Love Comes Calling

by Siri Mitchell

  I would still know, though.

  Sitting up, I punched my pillow into shape. I would know just how hard I’d had to apply myself to work it all out. I’d know I had finally buckled down, I’d focused all my concentration, and I’d done it. That was the important thing.

  I closed my eyes again, took a deep breath, rolled onto my side, and prepared to sleep.

  But then I realized there was something I’d forgotten.

  The king. I’d forgotten all about that king.

  Oysters and clambakes!

  And I still had a date to go on with Jack.

  I didn’t sleep very well.

  And I managed to chew all of my fingernails to the quick while I wasn’t doing it, which meant I had a hard time pulling the pins out of my hair. And plugging in all those cords down at Central.

  Ow!

  By lunchtime I was sucking on my fingers as I climbed the stairs to the cafeteria.

  I hadn’t dropped any telephone calls. I hadn’t forgotten to flip any switches. And I hadn’t transferred any calls to a wrong number—that I knew of, anyway. But I also hadn’t thought much about Jack. He would be waiting out on the sidewalk for me at the end of the day and . . . I didn’t know what to do. I couldn’t sneak past him. I mean . . . I could, but I wouldn’t because he could help me figure out how to keep Griff alive. So I had to meet him. Even though . . . I wondered if it was safe.

  No one knew I worked here, and no one knew where I was going with him. Even I didn’t know where I was going with him! I could disappear from the face of the earth, and no one would ever know where I’d gone.

  I tore a corner from the page of a magazine and asked to borrow a pencil from a girl who was working a crossword puzzle.

  She handed it to me with a wordless frown.

  I scrawled Jack’s name and precinct on it and then I took it to Doris. “I am going to place my life in your hands.”

  She looked at me with a blank gaze for a moment. And then her eyes widened. “Oh! You’re good. It’s Mary Pickford, right? In—oh! What was the name of her last movie?”

  It was. But that wasn’t important. What was important was that someone knew who I was seeing. “I’m going out tonight after work.”

  “With who?” She fluttered her lashes. “See? Mildred Harris. How’d I do?”

  Not very well. Mildred Harris fluttered hers with much more grace. But that’s why I was such a good actress: I noticed those kinds of things. “It’s with someone I don’t know very well. And if anything happens to me, if I don’t show up at work tomorrow . . .” I held the scrap up in front of her. “This is his name.”

  She took it, turning it so she could read it. “Jack Feeney. Harrison Avenue?”

  “That’s the station where he works. He’s a policeman.”

  “Are you sure he’s a policeman?”

  “Of course I’m sure!” He had to be a policeman, didn’t he? He’d been wearing a uniform.

  “Because what if he’s just pretending? Oh! What if he’s one of those fellows like in True Confessions? Maybe he wants to kidnap you and make you his gypsy queen!”

  “I don’t think—”

  “And what if . . . golly! I hope everything will be all right. Maybe you shouldn’t go.”

  “I have to go. So if anything happens to me, just . . . take that to the police station. Only . . . maybe not his station. Maybe you should take it to a different one.”

  She nodded. “Right.”

  As I sat in front of my board that afternoon, I had even more to worry about. What if Jack wasn’t who he said he was? What if he was a truly bad, bad guy?

  Then that would be really very bad.

  And where was he planning on taking me? I wished I knew. I would have chewed on a fingernail—indeed, I tried to—but I had bitten them all off. One thing, at least, was good. Jack didn’t know me as Ellis. So the most important thing was to keep being Janie. And then I had to figure out what was going on just as quickly as I could.

  12

  Where are we going?” I threw a glance up at Jack as we walked along the sidewalk. He sure didn’t look like a bad guy, but looks could be deceiving.

  He smiled. “Curiosity killed the cat, baby. Didn’t you know that?” He put his hand to my waist and guided me around a newsstand.

  “Are we going to walk there?” Because if we were, that meant we’d be staying in the city, around people. He couldn’t do anything bad to me if we stayed in the city.

