Prologue | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20A | 20B | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25-26 | 27 | 28-29 | 30 | 31 | 32 | 33 | 34
PART I
SPEAKING IN TONGUES
35
“MARINA,” DOT WHISPERED in the dark, “are you still awake?”
Marina was trying to be quiet about her weeping, but she wasn’t succeeding. Dot knew. All this time, she knew and never told her. She’d been trying to protect her to keep that from happening, but she wouldn’t tell her.
“I can’t sleep.”
Dot sat on the edge of her bed, the one she only used a couple of hours a night, stroking Marina’s forehead. “Don’t cry. It’s not your fault.”
Yes, it was. She had not been in full control of herself. But she was stupid, so of course she couldn’t discern anything wrong. It was a mystery she could not have unraveled herself because she didn’t have enough clues. And the biggest was how babies were made.
Marina was horrified by the things Sister Albright told her and refused to believe that it was done in that disgusting, horrible way, and furthermore, that Marina was thought to have done this. With Trey. She had the flu! Why wouldn’t anybody believe her?
Sister Albright had gone to get one of Bishop Albright’s veterinary textbooks and showed her how puppies were made. Marina had scrambled off the bed and into the bathroom to heave into the toilet. She had nothing in her stomach.
“I would never do that!” she wailed. “Not even if I were married.”
“You would if you were drugged.”
“What?”
“There are drugs that make you want to do it very badly and there are drugs that make you forget. I don’t know of any that make you want to do it and forget. Do you remember anything off about the way your soda tasted those times, before you had those strange dreams?”
“No.”
She ran off and came back with a bottle of whisky, which was shocking enough, but she uncorked it and waved it under Marina’s nose.
She promptly ran to the bathroom again, unable to get that rotten-corn smell out of her nose.
When she returned, Sister Albright was waiting for her. “Wasn’t liquor.”
“I thought—” she squeaked. “I thought you didn’t drink?”
“We don’t. We use it to sterilize wounds and mix poultices. You may see chew in our house, too. That is also for wounds, to draw out infection. Bishop doesn’t like to lance if he doesn’t have to.”
Marina wouldn’t want to have a wound lanced, either. “I thought medicinal whisky was an excuse to drink. And it’s illegal.”
“Well!” she said briskly. “Shooting Mormons on sight is state law, but you wouldn’t do it, would you?”
Marina got the point: It was a bad law.
“You’d need a lot of straight whisky to make you forget. Spanish fly isn’t strong enough to make you that horn— Um, willing to have sex.”
Marina winced away from that phrase. It was so awful and ugly. “Spanish flu?”
“Fly. And it doesn’t make you forget. I do not believe what you dreamt were actual dreams, but if you were drugged, they would seem like dreams. And since you didn’t know how it’s done, your mind turned it all into something it could understand.”
“How— How do you know all these things?” Marina whispered, seeing Sister Albright in a whole new way. “About drugs and liquor, and, and, and … ”
“Dot never told you?” she asked, surprised. “Once upon a time, I was a flapper.”
Marina gasped and tried to scoot away, but she was in pain and had no space to move over anyway.
Sister Albright smiled mischievously and her eyes twinkled. “Repentance?” she teased gently. “Forgiveness? Grace? Mercy?”
Marina tried to breathe through her horror. Then she realized that her indecency with Trey was her own sin and she wished to be forgiven. “I— I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I don’t mean to judge.”
“Sometimes grieving feels like judgment, and grief isn’t just for death.”
Marina would figure that out later.
“Anyway. You aren’t the first girl we’ve fostered who had no idea how she got pregnant, and you won’t be the last, but we’ve never had any who forgot doing it. I’ll have to ask Bishop if he’s ever heard of such a thing.”
“You talk to him about such things?” she squeaked. “He’ll know?!” She moaned and almost started crying again.
