Brooklyn Bones Page 5

  He laughed and shook his head. “All right, small but fierce, good for you. And if he didn’t scare you then, how about now?”

  “OK. Now I am scared. Or, sort of nervous, anyway.”

  “I’m glad to see you still have a little sense. I’m going to get some supplies out of the truck and my crew will be here any minute.” He stood up. “Try not to do anything dangerous before then. Think you can manage that?”

  At that moment I knew I could lean on Joe but I didn’t want to. He is older than I am, but not at all old enough to be a father figure. That’s not our relationship. He’s more of a big brother figure, my neighborhood buddy. We hang out, we barbecue, we kid each other. He shovels my walk, I advise him on his complex love life. That’s how it has always been from the first time we met, when a cousin of my husband sent him to help me with a house repair.

  His work crew began drifting in and soon they were ripping out the scary bathroom with the hole in the floor.

  I sat at my computer, door shut tight, working, but the noise and chaos on the second floor soon made concentration impossible. I wasn’t expected at my part-time job today, which made it the perfect day to go in and get a lot done there, while escaping from the noise and confusion here. Not everyone would be thrilled to spend a morning looking at microfilm of decades-old neighborhood newspapers, but I was. Perhaps the seed was sown in third grade, when I read the Little House books and the Betsy-Tacy books and realized there was something called “a long time ago” where little girls like me lived very different lives.

  An hour later I was in my cubicle, glued to my desk, buried deep in my printouts and news clips when I heard a tentative, “Excuse me? They directed me here at the entrance. Would you be Erica Donato?”

  “Uh, yes.” I dragged my brain back from Brooklyn in the 1950s and I’m sure I looked as unfocused as I felt.

  “I’m Steve Richmond, Darcy’s friend. You look busy. I’m sorry if I’m interrupting.”

  Oh, crap. I’d completely forgotten we had an appointment. He was tall, slim, dark-haired, in tan pants and a striped dress shirt with rolled up sleeves, matching tan jacket slung over his shoulder. Loosely knotted silk tie. Elegant Mark Cross attaché, just like Darcy’s—the reason I recognized it—in his hand. Nice enough but I was busy.

  He didn’t look that sorry. He sounded tentative but he looked confident.

  “Yes.” I almost stuttered it, I was so surprised. “I’m sorry…Darcy…she didn’t say you would be….”

  “Were you expecting someone different?”

  “Yes, I was.” I might have sounded indignant. “I was expecting a gray-haired guy in a Brooks Brother suit. She said a friend of her dad’s. I’ve met her dad.”

  “Ah, you were expecting the traditional model. I’m sorry to disappoint you.” He leaned over and whispered, “We haul those guys out of storage to meet with the major investors.” And he smiled. “I do play golf with her father, but I went to business school with Darcy.”

  I gave up. “Come on in.” I waved to the only chair in my tiny, cluttered space. “Just what is it that Darcy thinks I can do for you?”

  “She says you are an expert in the history of Brooklyn neighborhoods.”

  “I don’t know about that. I am writing a dissertation, and I am working here on an exhibit…”

  “I’ve known Darcy since b-school and her judgment of useful sources is never wrong.”

  “That’s exactly what I have found!”

  “So there.” He smiled. “She can’t be wrong about you. Let me explain the problem I am working on. I have a client who is thinking about a major investment in this part of Brooklyn. I can’t say more as it’s entirely under the radar for now. He wants to do it right and he also wants to do it without a lot of controversy. We’re just in the early stages of defining what the ‘right way’ would be and that means getting a lot of background.” The polite tentativeness was gone. He was all business, crisp and to the point. “Could you help with that? There would certainly be a nice consulting fee. We don’t expect you to give away your time and expertise.”

  I was flabbergasted. I really had no time. None. But I sure could use the money. And what was this mysterious project anyway?

  I looked at the pile of work on my desk, the calendar on my wall with looming job and academic deadlines, and thought about how one of the deadlines was Chris’ next school payment. So I held my breath and said, “Yes.” Followed immediately with, “What would you expect from me?”

  “Why don’t we start with a conversation and see what develops?”

  I nodded, keeping quiet so I would not say something dumb, or inappropriate, or unbusinesslike. Business to me was maybe a neighborhood hardware store. A construction crew. The guy who fixed my ancient plumbing. I sensed I was now in a whole different realm.

  “We are starting with the basic assumptions that development is neutral. It can be positive for some and negative for others; it is possible to create new properties for profit while preserving neighborhoods and also, alternatively, to wreck them.” He added, with a self-deprecating smile, “We also know that the very word ‘development’ is liable to raise fears and lead to—let’s say, confrontations. My client really, and I mean that strongly, does not want that. So they—my client—feels that we will do a better job if we get a good sense for how these things have played out in the past.”

  “That’s where I come in?”

  “Exactly. Am I making sense so far?”

  “Sure. It’s way too complex an issue for a quick discussion though. There are whole academic careers built on this topic.” I remembered he went to Harvard Business School with Darcy and added, “As I’m sure you know.” This was not, after all, a high school student doing a social studies assignment.

