Whereas his time in Special Squads had been marked by a self-loathing so acute he now wondered how he’d managed to do any of it, his time doing BSC work in hopes of forming a union with true bargaining power made him feel a sense of purpose that bordered on the evangelical.

This, he decided one afternoon as he returned to the station house with three more testimonials from patrolmen in the One-Oh, was what he’d been looking for since Salutation Street: a reason why he’d been spared.

In his box, he found a message from his father asking him to come by the house that night after his shift. Danny knew few good things had ever come from one of his father’s summonses, but he caught the streetcar out to South Boston just the same and rode across the city through a soft snow.

Nora answered the door, and Danny could tell she hadn’t expected him to be on the other side of it. She pulled her house sweater tight across her body and took a sudden step back.

“Danny.”

“Evening.”

He’d barely seen her since the flu, barely seen anyone in the family except for the Sunday dinner several weeks back when he’d met Luther Laurence.

“Come in, come in.”

He stepped over the threshold and removed his scarf. “Where’s Ma and Joe?”

“Gone to bed,” she said. “Turn around.”

He did and she brushed the snow off the shoulders and back of his coat.

“Here. Give it to me now.”

He removed the coat and caught a faint whiff of the perfume she wore ever so sparingly. It smelled of roses and a hint of orange.

“How are you?” Danny looked in her pale eyes, thinking: I could die.

“Just fine. Yourself?”

“Good, good.”

She hung his coat on the tree in the hallway and carefully smoothed his scarf with her hand. It was a curious gesture, and Danny stopped breathing for a moment as he watched her. She placed the scarf on a separate hook and turned back to him and just as quickly dropped her eyes, as if she’d been caught at something, which, in a way, she had.

I would do anything, Danny wanted to say. Anything. I’ve been a fool. First with you, then after you, and now as I stand here before you. A fool.

He said, “I—”

“Hmm?”

“You look great,” he said.

Her eyes met his again and they were clear and almost warm. “Don’t.”

“Don’t?”

“You know what I mean.” She looked at the floor, hugging her elbows.

“I’m…”

“What?”

“Sorry.”

“I know.” She nodded. “You’ve apologized enough. More than enough. You wanted to be”—she looked up at him—“respectable. Yes?”

Christ—not that word again, thrown back in his face. If he could remove one word from his vocabulary, erase it so that it had never taken hold and thus he never could have used it, it would be that one. He’d been drunk when he said it. Drunk and taken aback by her sudden and sordid revelations about Ireland. About Quentin Finn.