“I know of a white family that needs a houseman. Could you handle that work?”
“Can’t see why not.”
“They are good people as far as whites can be.” He spread his hands. “There is one caveat—the household in question is headed by a police captain. If you were to attempt an alias, I suspect he would ferret it out.”
“No need,” Luther said. “Trick is to never mention Tulsa. I’m just Luther Laurence, late of Columbus.” Luther wished he could feel something beyond his own weariness. Spots had started popping in the air between him and Isaiah. “Thank you, sir.”
Isaiah nodded. “Let’s get you upstairs. We’ll wake you for dinner.”
Luther dreamed of playing baseball in floodwaters. Of outfielders washed away in the tide. Of trying to hit above the waterline and men laughing every time his bat head slapped off the muddy water that rose above his waist, up over his ribs, while Babe Ruth and Cully flew past in a crop duster, dropping grenades that failed to explode.
He woke to an older woman pouring hot water into the wash pot on his dresser. She looked back over her shoulder at him, and for a moment he thought she was his mother. They were the same height and had the same light skin speckled with dark freckles over the cheekbones. But this woman’s hair was gray and she was thinner than his mother. Same warmth, though, same kindliness living in the body, like the soul was too good to be kept covered.
“You must be Luther.”
Luther sat up. “I am, ma’am.”
“That’s good. Be a frightful thing if some other man stole up here and took your place.” She lay a straight razor, tub of shaving cream, brush and bowl by the pot. “Mr. Giddreaux expects a man to come to the dinner table clean-shaven, and dinner’s almost served. We’ll work on cleaning up the rest of you afterward. Sound right?”
Luther swung his legs off the bed and suppressed a yawn. “Yes, ma’am.”
She held out a delicate hand, so small it could have been a doll’s. “I’m Yvette Giddreaux, Luther. Welcome to my home.”
While they waited for Isaiah to hear back from the police captain, Luther accompanied Yvette Giddreaux to the proposed NAACP offices on Shawmut Avenue. The building was Second Empire style, a baroque monster of chocolate stone skin with a mansard roof. First time Luther’d seen the style outside of a book. He stepped in close and looked up as he walked along the sidewalk. The lines of the building were straight, no bowing, no humps, either. The structure had shifted with the weight of itself, but no more so than would be expected from a building Luther guessed dated back to the 1830s or so. He took a good look at the tilt of the corners and decided the foundation hadn’t racked, so the shell was in good shape. He stepped off the sidewalk and walked along the edge of the street, looking up at the roof.
“Mrs. Giddreaux?”
“Yes, Luther.”
“Seem to be a piece of this roof missing.”
He looked over at her. She held her purse tight in front of her and gave him a look of such innocence it could only be a front.
She said, “I believe I heard something to that effect, yes.”
Luther continued moving his gaze from the point on the ridgeline where he’d spotted the gap, and he found a dip exactly where he was hoping he wouldn’t—in the center of the spine. Mrs. Giddreaux was still giving him that wide-eyed innocence, and he placed his hand softly under her elbow as he led her inside.
Most of the first-floor ceiling was gone. What remained leaked. The staircase just to his right was black. The walls were missing their plaster in half a dozen places, the lathes and studs exposed, and scorched black in half a dozen more. The floor was so eaten away by fire and water that even the sub flooring was damaged. All the windows were boarded.
Luther whistled. “You buy this place at auction?”
“About so,” she said. “What do you think?”
“Any way you can get your money back?”
She slapped his elbow. The first time, but he was sure it wouldn’t be the last. He resisted the urge to hug her to him, the way he’d done with his mother and sister, loving that they’d always fought him, that it had always cost him a shot to the ribs or the hip.
“Let me guess,” Luther said, “George Washington never slept here, but his footman did?”
She bared her teeth at him, little fists placed to little hips. “Can you fix it?”
Luther laughed and heard the echo bounce through the dripping building. “No.”
