by Nick Petrie
“Been doing that for years,” said Lewis. “Just not with houses.”
“Are you ever going to tell me how you used to make a living?”
“Prob’ly not.” Lewis twirled the shotgun like a majorette with a baton as he glanced up and down the block. “Learn anything useful?”
“I don’t know,” said Peter. He told Lewis about his faint glimpse of blue on the face in the old station wagon. “The guy who owned this house before Wanda, he swears up and down that the Devil ran him off the road. Not a guy in a mask, but the actual Devil, with a blue skull and pointed teeth.”
“I thought the Devil was bright red, with horns and a forked tail.”
“I’m told the Devil comes in many forms,” said Peter.
“You think someone was trying to kill him?”
“I don’t know,” said Peter. “Easier just to shoot him, right? But maybe better if it looked like an accident. He ended up in jail and lost the house because he had drugs in the car. But if he was too hurt to work, or went broke because of his medical bills, he’d have lost the house that way, too.”
“This is the South,” said Lewis.
“I’m aware of that,” said Peter. “Although I believe Memphis considers itself the Mid-South.”
“There are white supremacist groups in the South.”
“Not just the South, they’re all over,” said Peter. “Spreading like a disease.”
Lewis gave him a look. “The really hard-core white-power assholes, sometimes they get facial tattoos. They don’t want to blend in, they want to scare people. Some of them get radicalized in prison gangs, and that’s where they get their tattoos. The equipment is pretty primitive, maybe just a sharpened paper clip dipped in ink, or a modified electric stapler. They don’t have many colors to choose from, either. The ink usually comes from ball-point pens. Black or blue.”
Peter felt stupid. He was used to that, talking with Lewis, but it had been happening a lot more these last few days. “You think the blue is a facial tattoo. A jailhouse tattoo of a blue skull.”
“If our guy’s been in the criminal justice system, identifying marks will be in that database. That Memphis police detective should be able to narrow the search.”
“If I tell the cops,” said Peter, “that takes us out of the loop.”
“All depends,” said Lewis. “Sometimes law enforcement needs somebody to do what they can’t do themselves.”
Peter had noticed that Lewis’s street accent often fell away when he was talking about something that interested him. Which was almost everything.
“Where do you learn this stuff?”
Lewis gave an elaborate shrug, and put the street back in his voice. “You know the most dangerous man in America.”
Peter finished the reference to the Malcolm X quote, something he’d heard from Lewis many times. “A black man with a library card.”
More than anyone Peter had ever met, Lewis was the product of his own creation. He’d grown up on the streets of Milwaukee and, as far as Peter knew, had never finished high school. But he was smart and curious, a voracious reader, and very good with money. He’d taken the financial windfall from their little Milwaukee adventure and grown it into a large and diversified fortune.
Lewis continued to insist that half of that fortune belonged to Peter. He’d gotten hold of Peter’s Social Security number somehow, and signed Peter’s name on a bunch of incorporation paperwork. He’d even issued Peter a no-limit credit card, paid automatically each month from a corporate account.
But Peter was uncomfortable with how they’d acquired that money in the first place. Aside from the occasional emergency purchase, he was still living off the remains of his savings from the Marines. It wasn’t difficult. The things Peter spent money on were groceries, gas for his truck, and backpacking gear.
At the end of the block, a slim figure on a bicycle turned the corner and pedaled steadily toward them. The bike had a big wire basket on the front with a brown paper package sticking out of the top.
“I think that’s lunch,” Peter said. “Better go wash up. We’re trying to make a good impression.”
He stepped past the dump truck in its newly widened brick hole to see the shattered planks and timbers of the living room cut away and scaffolding built up around it. The dirt-floored foundation crawl space was open to the air, along with one side of that ancient tree stump that had held the center beam of the original structure.
The floor structure of the bedroom above, crumpled like an accordion by the high leading edge of the dump bed, had also been removed. Dupree and Romeo were up on the scaffolding over the truck body, busy reinforcing the rafters to hold the walls together when the truck came out.
“Dupree,” Peter called. “I think Nadine’s here.”
40
The girl rode an old blue Schwinn with wide handlebars, rusty blue fenders, and a big paper grocery bag in the front basket. She stood on the pedals for the climb up the sloped gravel drive, and made it with ease. She swung one leg over the back wheel while the bike was still rolling, then stepped off and walked the bike to a stop.
Peter had seen her before.
She was the young waitress from the club, who had blocked Peter’s way with a serving tray in the hall, buying time for Eli to run out the back.
This time, she wasn’t wearing her thin black leather gloves. But he could see them poking out of her pocket.
In the club, she’d seemed very young and brave. Out in the daylight, she was different. With her light step and slender figure, she still looked like a schoolgirl, but she had a strange air of self-possession, as if some invisible part of her was deeply rooted in the world. A young woman who’d come into her own while nobody was paying attention.
