Lovecraft Country

by Matt Ruff

  —“Standard Form, Restrictive Covenant,”

  drafted for the Chicago Real Estate Board by

  Nathan William MacChesney of the

  Chicago Plan Commission, 1927

  Summer was waning when Letitia got the blessing she’d been waiting for. By then, her ordeal in Ardham had come to feel like a distant memory, and there were times, as June became July and July became August, when she wondered if she’d been wrong about God having something special in store for her. Maybe the virtue of helping Atticus find his father was supposed to be its own reward—that, and getting to go home alive, afterwards.

  If that had been the case, she’d have accepted it and been grateful. Though her brother, Marvin, might claim otherwise, Letitia knew better than to believe God owed her anything. But she also knew that the Lord moves at His own speed, and that patience is often part of the price He exacts for giving us what He wants us to have.

  The blessing when it finally did come was everything she’d hoped for, and more. Letitia had been wrong about one thing, though: Her ordeal wasn’t over.

  She came by the Safe Negro Travel Company the same day she deposited the check. George was alone in the office, looking over the proofs for the autumn edition of the Guide. Letitia got straight to the point.

  “Real estate,” George said. “You win a sweepstakes?”

  “Kind of,” Letitia said. “I got a registered letter last week.” Actually, the envelope had been addressed to “Miss Dandridge,” and since Letitia was staying at Ruby’s, it would have been fair to assume the letter was meant for her. But Letitia was home by herself that morning, and curiosity got the better of her. “The letter was from a lawyer. He said he had some money from one of Daddy’s business partners, to pay off an old debt.” “Business partner,” in Warren Dandridge’s case, meaning “gambler.” Letitia’s father had made his living at cards: poker and gin rummy, primarily, though he’d play any game he could win.

  “I know what you’re thinking,” Letitia said.

  “I’m not thinking anything, honey. I always respected your dad.”

  “I know you did. But you’d be a fool not to think it. Daddy wasn’t a con man, but he ran with con men. Ruby wanted to burn the letter.”

  “But not you, huh?”

  “I had to go see.” Thinking even if it was a con, she might be able to turn it to her advantage somehow. “The lawyer’s office was in this fancy building on LaSalle Street. The security guards didn’t even want to let me in the lobby.” They’d made her use the service elevator, which she’d found reassuring. Playing hard to get was an old con man’s trick, but a white lawyer in a white building was a lot of trouble to go to to fool someone, and she didn’t think her father’s friends respected women’s intelligence that much.

  “Did the lawyer tell you who this business partner was?” George asked.

  “No. That was the whole point of the lawyer—he wanted to be anonymous.”

  “Hmm.”

  “I know,” she said. “As soon as he told me that, I was sure he was going to ask me for money up front, some kind of fee. But he didn’t want anything, not even a signature. All I had to do was show him my driver’s license and he gave me a check.”

  “How much was the check for?”

  “This stays between us?”

  “Of course.”

  She told him the amount.

  “Well now,” George said. “With that, you really could buy an apartment—a small one, anyway. If—”

  “If the money’s real, yeah. I’ll know soon enough. But meantime, the reason I’m here, I want something more than just an apartment.”

  “A house?”

  She hesitated, unsure what name to give her desire. “A place,” she said finally. “With space for me and Ruby so we’re not always on top of each other, and a room for Marvin to stay in when he visits, and some extra rooms to let out . . .”

  George smiled. “You want to be a landlady?”

  “I know it’s not glamorous,” she said, “but yeah, I think I’d like that.” Letitia cast an appraising glance around the office. “Maybe space to run my own business, too . . .”

  “Well I admire your ambition,” George said, “but even if you can afford the down payment on the kind of place you’re talking about, you know no bank is going to give you a mortgage.”

