Without Prejudice (16 page)

But then there were flickers, intimations of something he sensed but could not describe. There had been a particularly riotous agents’ party he’d given a miss, going home to look after Sophie while Anna had a late-night conference with a bunch of forlorn Ethiopians, arrested in Clacton, of all places, and now awaiting deportation. The next morning he was outside the conference room, reviewing the agenda before the acquisitions meeting, when he heard two young women editors, already in the room, discussing the party.

‘Did you see Latanya Darling?’ one asked the other.

‘She was putting it back,’ said the other appreciatively.

‘And awfully indiscreet about you-know-who.’

When he entered the room just then, the two young women looked embarrassed, but also disapproving, as if there were stains on his trousers. Why? They were too young to have been at the company when Latanya had worked there. He couldn’t believe a two-night stand almost a decade before would constitute current gossip value. A proverbial light bulb was flickering that he didn’t like.

Then he had an argument with another division head, an experienced woman he’d always got on with well enough. But the argument had been a bad one – she’d accused him of poaching an author who had actually begged to shift divisions to his – and he had almost lost his temper. She’d looked at him coldly. ‘I see what they mean about you,’ she’d snapped, then stalked out of the room.

So it seemed perversely logical to hear an explanation of what was going on from Prothero again, this many years later. ‘You know Latanya Darling’s back?’ Prothero said as they sat in the very same watering hole off the Strand.

‘I know,’ he said heavily. All he’d wanted was to have a drink after work, share the usual moan about their respective employers, talk a little baseball, and then go home to his family.

‘I’d like to say the girl was carrying a torch for you, Robert, but it’s more like a flamethrower.’

‘It was years ago,’ he said wearily. ‘Look, it’s not like we even had a relationship. We spent the night together twice. Okay?’ He looked at Prothero’s face, which was unexpectedly earnest. ‘Jesus, Frank, I need Latanya Darling in my life like I need a hole in the head.’

Frank clawed at the bowl of peanuts between them, then chomped on a handful. ‘The thing is, she’s saying some pretty rough things.’

‘About me?’

Prothero nodded. ‘I didn’t think you’d exactly
want
to know, but I thought you needed to.’

What was she saying? What was the worst a spurned woman could say? That you were bad in bed? Unanswerable, unless you provided a large erection for public display. Or was it something else? That he was kinky – wore a leather jacket underneath the sheets? Liked pain? Or that he was gay? Or that he was a drunk? – though that would be rich coming from Latanya Darling.

‘All right. I’m ready. What’s she saying?’

‘She says you used to hit her.’ Prothero was looking at his fingers.

‘Oh, for fuck’s sake.’

Flabbergasted, he looked wildly around the room. When he looked back at Prothero his friend seemed no less tense for unburdening himself.

‘Don’t tell me you believe that, Frank.’

‘Of course not. But you were pretty hot-tempered back then.’

‘What do you mean, back then?’ he demanded. He was going to get hot-tempered very soon if Prothero didn’t explain.

‘When you and Cathy were splitting up.’

‘That was eight years ago. I was fine as soon as I met Anna.’

‘I know that. But people have long memories – and you were pretty tough in the office. That’s what I was told, anyway. So when this woman starts claiming . . . things, people think, “Ah, that makes sense.” You know, for most people a little smoke makes a big bonfire.’

Did it? He had never conflated gossip with fact. ‘Cheer up,’ said Prothero suddenly, signalling early for another round. ‘Sometimes bonfires go out of their own accord.’

This one didn’t. It smouldered but never burst into flame, which meant Robert didn’t get the opportunity to fight the fire. He tried not to become paranoid, ignored the meaningful glances at the occasional party where he and Latanya were in the same room – when interestingly, Latanya always ignored him completely. But he felt that some force was gathering against him.

In his own company, the CEO left, but where once Robert would have been in the running to replace him, it was made discreetly clear to him that now he wouldn’t be. So when a job running a much smaller publisher came up, one which five years before he would have disdained, he applied – to the gleeful surprise of the headhunter, who clearly considered Robert to be a catch for the position.

The interviews went well, and he was confident he’d get an offer – not out of arrogance, but because, as the headhunter said himself, this was one he ought to walk.

Only he didn’t, and the headhunter was embarrassed. After Robert’s insistent probing he told him there had been ‘some personality issues’.

‘But they don’t even know me,’ Robert protested.

‘I know. It’s weird. It’s as if somebody’s told them something about you.’

