It’s somewhere on the West Side, around 96th Street, that he finally speaks. “I know you’ve gone soft on something, plemyannik.” I start to argue, but he raises a pacifying hand. “I don’t need to know what. That is your business. But I needed you to see that today. So that, when the moment comes, the next moment, the real one, you do not hesitate again. Whatever it is that made you come back from the Pierre with the gun still cold, I am asking you to put it in a box and stow that box on a high shelf, out of sight, until the job is done. Two weeks from now, once this thing is finished, the box is yours again. Whatever is in it. You can take it down and open it and live with it however you want. Yes?”
He turns back to the window. The conversation, such as it is, is over.
We don’t speak aga
