Fire Sale

23 Star-crossed Lovers

The snow had stopped when I got outside. The snows of November are usually light, merely a warning to the city of what lies ahead, and this one had ended with a scant half inch. It was a fine, dry powder, blowing across the walks, disappointing a group of kids in the vacant lot next to me who were trying to turn it into snowballs.

I sat in my car, the engine running and the heater on, and tried to make a few notes while the conversation with the Dorrados was still more or less fresh in my mind, although I was hard put to make sense of anything I’d heard just now.

BILLY, I wrote in block letters in my notebook, and then stared at it, unable to think of anything to add. What was going on with him? When we spoke on Thursday, he told me to tell his father he’d call the company’s shareholders if the family didn’t leave him alone. Was that why Buffalo Bill had come to see me last night? And, if that was the case, what didn’t the Bysens want the shareholders to know? From my perspective, the company did a ton of outrageous things-locking employees in overnight, paying badly, busting unions, leaving families like the Czernins in the lurch when it came to health insurance-but the shareholders must know those things already. What could be so horrible that the shareholders would shy away from it?

I thought back to the prayer meeting out at By-Smart headquarters. The share price had fallen on the rumor that By-Smart was going to allow union organizers. Maybe Billy was just threatening to call and say that was really going to happen. But what would be the “or else”?

Just why had Billy run away from home? Was it because he was in love with Josie, or troubled by his family’s business practices, or ardently committed to the South Side? Certainly he admired Pastor Andrés, but what would make him ally himself with the preacher against his family?

Which brought me to the preacher himself, whom Buffalo Bill had threatened with deportation. Of course, the Buffalo dished out threats like hash at a diner-last night, he’d threatened to get the bank to foreclose on my mortgage and to shut down my business if I didn’t do what he wanted. Maybe it was a form of verbal incontinence-Mildred had kept shutting him up in a nice, deferential way.

At the same time, the Bysens really did have enormous power, more than I could imagine. If you operated a colossus like By-Smart, with its global reach, with annual sales bigger than the GDP of most of the countries in the world, you could get congressmen and immigration officers to do pretty much anything you wanted. Say, Pastor Andrés was here on a green card-the Bysens could probably get that revoked with one phone call. Who knows-if he was naturalized, they might even be able to get his citizenship stripped from him. Perhaps that would take three calls instead of just the one, but it wouldn’t surprise me to hear they’d done it.

I printed ANDRÉS on the next page. I didn’t care much about his ties to Billy, but what did he know about the fire at Fly the Flag? He’d met with Frank Zamar ten days ago, the day I’d surprised the punk in the basement.

That punk. Between April’s heart stopping and watching the factory go up in flames, I’d forgotten the punk. Andrés knew who he was. A chavo banda, whom one saw around stealing from jobsites, Andrés had said, and he’d shooed him away from the street where we’d been talking. Maybe Andrés was just protecting his jobsite, but maybe he knew something more about that chavo.

FIND THE CHAVO, I added, followed by FREDDY?? Did he matter in the scheme of things? Seeing his name next to “Find the chavo” made me wonder if he was that chavo. But a punk, what would he be doing in Andrés’s office, able to overhear Buffalo Bill threaten the pastor? Or, or, or. My brain wasn’t working. Despite the heater, my feet were starting to freeze, and I was feeling a dull throb in my wound. I stuck the notebook back in my bag.

I was putting the car into gear when a midnight blue Miata, with a license plate that read “The Kid 1,” pulled up in front of the Dorrado building. I hadn’t suspected Billy of so much whimsy. I hesitated briefly, then shut off the Mustang’s engine and got out to cross the street.

I leaned over the driver’s door as Billy was starting to extricate himself. “Your car is about a hundred times easier to trace than your phone, Billy, especially with that vanity plate. Even I could track you if I wanted to. It will be child’s play for the big agencies that your dad and your grandfather use. You want them charging in on Josie and her family?”