He realised that he was in a trap, one he wouldn’t be able to escape, for he was being done down by a rumour no one would put to his face. If he had been accused of breaking some law – or even the rules of his company – he could have confronted the charges head on, been cleared or convicted. Instead he suffered from an insidious campaign that damned him
sub rosa
. His professional life, once a seeming succession of new opportunities, was becoming hemmed in. He felt he was operating in a room with shrinking walls, and sooner or later the lack of space would begin to pinch. He didn’t know what to do.

It had been Anna who proposed a solution. He had never told her about Latanya – in the past there hadn’t seemed any point, as he didn’t want the sheer sourness of his fling to infect his new relationship; later, it simply seemed pointless bringing it up. Yet she knew he wasn’t happy, even if she didn’t know quite why.

‘I think we need a change,’ she’d declared one night, when she came home late, exhausted from another futile case. ‘I barely see my daughter; you aren’t enjoying work – don’t deny it. We’re getting stale here.’

‘We could move to the country,’ he said, though he dreaded commuting.

‘No. That’s not what I had in mind. I meant a real change – like a different country kind of change.’

It was as simple as that. He’d put out feelers immediately for any job in any place that was far away. It had seemed unfortunate that the first significant opportunity had come from his native city, but when he flew out for an interview he found almost no reminders of a past he would rather forget.

There was a lot that could be done in the new job – he saw considerable potential that was going unrealised – and this without the grinding demands and ferocious politics of a large corporation. The trustees had not only been welcoming, they had seemed actively to want him. The press’s offices were modern, spacious, and located on the North Side; Hyde Park could have been in a different city altogether. Houses seemed incredibly inexpensive, moreover, which meant the sale of their small London home could buy a large Midwestern one in a pleasant suburb like Evanston – next door to the city and its culture, yet leafy, green and safe, and with a good school for Sophie. Anna had positively glowed during their three days in Chicago, and had leads already in place for work at the British Consulate.

In short, there was nothing stopping them from moving, and plenty of reasons to prod them westward ho. When the 747 had lifted off the ground, he had vowed to leave all thoughts of Latanya Darling behind him. He was making a fresh start.

IX

1

D
UVAL ORDERED APPLE
pie this time, with ice cream again, after eating a double cheeseburger with fries – all at Robert’s urging as they sat again in the coffee shop of the Marchese building. He had the sense that Duval didn’t take many meals with his cousin Jermaine and his family, and that he wasn’t particularly welcome there, a lodger foisted on them through a family tie they couldn’t quite bring themselves to sever.

Duval was dressed in black trousers with cuffs and a light blue, short-sleeved shirt that was at least one size too big for him – it made his arms look thin as sticks. Again, there was an anachronistic air about him, and as they sat under a large ceiling fan – ornamental rather than functional since the coffee shop was airconditioned – Robert felt they could have been in a 1950s movie.

Although quiet at first, Duval seemed in good spirits, which was more than Robert could say about his view of his old friend’s prospects. His own efforts at finding work for Duval had come to nothing – Flynn, the maintenance head in the building, had shaken his head unambiguously when Robert sounded him out about prospects of work for Duval. ‘Union’s got it all tied up,’ he said. ‘I even tried to get my nephew a few hours helping me paint the ground floor. Nothing doing. Sorry.’

When Robert related the bad news Duval looked unaffected, though not because he’d found anything much off his own bat – the job prospect he’d mentioned on the phone had not materialised. There had been some other bits and pieces – a few days offloading delivery trucks for a warehouse on the West Side, a cleaning job in an office block on the fringes of the Loop when the regular cleaner had been out with the flu. And that was it.

Robert asked how he was spending his time. Duval didn’t give a very full explanation – sometimes he went to the library, he said, but otherwise he was vague about his routine. There didn’t seem to be one, and though he mentioned his parole officer, Robert couldn’t tell how often Duval was required to see the man. He did say he liked riding the bus, and Robert envisaged Duval on a series of aimless travels around the city, content just to have the freedom to move wherever the bus took him.

Duval grew more talkative as he ate, but he talked mainly about the distant past, as if he chose simply to ignore his adult years in prison – unlike an archaeologist, he didn’t sift through the layers on his journey backwards to childhood. Robert found himself colluding with this excavating leap. Perhaps it was the trip to Hyde Park with Sophie, but he was not only intrigued to watch his old friend root around, he was also happy to do this himself.

‘Do you go to church these days?’ he asked as the waitress refilled his coffee cup for the second time and delivered Duval his pie. He didn’t remember the boy Duval as especially religious; church then seemed to mean choir, and the feeding of the singers afterwards. But Duval had been reading the Bible when they’d first met here in the coffee shop.

‘I go, though not always to the same one.’

‘How about singing?’

Duval shook his head. ‘I done lost my voice. Not that there was much opportunity for singing where I been.’ He paused. ‘Squealing, yes. Singing, no.’

