Over the next 50 years Walt had stayed in touch with both men, calling them on New Year's Day from different cities. It was just after his dad had been killed in Korea and Walt needed all the support he could get. They came into his life when Walt was in grammar school. Jim and Joe had been more like uncles to Walt than mentors.

She was happy the priest got there in time to administer the last rites before Joe stopped breathing. Joe's widow said her Joe had tripped on the bathroom rug on All Soul's Day, banged his head on the commode and died in intensive care a week later, never emerging from his coma. Walt thought she should have heard his body fall since Jim was a big man, all belly and buttocks, as Jim himself would put it. Jim's widow said she was a sound sleeper. They had found his body in the morning, half in the bathroom and half in the hallway, cold as a mackerel fresh out of the sea. Jim's widow spoke to Walt on the phone and told him Jim had died from a stroke on Halloween. Walt O'Brien, their protege, found this out when he called the homes of both men on New Year's Day, an annual custom for Walt, something he started doing years ago just to find out how his old mentors were doing. They died at 80 going to the bathroom in the middle of the night. Jim Daley and Joe McCarthy had something in common.

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