Lieberman's Day (24 page)

“Viejo,”
said El Perro, grinning, his scar shining as the grin stretched his young dark face.

Myslish had pushed himself to his feet and was hurrying around his desk to aid his son, who stood trembling in the middle of the room.

“Gentlemen,” said Lieberman, still sitting, “this is Emiliano Del Sol and two of his associates, Carlos Piedras and Jorge Manulito. Emiliano, we are all very impressed by your entrance. Now, please make a less colorful exit and wait for me outside.”

Emiliano paid no attention. He stepped farther into the room, with Piedras behind him.

“I never been in a place where they got funerals for Jews,” said El Perro, looking around. “But I thought we should dress up a little. Out of respect for you, you know. That's why we put on these little hats from the box out there. We get to keep them or we supposed to put them back?”

“You put them back,” Lieberman said calmly. “And this isn't the chapel,” said Lieberman. “This is the funeral director's office.”

“It's O.K. That's a rabbi over here, right?” asked El Perro, pointing to Rabbi Wass, who stood and faced him.

Abe had to admire Wass, maybe for the first time. There wasn't a trace of fear in the rabbi's eyes.

“This is a private meeting to make funeral arrangements,” said Wass.

“Who's that?” asked El Perro, pointing to Maish, who hadn't even turned around to look at the intruders.

“My brother,” said Abe, still seated. “It was his son David who was killed.”

“I'm sorry,” said El Perro. “We're all sorry. Ain't you gonna ask how I found you here,
viejo?
”

“Emiliano is also known as
El Perro,
the dog,” Abe explained to Rabbi Wass and the Myslishes, who had taken refuge together behind their massive dark desk. “There are various reasons given why he has such a nickname, but most of them deal in some way with the idea that he has been known to engage in carnal and uncontrolled violent acts.”

“He talks good,” said El Perro, standing in the center of the room with his arms folded over his chest, legs apart, a torn grin on his face.

“Emiliano likes to pose,” said Lieberman. “He has an image to maintain and it derives mostly from old movies and mentors who were themselves influenced by old movies about Mexican bandits.”

“I think you are being a little rude now,
viejo,
” El Perro said with a sign of dwindling goodwill. “That's not like you.”

“It's been a long day, Emiliano,” said Lieberman. “Now please wait outside that door.”

“O.K., but you should be more careful who you talk to like that,” said El Perro.

Carlos continued to stand behind El Perro, hands at his sides, not at all sure of what was going on and decidedly uncomfortable about being in this unfamiliar world.

“I know,” said Lieberman.
“Pero, por favor, Emiliano. Yo vengo muy pronto.”

El Perro considered the request for a moment and then turned suddenly and left the room with Piedras and Manulito at his sides. Piedras reached back and closed the door behind them.

“The big one's name means ‘stone,'” Lieberman explained.

“Entiendo,”
said the younger Myslish. “What …Maybe we should call the police?”

“My brother's a police officer,” Maish said with a sigh. “He knows killers and crazy people. It's his job.”

Abe nodded.

“He's a police officer,” Rabbi Wass confirmed.

“Go on without me,” said Abe, standing. “I'll get rid of Emiliano.”

The Myslishes looked relieved. Rabbi Wass nodded and Maish did nothing.

Stepping into the corridor outside the study, Lieberman closed the door. There were four doors in the darkly carpeted corridor. All were closed. El Perro was seated on a bench covered in what looked like red satin. Carlos stood at his side looking decidedly uncomfortable. Jorge adjusted his
yarmulke
and stood, legs apart, hands folded in front of him like a Secret Service agent protecting the president.

“Nice friends you got,” said El Perro.

Lieberman stood silently until El Perro continued, with a grin, “I got your guy.”

“George DuPelee shot my niece,” said Lieberman. “My nephew was killed by a man named Raymond.”

El Perro was still grinning.

“What have you got, Emiliano?” Lieberman said.

“Raymond Carrou,” said El Perro. “I got his address, but he moved out fast.”

“And?”

“I know where he works,” said El Perro.

“And that's important?”

