by Rick Bennet
Kellogg: How about “A private individual has hired us to help find the boy”?
Passer: Fine.
Kellogg: Look around the house for signs the boy might be there. No, he won’t be there, because he would have been seen. But see how worried she is. If she’s cool about the assistance offer, it might just be because she knows he isn’t missing.
Passer does “black up” a very little bit, with a lightly curled wig pulled over her own short, straight, fine hair; with some very slightly darkening foundation. Some accent and talk. Just a little. She’s careful to underplay roles, but she knows Kellogg is right when he says people are more open with members of their own race. She knows the different prejudices about darkness within the black community. She could have, and has previously, blacked all the way up. But she thinks it’s better psychology to go for the mixed-race look here.
She dresses sharply, professionally, in a navy-blue skirt with a white blouse, matching jacket, handbag, and pumps. As she stands at the corner during lunch hour on this bright spring day, flagging a cab, every man looks at her; most women do too. She’s the picture of city confidence, youthful assurance, daytime elegance. She gets a cab in forty-five seconds. Minutes later she’s at Mrs. James’s dull-red brick row house, going up the steps of the wood porch, knocking on the door.
Mrs. James opens the door. Looks at Passer. Nods and smiles.
Passer, in sunglasses, seems arrogant, aloof, with her slenderness and height and style. She takes the sunglasses off, and the intelligent innocence of her eyes dispels the intimidation her beauty sometimes causes.
“I’m Catherine Jones,” she says softly.
“I know,” Mrs. James says, beckoning Passer inside, leading her down the wood-floored hall to the bright, daylit, white-tiled kitchen. “I remember you from your testimony at the Chavez trial.”
“My boss, Kellogg, called you?”
“Yes.”
They enter the kitchen, and Passer sees a light-skinned young girl whose stiff long hair is pulled back into a ponytail. Sitting at the table, she is drawing with colored markers. The girl looks up at Passer. Studies her. Doesn’t speak.
Passer says hello and smiles. The girl, eyes running over Passer’s clothes, says hello back but doesn’t smile.
“This is my granddaughter,” Mrs. James says.
“I gathered,” Passer says. “She’s so pretty.”
“Isn’t she? Interracial children just always seem better-looking than either parent. Isn’t that strange? I always thought that was God’s way of telling us something.” She hesitates, then says, “Don’t get mad I ask this, but what all is in you?”
“I don’t mind you ask.”
“Some people are sensitive about that question.”
“I’m sensitive about it sometimes. But not paranoid. I’m part black, part Vietnamese, part Mexican, part white. My Vietnamese part is also half Chinese.”
“That’s a lot of stuff!” the little girl says.
Passer smiles. “I’m an all-American mongrel.”
“No, not mongrel,” Mrs. James says. “Thoroughbred.”
“Okay,” Passer says.
“You want some tea or coffee or soda?” Mrs. James asks. “Sure. Whatever you have.”
“Well, since we all went to England a few years ago, I have just loved a nice afternoon tea.”
“Sounds good.”
“It’ll take a minute. You sit on down.”
Passer sits by the girl while Mrs. James puts water on to boil, then pulls out a fine china tea service.
“This was my London souvenir,” she says proudly, putting the cups and saucers and teapot, the creamer and sugar bowl, on the table.
“It’s beautiful,” Passer says, picking up a cup, examining it, admiring it.
“Are we going to have those cookies now?” the girl asks.
“Yes,” Mrs. James declares. She takes a wondrously decorated tin box of cookies out of a cupboard, sets a lace napkin over a plate that matches the rest of the service, puts the cookies on the plate, and sets the plate on the table across from the girl, out of her reach. The girl says nothing, just bites her lower lip a bit.
“I think you’ll survive five minutes of waiting,” Passer says to her.
The girl looks forlornly at her coloring paper, sullenly picks up a marker, and goes back to it. Passer and Mrs. James share a smile.
