marks on a pad he kept by his side. “Fifteen by my count.”

“I only cut sixteen out of that piece.”

Ramon came through the door with a bus tray. As he went by, Karras said, “Ramon, when you go back out to the floor, tell Mai
and Anna: eighty-five on the meat loaf.”

“One mo?”

“Right.”

“Dimitri,” said James. “These burgers gonna be up in a minute. You can call out your colds.”

“Thanks, James. All right, Maria. I need a cold cut, everything, no onions. A tuna on rye, plain. And a Maria’s salad.”

Maria laughed. “Jame, the salad moving!”

“I know it,
senorita
. Good thing you put your name on that one, because it
is
your masterpiece.”

Anna Wang walked in, put a ticket in front of Karras. “Food’s coming out great, everybody.”

“Thanks, baby,” said James. “But I know you didn’t come in here to shower us with compliments.”

“Well, I
was
wondering about the order for my eight-top.”

“You can just get your hot little self back on out there, too.”

“All right, I’m gone.” Anna buzzed out of the kitchen.

“Hit me, Dimitri,” said James. “I’m all caught up.”

Karras gave James the new hots, repeated the order, studied his tickets, rearranged them according to cooking times. James
crowded the grill with meat, then went to the radio and turned it up.

“Luther Vandross,” said James. “Sing it, my brother.” James sang the chorus of the song in baritone. Maria looked at him and
cracked up. The two of them laughed, hugged each other briefly, then split apart and went back to their stations.

“Jame likes Luther,” explained Maria to Karras with a smile. There was a blue mark under her right eye.

“Luther is
serious,
” said James, transferring the burger order onto plates. “I remember listenin’ to him when he sang for that group Change,
didn’t even have his name on the cover of the album, and I can remember thinkin’, who the fuck is
this?
”

“You ready, Maria?” said Karras.

“Go ahe, Mitri.”

He recited her colds. He didn’t repeat the order because by now he knew that you never had to tell Maria twice.

Darnell turned his head halfway around, watched Karras work. Karras was doing a good job, and for a moment Darnell thought
he’d tell him. But the moment passed, and Darnell went back to his dishes and the sink.

Karras sat at the bar, eating the last of the meat loaf with a side mound of garlic mashed potatoes with gravy pooled in its
center. Darnell made a nice meat loaf, not too dry, with just enough onion in it to give it taste.

Karras liked this time of the afternoon. He had done a good job at lunch today, and that was something in itself. He’d prepared
his own food after the rush while Maria listened to her half hour on the Spanish station, wrapping her salads away for the
night. Then he’d brought his food out to the bar and eaten it quietly, his personal reward. This had been a good day.

A beefy guy in a tweed jacket sat two stools down to Karras’s right, nursing a shot of something along with a beer. Karras
only knew him as the Irish homicide cop who frequented the Spot. Down the bar sat Happy, staring straight ahead, and beyond
Happy sat a couple of GS-10s, arguing over sports trivia while splitting their second pitcher of draft. Mai was behind the
stick, her arms folded, a cigarette in one of her thick hands, listening intently to the Carpenters mix she had going on the
box.

Karras considered today’s lunch. It had gone well. His first few days on the job had been pretty rough; there were a couple
of times, when he was in way over his head and the tickets were flowing into the kitchen in bunches, that he thought of just
bolting. He’d heard restaurant people talk about being “in the weeds,” and that’s how it felt. You couldn’t see your way out,
and the next step was panic.

But it had worked out. And every day he grew more confident and got better at his job. He had begun to figure it out: the
rhythm, the personalities, the way James and Maria interacted, knowing when James could take a hot call, watching his body
language signal overload and knowing when to pull back and wait. Working the kitchen was a kind of challenge, and he was beginning
to beat it. And there was the other thing, too. During the lunch rush he could only think of the task at hand. For two hours
every day, he could forget.

“You mind?” said the Irish cop.

Karras looked over. The cop was putting a match to a cigarette. “No, go ahead.”

Darnell came from the kitchen and had a seat next to Karras at the bar. He removed his leather kufi and wiped his face with
a bar napkin. Mai drifted over and Darnell said, “Mix me up one of your specials, Mai.”

“You got it,” said Mai.

“So, Dimitri,” said Darnell, “how’s that meat loaf?”

“Beautiful,” said Karras. “I was afraid I wasn’t gonna get it, the way it was moving.”

“The heel’s the best part anyway, you ask me.”

Mai served Darnell a mixture of pineapple and orange juice. He thanked her and had a long sip.

“How long have you been cooking?” said Karras.

“I started back when I was doin’ this little stretch at Lorton. I guess Nick’s already told you about that. I got a job in
the kitchen as a dishwasher. This guy that had been cooking for years there kind of took me under his wing.”

“You’re good at it.”

“Yeah, I can put a meal together, I guess. Thing is, Phil doesn’t let me stretch out too much here. Wants to keep this a meat-and-potatoes,
middle-of-the-road, bar-food kind of place. I’d like to do a whole lot more.”

Karras pushed his empty plate to the side. “Listen, Darnell…”

“You don’t have to say nothin’, man. You’re doin’ a good job. Things have been running smoother since you got here, and I’m
happy about that. I just wasn’t suited for that position, that’s all.”

“You were trying to do too much, is what it was. I can’t take too much credit, either. I’ve had a lot of help. James and Maria
have been great.”

“Yes, those two sure can do it. ’Specially Maria. She can sense when that food’s coming off the grill, like she’s seein’ behind
her back.”

Karras drummed his fingers on the bar. “Let me ask you something about Maria.”

“Go ahead.”

“I’ve noticed marks on her face —”

“Her husband. He drinks at night and sometimes he drinks too much. When he does, he beats her.”

“Can’t we do anything?”