“You think I come bustin' in here, messin' with your grief, if I didn't have somethin' big? I trust you,
viejo.
I give you information. You owe me bigger than we been talkin'.”

“What have you got, Emiliano?” Lieberman said with unfeigned weariness.

“I heard the news on the television,” El Perro said, fingering his scarred face. “All about what these guys done. And then when we find about this Raymond, it hits me like this.”

El Perro suddenly clapped his hands together. The clap went dead in the draped corridor.

“Oigo,”
said Lieberman.

“Your friend Raymond works in the newspaper and candy stand downstairs at the Stowell Building. Been working there almost four years,” said El Perro. “I seen the news on TV about the shooting, your family, and I put things together, you know?”

Lieberman folded his hands in front of him to keep them from shaking.

“Is that worth something or is that worth something?” asked El Perro.

“Yes,” said Lieberman. “It's worth something.”

“I figured it out jus' like that,” said El Perro with pride, snapping his fingers with no more effect than he had achieved with the clapping of his hands.

“I owe you,” said Lieberman.

“And you think I'm a
loco
fuck,” said El Perro, rising. “Somebody here is even more nuts than me or even more stupid than Carlos.”

Carlos stood stone-faced, waiting.

“We're goin',” El Perro went on. “I forgive you for insultin' me. You got a lot on your mind.”

“One more thing,” said Lieberman. “A favor.”

El Perro turned with curiosity and listened to the request.

“If the baby is a boy,” Yetta Lieberman said slowly, carefully, as if stating something she had been thinking about for a long time, “we should name him David. If Carol agrees, of course.”

Her eyes were long beyond red and puffy. Her entire face was pink and looked to Lisa as if it had been stuffed with cotton balls. Her aunt was calm now as they sat in the kitchen of Abe and Bess's house, the house in which Lisa had grown up and into which she had recently brought her children.

Bess was sitting next to her sister-in-law. Yetta wore a baggy, thrown-on off-white dress with faded purple and red flowers in repeating dull patterns. Bess wore a dark skirt, a white blouse, and a string of pearls. Perfect. Hair perfect. Attitude of concern toward the grieving mother, perfect. And, Lisa conceded, sincere.

Lisa Cresswell had neither her mother's delicacy, grace, nor looks. She didn't have her mother's sense of humor nor her comfortable assurance and leadership. What Lisa had was her children, her intelligence, determination, and a husband she had probably already lost.

Lisa poured more coffee for her aunt and mother and tried to pay attention to Yetta's rambling.

“You think Carol will say yes?”

“When she's up to it, we'll ask her,” Bess said softly. “Maybe she and David had another name picked, one that David particularly liked.”

Once again, her mother had said the right thing. If Bess hadn't been there, if the question had been asked of her, Lisa would have said that the decision to name the baby was Carol's and Carol's alone, that it wouldn't be right to try to tell the mother what to name her child. No one had told Lisa. It was she who had chosen the names of her own children. Todd, who had mounted mild campaigns for more Grecian names for his children—Cassandra, Electra, Orestes—had given in to Lisa's determination.

It was also Lisa's determination that had led her to take her children and leave Todd. Dissatisfied with what she had and not knowing where she wanted to go, she had acted abruptly, uncharacteristically, and with apparent certainty.

Before she was forty she had to leave Todd Cresswell. Todd the depressing and often depressed. Todd the apologetic. Todd who escaped to ancient Athens when things got too rough in contemporary Chicago.

She had left determined and now she stood, coffeepot in hand, not knowing how she looked or what she was wearing, wondering if her husband was in bed with a woman named Faye while Lisa's children slept in the next room. She had to admit that she was still almost certain that she did not want Todd back. She also had to admit that she was less disturbed by the vague image of Barry lying in bed with his eyes open listening to his father and Faye in the next room than she was by the more vivid image of Todd in bed with this woman. What made it worse was that Abe had liked the woman.

“… is what I think,” said Yetta. “What do you think, Lisa?”

“That we should wait till tomorrow after we've had some sleep to think about it,” said Lisa, not knowing what she was supposed to think about.

