Lincoln Perry 02 - Sorrow's Anthem (2 page)

My dad’s at home now, probably asleep in his armchair with the Indians
game on the television or the radio, whichever is broadcasting tonight.
We don’t have cable, so we still listen to a lot of the games on the
radio. I’m allowed to be at Ed’s house because his mother is home.
Ed’s father is probably down at the Hideaway, playing cards and
drinking beer. He might come home soon, toss the ball around with us
for a while and tell jokes, or he might not come home at all. Ed will
pretend he doesn’t care if his dad hasn’t shown up by the time we go to
bed, but he’ll also alternate glances between the clock and the street until
he falls asleep.

“Pretty Boy Pete Rose,” Ed sings, jogging back until he is on the
sidewalk and rifling the ball at me so hard I take a step back and hold
my glove up with both hands, feeling silly, but thankful I am able to see
the damn thing before it can drill me in the nose.

“'Tougher than usual tonight,” Ed says, seeing my near disaster with
his throw. He points skyward. “One of the streetlights is burned out.”

“You wanna go in?” I say.

He scowls. “Nah, I don’/ want to go in this early.”

I toss the ball in and out of my mitt and wait for him to make a decision.
He scuffs his sneaker on the ground and eyes the garage
thoughtfully.

“ 'Member when my dad was painting the house?” he asks. When I
nod, he says, “Well, he couldn’t do it till he got home from work, and by
then it was already almost dark. So he bought a spotlight to help him.”

“You still have it?”

“Yeah. He never really used it, said the paint always looked different
during the day and that pissed him off. But I think he kept the
light.”

“We bring that out here, maybe we can even see well enough to hit
wiffle balls,” I say, liking this suggestion. “It’d be like playing at the
stadium in a night game.”

“Come on.” Ed’drops his mitt to the ground and starts for the tiny,
one-car garage that sits behind the house. I follow.

'There used to be a floodlight attached to the garage, but it, too, is
broken. 'The overhead door is down, and we have to go in through the
side door. Ed’s a step in front of me, but even so I can smell the gas as
soon as he pulls the door open. Most old garages carry the smell of fuel
with them, but this is different, just a bit too strong. There’s music
playing, too—Van Morrison singing “Into the Mystic. “

Ed is fumbling against the wall for the light switch, oblivious to the
smell. He can’t find the switch, reaching with a twelve-year-olds short
arms, so he steps farther into the garage. I move with him, and now
I’m inside the dank little building. The fuel smell is still potent. I’m
wearing my mitt, but I slip it off my hand and let it drop to the concrete
floor. The baseball is clenched tight in my right hand, my arm pulled
back a bit. I’ve never been scared of the dark, but for some reason I
want out of this garage.
“/ can’t find the damn switch,” Ed mutters beside me, and then
there’s a click and the little room fills with bright white light. For a second
it’s too bright, and I close my eyes against the shock. They’re closed
when I hear Ed begin to scream.
My eyes snap open and I take a stumbling step backward, trying to
get out of the garage, thinking that there is an attacker in here, some
sort of threat to make Ed scream like that. My back hits the wall,
though, and in the extra second I’m kept in the garage my eyes finally
take in the scene.
Ed’s father’s Chevy Nova is inside the garage. 'The driver’s window
is down and upon the doorframe rests Norm Gradduk’s head. His face
is pointed toward the ceiling, his skin puffy and unnatural. It takes
one look to tell even me, a child, that he is dead.
Ed runs toward the car, shrieking in a pitch higher than I would’ve
thought he could possibly reach. He extends his arms to his father, then
pulls them back immediately. He wants to help him; he’s scared to
touch him.
“We gotta call somebody,” I say, my own voice trembling. I step
closer to the car despite a deep desire to get as far from the scene as possible,
and now I can see inside. 'There’s a bottle of liquor in Norm
Gradduk’s lap. One of his hands is still wrapped around it. On the
stereo. Van Morrison sings of a foghorn blowing, “I want to hear it; I
don’t have to fear it. . .”
Ed turns and runs past me, out the door and into the yard. He’s
still screaming, and after one more look at Norm Gradduk, I begin to
shout, too. Inside the house, Ed’s mother yells for everyone to keep it
down out there.
It takes the paramedics seven minutes to arrive, and about seventy
seconds for them to tell Ed and his mother that there is nothing they
can do.

