Dominion

  Both in college and at the newspaper he found most white folks awkward and self-conscious and over-polite. He supposed he understood them far better than they understood him. No wonder. He had to live in their world; they didn’t have to live in his. White reporters in the newsroom thought they knew him, but they didn’t. That was painfully obvious.

  “Clarence,” one of them told him, “you’re the whitest black man I’ve ever known.”

  “Thanks, Lee. I suppose that’s quite a compliment coming from you.” There was no use trying to educate some people. He didn’t even know where to begin.

  An editor looked at him one day and asked, “You people spend a lot of money on clothes, don’t you?”

  “Not a dime,” he said. “Us people shoplift all our threads.”

  He couldn’t win. If he looked like a slob, like some of them, he’d be a shiftless black man. If he wore decent clothes, he’d be a materialistic superficial black clotheshorse on the make.

  Socializing was a challenge his first few years at the Journal. White people tended to be old fashioned, apprehensive, constipated. “White tight” the brothers called it. White folk stood around, schmoozed, talked about current events, and told corny jokes. It wasn’t bad, just a different world with different rules. White parties were weird. Lots of times there was no music. No music at a party? Kind of like no meat at a barbecue. Black parties pulsated with rhythm, throbbing beats, perpetual dancing. A black friend once said to him, “At white parties, nobody sweats.”

  Though he’d been tempted to quit more than once, in time Clarence had become more at home in the workplace with whites than he’d ever felt possible. But that’s where it ended. His interaction with them started and stopped at the Trib’s front door. In his home, in his personal life, even out in the white suburbs, he didn’t feel close to a single white man. Except Jake. He was still weighing and measuring his relationship with Jake. He knew too many black men who’d thought they had a good friendship with a white man, only to discover it wasn’t what it seemed. A brother at the Trib warned him not to think Jake could ever be a real friend. He’d been stubborn enough to ignore the warning but guarded enough to keep his eyes open and let time be the test.

  At the Journal Clarence had been the only black person in sports. He’d had to learn the white culture, as a missionary must learn a nation’s culture in order to understand its people and not misread their intentions. At first he’d been offended when other reporters would brush by and not acknowledge him with a word or a nod. In black neighborhoods, you didn’t do that unless you were sending a message of disrespect. Eventually he realized this was part of white culture, or at least part of the busy milieu of newspaper culture. What was rudeness elsewhere he came to regard as professional efficiency here.

  In 1982 the Journal was absorbed into the Tribune. Going to work for the Trib meant starting over for Clarence, having to prove himself again. He worked long shifts and often came in on his day off. It had been tough on Geneva. He realized why the divorce rate was so high among journalists, as it was among doctors, lawyers, and pro athletes. In the newsroom it was harder than in sports—men and women working long hours with each other, creating a “let’s go have a drink” synergy while their wives and husbands were off in their own world a million miles away. Given this reality, Clarence felt thankful to be holed up in the sports department.

  This crew can bug me, but they sure don’t tempt me.

  Race was omnipresent, always there though rarely spoken of. It lurked in the shadows, just beneath the surface of words. It skulked around in Clarence as much as some of the whites, sometimes more. Occasionally he’d balked in those early years, thinking the white guys were getting the good assignments while he was covering double-A high school JV water polo.

  In time though, he determined not to attribute it to racism, but to the seniority pecking order. Other young inexperienced journalists, white guys, also got the nonglamorous jobs. That came with the territory. Seniority should count for something, and when he had it he would want the best assignments and be glad there were younger guys to cover the dog races. After all, he reminded himself, he wanted to be treated like those other guys, no worse and no better.

  Meanwhile, he always carried the burden of having to prove himself. While this burden drove some men to resignation, he’d managed to turn the burden into an edge by letting it drive him to excellence.

  Excellence? He shot back to reality. There would be no excellence today unless he started writing. He pulled back his desk drawer and removed one of four large three-by-five card holders. He flipped through them and found the section labeled “Green Bay” and a subsection with a group of a few dozen cards labeled “Women in Locker Room.”

