“That’s the idea,” Cogan said. He made a sucking noise with his tongue and his teeth. “Jesus,” he said, “that’s too bad. If I’d’ve only run into you sooner. I should’ve got on this right away, when I first get the word from China and them. I knew a guy could’ve helped you along that line. Really knew some great broads. But he’s dead.”

“Oh yeah?” Frankie said.

“Yeah,” Cogan said. “It’s too bad. You maybe saw it inna paper. Somebody whacked him out the other night. Markie Trattman. Nice guy. A real nice guy, and what that guy didn’t know about getting broads, nobody knew.”

“Must’ve fucked the wrong one, I guess,” Frankie said.

“Yeah,” Cogan said, “it was either that or something else. He got somebody pissed off, that’s for sure. That’s the way it is with most of them guys, I think, that get whacked. They get somebody pissed and then something happens. You got to be careful, these days. You do something, looks perfectly all right to you, and the right guy gets pissed off for no reason at all and you’re in the shit. Look at China. How long you known China?”

“China?” Frankie said. “Ten years or so, I guess.”

“Well,” Cogan said, “that’s long enough. Now there’s a guy, you should’ve heard what they’re saying about China, year or so ago.”

“I did,” Frankie said.

“Yeah,” Cogan said, “and, knowing China, you got to know, it’s not true. China’d eat shit before he’d talk to anybody. But the trouble is, some asshole gets it in his head that something’s going on or something, and he starts spreading stuff around about China, and of course nobody asks any questions or does anything smart like that. They just talk and talk and talk and pretty soon China’s getting all this static, and he wasn’t even doing anything.

“Now,” Cogan said, “China’s a smart bastard. He’s down there and he knows he’s gotta see somebody and see them quick. So he gets himself a habe or something and they bring him up here and he gets a chance to get the word to a few guys and somebody got in to see him and he told him: ‘Look, I’m gonna get a shiv up my ass if somebody doesn’t start stopping all this talk and shit, you know? And, I’m not gonna stand still for that. If I gotta protect myself, I’m gonna have to go to somebody and start telling them things, and I don’t want to do that, all right?’ So the guy comes out and he puts it around and China’s all right again with everybody. See, that’s what I mean. China’s a smart bastard, knows how to protect his ass. Markie, well, he knew a lot about broads, but I guess he didn’t know nothing about protecting his ass.”

“Kind of hard to cover your ass,” Frankie said, “you don’t even know some guy’s after you for dipping your wick. Kind of hard.”

“Yeah,” Cogan said, “but there’s other things it could’ve been, it could’ve happened. Now Markie, Markie ran a game. And it got knocked over. You know that?”

“I think I heard something about it,” Frankie said.

“Yeah,” Cogan said. He drank his beer. To the bartender he said: “Lemme have another one.” To Frankie he said: “Want another one?”

“I think I’m set,” Frankie said.

“Right,” Cogan said. He accepted the fresh mug and drank from it. “Good,” he said, wiping his mouth. “Nothin’ like a cold beer, I always say. Well, now, Trattman always ran that game, right? He had a game running ever since anybody can remember. And he had a game, went over before. He got robbed before. And you know something?” Cogan said. “It was actually Markie, had it knocked over.”

“Maybe he did it again,” Frankie said.

“There’s a lot of silly shits that’re running around, saying that,” Cogan said. “I actually heard some of that talk myself. And it pissed me off. Because, Markie wasn’t no particular friend of mine, you understand, I bet I didn’t talk to him more’n once, twice, in my whole life. So, he gets himself in some kind of trouble, it’s not up to me, go around and straighten him out. Who am I? Just a guy he knows. Why’s he gonna listen to me? But since then, I thought, I should’ve. I really should’ve. Because there wasn’t nothing to that talk and shit. Markie wouldn’t do that again. He was way too smart for that. But see, that’s what I mean. He hadda know, he hadda know the kind of talk that was going around, and he should’ve been smart enough, he heard some of it, like China, you know? Do something about it. So some silly shit don’t decide he’s gonna make himself all kinds of friends, all he’s gotta do is whack Trattman out. It’s a crazy fuckin’ world.

“See, Frankie,” Cogan said, turning slightly toward him, “I think that’s what China and them think, your friends, that’re worried about you. They think, well, they dunno how much you grown up, since you got out, even. They think you need somebody around, knows about things, advise you.”

“Yeah,” Frankie said.

“Teach you how to cover your ass,” Cogan said. “See, like I was saying, it’s not what you been doing so much’s it is what guys think you been doing, and that’s what you got to look out for, and when it happens, well, you got to be prepared to do something.”

“Yeah,” Frankie said.

“So,” Cogan said in a lower voice, “where’s he gonna be, tomorrow night?”

“Who?” Frankie said.

“Johnny Amato,” Cogan said. “Tomorrow night. Where’s he gonna be?”

“I dunno,” Frankie said.

“Frank,” Cogan said, “you got to keep in mind what I told you. Your friends’re worried about you. You wanna finally get laid right, it’s your friends, they wanna see you get the chance, you know what I mean? And it’s your friends, wanna know where Squirrel’s gonna be.”

“This’s the first time I seen you,” Frankie said.

“New friends’re best,” Cogan said. “Your other one, there, you can’t depend on him, you know? Look at what he got you in before. All that time. You could’ve been out getting a decent piece of ass, ’stead of pounding sand up yours and everything.”

“I don’t know who the fuck you are,” Frankie said.

“Very few guys do,” Cogan said. “Oh, China, maybe, and, oh yeah: Dillon. Dillon knows me. You’re, you strike me as a pretty intelligent guy. Want me to call Dillon for you, and you can talk to him, see who I am? There’s not much to find out, I can tell you that. But you can talk to him. Wanna talk to Dillon?”

“No,” Frankie said.

“Well okay,” Cogan said. “Where’s he gonna be? I know you’re gonna know, if you don’t know now.”

“I haven’t got no idea,” Frankie said. “I seen John three or four times since I got out. I don’t know what he does, nights. Goes home, I guess.”

“Okay,” Cogan said. He finished his beer. “See you around, Frankie, my friend.” He started to get off the stool.

“Wait a minute,” Frankie said.

“There’s things,” Cogan said, “there’s things that won’t wait. You tell me, you don’t know. Okay, I accept that. But I got something to do. I got to find a guy that knows.”

“Where John’s gonna be tomorrow night,” Frankie said.

“And something else now, I guess,” Cogan said. “Like where you’re gonna be, the day after. You gonna be here again? Gonna come in about three-thirty, drink about four beers, hang around until you eat, leave and go up Pagliacci’s like you always do, see what’s still breathing enough to fuck, go home around midnight, one o’clock? That what you’re gonna be doing day after tomorrow? Or are you gonna be doing something else, so it takes me a couple, three days extra? It’s not gonna matter. You could just save me a lot of time, is all.”

Frankie said nothing.

Cogan got off the stool. He rested his forearms on the back of it. “Look,” he said, “you gotta be realistic, right, kid? You gotta be. I know the guy. I also know what’s goin’ through your head. He’s, you think he’s a friend of yours, right? You probably, you probably got something lined up with him right now, am I right?”

Frankie did not answer.

“It don’t matter,” Cogan said. “I know how you feel. But you think, I bet you figured, that Trattman thing, it was gonna work, right?”