War at Home: A Smokey Dalton Novel

by Kris Nelscott

  No wonder Daniel’s scholarship was being revoked.

  “I don’t suppose there’s any way I can get a copy of the file,” I said.

  “I’m sorry.” St. James sounded prim again. “Only the university and the financial aid providers are entitled to this information.”

  There was nothing left to ask him, so I thanked him for his time and hung up.

  I had no idea how I would tell Grace all of this. She knew Daniel was involved in the antiwar movement, and she didn’t appreciate it, but I doubted she had ever thought of him as a troublemaker.

  I hadn’t liked his attitude last summer, his unwillingness to let his family know he was home, his assumption of ignorance by all of us who weren’t involved in his cause, but he didn’t seem like a young man who would get thrown out of a prestigious college. If anything, I would have expected him to disappear, to fade away as if he hadn’t been there at all.

  Apparently, I had misjudged him as well.

  FOUR

  After I hung up the phone, I sat at my desk for a long moment, staring out the window at the building next door. Judging from St. James’s comments, Daniel had had to deal with incredible bigotry at Yale, not just based on skin color, but also on the poverty in his background. Had Daniel been afraid to contact his mother? And if so, what had he done with his time since he left Yale?

  This case couldn’t be resolved with simple phone calls and, as Grace said, she couldn’t afford an out-of-state investigator. Even if she could afford it, I doubted one would take the case when he found out that Daniel was black.

  I leaned back in my chair and templed my fingers, a bit startled at my own reaction. I wanted to take the case, not so much for the work, but as an excuse to leave Chicago.

  The thought of leaving Chicago had been floating around my mind since I became involved in a shooting in the worst part of the city, a section known as the Gaza Strip. Chicago hadn’t been the haven I had hoped for. The schools were crumbling, riots had become common, and the violence in the south and west sides made this city one of the most dangerous places in the nation.

  I had come here initially because I had nowhere else to go. Laura Hathaway lived here, and even though we had not been seeing each other at the time, I had subconsciously picked Chicago as my destination because of her.

  But Chicago wasn’t fulfilling my hopes for it. Jimmy still had nightmares. If anything, they had grown worse. I had developed community ties, but Grace was right: my cases often led me deeper into danger, something I couldn’t afford with an eleven-year-old child as a dependent.

  I had saved quite a bit of money from my work with Sturdy and the cases I had taken for various black insurance agencies. Part of me had been subconsciously planning to leave for a while now.

  And Jimmy and I weren’t in as much danger from the authorities as we had been. Even though the FBI had issued an APB describing us, that APB was over a year old. Other fugitives took priority. Jimmy and I had solidly established identities. I could portray Bill Grimshaw for the rest of my life, if need be.

  We could see if other cities, other places, suited us better.

  This case might provide an excuse to explore.

  First, though, I had to talk to Grace. She might know more than she realized.

  Grace Kirkland lived only a block away from me, and when she wasn’t teaching, she was at home. I left the apartment and hurried down the stairs. Jimmy sat on the stoop outside, talking to some of his friends.

  They moved furtively when they saw me. I wondered what they were up to.

  “Jim,” I said. “Everything okay?”

  He glanced up at me. His face was lightly coated with sweat, and the back of his T-shirt was damp. He wore a pair of hand-me-down shorts from the Grimshaws.

  “Yeah,” he said.

  His friends, two boys who lived across the street, watched me with big eyes.

  I couldn’t see anything out of place except their guilty attitude. I decided not to push my luck. “I’m heading to Grace’s. Please be here when I come back.”

  Jimmy nodded. The other boys didn’t move.

  I stepped past them, and walked quickly down the block. Grace’s apartment building, like mine, had been built before World War II. Unlike my building, however, hers hadn’t been maintained. The white brick was a musty gray, the grass out front was overgrown with weeds, and the main door had nearly come off its hinges.

