Without Prejudice (24 page)

The waitress stopped at their table with a vast aluminium tray. She put it down on a stand and gave Sophie her plate of fried perch, then distributed three duck platters. Duval looked at his with alarm.

Robert said, ‘If you don’t like it, I’ll get you something else.’

Duval gave a friendly shake to his head. ‘Your daddy always did look after me,’ he said to Sophie.

‘Bossed you around more likely,’ said Anna.

Duval grinned. ‘Yeah, that too.’

But he tucked in promptly and seemed to like the duck – a big half-bird in a cherry-laden sauce, served with mixed white and wild rice, walnut stuffing and green beans. Robert noticed again how ravenously Duval ate. Didn’t Jermaine and his family feed the man?

‘This is
good,
’ said Duval as he ate. ‘It’s nice eating with you all. Shoot, it’s nice to be with such a close family.’

‘Are you coming to see us soon in Evanston?’ asked Sophie.

Duval look wistful. ‘That depends if there’s more work I can do for you all.’

Sophie said, ‘Maybe you can babysit for me when Mom and Dad go out.’

Christ, thought Robert – what will she think of next? Even Anna looked uncomfortable. But Duval batted it back, saying, ‘I’m sure you got yourself some nice babysitters already.’

‘Mrs Peterson,’ said Sophie, and made a face.

‘There’s plenty of other things to do, Duval.’ Anna spoke before Robert could intervene. ‘It’s a big place – something’s always not working right. And there’s plenty of gardening jobs. I want to have flower beds dug, and maybe plant some more trees. Once I have a plan, I could use some help.’

She continued talking in this unprecedented horticultural vein until they’d had dessert and Robert paid the bill. Outside the restaurant, when Anna and Sophie said goodbye, the little girl spontaneously hugged Duval. He stooped down awkwardly and put his arms around her in return. Anna shook his hand. ‘You make sure you see that Donna lady again at the centre this week,’ she said.

That Donna lady?
thought Robert. Even Anna’s English was turning American.

He stood with Duval as Anna and Sophie drove off, then Robert took three twenty-dollar bills he had folded in his shirt pocket and handed them to Duval.

‘What’s this for?’

‘You did some work, so I owe you some money. Simple as that.’

‘I wouldn’t call it work. You put me up, you fed me. I had a nice bed.’

‘Go on, take it.’

He was glad when Duval did. They got in the car, staying silent, listening to the radio until they reached the outskirts of Chicago, when Duval suddenly declared, ‘You’re a lucky man, you know. You got yourself a wonderful family. That little girl – she’s a pistol. And Anna, she’s as nice as she can be.’

‘Thank you,’ Robert said, hoping the laudatory gush could now stop. ‘Would you like to have a family, Duval?’

‘Sure.’ His voice was short. ‘Not likely though, is it?’

‘You’re not that old, Duval. Lots of people just get started at our age.’

‘I wasn’t talking about my age. I’d have to meet somebody who believed me, Bobby. People think if you did the time, you did the crime.’

‘Not necessarily. There are all these cases where DNA shows the wrong people have been put in prison. I read about one in the paper just last week.’

‘I did too. He done six years.’ A mere bagatelle, his voice suggested.

‘People aren’t so quick to judge now they see that the system can get it wrong. It may take a while but there’s no reason you won’t meet somebody, settle down, even have kids.’

‘It’s not just whether I did it that worries them.’

‘Oh?’ They had come off the Skyway now, and he turned to head for Cornell Avenue, slowing at the corner as an ambulance flashed by with no siren on.

‘They have to ignore the missing twenty-four years.’ There was a relentless quality to his voice. ‘They have to think it didn’t twist me up, my being put away so long. They have to trust me.’

‘It doesn’t seem to me you’re twisted up.’

They’d reached Jermaine’s house, and Robert pulled over but left the engine running. He reached out a hand and they shook.

‘Thank you,’ said Duval.

