“I have to call Levine myself. For all I know, Levine knows everything about Antonucci—and more—and is using your friend and you to feed me the kind of stuff to make me come in and talk about it. Levine is that good.”

He looked around. The lights of the theater marquees and the billboards made the fading daylight high overhead seem far away. Baseball scores scooted across the lighted strip around the New York Newsday building—less the upgrades inside and out, the old Times building. Devlin had forgotten to call Major. He knew he was trying to forget Liz Becker. He didn’t like the woman, had no respect for her. But he wanted to touch base with Sal. And he had to call the Brennans! And now he wanted to make an appointment with Harry Levine.

Remembering. Doing his homework for Harry Levine …

“So you know about Hadley.”

“Yeah, I know about Hadley,” Devlin said. He and the Brennan brothers were in an old workingman’s bar under the el on Jamaica Avenue, just a few blocks from Gertz’s Department Store, on a Saturday afternoon in the heat of summer, the Yankees on television, Yogi Berra at the plate. Devlin had known Maryellen for six weeks, and this was his first time in the company of her brothers, Jack and Joe.

Devlin figured they wanted to size him up, and he had gotten an idea about them from Maryellen. She saw her older brothers as tough, savvy guys. Devlin quickly saw for himself that they weren’t. Older than he was, too, they were simply big, pushy Irish brats who were used to getting what they wanted. Bullies. Hadley was the guy who had just dumped Maryellen when Devlin ran into her in Joe King’s G-A. Too many problems, Maryellen had reported Hadley had said. Devlin was wondering now if Hadley had meant these two in addition to all the others, including Hadley himself.

The Brennan brothers and Devlin were getting drunk on beer. They had called him around noon to come out to the Jamaica Estates place and say hello. Maryellen and their mother were in Manhattan for shopping, lunch, and more shopping, and their big-deal old man, the famous big-city fixer Jim Brennan, had flown to Washington for a private Saturday meeting with the Secretary of Commerce.