CHAPTER
2

I still knew the house, although I hadn’t been inside in years. Word
of mouth brought me the news that Ed had bought his childhood
home, and while I could no longer remember the source, I remembered
hearing about it. The house had never been a showpiece—
nothing in our neighborhood was—but when Ed’s dad was alive it
had been the best on the block, hands down. He’d spent hours on
it, painting and repairing and weeding. My own father had always
been impressed by it, telling me on many occasions that while
Norm Gradduk had his faults, he took pride in his home, and there
weren’t enough men around who still did that.
It was evident that Ed intended to match his father’s devotion.
The house looked bad, with a sagging porch roof, a broken window
on the second story, and paint that had forgotten whether it
was pale yellow or white and decided to settle on grimy gray. A
ladder was leaning against the west side of the house, though, and
it was clear that someone had been scraping the peeling paint off
that wall with the idea of applying a fresh coat. A stack of discarded
scrap wood near the porch was evidence of new planking
laid on the floor. No doubt the porch roof was next on the list.
No police cars were in the driveway or at the curb when I arrived,
but I saw a black Crown Victoria parked on the street two
blocks down. They would be there all night, watching for a return
that would surely not occur. I parked my truck facing them, and
then I walked through the yard and up the front steps. Maybe

someone would be home. A girlfriend, or a roommate. Hell, he
could be married by now for all I knew.
My footsteps were loud on the new porch. I stood there and
looked around for a minute, lost in memories, then nearly fell back
off the porch when someone screamed at me from inside the
house.
“Go away, go away, go away,” a woman’s voice screeched. “I told
you filthy bastards to go away!”
I started to heed the command, but then the voice jarred something
loose in my memory, and I stopped and turned to the closed
front door.
“Mrs. Gradduk, it’s Lincoln Perry,” I said, speaking loudly.
Cars passed on the street, and a few blocks down some kids were
yelling and laughing, bass music thumping in the background, a
party building. The streetlight flickered and hummed, and I stood
with my hands in my pockets and waited. I waited until I was sure she was not coming to the door, and then I reached out and
knocked. I’d hardly laid my knuckles to the wood when the door
swung open and a thin woman with hollow eye sockets and deep
wrinkles stood before me.
“You son of a bitch,” she said. Her voice was as thin as she was;
you could hear it fine but it always seemed on the verge of breaking,
maybe disappearing altogether. If you didn’t know the
woman, you’d associate those vocal qualities with old age or a lifetime
of cigarettes. But I knew that the voice had always been the
same and that she’d never smoked. Her hand rested on the doorknob,
and her forearm and wrist were the sort of severely thin that
made me think of starving children in Africa and black-and-white
footage of Holocaust concentration camps. Her skin hung draped
from sharp, angular bones in the same fashion as her sleeveless
dress, creased and puckered and wrinkled. Her blond hair was gray
now, filled with split ends and tangles. Looking at her, it was hard
to believe that she had once been a beautiful woman. Not that
many years had passed, but it seemed she’d aged ten with every one
that had gone by on the calendar.
“Evening, Mrs. Gradduk,” I said. Evening. As if I’d dropped by
for a glass of lemonade and a chance to discuss the weather and
the kids.
She tightened her hand on the knob, and I couldn’t help but
stare at it, waiting for the bones to splinter.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing here?”
A fine question. I licked dry lips and ran a hand through my
hair, my eyes on the fresh planks beneath my feet.
“Well?” she said.
“I didn’t know you were living here, too,” I said, just to fill the silence
with something.
“I asked what you want.”
I straightened up and looked her in the eye again. “I guess I’d
like to find Ed. Maybe I can . . . maybe I can help him.”
“Help him? Help him?” She took a half step out onto the landing,
peering up at me, her mouth twisted with distaste. “You’re the
one to blame for this, you know? He made one mistake and then
you ruined him. He was never the same.”
“That was a long time ago,” I said. “I can’t fix that. But I hear
Ed’s in a lot of trouble now. I’d like to find him.”
She leaned back and glared at me. “You even spoken to him in
the last ten years?”
It hadn’t been ten years, but I also hadn’t spoken to him. I didn’t
answer, just stood there awkwardly before a woman who’d once
baked me cookies and was now looking at me as if she’d like to
sink her teeth into me, pour venom into my veins.
“What the hell do you think you can do, you asshole?” she said,
and I was struck by her language, the stream of profanity. In all the
years I’d known Alberta Gradduk, I couldn’t think of one time I’d
heard her swear. “The police have it all on tape. He did it, you
know. He set that fire and burned that girl up. And you want to
know why he did it?”
I didn’t answer.
“Because it’s what he turned into after you turned your back on
him. He made a mistake. People make mistakes. And you were
supposed to be his friend. His best friend.”
“I did what I was required to do, Mrs. Gradduk. I’d taken an
oath, and it didn’t stop with friends.”
“What do you think you can do now?” she said, and while there
was still hostility in her voice, there was also a hint, however vague,
of hope.
“I don’t know.” Down the street, the shouts and the music were
getting louder, the party picking up steam. I took a glance at the
Crown Victoria at the curb, saw the streetlight reflecting off the
tinted windshield, then looked back at Ed Gradduk’s mother.
“I know attorneys, and I know the police,” I said. “I’m an investigator
now. I don’t know what the situation was, but I do know
he’s only doing himself more harm by running. He needs to come
in and get legal help, get some people behind him. I can help him
with that. Right now, he’s just getting himself into more trouble.”
“And you’d know all about getting him into trouble.”
“Listen,” I began, but she wasn’t having it.
“Get away from my house,” she said, stepping back inside. I saw
for the first time that she was barefoot, the veins on her pale feet
standing out stark and thick and purple against the skin.
“I can help him if I can find him,” I said, and somehow I believed
it, though I had no reason to. “Where would he go, Mrs.
Gradduk?”
But she closed the door then, the old windowpane rattling as it
slammed. I heard the bolt roll shut and the security chain slip into
place. For one wild moment I was ready to lean back and slam my
foot against the door, kick it again and again until it was open and
I could grab the crazy old bitch and shake her and tell her that it
wasn’t my fault, it had never been my fault, Ed had screwed up and
I’d had no choice but to be the one who made him accountable. It’s
tough to raise that kind of anger and conviction over something
you’re not entirely sure you believe, though. I turned and walked
back down the steps.

