I was sitting on a sheetless gurney parked outside the Trauma Room. Next to me was the "crash cart" they had used for Marcus. Rubber tourniquets hung like streamers from the black handles of the cart.
"How"s the boy?" Sampson asked. He knew about Marcus already. Somehow, he always knew. The rain was running down his black poncho in little streams, but he didn"t seem to care.
I sadly shook my head. I was still feeling wasted. "Don"t know yet. They won"t tell me anything. Doctor wanted to know if I was next of kin. They took him to Trauma. He cut himself real bad. So what brings you to happy hour?"
Sampson shrugged his way out of his poncho, and flopped down beside me on the straining gurney. Under the poncho, he had on one of his typical street-detective outfits: silver-and-red Nike sweatsuit, matching high-topped sneakers, thin gold bracelets, signet rings. His street look was intact.
"Where"s your gold tooth?" I managed a smile. "You need a gold tooth to complete your fly ensemble. At least a gold star on one tooth. Maybe some corn braids?"
Sampson snorted out a laugh. "I heard. I came," he said offhandedly about his appearance at St. Anthony"s. "You okay? You look like the last of the big, bad bull elephants."
"Little boy tried to kill himself. Sweet little boy, like Damon. Eleven years old."
"Want me to run over to their crack crib? Shoot the boy"s parents?" Sampson asked. His eyes were obisdian-hard.
"We"ll do it later," I said.
I was probably in the mood. The positive news was that the parents of Marcus Daniels lived together; the bad part was that they kept the boy and his four sisters in the crack house they ran near the Langley Terrace projects. The ages of the children ranged from five to twelve, and all the kids worked in the business. They were "runners."
"What are are you doing here?" I asked him for the second time. "You didn"t just happen to show up here at St. A"s. What"s up?" you doing here?" I asked him for the second time. "You didn"t just happen to show up here at St. A"s. What"s up?"
Sampson tapped out a cigarette from a pack of Camels. He used only one hand. Very cool. He lit up. Doctors and nurses were everywhere.
I s.n.a.t.c.hed the cigarette away and crushed it under my black Converse sneaker sole, near the hole in the big toe.
"Feel better now?" Sampson eyed me. Then he gave me a broad grin showing his large white teeth. The skit was over. Sampson had worked his magic on me, and it was was magic, including the cigarette trick. I was feeling better. Skits work. Actually, I felt as if I"d just been hugged by about a half-dozen close relatives and both my kids. Sampson is my best friend for a reason. He can push my b.u.t.tons better than anybody. magic, including the cigarette trick. I was feeling better. Skits work. Actually, I felt as if I"d just been hugged by about a half-dozen close relatives and both my kids. Sampson is my best friend for a reason. He can push my b.u.t.tons better than anybody.
"Here comes the angel of mercy," he said, pointing down the long, chaotic corridor.
Annie Waters was walking toward us with her hands thrust deeply into the pockets of her hospital coat. She had a tight look on her face, but she always does.
"I"m real sorry, Alex. The boy didn"t make it. I think he was nearly gone when you got him here. Probably living on all that hope you carry bottled up inside you."
Powerful images and visceral sensations of carrying Marcus along Fifth and L streets flashed before me. I imagined the hospital death sheet covering Marcus. It"s such a small sheet that they use for children.
"The boy was my patient. He adopted me this spring." I told the two of them what had me so wild and crazed and suddenly depressed.
"Can I get you something, Alex?" said Annie Waters. She had a concerned look on her face.
I shook my head. I had to talk, had to get this out right now.
"Marcus found out I gave help at St. A"s, talked to people sometimes. He started coming by the trailer afternoons. Once I pa.s.sed his tests, he talked about his life at the crack house. Everybody he knew in his life was a junkie. Junkie came by my house today... Rita Washington. Not Marcus"s mother, not his father. The boy tried to slit his own throat, slit his wrists. Just eleven years old."
My eyes were wet. A little boy dies, somebody should cry. The psychologist for an eleven-year-old suicide victim ought to mourn. I thought so, anyway.
Sampson finally stood up and put his long arm gently on my shoulder. He was six feet nine again. "Let"s head on home, Alex," he said. "C"mon, my man. Time to go."
I went in and looked at Marcus for the last time.
I held his lifeless little hand and thought about the talks the two of us had, the ineffable sadness always in his brown eyes. I remembered a wise, beautiful African proverb: "It takes a whole village to raise a good child." "It takes a whole village to raise a good child."
Finally, Sampson came and took me away from the boy, took me home.
Where it got much worse.
Chapter 5.