He turned white. “Are you following me? For them?”

“Nope. I came to see Josie and her mom. And realized you’ve been sleeping here. It’s not a great idea, for lots of reasons, one of which is I don’t want Josie having a baby.”

“I-we wouldn’t, we don’t, I respect her. I belong to True Love Waits.”

“Yeah, but teenagers in a bedroom all night, respect only carries you so far for so long. Besides that, they don’t have any money. Ms. Dorrado lost her job-it’s a burden for her to have an extra person there.”

“I wasn’t taking food from them. But you’re right: I should buy some groceries for them.” He flushed. “Only, I’ve never been grocery shopping, I mean for a family, of course I’ve been in a store sometimes. I don’t know what you buy if you want to cook a meal. There are so many ordinary things that I don’t know.”

He was touching in his earnestness. “Why don’t you want to go home?”

“I need to figure some things out. Some things about my family.” He shut his mouth tightly.

“What did you mean by that message to your father, about you calling the shareholders if he kept looking for you? I gather it’s upset both him and your grandfather.”

“That’s one of the things I need to figure out.”

“Were you threatening to call your major shareholders to say that By-Smart was going to allow union activity?”

His soft face hardened in indignation. “That would be a lie: I don’t tell lies, especially not one like that, that would hurt my grandfather.”

“What, then?” I tried to smile engagingly. “I’d be glad to lend an ear, if it would help to have someone to talk them over with.”

He shook his head, his mouth shut in a thin line. “You may mean well, Ms. War-sha-sky. But right now, I don’t know. I don’t know who I can trust, besides Pastor Andrés, and he is really helping me, so thank you, but I think I’ll be all right.”

“If you change your mind, call me; I’ll be glad to talk to you. And I really wouldn’t betray you to your family.” I handed him a card. “But do Josie a favor: find somewhere else to stay. Even if you don’t sleep with her, your grandfather is bound to find you here, especially with a car that stands out like yours. People in this neighborhood notice everything, and plenty of them will be willing to tell your dad or your grandfather they’ve seen you here. Buffalo Bill’s-your grandfather’s-angry; I know you know he threatened the pastor with deportation just because you and Josie had a Coke together. He could cause Rose Dorrado a lot of trouble, and she needs a job right now, not more trouble.”

“Oh. Now that Fly the Flag is gone-I didn’t even think.” He sighed. “All I thought was, What difference does it make?, and, of course, it makes a terrible difference to the people who worked there. Thank you for reminding me, Ms. War-sha-sky.”

“All you thought was ‘What difference does it make?’” I repeated sharply. “What do you mean by that?”

He waved his arms in a vague gesture that seemed to mean the South Side around him, or maybe the world around him, and shook his head unhappily.

I turned on my heel to cross the street, then remembered the frog soap dish. I pulled out the baggie again from my bag and showed the frog to him.

He shook his head again. “What is it?”

“To me, it looks like a soap dish in the shape of a frog. Julia Dorrado says she bought it, or one like it, at By-Smart last Christmas.”

“We carry so much stuff, I don’t know our whole inventory. And I only met Josie this summer, when my church did the exchange. Where did you find it? I hope you aren’t trying to say we sell things that are this dirty.”

He was so serious all the time that it took me a moment to realize he was trying to make a joke. The license plate, and now a joke: maybe there were depths in the Kid that I was overlooking. I smiled dutifully, and explained where I’d picked it up.

He hunched a shoulder. “Maybe someone dropped it there. There’s always a lot of garbage around these old buildings.”

“Maybe,” I agreed. “But judging from where it was lying when I picked it up, I think it came shooting out when the windows in the drying room blew. So I think it was inside the factory.”

He turned the baggie over in his hands several times. “Maybe someone wanted it, like, as an ornament on a flagpole. Or maybe one of the ladies who worked there used it as a mascot. I see that a lot down here, people have funny things as mascots.”

