San Francisco Noir (4 page)

Pilgrim bought the Excelsior house after his accident, when he came into money through the legal settlement. He was broadsided by a semi when his brakes failed, a design defect on his lightweight pickup. Lorene stood by him till the money came through, then filed for divorce, saying she was still young. She needed a real husband.

Actually, the word she used was “functional.”

The divorce was uglier than some, less so than most. The major compromise concerned the Victorian. He gave her a living estate—it was her residence till she died—but it stayed in his name. He needed that. Lorene would have her lovers, the men would come and go, but he’d still have that cord, connecting them—his love, her guilt. His money, her wants.

He got $12,000 a month from the annuity the truck manufacturer set up. Half of that went to pay Lorene’s mortgage, the rest got eaten up by medical bills, twenty-four-hour care, medicine, food, utilities. He had no choice but to stay here in this ugly, decrepit, shameful house.

“Know your problem, Pilgrim? You don’t get out. Dust off that damn wheelchair and—”

“Catch pneumonia.”

“Wrap your damn self up.”

“Who is he, Lorene?”

She cocked her head. “Who you mean?”

“The man in the house I pay for.”

Lorene put her hands on her hips and rocked a little, back and forth. “No. No, Pilgrim. You and me, we got an understanding. I don’t know what Corella’s been saying—”

“I know you got men. That’s not the point here. You take this one in?”

“You got no say, Pilgrim.”

“Even folks at Corella’s church know about him.
Reverend Williams
, he calls himself. Slick as a frog’s ass.”

“I ain’t listening to this.”

“All AIDS this and Africa that. But he’s running from trouble in Florida somewhere, down around Tampa.”

“That’s church gossip, Pilgrim. Raymont never even
been
to Tampa.”

“Now you spending money hand over fist. That where it’s coming from, Lorene? Phony charity, pass the basket?
Raymont
? No. That wouldn’t pay the freight, way I hear you redone that house. What you up to, Lorene? You know I’ll find out.”

Finally, fear darkened her eyes. He wanted to ask her: What do you expect? Take away a man’s body, he still has his heart. Mess with his heart, though, there’s nothing left but the hate. And the hate builds.

“Pilgrim, you do me an injustice when you make accusations like that.” The words came out with a sad, lukewarm pity. She sighed, slipped off her shoes, motored the bed down till he lay flat, then climbed on, straddling him. “This what you after? Then say so.” She took a Kleenex from the box on the bed and wiped his puddled eyes, then stroked his face with her fingers, her skin cool against his. She cupped his cheek in her palm and leaned down to kiss him. “Why do you doubt my feelings, Pilgrim?”

“Send him away, Lorene.”

“Pilgrim, you gotta let—”

“I’ll forgive everything—I don’t care what you’ve done to get the money or how much it is—but you gotta send him away. For good.”

Lorene got down off the bed, slipped her shoes back on, and straightened her skirt. “One of these days, Pilgrim—before you die—you’re gonna have to accept that I’m not to blame for what happened to you. And what you want from me, and what I’m able to give, are two entirely different things.”

Robert returned to find Lorene gone. How long she leave Mr. Baxter alone? he wondered, chastising himself. He checked his watch, barely half an hour since he’d left but that was plenty of time to have an accident. And he ain’t gonna blame her, hell no. That witch got the man’s paralyzed dick wrapped around her little finger tight as a yo-yo. He’s gonna lay blame on me.

That was pretty much the routine between them. Bitch rant scream, beg snivel thank. Return to beginning and start again. Even so, Robert knew he had the makings of a good thing here. He didn’t want it jeopardized. Mr. Baxter wasn’t long for this life, every day something else went wrong, more and more, faster and faster. The man relied on Robert for all those sad, pathetic, humiliating little tasks no one else would bother with. If Robert played it right, made himself trusted and dependable—the final friend—there could be a little something on the back end worth waiting for.

Everybody working in-home care knew a story. One woman Robert knew personally had tended an old man down in Hillsborough, famously wealthy, and he scribbled on a napkin two days before he passed that she was to get $40,000 from his estate. The family fought it, of course—they were already inheriting millions, but that’s white people for you—claiming she’d had undue influence over his weakened mind. The point was, though, it can happen. Long as you don’t let the family hoodwink you.

