Without Prejudice

by Unknown

  But she just shook her head. ‘You know what I mean. It’s not right they’re so invisible.’

  ‘No. It’s just Chicago.’

  They were on Stony Island now, about to enter Jackson Park, touching directly on Hyde Park. If he changed one lane he would probably be able to see his father and stepmother’s apartment building, a thirties brick block, squat and solidly constructed. The light turned green, and as he drove forward he pointed westwards, towards the full weight of his childhood. ‘With Sophie out of school, maybe we should come down here,’ he said impulsively. ‘I could show her where I grew up.’

  4

  Dorothy Taylor was back, but all morning made no effort to say hello. Robert had a lunch on Printers Row in the south Loop, then met for coffee near the Public Library with an academic keen to edit a series on consciousness. Caught by a brief cloudburst on his way back to the office, his linen jacket was spotted like an ink-stained blotter when he stopped by Dorothy’s office.

  She was gazing intently at a terminal full of sales figures and gave him the barest nod. She possessed what Robert thought of as classic Wasp features, despite her manifest blackness: a short sharp nose, equally angular jaw, high-boned cheeks, and a tight thin-lipped mouth. Pert, handsome rather than pretty, with nothing soft about the eyes. She dressed smartly but not showily, carrying herself with a reserve that suggested considerable professional pride. Never raising her voice, Dorothy was formally polite with everyone except Robert, and very rarely smiled – she was not, as Robert once overheard the production controller complain, ‘exactly a barrel of laughs’.

  ‘Hi,’ he said cheerily. ‘Welcome back. Can we have a word when you have a minute, please?’

  She didn’t look directly at him but did a half-turn, gesturing with a flat palm for him to sit down in the visitor’s chair in front of her desk. He ignored this, saying, ‘Come down in a few minutes if you can.’ And walking off whistled a little to show that yet again, she hadn’t got to him. He had fired enough people in his time to know that if push came to shove Dorothy could go, too.

  He didn’t know very much about her, and as the organisation’s head didn’t feel he could ask around, in the standard way one learns about a colleague. Her CV was clear but uninformative: she’d attended a public high school on the West Side, then studied communications at the local college UIC for her bachelor’s degree. After five years’ work for a technical publisher, she’d joined the press as a marketing assistant, then managed a nimble move to take over rights, before becoming a commissioning editor. For the last three years she had been the publishing director, and it was clear to Robert from the start that she’d wanted his job as the press’s overall head. And expected it.

  He often wondered why she hadn’t got it. She was intelligent, thorough, reliable, and by now quite experienced. More important, a cynic might say, she was a woman and she was black – strong cards these days with a university as keen on equal opportunities as their employer. She was thoroughly respected, though not liked; if there had been an internal ballot for new director, Robert imagined she would have received very few votes. Yet popularity didn’t seem to count for much these days in the choice of management; sometimes it could be a positive liability. He could only imagine that the search committee had wanted a more senior figure to spearhead the press and its anticipated move – into what exactly? They hadn’t said, and not for the first time the absence of a brief made him uneasy. Sadly, Coach Carlson’s memoirs seemed to be the only title most of the trustees were interested in.

  ‘Good vacation?’ he asked as she came in and sat down.

  She nodded, never happy when he was familiar. ‘I see last quarter was good,’ she said.

  Have it your way, he thought. ‘We’ve got a bit of a problem,’ he said, and detected the smallest sign of a smile – Dorothy must have thought it was strictly his problem. ‘Bud Carlson wants to shift house.’

  She reacted at once. ‘When did he tell you that?’

  ‘He didn’t.’ He described his conversation with Balthazar. Her face turned stony.

  ‘So, what do you think we should do?’ he asked.

  ‘I’ll call Coach Carlson and go see him,’ she said shortly. ‘I can’t believe he wants to move. Somebody’s got to him.’

  ‘You mean Balthazar?’ He found it unlikely the agent would have done the soliciting. He had plenty of fish to fry who came to his net of their own accord.

  ‘Who else? These New York agents.’ She made a prim moue with her mouth.

  ‘Maybe I should go see Carlson.’