Her face was clean and pure in a way Peter couldn’t quite define. Her hair was in a modest Afro pushed up toward the top of her head with a pink elastic band. Her threadbare blue men’s dress shirt was too big for her, tucked into shorts made of men’s khaki pants roughly hacked off at midthigh and cinched tight with a too-long leather belt. The extra length of the belt was looped over itself and tucked back through. The faded pink flip-flops on her feet were dressed up with bright pink toenail polish.
Dupree slipped around the dump truck and walked toward them. “Nadine,” he called. “Thank you so much for getting lunch. This is Peter, the man I was telling you about.”
She looked Peter carefully up and down. “We’ve met.”
Peter put out his hand. “It’s nice to see you again.”
She looked at Peter’s extended palm as if it might explode.
“Nadine doesn’t shake hands,” Dupree said. “What did you bring us, child? And how much do I owe you?”
“I went by Central Barbecue,” she said. “Twenty dollars will do.”
“For five sandwiches?”
“I can buy my own lunch.”
“Still, it must have been more than that. And you delivered them, too.” He pulled out his wallet and extended three twenties folded lengthwise. “For your trouble, child.”
She dipped her head in thanks, took the money without touching her grandfather, and held out the paper bag by one corner of the folded top.
Romeo walked from the back door carrying two more chairs. He set them on the porch and gave Nadine a small, polite bow from several steps away. “Miz Nadine.”
She gave him a radiant smile. “Mr. Romeo. Thank you.” She put a pink flip-flop on the bottom porch step. She began to grasp the porch post in her hand, but jerked it away as if it were electrified.
Blinking, she cleared her throat. She put her foot carefully back on the ground.
“I believe I’ll sit in the yard.”
Romeo hurried for the chairs, but she waved him away and sat on the lumber pile with her foil-wrapped sandwich and a Dr Pepper. Dupree brought his chair down from the porch, and R
omeo arranged the others in a semicircle by the lumber pile. Peter sat beside Romeo, across from Nadine.
Lewis came from the parked Yukon, glancing up and down the street. He wore a clean black T-shirt and carried the shotgun in one hand. He’d washed his face and arms and dusted off his black jeans, although they were still stained with red brick dust. He sat on the lumber pile where he could see the street, leaned the shotgun against his leg, and gave Nadine a gentle smile. “Thank you for lunch, Miss.”
Staring at him, she dipped her head in hello, but didn’t say a word.
They unwrapped their sandwiches—pulled pork on soft buns, rich and flavorful—and ate in a strange silence.
Finally, Dupree wiped his fingers on a paper napkin and said, “Nadine, I hope you can do something for me. Your friend Eli is in trouble.”
* * *
• • •
She opened her mouth to speak, but Dupree put up a hand to stop her.
“I know you’re sweet on him. I think the world of that boy. But King Robbie and his people are after him. I want to help.” He gestured at Peter and Lewis. “We all want to help. But first we got to find him. You’re the only way I know to reach him.”
She was so young, but already smart and composed enough to make her way anywhere she wanted to go.
She ignored Peter entirely.
She kept her eyes on Dupree, her face calm and focused. She knew what was at stake. Peter figured she’d seen more at fifteen than most people had at forty.
“He’s safe enough for now,” she said.
Her degree of self-possession was almost eerie.
“But for how long?” asked Dupree. “This is King’s town, you know that as well as I do.”
“He doesn’t trust your friend,” she said, somehow indicating Peter without a single gesture. “Says he’s no different from the rest.”
“You’ve known Miss Wanda since you were a baby,” said Dupree. “Well, she’s got some serious troubles, and this man Peter drove halfway across the country to help. Nobody’s paying him a dime. Not for his time, not for gas, not for all this lumber you see here. Certainly not to get shot at. So he’s all right by me. I don’t know if that’s good enough for you, but I hope it is.”
Now she turned to look at Peter for a long slow moment without blinking. Her eyes were a vivid golden color, with a startling depth.
“Is that true?”
Peter found himself answering almost without volition. “Yes.”
“Where does the money come from?”
Had she still not blinked? Her eyes were hypnotizing. He had to remind himself she was only fourteen or fifteen.
“My friend and I.” He lifted a finger toward Lewis, still sitting on the lumber pile with the sawed-off leaning against his thigh. “We took it from some pretty bad people, a few years back. They’re gone now. But money’s no good if you don’t use it for something bigger than yourself. When Wanda needed help, we came. As it turns out, your friend Eli needs help, too.”
She raised her eyebrows in rebuke. “There are a lot of people need help around here.”
“I’m sure there are,” said Peter. “But I don’t know them. I do know Wanda. Maybe I know Eli a little now, too. Eli’s not just anybody. He’s special. I’m sure you see that better than I do.”
She regarded him with that eerie calm. “Give me your left hand.”
He stood and walked to her and held out his hand.
She studied it without touching it. Then she took it, palm up and open, in her right hand. With a single feathery left-handed fingertip, she traced the paths of the hard lines etched there.
A deep shiver ran through Peter’s body.
As though someone had lifted his worn, crumpled soul from its shadowy hiding place and shook it out into the light, where it shone gossamer and translucent.
He felt utterly naked.
Hot and cold at the same time.
It was spooky as hell.