Venturing into the bedroom doorway, Robert discovered Pilgrim trembling. His breathing was ragged.

“Mr. Baxter, you all right?” Edging closer, he saw more tears streaking down the older man’s face than leakage could explain. “Good Lord, Mr. Baxter? What did that woman do?” Pilgrim hissed, “Call my lawyer.”

Marguerite Johnstone had gone to law school to escape Hunter’s Point but still had clients in the neighborhood—wills and trusts, conservatorships, probate contests, for those who could afford them. She sat parked at the curb outside Pilgrim’s house, waiting a moment behind the wheel, checking to make sure she had the address right.

The place was small and square with peeling paint and a flat, tar-paper roof. In back, a makeshift carport had all but collapsed from dry rot. Weeds had claimed the yard from the grass and grew waist high. How in God’s name, she thought, can a man worth three-quarters of a million dollars live in a dump like this?

It sat at the corner of Fitch and Crisp—“Fish & Chips,” they used to call it when she lived up the hill on Jerrold—the last residence before the shabby warehouses and noxious body shops rimming the old shipyard. The Redevelopment Agency had big plans for new housing nearby but plans had never been the problem in this part of town. The problem was following through. And if any locals, meaning black folks, actually got a chance to live in what the city finally built up there, it would constitute an act of God. Meanwhile, the only construction actually underway was for the light rail, and that was lagging, millions over budget, years behind schedule, the muddy trench down Third Street all anyone could point to and say:
There’s where the money went
.

The rest of the neighborhood consisted of bland, crumbling little two-story houses painted tacky colors, with iron bars on the windows. At least they looked lived in. There were families here, holding out, waiting for something better to come—where else could they go? And with the new white mayor coming down all the time, making a show of how he cared, people had a right to think maybe now, finally, things would turn around. But come sunset the hoodrats still crawled out, mayor or no mayor, claiming their corners. Making trade. Marguerite made a mental note to wrap things up and get out before dark.

Robert led the lawyer through the bedroom door and Pilgrim sized her up. A tall, freckled, coffee-skinned woman with her hair pulled back and tied with a bow, glasses, frumpy suit, and flats. Be nicer-looking if she made an effort, he thought.

“Nice to meet you,” he said. “You come well recommended. This here’s my daughter.”

Corella sat at the end of the bed, dressed in black, down to the socks and shoes, her hair short like a man’s. His other daughter, Cynthia, was the pretty one, but she wasn’t Lorene’s child. Cynthia lived with her mother far away—St. Louis, the last anybody heard.

Corella would never move away. She was Daddy’s little princess, homely like him.

Marguerite extended her hand. “Pleasure.”

“Obliged,” Corella said.

Pilgrim shooed both Robert and his daughter from the room. Robert went quick, Corella less so.
Clingy
, that was the word he wanted. But bitter. He waited for the door to close.

“I got the feeling,” he said, “way your voice sounded over the phone—”

“You were right, there are problems.” Marguerite removed a thin stack of papers from her briefcase, copies of documents she’d discovered at the County Recorder. “With the Excelsior property.”

She explained what she’d found. Six months earlier, the IRS had filed tax liens for over $300,000 in back taxes against a Raymont Williams—who came with a generous assortment of aliases. Soon after that, Lorene, who worked at a local credit union, recorded the first of three powers-of-attorney, forging Pilgrim’s signature and getting a notary at the credit union to validate it. Then, acting as Pilgrim’s surrogate under the power-of-attorney, she took out a loan for $120,000, same amount as the oldest of the tax liens, securing it with the Excelsior property.

But no release of lien was ever recorded. Apparently, when Lorene realized how easily she could phony up a loan, she got the fever. The IRS could wait for its money. Two more loans followed for increasingly shameless sums from hard-money lenders. The house was now leveraged to the hilt, the total indebtedness over $600,000, and that was just principal. Worse, though Lorene had made a token effort to cover her tracks, keep up with the payments, she’d already slipped into default.

“Expects me to come to the rescue,” Pilgrim guessed.

“It’s that or lose the house to foreclosure,” Marguerite said.