  Letitia nodded. Because banks didn’t like to invest in colored neighborhoods, or neighborhoods likely to become colored, mortgage loans were almost impossible for Negroes to obtain; for home financing, most were forced to rely on installment contracts. The payment structure was similar to a mortgage, but you didn’t own the property until the contract was paid off—and if you defaulted, even on the very last payment, you lost everything you’d put into it. The upside was, anyone could get one: Sellers were often eager to offer contracts to buyers they thought would default, because it allowed them to collect multiple down payments on the same property.

  “The other problem,” George added, “is finding a place. I don’t have to tell you what the housing situation’s like.”

  “Well, about that,” Letitia said. “I was thinking I might try pioneering.”

  “You want to buy property in a white neighborhood?”

  “I know you know people who’ve done it. Like Mr. and Mrs. Powell—didn’t you help get them into East Woodlawn, back when there were practically no Negroes living there?”

  “Yeah,” George acknowledged reluctantly. “But what happened with Albert and Thea is as much a cautionary tale as a success story . . .”

  “So tell it to me,” Letitia said. “How did it work?”

  “Well,” George said, “this was six years ago, right after the Supreme Court ruled that racist housing covenants were unconstitutional. Albert and Thea had plenty of money saved up and they’d been wanting to buy a house for the longest time, so they took the ruling as a go signal. That’s when Albert came to me and asked if I knew a real-estate broker he could trust.

  “See, what the justices actually said is that race-restrictive covenants aren’t enforceable in court. Property owners can still abide by them voluntarily, though, and most white folks, unless they’re desperate, aren’t going to sell to colored people if it costs them all their friends. So Albert needed a broker who’d play along with a shell game, and he also needed to find a white person who’d act as a front man.”

  “To buy the house for him, you mean? He had to pay someone for that?”

  “That’s usually how it works,” George said. “Albert had a bit of luck there. His sister is married to a white man. Jewish,” he clarified, “but German enough to pass for Lutheran. So Albert got his brother-in-law to buy the house, using Albert and Thea’s money, and with the understanding that they’d get title once the deal closed.

  “The next step was taking possession. Even with the Supreme Court on their side, Albert and Thea were worried their new neighbors might try to stop them moving in. So they did it on the sneak: went to a Saturday-night mass, asked St. Jude to look out for them, and made the move the next morning while the neighbors were all at their own churches. Once they got the van unloaded, Albert put in a call to the local police and let them know they had a new Negro couple living in their precinct who were probably going to need protection.

  “Of course the cops turned right around and told the neighbors. And so by Monday morning, when Albert and Thea left to go to work, every other house on the block had a sign up saying WE ARE A WHITE COMMUNITY—UNDESIRABLES MUST GO.

  “That was Monday. Tuesday night, someone threw a brick through Albert and Thea’s front window. Albert called the police again, and when they didn’t do anything, he called the NAACP and the city Commission on Human Relations. I made some calls too. Eventually the cops stationed a patrol car in front of the house. For what good it did: That first year, there were thirty-nine instances of vandalism, including two arson attempts. Albert’s dog was poisoned. And of course he and Thea couldn’t even walk down the bl
ock without people hurling abuse at them . . .”

  Letitia nodded, understanding the point George was trying to make here, but eager to make her own: “In the end, though, they kept the house. Right?”

  “Oh, yeah,” George said. “Albert went prematurely gray from not sleeping for a year and Thea had a heart attack, but they kept the house . . .” He shook his head. “You’re serious about this, huh?”

  “Well, George,” Letitia said, “I can’t imagine the Lord giving me this opportunity if He didn’t intend me to use it.”

  “And Marvin and Ruby, they’re on board too?”

  One thing the lawyer had been clear about: The check was intended to go to Warren Dandridge’s daughters. So Marvin and his skepticism weren’t a part of it. As for Ruby . . .

  “Yeah,” she said. “They’re on board.”

  The words on the frosted-glass pane read HAROLD BAILEY, REALTIST. Realtist: a Negro real-estate broker. Not to be confused with a white Realtor, whose national association Negroes could not join. A pair of decals indicated Mr. Bailey was also a member of the Prince Hall Freemasons and the Improved Order of Elks.