  ‘No.’ He was taken aback by her sharpness, and watched as she tried to regain her composure. ‘I mean, you don’t even know the man,’ she said.

  They stared at each other, until her eyes moved and targeted his desk instead.

  He said, ‘I’ve met him. But you’re right – I don’t really know him.’ He made a show of thinking about it, but he had already decided. ‘Okay. You signed him. You keep him. Let me know when you’ve had your talk.’

  And he turned in his swivel chair and looked out his window, not rudely, but as a clear sign their conversation was over. He could tell she was angry, though he didn’t really understand why. It was her baby and he was letting her handle things. What more did she want?

  She stood up to go while he looked out at the playground, deserted in the rain. No, almost deserted; there was a lone man sitting on a bench under a sycamore tree in one corner. It seemed odd: adults were not allowed in the playground unless accompanied by a child – a neat reversal of the usual formula.

  He realised Dorothy was still in his office, standing in the doorway. ‘I saw an old friend of yours. He asked me to say hello.’

  ‘Who was that?’

  ‘Simon Hilton.’

  ‘You were in London?’ he asked, feeling somehow that his guard was down.

  ‘On my way back.’

  ‘How did you happen to meet him?’ he asked. Hilton had been a colleague rather than a friend.

  ‘I went to a launch party.’ She still stood there, and he wondered what more she wanted to say. ‘I met somebody else who used to work with you.’

  ‘Oh, yes,’ he said carefully. He turned round and looked at Dorothy. She was trying to suppress a smile, and looked unaccountably triumphant. Then he learned why. ‘Latanya Darling said to say hi,’ she declared.

  He blushed, and was powerless to stop it. He forced himself to look Dorothy in the eye. She was watching his reaction carefully. Christ, he thought, and tried to keep his voice steady, though he knew it was wavering as he said, ‘Thanks, Dorothy. Say hi back if you get a chance.’

  She couldn’t suppress a smirk before she went out the door.

  His heart sank. ‘Say hi’ – Latanya Darling would have had a lot of things to say to him, but ‘hi’ wasn’t one of them. So Dorothy would have had the story; doubtless it would be around the building by lunchtime the following day. To think that he had believed he could start with a clean slate, leave the knowing looks and the unspoken intimations four thousand miles behind him. He was fleeing rumours rather than reality, scuttlebutt rather than fact. How could you leave behind a mistake you hadn’t even made?

  In the playground, the man on the bench stood up, and seemed to look around him – the rain made it difficult to tell. Then Robert realised it was Duval.

  He quickly went down the hall to the elevator. Passing Dorothy’s office, he was conscious she might think he was running away, stunned by her unpleasant interjection of a previous world. He reached ground level and went outside into the rain, but despite the clear view he had all the way to Michigan Avenue there was no sign of anyone. What was Duval doing, hanging around here? It couldn’t be a coincidence.

  Then he saw him, across the street from the playground, sheltering from the rain under the ivy-green canopy of an apartment building. Avoiding a speeding yellow cab, he crossed the street at a run until he was alongside Duval, who was standing completely still, looking in the dire
ction of Michigan Avenue. He wore green work pants and a faded long-sleeved shirt.

  ‘Duval,’ he said quietly.

  At first he saw only bewilderment on his friend’s face, then he seemed to come to and recognised Robert.

  ‘Hey, man.’

  ‘What are you doing here?’ The answer would be crucial – if Duval said he was just passing by Robert knew he wouldn’t believe him. And thereafter would be sceptical of everything his old friend said.

  ‘Right now, I’m just trying to get out of the rain.’ He gave a weak smile and Robert noticed for the first time that one of his front teeth was cracked. ‘Actually, I was hoping to see you,’ he explained, to Robert’s relief.

  The doorman in the foyer of the building was peering out anxiously. Robert signalled with a half-wave that they would be moving. ‘Come on, Duval. Let’s go.’

  ‘Man, it’s raining hard. I don’t want to get wet.’

  ‘Duval, there’re people living in this building. We can’t stay here.’

  ‘That’s what you think,’ said Duval. It seemed a reflexive defiance, which was a change from the Duval he had known. Doubtless the product of too many years being told what to do.

