The Case Against My Brother

by Libby Sternberg

  Shuffling down the lonely street by the warehouse, I pulled my collar around my neck and shoved my hands in my pockets. As the heat of fear receded, the icy air chilled me to the bone.

  I’d almost reached the end of the warehouse block when a noise behind me made me jump. An engine! Looking behind me, I saw the two white eyes of a car’s headlights speeding my way.

  It was as if the car itself had noticed me. It veered toward my side of the street, forcing me back against the wall. There were no weeds here for me to hide in. Pressing my back against the rough brick, I held my breath and closed my eyes, anticipating the heavy weight of the car ramming me. Bernard Peterson hadn’t killed himself, and now he was trying to kill me!

  But then the car breezed past so close I felt its front fender brush my pant leg. I turned back and ran to the river’s edge to see if I could help the soul who’d been shot. But the river held no clues. No body, no car—only the lapping waves against the shore. I ran faster than I ever had—away from the river, away from the scene of a dreadful crime, and most of all, away from danger.

  I wandered for several hours before finally discovering familiar territory. I wanted to kiss the ground of my neighborhood. I was home. I was alive.

  But by the time I made my way back to Pete’s house, I was also exhausted, defeated, and filled with grief for a man I’d never met. Bernard Peterson had killed Reginald Jones. I’d heard it. I was there. Dear Lord, I deserved punishment now. I deserved all the names an Officer Miller could call me. I’d had enough of lies, too, so I’d have to tell Pete the truth. We could go to the police together.

  I pulled myself tall and prepared to take a scolding. As I entered the house, though, I didn’t hear a sound or see a light. It was around nine o’clock—sometimes Pete would be in bed by then. But once he noticed I wasn’t home, he’d have stayed up.

  I raced for the sink as I entered the kitchen, guzzling down a glass of water. My hands shook.

  Turning toward the table, I spied a slip of paper. In pencil, Pete had written, “I went to a meeting. Don’t wait up for me. Get yourself a sandwich at Old Mickey’s.” On top of the note were a few coins.

  I sank into a chair. Pete hadn’t known I was missing because he himself had been out. Yet, while I stirred up trouble, he’d been kind enough to see to it that I got something to eat.

  For the first time all evening, I was safe enough to feel hunger gnawing at my stomach. I found a bread heel and wolfed it down, followed by two glasses of milk. Grabbing a pencil from a nearby drawer, I scrawled a note back to Pete: “Thanks, I ate something here.”

  Then I went to bed, thinking I’d wait until Pete got home and then confess it all. But it wasn’t long before I fell into a deep and tortured sleep, dominated by dreams of the drowning ghost of Reginald Jones, his dripping, weed-enshrouded body emerging from the Willamette River, his eyes popping open and gazing into mine. “Why didn’t you save me?” his lonesome voice droned, the sound muffled and deepened by the water in his lungs.

  The heavy grayness of yesterday vanished that next morning, replaced by a cool, dark blue sky striped with wisps of clouds. Pete was up and out by the time I arose, so I’d either have to go to the police on my own or wait until I could talk to Pete later. I decided to wait. I could barely think well enough to tie my shoes, let alone reconstruct the events of the night before.

  I coughed and sneezed and rubbed my burning eyes all the way to the Academy. I couldn’t concentrate on my chores, my mind wandering as I emptied and burned trash, raked up newly fallen leaves, and painted an outside door. I dwelled on the horrors of the previous evening, flashes of memory stopping me in my tracks more than once. Chills and fever washed over my body. My joints ached as if I’d been hit by a bat, and my head throbbed.

  By the time Lester told me I could go, I wanted to hobble home and head to bed, losing myself in the blackness of sleep. The thought of Reginald Jones’s body in the river made my already churning stomach bubble and foam.

  But what if I was wrong about what had happened last night? It was dark. I’d heard voices and noises. I’d seen a car leaving the scene. From that, I’d assumed a murder had taken place.