  Two of his best columns last football season had come out of his unforgettable visit to Green Bay. He’d gone back to legendary Lambeau Field. The names of Vince Lombardi, Willie Davis, Ray Nitschke, Bart Starr, and Jim Taylor were among those encircling the stadium. He visited the Packer Hall of Fame. He loved the place.

  The sixty thousand plus fans generated an indescribable noise. They were knowledgeable about the game, not like the stupid fans in some cities who booed when coaches didn’t go for it on fourth and two in the second quarter. But what really struck Clarence was their unique relationship with the fans. The way their wide receivers would jump into the crowd after scoring a touchdown. The way the fans would carefully catch them and congratulate them and hug them, then lower them back down to the field. He’d written a column contrasting the Packer fans to the thousands of ice-ball-throwing fans in New York who had pelted coaches and players on the field. In Green Bay they announced that any fans throwing ice would go to jail and their season tickets would be confiscated. Jail was the less serious threat. Losing your season tickets in Green Bay was worse than having your house burned down.

  Among the many subjects of his interviews in Green Bay had been the controversy surrounding women reporters in the men’s locker room. Clarence hadn’t been able to squeeze in this column last year, but now its time had come. On Sunday another NFL coach had gotten in trouble for not allowing a female reporter into the locker room immediately after the game.

  Clarence typed a tentative title: Women Reporters in the Locker Room. He’d change it to something snappy later on. As the first words came out, he experienced the rush.

  An hour later Clarence pressed the word count button: 829. He’d have to cut twenty-nine words, and maybe another fifty to make room for names and specific quotes that would personalize it and give it authority. He’d get on the phone right now and go down the list of athletes and wives he’d interviewed before. Hopefully some of them would be available. If not, he’d use their old quotes.

  Clarence thought of all the people, including the publisher and three or four reporters, who would hate this column. The thought energized him.

  Now it was strategy time. Hugh, the sports editor, was sure to cut “jack-booted feminists” and make a half dozen other changes to placate irate readers. So Clarence began inserting other offensive phrases he had no intention of including. This way Hugh, like any editor with rifle butted against his shoulder, could shoot at these targets on the fringes of the herd while the main pack managed to get away. Hugh could say, “You think that’s offensive, you should have seen it before I whittled it down.”

  Clarence took quiet pride in positioning himself so that what survived editing would be as close as possible to what he wanted in the first place.

  After half an hour of phone calls, additions, deletions, and revisions, he pushed the “send” button to route the column to Hugh, who he saw at his desk drinking a Dr. Pepper. He would watch his editor’s facial expressions as he read it.

  Okay, Hugh, don’t let it snort out your nose.

  He looked over at Laurie, his main sports columnist competition. She was a veteran with a great knowledge of sports, but she was a flaming liberal. It was amazing how much of your agenda you could hijack even into
a simple sports column.

  You’re going to be livid, Laurie.

  He smiled. Like a sidelined quarter horse able to run against the competition once more, for the first time in a week Clarence felt really good, on an emotional high. If only it could last.

  Clarence entered the Justice Center pretending not to be nervous. He walked directly to the elevators on his right, as if he belonged there. He got a nod of recognition from one uniformed officer and cold stares from two others. As usual, he was glad to be wearing a suit. There were probably at least a hundred other black men in this building. Eighty percent of them, however, were behind bars.

  He stepped in the elevator, which gave him only five options despite the building’s sixteen floors. Floors two and three were courtrooms, four to eleven were jail floors, both accessible only from the other side of the building and only by authorized personnel. Twelfth floor, his first option, was ID, Intelligence, Juvenile, and Narcotics. Thirteenth floor housed Internal Investigations, the DA’s office and a hodgepodge of smaller departments. Fourteenth, the button he pushed, was the detective floor. Above it were the Chief of Police’s office and the media room. He’d been to the media room only three times, all in the last few years. His first fifteen years on the sports beat never brought him into contact with the police. The last three years, with player scandals ranging from drunk driving to girlfriend beating, had changed that.