  “For now, we need a get-smart-quick orientation. The view from 40,000 feet, let’s say. How about some case studies? That’s how we like to organize information and it’s a great way to focus it for the client. Can you give us examples of some situations that were done well, and some disasters?”

  “Hmm. Probably. Let me give it some thought. Can I send you a list? Do you specifically want Brooklyn? That’s what I know best.”

  “Exactly. Some very local examples would have the most impact.”

  “My own neighborhood is practically a case study in neighborhood change and it will probably be one of the examples in our exhibit. Where I live is on the very rough edge of a highly gentrified area…”

  “Park Slope, right? Near Darcy?”

  “Park Slope, yes. Near Darcy, no. Big difference. Huge. She lives in the very gentrified section. Let me see if I have some pictures that would show you the difference.” I looked over my paper-covered desk and started moving things around. “Somewhere in here. Aha.”

  I handed him a booklet about the posh historic district, and some recent photos from other, less renovated blocks. He lined up the two sources side by side on the edge of my desk, and turned the pages with interest. “I’m seeing what you meant. Here we have the historic district, looking pretty shabby, right? And here, after what I guess is considerable restoration. And revived main street shopping too. Skyrocketing property values here?”

  “See?” He smiled. “You are already earning a fee, with this material and the idea of some interviews. Let’s say….”

  “Well, well, well. It’s Steve Richmond! I just got your message. What brings you across the river to my world?”

  I looked up and it was the director of the museum, standing right there at my cubical entrance. Smiling. That had never happened before. I was sure he did not know my name.

  Richmond stood up and grabbed the boss in an enthusiastic handshake. “You got my message! I had business at one of the courthouses and came over to get a little education from Ms. Donato here. She is a friend of a friend.”

 
He looked at me, and back at Steven, “And has she been helpful?”

  “Very much so. You have a good employee here.”

  “I’m sure of that.” I wondered if he would remember my name next time he saw me. “Now I’m taking you to my club for lunch. “

  Richmond gathered up his papers. “I’ll hear from you then?” he said to me. “With more information? And I’d really like to have some of those photos. Here’s my card with all my contacts. And you will hear from me too. Do you have a card?” I shook my head and quickly jotted down my phone and e-mail. “I’ll get a proper consulting agreement sent to you.” He turned to the director, “That’s all right, isn’t it? For her to work for me off hours?’

  “Of course, of course. Give Steve any help he wants and consider it cleared with me. He is an old Deerfield roommate and if you make him happy enough, maybe we can even lure him onto the museum board.” He winked.

  Steven laughed. “I’m in your sights, is that it?”

  “You know it.” As they left, he was saying, “Now, tell me, have you heard from Buzzy? Or Dex? We’re planning a reunion….”

  And they were gone.

  I was about to have a consulting contract. I wasn’t sure what that would entail, except that it was one more responsibility. What had I done? And what did he really do on his job? The business card was on thick creamy stock, with real engraving, like a wedding invitation, discreet and elegant. The company name was discreet too and told me precisely nothing. His title was director. I tried unsuccessfully to call Darcy and get her to tell me what to expect, and to explain why she deceived me about who he was. Her dad’s golf buddy? I still felt indignant about that.

  But Deerfield was a fancy boarding school and he was a friend of our museum director. Just as Darcy had predicted.

  And I had accomplished precisely zero for the museum today, but there was one useful thing I could still do. I called the precinct again.

  “Mrs. Donato, we were about to call you. Good news, bad news. We ran the plates, but the owner reported those plates stolen awhile ago and the car doesn’t match…”

  I groaned.

  “Yeah, well, it was long shot. Here’s the good news. Since a couple of other people reported it, we’re keeping our eyes open—we’d like to know what he’s up to—but it doesn’t look like it was directed at you. He was seen parked in other places too. We’ve got a few pictures we’d like you to take a look at, known neighborhood nuisances and such.”

  Relief flooded through me. He’s a neighborhood nuisance, that’s all. This was not about us. I was not going to send my daughter away. I was not going to cash Rick’s check, no matter what he said. What I was going to do was get on with my life.

  Right now, getting on with my life meant getting some actual work done. I headed to the museum archives where material was waiting for me.

  My job is really an internship with a tiny stipend. I need the money and experience, they need the labor and it fits perfectly with my academic work. The museum is dedicated to local Brooklyn history, everything from the Dutch settlements to the building of the Brooklyn Bridge to the most recent immigrants from Afghanistan, Ghana, Russia, Yemen, Jamaica. Part of our mission is to educate the public that history is happening all the time. Eventually I will write a paper for credit about my work here.

  My assignment was to research background for an upcoming exhibit about neighborhoods changing through the decades, and all the turmoil that created. No doubt that’s why Darcy had hooked me up with this Steven Richmond.

  Scrolling through the newspaper film, I found everyday lives laid out for me in words and pictures. There were graduations from public, private, and parochial schools. The hairstyles changed from backcombed beehives to the long, straight Joan Baez look to the curly shag and the cute Hamill wedge. Hmm. That one looked like my own graduation picture. And of course there were the mothers with beehives and the daughters with shags, too. And fathers with military-trim barbering and sons with flowing curls and drooping mustaches.