While the water comes to a boil, and then for a few minutes afterward as the tea steeps, Mrs. James and Passer talk about the neighborhood, her garden, tea, England. Passer tells a joke in perfectly mimicked British and Cockney accents, making the girl and Mrs. James laugh, relax. The tea comes ready and the cookie plate gets passed around. Ten minutes later the cookies are gone, the first cups of tea finished. The girl asks Passer to do her accents again, tell the joke again, which Passer does. After she stops laughing at Passer’s joke, she asks, “Is that a wig?”
“Girl,” Mrs. James says.
Passer pries into her hair, unzips the wig, and says, “You want to try it on?”
“Yes! I can? Cool.”
She takes the wig and leads Passer to the bathroom, where Passer puts it on for her, as best she can considering it’s big for the child’s head. Passer then brushes up her own hair, washes her hands.
The girl shows off for her grandmother, asks if she can wear it until Ms. Jones leaves. Mrs. James says yes, but go outside, out back, and play in the garden, because they have to talk about some grown-up things. The girl’s smile disappears. She knows what “grown-up things” means these days.
She turns on the radio on the windowsill. Points it outside so she can listen to it out there. Country music. Goes outside.
“She likes country music?” Passer asks. “Her mother played it at home. I guess it soothes her now.”
Mrs. James refills their teacups. Sits back down, across from Passer at the table, where she can keep an eye on her granddaughter. “Henry told me you made yourself look blacker for your testimony in the Chavez trial, to help with the jury. Is this your natural color now?”
“I’m a little lighter than this, even. I’m sorry.”
“I don’t mind. Henry said it was his idea to put you on the stand. That you didn’t really need to testify, but he wanted you up there for just a minute, to help make the case seem more racially balanced.”
A Washington Hispanic business organization had hired Passer to supplement what they considered a disappointing police investigation in that case, particularly within the Hispanic community.
“Did you talk much with your son about his cases?” Passer asks.
“No.”
“Do you know what he was working on … last?” Mrs. James sighs. “You work for Mr. Kellogg?”
“Yes.”
“For what client?”
“That’s private.”
“So am I”
There’s an edge in Mrs. James’s voice when she says that. Part of her might sometimes fear the world, but part of her has lost too much to care too much. She could not have asked for more in a son, or been prouder than she’d been of Henry. She had come to truly love Jessica.
“Jimmy Close hired us.”
“Hmm.”
“You know who he is?”
“Yes.”
“Does it offend you that we’re working for him?”
“I don’t know. Why are you working for him?”
“Mrs. James, Jimmy Close says LTC had nothing to do with your son and his wife’s murder, or your grandson’s disappearance. He told us that. He hired us, among other things, to help prove it. I believe him, by instinct.”
“What does that have to do with me?”
“I don’t know.”
“What did you want to ask me about?”
“What can you tell us about your son’s cases, his investigations, into the Mayor’s administration, or New Africa, or any other political organization?”
“Nothing. He didn’t mind if I sat in on the trials he pros
ecuted. But he didn’t talk about his business with me.”
“Do you think he knew Ells, even slightly?”
“I don’t know. The police say they’ve found no connection.”
“What about the boy? Any idea where he might be?” She shakes her head, her shoulders droop. “I don’t know.”
Passer knows then that Mrs. James doesn’t have the boy or know where he is. “Is there anyplace, or anyone, he might have gone to?”
“I’ve answered those questions for the police and the FBI.”
“But you don’t trust them.”
“And I do trust you?”
“Yes.”
Mrs. James smiles at the young woman’s confidence and perceptiveness. Says, “Maybe.”
Passer returns her smile. “My boss and I, between us, know this city, its people, and can get in anywhere and ask anyone anything. Better than the police, because we aren’t the police. Let us look for the boy.”
Mrs. James thinks about that. Says, “Of course. Maybe that would be good.”
“So you still have hope for him?”