  As I cut the wire on my bundle of papers in front of Jasluzek’s store that afternoon, I had to laugh at myself. The late afternoon sun shone and warmed my shoulders. My imagination had gotten the better of me last night—that had to be it. I’d probably heard nothing more than a good fist fight, the cold and my oncoming fever transforming it into a fantastic tale of murder. Why, if I went over to Portland Bank the next day, I’d probably see Bernard Peterson sitting at his desk, calm as could be, as if nothing had happened—because nothing had!

  Gus had left a note for me on my papers, berating me for not doing my route the day before. He’d had other boys cover for me, he wrote, and would give them the route permanently if I didn’t buck up. As sick as I felt, I had to get the papers out today. I’d rest when I got back to Pete’s. I’d clear my head then.

  As I heaved my newspapers onto my shoulder, my skin felt prickly and dry, my throat was sore, and my vision blurred. Maybe something did happen after all. If Reginald Jones was in the river, shouldn’t I have tried harder to see if he needed help? Oh, Lordy, maybe I could have helped.

  I coughed so hard my body shook and I had to lean against a lamp post. How did it feel to tumble to the bottom of a river, gallons of water pressing you down? I couldn’t think of it. It was too late now to help.

  I worked my route, but it was hard. Every step rattled my bones. And a hundred voices filled my head: Tell Pete about Jonesy. No, keep it to yourself. Nothing happened. You imagined it. Tell Pete. . .

  On and on they went, a new voice for every doorstep I flung a paper onto. By the time I finished, I hardly knew who I was anymore—or even where I was. I had no papers left, but I’d not hawked the extras. Who’d I given them to? Looking around, I got my bearings—I was a block from home.

  My face was hot and my throat as dry as sandpaper. My head pounded out a symphony of drums, and my ears felt stuffed with wads of cotton. I couldn’t think, but I needed to—to figure out what Bernard Peterson and Reginald Jones had been up to. I wanted to feel better. I wanted to know what to do. I wanted. . .

  My empty paper web on my shoulder, I slowly covered the last block home. I was so hot with fever by the time I got there that my eyes clouded and my knees trembled. Opening the front door, I called out to Pete, who was home from his delivery job.

  “I’m home!” I tried to shout. But instead, a raspy croak came from my throat, followed by a spasm of coughs. The coughing doubled me over and racked my body, tightly squeezing my chest and throat. I couldn’t breathe. Like Reginald Jones, a voice inside whispered. Like Reginald Jones before he died, you wicked papist.

  It must have been then that my knees gave out and I fell to the hard wooden floor.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Where was I?

  Voices floated from somewhere in the distance. I looked around and listened. A lonely streak of sunshine cut across the room to my bed. Where was I? Was I in Baltimore? No, Pete isn’t in Baltimore. . .

  “Bed rest and hot liquids. . .”

  “Tea all right?”

  “Yes, better than coffee. Some broth would be good. . .”

  “Thanks for coming by. . .”

  Dr. Beckel? His office was just two blocks over. Pete had taken me there last spring when my arm had swollen up from a bee sting.

  Their voices faded with the footsteps, and eventually I heard the front door creak open and slam shut. Pete’s regular tread moved below and a spigot turned on, the upstairs pipes knocking and groaning from the rushing water.

  I looked around. I wasn’t in my bedroom, the one I usually shared with Adam. I was in the back room, the one with the two windows overlooking the yard. My bed had been moved into a corner of the room, along with a small table that used to be in the living room. Heavy blankets had been hung like curtains over the tall windows, block
ing most of the light. As my eyes adjusted to the dimness, I made out the outline of a brown glass medicine bottle on the table beside me.

  My head felt like a vise was squeezing it, and I felt eerily warm, wrapped in a hundred layers of wool, but there was no sweat. I tried to sit up and go to Pete, but when I tried, the room danced and spun. Sinking back onto my pillow, I fell into a half-sleep.

  When my eyes fluttered open later, Pete stood over me. He held a bowl. He looked around.

  “I need a chair,” he said. He placed the bowl on the bedside table and left. A few seconds later, he returned with a straight-back chair from the kitchen. Positioning himself next to the bed, he picked up the bowl and spoon.

  “Try to eat some of this. It’s chicken soup.” He held a spoonful out to me. It smelled like health itself, all warm and homey and fragrant, and it reminded me of my mother. A now-distant image wafted through my mind: Ma bent over me with a soup spoon in her hand, urging me to eat when I was sick. I missed her now, in ways I hadn’t missed her since coming west.