  The clothing styles went from prim dresses for women and stiff suits for men to flowing bell-bottoms and daisy prints for everyone. Only the parochial school uniforms were the same from one decade to the next.

  And the smiles for Halloween, graduation, First Communion, prom were the same, year after year.

  New businesses opened, with proud owners holding the first lucky dollar in a photo. Most of those stores have come and gone. I miss the friendly butchers at 3 Vets Meats, but here was Park Diner, seemingly immortal, in a picture from the 1950s, and here was a corner bar that had changed names from Eagle to Flynn’s to Shamrock to Oak, but never disappeared.

  I looked at the street scenes with teenagers and wondered if the girl in our house was in any of them, part of the everyday crowd, living her everyday life. Until…

  I mentally slapped myself and ordered my mind to focus on work.

  Politicians were criticized, defended themselves, faded or were promoted out of local public life. There were letters from the early seventies, railing about the hippies who were moving in, and from the eighties, railing about the investment bankers moving in.

  One of the summer interns popped in to chat and pass on the gossip that the boss was really pushing on deadlines. Great. Just what I needed to hear.

  Actually, I did tend to get sidetracked, so fascinated by these tiny windows into life in the recent past that I almost forgot researching. By the end of the day, though, I had learned about some major actions way back when. Landlords were sued, and by the city, no less! There was even a small-scale riot. I made copies and notes. A tenants organization and its lawyer. A judge. A reporter who kept showing up as the author of the news reports.

  That reporter, Brendan Leary, intrigued me.

  He would be such a terrific source for our exhibit. He seemed to know everyone and be everywhere, and he wrote with passion. Then he seemed to disappear. I ran a Nexis search, hoping his byline would turn up at another paper.

  No luck. I found a few other Brendan Learys and tracked them down. There was a fireman in the Bronx, an Aer Lingus pilot with a beautiful Irish accent who tried to get a date, a potter in Boston named Brenda Leary who was annoyed to find out she was showing up as Brendan. No reporters or ex-reporters.

  I refused to believe he could not be found.

  The major paper where he had worked might have some records for him but in a large organization, which department might be the most helpful with information? Dope, I said to myself. If you want information, start with the library. A couple of phone extensions later, I was talking so someone at the newspaper library’s reference desk.

  I explained what I wanted and the voice at the other end exclaimed, “Brendan Leary? Why, I haven’t thought about that old reprobate in a decade or so! Good thing you got me today. I’m the only old-timer still here. Sure, I knew him. He retired a long time ago. No party or anything, just left, just like that. Not a clue as to what’s become of him. Well, you’ve given me a very interesting problem.”

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean…”

  “We live for interesting problems. I have a few ideas. Give me your number and I’ll see what I can do. I’ll get back to you Monday or Tuesday.”

  I had accomplished a lot today and as I started to wind up, I suppose it was inevitable that I started thinking about our skeleton again, much as I had hoped to push it away with work. My work on this project was too close to my home.

  I wondered again if that living girl was in any of these pictures? Had she walked these streets or spoken to these people? What was she doing in my house that caused her death? Of course that’s what I really wanted to know.

  I forced myself to stop thinking and to stop working, too. I closed up all my folders, stacked up my notes, and left. I stopped in at the precinct and examined an array of photos but none of them we
re the ugly guy in front of my house. So much for my fantasies of seeing him hauled off in cuffs. And I did have to ask myself what exactly could be the charge? Annoying me—no, scaring me—probably was not cause for an arrest.

  When I got home, Joe was washing the dust from his arms in my kitchen sink, but Chrissie was nowhere in sight.

  “She asked for the day off,” he told me. “She said she had to do something important and it would be fine with you.”

  “Well, it’s not fine. It would be nice if she would clear these changes with me. Or if you would. What were you thinking?”

  “That she’s smart and responsible? You worry too much. See you tomorrow.”

  Chris came home a few minutes later.

  “Mom, I had the most interesting day!”

  “I’m sure you did, not being at work and all.”

  “I asked Joe and he said it was OK.” The excitement was replaced with uncertainty. “I mean, wasn’t that the right thing to do?”

  “It depends on what you were doing, which you did not tell him. How about telling me?”

  “I—I don’t want to.” She saw my expression and added quickly, “I mean, not yet. It’s—it’s a secret. You won’t mind, honest. I just—I just—I needed to do something myself.” I’m sure my face was grim; hers was a mixture of uncertainty and defiance.

  “This isn’t all right, Chris. You can’t take off for a day with nobody knowing where you are. What if…?”

  “Mom!” It was the three-syllable mom, as only a teenager can say it. “I’m not going to get into any trouble. I’m smart and I’m careful. Or is that you don’t trust me?”

  I was staring at defeat and I knew it. Did I trust her intentions? Probably. Did I trust her good sense? Not completely. Does any parent of a teen? Nope, not really.

  Was it a good idea to tell her that? I didn’t know. I gave up. For now.

  “OK, miss,” I said. “You get a pass this time. Don’t make me sorry I believe you and next time you take off for the day, I want to know. Got it?”