Sara Paretsky - Burn Marks

“She didn’t do it for the money, you know,” Velma said.

I made an impatient gesture. “I know-she did it for her cousin, family loyalty, wanting Hispanics to have a bigger piece of county action. Just because her motives were so damned wonderful doesn’t make me like it any better.”

Velma stared at me unblinkingly for a minute. “Well, anyone looking at your body knows you take risks, Warshawski. I’ll give you that. I did resign from her staff today. She-she-” The wide, generous mouth crumpled. “She talked to me so sweet, you’d think that voice was every mother in the world singing a lullaby. That hurt. I had to quit.”

I looked at her and nodded without speaking. She winked back her tears and left abruptly.

The Birthday Party

On Saturday, before I took old Mr. Seligman his check, I stopped at a Pontiac dealership on Western and bought myself a bright red Trans Am. I’ve never owned a new car before, especially not one with twin exhausts and 180 horsepower. I didn’t know what I was going to do for money to pay for it, but when it moved up to fifty with just a whisper of gas it seemed like the car I’d been waiting for all my life.

After that I took my time going north and west to Norwood Park. Eileen had decided to go ahead with the party for Bobby. So much planning had gone into it, involving so much of the neighborhood, that she didn’t feel she could turn it off now. The people on either side were lending their yards so there’d be a place for a refreshment tent and for some pipers.

I’d called Eileen to tell her I wasn’t up to seeing Bobby, but she’d begged me to come.

“Vicki, try to understand. Michael is his godson. He was like a seventh child to Bobby and his great hope in the department. He was only yelling at you out of his hurt for Michael.”

“It doesn’t work for me, Eileen. Michael wanted to kill me and he damned near did it. By the time Bobby finished with me I felt he wished it had happened.”

“No, no, don’t ever think such a thing.” Her warm rich voice cracked in distress. “Tony’s child? Gabriella’s? It was himself he wanted to attack, for letting himself be so betrayed. He-Bobby’s a good man, Vicki. A good cop too. You know that. Tony would never have taken him up if he wasn’t. But-he’s not good at thinking through these things, figuring out why he lashed out at you the way he did. He has other strengths, but not that one. I’m asking you-begging you-to understand and be better than him. It would mean so much. Not just to him, but to me. So if you can’t do it for him, will you do it for me?”

And so I found myself ducking under a billboard of Boots Meagher at the corner of Nagle-a smiling year-round fixture proclaiming that “Boots Is Chicago”-and crossing into Bobby’s neighborhood. Bobby’s neighborhood. Michael’s neighborhood. Where my father and uncles and Aunt Elena grew up. Where Boots and Ernie and Ron came from. Where they all grew up together and helped each other out because the one thing you must never forget in Chicago is to look out for your own.

Usually when I cross the invisible line into Norwood Park I feel as though I’ve gone into Munchkin land, a place of tidy tiny bungalows on minuscule well-tended lots. It’s a mirage of a neighborhood-it seems to have nothing to do with the sprawling, graffiti-laden, garbage-ridden city to the southeast.

Today, though, it seemed dead. The October air was gray and the houses looked drab and colorless. Even the bursts of fall flowers in the tidy yards seemed drained of vividness, the bronze mums looking brown, the gold ones merely sickly. I wished I was anywhere in the world but here.

I pulled my new toy into a line with other cars blocking the street. No one would be out ticketing today. I dragged myself slowly up the short drive. Laughter and the sound of bagpipes were coming from the back. A few knots of people had spilled over into the front yard. They smiled and waved at me in the happy camaraderie of a big party and I dutifully waved back.

When I got to the back the crowd was packed into every inch of turf, not just in Eileen’s yard by the two adjacent. A canopy with Bobby’s name done up in lights stood in the middle. I couldn’t see the pipes or anyone I knew. I stood awkwardly on the fringe until Eileen suddenly came from nowhere and pulled me to her large soft breasts.

“Oh, Vicki, oh, it’s so good to see you. Thank you so much for coming. I was afraid… Anyway, Bobby’s over here. He’ll be so pleased-he hasn’t said-but you know…” Tears sparkled on her long black lashes. She took my hand and made her way through the throng to the densest part, where Bobby stood. Beyond him a piper was playing and the crowd was urging Bobby to dance.

Eileen waited until the howl of the reel had ended before thrusting me forward. “Bobby. Look who’s come.”

When Bobby saw me the smile died from his face. He looked at me with some combination of embarrassment and rigidness.

“You guys gotta excuse me,” he said abruptly to the group around him. “I need to see this young lady for a few minutes.”

He took me into the house, a slow procession through the jam of happy neighbors, fellow cops-I even saw Officer Neely looking flushed and relaxed in a bright fuchsia dress-and screaming grandchildren.

Inside the house two of Bobby’s daughters were constructing a giant cake. They squealed when they saw him. “Daddy! You know you’re not supposed to come in here.”

“It’s okay, girls-I ain’t seen nothin’. I’m just going down to the family room with Vicki for a few minutes. You keep everyone out, okay?”

“Sure, Daddy, but go on before you see something!” They shooed us down the steps.

Bobby had finished the basement himself, installing a bathroom, real floors and walls, building in bunk beds for his two sons when there’d been six children in seven rooms upstairs. Only two of their daughters were still at home, but he’d left the beds for his grandchildren to sleep in-he loved having them stay over.

He turned on a lamp and sat on the red plaid couch next to the bunk beds. I sat in the shabby armchair facing him, next to the fake fireplace. He moved his big hands uncomfortably, trying to think of something to say. I didn’t help him.

“I didn’t expect to see you here,” he said at last.

“I didn’t want to come. Eileen talked me into it.”

He looked at the floor and muttered, “I said a lot of things I shouldn’t have last week. I’m sorry.”

“You hurt my feelings, Bobby.” I couldn’t keep my voice from cracking. “Your golden boy damned near killed me and you talked to me like I was some kind of street scum.”

He rubbed his face. “I-Vicki, I talked to Eileen about it, she tried to make sense out of it for me. I don’t know why I did it, that’s God’s truth. Dr. Herschel called me. That’s how I knew you were in trouble. You know about that part, don’t you?”

I nodded without speaking.

“I knew by then it was Mickey. Well, you’d tried to tell me, but it wasn’t until she told me he’d shot the old man that I-don’t look at me like that, Vicki, you’re making it hard to say this and it’s hard enough to start with.”

I turned my head toward the cowboy coverlets on the bunk beds.

“I called John and the Finch. They weren’t as upset as I was-they knew Mickey’d been acting queer since the day before when you brought that damned bracelet of his in. And they’d wondered about some other things. Of course they’d never told me-I was the lieutenant and he was my fair-haired boy.” He gave a harsh laugh. “What was the story with the bracelet? Why did it send him into orbit?”