  “Whad’you expect? I’m a policeman, not a prince.”

  “I hadn’t meant to imply—”

  “But don’t worry. I can still show you a good time.”

  He seemed like a policeman. He looked like one. And he hadn’t bundled me into some dark, sinister-looking car. But still . . . Doris was right. He could be anyone at all. I stopped walking.

  It took him a moment to realize it. Then he turned around and headed back toward me.

  “I don’t know you very well, Jack. . . .”

  “You want a formal introduction? Now?”

  “I think I’d like to know something about you if we’re going to be spending the evening together.”

  “Maybe I’d like to know something about you too, Miss I Don’t Know.” He winked as he said it. “So, where you from?”

  “Here.”

  “Here. As in right here?”

  “Very nearly.” Twenty blocks north and several over, up on Beacon Hill. “And where are you from?”

  “Here and there. Here more than anywhere.”

  That wasn’t very helpful. “And you’ve been a policeman for . . . ?”

  “More than long enough.” He clamped his lips together after he’d answered.

  “And before that . . . ?”

  “Before that I was holed up in a trench filled with mud and guts in the fields of Flanders fighting the Boche. And before you ask ‘before that,’ I’ll tell you straight: There’s nothing worth remembering in my past. So . . . shall we?” He gestured to the train station across the street. “Anyway, it’s not important where you came from. What’s important is where you’re going.”

  I could agree with that. “I’m going to Hollywood.”

  The corners of his eyes crinkled as he smiled at me. “That’s the way, sister! No point in dreaming if you don’t dream big.”

  “Where are you going?”

  “Somewhere. I’m going from nowhere to somewhere just as soon as I can.”

  “Somewhere no one has it in for you, where you can just be . . . free. Somewhere different. Somewhere exciting.”

  He looked down at me. “Exactly.”

  I smiled, and he smiled back. As long as he didn’t try anything, I thought—I hoped—I’d be fine.

  Jack bought two tickets for the elevated railway, and twenty minutes later we got off and walked into a neighborhood that looked . . . well, frankly, it looked unsavory. Garbage erupted from the alleyways, and swarms of children raced through the streets between automobiles. There was a distinct smell of garlic and coffee. And there were flies. Lots and lots of flies. We stepped onto the street to pass a group of old women who were sitting in chairs arranged on the sidewalk. They glared at us as if we were walking through their front parlor.

  I must have shrunk back because Jack put an arm around me, letting his hand flap free from my shoulder as we walked. “Don’t worry, baby. I saw worse in the war and I survived. We’re just here for a good time.”

  “Where are we?”

  “The North End. Haven’t you been here before?”

  The north end of what? I shook my head.

  “Well, buck up. We’re only passing through.”

  Did people really live here? Like this? The fluttering of laundry hanging on lines strung between buildings caught my eye. Apparently they did.

  We walked through alleys and shabby narrow streets that didn’t belong to the Boston I knew. As we turned a corner, we passed by a quaint little grocery. Zanfini’s, it was called.

  Jac
k tugged on my arm and pulled me away down into a stairway that led to a basement-level door.

  He rapped on it with a knuckle.

  A little window set into the door slid open.

  He shot a look over his shoulder up the stairs and then stepped closer to the door. “Joe sent me.”

  The door cracked open. He started through, but I hung back. I knew what this was. I’d heard about them before from some of the girls. It was a speakeasy! “I don’t think I should go in there. And I don’t think you should either.”

  “Relax, baby. This place isn’t on the list for tonight.”

  “What list?”

  Sighing, he held up a finger to the man tending the door and stepped back out, bending to talk into my ear. “It’s not going to be raided . . . at least not tonight. So we’re safe, see?” He put an arm around my shoulders and turned me toward the door.

  Raided! I hadn’t been worried about being caught in a raid. I was worried about being there at all. And so should he. “But—but—you’re a policeman!”