‘Thank
you
,’ said Robert. ‘At least I know the garage window won’t fall out tomorrow, which it would if I’d done it.’

Duval gave a weak laugh and opened the door. He got out, then leaned down, his expression suddenly set, and spoke through the open window. ‘You should trust me, too, Bobby.’

‘I do, Duval.’

‘Then why did you lock the door last night?’

4

A front of heavy stratocumulus moved down from Wisconsin and the temperature dropped 20 degrees. Staff were starting to go on summer holiday, but Vicky had deferred hers to coincide with his trip to Frankfurt in October. She seemed determined now to conduct herself at some imagined professional standard – there was no more reading of novels during slow moments. When Balthazar called that afternoon, she put him through right away, and Robert picked up the phone happily, noting that like many friendless people, he was starting to mistake acquaintance for amity.

Balthazar said, ‘I
told
him not to talk to you.’

‘Excuse me?’

‘Coach Carlson. I don’t know what you said to him, but it worked.’ Balthazar sounded both impressed and irritated. ‘Though who the hell is Candy Williams?’

‘A legend in her time.’

‘What time is that – 1875?’

‘I did my best,’ said Robert. ‘So what’s the story?’

‘We’ve had four bids in. Carlson says if you can match the best one, then the book is yours.’

‘What do I have to pay?’ he asked. If silly money was going for the book, he might as well cut and run now – all his showmanship with Carlson wouldn’t matter.

‘275K.’

‘I see,’ he said gnomically. There was no point rushing to accept, since it seemed Carlson was calling the shots, not the agent – Balthazar didn’t sound happy at all about letting Robert and the press enter the bidding. It was a lot, but the figure was less than he’d feared, and provided the hardback got some decent reviews, he could always sell off the paperback rights.

‘That’s for North American rights only. You’ll have to pay more for World English.’

Robert laughed. Did Balthazar think his brain had turned to mush out in the boondocks? ‘I’m happy for you to keep those. Can’t see a big sale in Australia for the coach’s memoirs.’

‘Suit yourself. There’s one condition, though.’

He should have known. ‘What’s that?’

‘Carlson wants you to be his editor. Otherwise he’ll go with HarperCollins.’

‘Me? Why does he want that? I thought he got on with my publishing director. She’s a good editor.’ If a major pain in the ass who had almost lost the book.

‘That’s the condition.’

Christ, thought Robert, I don’t even like football. Or the coach, for that matter. ‘I’m a little surprised by this.’

Balthazar sighed. ‘Can we speak frankly?’ he said.

‘Of course.’ It seemed an unnecessary request – he had never known Balthazar to speak in any other way.

‘I think the coach got on well with this woman.
Very
well.’ He paused to let this sink in. ‘But relationships change – as you and I know to our cost.’

A reference to his and Robert’s divorces? Probably, but Robert was still trying to digest what the agent had just said – Dorothy had been involved with Coach Carlson. It seemed positively incredible.

‘Are you sure about this?’

‘I had it from the horse’s mouth, as they probably like to say in Chicago.’ He added with slight malice, ‘It seems my client’s fabled interest in African-American athleticism has not been confined to football.’

Cautiously, Robert asked, ‘But you say the relationship changed?’

‘Apparently. I believe his wife may have had something to do with it.’

‘She found out?’

Balthazar grunted a verbal affirmation over the phone. Robert pressed on, intrigued, ‘Is that why you went elsewhere with the book?’

‘I don’t know the precise order of events. And I don’t want to,’ he said piously, in a rebuke to Robert’s probing. ‘All I know is, he won’t work with that woman. It has to be you.’

Reining in his curiosity, Robert said, ‘Okay. Can you give me a day or two?’

‘If I must. What’s the issue?’

The issue was Dorothy; he would need to talk with her first. But it would alarm Balthazar if he said so – as well as Coach Carlson if Balthazar reported the conversation. ‘The money’s the issue. It’s worth it, no question. I just need clearance at that level of spend.’