“He’s a doctor,” Sister Albright said wryly. “And once upon a time, he was a bootlegger. It was how we met. We got married about a week before Dot was born.”
“Dot knows about all these things too?” Her register climbed.
“Of course. How can you avoid sin if you don’t know what it is? That’s how girls get in trouble, not knowing.”
“You … you’re not mad?”
“Not at you.”
“Trey did this to me?”
“He got you pregnant, yes. The rest doesn’t make sense.”
“How?”
She was suddenly uncomfortable. “Ah, well, that is to say, he was courting you for two months. He … had to have a reason.”
Marina bowed her head. “Because why else would he want to court me?” she whispered.
“I didn’t say that,” Sister Albright protested weakly.
“You didn’t have to.”
“Marina,” she huffed, “if he just wanted to have sex with you, he wouldn’t have bothered to wait two months. He’d have drugged you first thing. He could have also raped you, but he didn’t do that, either. You like mysteries. I do too. So think of it this way: There are two mysteries. Why and why wait? We need more information to sort all this out, and that’s up to Bishop to gather. Until then, we need to wait.”
36
THE SUMMONS TO the Jackson County Democratic Club came at possibly the most inconvenient time, which was as Trey was beating Solly Weissman half to death for assaulting one of his girls after she’d refused his business.
The first time Solly tried it, Trey had politely explained that just because his girls were whores didn’t mean they were there for the taking. He reminded Solly that his girls were expensive for a reason, and that Trey allowed them to refuse service to anyone for any reason because there were always more where he came from.
Now Solly, being one of Boss Tom’s enforcers, was a very big man, going on three hundred pounds at least, and taller than Trey. But Trey was strong and lean from slinging cases of whisky around every day, so when Solly attempted to throw his weight around, thinking Boss Tom would take his side over Trey’s, he politely reminded Solly that Boss Tom liked the money Trey made, and happy whores made more money.
When Solly decided to try to enforce his right to Trey’s girl, Trey had politely bashed “Cutcherheadoff”’s head into the table so hard it bounced, then dragged him out back to make his point.
Trey had bested Solly in front of Lazia, Carrollo, and a few cogs in the Machine, and here he was, out in the back alley, still pounding the motherfucker’s face in. If Solly didn’t have a raging hatred for Trey before, he would now.
“I’ll finish him,” Brody muttered, hauling Trey back by his scruff. “Boss Tom said now.”
And when Boss Tom said now …
“Did he say what for?”
“Naw.”
Trey bolted down the alley and sprinted three blocks until he was within half a block. He stopped, caught his breath, and proceeded to saunter up the stairs and right on into Boss Tom’s office.
“Yeah, Boss.” Trey barely managed to catch whatever Boss Tom had launched at him. He looked down at a set of keys. “Whats’iss? You called me down here for a lost’n’found?” He didn’t know what to expect when he looked up at Pendergast but his boss’s expression of rage was not it.
“Got word Marina Scarritt is living with the Albrights.”
Trey wasn’t smart enough to put that together immediately.
“Scarritt just couldn’t put the girl on a train, could he?” Boss Tom barked, standing to pace his considerable bulk across the floor. “No!”
“Boss, got no idea what you’re talkin’ about.”
He jerked his head toward the window. “You won. 1520’s yours.”
Trey’s mouth dropped open. “She’s … It’s … It ain’t even been a month since the last time I was with her.”
“Yeah, well, I know when the first time you were with her was.”
“Then you know I was only with her three times.” Nine if he counted multiples. Given that, there was only one reason she’d be living with the Albrights now. As Trey rubbed his chin, the only thing he could think about was how much he missed the sweet girl he’d spent so much time with. The other one, he could barely remember at all. Hope began to gather in his chest and he began to grin. “Well, hot damn! Now I can marry the girl.”
“You marry her and I’ll torch it.”