  “That’s right. And you’re a hello girl. And we both deserve a drink after a hard day’s work, right?” Eyeing the man at the door, he pushed me through it and we were enveloped by a blanket of hot, stale air and the blue haze of cigarette smoke.

  My nose wrinkled. It smelled all yeasty, like the insides of Lawrence’s smelly old shoes.

  There was a band playing on a stage at the back of the long narrow room. A bar along one of the side walls looked very much like the one at the country club, only this one had both men and women lounging along it. And cigarette smoke drifted from everyone’s lips.

  At least they were only drinking coffee.

  I tapped Jack’s arm. “This . . . isn’t right.”

  He took a look around the room. “You said it. There ought to be a free table at this hour.” He gestured a waiter over and said something to him I couldn’t hear for all the noise in the place.

  The man turned and bent toward a table.

  The people sitting at it looked up at the waiter, looked over at Jack, and then they gathered their things and left. The waiter pulled out a chair, gesturing us over. “Here you are, Mr. Feeney. Anything you need, just tell me.”

  Jack winked at me as the waiter left. “That’s better.”

  “What did you say to him?”

  “I do people favors, they do me favors.” He shrugged as he sat, then gestured toward one of the empty chairs. “Go on. Have a seat.”

  Favors? I didn’t want to be too obvious about things but . . . “Do you ever do favors for Irish people?”

  “Sure. And Italians too.”

  “What kind of favors?”

  “Oh . . . I don’t know.” He grimaced. “I’m starting to sound like you.”

  I tried to be the most Ellis-like Janie I could, opening my eyes wide and fluttering my lashes as if I were the dumb Dora I felt like most of the time. “You must know a lot of important people, being a policeman and all.”

  “I know some.”

  “Do you know the governor?”

  He put an elbow on the table as he looked around the room. “Naw. Never met him. Seems like a flat tire.”

  “Do you know . . .” Who was that baseball player Lawrence was always going on about? “ . . . the Babe?”

  “Wouldn’t I like to!”

  “How about the mayor?”

  “Mayor Curley? Sure. Everyone knows him.”

  I felt my heart pause in its beating. “Did you ever do any favors for him?”

  He stopped looking at the crowd and fixed his gaze on me. “This is starting to sound like the third degree.” He looked past me and then summoned someone with the crook of his finger.

  The waiter soon appeared.

  Jack looked up at him. “What have you got to eat?”

  The waiter rattled off the choices. Jack ordered for both of us. With people drinking coffee and Jack ordering food, maybe my fears had been ill-founded. Maybe this was just a restaurant after all. I felt myself begin to relax. Maybe everything was going to be fine. Except Jack had said he knew the mayor. “Have you ever . . . shaken his hand?”

  “Whose hand? The mayor’s?” He looked at me through narrowed eyes. “Don’t tell me you’re one of those dames who’s crazy about him.”

  “No, I—”

  “I guess I could introduce you sometime if you really want to meet him.”

  “No!”

  He cocked his head and gave me a knowing look. “So you’re one of those who thinks he’s not good enough to be mayor? Are you one of those lace-curtain Irish who got something against him?”

  “I just think a mayor ought to follow the laws he makes like everyone else has to.”

  “Baby, let me tell you something.” As he leaned close, I couldn’t keep myself from doing the same. “Nobody follows the laws.”

  “I do.”

  “And I’ll bet that’s only because you don’t know any better. But I’ll tell you something else: You’ll never get anywhere by just following along, doing what people tell you to.”

  “But I—”

  “Take me, for instance. I could just keep my head down and mind my own business and never be anything but a policeman. But I looked around and decided, what’s the use in that?” He reached into his pocket and pulled out a pack of cigarettes. “Nobody likes a stool pigeon. There’s people getting rich in this city, making money on the side, just by being friendly. And what’s that cost me? Nothing. But it sure makes me an awful lot.”

  “But those favors you do . . . are they . . . wrong?”

