The Only Good Lawyer - Jeremiah Healy by Jeremish Healy Read Free Book Online Page A

Spaeth, eh?"
    "Yes."
    "Just the Mick."
    Here we go. "Irish guy, you mean?"
    "Hey, no offense. I mean, you're Irish, too,
right?"
    "Grew up about ten blocks from here."
    "Ten blocks? You might know him, then. With his
whole name and all."
    "Who?" I said, innocent.
 
"This barfly named 'Mickey Mantle,' like the
baseball player."
    "Never had the pleasure"
    "You ever go to the Quencher?"
    God, that took me back, all the way to high school.
The drinking age in Massachusetts was supposed to be twenty-one, and
it was enforced everywhere except for private homes or college
campuses. And at the Quencher, a dive with benches in the booths and
the smell of stale smoke and fresh urine in the air. The owner was
named Victor, an older guy from Poland, though there were photos
around the bar of him as a younger man, in the circus and very
muscular.
    Dufresne said, "The Mick claims it was dimeys at
the Quencher got him started on the brew."
    It was possible. You could get served there if you
had proof of being at least eighteen. Construction workers would mob
the bar after they left the job sites, buying a round of "dimeys"—a
six-ounce glass of beer that cost a dime—for any kids in the place.
    Dufresne shook his head. "Only thing is, I know
a lot of guys say they had their first beer at the Quencher, but not
all of them became boozers."
    "This Mantle really likes the stuff?"
    "Likes it too much. Half-lit, funniest guy you
ever been around. Anybody'll talk to him, even women. And the things
he comes out with. You know there's this new Irish cable channel?"
    "I've caught it a couple of times."
    "Well, the Mick, he sees some kind of music show
on the screen at a bar, then hears about this Portuguese guy over in
Somerville who's on a hunger strike till they carry a Portuguese
channel, too. The Mick says to me, 'Hey, Vinnie, you got to have a
rent strike till they give you a French channel.' "
    The honking laugh. "See what I mean?"
    "Funny." I said, guessing you had to be
there.
    "Yeah, but that's only when he's half-lit."
Dufresne shook his head again. "All the way drunk, the Mick's a
fucking mess, days at a time."
    "Could we check his room, too?"
 
A cocking of the head I thought I recognized.
"Viewing fee's double when somebody's still living there."
    I gave Dufresne the forty, and he moved diagonally
across to the front room on the other side of the staircase. He
fished around for a while in his side pocket, coming out with a key
that turned in the lock right away.
    I said, "Handy you had that with you."
    "This?" He held it up. “This isn't the
Mick's key. I had the locksmith come in, make me a real master."
Dufresne twisted the glass knob, and we entered a bay-windowed front
room that was bigger than Spaeth's, maybe fifteen feet square. The
walls were painted instead of papered, but similar furniture and
floor. However, the sheets on the bed lay filthy and unmade, the air
smelling like the Quencher in high August. I wasn't surprised that
nobody was there.
    Dufresne frowned. "Fuck, it's no better than
last week."
    "Last week?"
    "Yeah. I had to help him up the stairs one
night. The Mick's a carpenter, makes good money when he works. But
he's been on and off the benders for over a month."
    The only towel I saw in the room was heaped on the
floor by the bureau. I walked over to it and bent down. Bone dry.
    "You remember which day last week?"
    Dufresne cocked his head a new way. "That I
helped him? Monday or Tuesday, maybe?"
    Woodrow Gant had been shot on Wednesday night. "Can't
you just throw Mantle out?"
    A confused look now. "I don't get you."
    "He keeps his room like this, and him not
working means he's not paying rent. Is the—"
    "Oh, the Mick's all paid up."
    I stopped. "What?"
    "Yeah. A month ago maybe, I caught him coming in
drunk again, only this time just the half-lit, eh?"
    "Go on."
    "Well, he wasn't working, like I told you, so I
said to him, 'You've already missed two Fridays now. What's the
story, you got money for the brew