“All that happen in just six months?” Pilgrim chided himself for not seeing it sooner. Hadn’t even known about this Raymont fool till recent. Why hadn’t Corella told him? She went to see her mother from time to time—not often, they didn’t get on, but often enough. Daddy’s homely, clingy, bitter little princess was playing both sides. But she’d pay. Everyone would pay.

Marguerite said, “You’ve got a very strong case against the notary, pretty strong against the lenders, though the last two are a step above loan sharks. I don’t know what Lorene told them—”

“Woman can charm a stump.”

“But they’ll want their money. They’ll know they can’t go against Lorene or this Raymont individual for recovery. And they could say they had a right to rely on the notary and turn on her, but her pockets most likely aren’t that deep either. So they’ll come after you. And my guess is they won’t be nice about it.”

“How you figure?”

“It’ll suit their purposes to stick with Lorene and her story, at least for a while. She’ll say she had your full authority to do what she did and now you’re just reneging out of jealousy. It’s not an argument that’ll carry the day, not in the end, but the whole thing could get so drawn out and ugly they could grind you down, force a settlement that still leaves you holding a pretty sizable bag.”

“Maybe I’ll just walk away from the house.”

“If you’re okay with that, why not do it now? Save yourself my legal fees.”

Pilgrim cackled. “You don’t want my money?”

“Not as much as some other people do, apparently.”

Pilgrim blinked his eyes. He could feel the water building up. “And this Raymont Williams, this phony preacher, he walks away clean.”

“I call it the Deadbeat Write-off. Meanwhile, for you, this could all get very expensive, particularly in addition to the other work you mentioned.”

Pilgrim glowered, trying to shush her. He figured Corella had an ear pressed up to the door, trying to hear his business.

“Expensive is lying here doing nothing. I can’t move. Don’t mean I can’t fight.”

That night Pilgrim dreamed he had his body back. He and Lorene were in the throes, the way it used to be—give some, not too much, take a little away, then give it back till she’s arching her spine and making that sound that made everything right. Damn near the only good he’d done his whole sorry life, pleasure that woman—that and turn himself into a quadriplegic piggy bank.

But no sooner did she make that gratified cry in his dream than the whole thing changed. He heard another sound, a low fierce hum, then the deafening broadside slam of the semi ramming his pickup, the fierce growl of the diesel inches from his bleeding face through the shattered glass of his window, the scream of air brakes and metal against metal, then the odd, hissing silence after. His head bobbing atop his twisted spine, body hanging limp in the shoulder harness. The smell of gas and smoldering rubber and that
tick-tick-tick
from the truck’s radiator that he mistook for dripping blood.

Raymont Williams, dressed in pleated slacks and a cashmere V-neck, Italian loafers, and silk socks, heard the doorbell ring and glanced down from a second story window. A fluffy little white fella, baggy suit, small hat, stood on the porch. Something wrong with this picture, he thought. White people in the neighborhood didn’t come to visit.

Raymont lifted the window: “Yeah?”

The man backed up, gripping his hat so it wouldn’t fall off as he tilted his head back to see who was talking. “Reverend Raymont Williams?”

No collar, Raymont thought, touching his throat. “You’re who?”

“Name’s William Montgomery. I live down the block. I received some of your mail. By mistake. The names, I guess.” He tugged on the brim of his puny hat. “Kind of similar in a backwards sort of way.”

“Shove it through the slot.”

The man winced. “There’s a bit of a snafu.” He looked at the wad of mail in his hand, like it might catch fire. “One of the letters is certified, I signed by mistake. I don’t know, I didn’t look carefully, I just…” He scrunched up his face. “I called the post office. I have to get your signature, too, next to mine, then take the receipt down to the main office on Evans. It’s a hassle, I realize—”

“That don’t make sense.”

“They were very specific. I’m truly sorry, Reverend.”

The hairs on Raymont’s neck stood up.
You mocking me?
“Hold on.” He closed the window, walked down the carpeted stairs to the entry. The crystal prisms on the chandelier refracted the sunshine streaming through the fanlight. In the dining room a bouquet of lilies and irises exploded from a crystal vase on the Hepplewhite side table. Lorene had this mania for Waterford lately, in addition to a number of other decorating obsessions. Out of control. They’d need to talk on that.

He flipped open the mail slot from inside. “Okay, slip it through.”