I DIDN"T like what I saw at home. A lot of cars were crowded helter-skelter around my house. It"s a white shingle A-frame; it looks like anybody"s house. Most of the cars appeared familiar; they were cars of friends and family members. DIDN"T like what I saw at home. A lot of cars were crowded helter-skelter around my house. It"s a white shingle A-frame; it looks like anybody"s house. Most of the cars appeared familiar; they were cars of friends and family members.
Sampson pulled in behind a dented ten-year-old Toyota that belonged to the wife of my late brother Aaron. Cilla Cross was good friend. She was tough and smart. I had ended up liking her more than my brother. What was Cilla doing here?
"What the h.e.l.l the h.e.l.l is going on at the house?" I asked Sampson again. I was starting to get a little concerned. is going on at the house?" I asked Sampson again. I was starting to get a little concerned.
"Invite me in for a cold beer," he said as he pulled the key from the ignition. "Least you can do."
Sampson was already up and out of the car. He moves like a slick winter wind when he wants to. "Let"s go inside, Alex."
I had the car door open, but I was still sitting inside. "I live here. I"ll go in when I feel like it." I didn"t feel like it suddenly. A sheen of cold sweat was on the back of my neck. Detective paranoia? Maybe, maybe not.
"Don"t be difficult," Sampson called back over his shoulder, "for once in your life."
A long icy shiver ran through my body. I took a deep breath. The thought of the human monster I had recently helped put away still gave me nightmares. I deeply feared he would escape one day. The ma.s.s killer and kidnapper had already been to Fifth Street once.
What in h.e.l.l was going on inside my house?
Sampson didn"t knock on the front door, or ring the bell, which dangled on red-and-blue wires. He just waltzed inside as if he lived there. Same as it"s always been. Mi casa es su casa. Mi casa es su casa. I followed him into my own house. I followed him into my own house.
My boy, Damon, streaked into Sampson"s outstretched arms, and John scooped up my son as if he were made of air. Jannie came skating toward me, calling me "Big Daddy" as she ran. She was already in her slipper-sock pajamas, smelling of fresh talc.u.m after her bath. My little lady.
Something was wrong in her big brown eyes. The look on her face froze me.
"What is it, my honeybunch?" I asked as I nuzzled against Jannie"s smooth, warm cheek. The two of us nuzzle a lot. "What"s wrong? Tell your Daddy all your troubles and woes."
In the living room I could see three of my aunts, my two sisters-in-law, my one living brother, Charles. My aunts had been crying; their faces were all puffy and red. So had my sister-in-law Cilla, and she isn"t one to get weepy without a good reason.
The room had the unnatural, claustrophobic look of a wake. Somebody has died, Somebody has died, I thought. I thought. Somebody we all love has died. Somebody we all love has died. But everybody I love seemed to be there, present and accounted for. But everybody I love seemed to be there, present and accounted for.
Nana Mama, my grandmother, was serving coffee, iced tea, and also cold chicken pieces, which no one seemed to be eating. Nana lives on Fifth Street with me and the kids. In her own mind, she"s raising the three of us.
Nana had shrunk to around five feet by her eightieth year. She is still the most impressive person I know in our nation"s capital, and I know most of them-the Reagans, the Bush people, and now the Clintons.
My grandmother was dry-eyed as she did her serving. I have rarely seen her cry, though she is a tremendously warm and caring person. She just doesn"t cry anymore. She says she doesn"t have that much of life left, and she won"t waste it on tears.
I finally walked into the living room and asked the question that was beating against the inside of my head. "It"s nice to see everyone-Charles, Cilla, Aunt Tia-but would someone please tell me what"s going on here?"
They all stared at me.
I still had Jannie cradled in my arms. Sampson had Damon tucked like a hairy football under his ma.s.sive right arm.
Nana spoke for the a.s.sembled group. Her almost inaudible words sent the sharpest pain right through me.
"It"s Naomi," she said quietly. "Scootchie is missing, Alex." Then Nana Mama started to weep for the first time in years.
Chapter 6.
CASANOVA SCREAMED, and the loud sound coming from deep inside his throat turned into a raspy howl.
He was crashing through the deep woods, thinking about the girl he had abandoned back there. The horror of what he had done. Again. Again.
Part of him wanted to go back for the girl-save her-an act of mercy.
He was experiencing spasms of guilt now, and he began to run faster and faster. His thick neck and chest were covered with perspiration. He felt weak, and his legs were rubbery and undependable.
He was fully conscious of what he had done. He just couldn"t stop himself.
Anyway, it was better this way. She had seen his face. It was stupid of him to think she would ever be able to understand him. He had seen the fear and loathing in her eyes.