  Robert sighed; he didn’t want an argument with the doorman. He could imagine its escalation, the arrival of the police. ‘Come on over to the office and dry yourself out.’

  He was going to take Duval’s arm but thought better of it, gesturing instead for him to follow. He started to cross the street, feeling the rain on his neck as he waited to let a passing cab go by. Then he ran, dodging puddles, and he could tell Duval was behind him – he heard him laugh like a kid as he dodged the puddles, too.

  Upstairs Vicky was reading Donna Tartt. He didn’t introduce Duval, but led him into his office and motioned him to take the same chair Dorothy Taylor had vacated ten minutes before. He took off his own wet jacket and hung it around the back of his swivel seat.

  ‘Bet you could use some coffee.’

  Duval nodded gratefully, and Robert went out and filled two mugs from the machine next to Vicky’s desk. There was sugar but no milk. ‘You should go home now,’ he told Vicky. It was not a suggestion.

  In the office he handed the mug to Duval. ‘I hope black’s okay,’ he said, and handed him a sugar packet and a plastic stirrer. Sitting down, he blew on his own mug and took a cautious sip. It was scalding.

  ‘You should have told me you were in the neighbourhood,’ he said, having to work hard to sound friendly. He was disconcerted to have seen Duval, sitting on his own in a children’s playground. Didn’t Duval understand he shouldn’t have been there? He must be on a sex offenders register – he’d been convicted of rape, after all.

  ‘I was going to call but I left the phone number at Jermaine’s. I didn’t want just to show up, without an appointment, I mean.’

  They sat in silence for a moment, sipping their coffee. ‘It was good to see you in the coffee shop,’ Duval said.

  ‘It was good to see you, too,’ Robert said, but curtly. Go on, he thought, spit it out and tell me what you want. He wondered how much cash he had in his wallet. ‘Is there something you wanted to talk to me about?’

  Duval didn’t say anything at first. He was leaning forward now, holding his coffee, eyes on the floor. And then to Robert’s horror this tall middle-aged man put his head in his hands and started to cry. Sobbing quietly, his shoulders shuddering. Robert’s impatience evapor-ated, and he felt awful at how brusque he’d been. He wished he could comfort him. He wasn’t used to seeing a grown man cry – not like this anyway, inexplicably, in his office at the end of a working day.

  Duval’s shoulders stopped moving, and then he lifted his head and rubbed his eyes with his hands. ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘What’s the matter, Duval? Are things tough right now?’

  He shook his head and looked away. He seemed embarrassed. Then he said in barely more than a whisper, ‘I’m just so lonely.’

  ‘You must have had friends where you were,’ Robert said cautiously. ‘It would make sense if you missed them.’

  ‘No,’ he said, shaking his head with insistence. ‘In Stateville a man ain’t got no friends – not real ones. Anybody tell you the opposite is lying.’

  ‘How about Jermaine, and his family?’

  ‘They’re good to me; I can’t complain. Wasn’t for Jermaine I’d be living in some halfway house or shelter. I don’t know,’ he said wearily, as if facing a predicament he couldn’t fathom. He looked at Robert, then at his own hand, as if it could help him find the right words. ‘The thing is, Vanetta was the one who visited me. Jermaine would only come every other year or so. My momma would come sometimes, but she never won her battle with junk. It was Vanetta who stuck by me all those years. And I always thought when I got out I’d be living with her. I can’t tell you how long I planned that.’ His voice went flat and his eyes turned dull. ‘Then she passed.’

  For a moment, Robert thought Duval might break down again. ‘Listen,’ he said gently, ‘everything’s going to be okay. It’s just going to take a while. You’re making a hell of a big adjustment. You need to find a job to keep you occupied and make some money.’

  ‘I had me a job for a while. Three days,’ Duval added with a small derisory snort. ‘Fixing up the attic for some old lady lives down the block from Jermaine. Then she says all of a sudden, “Sorry, I can’t be using you no more.” I said, “Is something wrong with my work?” No, that wasn’t the problem. So I asked her what was the problem. At first she wouldn’t tell me. Then finally she says that her daughter was coming to stay, and she didn’t think it would be a good idea if I was to be in the house with her. She said I might be tempted. I asked her, “tempted to what?” She just shook her head. She tried to pay me for an extra day but I wouldn’t take her money.