Trey’s mouth dropped open. “The condition was I wasn’t to marry her first. You didn’t say nothin’ about marryin’ her after an’ I had no reason to want to then. Now I do an’ it ain’t because she’s pregnant, but never no mind about the fact that the kid’s mine.”
“You got the gin mill. You don’t get the girl too.”
“My. Kid.”
“Find some other way to provide for it, then, but marry her and the whole thing is pointless.”
“Is Scarritt gonna get run out of his situation?”
Boss Tom hesitated. “It’s cooking.”
“Then it wasn’t pointless.”
“It didn’t happen the way I wanted it to!” Boss Tom barked.
“What did he do to you that it was worth 1520?” Trey demanded.
Boss Tom squinted at him. Trey backed off physically, his hands in the air. “No disrespect intended, Boss,” Trey said as penitently as he could muster. He hoped it was enough.
“Hrmph.” Penitent enough then. Good. “Gimme the keys back, you can have the girl and continue on as if the only thing that changed was you got married and you have a wife and kid to go home to after closing time.”
“That ain’t gonna work,” Trey said flatly.
“Why not?
“You’re pissed that I won and you’d be lookin’ for a reason to fire me or keep me busy elsewhere. Lazia wants the speak, so it wouldn’t be long until one of his flunkies gets my job, no matter what he says about keepin’ me on. Even if he did keep me on, it would make me fair game for either Carrollo or Solly or both. Or I could give it up for Marina and my baby. Either way, my people are toast.”
Boss Tom cocked his head and looked at him strangely. “You’d do that? Give it up for her? Even if I gave you my word nothing would change?”
“I don’t believe you.” When Boss Tom’s nostrils flared, Trey said, “That ain’t a knock on you. Just life, things changin’ too fast, ’specially in our business. I got no good options when I made a deal with my people an’ already went back on it ’cuz I couldn’t look myself in the mirror for what I was doin’. Who’d’a predicted that, me growin’ a conscience?”
“What do you mean, you grew a conscience?” Boss Tom growled. Shit. Trey hadn’t gotten around to informing him of his change of heart.
Trey stuck his tongue in his cheek. “Uh … ”
“Are you telling me you didn’t intend to get it done at all?”
Trey held up the keys and jangled them. “But I did. Now I have a better footing to protect my people and they have a better reason to be loyal.”
“This is about the Terranova kid, isn’t it?” Trey hated that he knew who Gio really was. “Atlantic City was buzzing with where he went and why. The gossip was not kind to the family, being unable to control their people. So it’d be very easy for me to get Giuseppe Morello out here to meet your maître d’.”
“I’m small time. Last thing I want’s to attract the attention of the Black Hand.”
“Marina or Matteo Terranova. Choose wisely.”
Trey closed his hand over the keys and drawled, “Nice doin’ business with ya, Boss.”
35-36
If you don’t want to wait 2 years to get to the end, you can buy it here.
No answer as to why Scarritt pissed off the boss? He never intended to run a fair deal. Trey better have a quick exit.
I don’t remember if Boss Tom has or had a wife. If so, that’s the obvious thing.
Yes and two daughters, and I think a step/son? For the purposes of the book, I only cared about the girls.
Ahhh….
Tent Hunters: California Couple Searches For Their Dream Home
That’s way too close to the truth.
What zoom are we on?
Link in links post.
We’re not.
👍🏻
I should have seen the drugging. Trey called Marina a “natural” at sex. I doubt a girl like Marina would be like that. Too many hang-ups.
It’s okay. You’re not supposed to guess, although Sean and Spud did last week. The sex episodes are supposed to feel almost surreal.
I was catching up on some old threads. I saw the news on yesterday’s afternoon links. Congratulations!
Thank you!
So many unanswered questions so far. Great story.
I can’t do much better than the first comment for this Memorial Day weekend.
The Man Who Kept the Secrets – Eighty years ago, a U.S. Navy captain chose to go down with the ship.
He used a paywall to keep the secrets?
Why do you hate success?
