Southland. Nina Revoyr
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that your grandfather had a business here. Crenshaw was mixed back then, much more than it is today, but there were a few people—white and black—who still hated the Japanese. So even though just about everyone knew he wasn’t involved, your family still took some flak.”
“Which explains,” Jackie said, more to herself than Lanier, “why they shut down the store and got out of here so fast.”
Lanier nodded. He remembered the “Closed” sign hanging in the window of the empty store for months, the Sakais vanishing like apparitions before the smoke had even cleared.
She looked up at him. “Why are you telling me all this?”
“So you won’t waste your time looking for Curtis. And so you’ll know.” And because I need to share this with someone, he thought, hand over half the burden. He leaned across the desk and looked at her intently. “I want to build a case against Lawson. I want the motherfucker to pay. I’ve been carrying Curtis’s murder, all those murders, around with me for years.” He knew his burden, his sense of urgency, were heavy in his voice; he felt accused by the image of Frank there in front of him, for not doing anything until now. Jackie leaned back, away from him, so Lanier eased off a little.
“Well, what about his brother?” she asked. “Or his parents? Where are they?”
“Dead. All of them. His parents both died a few years ago, and Cory was killed in Vietnam. It haunted him, too. I’ve always meant to do something, but I’ve just kept putting it off, you know. Didn’t know how to start. But when I ran into Loda this morning and she said that Frank Sakai had died and that his granddaughter was looking for Curtis, I knew it was finally time.”
“You said people didn’t know about it, right? So how are you going to build a case?”
“Oh, they knew the boys were murdered—they just didn’t know how. There were all kinds of rumors—that they’d been shot, or lynched, or burned up in a fire.”
Jackie rocked back and forth, thinking. “But what do I have to do with all this?”
Lanier looked at her and shrugged. “I don’t know. As much as you want.”
But then doubt settled over him, heavy and uncomfortable as a wet quilt. What the hell was he doing? For one thing, how was he supposed to get information on a cop? He thought of Allen Cooke, the cop from the Southwest Station who volunteered for his fathers group. Southwest was the natural place to ask questions, since that was where Lawson had worked, but it was a tricky thing, he knew, to look for dirt on another cop. The department, when you poked it, tended to close in on itself, and he didn’t know if Allen would be willing.
For another, he wasn’t sure he’d made the right move by enlisting Frank’s granddaughter. Her knowledge of the law—Loda had said she was in law school—might help with legal matters, if they ever got to that point. And someone in her family had to know something—maybe they’d even seen Lawson lurking around the store on the day of the murders. But Jackie Ishida was not the same kind of person as her grandfather. Frank was a down-to-earth, blue-collar man. Jackie, on the other hand, had clearly been coddled. She had the air of someone who never questioned her right to anything. Her hands were soft and unlined, her fingernails even and clean; those hands had never seen a day of real labor. Her clothes, though casual—jeans, blouse, light leather jacket—were elegant, cut well, expensive. She was attractive enough—nice face, straight shoulder-length hair, thin athletic figure—but there was something too prim about her, fastidious, as if she didn’t swear or sweat. She was a package wrapped tightly with a bright and colorful bow; all the edges of the paper lined up perfectly. Frank Sakai’s family, clearly, had moved up in the world—but maybe they’d moved so far that they no longer had use for Frank. Lanier wondered if he should leave Jackie alone and pursue Lawson by himself. But she had been the one to call Loda Thomas; she’d started this entire thing. He believed in omens, and this one was undeniable.
Jackie, sitting across from him, believed in omens too. She knew that her family was touched by what had happened. Their flight after the murders might have implied something at the time—even if, as she realized, most of her grandfather’s old acquaintances had liked him, there would always be that shadow of a question. And Frank would have wanted her to pursue this; he had practically willed it. She looked at Lanier, his probing eyes, his intense and handsome face.
“So what do we do now?” she asked.
HE WAS wearing a suit for the first time, skipping south along Westside Avenue, heading toward the church on Santa Barbara. The suit was one of Cory’s, fully half of his supply, but his cousin had been happy to wear the other one and lend the scratchy new brown one to Jimmy. Curtis was in a suit too, and suspenders and a hat. Curtis and Cory’s mother, Alma, wore a dark flower-print dress that swished and furled around her fast-moving legs. She was a little ahead of them, not looking back, forcing her three ducklings to swim after her quickly, and Jimmy wondered if God always expected his children to come calling in such a hurry.
It was almost nine when they arrived at the church, a plain square building a little short of the corner. Jimmy had never been to this church; hadn’t been to church much at all since he was a baby, although his mother came sometimes to get word about jobs. She was working this Sunday—the family she worked for was having a party—but his aunt had insisted that he go with her and her boys. It would be good for him to be there, and his presence was needed.“’Specially today,” she’d said. “’Specially today.”
People were milling around in the street and on the front steps, touching their hats, picking pieces of lint off their children’s shoulders. Jimmy knew from Curtis that several Black Muslims had been shot by the police that week, gunned down just outside of their mosque. He didn’t really know what a Black Muslim was, except that Curtis’s girlfriend’s brother was thinking of becoming one. Now pieces of conversation rustled past him, loose scraps blown by the wind. “You watch. Ain’t none of ’em gonna be punished, neither.” “Police be worse than overseers back in Arkansas.” “Those Negroes cause they own problems, followin around after that brother X.” “Need to stop hollerin Allah and come on back to Jesus.” “Hush, sister. To the cops, niggers niggers, don’t matter what name you tack on to the front of your prayers.”
Jimmy didn’t know what any of this meant. But he wondered if it was related to all the black people he kept seeing on TV, from Nashville, Montgomery, Birmingham, Jackson. When he was over at the Martindales’, Alma would shake her head at the images on the screen, and she’d been shaking her head at the Eagle and the Sentinel all week. Now, as they walked through the crowd of people, Jimmy watched her swivel and step, the angle of her head, her long, elegant neck, the fine hard line of her jaw. She looked strong and queen-like, and he was proud to be part of her group. The men tipped their hats and she acknowledged them with nods; the women, eyeing her suspiciously, laid firm fingers on their husbands’ arms. Curtis moved through the crowd more slowly, a man at fourteen, touching the rim of his hat at the women, shaking hands with all the men. Jimmy watched his ease, admiringly, and smiled politely as large women leaned over him and cooed. The three boys followed Alma at a distance, Curtis with a hand on Jimmy’s shoulder, steering him. They entered the church and sat in a pew about halfway to the front, Alma, Cory, Curtis, James. Curtis showed Jimmy where the hymnal was and pointed out some of his friends from school. Reverend Greene came in then, with his bible, and the noise tapered down to a hush. He was a tall, skinny man, all angles, the only rounded parts of him the top of his skull and the eyes that protruded out of his sunken face.
“My brothers and sisters,” he began, “a terrible tragedy occurred this week on South Broadway.” And after that, Jimmy was lost, words swirling around him that he didn’t understand, Moses and David, Redemption and the Promised Land. He heard people responding, “You tell it, brother,” and “Amen!” and because Curtis was one of those who called