Tears suddenly rush down the older woman’s face, and Passer cringes in recognition of her question’s stupidity. She blinks back her own tears. Says, strongly, because she feels it strongly, “We’re going to look for him. Okay? I swear to you.”
Passer stares into Mrs. James’s eyes. Asks, “What do you know that you haven’t told the police?”
Mrs. James shakes her head. She fluctuates between great strength and determination, and weakness, surrender. The emotional switching exhausts her. “I think I do trust you. I need to trust someone. But my other son, he says don’t trust anyone, don’t talk to anyone.”
“What?”
Mrs. James nods. “There is one thing I haven’t told the police. And my other son, he’s tried to look into it and not gotten anywhere. So I’d like you to look into it, because, for reasons you’ll understand when I tell you, you’re more likely than anyone to succeed at it. But I have to talk to my son first. Okay? Can you come back tonight?”
Passer nods.
“And bring your boss with you?”
12
LONG RAY SITS IM HIS MOTHER’S KITCHEN, saying no to the tea she’s willing to make for him, saying he’ll walk the few blocks to the store and get some black coffee. Says he’ll think about what she’s said. Says she might be right, but he still doesn’t like it. Admits he can’t get hold of Chavez but says working with white people always turns out bad.
She says, As opposed to all the associating you’ve done with blacks, which has put you in prison for most of your life?
Long walks to the store. Gets his coffee. Comes back. Turns off the porch light and sits outside, in a corner, nearly invisible in the dark, from which he can see the street.
Kellogg and Passer, driving his ex-taxi, park down the block in the only spot open this time of night. Kellogg labors up the walk. Passer slows down to not distance him, but bounds up the steps to the front door without him. She looks back. He’s not following her; he’s looking to the porch’s corner. Saying, “How you doing?”
Only now does Passer notice Long, who’s partly hidden from her by the front window’s open shutter.
“You the man, huh?” Long says sarcastically.
Kellogg slowly climbs the three steps.
“You all right?” Long says. “That’s three whole steps there.”
“Don’t worry about it.”
“Why would 1?”
“You the serial killer?”
“Don’t worry about it.”
“I got your sheet. Killed three people. And that’s just the ones you been caught for.” Kellogg, the find-it-out wizard, this afternoon made the calls, did the research, and learned who Mrs. James’s other son must be, and then he made some calls and got his arrest record.
Long rises from his seat; glowers at Kellogg. Kellogg stands there, not the least intimidated. Passer sighs. Opens the door. Enters. The men follow her.
In the kitchen, Mrs. James has everyone sit around the table. The girl is upstairs sleeping.
Kellogg, polite, sincere, sensitive to Mrs. James’s difficulties, says, “Ms. Jones tells me you want us to look for your grandson.”
Mrs. James nods.
“She tells me you have some information about where he might have gone?”
Mrs. James nods again.
“Information you haven’t told the police?”
Mrs. James nods one more time. “Are you afraid of them?”
“I think Henry was working on some corruption investigation of them and the Mayor.”
“Mrs. James,” Kellogg says, “I don’t think your grandson is alive. It’s important to me not to mislead you at all. Not to give you any false hopes. But I admired Henry and would be happy to try to help.”
She nods.
Long says, “You know, she don’t trust the police, but I don’t trust you. You’re working for LTC, right?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Those racist motherfuckers are the ones who killed my brother. Now they hire you to cover their own butts. And we’re supposed to trust you?”
“If the path to the boy leads to LTC, I got no problem saying so.”
“Just like that?”
“Sure.”
Long sneers. Kellogg smiles, amused by him.
Passer asks, “Mrs. James, tell us what you know.
Please?”
Mrs. James says, “You know Arcides Chavez. You did some work on that case.” Kellogg and Passer nod.
Mrs. James goes on. “Even though the men who killed Chavez’s wife got off, Chavez respected Henry, and I think he did some work for him after that. I don’t know what, but if Henry wasn’t using the police, then I have to think it might somehow have had something to do with them.”