A most pleasant evening on the zoom with ya’ll. I now have to scrub down and triple-mouthwash before I’m allowed in bed. She is not a fan of second-hand cigar smoke.
Oh darn. Sorry I missed you.
Ugh. Hotel TV so just watching what is there.
I had no idea the 2nd reboot Trek was a rewrite of Khan! with everything switched around. It robs the thing of any dramitic impact.
Into Darkness was so maddening. There is a core of something interesting there. But as always, JJ went with bland carboncopy for nostalgia’s sake, without understanding why it worked in the first place, same as he did for Force Awakens. Have Cumberbatch play a Khan follower trying to find/free him and the entire plot unfolds more naturally, but instead, JJ forced the movie into duplicating Wrath of Khan. sigh.
Though I do hold some fond memories of that movie for another reason which was pretty funny:
I was driving my kid to his school and there was a big set up in an empty field. “oh, huh, wonder what that is.” The next day, there’s a huge — 100 ft by thirty ft high– green screen visible from the road. “oh it’s a film shoot! interesting” says me. I live in LA, it’s not that rare, so I didn’t think much of it. Two days later, I see a leaked set photo of Cumberbatch on some familiar “debris” in front of a huge green screen, and I realize- “oh they’re filming Into Darkness right there!”
Well, JJ Abrams is notoriously PISSED at spoilers/set leaks, and overnight, after the picture comes out, there’s a giant fence around the set. Another picture comes out. The day after that, shipping containers are stacked in a fence around the set, two high, all around so you can’t see anything from the road.
But the next day? They’re gone. The field is empty. lol
The whole filming style looks like it could have been shat out of a computer to me. The Miami Beach aesthetic was ridiculous. It was so off putting.
You are both right.
The New Office Math
I’m glad I found this guy recently.
Here he comes, and the crowd cannot wait…
The Bro
The Bro
The Brochettaward
Hello all.
No time for Zooming tonight. It’s been a long week.
I’ll try to check in this weekend with you all.
I’ll leave you all with my last song of my night.
This song reminds me of my beautiful wife.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=cvIjQSFLb3U
Nice. I don’t think ive heard that since Wonder Years or something.
Boogie Nights?
I feel like one day they will make live action movies about my Firsts, but they will need a lot of CGI to make that a reality. It will be sort of like the Disney remakes.
Proving that Jonah Goldberg can still pull out some decent writing every once in a while. (from his weekly newsletter)
Dude. My thumbs are wore out now.
That has to be a record for a re-post
Well, I don’t have a link for it – I don’t actually subscribe to the dispatch, just my emails.
Holy wall of text!
“Now, it was dumb for the school to remove it based on a single complaint—or any complaint.”
No, it’s not necessarily wrong to move a book based on a complaint. I don’t know anything about the merits of the case, but it it wasn’t age appropriate, you are actually improving education and listening to consumer preferences. What’s wrong in that?
You need to know details to say if it’s a good or bad decision on a case by case basis, but parents having a day over education is not bad. Can’t get anything right this guy, whoever he is.
hang on
No, it’s not necessarily wrong to move a book based on a complaint.
His whole point is that it is okay to do just that. I think “single complaint” was poor phrasing: he is clearly advocating curation, and some complaint has to be the first one.
parents having a day over education is not bad.
He clearly makes that very point. It’s unmissable: he wants the community to have a say or community doesn’t work. Community and institutions are his whole
shtick; you could not have missed that.
I really like Jonah, but I don’t like all of Jonah’s ideas. That’s basically how I must view everyone or I’d never read anything or have any friends. He’s a good guy who is wrong about a few things, some of which are important.
