Sara Paretsky - Fire Sale

In the evening, when we’d eaten the way one always does on these holidays, and I was in the garden with the dogs, Morrell limped out to join me. He didn’t need his cane for short periods now, a hopeful sign.

With the crowd inside, and me watching the football game while Morrell talked politics with Marcena’s father, we hadn’t really spent any time together today. The sky was already dark, but the garden was protected by a high wall that kept the fiercest of the lake winds at bay. We sat under the trellis where a few late-blooming roses produced a feeble sweetness. I tossed sticks for the dogs to keep Mitch from digging.

“I’ve been jealous of Marcena.” I was astonished to hear myself say that.

“Darling, not to be indelicate, but a Siberian tiger in the living room is less obvious than you are.”

“She takes so many risks, she’s done so much!”

Morrell was astounded. “ Victoria, if you took any more risks, you’d have been dead before I ever met you. What do you want? Skydiving without a parachute? Climb Mount Everest without oxygen?”

“Insouciance,” I said. “I do things because people need me, or I think they do-Billy, Mary Ann, the Dorrados. Marcena does things out of a spirit of adventure. It’s the spirit, that’s what’s different between us.”

He held me more tightly. “Yes, I can see that-she must look as though she’s free, and you feel too tightly bound. I don’t know what to say about that, but-I like knowing I can count on you.”

“But I’m tired of people counting on me.” I told him the image I’d had, the rhino and the greyhound.

He gave a loud shout of laughter but took my hand. “Vic, you’re beautiful in motion, or even when you’re lying still-not that that happens very often. I love your energy, and the grace you have when you run. For Christ’s sake, stop being jealous of Marcena. I can’t imagine you casually helping Bron Czernin rig a lethal device in his back kitchen and then not telling the cops because you didn’t want to ruin your big story. And it’s not because you’re so damn conscientious, it’s because you use your brain, okay?”

“Okay,” I said, not really convinced, but ready to drop the subject.

“Speaking of jealousy, why does Sandra Czernin have it in for you?” Morrell asked.

I felt my face turning crimson in the dark garden. “When we were in high school, I helped play a very nasty practical joke on her. My cousin Boom-Boom invited her to the senior prom. My mom had just died, my dad was kind of clinging to me, didn’t want me dating, and Boom-Boom had said I could go with him. But when I found out he was taking Sandra and I’d be like a fifth wheel, I really lost it. We’d already had some disagreements, she and I, so the prom felt like a total betrayal to me. She slept around, all us girls knew that, but I wouldn’t acknowledge that Boom-Boom did, too. She used to be pretty, in a soft, Persian cat kind of way, and I suppose, well, never mind that. Anyway, I was furious, and-and my basketball team and I, we stole her underpants out of her locker when she was in the pool-we used to have a swim program at Bertha Palmer. The night before the prom, we broke into the gym and shinnied up the ropes and hung her pants from the ceiling, with a big red S drawn on them, next to Boom-Boom’s letter jacket. When Boom-Boom found out it was me, he didn’t speak to me for six months.”

Morrell was roaring with laughter.

“It’s not funny!” I shouted.

“Oh, it is, Warshawski, it is. You are such a pit dog. Maybe you don’t have a spirit of insouciance, but whatever your spirit is-it keeps a lot of people on their toes.”

I figured he meant it as a compliment, so I tried to take it as one. We sat in the garden until I was shivering in the chill air. After a while, we went back to his place with the dogs-a Loop-bound guest volunteered to drive Mr. Contreras home. We huddled in bed much of the weekend, two sore and fragile bodies, bringing each other such comfort as this mortal life affords.

On Monday, I had a call from Mildred, the Bysen family factotum, to say they had cut a check for Sandra Czernin and were messengering it down to her. “You might like to know that Rose Dorrado started work this morning as a supervisor in our Ninety-fifth Street store. And Mr. Bysen feels he’d like to make a special gesture to Bertha Palmer High, since that’s where he went to school. He’s going to build a new gym this summer, and, next winter, he’ll install coaches for both the girls’ and the boys’ basketball teams. We’ll be holding a press conference on this down at the school this afternoon. We’re creating a whole new program for teens called the ‘Bysen Promise Program.’ It will help teens keep a Christian focus through athletics.”

“That’s wonderful news,” I said. “I know Mr. Bysen’s Christian practices will be highly regarded on the South Side.”

She started to ask me what I meant by that but decided to change the subject, just asking for my fax number so she could send me the complete details.

The press conference took place right before Monday’s basketball practice. The girls were so excited that it proved impossible afterward to keep them focused on their workout. I finally sent them home early, but told them they’d have to have a double practice on Thursday to make up for it.

The Bysen Promise Program wouldn’t start formally until next fall, which meant I was stuck with coaching the team for the rest of the season. To my surprise, I found I was glad to stay with them.

During the dreary winter months, Billy flew to Korea to see his sister. He brought her home with him, and they bought one of the little houses Pastor Andrés had been helping build. I had the feeling that Billy and Josie’s passion might have run its course. He was such a scrupulous kid, he continued to look after her, to see that she worked hard on her academics, but his energy now was turned to a program he and his sister were running called “The Kid for Kids,” to provide tutoring and job training for young people in the neighborhood.

Right after New Year’s, April Czernin had her cardioverter defibrillator implanted. It would be several months before she could return to school, but she did show up for the Lady Tigers home games, where the other girls treated her as a kind of mascot. Celine and Sancia, the co-captains, were very solemn about dedicating their games to her.

Sandra used part of the rest of Bron’s indemnity check to build a small addition to her house, so her parents could move in and help look after April. She also bought a used Saturn, but the rest of the money she squirreled away for April. She knew she had me to thank for getting her the money so fast, and without any legal battles-or fees-but it didn’t make her any less venomous when we ran into each other at the high school.

During the winter, I also kept having to make depositions to the various lawyers involved in the legal battles over By-Smart’s operations. They were following a predictable course of discovery, investigation, motions, continuances-I didn’t know if a judge would set a trial date in my lifetime.

I was outraged to learn that Grobian had actually gone back to work at the warehouse: Billy, flushing painfully, said his grandfather admired Grobian for his forcefulness. William, on the other hand, was taking an extended leave of absence: Buffalo Bill couldn’t forgive his son’s wish that he have a stroke and die. And Gary had begun divorce proceedings against Aunt Jacqui-another legal battle that was likely to go on for a few decades. She wasn’t going to relinquish those Bysen billions at all easily.

The only good thing, really, to come out of the By-Smart carnage was a thaw in my relationship with Conrad. After basketball practice, we’d meet sometimes for a cup of coffee or a whiskey. I never told Morrell about it-Conrad and I were old friends-we could have a drink now and then. After all, it wasn’t like he was staying with me the way Marcena was staying at Morrell’s while she recovered her strength. Even if Morrell preferred my conscientious spirit to her insouciance, I didn’t much like finding her propped up in the living room every time I went over.