“Nick asked her if she wanted us to report the guy. She said no. I think she’s afraid. Afraid for herself but mainly for that
beautiful girl of hers. So there it is. Everybody’s got their own little world of problems they got to deal with, man. We’re
all out here just doin’ the best we can.”

Darnell swallowed the rest of his juice and got up off the stool.

“Thanks, Darnell.”

“Let me get on out of here and back to those dishes.”

Darnell headed toward the kitchen.

“What’s up, Darnell?” said the cop.

“Officer Boyle.” Darnell didn’t stop or turn his head.

When Darnell had entered the kitchen, the cop leaned over, extended his hand, and said, “Dan Boyle.”

“Dimitri Karras.”

They shook hands.

“Yeah, Nick told me your name. I said to him, Now we got two Greeks in this joint.”

“Uh-huh.”

Karras hoped that would end the conversation. There were certain kinds of drinkers who had a sleepy kind of cruelty in their
eyes. Boyle had that look — and he was a detective in the bad bargain. Along with everything else, Karras had lost his faith
in cops.

Boyle said, “You know, when I asked Nick who the new guy was and he told me your name, it rang a bell. It wasn’t just that
your name had been in the papers a few times these last couple of years.”

“Yeah?” So this Boyle character knew about the murder of his son.

“Yeah, it was something else.”

“What was it?” asked Karras tiredly. “You figure it out?”

“Well, it turns out it was your last name I was picking up on. I have this uncle, Jimmy Boyle, was a beat cop in this town
and then a homicide detective later on. I’m going back to the forties, understand? Anyway, I can remember, even as a kid,
my uncle talking about this friend of his he grew up with, back when the poor immigrants lived in Chinatown. I don’t know
the story, but my uncle claims this guy had something to do with him getting his gold shield. Pete Karras was his name. He
died before I was born, so I never met him or anything like that. But around my uncle it was always Pete Karras this and Pete
Karras that.”

“Pete Karras was my father.”

“Christ,” said Boyle, “wait till I tell my uncle.”

“He’s alive, huh?”

“Yeah, he’s alive. Boy, I had a feeling, too.”

Boyle finished his shot with a quick toss. Karras noticed the butt of Boyle’s revolver beneath his jacket as he threw his
head back to drain his beer. Boyle took a last drag off his smoke, crushed the cherry in the ashtray, stood up, and left a
heap of ones on the bar.

Boyle went over to Karras and squeezed his shoulder. He leaned in close. Karras could smell the whiskey and nicotine on his
breath.

“Nice meeting you,” said Boyle. “My sympathy for the loss of your son.”

Karras nodded but said nothing. Boyle left the bar.

NICK STEFANOS PARKED
his Dodge between the customized Lexus and a black Maxima in the Kennedy Street lot beside Hunan Delite, where Jerry Sun,
the partial witness in the Donnel Lawton case, was employed.

Today Stefanos wore his version of a uniform: blue Dickies pants, a blue shirt, and a charcoal waistcoat. He carried a cell
phone that he had rigged to an oversize case.

The blue shirt and pants, the phone that looked like a pack set — he wasn’t impersonating a cop, exactly. But he looked enough
like the species to give pause to the people he was hoping to talk to on the street.

Stefanos pushed open the door of Hunan Delite. Lunch was over, and there was only one customer, an obese woman in tights and
a sweatshirt, in the lobby. She leaned her back on a red eat-in counter and avoided eye contact with Stefanos.

The place smelled of fried food and grease. A speaker mounted in the lobby was set on PGC. Callers to the station were giving
their shout-outs to friends, family, and lovers.

Stefanos went to the lazy Susan contraption set in the Plexiglas wall. An old Asian woman came forward and stood before him,
spoke through several teardrop cutouts in the glass.

“What you have?” she asked.

Stefanos opened his billfold. Inside was his investigator’s license, a photo ID that simply said “Investigator,” white letters
against a red background, barred across the top. He placed the open billfold flat against the glass and spoke into the cutout
teardrops.

“I want to speak to Jerry Sun. Could you get him, please?”

The woman left without a word. Stefanos heard a foreign tongue in a raised voice. He waited. A clean-cut young man in a black
turtleneck came to the glass. It looked like the same young man Stefanos had seen the night he had driven by.

“Yes?”

“Jerry Sun?”

“That’s right.”

“I’m an investigator working on the Donnel Lawton case.”

“I’ve already talked to the detectives, two times.”

“I have a few more questions, if you don’t mind.”

Jerry Sun looked over his shoulder, then back at Stefanos. “Go around the store and meet me behind.”

“See you there.”

The obese woman studied Stefanos as he walked out the door. Jerry Sun stood against the brick wall beside the rear entrance
to the kitchen. As Stefanos approached, he noticed the tail of a rat disappear beneath a nearby Dumpster.

“Nick Stefanos.”

Stefanos offered his hand. Sun took it tentatively.

“Make it, quick, okay? I’ve got to get back inside.”

“You run this place?”

“With my mother.”

A couple of young men passed by on the sidewalk. One of them yelled, “Hey, Jerry-San, whassup?” His friend laughed.

Jerry smiled tightly and half-waved back.

Stefanos said, “You get that much?”

“Sure, all the time. Customers ordering in a Chinese accent. People who make fun of my mother.”

“But you stay.”

Sun shrugged. “I’m the oldest son of six children. It was my responsibility to stay. This place has put three of my siblings
through college.”

“Not you?”

“The birth order decided my fate. It was just an accident. But I accept it.” Sun lost his frown. “Don’t get me wrong; it’s
not so bad. There are people who mock us, but there are plenty of nice people down here. I grew up in Montgomery County. But
in some ways I’ve grown up with a lot of these neighborhood people, too.”

“Known many who’ve died?”