Squealing? Robert didn’t know what to say. On Duval’s face a strange smile was creeping into the corners of his mouth. Then he looked down at his pie, and the two men were silent while Duval ate his dessert.

Finished, Duval put down his fork and wiped his mouth carefully with his napkin. He said, ‘Do you remember how you used to sing in the back bedroom?’

Robert laughed. ‘If you could call it that. You were the singer.’

And Duval suddenly sang, quietly but loud enough for a couple near them to stare, ‘
For once in my life I have people who need me, people I’ve needed so long.
’

The words weren’t quite right, but the voice remained pitch perfect and clear. Robert laughed, and it looked as if Duval were going to sing some more, when a female voice said, ‘You must be Duval.’ Robert looked up, half-expecting the waitress, but it was Anna.

‘I was done early,’ she said, addressing Robert. ‘I thought I’d come by and save you the trip.’

The trip was all of two blocks. He frowned, then remembered his manners. ‘This is my wife Anna.’ Both he and Duval stood up awkwardly.

‘I don’t want to interrupt you gentlemen.’ She looked at Robert, her expression absolutely neutral. ‘I can do some shopping and meet you later at the office.’

‘No,’ said Duval. ‘Join us. I’m glad to be meeting Bobby’s wife.’ At the name ‘Bobby’ she looked surprised, then amused. Duval got a chair from a nearby table and Anna sat down between them.

‘So how’s it going?’ she said pleasantly to Duval. She wore a cheerful summer dress, a print frock of small cherries on a white cotton background – but looked tired.

‘Just fine,’ said Duval. He had gone back into shy mode, sitting with his hands together like a pious student. ‘We was just talking about old times. We used to sing together when we was little.’

‘You did?’ Anna was laughing. ‘You must have been the lead then. Robert’s got a tin ear as far as I can tell.’

‘Thanks,’ Robert said, watching her.

She looked around at the coffee shop. ‘So is this your new hangout?’

‘Yes, ma’am,’ said Duval, sensing a joke.

‘It’s where the best folks come to eat the big dinner,’ said Robert. ‘You want some coffee?’

Anna shook her head. ‘No, thanks.’ She laid a tanned arm lightly on the table. ‘Well, Duval,’ she said, then paused. Robert watched her lips press together as she weighed up her words. He was pretty sure he knew what was coming.
Robert’s told me about your case and I think maybe I can help.
But he was wrong. She said, ‘Robert tells me you’re having trouble finding work.’

‘It’s tough,’ Duval conceded. He snuck a look at Anna. ‘It’s not that I’m fussy, it’s just no one seems to want to know. If they do hire me, it doesn’t usually last long. I work hard, but if they hear about my record—’

He left the sentence unfinished, but Robert noted that Duval was openly acknowledging the problem to Anna. She had a remarkable facility to get people to tell the truth about themselves.

‘What kind of work are you looking for?’

‘Like I said to Bobby, I like working with my hands – carpentry, decorating, that kind of thing.’

‘Do you mind being outside?’ She ignored Robert’s stony look.

Duval gestured towards the windows on Wacker Drive. ‘Not when the weather’s like this.’

Anna laughed, and Robert watched her warily. What was she up to?

She said, ‘I couldn’t guarantee the weather, but we have got a few jobs at home that need doing. I don’t seem to have time to get round to them. And Robert,’ she pointed an accusing finger at him, ‘is absolutely hopeless at that kind of thing.’

He looked at her frostily. He wasn’t cross about the aspersion on his DIY ability; he was angry about the invitation.

Anna was speaking briskly. ‘There’s a fence needs painting – the neighbours have done their side, and keep waiting for us to do ours. And I know there’ll be other little jobs once you show up.’

Duval laughed, with that same curious motion of his hand covering his mouth. ‘That sounds Eye-deal.’ Robert saw that he was already at ease with Anna.

‘Could you come out on Saturday? Sometimes we go to the Indiana Dunes, but not this weekend.’

‘I’d like to,’ said Duval.

‘We can’t pay union rates,’ said Anna, ‘but we’ll pay you in cash. 15 dollars an hour. That sound okay?’

‘Yes, ma’am.’

‘Call me Anna,’ she said, with a smile to reinforce it. ‘Can you get to Evanston all right?’

‘Sure, I was telling Bobby here I know half the bus routes by heart.’

‘Let me give you the address,’ said Anna, reaching down for her briefcase and a pen.

‘I know where you live,’ said Duval.

‘How did you know that?’ Robert asked sharply.

Duval looked at him calmly, his faint theological air back in place. ‘I called you, remember? You’re in the phone book, Bobby.’

