LIKE MOST MOURNFUL rec eptions, this one didn’t last too long. The girl who had been hanging around Rob
Trilling, who I now knew was named Cindy, stayed and helped the Trillings and me to clean up. I noticed she was
quite friendly with Gary Trilling as well.
Maybe I’d misunderstood the situation. I also noticed, however, that Rob k ept busy cleaning and moving things so
that he didn’t have to chat with Cindy.
While I was helping Mona Trilling fold a tablecloth, I heard the young woman call out to Gary, “Are we going
anywhere after this?”
Gary thought about it for a minute and said, “Hildebrand’s.” He glanced over to his brother, who nodded.
I asked Mona, “What’s Hildebrand’s?”
“A sports bar on the way to Bozeman.”
“Are you and Chet going?”
“No, I don’t think so. Chet’s getting tired. I’ll drop you boys off at the car lot and Gary can find a car for you guys
to take to Hildebrand’s.”
“Are you sure? I can help you with Chet or around the house.”
“Go with the boys. You need to see a little of the town outside of the car lot.” After a pause, she added, almost under
her breath, “I’m not sure why Cindy is going. We never really saw much of her until the last few weeks.
She was always in school, and when she came home it was always a brief visit.” Before I had a moment to process
that, Mona handed me the stack of folded tablecloths and said, “Maybe you guys will come up with a good idea
about how to deal with this real-estate developer.”
The way Mona had said “real-estate developer” made it seem like Arnold Marks had some kind of sexually
transmitted disease. She didn’t
sound all that enamored of Cindy either.
About a half hour later, the Trilling brothers, Cindy, and I rode in a three- year-old Chevy Silverado truck to
Hildebrand’s Sports Bar.
The first thing I noticed when I walked through the door was the comfortable temperature. They may not have had
the heat on full blast, but it was at least 40 degrees warmer than the temperature outside. The place didn’t look too
different from sports bars back home, exc ept it was disconcerting to not see any Jets, Giants, Knicks, Nets, Rangers,
Yankees, or Mets paraphernalia. I didn’t even know which sports teams they followed out here.
Cindy made a quick phone call while the rest of us found seats at the bar.
The conversation was a lot like any after a funeral. Gary told a few stories of what it had been like to work with
Lillian. Rob was his usual quiet self, but I noticed he made it a point to sit between Gary and me so that when Cindy
joined us, she took the seat on Gary’s other side.
Cindy looked at Gary and asked, “Are you going to sell like my dad and everyone else?”
Gary shook his head silently.
Cindy said, “My parents seem pretty happy with the deal. Mr. Marks is going to own everything from Central
Avenue to the edge of town. I’m not sure what that’ll mean for everyone else.”
Rob Trilling chimed in with, “It means nothing good. We’re not selling the lot. We’re not giving in to a bully like
him.”
The front door opened and two thuggish-looking redneck men came inside. I immediately tracked them by looking
at the huge mirror above the bar. Neither of them wore heavy coats, and both appeared to be in excellent physical
shape. Something about them made me a little nervous.
That’s when Rob Trilling nudged me and said, “If a dark-haired woman and a guy about forty walk in next, it’s the
same crew that almost jumped us a couple of days ago.”
I k ept watching the two men as they walked through the bar and sat at a small table on the other side of the old,
ratty-looking pool tables. Not long after, the front door opened again. A tall man with broad shoulders and an
attractive woman with shoulder-length dark hair came in and walked directly to the end of the bar.
I looked at Trilling, who leaned toward me and said, “Y ep. The same folks from the other day. It’s not even very
original. He just sent in these four again.”
I nodded my head slowly while ke eping my eyes on the mirror.
“Probably means there’s not nearly as many people as Marks likes to brag about.” I took a moment to pick out a
specific distinctive feature of the woman and each of the men. I never knew when details like that might come in
handy.
One of the men near the pool tables had a cauliflower ear. That told me he might have been a boxer. His partner also
probably did some fighting— he had a very crooked nose that looked more like a geometric structure than a human
feature.
The pair at the end of the bar were more difficult to identify. They had no obvious characteristics. I put the woman
at about thirty-five and the man, as Rob had said, at around forty. Both were lean and fit. The woman had a sharp
nose and chin. The man’s right eye drooped ever so slightly.
Not a lot, but I noticed it.
I said to Trilling, “Looks like they’re up to no good.”
Trilling turned and looked at me. “Really? What tipped you off?”
At least it lightened the mood before we started fighting.