  Grace’s apartment was at the end of the hall. She had lived there for years, maintaining a garden in the back, surrounded by a fence that she had built herself. Even though the building was run-down, her apartment wasn’t — showing a pride that I always associated with Grace, an ability to make the best out of anything that life had given her.

  I knocked. After a moment, I heard rustling behind the door.

  It opened, revealing not Grace, but her youngest son, Elijah.

  He had grown since the previous summer, looking more like a teenager than a young boy. A wispy mustache graced his upper lip, and stubble covered his chin. However, his cheeks were still as smooth as Jimmy’s.

  “You come for Mom?” he asked, and his voice was deep and startling — a baritone in a tenor’s body.

  I nodded as he shouted for her.

  Grace came into the narrow hallway. She was wearing an apron over a white sleeveless dress, and she was carrying a towel. When she saw me, she smiled.

  “C’mon in,” she said, gesturing with the hand holding the towel.

  I stepped inside. The apartment was cooler than the hallway and smelled faintly of cinnamon.

  “Don’t tell me you’re baking on a day like today,” I said.

  She shrugged. “I learned a secret from my momma. Bake before the sun comes up, and you’ll have sweets for the heat of the day. Want a cookie?”

  She had chocolate chip and snickerdoodles and good old-fashioned sugar cookies. I took one of each, and a cup of coffee, which sounded good despite the heat.

  Elijah grabbed a chocolate chip, then disappeared down the hall, probably heading to his bedroom.

  “He’s become a teenager,” I said.

  “Overnight.” She sighed, and untied her apron, hanging it on a peg in the half-kitchen. Then she led me to the table, which she had placed in front of the glass patio doors, one of the few features of her apartment that I liked better than mine.

  “I made those calls,” I said as I sat down on the nearest wooden kitchen chair, “and I was wondering if I could see that letter about Daniel’s scholarship.”

  A slight frown creased Grace’s forehead, but to her credit, she didn’t ask me any questions as she went to the small desk pushed up against the wall. She thumbed through a pile of open envelopes until she found the one she was looking for.

  Then she handed it to me.

  It was exactly as Grace had reported to me: because Daniel hadn’t completed his fall semester and hadn’t enrolled for the spring semester, he would lose his scholarship if he didn’t enroll in the upcoming semester, which was Fall of 1969.

  “That’s odd,” I said.

  “What is?” Grace sat down across from me. She had poured herself some coffee, but now she pushed the cup away from her, as if she couldn’t bear to drink it.

  “I spoke to a man in the registrar’s office who told me that Daniel had completed the fall semester. He even mentioned the grades.”

  I would have thought that St. James was looking at the wrong file if he hadn’t mentioned where Daniel had grown up and the color of his skin.

  “He did?” The news brightened Grace considerably. “That sounds more like Daniel. He always completes what he starts.”

  “But he still didn’t register for the spring semester,” I said. “He’s not at Yale.”

  Her lips thinned, and that brightness faded just as quickly as it had come. “How come they never contacted me? Aren’t they supposed to?”

  “I don’t know,” I said. “Everyone I spoke to made a point of reminding me that Daniel is
an adult. And he is, Grace. He has the right to make his own choices. Even the police had no record of him, at least in the last few months.”

  Grace sighed. “I can’t imagine him dropping out without telling me.”

  I could. But I wasn’t his parent. I wondered if I would become this blind about Jimmy — or if I already had.

  She stood. “I can’t believe he would give up all that we worked for. That scholarship was everything. He knew that.”

  She shoved her hands in the pockets of her dress, pulling it across her back.

  “What kind of example is this for Elijah? How am I supposed to make something of other people’s children when I can’t even control my own?”

  “You got him there,” I said. “What he did after that is his business.”

  She shook her head. “College wasn’t the end. He knew that. He had proven that a black boy from a bad high school could get into one of the best schools in the world with his smarts, his willingness to work outside of class, and his stick-to-itiveness. I used to tell him that if he could get into a college, he’d fought part of the battle. That would show the world that he was good enough for all the perks a college like that provided. He could be a lawyer or a doctor or anything white folks could be, only he could be better.”

