Thin Walls: A Smokey Dalton Novel

by Kris Nelscott

  “I don’t want to know how you’re going to attach that,” I said, thinking of Sinkovich’s mention of fire.

  “I don’t either,” he said. “I’m just following Franklin’s orders. Guess Althea’s always wanted a house at Christmastime.”

  I hadn’t known that, but it didn’t surprise me. After being so cramped in our apartment, the Grimshaws must have felt as if they were in heaven in their large house.

  “I’ve been tracking down the watch,” Malcolm said. “I haven’t found anything yet, but I’ve been doing some asking. There’s a pawnshop the Stones use, but no one’ll tell me which one it is.”

  “If you don’t feel comfortable going there,” I said, “I’ll do it.”

  He grinned at me. “You gave me this task, boss. I’m following it through. I’m not afraid of those guys.”

  “You should be,” I said.

  “Nothing wrong with looking at the merchandise in a pawn-shop,” he said. “In fact, without customers, it would be out of business.”

  I nodded. “Just be careful, okay?”

  “Okay.” He wrapped the last of the lights. We both went inside.

  The interior of the house smelled of sausage, pancakes, and syrup. I was full from my own breakfast, but the smells made my mouth water all the same.

  The little girls were still at the table, along with Althea and Franklin. Jimmy had a plate before him and was happily munching on a piece of sausage. Keith was sitting by the door, clutching his jacket and looking impatient, and Lacey was nowhere to be seen.

  “Smokey,” Franklin said. “You’ve got a few minutes. Come with me.”

  Keith glared at us. Althea smiled and said, “Girls, time to clean up. Tell your sister she’s pretty enough.”

  Franklin led me to his study. As we went by the bathroom, he pounded once on the door with his fist. “Finish up, Lace. Your sisters need to get in here before we go.”

  “Da-ad,” Lacey said.

  “No arguing, girl.” He rolled his eyes at me, then led me into the study. It was a cozy room, not much bigger than a closet, and it smelled faintly of pipe tobacco.

  He closed the door. “I’m not sure I’m ready for a teenage daughter.”

  I smiled. “And you’re going to have three of them.”

  “Don’t remind me.” He rummaged around on his desk. “I put some feelers out last night. There are half a dozen candidates for your arson, maybe more.”

  He stopped moving papers, then handed me a copy of the Defender. It was yesterday’s. I hadn’t seen it.

  “Could this be them?” he asked.

  I stared at the headline. FAMILY TERRORIZED IN ALL WHITE AREA. I shook the paper open and read.

  A woman who had moved into the 1500 block of west Eighty-second Street called the Defender to complain that she and her son, a Vietnam vet, were being terrorized by their neighbors. She had called the police repeatedly, but the police had refused to do anything.

  Just like Sinkovich had said would happen.

  I handed the paper back to Franklin. “No. This is a family with little children. And they live closer to Eighty-seventh.”

  “Just checking,” he said. “One of my contacts suggested that maybe you’d heard from this woman too. She’s spreading the news of the harassment everywhere she can, trying to hang onto her home.”

  “I don’t know why. It’s not a great neighborhood.” Then I sighed. “I’ll try to reach my contact again, and I’ll get the family’s name this time.”

  Even though the thought of stepping into that mess made my stomach twist.

  “Don’t know why you didn’t in the first place,” Franklin said.

  “Long story.” I glanced at the wind-up clock on his desk. We still had a few minutes. I could hear girls arguing in the nearby bathroom. “Any problems yesterday?”

  “The boys are pretty quiet,” Franklin said. “They haven’t said anything, but I get the sense that they’re not happy with this.”

  “Think the Stones are bothering them?”

  “I have no idea, Smokey, and that has me worried. I’m out of my depth here.”

  “Yeah,” I said softly. “So am I.”

  * * *

  My conversation with Franklin didn’t help my mood. I dropped the kids off at school and escorted them in. A gang of young boys wearing red Stones’ tams watched from the playground, but didn’t do or say anything.

