Steve Hamilton - The hunting wind

“Come on,” I said. “While we still have some of the day left. Show me where she lived.”

We walked east on Michigan Avenue. There was a big car dealership across from the stadium, and then a little corner bar and a dry cleaner. We passed a block of little brick houses, where during the season the owners would sit outside on their lawn chairs, watching the people make their way toward the stadium. Some of them would make a little money by letting cars park in their driveways. With the new stadium opening up next season, that was about to end.

“Leverette Street,” Randy said. “It’s right up there. God, Alex, this feels kinda weird.”

“I wonder why,” I said.

“Lindell AC is one more block down, right? Whaddya say we go have a drink first?”

“We’ll go there later,” I said. “Show me the house.”

We walked south on Leverette, right into the heart of old Corktown. It used to be a Polish neighborhood, and this street was probably the high end of the market back then. Most of the houses were two-story Victorians, and every single one of them looked restored and freshly painted. A sign on the comer read CORKTOWN, DETROIT’S OLDEST NEIGHBORHOOD.

“God, where’s the house?” he said. “It was two forty-one. That much I remember. Here on the left side, in the middle of the block, close enough to Michigan Avenue that you could see the sign…”

We passed a man mowing his lawn, which, from the size of the lawn, would take him about three minutes. There were thousands of blocks just like this one all through Detroit and into the suburbs. Just enough room for a house, a driveway, and maybe five hundred square feet of lawn in the front, another thousand square feet in the back. Just like the house I had grown up in over in Dearborn. Just like the house I had bought after I got married, over in Redford. If I had stayed down here, I’d still have the same kind of house.

Some kids were out playing catch. Another kid was riding a bike. This street happened to be mostly black now, the Polish immigrants long gone. We were the only two white faces on the block, but nobody seemed to notice. Randy walked slowly. He was trying to picture the place the way it had been almost thirty years before.

The house numbers progressed from 235 to 237 to 239. And then we stopped in front of 241. Randy stood there looking at the house. It was another Victorian, like every other house on the block. It was painted a rosy sort of pink, with green trim.

“This isn’t it,” he said.

“Excuse me?”

“This isn’t the house. It can’t be. There was an enclosed staircase on the right side, with a separate door.”

“I thought you said this was the address,” I said.

“It is,” he said. “I mean, it was. Two forty-one Leverette. I’m sure it was.”

A young black woman came out of the house next door, pushing a baby carriage. She didn’t look much older than seventeen.

“Excuse me!” I said. “Is this Mr. Shannon’s house?”

She just looked at us for moment. “Yeah,” she finally said.

“Can I ask you a strange question?”

“How strange?” she said.

“Did this house once have a staircase on the outside of it?”

“What are you talking about?” she said.

We walked over to her. “I’m sorry to bother you,” I said. “I’m a private investigator.” I started to dig out one of my cards.

“Did somebody steal a staircase?” she said. “Is that what you’re investigating?”

“No, no, ma’am. We’re just looking for somebody who lived here about thirty years ago. We think there was a staircase on the outside of this house then.”

“Don’t know nothin’ about that,” she said.

“I understand,” I said. “How about Mr. Shannon? We’ve been trying to contact him.”

“He’s gone to see his son in St. Louis,” she said. “He’s supposed to be back today, I think. Are you two really private investigators?”

“No, just him,” Randy said. “I’m a normal citizen.”

“Well, good luck finding your staircase,” she said. There was a hint of a smile on her face as she pushed the carriage down the sidewalk.

I smacked Randy on the shoulder.

“Hey, come here, Alex,” he said. “Look at this.” He led me back to the front of Mr. Shannon’s house. “You see how there’s a little bit of extra space here on the right side? Between the house and the driveway?”

“You think they tore the staircase off?”

“They could have,” he said. He walked down the driveway, took two steps up onto a small cement front porch. He looked at the door, and then up at the window on the second story.

“This is it,” he said. “This is the house. Maria lived right up there.”

“Okay, good.”

“I can’t believe it, Alex. I’m standing right underneath her window again.”

“All right, I hear ya,” I said. “Now will you get off the man’s porch before somebody calls the police?”

“So now what?” he said when he was back on the sidewalk. “You wanna start knocking on doors?”

“We could do that,” I said. “Or we could see if Mr. Shannon gets home today, then cover the rest of the neighborhood tomorrow if we have to.”

“What time is it, about four o’clock? Why don’t we hit the city office, see if we can get lucky on her birth certificate. Maybe we’ll get a human being this time.”

“I wouldn’t bet on it,” I said. “But it’s worth a shot.”

“We could try the library, too,” he said. “You know where that is?”

“I was a cop in this city for eight years, Randy.”

“So lead the way,” he said.

We walked back down the block, got in the truck, and headed east toward downtown. After turning onto Woodward Avenue, we were right in the middle of my old precinct.

Woodward Avenue. As I said it to myself, I felt something jump inside me. Woodward Avenue. It shouldn’t have surprised me. It was just a gut reaction. Something I could never stop, no matter how hard I tried.

Woodward Avenue.

“You okay?” Randy said.

“Yeah,” I said. “We’re just heading down memory lane here. And here we are. City-County Building.”

The building was down at the end of Woodward, right next to the waterfront. From where we stood, we could see the five towers of the Renaissance Center, the great metal fist of Joe Louis, the fountain in Hart Plaza. On a nice day, the sidewalks would be full of people walking up and down the river. Today, it was empty. We walked into the building, past the statue they called the Spirit of Detroit. Or as my old partner used to say, “the great big green guy holding the sun in one hand and the people in the other hand.” When the Red Wings finally won the Stanley Cup in 1997, they put a giant jersey on him. My old partner would have gotten a kick out of that, if he had been alive to see it.

“Why don’t you let me take a try this time?” Randy said.

“It’s all yours,” I said.

“Watch and learn, my friend.”

As soon as we found the city clerk’s office, I knew he had an unfair advantage. With the big windows letting in the late-afternoon sun and an assortment of Tigers and Red Wings posters all over the walls, this room was a hell of a lot nicer than the State Office of Vital Records. The young woman sitting at her desk looked almost happy to be working there. “Can I help you?” she said. She was smiling.

“Good afternoon,” Randy said. “We finally made it! Do you know how long we traveled to get here?”

She smiled again. “What can I-”

“What are they doing to this city, anyway?” Randy said. “Every road is closed! Construction everywhere!”

“Tell me about it,” she said. “It takes me over an hour to get to work in the morning now.” This woman was much too friendly to be working as a public servant. How she ever got through the screening process was a complete mystery.