“Don’t be a wet blanket,” I said. “It’s my only clue; I have to pursue it enthusiastically.”

“And then what? What if it leads you to some poor person down here who’s already spent their whole life being harassed by the police?”

I narrowed my eyes. “Do you know who put this in the factory, or why?”

“No, but you, you’re treating it like it was a game, like you’re in Crossing Jordan or something. And people down here-”

“Don’t keep talking to me about ‘people down here,’” I snapped. “I grew up in this neighborhood. For you, maybe this is a game, living among the natives, but for people like me, who never spent a dime we didn’t work like dogs to earn, this is not a romantic neighborhood. Desperation and poverty push people to do mean, spiteful, sordid, and even cruel things. Frank Zamar died in that fire. If someone set it, then I will be happy to lead the police to him. Or her.”

His soft young face tightened again. “Well, people who are richer than anyone also do mean and spiteful-and-and cruel things. I am not playing a game down here. This is the most serious thing that has ever happened in my life. And if you tell my grandfather where you saw me, it will be-mean and cruel. And spiteful.”

“Relax, Galahad, I’m not ratting you out. But he found you at the church on his own this morning, and it won’t take much for him to find you here.”

He nodded again, his anger disappearing into his serious good manners. “You are giving me good advice, Ms. War-sha-sky. I do appreciate it. And if they can trace my car as easily as you say, I guess I shouldn’t hang around here.”

He looked forlornly at the battered building for a long minute, then climbed back into his little sports car and took off. I looked up at the apartment, wondering if Juliet had been on the lookout for Romeo. I was tempted to go back inside and reassure her-he came to see you, but one of the Capulets was lurking. It was a silly fantasy-with Rose’s economic woes, the Bysen family, Pastor Andrés, and all those young hormones, I definitely shouldn’t meddle.

I was crossing the street back to my own car when the cabin-cruiser Cadillac turned south onto Escanaba. The driver did a laborious U-turn and pulled up in front of the Dorrados’ building. Young Montague had escaped in the nick of time.

The chauffeur put on his peaked hat and opened the middle door to help Mr. Bysen from the backseat. Mr. William, who’d been sitting in the third row of seats, climbed down to assist his mother.

I crossed Escanaba back to the boat. “Hi, Mr. Bysen. Great service, wasn’t it? Pastor Andrés is a truly inspired preacher.”

Buffalo Bill pulled his cane out of the middle seat, made sure he was standing erect, and puffed air out at me. “What are you doing here?”

I smiled. “Sunday after church is when we all pay social calls. Isn’t that what you’re doing?”

I heard a ripple of malicious laughter and peered inside the Caddy. Jacqui was sitting in the front seat. Her husband, who was in the third bank of seats, called out a sharp reprimand to her, but she just laughed again, and said, “I never knew Christian worship could be so dramatic.”

“Will you make your wife behave?” William snarled at Uncle Gary.

“Oh, yes,” Jacqui said, “‘as the church is subject to Christ, so let wives also be subject in everything to their husbands.’ I have heard that verse quoted once or twice, Willie, once or twice. Just because you and your father want it to be true doesn’t make it true.”

Buffalo Bill put the crook of his cane over my shoulder and jerked me around to face him. “Never mind all that squabbling. I’ve come to find my boy. Is he here?”

I took the cane from my shoulder and pulled it out of his hand. “There are easier ways to get both my attention and my goodwill, Mr. Bysen.”

He glared at me. “I asked you a question and I expect an answer.”

“Oh, Bill, never mind all that.” Mrs. Bysen had come around the back of the Caddy to where we were standing; she spoke to her husband but looked at me. “We haven’t met, but William told me you were the detective he’d hired to find our Billy. Do you know where he is? Is this where that Mexican girl lives? Jacqui thinks she knows something, so she asked one of our people to find their name and address.”

