The Rat on Fire (24 page)

“He say anything yet?” Roscommon said. “Because once Tiger Mike gets here and has a little chat with him, he isn’t going to. Mike’ll get somebody else to represent Dannaher, and Fein’ll have his own guy, and Proctor’ll have Mike and that’ll be the end of it.”

“Not a fucking thing,” Carbone said.

“
Shit
,” Roscommon said.

“The only thing he said was, I didn’t really understand it,” Carbone said, “but what he said was did we know how the fire started, and I said it was still too hot for the fire marshals to go in, but it looked like it was wiring to them. And he said, ‘Leo lit the rats off.’ ”

“Where is Leo this fine afternoon,” Roscommon said.

“In the holding pen,” Carbone said. “They picked him up when he came out of his house for the second time, around one this afternoon.”

“Leo, my friend,” Roscommon said to Proctor in the holding pen, “it’s been too long between conversations.”

“Yeah,” Proctor said.

“Leo, my friend,” Roscommon said, “Jimma Dannaher says that you’ve been being mean to rats.”

“That son of a bitch,” Proctor said, “he ducks out on me and I can’t find him when I need him? That son of a bitch.”

“Is it true, Leo?” Roscommon said. “Is it true that you’ve been being mean to rats.”

“That son of a bitch,” Proctor said.

“You know me, Leo,” Roscommon said. “I am always kind to animals myself. I, for example, would not even hurt a rat, if I had a choice.”

“No,” Proctor said.

“Particularly,” Roscommon said, “if the rat knew something about a first-degree murder case.”

“You wanna talk?” Proctor said.

“That was my hope,” Roscommon said. “That was my hope. Leave us talk about some rats, and a lawyer and maybe even a cop.”

“Cop?” Proctor said.

“Leo, Leo,” Roscommon said, “how’d you like a Danish, one of the prune Danish down the Scandinavian Pastry?”

“I never got but one of those Danish,” Proctor said.

“I know,” Roscommon said. “But I am gonna get that cop.”

“I know,” Proctor said.