Set the Night on Fire

by Libby Fischer Hellmann

  Lila read on. After the convention, Dar went quiet, and information about him was scarce. He dropped out of Michigan. Just like her father. Judging from the Google citations, he might have stayed in Chicago. Again like her father. Lila tapped a finger on the mouse. Were they together? If so, what were they doing?

  He resurfaced again in June 1970, about a month after the shootings at Kent State. It was then that everything blew up. Literally. On June 2nd, sometime after midnight, a bomb exploded overnight in the Kerr’s department store in downtown Chicago. Along with Marshall Field’s, Goldblatt’s, and Carson Pirie Scott, Kerr’s was one of the bastions of State Street shopping. Although there were no shoppers in the store at that hour, two security guards were killed. A third person, a young woman, was found in critical condition in the rubble. She was taken to the hospital where she died. She turned out to be Alixandra Kerr, daughter of the department store owner. It was unclear how she came to be at the store in the middle of the night. Some speculated she was part of the bomb plot; others said not. One article even theorized that she’d been kidnapped by the bombers.

  Lila winced as she gazed at photos of the devastation. The first floor of the store was destroyed. The ceiling had fallen down in large chunks, and beams dangled at odd angles. Glass was everywhere, and a layer of detritus, which had once been leather wallets, cosmetics, and clothing, covered the floor. One photo showed a gauzy haze in the air.

  Kerr’s was owned by Sebastian Kerr, a political conservative and generous Republican contributor. Although he was grieving the death of his daughter, he vowed to rebuild promptly, and, despite the fact that the store was not in any way responsible for the tragedy, he created a fund to help the families of the dead security guards. “We will not be cowed by thugs and murderers, whoever they may be,” he was quoted as saying.

  Lila kept reading. The FBI took the lead on the investigation. They scoured the country for leads, conducted extensive and intrusive (at least to civil libertarians) interviews, and kept close watch on anyone who might have had a connection to the crime. Six weeks later, in late July, they arrested Dar Gantner, who’d been hiding out in Lanedo, an abandoned Colorado mining town near Aspen.

  Dar was flown back to Chicago and held at Cook County Jail in solitary confinement. Meanwhile a tussle between the U.S. Attorney and the Illinois State’s Attorney broke out. The Feds wanted to make the bombing a cause célèbre, thinking that the charges of conspiracy—once they found the other people involved—and the use of explosives would make a dramatic statement. But the Illinois State’s Attorney’s office, mindful of Mayor Daley’s influence, and the fiasco of the Federal “Chicago Seven” trial, fought for the case. Innocent people from our city were killed, they argued, and the monsters responsible ought to be punished.

  The state, backed by Daley, won, and an indictment was handed down a week later, charging Dar Gantner with three counts of murder. Punishable by death. He was also charged with arson and criminal damage to property.

  The challenge for the prosecution was finding the other conspirators. No one believed Gantner planned and executed the crime alone, and rumors surfaced about a deal to withdraw the death penalty if he gave up his associates. Other rumors hinted at a not-guilty plea, and some journalists were predicting a lengthy trial, one that, hopefully, wouldn’t sink to the level of the Chicago Seven.

  But Gantner surprised everyone. Two weeks after the indictment, he pled guilty to murder and criminal damage to property. His sentence was one hundred to three hundred years. He made no public statement, and he did not identify his associates. He was sent to Stateville, the maximum security prison near Joliet.

  Lila got up from the computer and poured another drink. Why Kerr’s? Granted, Kerr was a Republican, and a conservative, but Kerr’s only had one store in Chicago. The rest were scattered around the Midwest. If someone was going to make a political statement, wouldn’t they bomb Field’s, or Carson’s, or even Sears, with its reputation as America’s foremost retailer? Why target a less known, regional merchant? She went back to Google to find out.

  Sebastian Kerr was the son of an Irish immigrant farmer who settled in central Indiana. But Sebastian had no interest in farming, and at eighteen he moved to Indianapolis to work in a small variety store. He eventually became its manager, and when the owner passed away, took out a loan to buy the store from the man’s wife. Kerr paid off the loan in three years, then took out a larger loan to expand into clothing for women and children.