“I’m V. I. Warshawski, Mrs. Bysen. I’m sorry, but I don’t know where Billy is. The Dorrado family lives here; one of the girls is on my basketball team. They’re in considerable distress right now because the factory where the mother worked burned down last week and she has five children to support. They’ve got a lot more than Billy on their minds, I’m afraid.”

“Billy doesn’t have good sense,” Bysen growled. “If they’re giving him a sob story he’ll fall for it, hook, line, and sinker.”

“Billy is a good boy,” his wife reproved him. “If he is helping people in distress, he’s a good Christian, and I’m proud of him.”

“Oh, enough of this nonsense. I’m going up to see this girl for myself. If she needs to be bought off, well-”

“We will not be blackmailed by any welfare cheats,” Mr. William interrupted his father. “Billy needs to learn a few things about life. If he has to learn them the hard way, the lessons will stick with him longer.”

“That’s a good paternal attitude,” I applauded him. “No wonder both your kids ran away from home.”

Jacqui laughed again, delighted with the rancor. Buffalo Bill snatched his cane from me and stomped up the broken walk to the front door. His wife squeezed my hand before following him, with Mr. William taking her arm again. The chauffeur opened the apartment door for them, then leaned against the building to smoke a cigarette.

I climbed into the middle row of seats, behind Jacqui. “So you called Patrick Grobian at the warehouse to track down the Dorrados? How does he know them?”

“Not that it’s any of your business, but you ought to realize that anyone who wants to move ahead in the Bysen operation has to keep track of what’s important to the big buffalo. Pat saw the girl having a Coke with Billy in September; he knew the old man would want that information. He made it his business to find out who she was. So of course he knows where she lives.”

“No one can expect to move too far up the By-Smart ladder if they’re not part of the family,” I said.

“You don’t need to be the CEO to have a lot of power and make a lot of money in a company this big. Pat knows that, and he’s a go-getter. If he was a Bysen, he’d be leading the pack. As it is, when the old man goes, he’s likely to get a good position at the home office.”

“If you’re in charge,” her husband said from the back of the Caddy. “But, my dear Jacqueline, you won’t be. William will be, and he doesn’t like you.”

“This isn’t medieval England,” Jacqui said. “Just because he’s the oldest doesn’t mean Willie gets the throne, although he’s like poor Prince Charles, isn’t he, waiting around for his mum to die, except in this case Willie is waiting for Daddy to die. I’m surprised sometimes he doesn’t-”

“Jacqui.” Gary ’s voice sounded a warning. “Not everyone has your sense of humor. If you want to keep doing the work you’re doing, you need to learn to get along with William, that’s all I’m going to say.”

Jacqui turned around in the front seat and fluttered improbably long eyelashes. “Darling, I am doing everything I can to help William. Everything. Just ask him how much he owes me these days and you’ll be surprised by his change in attitude. He finally sees how incredibly useful I can be.”

“Maybe,” Gary muttered. “Maybe.”

I looked over at the apartment, thinking I should go up to give Rose a helping hand. She didn’t have the resources to face the Bysens alone. Before I got to the front door, though, the trio reappeared.

“Did they know anything about Billy?” I asked Mrs. Bysen.

She shook her head unhappily. “I can’t be sure. I appealed to the woman as a mother and a grandmother-I can see how much she loves those children, and how hard she works to give them a decent life-but she said she only ever sees him at Mount Ararat, and the girls said the same thing. Do you think they’re telling the truth?”

“People like that don’t know truth from lies, Mother,” Mr. William said. “It’s easy to see where Billy got his gullibility.”

“You don’t talk to your mother that way while I’m alive, Willie. If Billy got your mother’s sweet disposition, that isn’t a bad thing. The rest of you pack of hyenas, you’re all waiting for me to die so you can eat the company I built.” He glowered at me. “If I find you know where my boy is and you’re not telling me-”

“I know,” I said wearily. “You’ll break me in your soup like crackers.”

I stomped across the street again and turned my car around to head for home.