Three women drinking coffee in the warm, familiar kitchen. Tragedy, Todd's kind of tragedy, had brought them together. Tragedy or not, Lisa felt comfortable, the warm coffee cup in her hand, the erect assurance of her mother across the table, the slouching dismay of her bewildered aunt.

The house was too warm. It was always too warm.

Lisa reached out and touched her aunt's shoulder. The corners of Yetta's mouth twitched into a pained smile and she reached up to touch her niece's hand.

“I don't know if I can face all those people tomorrow,” Yetta said.

“I know,” said Lisa.

“You'll do fine,” said Bess. “We'll be right at your side.”

“David's dead,” Yetta said, looking at Lisa.

“Yes,” said Lisa.

“I keep asking myself,” said Yetta, looking at a photo of Aspen on Barney Weitze's insurance-company calendar next to the refrigerator, “Why would anyone shoot David? Who would do such a thing?”

“I don't know,” said Lisa. “People are … I don't know.”

“Abe will find out, Yetta,” said Bess.

Lisa nodded, but it was not her father roaming the frigid streets nor the rush of icy air that would take his breath as he turned corners that she imagined. It was Todd smiling, content, in the arms of some woman whose face Lisa couldn't conjure.

Raymond really had no place to go for another hour at least. He couldn't go to his apartment for fear that something might lead the police to him. He had taken what little there was of value in the three small, bleak rooms. The trunk of the car was full. The little black and white television sat on the backseat looking up at him with a cold, cataracted eye of disapproval whenever he turned around.

Raymond had spent more of the dead man's money on gas but he was not sure where he should go to wait out the hour. He was afraid to go too near the hospital. A policeman might see him with his motor running and wonder what a black man was doing in this neighborhood at night and Raymond, whose mind was racing madly, might not be able to come up with a suitable lie. Keeping the engine running was essential if he was to have enough heat in the car to stay alive.

The radio said the temperature had dropped to fifteen degrees and would go down to nearly zero.

He could not go back to his job. He would call in and say that he had to go back to Trinidad to be with his family, that he could take no more of the cold. Old Wycheck wouldn't mind. He'd find another black or maybe a Mexican for less than Raymond was getting.

He told himself that in a week, two weeks, a month, the police would search less hard if he could stay hidden, and the newspapers and television would have long forgotten.

It was not hard to hide if you were black, smart, and stayed out of white neighborhoods. Raymond had learned that. It was the money that bothered him. The money, and her eyes, looking up at him when George had shot her.

He went down a dark street past a Jack-in-the-Box and found himself next to a high school. He parked half a block down, close enough to the Jack-in-the-Box so that if he was approached by a policeman he could say that he was about to get out of the car to buy some cheeseburgers. He would even get out and buy the cheeseburgers and would explain that the parking lot had been full when he pulled up.

Raymond needed sleep, but he dared not sleep. It wasn't that he feared nightmares, the sight of the dead man with the fur hat, the sight of George lying on his stomach in the frigid ditch of dirt and snow. He feared dreaming of warm breezes and a white sandy beach, of his sister calling him from the street where he was playing cricket with his friends Bryan and Jason, using a dead tennis ball and planks from banana crates, of the cocoa-colored body of the girl named Zeal whose beaded sweat smelled of sweet sugar the afternoon they made love in her father's house. He feared dreaming these dreams and waking to the nightmare that was now his life. And he longed for Lilly.

Raymond turned on the radio. It crackled, and a woman's voice came on.

“… seems to me that if you can't be safe on the street in a good neighborhood of this city when the temperature is minus zero then you might as well pack it in and … when I was a kid in Buffalo we never …”

Raymond changed stations until he found music, an old song, a voice that sounded as if it came from the past, a band of mellow brass and memories.

“Just one more chance,” the man on the radio crooned, “to prove it's you alone I care for. Each night I say a little prayer for … just one more chance.”

The walls of the office of Father Samuel Parker of St. Bart's on Granville were filled with photographs, mostly of football players. All the photographs were signed. One, which Hanrahan had seen before, was of himself in uniform, or someone about twenty who used to be him, someone big, erect, confident, with the open face of a boy to whom nothing could happen and for whom the future was open and sunlit.