She looked up at him. Her face was stony. Her eyes were gay. “But of what usefulness does that speak, Luther?”
“Can’t nobody fix this. I’m just amazed the city didn’t condemn it.”
“They tried.”
Luther looked at her and let out a long sigh. “You know how much money it’ll take to make this livable?”
“Don’t you worry about money. Can you fix it?”
“I honestly don’t know.” He whistled again, taking it all in, the months, if not years, of work. “Don’t suppose I’ll be getting much in the way of help?”
“We’ll round up some volunteers every now and then, and when you need something, you just make a list. I can’t promise we’ll get you everything you need or that any of it will arrive in the time you need it, but we’ll try.”
Luther nodded and looked down into her kind face. “You understand, ma’am, that the effort this will take will be biblical?”
Another slap on the elbow. “You best set to it then.”
Luther sighed. “Yes, ma’am.”
Captain Thomas Coughlin opened the door to his study and gave Luther a wide, warm smile. “You must be Mr. Laurence.”
“Yes, sir, Captain Coughlin.”
“Nora, that’ll be all for now.”
“Yes, sir,” the Irish girl Luther’d just met said. “Nice to meet you, Mr. Laurence.”
“You, too, Miss O’Shea.”
She bowed and took her leave.
“Come in, come in.” Captain Coughlin swung the door wide, and Luther entered a study that smelled of good tobacco, a recent fire in the hearth, and the dying autumn. Captain Coughlin led him to a leather chair and went around the other side of a large mahogany desk and took his seat by the window.
“Isaiah Giddreaux said you’re from Ohio.”
“Yes, suh.”
“I heard you say ‘sir.’”
“Suh?”
“Just a moment ago. When we met.” His light blue eyes glittered. “You said ‘sir,’ not ‘suh.’ Which will it be, son?”
“Which do you prefer, Captain?”
Captain Coughlin waved an unlit cigar at the question. “Whichever makes you comfortable, Mr. Laurence.”
“Yes, sir.”
Another smile, this one not so much warm as self-satisfied. “Columbus, correct?”
“Yes, sir.”
“And what did you do there?”
“I worked for the Anderson Armaments Corporation, sir.”
“And before that?”
“I did carpentry, sir, some masonry work, piping, you name it.”
Captain Coughlin leaned back in his chair and propped his feet on the desk. He lit his cigar and stared through the flame and the smoke at Luther until the tip was fat with red. “You’ve never worked in a household, however.”
“No, sir, I have not.”
Captain Coughlin leaned his head back and blew smoke rings at the ceiling.
Luther said, “But I’m a fast learner, sir. And there’s nothing I can’t fix. And I look right smart, too, in tails and white gloves.”
Captain Coughlin chuckled. “A sense of wit. Bully for you, son. Indeed.” He ran a hand over the back of his head. “It’s not a full-time position that’s being offered. Nor do I offer any lodging.”
“I understand, sir.”
“You would work roughly forty hours a week, and most of it would be driving Mrs. Coughlin to mass, cleaning, maintenance, and the serving of meals. Do you cook?”
“I can, sir.”
“Not a bother. Nora will do most of that.” Captain Coughlin gave another wave of his cigar. “She’s the lass you just met. She lives with us. She does chores as well, but she’s gone most of the day, working at a factory. You’ll meet Mrs. Coughlin soon,” he said, and his eyes glittered again. “I may be the head of the household, but God was remiss in telling her. You follow my meaning? Anything she asks, you hop to.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Stay on the east side of the neighborhood.”
“Sir?”
Captain Coughlin brought his feet off the desk. “The east side, Mr. Laurence. The west side is fairly infamous for its intolerance of coloreds.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Word will get out, of course, that you work for me and that’s fair warning, sure, to most ruffians, even west-siders, but you can never be too careful.”
“Thank you for the advice, sir.”