  She spoke with so much force that her body shook with each word. Yet she still didn’t face me as she talked.

  I was glad that she didn’t. Her words echoed St. James’s. Daniel had taken the view she had expressed and twisted it, trying to mold the university into a place that would be his ideal school. He had been following Grace’s plan, only in a more militant fashion.

  She sighed, pulled her hands out of her pockets and threaded them together as she turned around.

  “I guess I should thank you,” she said. “I’ll just wait until he calls me.”

  “There’s one other choice.” I heard the words come out of my mouth before I planned to say them. “I can go to New Haven and see if I can track him down.”

  Grace shook her head. “I can’t afford to pay for that, Bill. I wish I could, but I’m barely making it as it is. All my extra money is going into Elijah’s school fund now. I just hope he doesn’t follow his brother’s example—”

  “We can trade, Grace,” I said. “I know Franklin’s talked to you about teaching next year. I’ll keep a ledger, like I do for regular clients. I’ll bill you for expenses and my time, and you do the same.”

  She teared up, then sank into her chair. “Would you do that?”

  I nodded. I might never take advantage of the barter. If Jimmy and I decided the East Coast was better for us, I would lose money on this deal. But I was willing to take that risk. I had a son to protect, too, just like Grace did.

  “That means all of this would come out of your pocket,” she said. “You can’t afford that.”

  “I’ve been working steadily for the past several months,” I said. “I have some money saved up. I should be fine.”

  “You’re being too kind.” Her gaze met mine. It was steady, as if she could see through me.

  “No, I’m not,” I said. “I’m feeling restless. I figure some time away from the city might be good for me.”

  Her gaze didn’t waver. “You don’t like it here.”

  I shrugged. “This isn’t my home.”

  “Neither is the East. I hear the South in your voice.”

  I gave her a small smile. “Just part of it. I grew up in Atlanta, but I went to school in Boston. I’m more familiar with the East than I am with the Midwest.”

  “And you like it better.”

  I took a bite from the snickerdoodle. It was fresh and soft and tasted like childhood. Then I chased it with some coffee, fighting the urge to tell her just how much I wanted to leave.

  “I haven’t given this place much of a chance. Jimmy and I were broke when we came here. We haven’t had much, and our opportunities are limited. I don’t like living like that.”

  I regretted that last sentence the moment I spoke it. Grace’s opportunities had been limited, too.

  “You told me once that Jimmy spent a lot of time with his mother,” Grace said. “You’re not used to having a child.”

  “No, I’m not,” I said.

  “It restricts you.” Her voice was soft. “But it’s worth it. Most of the time.”

  I knew she was thinking about Daniel when she said that last.

  “I don’t regret a thing I’ve done for Jimmy,” I said, “and I love raising him. But—”

  “What’re you going to do with him while you’re gone?” she asked. “Is he going to spend the summer with your family?”

  She meant the Grimshaws.

  I hadn’t given it much thought. But I knew that I couldn’t leave Jimmy in Chicago. “He’ll come with me. See more of the world.”

  “And who’ll take care of him while you’re looking for Daniel?”

  I hadn’t even thought of that.

  “I’d offer to come,” she said, “but I can’t. Elijah might need to see the world, just like Jimmy, but I need the work. If I left now—”

  “I’m not asking you to, Grace.”

  “But see, you’re not thinking of Jim. There’ll be places an eleven-year-old shouldn’t see. You know that.” She sighed. “I could watch him, if you want him to stay here.”

  It was a generous offer. Grace would be a strict guardian, but a good one. Only I couldn’t take her up on it. Last summer I had left Jimmy in Laura Hathaway’s care and had put them both in danger.

  I couldn’t do that again. Not to Laura — who would always be my first choice to care for him, not to the Grimshaws, and certainly not to Grace and Elijah.

  “Thank you,” I said, “but I know a lot of people back east. We’ll find a way to cope.”

