Martha put her coffee down at Shana’s table and sat. “Who’s the man with Robbie the Ridiculous?” she asked. “He looks like a recruiting officer for the FBI.”
Shana Malvera giggled. Shana Malvera always giggled. She always rolled her eyes. She always shook her head. She always shrugged her shoulders. Shana Malvera was never still. At the age of five, it had been cute. At the age of forty-five, it was intensely annoying. People put up with it because Shana always knew everything. Shana was a one-woman compendium of gossip.
“FBI is exactly it,” she now told Martha. “I’d have thought you’d know. It’s all because of your grandfather that he’s here. Gregor Demarkian, I mean.”
“Gregor Demarkian?” The name was vaguely familiar. “He’s from the FBI?”
“No, no.” Shana’s head-shaking was so vigorous, her eyes looked as if they were going to pop out. “He used to be with the FBI. He used to chase serial killers. You know. Like Jeffrey Dahmer. Except he’s really old. I don’t think he chased Dahmer himself. No, he’s some kind of private detective now. The Cardinal called him in. Don’t you remember all that fuss a little while ago when Donald McAdam died?”
Martha certainly did remember “all the fuss” when Donald McAdam died. There had been a lot of it. In the first place, Donald McAdam had been the lynchpin of a federal insider trading case that had touched every important financial firm on Wall Street. In the second place, he’d gone right out a penthouse apartment window onto Fifth Avenue in the Fifties.
“What did this Gregor Demarkian have to do with Donald McAdam?” Martha asked.
“He solved the case,” Shana said, obviously surprised Martha didn’t know. “Not right away, you know, but later, on that boat Jonathan Baird owned. I’d think your grandfather would have known Jonathan Baird.”
“Maybe he did. He knew Donald McAdam.”
“Well, from what I hear, the Cardinal is going crazy. With the murder being unsolved and all. So he’s called in this Demarkian person to clear it up. The police are supposed to be just livid.”
“I wonder what he’s talking to Robbie the Ridiculous for.”
“Maybe Robbie saw something pacing back and forth with his sign like that. Maybe he saw somebody come in or somebody go out. Or maybe he saw something inside the center itself. He was inside that night, you know.”
“No, I didn’t know.”
Shana was nodding this time. It was just as violent as everything else she did. “Oh, yes. I gave him directions to the cafeteria myself. He was lost up on the first floor. It was the first time he’d come in.”
“I’m surprised he does come in,” Martha said. “Considering.”
“Oh, Martha. He’s harmless enough. He’s just one person by himself and he isn’t the kind who does dangerous stuff like unplug things. And he’s so sad. Anyway. I found him upstairs by the examining rooms looking perfectly ready to panic, and I told him the way down here.”
“And he’s been coming down here ever since,” Martha said musingly.
“Mmm hmm.” Shana sounded happy. “You know, Martha, I don’t think he’s really serious about all this pro-life business. I don’t think he’s real about it, you know, the way somebody like the Cardinal is, or that woman who went to jail for five years because she wouldn’t give her name at her trespassing trial or whatever it was down in Florida. I think he’s just—lonely.”
“Lonely,” Martha repeated, shocked. “Shana, what are you talking about? The man’s outside our doors with a picket sign twenty-four hours a day. I don’t think he sleeps.”
“He does. He goes away at midnight and comes back at six. I heard somebody say he lives in Brooklyn or Queens or somewhere.”
“The Holly Hill Christian Fellowship. In Queens.”
“Whatever. Do you think if he had a family that loved him he’d be here like this all the time? At least he wouldn’t be alone. His wife would come with him once in a while.”
“Maybe his wife has to stay home taking care of their seven children.”
“If he had seven children he wouldn’t be able to picket.” Shana was definite. “No matter how bad the economy was, he’d have to find work doing something, like working in Burger King or picking up deposit bottles or even dealing dope. Trust me. He’s all alone in the world.”
“And you’re going to make it all better?”
“I just thought I’d start talking to him, that was all. See what he’s like. If he isn’t too crazy, maybe there’s something around here he could do.”