  I wanted to eat Pete’s soup, but I was so weak I could barely move. When Pete saw me struggling, he brought the spoon to my lips.

  Sucking in the hot broth, I nearly cried out. It was like swallowing a thousand pins, all scratching at my throat at once.

  “It’ll hurt for awhile,” Pete said gently. “You’ve got a bad throat, son. Nothing to be done but rest and drink. Mrs. McGreevey next door made this soup when she heard you were sick.” He fed me another spoonful, and this one went down somewhat more easily. “The doctor says we have to make sure it doesn’t become rheumatic fever. That’s why I moved you in here. He said you should get some fresh air outside that stuffy old bedroom.”

  More soup, more talk. It was the most Pete had ever talked to me. In fact, he kept up a steady monologue while feeding me.

  “I never understood why you and Adam chose to share that tiny room upstairs instead of one of you using this room as your bedroom,” he continued.

  I wanted to answer him—I wanted to say it had been because Adam and I didn’t want to be separated, so when I chose the smaller room, Adam decided to move in with me. We’d shared a room in Baltimore, he’d told Pete at the time, and we didn’t want to take up too much room. Adam had winked at me, signaling that everything would be all right, because he’d look out for me still.

  But I couldn’t speak. I sipped at more soup.

  “The light might hurt your eyes, so we’re keeping it low for a while.”

  “What time is it?” I whispered.

  “About noon.” He pulled a handkerchief out and wiped my chin.

  Noon? On what day? How long have I been asleep?

  As if reading my mind, he said, “You fell sick yesterday. I couldn’t get Dr. Beckel here until this morning.” He sounded guilty, and I wanted to thank him for all he’d done for me—moving me into this room, getting the soup, taking off from work.

  I had a lot more I wanted to say, too—mostly questions. I wanted to know how long I should expect to be laid up, if Adam had come by, and, mostly, if I’d only dreamt about the burglary of the Peterson jewels, and of Adam being a fugitive, and Bernard Peterson a murderer. Just the thought of him made me shiver.

  “I can get you another blanket,” Pete said, placing the bowl on the table. He brought a ragged coverlet from the closet and draped it over my already warm body. He started to feed me more soup, but I shook my head. As good as it was, my stomach rebelled and the soup went sour in my mouth.

  “You rest now,” he said, standing. Taking the bowl and spoon away, he walked to the door. “Don’t worry about anything,” he said before leaving. “I’ll take your paper route this afternoon and let Lester know you won’t be coming in tomorrow.”

  I lay on that sick bed for a full week. As my energy returned, so did my impatience. I wanted to find out if what I thought had transpired at the river was reality or dream. The more time went by, the more unreal it seemed, and the more I hoped it was unreal. I tried talking to Pete about it one evening. I told him I’d had the strangest dream, and then I described the evening I thought Bernard Peterson had killed Reginald Jones. Surely it would have been news by now. But Pete had only smiled and told me I was on the mend. So I concluded that maybe it hadn’t happened after all.

  I could hardly wait to get out of that house and return to Adam’s case. I now just wanted to be done with it so I could be on my way back home. Esther and my friends were waiting for me. Sure, I wanted to go with Adam, but an idea, once unfathomable, was beginning to tease at the edges of my mind—maybe I wouldn’t go back East with him. Maybe I’d go alone.

  I couldn’t go, though, until I knew Adam was cleared. “Look after your brother,” Ma had said. She had been looking at me.

  It bothered me that I didn’t know where Adam was or what was happening. Had he gone to the church as I’d suggested, or found the money to head East without me?

  The response to my letter only made things worse. While I recuperated that week, I heard from one jeweler, informing me he didn’t have any sets like the one I described but would be happy to help me pick out something “suitable.”

  As I recovered, I came to appreciate the many kindnesses Pete performed for me. He not only delivered my newspapers every day, but did some work for Lester so the Academy wouldn’t feel the need to hire someone in my place. And I know he gave up one of his Truth Society meetings because of a bad coughing spell I had one night. He told me he didn’t mind, though, because he felt the campaign was going well, and he wouldn’t be surprised if all those Klansmen received a big surprise on Election Day.