His closest friend was Scott Draper. It had been me once, but that
was long in the past, and Draper had lingered as a presence in Ed’s
life while I had not. At least four years had passed since I’d seen
Draper, but he wouldn’t be hard to find; the Hideaway on Clark
Avenue had been in his family for three generations, and unless the
building had crumbled around him, he’d be there now.
To get there, I had to walk west down the street, past the
Crown Vic. I was about ten feet from it when there was the soft
purr of a power window, and a drawling voice said, “How’s it going,
partner?”
“Fine,” I said, walking past, but then the door opened and one
of the car’s occupants stepped out onto the sidewalk in front of
me. I pulled up and looked at a cop whom I’d never seen before. If
he knew me, he didn’t show it.
“Nice night, huh?” he said, leaning against the car. I glanced in
the vehicle, trying to see the face of the man in the passenger seat,
but it was too dark.
“Fine night,” I said, trying to step around him and continue on
my way. He stepped with me, though, and I pulled up again.
Mind my asking what your business with Mrs. Gradduk was?”
He was tall enough that I had to look up at him, into a face that
was set in a hard scowl, dark brown eyes looking at me coldly. It
wasn’t the eyes that held my attention, though, but his nose. It was
swollen and purple, the bridge askew beneath the puffiness, the
discoloration spreading into his eye sockets. He’d had his nose
broken very recently. Probably by Ed Gradduk, if Amy’s information
about his fight with police had been accurate.
“Expressing my condolences,” I said. “Heard her son had a run
of bad luck today.”
“Or caused one,” the cop said. “What’s he got to do with you?”
“I’m his priest,” I said, and stepped away one more time. He
reached out and put his hand on my arm, but I twisted free and
kept going.
I should have stopped and talked to him. I should have explained
the situation for exactly what it was, tell him that I was an
old friend with no idea what I was doing here, chased by bad
memories. Tell him that I’d been a cop, too, maybe swap a few stories
about long nights on stakeout duty. Everything about the evening
had suddenly become surreal, though, twisted and strange.
And so, even while I told myself to stop and clear the air, I lengthened
my stride and pulled away. He did not pursue me.
I walked west on Clark for several blocks, past the Clark Recreation
Center, an ancient brick building that had started as a bathhouse
around the turn of the century. For decades now it had been
a rec center, and I remembered many furious basketball games
played on the small court inside, a handful of onlookers watching
from the balcony that ringed the court. Tonight a group of Hispanic
teens sat on the steps and watched me go past. The neighborhood
was shifting more and more toward the Hispanic and
Puerto Rican populations now, but it had been even when I was
growing up. Beside the kids was a vacant lot, nothing left but a
concrete pad where a house had once stood. I remembered the
house, and seeing the lot empty made me feel much older than my
years.
The Hideaway was just west of the rec center, tucked in a narrow
building with a crumbling brick facade and a
PABST
BLUE
RIBBON
sign hanging in the window. I hesitated on the cracked
sidewalk for a moment, looking up at the familiar structure. First
place I’d been served a beer. I was fourteen—something the bartender
had been well aware of—and I’d knocked the neck of my
bottle together with Ed’s before I’d downed it. Budweiser, of
course. That’s what you choose to drink when you’re fourteen; it’s
got to be called the King of Beers for a reason, right? I’d spent
countless hours in the place growing up, and I remembered the interior
of the bar as well as my old house. Upstairs, there was a
storeroom and an attic, but those windows were dark tonight.
Whatever business had been next door was gone, the space empty
now. I went up the steps and entered the bar.
Inside, the room seemed long and narrow, with cramped booths
lining the walls and cigarette smoke hanging in the air. A broken
jukebox sat beside a pay phone on the back wall. This was the dining
room, and although I could remember some booths as the permanent
