Again, he was being a lot more astute than I had given him credit for. Still, I wanted to stay, to see how the police handled the crime scene.
Sinkovich must have seen the hesitation on my face. “I looked up the rotation. The coroner we’re gettin’s a deputy. He’s good, but he ain’t gonna listen to you. He’s probably gonna treat you like you done something wrong, ‘specially if you get in his face. Now, I know this’s important, and I’ll do what I can to make sure you get all the information. You okay with that?”
I had called them. I had been the ones to put this in the police’s hands.
“Promise me you’ll make sure this child doesn’t get cremated and tossed out,” I said, even before I realized I was going to speak. “Promise me that we’ll be able to take the body and have some kind of service.”
“Gettin' soft on me, Grimshaw?” Sinkovich had no malice in his tone. He was a realist, and he was right. Children got discarded every day. Jimmy had, but he had been old enough to fend for himself.
“Maybe,” I said.
Sinkovich studied me for a moment. “If we release this kid to you, you got enough ready cash to make sure it gets taken care of proper?”
I looked at him in surprise. “Yeah.”
“Okay, then I’ll make sure nothing else goes wrong for the poor thing. Deal?” He extended his hand.
I took it. His skin was cold. “Deal,” I said.
FIFTEEN
I GAVE SINKOVICH my keys to the abandoned building, with the promise that he’d make copies and return them later that evening, along with a report about the day’s events. I felt odd leaving him at the house alone. A white man was conspicuous in that neighborhood, but he told me he could take care of himself.
He was going to stand guard over the little grave until the coroner showed up. Then he was going to inspect the basement, and see if he found any clues as to what had happened.
By the time I drove away, the teenagers had disappeared, leaving a pile of cigarette butts behind.
It wasn’t yet noon, and my plan for the day was shot. I had expected to remain at the building, maybe even finish it up, not deal with something like this.
I had to go see Laura and tell her what had happened, but before I went anywhere near Sturdy Investments, I needed a shower. I had a hunch I smelled a lot more like dead rat than I knew.
I hadn’t told Sinkovich about that, nor had I mentioned the holes in the stairwell. My mistake. But I supposed he would find all of that soon enough.
My apartment building was empty when I arrived. The main door was shut and locked, and the interior of the building was stifling. Marvella, usually the only other person home during the day, probably wasn’t in. Her Defender was gone, but when I knocked, hoping to get an update on Valentina, no one answered.
My own apartment was unbearable. The heat had kicked on. The radiator clanged merrily, as if it were forty below instead of seventy and humid outside. I opened every window, found the fans that Franklin had left me, and scattered them around the apartment.
Then I climbed into the shower, throwing my filthy clothes into the laundry bag. I would have to find time to go to the launderette sometime this afternoon as well.
The shower cooled me down, but didn’t help my attitude. Finding that corpse had brought up anger I hadn’t even realized I had buried. At first, the anger felt general and formless—anger at that faceless person or persons who had allowed a baby to die, and who didn’t even have enough respect for the poor thing to give it a decent burial.
Then I thought about all the children I had known who had been left behind by someone, all the children no one wanted, like the thousand unwanted black children Laura and I had learned about on Sunday night. Not to mention what had happened to Jimmy—and, at the bottom of it all, what had happened to me.
I came to that last thought with one hand braced on the green tile wall of the shower, the water turning cold. My final memory of my parents—the pounding at the door, my father whispering, Hide, son as he carried his shotgun down the stairs, the darkness of the crawlspace in the back of my closet where I heard all the angry voices, my mother’s, shrill and frightened, shouting, It ain’t so! It ain’t so! and then the silence, the hideous awful silence that went on, it seemed, even until now.
I shut off the water, and rested my head on my arm, water dripping down my skin. It seemed like my entire life was about other people’s children. My parents had died because someone thought they had kidnapped a white child. I escaped Memphis because the police and the FBI wanted to kill a black child. Cases over the years, from Roscoe Miller begging me to help his daughter to the death of Brian Richardson last summer, always forced me to put me and mine second, and someone else’s child—someone else’s crisis—first.
With my wet hand, I wiped the water off my face. Somehow these cases came to me, probably because I understood them, because, even though they didn’t intend it, my parents abandoned me that night—protected me, yes; saved me as well; but they never came back because that choice was taken from them, just like it had been taken from me.
That was why I reacted so strongly to that small grave. Why I couldn’t leave those bones, that bit of skin, and that pathetic little jumper to the animals and the elements. Why I had to have the small corpse released to me, so that that tiny child wouldn’t be abandoned again.
I grabbed a towel, dried myself off, and then dressed. I had an afternoon of tracing names on the list Marvella gave me, looking for people who didn’t want to be found, something I was not in the mood for, at least, at the moment.
I invaded Jimmy’s room, grabbed his dirty clothes, and packed them with mine. Then I left the apartment for an exciting hour of lunch and laundry.
* * *
The skies were black with thunderclouds. The mugginess had grown even worse, and it had brought out little black bugs that liked to fly in circles. I had no idea where the bugs came from or how they survived in this city filled with concrete and steel, but they managed somehow.