The captain’s eyes fell on him through the smoke again. This time they were part of the smoke, swirling in it, swimming around Luther, looking into his eyes, his heart, his soul. Luther had seen hints of this ability in cops before—they didn’t call them copper’s eyes for nothing—but Captain Coughlin’s gaze achieved a level of invasion Luther had never come across in a man before. Hoped to never come across twice.
“Who taught you to read, Luther?” The captain’s voice was soft.
“A Mrs. Murtrey, sir. Hamilton School, just outside of Columbus.”
“What else she teach you?”
“Sir?”
“What else, Luther?” Captain Coughlin took another slow drag from his cigar.
“I don’t understand the question, sir.”
“What else?” the captain said for a third time.
“Sir, I’m not following you.”
“Grew up poor, I imagine?” The captain leaned forward ever so slightly, and Luther resisted the urge to push his chair back.
Luther nodded. “Yes, sir.”
“Sharecropping?”
“Not me so much, sir. My mother and father, though, yeah.”
Captain Coughlin nodded, his lips pursed and pained. “Was born into nothing myself. A two-room thatched hut we shared with flies and field rats, it was. No place to be a child. Certainly no place to be an intelligent child. You know what an intelligent child learns in those circumstances, Mr. Laurence?”
“No, sir.”
“Yes, you do, son.” Captain Coughlin smiled a third time since Luther had met him, and this smile snaked into the air like the captain’s gaze and circled. “Don’t muck about with me, son.”
“I’m just not sure what kind of ground I’m standing on, sir.”
Captain Coughlin gave that a cock of his head and then a nod. “An intelligent child born to less than advantageous surroundings, Luther, learns to charm.” He reached across the desk; his fingers twirled through the smoke. “He learns to hide behind that charm so that no one ever sees what he’s really thinking. Or feeling.”
He went to a decanter behind his desk and poured two helpings of amber liquid into crystal scotch glasses. He brought the drinks around the desk and handed one to Luther, the first time Luther’d ever been handed a glass by a white man.
“I’m going to hire you, Luther, because you intrigue me.” The captain sat on the edge of the desk and clinked his glass off Luther’s. He reached behind him and came back with an envelope. He handed it to Luther. “Avery Wallace left that for whoever replaced him. You’ll note its seal has not been tampered with.”
Luther saw a maroon wax seal on the back of the envelope. He turned it back over, saw that it was addressed to: MY REPLACEMENT. FROM AVERY WALLACE.
Luther took a drink of scotch. As good as any he’d ever tasted. “Thank you, sir.”
Captain Coughlin nodded. “I respected Avery’s privacy. I’ll respect yours. But don’t ever think I don’t know you, son. I know you like I know the mirror.”
“Yes, sir.”
“‘Yes, sir,’ what?”
“Yes, sir, you know me.”
“And what do I know?”
“That I’m smarter than I let on.”
The captain said, “And what else?”
Luther met his eyes. “I’m not as smart as you.”
A fourth smile. Cocked up the right side and certain. Another clink of the glasses.
“Welcome to my home, Luther Laurence.”
Luther read the note from Avery Wallace on the streetcar back to the Giddreauxs.
To my replacement,
If you are reading this, I am dead. If you are reading this, you are also Negro, as was I, because the white folk on K, L, and M Streets only hire Negro housemen. The Coughlin family is not so bad for white folk. The Captain is never to be trifled with but he will treat you fair if you don’t cross him. His sons are mostly good. Mister Connor will snap at you every now and again. Joe is just a boy and will talk your ear off if you let him. Danny is a strange. He definitely does his own thinking. He is like the Captain, though, he will treat you fair and like a man. Nora is a funny thinker herself but there is not any wool over her eyes. You can trust her. Be careful with Mrs. Coughlin. Do what she asks and never question her. Stay well clear of the Captain’s friend, Lieutenant McKenna. He is something the Lord should have dropped. Good luck.
Sincerely,
Avery Wallace
Luther looked up from the letter as the streetcar crossed the Broadway Bridge while the Fort Point Channel ran silver and sluggish below.