  The elevator stopped at the twelfth floor. A young woman in a sharp business suit stepped on. She forced a smile because she knew she should, Clarence thought. But he felt her uneasiness. She looked educated. Maybe she told herself she shouldn’t feel what she was feeling. But she felt it nonetheless, he was certain.

  I’m only going up a few more floors, lady. No time to mug or rape you.

  The acid of his cynicism burned deep. This woman had learned society’s lessons well, he supposed. Black men are ruthless crooks and killers. If you had to share space with them on an elevator, put one finger on your mace spray.

  Nearly everyone wore plain clothes on the detective floor, so Clarence didn’t stand out, except his tailored suit was sharper than the shop-worn standard here. Unlike the other floors, which allowed free access to hallways, detective division had only one place the general public could go—the reception desk, with a thick bulletproof window and no door that opened from the outside.

  “I have an appointment with Detective Chandler,” Clarence told the receptionist. Five minutes later Ollie Chandler came through the lone door on the far end of the floor, licking his fingers. This was Clarence’s first daylight view of him. He sized him up. Ollie’s stomach and chest were battling to occupy the same space. Clearly, his stomach was winning. Clarence’s impression was of a man in no danger of being mistaken for a regular on Baywatch.

  “Come on in, Mr. Abernathy.” The raspy basement voice seemed even lower than Clarence remembered from outside Dani’s. “Just finishing up a steak sub in chili sauce. From the vending machine. It’s not Tony Roma’s, but when you’re stuck in the office it works. Hungry?”

  Not anymore.

  Clarence shook his head.

  Ollie escorted him to his desk in an open area. It was reminiscent of the Trib, but much smaller and less segmented, with greater separation between desks and therefore a little more privacy.

  “Hang on just a second,” Ollie said, stealing a chair from an unoccupied desk and rolling it to Clarence. “Got to make a quick phone call.”

  Clarence looked beyond the desks, out the huge windows. He soaked in the breathtaking panoramic view of the city. It all seemed so tranquil from up here. So ordered and peaceful, the stately buildings testifying to man’s ability to create beauty, the bustling shops and offices his ability to produce wealth. Ironic, since this grand view came from Homicide.

  Jake said he felt more secure visiting Ollie than anywhere in the city. So why did Clarence feel so insecure here? Why did he feel as if he were standing there naked and every detective who walked by stared at him?

  Ollie put down the phone, then walked eight feet and peeked into a window. “Let’s meet in the lieutenant’s office,” Ollie said to Clarence. “It’s empty. Give us a little privacy.”

  They sat down, Ollie behind the desk, Clarence on the other side. He studied Ollie’s light-skinned Scandinavian features and blotchy cherry-tinted neck.

  A red neck. How appropriate.

  “Jake Woods told me you might be calling. So what’s on your mind, Mr. Abernathy?”

  “My sister’s death is on my mind. It’s been over a week. I want to know who did it. And why.”

  “You and me both, friend.”

  I’m not your friend. Don’t patronize me.

  “Jake said you told him once if a case isn’t solved in the first two or three days, chances are it won’t be.”

  “Hey, guess I trained Jake pretty good,” Ollie lightened up. “But actually, it’s thirty-six hours. Even the third day is marginal, and by the time you hit seventy-two hours, good luck. Most of your physical evidence is gone and people’s memories deteriorate. That’s if you’re lucky enough to find witnesses. For the most part, we weren’t.”

  “What about Mrs. Burns?”

  “She’s our one witness, but darkness and failing eyesight are the problems. She heard the shots—so did most of the neighbors. They all said it was like a series of explosions, had its own quick cadence, loud and long. Automatic weapon, obviously. But most of our potential witnesses were frozen in bed. Can’t blame them. You hear forty rounds ripping a house to shreds and you don’t want to stick your head out as a target. By the time they looked, the car was gone. From the first shot to the screeching tires was maybe less than ten seconds. Barely time to wake up and get to a window.”