If only she"d listened when he"d tried to talk to her. After all, he was different from other ma.s.s killers-he could feel everything he did. He could feel love... and suffer loss... and... he did. He could feel love... and suffer loss... and...
He angrily swept away the death mask. It was all her fault. He would have to change personas now. He needed to stop being Casanova.
He needed to be himself. himself. His pitiful other self. His pitiful other self.
Chapter 7.
IT"S NAOMI. Scootchie is missing, Alex. Scootchie is missing, Alex.
We held the most intense Cross family emergency conference in our kitchen, where they"ve always been held. Nana made more coffee, and also herbal tea for herself. I put the kids to bed first. Then I cracked open a bottle of Black Jack and poured stiff drinks of whiskey all around.
I learned that my twenty-two-year-old niece had been missing in North Carolina for four days. The police down there had waited that long to contact our family in Washington. As a policeman, I found that hard to understand. Two days was pretty standard in missing-person cases. Four days made no sense.
Naomi Cross was a law student at Duke University. She"d made Law Review and was near the top of her cla.s.s. She was the pride of everyone in our family, including myself. We had a nickname for her that went back to when she was three or four years old. Scootchie. Scootchie. She always used to "scootch" up close to everybody when she was little. She loved to "scootch," and hug, and She always used to "scootch" up close to everybody when she was little. She loved to "scootch," and hug, and be be hugged. After my brother Aaron died, I helped Cilla to raise her. It wasn"t hard-she was always sweet and funny, cooperative, and so very smart. hugged. After my brother Aaron died, I helped Cilla to raise her. It wasn"t hard-she was always sweet and funny, cooperative, and so very smart.
Scootchie was missing. In North Carolina. Four days now.
"I talked to a detective named Ruskin," Sampson told the group in the kitchen. He was trying not to act like a street cop, but he couldn"t help it. He was on the case now. Flat-faced and serious. The Sampson stare.
"Detective Ruskin sounded knowledgeable about Naomi"s disappearance. Seemed like a straight-ahead cop on the phone. Something strange, though. Told me that a law-school friend of Naomi"s reported her missing. Her name"s Mary Ellen Klouk."
I had met Naomi"s friend. She was a future lawyer, from Garden City, Long Island. Naomi had brought Mary Ellen home to Washington a couple of times. We"d gone to hear Handel"s Messiah Messiah together one Christmas at the Kennedy Center. together one Christmas at the Kennedy Center.
Sampson took off his dark gla.s.ses, and kept them off, which is rare for him. Naomi was his favorite, and he was as shook up as the rest of us. She called Sampson "His Grimness," and "Darth One," and he loved it when she teased him.
"Why didn"t this Detective Ruskin call us before now? Why didn"t those university people call me?" my sister-in-law asked. Cilla is forty-one. She has allowed herself to grow to ample proportions. I doubted that she was five feet four, but she had to be close to two hundred pounds. She"d told me that she didn"t want to be attractive to men anymore.
"Don"t know the answer to that yet," Sampson told Cilla and the rest of us. "They told Mary Ellen Klouk not not to call us." to call us."
"What exactly did Detective Ruskin have to say about the delay?" I asked Sampson.
"Detective said there were extenuating circ.u.mstances. He wouldn"t elaborate for me, persuasive as I can be."
"You tell him we could have the conversation in person?"
Sampson nodded slowly. "Uh-huh. He said the result would be the same. I told him I doubted that. He said okay. Man seemed to have no fears."
"Black man?" Nana asked. She is a racist, and proud of it. She says she"s too old to be socially or politically correct. She doesn"t so much dislike white people as distrust them.
"No, but I don"t think that"s the problem, Nana. Something else is going on." Sampson looked across the kitchen table at me. "I don"t think he could could talk." talk."
"FBI?" I asked. It was the obvious guess when things get overly secretive. The FBI understands better than Bell Atlantic, the Washington Post, Washington Post, and the and the New York Times New York Times that information is power. that information is power.
"That could be the problem. Ruskin wouldn"t admit it on the phone."
"I better talk to him," I said. "In person would probably be best, don"t you think?"
"I think that would be good, Alex." Cilla spoke up from her end of the table. think that would be good, Alex." Cilla spoke up from her end of the table.
"Maybe I"ll tag along," Sampson said, grinning like the predatory wolf that he is.
There were sage nods and at least one hallelujah in the overcrowded kitchen. Cilla came around the table and hugged me tight. My sister-in-law was shaking like a big, spreading tree in a storm.
Sampson and I were going South. We were going to bring back Scootchie.
Chapter 8.