  Their acquiescence to my little plan was making me nervous.

  I thought about driving back down to the house Foster had been looking at, but I wasn’t sure I could tolerate more of yesterday’s problems. I hadn’t been able to reach Delevan, and I didn’t want to interrupt Mrs. Weisman yet to ask for the photographs. So I went to the library instead.

  The main branch of the Chicago Public Library was a five-story stone building that took up the entire block from Washington to Randolph Streets. Its eastern side flanked Michigan Avenue and fit in beautifully with the other turn-of-the-century buildings along that street.

  I used to hate going into the library, because I got a lot of stares, but the employees were getting used to me now. The interior itself was stunning, with two Tiffany domes and wide, flat marble staircases. I found that being inside, surrounded by all the books and the beautiful architecture, calmed me.

  The task I’d set for myself was a daunting one, and I’d been putting it off since Alice Foster had come to see me the Friday before.

  I wanted to find out two things: I wanted to learn if the previous victims and Foster were connected. If they were, then these killings were part of the same pattern.

  What I also had to check for was whether or not there were more victims. I hoped not. Three was three too many, but I would look all the same.

  In fact, I planned to start there, since that was the scenario I wanted most to rule out. So I decided to trace the year backward through the newspapers, looking at each page, especially taking note of the one-paragraph stories about deaths on the South Side. It was going to be long, tedious work, and I’d have to be sharp for it.

  I started with the Defender because it was most likely to carry stories about the South Side. From there, I’d look through the other main dailies to see if they covered anything as well.

  When I broke for lunch, my hands were covered with newspaper ink, and I felt like I had bathed in dust. I’d managed to go through the entire year’s worth of Defenders, taking notes on the previous two cases I knew about—and realizing my worst fear.

  It looked like there were at least two more.

  The first killing seemed to have occurred in February. The body of a young woman had been found in Lincoln Cemetery in Blue Island, which was close enough to the city to be considered part of it by a lot of residents. The woman had been stabbed, found with one shoe off and posed against Bessie Coleman’s gravestone,

  Bessie Coleman, the Defender article informed me, was the first black woman to get a pilot’s license. She died in 1926 during a barnstorming run. In fact, the Defender article told me more about Bessie Coleman—and Lincoln Cemetery, one of the Chicago area’s two all-black cemeteries—than it did about the woman who had died.

  That woman, Violet Stamps, seemed to have lived a quiet life. Stamps was a school teacher who lived in Bronzeville. Her family said she had never been to Blue Island in her life, and they had no idea what she was doing there.

  Her purse was missing, but she wore a valuable diamond engagement ring. The police believed robbery was the motive, but her family believed otherwise because her ring remained, and she never carried money in her purse, preferring to clip it inside her coat pockets. Someone who had gone to the trouble of killing her, her family contended, would also have taken that ring and gone through her pockets.

  I was inclined to agree.

  The other killing occurred in late September, and the body was found in Garfield Park, propped against a tree, much like the other three. This time, the deceased was an elderly man, Otis Washington, whom the police
had thought died of exposure, until the coroner found a single stab wound to his heart. Washington was an alcoholic who lived on the streets—although he tended to be seen more often in Jefferson Park than Garfield Park, which was quite a distance away. The police believed his death had been caused by a brawl with another vagrant, one who was carrying a knife.

  I wasn’t so sure, but it was hard to be certain about anything from the vague news reports. What I found most discouraging were the number of unsolved deaths reported—from teenagers found in the gutter to middle-aged black people—all crime victims. The Defender always printed a story or two about them, and then the case was dropped, with no more explanation at all.

  Probably the cases were left open, and no more explanation was to be had. I counted over a hundred random killings on the South Side alone, and most of the dead were teenage boys.

  But that didn’t help. If anything, it made me feel worse. Violet Stamps’ death was clearly linked to Louis Foster’s, and I suspected Otis Washington’s was as well.

