Walter Mosley - Fearless Jones

“Protect her from what?”

“Her family was from Estonia, like us. Only they moved to Germany after the First World War. Her father, Schmoil, Solly’s brother’s son, was a rich man and smart.” Fanny pointed at her temple to show me the degree of his intelligence. I realized then that she also had had a good share of schnapps. “We left Europe after they moved. Schmoil stayed on and did business. He owned three newspapers but sold them when he saw what was coming. He put all of his money into his art collection and moved it to Switzerland. Then he moved his wife and kinder to Vienna. He thought that they would be safe there.”

“That don’t sound too safe.”

“A wife, a grandmother, three uncles, and seven children,” Fanny said, “and only him and Gella survived. They were all betrayed by a Jew, but my Solly saved Schmoil and Gella.”

“He did?” I said. I found it hard to believe that the little old man I’d seen could have saved anybody.

“When Schmoil and Gella ran, my Sol hired smugglers in Italy to put them in barrels and take them to Africa. Then he bought them passports and brought them here.” Fanny had been whispering, and I could see why. Whatever he did, it didn’t sound legal.

“Wow,” I said. “Damn. That’s a great thing. That why they put him in jail?”

“No. They said he was a thief,” Fanny said sadly. “I don’t know. He sold his tailor’s shop and went to work for those goy accountants.”

“Who?”

“Lawson and Widlow. He went to work for them.”

“If he was a tailor, why’d they need him?”

“He did his own bookkeeping for years, and he went to work for almost nothing. He stayed late every night finishing everything they gave him. He stopped laughing with me, and then one day the police came and take him away.”

“And then,” I said, seeing my opening, “after he was in jail a while, a woman named Elana Love came to your door.”

“You know her?” There was surprise and anger in the old woman’s voice.

“You see, Fanny,” I said, “Fearless an’ me aren’t really gardeners…” I related, more or less, the story of me and Elana Love.

“And this man, her boyfriend,” Fanny asked when I was through, “he’s the one that hurt Sol?”

“I don’t think it was him in the cowboy hat, but he was probably the other one. I’d bet on it.”

“But you will find out because you want the money back for your store,” she said.

“I’d like my store back,” I agreed. “At least I’d like a new place. But like I said, Leon is three kinds of bad. It might not be worth —”

“I will pay you.” It was the kind of interruption that I didn’t mind.

“What?”

“You don’t have money, Mr. Minton. You will need something.” She got everything right, right down to calling me mister. “Now that Solly’s in the hospital, I have to do something. My nephew is a fool, and Gella is just a girl. I don’t trust the police.… All I have is you and your friend. I heard those men shouting at Solly too. They said they wanted the money he stole.”

“I thought you said he didn’t steal anything?”

“He told those men that they were the thieves. He told them they were gonif and they worked for thieves.”

“You tell the cops that?” I asked.

“I was afraid to tell them anything.”

“So what can I do?”

“You said they were looking for a bond. I gave a bond to that woman. Sol had given it to me. I asked him if it was stolen, and he told me no.”

“And you believe that even after those men came in here after him?”

“Solly would never lie to me,” Fanny said with dignity. “He’s in trouble, but he wants to protect me. I want you to help me find out what kind of trouble he’s in.”

“But I could tell you that right now,” I said. “It’s that bond.”

“No,” she said. “It is more than that.”

“What?”

“I don’t know. He told me the bond was nothing but in a way that I knew there was something he wouldn’t say.”

“You don’t think Leon came here after the money Sol owed him?”

“He wanted money stolen,” Fanny said stubbornly, “not money owed.”

“How much money we talkin’ about here?” I said. “I mean, what will you pay me?”

“I have one hundred dollars. I will give that to you and then, when you tell me what she says, I’ll give a hundred more.”

“And all you wanna know is why are they coming back after Sol?”

Fanny nodded.

“There’s just one thing,” I said.

“What?”

“Fearless thinks he can live on air, but we need that money. After what he told Sol, he won’t let you pay us a dime.”

Fanny nodded again and patted the back of my hand.

“Leave me your pants and shirt,” she said.

“Say what?”

“Leave your clothes out here when you go to bed. I’ll wash them and iron them in the morning and then I’ll put the money in your pockets.”

Fearless came in only a few moments after the deal was sealed.

“All clean and dry,” he announced. “I stacked ’em in the dryin’ tray though, ’cause I didn’t want to put ’em away wrong.”

“That’s okay.” Fanny was beaming. “I can do that.”

I jumped up then. “But it better wait till tomorrow.”

“Why?” both Fearless and Fanny asked.

“If we wanna protect Fanny, then we got to find out what they came here for,” I said. “And one thing about crooks, they don’t stay in one place too long.”

8

WE DROPPED FANNY OFF at her niece’s house, which was only three blocks away on Marianna Avenue. It made sense not to leave her at home with Leon Douglas on the loose.

Fanny gave us the keys to her house.

“We’ll call you in the mornin’, Mrs. Tannenbaum, ’cause you know we’ll probably come in late at night,” Fearless told her at the front door. Fearless was a gentleman and would never just leave a woman off at the curb. I wandered up there with him.

Morris Greenspan answered the door.

“What do you want?” he asked us.

“They’re my houseguests, Morris,” Fanny said.

“You can’t come in my house,” he said, somehow taking Fanny’s explanation as a request.

“Then we’ll leave you here,” I said to Fanny.

“No,” Fanny said. “Morris, apologize to my friends.”

“You don’t even know them, Aunt Fanny. They aren’t family.”

“We better be goin’, Mrs. Tannenbaum,” Fearless said. He hated seeing any man get humiliated.

“These men are my guests,” Fanny repeated, looking up at her nephew-in-law.

The glower on the young man’s face was the same when he was eight, I was sure. Sullen and on the verge of a pout, he might have stood there for half an hour before saying hello like a good boy.

“Mr. Minton. Mr. Jones,” Gella Greenspan said as she appeared at her husband’s side. The homely girl and her bearish, sullen husband made an ungainly pair. She took the big baby’s arm. “Would you like to come in for coffee?”

It wasn’t that Gella was any less afraid of us. She was just raised better.

“We have to go,” I said. “Thanks anyway. See ya, Fanny, Morris.”

The sloppy bowling pin grimaced.

“Call me if you need anything,” Fanny said.

“We’ll pick you up in the morning,” Fearless promised.

Then we left the unmatched set of relatives to argue manners and race over coffee and rolls.

I HAD THE ADDRESS of E. E. Love written down on a scrap of paper. Fearless drove us to the Twenty-eighth Street abode. The small, single-story gray house was surrounded by sagging trellises that were heavy with vines of golden roses. There was no light on, no car in the driveway, but still we knocked at the front door.