  He changed the store’s name from Green’s to Kerr’s. It doubled in size, and, a few years later, Kerr erected a six-floor building on Maryland Street. Ten years after that, seven more Kerr’s had opened in places like Des Moines, Milwaukee, Minneapolis, Detroit, and the location he called his “diamond”—the Chicago Loop. Kerr was now wealthy, and the family, consisting of Kerr, his wife, their daughter, and a son, bought a summer home on the Michigan shore. Lila couldn’t find much information about either sibling online. Someone had done a good job preserving their privacy.

  Lila closed the browser. She still didn’t know why Dar Gantner and his theoretical friends bombed Kerr’s. Like everyone else, she could only speculate. Did Kerr’s daughter target her own family? Some radicals during the Sixties did. Maybe Kerr’s was easier to get into than Field’s or Carson’s. Or maybe, since it was smaller, the bombers assumed the damage would be less severe. Maybe they knew there would be fewer security guards. No. That made no sense. Whether they killed two people or two hundred, they had to know they would spend the rest of their lives in jail. It was the statement. The act. That was the point.

  She went to her bag and pulled out the photo of her parents. Was Alixandra Kerr the other woman in the photograph with her mother? The one with granny glasses and long, ashy hair? She studied the faces in the picture, finally resting on the image of Gantner. Any way you parsed it, Dar Gantner was evil. There was no way she could talk to him about her mother. Even though forty years had passed, even though she would be in the well-protected confines of the Stateville visitors’ room, she couldn’t see herself chatting with a confessed murderer. For the first time since she’d found the photo, she felt a sense of betrayal. How could her parents have befriended someone like Gantner? What did that make them?

  She studied the photo again. Perhaps she shouldn’t try to track down her mother’s family. She didn’t have enough time, anyhow. Someone was trying to kill her. She should focus all her energy on finding out who and why. Digging up her mother’s past could wait.

  She put down the photo and took her empty glass to the kitchen. She remembered how, as a little girl, she was afraid to swim in deep water. Who knew what creatures lurked below the surface, their tentacles ready to capture and drag her down? Her father had spent hours patiently teaching her how to float, to tread water, eventually to swim. He’d shown her how to protect herself.

  She rinsed the glass, letting warm water spill over her hands and swirl down the drain. Her father was gone; now it was up to her. She would have to protect herself—from the man on the motorcycle, from stalkers, even from the knowledge that her parents were not the people she thought they were.

  But first she would check the locks one more time.

  SIXTEEN

  It took Dar several days to find Benny Spivak, a fellow inmate at Stateville. Benny had served a twenty-year stretch for dealing meth. A man had been killed during a deal—an accident, Benny argued; manslaughter, said the state. Benny was paroled three years before Dar, and, according to a postcard he sent Dar afterwards, was now running an engine repair shop near Rockford.

  Using the Internet and the phone book, Dar narrowed down the possibilities. Once he was sure, he set out before sunrise in Cece’s black Honda and headed west on I-90. The dark mantle of sky behind him became tinged with pink. It would be a clear day, but cold.

  Periodically he checked the rearview mirror for a tail. He couldn’t spot one, but they’d gotten more subtle over the years. Back in the Sixties
you’d see two figures in a car, both of them wearing cheap suits, white shirts, narrow ties, or, in winter, a bulky raincoat. They’d be driving a Chevy or Ford, maybe a Plymouth. They’d stay precisely two car lengths behind, no more, no less. These days, though, there were so many cameras and tracking systems on the road that actual physical surveillance was becoming obsolete. Given the right equipment you could tail someone from the comfort of home. Or so he’d heard.

  He reached Loves Park, a working-class town twenty minutes from Rockford, before eight. He checked the directions he’d printed out and drove to Prime Motor and Body. It sat in a commercial area off Harlem, near Range, not a backwoods road but not a major highway, either.

  He did a slow drive by. The shop wasn’t much more than a shack with a corrugated metal roof. The door was locked, and the front window was so grimy the only thing you could see was that it was dark inside. A plastic clock on the door indicated the shop’s hours were 10:00 to 6:00.