residences of local boozehounds, I didn’t remember
anyone doing much dining here. A Hideaway cheeseburger was
considered a real risk; the sirloin steak, for no one but the foolish
or suicidal. They could pour a cold Bud or
PBR
, though, fill a glass
with Jack, and that’s all anyone there tended to need.
Through the doorway to my left was the bar, a long expanse of
oak lined with vinyl-covered stools, the way a bar is supposed to
be. Behind the bar was a massive shelving unit with liquor bottles
stacked in front of a long mirror, and at the end of it stood two
pool tables. Both were in use now, and only a handful of the
barstools were occupied. A white kid in a sleeveless shirt and
toboggan-style hat was manning the bar. Summer, and he’s wearing
a toboggan. Tough.
What can I get you?” he said.
Your boss,” I answered, and he frowned.
“ 'Scuse me?”
'Scott Draper still own this place?”
A slow nod. “Uh, huh.”
“Well, go get him.”
He didn’t like the commanding quality of my tone, but he responded
to it, walking out from behind the bar and toward the
steps at the rear of the building. He paused on the first step and
looked back at me.
“Who’s here for him?”
“Lincoln Perry.” The guys at the bar were watching the exchange,
but my name didn’t seem to mean anything. It had been a
while since I’d spent any time in the Hideaway.
The kid went up the stairs and I settled onto a stool with a split
vinyl cover. The television above the bar had the Indians game on,
the Tribe down two in the bottom of the seventh with bases
loaded and the cleanup hitter at the plate. First pitch was low and
away, but he swung and caught air. Second pitch, same location,
same result. Third pitch a heater right down the middle and he sat
on it for called strike three.
“Lincoln.”
I looked over my shoulder. Scott Draper was as I’d
remembered—tall, thick, and bald. He had a natural sort of muscle;
as far as I knew, he’d never set foot in a gym, but he could probably
bench-press a Honda if he needed to. He’d been shaving his
head since we were kids.
“Long time, brother,” he said, extending his hand. His voice
was warm, but his eyes didn’t show anything one way or the other.
“Has been,” I said, shaking his hand, his palm rough and calloused
against mine. “Good to see you’ve kept the place running.”
“Would’ve closed down a year ago, but I couldn’t convince these
drunks to go home,” he said loudly. The men beside me laughed,
one of them giving Draper the finger. Regulars.
I gave it a half smile, then said, “You heard about Ed?”
He let his eyes linger on mine for a moment, then looked up at
the television, a beer commercial playing, and picked up a pack of
cigarettes that lay on the bar. I didn’t think they were his, but nobody
said anything. He shook one out, took a Zippo from one of
the guys at the bar, and lit it.
“I heard,” he said when he’d taken his first drag.
“It doesn’t sound good,” I said.
He shook his head and blew smoke at me. “Not good. Some serious
shit, is what it is. Murder. Plus arson, but at that point who
cares?
I nodded. “Cops come down here?”
“Not long ago, actually. Asked a lot of questions, I told 'em
where they could stick it, they made some noise about building inspections
and liquor licenses, you know, trying to be heavy about it.
Then they left.”
“They caught up with him and he got away, is the way I hear it.”
“That’s the way they tell it, yes.” He put his eyes back on the
television. After a brief period of silence he flicked them back at
me. “And what’s it got to do with you, Perry?”
“Not a damn thing.”
“But you’re here?”
I nodded. “Figured if I could find him, I might be able to help
him out.”
He raised an eyebrow, amused. “Help him?”
I wasn’t sure if he was entertained by the notion that I would try
to help Ed, or that I thought I could.
“I don’t know how,” I said. “But he’s not doing himself any good
taking off like this. They’ll catch up with him eventually, and then
it’ll go harder than ever.”
The game was back on, taking the attention of the drinkers at
the bar again, so we were alone even in the group. Draper put out
his cigarette and frowned at me.
“You haven’t said a word to him in all these years, have you?”
I shook my head. “Tried once,” I said, and then, after a beat of
silence, “but not very hard.”