The heat was worse in the launderette, so I sat outside while everything spun in various washers and dryers, watching lightning illuminate the clouds, and listening to more thunder rumble far away. The promised storm never hit this part of the city, although after a while, the air smelled like rain.
By the time I returned to the apartment, I was calmer. I hung up our clothes, stared at my desk, and then remembered that I had promised to talk to Laura.
I had planned on driving there, but I didn’t want to go back to the Loop. Instead, I called.
Apparently, she had been waiting to hear from me because she sounded relieved when she heard my voice.
I updated her, then I asked her if she could get me a copy of the tenants list.
“I’ll bring it over later along with a pizza,” she said, “unless you have an objection.”
I wasn’t ready to see Laura. I was still feeling a bit raw. I started to tell her that I needed some time alone with Jimmy, then I realized that Jimmy and I had been alone the night before, and I hadn’t gotten him to talk to me. Maybe he would talk to Laura. He sometimes told her his fears, things he wouldn’t tell me.
Besides, he idolized her. Laura was the only person in his life who, even though she had had to leave him, promised she would come back—and had.
“Can you bring the other list, too?” I asked. “The one I asked you for last night?”
“Sure,” she said. “I haven’t been able to reach everyone, but I can always update it for you as I get more information.”
“That would be great,” I said.
“See you around six, Smokey,” she said, and hung up.
I hung up, too, feeling inexplicably better. The decision to have her come over was the right one, even though I wouldn’t have made it without Jimmy. In my life, I had gotten too used to spending time alone, particularly when something disturbed me.
This past year, I was learning brand-new methods of coping, and they still felt strange to me.
&n
bsp; * * *
I spent the afternoon chasing names on Marvella’s lists. Most of the addresses were old, just like the one I had found the day before. They took me to abandoned buildings, or burned-out buildings or, in a few cases, non-existent buildings.
I was beginning to get discouraged, and wondered how anyone found one of these so-called doctors.
Marvella’s lists weren’t working. I was going to have to find a new method, or maybe get an update from Marvella. Perhaps she didn’t realize how dated her information was.
Around four, I found myself near Helping Hands, and decided to stop. When I pulled up outside, lightning still flashed across the sky. Here, the sidewalk was wet, as if I had just missed a downpour.
There weren’t as many people on the streets as there had been the day before. Everyone wore raincoats, and a few carried newspapers above their heads like umbrellas. I saw no tams this afternoon. The Stones had to be waiting out the bad weather somewhere else.
As I opened the glass door, I looked inside the office. A different volunteer manned the desk that afternoon. She was older. Her gray hair had been ironed thin, and she wore too much makeup. Her black dress—which looked too warm for that humid afternoon—had lace flowers decorating the neckline, a touch of frivolity that almost seemed out of place.
“May I help you?” she asked as I stepped inside.
The door closed behind me, and I wished it hadn’t. The office was hotter than my apartment had been. A rotating fan sat beside the typewriter on the credenza, but all it did was blow the hot air around.
“My name’s Bill Grimshaw,” I said, leaning over the desk and extending my hand.
She took it in her moist palm and put her other hand over mine. She didn’t even try to shake.
“It’s a pleasure, Mr. Grimshaw,” she said. “I can’t tell you what an honor it is to be a volunteer here. I feel like I’m doing the Lord’s work.”
I wondered if she was one of the people Althea had recruited from the church or if she had come to Helping Hands from another route. However, I wasn’t curious enough to ask.
“I was wondering if you could check on something for me, Miss…?” I let my voice trail off.
She smiled, patted my hand, and let it go. “I’m Anna Shay.”
“Mrs. Shay,” I said, “I brought a woman and two children in here yesterday. The woman said her name was Helen, and her children were Doug and Carrie. I never did get their last names. I was wondering if I might be able to visit them. I have a few questions for Helen.”
Mrs. Shay’s smile faded. “Now you know that’s not procedure, Mr. Grimshaw.”
I nodded. I had helped develop the procedure, although I didn’t want to tell her that.
“I understand,” I said. “It’s just that something’s come up, and I want to see if Helen knows anything about it.”
“Procedure dictates, Mr. Grimshaw, that I tell her of your request to talk with her and let her decide what she wants to do.”
I almost smiled. When we set up Helping Hands Incorporated, I sat across from Drew McMillan, who was helping us draw up guidelines, and said, The last thing we want is for the police or anyone official to use this organization as a way to get information or to mistreat the people we’re trying to help. We need to hire volunteers who’ll enforce the rules we set up, no matter who asks them to change those rules.
It seemed I had gotten my wish in the person of Anna Shay.
“Fair enough,” I said. “Please ask Helen if she’s willing to meet me here. Let me give you my phone number, just in case she is, so that we can set up a time.”
Mrs. Shay shoved a piece of paper at me, and I wrote my phone number on it. Then I handed it back to her.
“Can you tell me one thing, Mrs. Shay?” I asked. “Obviously Helen and the children decided to stay yesterday. Are they doing all right?”
“I saw them this morning before I started my office shift. That little boy is fierce. No one gets near his momma or sister. I just want to hug him, and tell him that he’s going to be all right now.” She shook her head. “At that age, children should be joyful. I’m hoping we’ll be able to help him recover that joy.”