  The lights in Mr. Bailey’s office were out and the door was locked. Letitia, standing in the third-floor hallway with Ruby, tried to control her impatience.

  A bystander might not have guessed they were sisters. Letitia, slender and light-skinned, favored her father. Ruby, curvy and dark, suggested a youthful Momma—but a Momma who could be pushed around. Her pliability wasn’t limitless, though, and there was a core of genuine Momma within her that could emerge, given time, like a mountain rising from the sea. The trick was getting what you wanted from her before you ran aground. So far Ruby seemed willing to play along with Letitia’s scheme, but if this morning’s meeting had to be rescheduled, she might start having other ideas.

  “He said nine o’clock . . .”

  “Well I promised Mrs. Parker that I’d be over to watch Clarice by eleven thirty,” Ruby said. “And I was hoping to stop into Mandel Brothers’ basement to look for shoes for that new catering job I told you about.”

  “I don’t see what you want to start another job for,” Letitia said. “Now that we got this—”

  “Of course you don’t see. You need to know how to hold down one steady job before you can talk about another.”

  “I am going to have a steady job now, Ruby. That’s what this is all about. Security!”

  “Yeah, big landlady on Easy Street.” Ruby sighed. “We could still give the money to the church.”

  “Ruby!” Letitia was horrified. “You didn’t tell anyone from church, did you?”

  “No, don’t worry, Uncle Pennybags, I didn’t give away your secret.”

  “You better not have. Daddy wanted us to have this money.”

  Ruby snorted. “Like you care what Daddy wanted.”

  “I do care! And I care about you.” Which brought another snort. “You want to spend the rest of your life living in one tiny room?”

  “Of course I don’t. But—”

  “And hard as you work? When’s the last time you came into a fortune like this?”

  “Never,” Ruby said. “That’s how I know not to trust it.”

  A door opened at the far end of the hall. The sisters turned to look at the white man who’d come out to look at them.

  “Miss Dandridge?” the man said.

  “I’m Miss Dandridge,” said Letitia. Feeling Ruby bristle beside her: “We both are.”

  “I’m John Archibald. I’m a friend of Mr. Bailey’s. He asked me to tell you that he won’t be able to meet with you today—”

  “Oh.”

  “He also told me what it is you’re here for. I’d be happy to help you myself, if you’d like.” He stepped farther into the hall as he said this, and Letitia looking past him at the open door saw the word REALTOR painted in reverse on the glass. “Of course,” he added, noting her hesitation, “if you’d rather wait for Mr. Bailey . . .”

  Ruby’s hand was on Letitia’s arm, tugging: Let’s go. But it might be another week before Ruby had free time again. Too long. “You and Mr. Bailey,” Letitia said. “Are you just friends, or . . .”

  “Partners,” Mr. Archibald said. “Silent partners.”

  “These are all white neighborhoods.”

  “Yes,” said Mr. Archibald. “That’s what Hal told me you were interested in.”

  “Nobody told me anything about white neighborhoods.” Ruby looked pointedly at Letitia, who went right on turning pages in the three-ring binder Mr. Archibald had offered them.

  “There’s something I don’t understand about these prices,” Letitia said. “Like these two buildings here: They look almost the same, in terms of square footage and lot size. But the first one’s so much cheaper.” She showed him the listings.

  “It’s a matter of location,” Mr. Archibald explained.

  “But they’re on the same street.”

  “Different blocks, though. With that first property, the block is still entirely white-owned. As I’m sure I don’t have to tell you, it can be difficult to be the first Negro to break into a block—”

  “We don’t want difficult,” said Ruby. “Definitely not.”

  “—so in this case the seller, an investor Hal and I both know, has agreed to offer what we call a first-in discount. Once that first sale goes through, subsequent sales become much easier. Eventually, as in the case of that second property, things reach a tipping point where ownership of the whole block can turn over in only a year or two.”

  “Lots of commissions for you,” Letitia said.