So this was his new life. So this was his new city.
Every morning, at six-fifty sharp, Mrs. Ellen Coughlin left the residence at 221 K Street and ventured down the stairs, where Luther waited by the family car, a six-cylinder Auburn. Mrs. Coughlin would acknowledge him with a nod as she accepted his hand and climbed into the passenger seat. Once she was settled, Luther would close the door as softly as Captain Coughlin had instructed and drive Mrs. Coughlin a few short blocks to the seven o’clock mass at Gate of Heaven Church. He would remain outside the car for the duration of the mass and often chat with another houseman, Clayton Tomes, who worked for Mrs. Amy Wagenfeld, a widow who lived on M Street, South Boston’s most prestigious address, in a town house overlooking Independence Square Park.
Mrs. Ellen Coughlin and Mrs. Amy Wagenfeld were not friends—as far as Luther and Clayton could tell, old white women didn’t have friends—but their valets eventually formed a bond. Both were from the Midwest—Clayton grew up in Indiana not far from French Lick—and both were valets for employers who would have had little use for them had they placed just one foot in the twentieth century. Luther’s first job after returning Mrs. Coughlin to her household every morning was to cut wood for the stove, while Clayton’s was to haul coal to the basement.
“This day and age?” Clayton said. “Whole country—’least what can afford it—is going electrical, but Mrs. Wagenfeld, she want no part of it.”
“Mrs. Coughlin neither,” Luther said. “Enough kerosene in that house to burn down the block, spend half my day cleaning gas soot off the walls, but the captain say she won’t even discuss the subject. Said it took him five years to convince her to get indoor plumbing and stop using a backyard privy.”
“White women,” Clayton would say, then repeat it with a sigh. “White women.”
When Luther took Mrs. Coughlin back to K Street and opened the front door for her, she would give him a soft, “Thank you, Luther,” and after he’d served her breakfast, he’d rarely see her for the rest of the day. In a month, their interactions consisted solely of her “thank you” and his “my pleasure, ma’am.” She never asked where he lived, if he had family, or where he hailed from, and Luther had gleaned enough about the employer-valet relationship to know it was not his place to initiate conversation with her.
“She’s hard to know,” Nora said to him one day when they went to Haymarket Square to purchase the weekly groceries. “I’ve been in that house five years, I have, and I’m not sure I
could tell you much more about her than I could the night I arrived.”
“Long as she ain’t finding fault with my work, she can stay silent as a stone.”
Nora placed a dozen potatoes in the sack she carried to market. “Are you getting on well with everyone else?”
Luther nodded. “They seem a nice family.”
She nodded, though Luther couldn’t tell if it was a nod of agreement or if she’d just decided something about the apple she was considering. “Young Joe’s certainly grown a fondness for you.”
“Boy loves his baseball.”
She smiled. “‘Love’ may not be a strong enough word.”
Once Joe had discovered Luther had played some baseball in his time, the after-school hours became games of catch and pitching and fielding instruction in the Coughlins’ small backyard. Dusk coincided with the end of Luther’s shift, so the final three hours of his workday were spent mostly at play, a situation Captain Coughlin had immediately approved. “If it keeps the boy out of his mother’s hair, I’d let you field a team should you ask, Mr. Laurence.”
Joe wasn’t a natural athlete, but he had heart and he listened well for a child his age. Luther showed him how to drop his knee when he fielded grounders and how to follow through on both his throws and the swings of his bat. He taught him to spread and then plant his feet beneath a pop-up and to never catch it below his head. He tried to teach him how to pitch, but the boy didn’t have the arm for it, nor the patience. He just wanted to hit and hit big. So Luther found one more thing to blame Babe Ruth for—turning the game into a smash-ball affair, a circus spectacle, making every white kid in Boston think it was about ooohs and aaahs and the cheap soaring of an ill-timed dinger.
The Given Day Page 26