  “Wrong doesn’t matter anymore. I was in the war with a bunch of fellows who worried about what was right and what was wrong, and guess what? They’re not here anymore. You do what you have to, you know what I mean? And what’s the harm in looking the other way? In letting people have a little fun once in a while?”

  Plenty, if it meant making plans to murder Griff! “But you never . . . you’ve never actually hurt anyone, have you?”

  “Naw. Seen enough blood and guts when I was in the trenches.”

  So if he was telling the truth, he wasn’t in on the plot. He was just . . . what was he doing? I wished I could think faster! Clearly the telephone men were part of the plan, but that didn’t mean Jack was, did it? I gave up trying to figure it out right then, but there was still one thing that bothered me. “Why do people keep voting for the mayor if he doesn’t follow his own rules?”

  “He buys their votes.”

  “Buys them? But—that’s illegal!”

  “Are you sure you’re from around here? He doesn’t pay them in money. He pays them in jobs and paved roads and playgrounds for their kids. They vote for him because he tells them what they want to hear, and he gives them what they want. Nobody votes for someone who’s going to sit there in city hall and shake his finger at them. The mayor’s just like everybody else. That’s why they vote for him.”

  “But . . . he’s very unfair, favoring his friends and buying votes.”

  “A person’d think you didn’t have any friends yourself! Who do you want him to favor? His enemies? What’s the good in being mayor if you can’t reward the people who vote for you?”

  “Well . . . I never actually thought—”

  “You sound like you’re one of those bluebloods who live up on Beacon Hill.”

  I shrugged.

  “They had their turn; they made their pile. Now it’s time for the rest of us.”

  “You make him sound like Robin Hood.”

  “Exactly! Bury the rich and help the poor. Or at least, don’t worry so much about the rich and help the poor. Who wouldn’t like a guy like that?”

  Me. And Griff. And—and nearly everyone I knew! Why should we be despised for making money? What was wrong with that? Why should they hate us for it when they wanted the chance to make some too? “But can’t you see? He isn’t Robin Hood anymore. He’s become that awful king who stole all the power in the first place.”

&nbs
p; “You have a funny way of looking at things, baby. Do me a favor—stop thinking. Start eating.” He pointed to the plates the waiter was setting down in front of us.

  I did. And I have to say, it was much better than the cafeteria food down at Central. But I wasn’t here to eat. I was here to figure out what Jack knew. “So . . . what are you working on now? At work?”

  “Work.”

  “Aren’t you . . . arresting anyone? Or catching any thieves?”

  “I’m trying to keep out of trouble, that’s what I’m doing. You haven’t remembered anything, have you? From that telephone call?”

  I shook my head.

  “Good. Then let’s just forget about it.”

  “But what if I did?”

  “What if you did.” He looked at me the same way my father did when he found out I’d done something I shouldn’t have. “If you did, you’d come and tell me. And then you’d forget about it again.”

  “But what if I couldn’t forget?”

  “What if you couldn’t forget.” He put down his fork and folded his hands behind his plate. “If you couldn’t forget . . . then I suppose, it wouldn’t really matter, would it? Unless you recognized the voices of the people who were talking. And even then it probably wouldn’t matter, because how could you know what they were talking about? And even if you did know, what could you do about it? Because if it were something you felt you had to tell the police, well . . .” He opened his arms wide. “Here I am. So you’d end up telling me.”

  “So if I told you . . . then what would you do?”

  He gave me a long, hard look. And then he dropped his gaze. “I don’t know.”

  The hairs at the back of my neck stood on end.

  “Thing is, I think you’re a peach, baby. And you weren’t trying to listen in on any telephone calls. So do me a favor—forget what you heard—and I’ll do you a favor.”

  He’d do me a favor? “So are you saying . . . we’re friends?”

  “Yeah. That’s right. We’re friends.”

  “But what if—”

  “Listen to me. Just let it go. Forget about it. Forget about the whole thing.”

  “But what if someone was going to get hurt because I didn’t say something?”