  “Lots of commissions for me and Mr. Bailey,” he corrected her. “And lots of new homes for deserving Negro families.”

  Letitia nodded. “Fair enough.” It wasn’t, but she couldn’t be too outraged by a practice she hoped to benefit from. The real problem was, even with the first-in discount, she wasn’t sure she could afford what she wanted—and however much of a straight shooter he made himself out to be, she didn’t doubt Mr. Archibald would gladly take her money for a property she’d end up defaulting on.

  She turned another page in the binder.

  “This can’t be right,” she said, reading over the listing. “This price can’t be right, can it?”

  Mr. Archibald leaned forward to see what property she was looking at. “Oh,” he said. “The Winthrop House.”

  “The which house?” Letitia said.

  “It’s ugly,” said Ruby.

  “It’ll be prettier once it’s ours,” Letitia replied. “Like a baby.”

  Noon of the following Sunday, and the sisters in their church clothes stood before a boxy edifice whose brick exterior exhibited all the charm of a public school building. But it was the inside Letitia cared about. Looking up, she could see the glass tent of the skylight that, according to the property listing, capped a two-story atrium surrounded by fourteen other rooms. Fourteen rooms: The apartment Letitia and her siblings had grown up in had had just two, plus a shared bathroom on a different floor.

  The Winthrop House shared its narrow block with a defunct tavern and an overgrown lot that had at one time been a park. The block was on the west side of a two-lane street. The east side was lined with small single-family homes, all white-owned; a woman sitting on the porch of the cottage directly opposite the Winthrop House had watched with trepidation as Letitia and Ruby approached and was now glaring openly at them.

  “It’s a lot longer trip to work from here, too,” Ruby said.

  “Yeah, but when you come home you’ll be able to stretch out and be comfortable.”

  “I’m comfortable where I am.”

  “This’ll be more comfortable,” Letitia insisted. She looked up again, at a rust-eaten chair perched incongruously at the roof’s northeast corner. “Must be a nice view. I wonder if you can see the lake from here.” She turned around smiling and was met by the white woman’s hostile stare.

  “Yeah, nice view,” said Ruby, casting her own glance a
cross the street. “I’m sure we’ll be real comfortable.”

  Mr. Archibald arrived a few minutes later. He tipped his hat to the glowering white woman and hustled Letitia and Ruby inside.

  Dust motes floated in the sunlight streaming down onto the atrium’s chessboard floor. Archways to the left and right of the front door gave access to what Mr. Archibald identified as a dining room and a parlor, though given the absence of furniture they had to take his word for it. Stairs ran up the atrium’s right wall to a gallery in back, with more doorways visible above and below.

  Letitia approached the atrium’s centerpiece, a sheet-draped figure standing inside a raised marble ring. The property listing had mentioned a fountain, but it hadn’t occurred to her that it might be indoors.

  “May I?” she asked.

  “Please,” said Mr. Archibald.

  Letitia grabbed a fold of the sheet and pulled, unveiling a naked divinity cast in bronze.

  “Lord,” said Ruby. The bronze idol, her hair pinned up with a crescent-moon tiara, gripped two massive torches, one in each hand, their flames rising past the level of her shoulders. A skeleton key dangled between her bare breasts. At her feet was a basket of hissing snakes, copper tubing in their coils feeding down into the guts of the fountain.

  “Hecate,” Mr. Archibald said helpfully. “Goddess of the moon.”

  “I see the moon all right,” said Letitia, circling around to the fountain’s rear. Two additional faces sprouted from the back of Hecate’s head, like something out of a carnival freak show; a chorus of toads, spigot-mouthed like the snakes, formed an unsightly mound behind her heels. “This is going to have to go.”

  “I can certainly speak to the seller about it,” Mr. Archibald said. “But as I explained yesterday, under the terms of the purchase contract—”

  “Yeah, I was paying attention.” Because she wouldn’t own the house until it was paid off, any “significant alterations” to the property had to be approved by the seller. “You sure I can’t talk to them directly?”