If he ever had it in the first place.
“Did the interview go well? Are we going to be able to help Helen become financially independent?” I was asking too many prying questions, but better to have one of the volunteers tell me than to ask Helen the following day.
“The interview did not go well,” Mrs. Shay said. “She doesn’t trust anyone, Mr. Grimshaw. But another volunteer discovered this morning that your friend has an amazing talent for sewing. It seems her mother was a seamstress, and young Helen learned at her knee. We’re seeing if we can use that somehow. Although I don’t know how, in this day of ready-made dresses, she would ever be able to earn a true living from sewing clothing.”
The news buoyed me up, although I wasn’t sure why. Perhaps I had assumed that Helen had no skills at all.
“Well,” I said, “please ask her for me if she’s willing to talk briefly tomorrow. If she’s not, that’s all right. But it would be helpful.”
“I’ll ask, Mr. Grimshaw,” Mrs. Shay said. “But I make no promises.”
“I can’t ask for more.” I smiled at her. “It was a pleasure to meet you, Mrs. Shay.”
Then I let myself out the door.
It was fifteen degrees cooler outside, at least, and for the first time that day, I didn’t mind the humidity. The air had droplets of water in it, but they hadn’t yet become rain.
Still, as I walked to my car, I noticed that it was beaded with tiny drops of mist, just enough to make me turn on the wipers and smear the windshield.
It was nearly five, so I drove to the church where Grace Kirkland held her afterschool lessons.
The kids were just coming out of the church as I pulled up. Two dozen children of all ages, carrying books, laughing, and shouting at each other. No gangs waited on the lawn, no barbed-wire fences cordoned off the area, and no graffiti decorated the church’s brick walls.
This was what school should be. The fact that Chicago didn’t provide it for its black children angered and disturbed me, and I wasn’t alone. Parents were up in arms all over the city, but unfortunately, each neighborhood seemed to have different issues.
I made sure my doors were unlocked, and leaned across the seat as the kids ran to my car. I grabbed the door handle and pushed the passenger door open.
Norene got in, filling the car with the scent of grape bubblegum. She had some in her hair, something Althea would hate. Mikie got in beside her.
Everyone else piled into the back. All of the kids said hello to me, even Jimmy, although he glowered as he did so. He hadn’t laughed with the rest of them as they had piled out of the church, and he had kicked at the sidewalk as he walked.
All the way home, I listened to conversations about the importance of fractions (“because you need to know how much a half is, stupid!”), and whether or not Crispus Attucks was a hero.
I didn’t join in. I figured they would learn fractions whether they wanted to or not, and Grace wouldn’t be happy if I weighed in with my opinion of Crispus Attucks, the first man to die in the American Revolution. That he was a black man seemed to me the first defining moment in United States history: a black man stood up for freedom—and got shot for his efforts.
But that view was too cynical for this group, so I kept quiet.
It didn’t take long to get to the Grimshaws’, and by the time the kids piled out, the car grew deadly silent. For the second day in a row, Jimmy did not move to the front seat.
As we pulled away, I said, “What’s going on, Jim?”
“Nothing,” he said.
I glanced in the rearview mirror. He was looking out the window.
“Is someone bothering you at school?” I asked.
“Nope.”
“You seem awfully quiet.”
He shrugged, and I swerved, realizing that I had better keep my
gaze on the road instead of in the back seat.
“Something’s wrong,” I said.
“Nah.” But he drew his legs up to his chest.
I sighed and drove. I had no idea how to approach him.
“You’d tell me if it was the Stones, right?” I said.
“You already asked me that.”
“And apparently the answer didn’t stick.”
“It’s not them,” he said, but I wasn’t entirely convinced.
We pulled up in front of the apartment. Laura’s car wasn’t there yet. I waited for Jimmy to get out, and then we walked inside together. I didn’t say anything as we went up the stairs and as I unlocked the door, but the moment I closed it, I said, “Jim, whatever it is, you can talk to me. I—”
“No, I can’t,” he said with more ferocity than I had ever heard from him. Then he stalked to his room and slammed the door.
I stood by the front door, my heart pounding. I wasn’t certain what I had done to deserve that much anger. I wasn’t certain if I should go after him or if I should let him sit alone for a while, to get some distance between us.
But distance was what we had. So I walked through the living room, picking up bits of the newspaper I had left lying around, and then I knocked on his door.
“Go away!” he said.
“Jim, I just want to find out what’s going on.”
“Nothing! Just go away.”
I opened the door. He was sitting cross-legged on his bed, his books spread out before him. He glared at me.
“What happened to ‘our rooms is our private space’?” he said, lapsing into the bad grammar that he had learned from his family in Memphis.
“It is. I just wanted to—”
“If it’s private, then go away and close the door. You wasn’t invited in. Go away.” He spoke with such force that spittle flew from his mouth.
I nodded, feeling my cheeks heat. I had broken one of our cardinal rules, and my concern for him was no excuse. Or rather, I wouldn’t have let it be an excuse if he had broken the rules with me.
Stone Cribs: A Smokey Dalton Novel Page 19