  He turned the corner and parked in front of Sherry’s Café. When he went in and ordered coffee—black—Sherry, or whoever was behind the counter, looked disappointed he wasn’t springing for a fancy drink. He hesitated. Coffee used to be a staple, one step up from water. Now people made obscene profits dressing it up. He wondered who harvested the coffee beans. He’d read that, in Africa, children were forced to pick cocoa beans under slave labor conditions.

  On the other hand, Loves Park was a working-class town. The owner of Sherry’s Café didn’t give a shit about international coffee cartels. For all he knew, a fancy coffee with its premium price was what helped Sherry feed her family. Who was he to deny a hard-working person her due? He changed his order to a cappuccino. The woman behind the counter beamed.

  He took the drink to the car and drove back to Benny’s. He wasn’t sure how Benny would receive him. Ex-cons were a weird bunch. Those who went straight often didn’t want anything to do with their past; those who didn’t were often on the lookout for rip-offs, especially from other ex-cons.

  He nursed his cappuccino for an hour. Around 9:30, a dark red Toyota pick-up pulled up to the shop. A man bundled up in a wool hat, quilted parka, and thick boots climbed out. Compact but solid like a wrestler, he strolled to the door, his gait a bit bow-legged. Benny.

  Dar waited until the inside lights flicked on and the “Closed” sign flipped to “Open.” He crumpled his coffee cup, tossed it on the floor, and got out of the Honda.

  A metallic smell hit him when he went through the shop door. The residue from oil, gasoline, and glue? Or the dregs of a meth lab? Dar peered over a battered counter with a chipped surface. At the end of a short hall was a closed door. But his entrance had set off some kind of buzzer. A moment later, the door opened, and Benny came out.

  He had gray hair, cropped so close to his skull he looked almost bald. He was wearing a faded green sweatshirt and jeans, and he’d put on weight since Stateville. Dar remembered a predatory look on Benny’s face, a look that said violence wasn’t far from his mind. He didn’t see it now.

  Benny tilted his head and squinted at Dar. A wide grin split his face. He came around the counter, grabbed Dar’s hand, and pumped. “Hey man! When did you get your 12:01?”

  “A couple of months ago.” Dar let Benny keep pumping. Then, as if he’d just realized he was too familiar, Benny dropped it and rubbed a finger below his nose, like he was stroking an invisible mustache. It was a habit he’d had inside, Dar recalled. Sometimes he rubbed with his finger, sometimes with his knuckle, sometimes his fingernail.

  “How’d you find me, man?” Benny asked.

  “I made some educated guesses.”

  “Still the geek.”

  “Actually, I called here a few days ago asking for you.” At Benny’s surprised look, he added, “A woman answered the phone.”

  “Reba,” Benny said.

  “You weren’t around, but she said you would be back. She sounded nice,” he added as an afterthought.

  “Met her about a month after I got out. Don’t know why she’s hangin’ around me, but … ” He shrugged and grinned at the same time, looking pleased with himself.

  Dar tried to look pleased, too, but his face must have shown something different, because Benny’s grin faded. “Hey, what’s goin’ down, man?”

  Dar swallowed.

  Benny tilted his head. “You know never to con a con. Qué pasa?”

  Dar slipped his hands out of his pea coat. “Things aren’t going so well.”

  “You in trouble?”

  Dar nodded. “Someone’s after me. But not for anything I’ve done.” He crossed his arms. “God’s honest truth.”

  “Fuck it, you don’t gotta convince me. I owe you.” Dar had helped Benny compose a letter to the parole board. Benny claimed the letter was what got him out. “What cha’ need?”

  Dar shrugged out of his coat. “You know motorcycles, right?”

  “Is the pope Catholic? Probably ain’t a bike on the road I don’t know somethin’ about.”

  “I want to describe a bike. See if you know what it is. It was … well, unusual.”

  “How?”

  Dar leaned on the counter. “It was higher off the ground than you’d expect. Almost like it was on stilts.”