  ‘Then I got work at the launderette, fixing the machines – that kinda thing. There’s a Vietnamese lady to do the laundry for people who just drop it off, and when it’s busy I helped her out loading the clothes and switching them to the dryer. Then some girl in the neighbourhood starts whispering to the Vietnamese lady and next thing I know I’m out the door. Shit – I ain’t done nothing wrong.’

  Robert wanted to sound encouraging. ‘Look at it this way – you’ve found some work. I know it hasn’t lasted, but one of these jobs will stick.’

  ‘Maybe,’ said Duval, though he sounded sceptical. He seemed to have pulled himself together; he was sitting more upright now, and you couldn’t tell that he’d been crying. ‘I’m sorry that I got upset. And I shouldn’t have bothered you here.’

  ‘Not a problem,’ said Robert.

  ‘I got no one to talk to. Jermaine, he’s busy, and if things go wrong he don’t really want to know. He just wants me to get enough money to move into my own place. I can tell – they don’t really make me feel at home.’

  Robert thought for a moment, suddenly aware that he was treating this as if he had an unhappy member of staff before him, not an ex-con with beat prospects he happened to have known almost forty years before. ‘Look, if you think talking to somebody would help, you can always call me.’

  ‘I don’t want no money.’

  ‘I know that. I’m just offering you my ear. You can pay for the coffee.’ He smiled to make it clear this was a joke.

  ‘You’ve known me since I was little, Bobby. Why, I told somebody once you was the only white friend I ever had.’

  Poor bastard, thought Robert. Duval was calmer now. He said, ‘Though it seems like you always be helping me. I ain’t never done much for you.’

  ‘I don’t know about that. Anyway, isn’t that what friends are for?’

  ‘Sure is. Say, you remember those three kids in the back yard at Blackstone?’

  ‘Yeah.’ He didn’t want to, but he did.

  ‘You saved my ass that time. You was brave. They were going to hurt me bad if you hadn’t been there. That dark nigger, he was mean.’

  He was slightly stunned that Duval ha
d said ‘nigger’. ‘I didn’t do that much.’ He paused, finding himself drawn in by memories, none of them nice. ‘Did I ever tell you they came back?’

  ‘No.’ Duval seemed startled. ‘When?’

  ‘About a year later. I wasn’t so brave that time.’

  ‘They hurt you?’

  ‘They did their best.’ He smiled insincerely, and Duval laughed.

  He realised someone was at the door – it was Dorothy. She must have been listening, though she made a show of knocking on the open door to announce herself. ‘Sorry to interrupt,’ she said, and looked over at Duval.

  He felt he had to introduce them. ‘Dorothy, this is Duval Morgan.’

  ‘Pleased to meet you,’ Dorothy said crisply. Duval didn’t stand up, though he managed a thin smile. Robert watched, intrigued, as they gave each other long appraising looks, some kind of weighing-up going on that he didn’t understand. He felt effaced by this exchange, like a referee in a boxing ring after he’s made the fighters tap gloves before the opening bell rings, then moves away, suddenly invisible.

  At last Dorothy turned to Robert. ‘I spoke with the coach. I’m seeing him next week.’

  ‘Oh, good,’ he said, though the memoirs of Bud Carlson seemed less urgent right now. ‘Let me know how it goes.’ She nodded, taking a final look at Duval as she left the room.

  Duval asked in a semi-whisper, ‘She work here?’

  ‘She does.’

  ‘You a lucky man,’ Duval said, in a richly lecherous voice. And Robert was so struck to think someone actually fancied the woman he considered such a pain in the ass that he found himself joining Duval in raucous laughter, which must have travelled down the hall to Dorothy’s office.

  5

  Two days later Robert’s phone rang as he was getting ready to go home early for the weekend. It was raining hard, heavy drops smeared the windows of his office, and would no doubt snarl up the Friday-night traffic on the Drive. He planned to leave early to beat the rush.

  ‘Hey, man, it’s Duval.’

  ‘You okay?’ he asked, trying to keep impatience out of his voice.