  Five deaths, all linked, meant that a killer had been systematically working his way through an agenda of some sort. Since Foster’s death happened less than a month before, I had to believe that the killer was still out there, still planning someone else’s death.

  My problem was finding that killer before he had time to kill again.

  I didn’t have the personal resources, but I also didn’t have enough information to go to the police. The white officers who handled these cases wouldn’t care about the deaths in the Black Belt—and one which occurred outside the city.

  Truman Johnson would care, but he might not be able to work on the cases. He’d given the first two to the FBI, and I didn’t want them involved.

  I’d go to him as soon as I had enough solid information. I still didn’t know the extent of the killings or what the link between the victims was. I’d have to do some more research to find out.

  I only hoped I would get to it all before the killer found his next victim.

  I still hadn’t gone through the other newspapers, nor had I looked at 1967, but I had to leave to pick up the kids. Even though it was still early afternoon, an accident on Michigan backed up traffic, and I had to wait for a quarter of an hour before I could inch forward a block and get an alternate route.

  I arrived ten minutes after the school’s closing bell to find chaos.

  On the playground, a dozen boys in tams—none of them over twelve—formed a half-circle around two other boys. They were playing a game of keep away with one of Norene Grimshaw’s dolls, a pale, blond Barbie. Norene was crying as she reached for it, her face a mask of agony.

  Keith held Mikie back. Jimmy hovered near the edge of the group, looking out of his depth. Lacey stood in front of the boys, screaming at them.

  A teacher peered out of a half-open door. She slammed the door shut as I pulled into the parking lot.

  I had known it had been too quiet. And I knew how this game worked. Jimmy was supposed to get the doll back for Norene. If he fought for it, he would probably get hurt—knifed or worse. If he didn’t, he would have to make a bargain with them—a bargain he wouldn’t be able to tell me about. And these boys would force him into their group because he had the best of motives: to protect little Norene.

  I got out of the car and strode into the playground. Only Keith and Mikie noticed me. The other kids were yelling too loudly. I put a finger to my lips.

  Norene was sobbing so hard that I could hear her over the shouts of the boys. The crowd quieted as they saw me, all except Norene, whose tears wouldn’t stop. She kept reaching for the doll, which was being held over the head of one of the taller boys.

  Jimmy shook his head at me, but I ignored him.

  “Uncle Bill, thank God,” Lacey said as she ran toward me.

  “Step out of the way, Lace,” I said. “Let me take care of this.”

  She moved to one side, close to Jimmy. Norene still cried and jumped for her doll.

  The boys expected me to talk to them. That’s what adults did. Adults tried to reason with these irrational children, forcing them to think in good, ethical terms.

  I was past good, ethical, and polite. I didn’t feel like reasoning with anyone.

  I picked up the boy with the doll, holding him by the collar until we were face-to-face. My anger helped my natural strength.

  “You want to know how it feels to be bullied?” I asked.

  He glared at me. I didn’t like the way he looked, so I slammed him toward the ground with as much force as I could muster. At the same time, I raised my knee. We connected—my knee into his groin—and he screamed. I let go of his collar and he toppled backward.

  As he fell, I snatched the doll from his hand. The junior Stones were so surprised they didn’t make a move toward me, even though several switchblades had come out.

  “Go ahead,” I said, meeting each of their gazes, one by one. “Try something. I’ll gladly break each and every one of you in half.”

  “It was just a game, Gramps,” one of the kids said. He spoke from the back.

  “It’s a game you’re not ever going to play again,” I said. “I made a deal with you all. You don’t mess with anything that’s mine. That includes this little girl here and her doll, as well as her sisters and her brother and my son. You got that? You guys touch anyone in my family again and I swear, you won’t know what hit you. Now get the hell out of here.”

  I didn’t have to tell them twice. They backed away, and when they thought they were out of my sight, they ran. The boy I’d hurt was still on the ground, clutching his crotch and moaning. None of his friends bothered to help him.