What he’s right about above is intellectual honesty: there ain’t much around. But, of course, the thing about liberals and conservatives is they’re all about their institutions, and the real problem with institutions is the generic American problem: the government owns too much of everything. I do not give a good god damn if the yeshiva bans (literally bans) book A, or Our Lady of Longshore Drive School for Constipated Redheads bans book B. The problem is that governments shouldn’t have schools because they shouldn’t be allowed anywhere near children, so, once again, we’re arguing about access to or the management of an institution that shouldn’t exist. Build your own school, pick your books, live happily ever after.
Remember that big debate I had with Sarah Isgur about Nazis marching in Skokie? Yes, she destroyed you, dear Jonah, because absolute free speech is an easy position to take and defend and all I need to do after that is be okay with all the assholes in the world and their distasteful positions and behaviors and bumperstickers because they are as eternal as death and taxes so tune it out and get on with your life. Sidebar: Nazis can’t march on private streets; I know, I know, it’s not practical and that ship has sailed, but: private streets are a thing (I live on one thank you very much, spent $65k on it last year) and private ownership works which is the true north and panacea we so dearly need.
I am not a conservative, but also listen to Isgur a lot because she’s intellectually honest. I listen to Moynihan because he’s funny and well-read; I totally get Gillespie because he’s awkward and academic in pretty much the same way I am. There are only a couple of true libertarians out there, and they are generally unbearable, so you compromise,
and then people grow on you. I’ll drive a couple of thousand miles these two weeks, and Jonah’s Remnant is my main podcast, and his unworkable nirvana is less workable than my unworkable nirvana, but I like him, and I like that he would die a thousand deaths rather than travel with bad people or take intellectual shortcuts or make excuses for very bad people just because of identity politics, and he is absolutely right that Trump is shit and owning the libs has been a stupid posture and pasttime and on balance has cost our country. I’m a better grown-up for listening to Jonah even though I don’t want my son or anyone’s son to die in Ukraine. So, to close, institutions fail, liberty has unpleasant residues, and FoxNews is still a pox.
I’m a little sick, a lot tired, and feeling overworked.
How is everyone else doing?
Sorry you’re under the weather.
I have a low fever, fatigue, and sniffles. Will be taking it easy this long weekend
Might go buy a whole chicken and make good ol’ chicken and dumplings this weekend.
I missed some of the details when you left your ex. Do you have your cat to cuddle you?
Sigh.
No. When I escaped, I could have taken the two kitties. My apartment allows two. But I couldn’t realistically figure out how could leave with 3 suitcases and two cats, and i didn’t have vet paperwork saying they were ok to fl(y ( I did have their vax records).
After I settled in here, I offered to take the cats, but we agreed they were better off in a big house, and Felix really likes the yard. So they’re Nevada cats now.
It does get lonely here. Maybe after my San Antonio trip I will get a kitty. I’m not going to force the issue. Sometimes a cat finds its way into your life unplanned.
Weekend weather going to be great.
Planning some yard work today (okay, I’m about 1/3 done already, gotta get it over with before it gets hot out) then the beach tomorrow
greetings from Tybee
which beach?
We are planning on fort DeSoto, hoping the crowds won’t be as bad there.
How is Tybee? I’ve never heard of it, but it looks fancy (for Georgia :p )
Tybee is a happy dump, a mix of 80 year old buildings in various states of decay and revival. Unlike Corpus or Galveston, poverty isn’t much mixed in; it’s just expensive enough to keep out the wrong people.
It’s also very American, very libertarian: various states of undress, lots of open booze, pedestrians and cyclists and golf carts and chickens clog the slow, quiet, tiny streets….milling is the gear most ride in.
Economy sucks=stocks up
What a world.
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/yellen-moves-forecast-earliest-potential-203518027.html
“Yellen had previously said a default could potentially happen as early as June 1, but is now characterizing June 5 as the precise deadline.”
I had heard some analyses suggesting mid June or even later. The more salient point is there is no reason we would default, we’d just have to stop spending extra, so basically anarchy.
The Rethuglicans are causing a recession!!!!!!
Mornin all y’all.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=BXkm6h6uq0k
🎵🎵