43

The sleeping pill Harry gave him did its job to perfection and the plane touched down at JFK ten minutes after it took off from Heathrow. He was still feeling groggy when he stepped outside into a New York blizzard. The warmth of the cab wasn’t enough to thaw his fingers so they could grip at the little card with Harry’s address on it. The squat Puerto Rican in the driver’s seat was staring impatiently at him, as if he was withholding state secrets from him. The driver slipped, skidded and slid his way into the crawling traffic before Cormac’s fingers finally remembered their function. He read the address to him Harry had written neatly last night.

D Building

1 W 72nd ST

New York

Zip 10023

The driver let out a whistle and then didn’t speak to Cormac for the rest of the journey. Instead, Cormac listened to Puerto Rican music made for sunshine and imagined what the Manhattan skyline looked like outside the window. Somewhere out there in the snow was Bernadette. Somewhere out there might be his future. The comfort of the thought and the remnants of Harry’s pill meant he slept the rest of the trip, in spite of the folk festival pulsating from the speaker beside his right ear. When the driver woke him to tell him they’d arrived, he could hardly see the entrance to the building from the car. He pointed to a black lump in the near distance and indicated the entrance was behind it. Cormac carried his bags the short precarious distance to the lump. When he got to it he could make out the Japanese faces of ten or fifteen people who didn’t acknowledge him as he skidded past them and into the entrance. He was shaking himself off when the doorman introduced himself in a thick Brooklyn accent.

‘You must be Mr O’Reilly. My name’s Brendan and it’s always a pleasure to meet a fellow Irishman. Harry said you’d be here this morning and I’m under strict instructions to look after you while you’re here in New York. The elevator is this way, Sir.’

Cormac followed him across the grand hallway that reminded him more of France than New York. His feet slipped along the floor, which to him, looked like it was carved from the finest oak. The elevator closed behind them. He turned to the immaculately dressed doorman.

‘Why is there a group of Japanese people freezing to death outside, Brendan?’

The door opened before he had time to answer. He put the key into the lock and they entered the apartment. Then he spoke.

‘You can close your mouth, Sir!’

Cormac couldn’t close his mouth. They walked into the grandest apartment he’d ever set foot in. The living room which they now entered was fifty feet in length and the ceilings at least fourteen feet in height. The floor was made of what looked like solid cherry wood. There was a warren of doors branching off the main hallway. He counted at least fifteen. When he came back into the living room, Brendan was lighting the huge log fire that sat against the far wall. Next to it, he flicked a switch which illuminated the majestic silver and gold Christmas tree in the corner of the room. Cormac sat on one of the three huge settees, all of which could comfortably sit five or six people.