She tells them the boy spoke of Chavez’s working for Henry She also tells about a night when she was at Henry and Jessica’s house and Chavez came over. Henry and Chavez went into the den, shut the door, and stayed there a long time. And from Jessica, she gathered that it wasn’t the first time Chavez had been there.
“And how does the boy connect with Chavez?” Kellogg asks.
“I remember—and his sister confirmed it when I asked her—that Chavez had become some kind of hero to the boy. Henry really respected Chavez, and you know the boy respected anyone Henry did. His father said that men like Chavez could be trusted long after others let you down. Henry told the boy that if things really got tough, if he ever got in real trouble, Chavez was the one he’d go to.”
“Where is Arcides now?” Passer asks Kellogg.
Kellogg shakes his head. “I’m pretty sure he’s moved out of the city. And I’m not sure how the boy could have gotten to him.”
“Maybe he had his phone number,” Mrs. James says. “I bet you he might have. But when I looked in the phone book and called the phone company, they didn’t have him listed, here or in Maryland or Virginia.”
“You didn’t call from here, did you?” Kellogg asks.
Mrs. James looks confused by the question but answers with a negative shake of the head.
“I ask,” Kellogg says, “because your line is probably being tapped.”
“It is,” she says. “The FBI said it would be, in case a ransom call came in. They asked me if they could.”
“They would have anyway,” Long says.
“They, or the police, might have been tapping it before all this, even,” Kellogg says.
“But I called the phone company from a pay phone,” Mrs. James says. “I wasn’t thinking about a tap; I just happened to be taking my granddaughter for a walk, when she volunteered that maybe her brother had gone to Chavez, and I didn’t want to wait to try to get hold of him.”
“You know what Arcides might have been working on? For Henry?” Passer says. “Something to do with the riot.”
A few years earlier, Latino residents rioted about a police shooting of a Latino man. Latino activists al
leged, and police denied, that video footage of the incident existed, taped by a local television news reporter and crew, which proved that the victim was handcuffed at the time. The officer, a black woman, was cleared of the shooting. The television news reporter and his cameraman, both black, denied having a tape of the incident.
13
NEARLY TWO IN THE MORNING. Passer and Kellogg are at the diner. The cellular phone rings. Passer, expecting the call, answers. Speaks in Spanish. Hangs up. Says, “I didn’t get an address, but I got the name of the bar he’s working at in Georgetown. Dishwashing.”
She tells Kellogg the bar’s name. He knows it. Looks at his watch. Says Chavez should still be there.
Passer: They close at three?
Kellogg: At two. But dirty work stays late. Do this: Go get the car. Pull around to the back alley but don’t stop, just go on through, up to the circle, then come back, stop at the front door, wait thirty seconds, then go around back to the alley entrance again and wait for me.
She knows this means he’s worried about a tail.
Passer: Routine precaution or special reason?
Kellogg: Is there any chance Long or New Africa is using us? They can’t work in the Latino community. Long might have given us Arcides’ name so we’d lead him there. I’m not saying that’s the case but let’s be aware of the possibility.
He takes a sip of coffee. Eats a mouth-filling bite of pie.
Passer goes through the routine with the car, and Kellogg, watching to see if anyone followed her, first when she pulled through the back alley and then when she faked the front-side parking job, sees nothing. She says she’s seen nothing. Downtown D.C. is deserted this time of night. It’s a bad time and place to tail anyone wary.
They drive to Georgetown in Kellogg’s fake cab. Check the bar’s front door—it’s locked, the place just closed. They drive around and park in the alley behind the bar.
A half hour later they see Chavez come out with two large garbage bags. He’s wearing a stained white apron over a sweatshirt and jeans. He puts the bags in the Dumpster and goes back in.
Another fifteen minutes go by.
Chavez, without the apron, comes out with another bag of garbage, throws it in the Dumpster, and starts up the alley in the other direction. Kellogg opens the car door and calls out, “Yo.”