He was so angry that as they walked down Michigan and turned towards the parking lot he didn’t trust himself to speak. From Anna’s own silence, he knew she was just waiting for his explosion, and once they reached the quieter pavement of the side street, he let rip. ‘Are you crazy? That man’s been in prison twenty-four years and you want him to come to our house?’

‘He says he didn’t do it. You told me so yourself. And he’s done his time. It’s thinking like yours that keeps him from getting a job.’ She must have been expecting his reaction, so composed were her arguments.

‘Do you know what prison’s like over here?’ His voice was rising. ‘Do you realise how violent it is – how horrible? People get raped all the time and beaten up and murdered. It’s not like the UK. The racial thing is horrendous – the blacks are in gangs and hate the Hispanics, who have their own gangs, and both hate the whites, who in self-defence all join the Aryan Brotherhood.’

They passed an old lady with a mink-collared coat who looked as if she had been listening to them argue.

‘But the thing is—’

‘No, you listen to me,’ and when he looked he saw the old lady stop and look away, frightened by the harshness of his voice. ‘If Duval had robbed a piggy bank, I still wouldn’t want him around – not after twenty-four years in prison. But he didn’t, did he? He was convicted of rape and aggravated assault – the girl was lucky not to die.’

‘You told me that.’

‘I’m telling you again. And you want to bring him into our house? You want him near our little girl? What the hell are you thinking of?’

‘If you’d just stop shouting for a minute, I’ve got something to tell you.’

‘I bet you do,’ he said angrily. She didn’t respond to this. ‘Go ahead,’ he said, waving a hand dismissively.

She said with an elaborate show of patience, ‘I spoke with Charlie Gehringer this morning.’

‘Don’t tell me: he remembers Duval. Or at least he says he does.’

‘He remembers him all right. He said he’s always been haunted by him.’

‘Haunted?’ Someone was being melodramatic. He couldn’t tell if it were Gehringer or Anna. ‘Why?’ he demanded.

Anna was looking at him coldly; he disliked the certainty she wore like a coat. And she spoke now with an even greater show of calm. ‘Because Gehringer thinks Duval was innocent. That’s why.’

‘All right,’ he said, shaken by the rage he’d felt. ‘Tell me what you’ve found out. It better be good.’

2

She had first telephoned Charlie Gehringer, several times, but had not had a reply. She wasn’t surprised; he would have literally dozens of calls each day, most of which went unanswered, or he would never get the job done.

So she’d taken the bull by the horns and gone down to 26th and California. The place was a zoo: there were lawyers and cops and people who looked like defendants, all milling around the hallways, which had a bewildering number of rooms leading off them behind closed doors – offices and of course the courts themselves.

Eventually she’d stopped a lawyer, who told her what floor the public defenders’ offices were on, but she’d found her way there barred by a security guard. She’d told him she had an appointment with Gehringer, and though she wasn’t listed on the duty sheet, he had let her through – she was dressed like a lawyer, after all, not like some former client with a grudge.

‘That was sneaky,’ said Robert, leaning back against the sofa in the living room while Anna commandeered the rocker near the window. Sophie was upstairs, watching a DVD of
Anne of Green Gables
.

Anna gave him a
come off it
look and continued the story. She’d found Gehringer in his office, an enclosed cubicle at one end of a large open plan. He was seated at his desk, talking to a middle-aged black woman, perhaps the mother of a client. He was a trim man, and looked more like an insurance salesman than the defender of lost causes she was expecting. He had light, sandy-coloured hair, carefully combed, and was neatly dressed in a suit and tie – ‘Not perhaps a suit our friend Mr Rycroft would choose to wear, but presentable.’ She could see his office was neat as a pin, with a bank of filing cabinets against one wall, and a clean desktop.

She’d found a spare chair and waited, completely ignored in the hustle and bustle of the room – phones kept ringing, people laughed and shouted; it was a scene out of one of those hard-edged TV shows –
Homicide
or
Law and Order
. At last the black woman left Gehringer’s cubicle, and then Anna stood up and tapped on his door, just as he started to pick up the phone.

She’d been nervous as she began to speak, unsettled by the man’s clear-eyed gaze. As she’d told him why she was there, her words sounded terribly lame even to herself – explaining that a former client of his was a friend of her husband’s, that he’d recently been released from prison (she didn’t want to say how many years he’d been there, it just made the whole thing sound even more bizarre), and that he was still protesting his innocence. As she’d stumbled her way through this small speech, Gehringer didn’t say a word, but his expression became increasingly sceptical, especially when she said that she had offered to look into the case, just to see if there was any way of reopening it.