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Chapter 4
My police trainingand instincts told me to jump into action. I fell to the lobby floor next to the body and slid on the waxed faux terrazzo.
It took only a moment for my brain to click into the first-aid course I took as a yearly refresher. CPR had so many acronyms and mnemonic devices that the learning aids seemed to cancel each other out. I started with the most obvious: I checked his pulse at the carotid artery in his neck. He had one. A strong pulse.
He was breathing. And he stank. Of alcohol. So that was why he was passed out on the floor. His gray hair was cut into a flattop. His ruddy face told me he’d spent a lot of time outdoors and drank a little too much.
Where the hell was the doorman, Darnell?
Mary Catherine already had her phone out, about to dial 911, when the elevator door opened. All we could do was stare at the image in front of us. My grandfather, Seamus, and the doorman, Darnell, were supporting another man on either side. The man was semiconscious and trying to sing an old Irish ballad, but I couldn’t figure out which one. A blue cap covered his silver, nicely styled hair.
As soon as he noticed us in the lobby, my grandfather blurted out, “Oh, shit.”
I stood up from the man on the floor and said, “The only excuse that will keep me from being pissed off is that these are some kind of half-assed elderly home invaders and you fought them off.”
My grandfather’s frozen expression would have been almost comical if I wasn’t worried about the children and what the hell had happened. Seamus and Darnell helped the man out of the elevator and deposited him on one of the decorative, uncomfortable Louis XVI chairs along the wall.
Then my grandfather turned and gave Mary Catherine a hug and a kiss on the cheek. He did the same to me with very little reciprocity. Then he stood right in front of me. I realized, to his credit, he was sober.
Seamus said, “Don’t worry about the kids.”
Mary Catherine let out an “Oh, thank God.”
Seamus smiled and said, “Ricky won a bundle. But you’re going to need to buy more of that Villa Wolf Pinot Noir.”
“What are we going to do with your two buddies?”
“I’ve already called a cab for them. I resent that you think I don’t know how to deal with people who’ve had too much to drink. I did own a bar for many years.”
“But my children didn’t have to deal with your clients from the bar.”
“Your children will benefit from meeting a wider cross section of people in the city. I’m just trying to do my part for the family.” Somehow he had managed to keep a straight face during that ridiculous statement.
“You were playing poker with my children?”
“Just the ones who had ten dollars for the ante.”
“And they spent the evening with your inebriated friends?”
“No, they spent the evening with my very smart friends, who didn’t become inebriated until the last hour or so. By then Ricky was the last child standing, so to speak. He finished on a beautiful ace-high flush. Everyone else is upstairs, having finished their homework and all the things they were supposed to, now just determined to wait up for you. They have been fed regularly and didn’t miss a single day of school. I count this whole situation as a win.”
As I was about to reply, we heard a car horn out front.
Seamus helped his friend off the floor and somehow guided him to the cab he’d called. He waved to the cabbie, and I heard him say, “Hello, Vonnu, how are you this evening?”
I stepped from the door to the street to make sure there were no problems.
The cabbie called out, “See you later, Father,” then drove down West End Avenue and turned toward the river.
I faced my grandfather and said, “‘Father’? You know that cabbie personally? You don’t care if he sees a priest with drunks?”
“They’re not drunks. They are fine men who had a little too much Pinot. Vonnu knows them too. You think this is the first time I’ve ever had to call him?”
With that, Seamus turned and marched back into the building.