  By Friday, though, I was ready to escape. That was the day I got a second jeweler’s letter, telling me there were no ruby sets at “his establishment.”

  With Pete off at work, I managed to wobble out of bed and into a bath on my own. Still weak, I was sweating by the time I dressed and went downstairs. I fixed myself a cup of tea and tried to eat, but my throat was too dry to swallow any bread.

  While I sipped at my tea, I looked through the week’s newspapers. Pete might have delivered my route, but he didn’t know I was expected to sell the extra papers every day. A stack of them sat on a chair in the corner.

  There were the usual stories about President Harding and Portland politics, including a fair number of columns on the School Question.

  I was about to close the last paper and get on my way when a headline caught my eye.

  “BANKER’S BODY PULLED FROM WILLAMETTE,” it screamed.

  My breath caught, and I coughed and coughed. Tears streamed down my face as I struggled to catch my breath. Through blurred eyes, I began to read, my heart racing.

  My nightmare had been real. Someone had been killed all right—but not Reginald Jones.

  It was Bernard Peterson.

  Bernard Peterson’s body had been dragged from the river, a bullet through his chest. As I relived that awful night, sweat coated my body. My hands trembled as I gripped the newspaper. I had to lay it flat, my palms on either side, to stop from shaking.

  Bernard Peterson was dead—not Reginald Jones.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Here I was again, exactly where I’d been nearly a week ago after running home sick, frightened that I’d witnessed a murder. Bad feelings washed over me—mostly guilt. Though I’d nothing to do with the crime, I hadn’t told anyone about it, either. Was not reporting it a crime in itself? My legs felt wobbly just thinking about it. What if I was held accountable for not telling? What if I was guilty—of something? Officer Miller would arrest me, happy to have a boy named Matuski in his custody.

  Even without an arrest, I would never let go of the feeling I could have done more. Poor Rose! She’d lost her older brother. I imagined her weeping at the news, her sweet face crumpled in sorrow.

  I got myself a drink of water and sat down. Fever and time obscured the memory of that nightmarish night, its details as murky as the river itself. Dropping my head into my hands, I tried
desperately to recall the events I’d witnessed.

  Bernard Peterson had asked Reginald Jones to meet him at the water’s edge. Bernard had threatened Jonesy with a gun, and accused him of. . . of things I couldn’t quite remember. No, of things that didn’t make sense. Of something connected with the bank. Why couldn’t I recall? What was the matter with me? A man was murdered and I couldn’t remember what happened? It should have been burned into me. All I remembered was that gun, glinting in the weak light, and Bernard’s drunken anger. Holy Moses! What else? What else?

  Bernard told Reginald to come to the shoreline and then—and then I hadn’t been able to see, I’d only heard. I’d heard an indistinct argument, some scuffling, and a shot. I’d assumed Bernard had made good on his threat and killed Jonesy. I’d assumed Bernard had then driven his own car into the river, killing himself.

  But I knew that hadn’t been the case! I thought I’d seen Bernard driving away, in what must have been Jonesy’s car—not Bernard’s.

  No, not Bernard—he’d been the one killed. It was Jonesy who drove away!

  My face flushed, and it wasn’t the fever but the fear.

  Grabbing the paper, I looked at the article’s byline, which indicated the story was written by none other than Vincent Briggs. He’d even thrown in something at the end of the tale about how Peterson’s mother’s house had been burglarized and some expensive jewels stolen. “Neither the thief nor the jewels have yet surfaced,” he’d written.

  Briggs was the man I had to talk to now. In scanning that week’s newspapers, I didn’t see a single story about Reginald Jones and his misdeeds at Portland Bank. I wondered why Briggs hadn’t followed up on that.

  Grabbing my hat and wrapping a scarf around my neck, I headed for the Telegram office.

  “You, my boy, are the very person I wanted to see.” Vincent Briggs stopped typing and took his cigar from his mouth as soon as he saw me approaching his desk. Twirling in his seat, he grabbed his coat and hat and stood. “C’mon, we’re going for a walk.”