  Benny nodded. “Off-road, probably.”

  Dar went on. “And when you see it straight on, one of the parts near the bottom stuck out at a right angle.”

  Benny’s brow wrinkled.

  “And a long, sleek piece extended out in front. Something similar was on the back. A fender of some sort, maybe. With lots of polished blue and gray.”

  Benny looked thoughtful. “Come on back,” he said, leading Dar down the hall to the back room. The chemical smell was stronger here, mixed with stale smoke, but Dar saw no evidence of a meth lab. Shelves loaded with cans of paint, brushes, and other equipment lined two walls. Boxes filled with magazines were stacked against the other two. A bare bulb was screwed into a ceiling fixture. In the center of the room was a rickety card table with three folding chairs. An open pack of cigarettes and an ashtray lay on the table. Benny waved him into a chair, then went to the magazines.

  “Lemme see here.” He squatted and sorted through the box. “Right angle, you say? A lot of blue and gray?”

  “Right.”

  Benny pulled out two magazines and started flipping through one. “I know I saw an article not too long ago … ” He dropped the first magazine and started in on the second. A moment later, he stopped at a picture and smoothed out the page. “There you go.” He passed it to Dar.

  Dar took the magazine, a recent issue of Motorcycle News. It was open to a two-page spread of lush photos that made the featured bike look positively sensual. One shot was plastered across both pages, but smaller insets showing different parts of the bike bordered it. Dar studied the photos. He could clearly see some blue and gray materials on the front and back. “That’s it!”

  Benny snatched the magazine back and studied it. “You sure?”

  “Yeah.”

  Benny whistled.

  “So, what is it?”

  “It’s a BMW. The H2 Enduro. A dirt bike, but very high end. Loaded with high-tech garbage. Lightweight but made for off-road racin’. ’Course, you can throw street tires on it.”

  “The tires I saw were narrow but … knobbly.”

  “Off-road,” Benny said. “You remember seeing a logo on the bike? You know, the black circle—supposed to be an airplane propeller—with the blue and white diamonds?”

  Dar shook his head. “It was dark. I was lucky to see as much as I did.” He leaned forward. “So what kind of person has an Enduro?”

  Benny gazed at the picture again. “A guy who knows his off-road machines. And has money to burn—it costs as much as a car.”

  “How much?”

  “Over twenty grand. And in this weather, all the salt on the roads is gonna ruin the frame. Not to mention the finish and tires. But if the guy’s loaded, he probably doesn’t give a
shit.”

  “You can ride it in the winter?”

  “Absolutely. You get a lot of traction on those tires. And BMW makes sure it handles like a kitten. But only a crazy man would freeze his nuts off in this weather.” Benny rubbed his finger across his face again. “Now, pardner, you tell me. Why you wanna know about this bike? My guess is you ain’t shoppin’.”

  From habit Dar looked around, checking for eavesdroppers. Then he told Benny about the incident with Casey’s daughter.

  Benny shook a cigarette from the pack on the table. He took his time lighting up, then inhaled deeply. “The asshole took a shot at you?”

  “Two. Missed both times.”

  “And he wasn’t wearin’ no gloves?”

  Dar nodded.

  “That’s probably why he missed.” Benny took another deep drag, blew it out. “Goddamn hands were frozen.” He shook his head. “Not that it helps you figure out who the asshole is. Got any ideas?”

  “Maybe.”

  Benny started to say something but was interrupted by the buzzer. The front door opened and boots scuffed on the linoleum floor. Dar turned to see a woman come into the back room. She was short and round, and when she took off her wool cap, she shook out a mane of long blond hair. She was wearing a quilted parka, mittens, and jeans, and her skin was so white it looked opaque.

  “Hey, babe.” Benny stubbed out the cigarette and got up.

  “Back at you,” she replied. She stepped around Dar to plant one on Benny.

  “This here is Reba,” Benny said proudly.

  She had cool blue eyes and the lightest eyelashes he’d ever seen. Dar shook her hand.

  Benny picked up the conversation. “Well, whoever it is, sounds like you’re gonna need some protection. Let me fix you up.”