  I knew that this kind of challenge would only work once. In the future, if they went after anyone named Grimshaw, they’d either bring guns or older kids, and eventually I’d find someone or something I couldn’t out-fight. I had to find a way to settle this once and for all.

  Norene snuffled beside me. I crouched, handed her the Barbie, and then pulled her close.

  “Uncle Bill,” she said and burst into fresh tears. Her whole body was vibrating with sobs. I picked her up and cradled her.

  “I don’t know what we would’ve done if you hadn’t shown up, Uncle Bill,” Lacey said. “No one was helping us.”

  “Yeah,” Keith said. “I even ran for the principal, but he was already gone and none of the teachers wanted to come outside.”

  They were as afraid of the Stones as I should have been. But I was tired, tired of seeing innocent people getting picked on for no real reason. Tired of making it from one day to the next, bottling all my rage inside and not taking any action. I had acted in August when I’d decided that nothing was going to force Jimmy and me from Chicago, but that action, however defensive, had been violent. It seemed like this week was just an extension of that.

  My gaze met Jimmy’s. His eyes were filled with unshed tears. He knew why this was happening. It was happening because I had returned his tam, and the gang wanted him, for whatever reason.

  “Let’s go,” I said.

  We walked toward the car. I saw a few faces peeking out the school windows. Teachers, frightened of their students, terrified to do the right thing.

  Like Sinkovich.

  How did we come to this? A place where people turned a blind eye to the violence around them because it didn’t involve them. It didn’t matter that it involved a sweet six-year-old girl who had never hurt anyone.

  Norene’s tears had soaked through my jacket. I could feel the warm dampness against my shoulder. She clung to me and her doll as if she were afraid to let go.

  As we reached the car, I saw a familiar van parked against the curb. The anger, which had exploded just a few moments ago and then receded, built again.

  The boys and Mikie got in the back seat. Lacey headed for the front, but I stopped her, handing Norene to her. Norene resisted, and Lacey looked at me in surprise.

  “I’ll be right back,” I said. “You all get in the car and wa
it.”

  They did, locking the doors even though I hadn’t told them to. I crossed the street, heading directly for the van. I could hear Franklin’s voice in my head. Smokey. You know better than that. And I did. But I couldn’t stop.

  I reached the van. The windows were covered with condensation and smudge marks where hands had tried to rub it away.

  I pounded on the driver’s window with my fist. The window rolled down and I found myself face-to-face with Chaz Yancy.

  “You feel good beating up little boys?” he asked me.

  “You feel good watching innocent children get trashed by these thugs?”

  “They weren’t doing anything illegal,” he said.

  “Really? I counted half a dozen switchblades there. What counts as illegal in your book?”

  “Can’t comment on that.”

  “I hope to God you’re here for a good reason,” I said, “because if your assignment is to watch and listen and not get involved—”

  “I think I should stop you now. Threatening a police officer isn’t the wisest thing in the world.”

  We stared at each other for a moment. The white guy in the passenger seat shifted uncomfortably and I heard a radio squawk in the back of the van.

  I broke the silence first. “Why are you sitting here day after day? What’s going on at this school that needs your watchful eye?”

  “Same thing as goes on at all the other schools down here,” Yancy said. “This is where it all starts.”

  “And you just let it.”

  He shrugged. “We’re taking care of things.”

  “Not from my vantage. That little girl didn’t deserve any of that treatment.”

  “Then maybe you shouldn’t have thrown that sun in the Stones’ faces,” he said.

  “My fault, huh?” I asked.

  “More yours than mine,” he said. “We’re trying to close down the entire shop. You haven’t even touched the edges of the problem yet.”

  “So you’re giving me the same advice you gave me before. Give up and let my kid run with the gang.”

  “You got six beautiful kids, there, Grimshaw,” Yancy said. “Better to lose one than all of them.”