‘I thought you ran the press.’ Balthazar’s voice was suddenly less friendly, reminding Robert that if it had been up to the agent, he would not be making this call, but enjoying instead a celebratory lunch at the Four Seasons with the acquiring editor from HarperCollins.

‘I need an okay from the university president.’ This was pure invention but should sound plausible. ‘It’s a lot of money for us.’

‘That’s what’s worrying me.’

‘Don’t let it, or you’ll get to hear the
spiel
I gave Carlson on what a great job we’ll do on the book.’

And for the first time Balthazar laughed, though Robert didn’t join in, since he was pondering with a mix of apprehension and fascination just how he should talk about this to Dorothy Taylor. At least now he understood why Mrs Carlson had been so angry with her husband.

He gave it an hour, then rang and asked Dorothy to come and see him. ‘Give me a minute,’ she said in her terse way, and it was twenty before she sashayed in and sat down across from him.

He cut to the chase. ‘David Balthazar called me.’

If she were surprised, Dorothy didn’t show it. ‘What did your old pal want?’

He ignored this. ‘He’s giving us the chance to match the highest offer he’s had.’

She nodded, but the way she lowered her head told him she was stunned.

‘There’s a condition.’

‘I’m sure there is,’ she said, still not looking at him.

‘He wants me to be his editor.’ When she kept her head down he added, ‘You don’t seem surprised.’

When she raised her head it was with the clear-eyed look of a liar. ‘Why should I be? You set this up with Balthazar from the beginning.’

He exhaled in disbelief. ‘Is that your take on this – that I’ve been scheming to get this book away from you? Are you serious?’

She shrugged and looked away.

‘It’s the last thing I need, Dorothy. Can’t you see that? This isn’t about Balthazar and me – he doesn’t even want Carlson to stay with us. But Balthazar’s not calling the shots; Carlson is. And the coach doesn’t want me – he just doesn’t want you.’

‘Shit,’ she said wearily, putting a hand to her head in what he felt was her first honest reaction since the conversation had started.

‘I don’t want to know about the coach and you,’ he said, and was pleased to see he had her full attention now. ‘That’s your business. We all have baggage that way – even me, as you know. But I don’t want to buy this book if you’re not going to be behind it.’

He knew what her dissension could mean: a fatal gnawing away at the book’s chances – by marketing, by publicity, even by sales, all orchestrated by a publishing director making it clear that the boss had paid way over the odds for a stinker. With Dorothy’s help, the title would become the focus point of any animus he had managed to attract in his brief tenure.

Dorothy sat there thinking for a moment. At last she said softly, ‘Buy it.’

‘You sure? You’re going to have to be behind this, Dorothy, or so help me, I will fire you.’

She laughed out loud. He sensed relief in her that this fear had been forced out into the open. ‘You know your problem, Danziger?’

‘If I do, I think you want to tell me anyway.’

‘You don’t know if you want to fuck me, and you don’t have the balls to fire me.’

He shook his head wearily. Where had she got this idea?

‘Shee-it,’ she said, in a parody of a ghetto voice. ‘You mean I guessed wrong. You know what they say, “Once you go black you never come back.”’

Latanya Darling bites again, he thought. ‘You’re batting five hundred, Dorothy. Great in baseball but not so good when your job’s on the line.’

‘I’m not resigning if that’s what you’re hoping.’

Her lips pursed like a cloth bag as its drawstrings were pulled. He didn’t want to reassure her, but felt he had to. ‘I don’t want you to resign. If I did,’ he continued, ‘we’d have had this conversation a long time ago. Don’t ever think I’d hesitate, balls or no balls.’ He looked pointedly at his desk. ‘Now if you don’t mind, I’ve got other things to do.’

She didn’t rise to go. ‘Latanya Darling said you were tough. She was right.’

He turned and looked out the window at the playground in the grey light of the overcast day, empty except for a park employee emptying a litter bin at one corner. Keeping his eyes on the view, he said softly, ‘Latanya Darling got me wrong. Just as you have.’