Nadine shuddered, then closed her eyes and abruptly curled Peter’s fingers back into his palm and let him go.
When she opened her eyes again, they were different, he thought. Were they lighter or darker? Or was it in the way she looked at him? It was hard to tell.
She stood with fluid grace and turned to go without another word.
“Nadine?” Dupree called after her.
She didn’t look back as she swung her leg over the seat of the old blue Schwinn. “I’ll text you later.”
Then she rode down the slope of the driveway to the street, once again just a pretty young girl in hand-me-down clothes and pink flip-flops.
Peter looked at his palm. His whole body hummed with a faint electric tremor. He looked at Dupree. “What just happened?”
“You felt it?” Dupree raised his eyebrows. “Nadine’s got some of that old-time gypsy woman in her. The family come up from New Orleans after Katrina. Her grandmother had it, too.”
“But what happened?”
Dupree gave him a kind smile. “I believe you passed the audition.”
Lewis squeezed his empty sandwich wrapper into a ball and tossed it into the Dumpster. He stood with the shotgun in his hand and glanced up and down the street.
Then he looked at Dupree. “Does your gypsy granddaughter just do people, or she do things, too?”
Dupree didn’t answer.
Romeo spoke softly. “She found my sister’s four-y’-old grandbaby by holding his teddy bear. Lost in the woods by the river, a mile away. She walked right to him.”
Lewis nodded. “Okay,” he said. “So what do you suppose she felt when she touched that porch post? When she jerked away like it was a dog trying to bite?”
41
Dupree said, “I don’t understand.”
“Peter thinks Wanda’s troubles might not really be about Wanda,” said Lewis. “Might be more about this house she was staying in. Somebody wants something pretty damn bad. Be nice to know what the hell it is.”
Dupree nodded, took out his phone and talked into the texting app. “I’m sorry to ask you for something more. Did you notice anything about the house?”
He pressed Send, but before he could put the phone back in his pocket, it chimed. He looked at the screen, then at Peter.
“What did she say?”
“She said there’s something evil down in the dirt.”
“What? Where?”
Dupree shook his head. “That’s all she said.”
Peter took in a breath, then let it out. “Huh,” he said. “I wonder.”
They followed him past the dump truck and into the house.
With the floor structure cut away around it, the big Kenworth looked smaller now in the area that had been Wanda’s living room. The scaffolding around it went from the dirt floor of the foundation crawl space to the exposed rafters of the second floor above. The space still smelled of hydraulic fluid and coolant and exhaust, but it also smelled like sawdust and plaster dust and fertile bottomland soil left covered for a century and a half.
“I wish Wanda were here,” said Peter. “She’d be taking pictures like crazy.”
The Kenworth’s front bumper had plowed the dirt right up to the huge, ancient stump at the edge of the living room. The stump had carried the center beam of the original house, and it looked as firmly rooted as the day the tree was cut down, despite the impact of twelve tons of dump truck.
Peter ducked under the remaining floor joists and scrambled around the stump to the far side. The clearance was still very low. He was on his forearms and toes. The static wasn’t happy, either, although it didn’t mind as much this time, because he was only a few feet from open space. Light trickled in from the work lamps set up in the living room.
When he’d gone into this crawl space on his first day in Memphis, the same day the truck had crashed into the house
, he’d approached it from the root cellar under the rear addition as Wanda took pictures of his bootsoles vanishing into the dark.
The engineer had gone into the crawl space, too, for his structural evaluation.
They’d both noticed the odd, misshapen bricks around the base of the stump.
At the time, Peter had thought the bricks had been foundation leftovers, broken or badly made, laid down like cobblestones to make it easier to work in the spring mud of West Tennessee, or to block the exit to an animal’s den under the stump.
But what if they’d been laid down to pave over something?
Something down in the dirt.
His fingers couldn’t move the cobbles. They were firmly set in the packed earth.
“Would somebody toss me a hammer? Something with a straight claw.” It would make a half-decent excavation tool in the tight space.
Dupree wriggled up behind him and laid the handle of a framing hammer into Peter’s waiting palm.
The static rose, sparking up his brainstem, as he used the claw to lever up the first dirt-crusted bricks. He thought about the long tradition of frontier families hiding their modest savings under a loose hearthstone or floorboard.
Part of Peter expected to find a small pouch of silver coins, or silver tableware saved for a dowry, or just a few copper pennies wrapped in oilskin, money kept away from the tax collector or thieves or some wrongheaded relative. Planning for a better future.
Nobody would have gone to this much trouble to hide a few copper pennies.
Another part of Peter, a much bigger part, was expecting bones. Someone long dead and buried, the crime hidden away. Maybe multiple bodies. Flesh and blood long ago reduced to soil.
As he pulled up the loosened bricks, he pushed them back to Dupree, who pitched them out of the darkness and into the light. Soon he’d get to what lay beneath.
The bricks were small and uneven, roughly two inches by two inches by four, flat on top and slightly rounded on the bottom. No good for building a wall. They were heavier than he expected. He figured some kind of local clay with lead in it. There were maybe forty of them.