  Grace gave me the same look she had given me in the basement of the church — as if I were an unrealistic, misguided man who didn’t understand his child. At least this time, she was too polite to say anything, especially considering the offer I had just made her.

  We talked a bit longer, and I asked for several things from her. I needed a photograph of Daniel. I also wanted a copy of Daniel’s application for Yale, copies of his scholarship questionnaires, and any other material he had sent the college. Fortunately, Grace had those in a file in her desk; she had insisted that Daniel type his materials using carbon paper. The copies were difficult to read, but legible.

  Then I asked her for any letters he had sent home, not just to her but to Elijah as well. She said it would take her a while to find those, and I knew she’d argue with me about taking them out of her apartment.

  Finally, I asked her to sit down with Elijah and make notes about the conversations they’d had with Daniel since he left for school — any and all details, no matter how trite. I wanted hints of where he would be and what he might be doing, leads that I could follow with or without finding someone in New Haven to talk with me.

  I didn’t tell her that I still had the lists she’d made for me last summer when Elijah had gone to Lincoln Park looking for his brother. Then Grace had given me the names of their local friends with a D, an E or a G beside the listings. I had noted at the time that there were very few Es, but there were a number of Ds. Daniel had known a lot of people in Chicago, and I wasn’t going to rule out that his local friends knew more about his life than his mother did.

  Grace offered to let me talk to Elijah, but I wasn’t ready to yet. I needed to put everything into a context. I also needed to get my own affairs in order. I had to either finish the cases I was working on for the various black insurance companies in town or give them back, and I had to talk to Laura, taking a leave from my work inspecting houses for Sturdy Investments.

  All of that would take time.

  As I walked back to my own apartment, I saw the kids sitting on the front lawn. They were playing cards, which surprised me. Jimmy was sitting sideways, concentrating as he set one card down and picked another up.

  Gin
rummy. That was why they looked guilty. A month ago, I had to stop Jimmy from taking Keith Grimshaw’s lunch money in weekend poker games.

  I sighed. Grace was right. I couldn’t take Jimmy with me on each visit I made in New Haven. And missing persons cases, while difficult, often went in unexpected directions. I needed the opportunity to follow each and every lead.

  I was also heading into a college. I would have to talk to young people. I learned last summer that when I walked into a room filled with college students and war protesters under the age of twenty-five, I was immediately suspect.

  If I was serious about leaving Chicago and doing a good job for Grace, I would need someone young to come with me. Someone who could talk to college students and whom I could trust with Jimmy when I had to investigate. Someone who had enough freedom to leave Chicago for a week, a month, or the entire summer if need be.

  For that, I needed Malcolm Reyner.

  FIVE

  Malcolm Reyner was an eighteen-year-old orphan whom Franklin Grimshaw and his family had taken in last summer, initially at my request. They treated him well. In May, he had gotten his GED, and now he was working as a short-order cook at one of the local restaurants. Sometimes he worked for me, too, helping me with a few of my cases, doing jobs that I needed a younger, more active person for.

  Jimmy was happy to leave his gin game to go to the Grimshaws’ house. As I suspected, he had been playing for money, but he was losing for once. One of the older neighbor boys who usually didn’t play was taking Jimmy for all he was worth.

  It was easy to get Jimmy to talk about his conquests on the way to the Grimshaw house. He was proud of his card-playing ability. I wasn’t sure how I felt about it. I did know, however, that by the end of summer I would have to find a way to convince him that preventing other kids from eating a healthy lunch by taking their funds was not a good thing.

  That would take some diplomacy on my part. Jimmy felt like he wasn’t good at most things. To take away one of the few things he did well would be a blow to his ego.

  I pulled up in front of the house. It was large and well maintained, loved in that way that people who appreciated what they had gave their homes. The Grimshaws didn’t own the house — Sturdy Investments did — but the place was a great improvement over the three-bedroom apartment the family had been living in last summer.