  “But Hattie Burns saw something, right?”

  Ollie nodded, looking down at his report. “Her head was on her pillow, just a couple feet from the window, which was open. Just had a screen over it. As soon as she sat up, she could see straight over to your sister’s porch. Couldn’t make out much but a shadowy figure holding a rifle. The noise level was incredible. Everybody’s used to hearing gunfire, but this was another ball game. One of the neighbors described it as ‘ear splitting.’”

  “So, what else did she see?” Clarence had talked with Hattie too. But he wanted to test what the detective told him.

  “Well, she saw a car. Of course, with a big assault rifle they’re not going to be on foot. Neighbors heard the squeal when it peeled out, so the driver was pretty excited.”

  “What kind of car?”

  Ollie shrugged. “Mrs. Burns doesn’t know for sure what kind, how big, anything. We’ve showed her all kinds of pictures. Midsize or large. She thinks four-door sedan but can’t swear to it. Maybe a light color, but not white. A couple of streetlights were out. That didn’t help.”

  “They’ve been out for months,” Clarence said. “If it was anywhere else, they’d have been replaced weeks ago.”

  Ollie hesitated. “Maybe you’re right. I don’t know. Anyway, artificial lights can really mess you up when it comes to colors.”

  “What else can you tell me, besides it being a drive by?”

  “Well, technically it wasn’t drive by It was drive up, walk up, then drive off. The walk up is considered big time macho, especially by Hispanic gangs. It’s just you, mano y mano. But the old drive by is more popular. It does the job and gets them on the road in a hurry. This was a combo.”

  “How many in the car?”

  “Well, it was left running in the street, not parked. Mrs. Burns saw the shooter jump in the passenger side. So it wasn’t a one-man job. At least two, shooter and driver. Could have been more in the backseat, who knows? No physical description of the perps. Don’t know size, color, age, what they were wearing, nothing. It’s frustrating.”

  “What about the weapon?”

  “We’ve got forty .223 shell casings.” He reached in his pocket, pulled out a casing, and handed it to Clarence. “Her
e’s one of them. Haven’t got the rest back from the technicians yet. There’s a huge backup in ballistics right now—too many shootings. Presumably the casings are all alike, so having forty won’t be much better than having one. We’ve got a partial left footprint coming up the porch steps. It matches perfectly a plaster cast of a full right footprint where the shooter stepped off the walkway onto the lawn during his retreat. At least we’re pretty sure it was the shooter. It had been dry all week and just rained earlier that night. The print was fresh. Size eight and a half, Air Jordans. That’s about it. Maybe narrows us down to a few million people.”

  “So…is this case going to be solved?”

  “To be honest, I don’t know. The initial window is gone. We’re into the tough part—trying to beat the bushes and find any witness, any clue. But I won’t give up. I’ve solved cases a week later, a month, three months, six months, two years. Some precincts have cold-case crews that have solved cases going back fifteen years.”

  “So…are you optimistic?”

  “The truth? Not really. Problem is, the killings don’t stop. If we could have one murder and just focus on it for however long it takes, it would be great. But we’ve only got five homicide teams. Manny and I already have three open cases, plus another dozen unsolved that can yank our chains anytime if there’s a new development.”

  “So Dani’s just number three?”

  “No. She’s still number one, but we rotate, go on call, and our number’s up again. Next homicide and she’ll drop to number two. That’s how it works. But I have to tell you, your sister’s case is really pulling my strings. I take it personally, the way it was done. Vicious. Mother and child. I want the perps. But I’m just being honest with you—the fact that we haven’t got much now suggests a good chance we won’t. The lieutenant’s always talking about case load management. There have to be priorities. The new cases get priority because if we put them on the back burner, we miss our best chance at solving them.”