The Sugar House

a hard, unapproving stare. Tess disentangled herself, slipped out of the car, and crossed the street, wishing she didn’t blush so easily. It was the one thing she had in common with her father, one of those red-all-over redheads.

“You went all the way to Texas to get him?” Patrick Monaghan asked, not for the first time.

“She brings ’em back alive,” Uncle Spike said around the butt-end of his cigar. His bald head gleamed in the weak winter sun, and his liver spots seemed to have multiplied since Tess last saw him, making his resemblance to a springer spaniel all the more pronounced. “Her and Frank Buck. They bring ’em back alive. He’s a good kid, Pat-”

“Kid being the operative word,” her father said.

“Just six years younger, Dad,” said Tess, determined not to let anything mar this annual ritual. “If the sexes were reversed, you wouldn’t think about it twice.”

But the word sexes was a mistake, even in a neutral context. Her father winced at the associations it raised.

“Has he had any luck finding a job?” Uncle Spike asked.

“The state’s hiring,” her father put in. “Your Uncle Donald says he could find something for him at the Department of Transportation. He’s got a lot of pull now, since he was posted to the comptroller’s office.”

Tess laughed. “Crow as a state employee? I can’t quite picture that. Don’t worry, he’ll find something. He’s part time at Aunt Kitty’s bookstore through Christmas, playing a few gigs around town. But that’s more for his own pleasure than the money.”

“An out-of-work musician,” her father mused. “Yeah, that’s what I envisioned the day you were born, honey. It’s what every father wants for his little girl, you know. Does he have a criminal record, too? That would just make my day.”

Tess considered and rejected several replies. “Let’s get inside, before the line gets too long.”

A volunteer, resplendent in a green and red double-knit pants suit, took their money and pointed them to four places at a long cafeteria table in the farthest corner of the parish hall. Tess inhaled-deeply, happily, nostalgically. Food was only part of the draw here. Sour Beef Day was a scene, and the Monaghan- Weinstein clans had always been in the thick of it. Politicians paid their respects, in memory of the power Uncle Donald, her mother’s brother, had once wielded behind the scenes. Shadier types shook Spike’s hand, whispering things better not overheard.

And everyone, it seemed, had a kind word for her dad. He had worked this territory thirty years ago, when he was just starting out at the liquor board, and he was still much beloved.

Today, as they squeezed their way through the narrow aisles, Tess found herself on the receiving end of the occasional back clap and elbow squeeze. “I seen about you in the Star,” one old man cackled. This didn’t quite track. Did he mean he remembered her bylines from the Star before it folded three years ago, or was he referring to the profile the Beacon-Light had finally deigned to run? In her opinion, it had been a snarky piece, full of stupid private-eye puns. Still, it was ultimately less embarrassing than her ranking on the local city magazine’s list of “hot” singles. Tess suspected her father of rigging that bit of false advertising. She loved her hometown, but it was too damned easy to be a celebrity here.

“You look better in person,” another man said, his back slap landing a little low of the mark. “You’re really just a girl, ain’cha? A girl in a pigtail, not that much different than when you was riding your tricycle around the Stonewall Democratic Club.”

Her father glanced back over his shoulder, smiling, and suddenly it didn’t matter how she was known, or where she was patted. Tess felt like royalty, a legacy from two families-maybe three, given that Spike’s relationship to the Monaghans and Weinsteins had never been settled to anyone’s satisfaction. She was proud to be descended from this long line of b’hoys and muldoons, the political foot soldiers who had made the city work. Well, who had once made the local Democratic clubs and city elections work. What followed was out of their hands.

They were taking their seats when Crow arrived, breathing hard from his run through the neighborhood. Normally given to exuberant, bear-hug greetings, he restrained himself and offered his hand, first to Spike, then to Patrick. Her father looked uncomfortable at even this brief contact.

“I had no idea this was such a huge thing,” Crow said. “I had to park at Fort McHenry, practically.”

“No South Baltimore politician with half a brain would dare miss it,” Patrick said. “State Senator Dahlgren’s already here, working the crowd. He’s over there talking to Senator Della, paying his respects.”

“Which is funny,” Spike said. “’Cause Locust Point don’t lie in the first congressional district, and that’s the prize Kenny Dahlgren has his eyes on these days, even if he does have zero name recognition. He ain’t a smart fellow, is he?”

Her father shook his head. “No, he’s just scared because the last election was so close. It reminded him he needs to do the basic stuff, not take anything for granted.”

“Sure,” Spike said, laying his cigar next to his plate, a treat for later. “I guess it’s just coincidence he’s in the newspaper every day now, spearheading that investigation into his poor sap of a colleague who had the bad luck to be the first one caught in the new ethics law.”

Tess turned toward the front of the hall and saw a man with the bland good looks that politics favored. Senator Kenneth Dahlgren, another lawyer in the so-called citizens legislature of Maryland, which was ninety percent lawyers, with the occasional beautician, farmer, and schoolteacher to keep it honest. He looked earnest and humorless, the kind of dullard to be avoided at any cost.

“No name recognition?” Tess said. “Try no face recognition. That’s the most forgettable man I’ve ever seen.”

Now the young man at his elbow, following so closely he might be a bodyguard, was more intriguing, one of the most beautiful men Tess had ever seen. One of the most beautiful people, period. Indian, his coloring begged for a Whitman sampler of bad metaphors-caramel skin, chocolate eyes, a mouth red and ripe as a cherry center. Tess had to remember to close her own mouth as she stared. The man didn’t project a sexual aura, so much as he brought to mind a host of exquisite objects that made one dizzy with longing. Ode to an Indian urn, she thought. Baby, you can sit on my mantel anytime. If Crow ever vacated the premises, she amended in her mind. A recent convert to monogamy, Tess had the convert’s typical zeal for her new religion.

Yet no one else seemed to notice him. Beauty for beauty’s sake was not a prized commodity in South Baltimore. The sour beef diners tried to push past the young man and toward the senator, children swamping the mall Santa. Gimme, gimme, gimme. Only their lists were full of road projects and state grants, zoning variances and jobs for otherwise unemployable relatives.

And not a single one was claiming to have been a particularly good boy or girl.

“I can’t believe he’s our best hope to win the first,” Spike muttered. “All politics is loco.”

“Local,” Crow corrected, even though he knew Spike had mis-spoken on purpose. “I’m pretty sure Tip O’Neill said all politics is local.”

But the mere sight of Dahlgren had made Spike grumpy. “It’s one thing to be ambitious, and my hat’s off to anyone who can get Meyer Hammersmith to sign on as his campaign chairman. Meyer’s a rainmaker, and a class act. But Dahlgren don’t play the game. He cares only about himself. He’s jumping ’cause he knows his seat is going to be carved up in redistricting. If he had worked with his colleagues to begin with, they wouldn’t be so gleeful about screwing him after the Census.”

“A Democratic congressman will do more for the state than anyone in the General Assembly.” Tess sensed her father was disagreeing just for the fun of getting Spike worked up.

“Do more to the state,” Spike said. “ Maryland, my Maryland. The despot’s heel is on the shore, for sure.” In his Baltimore accent, the state song became “Merlin, my Merlin” and the word despot sounded more like a place to catch a train.

The waitress took their orders, sour beef all around, and everyone wanted an extra dumpling, although Tess debated with herself back and forth. Diet averse, she believed one should always eat what one wanted, but knowing what one wanted-ah, that was another question altogether.

No longer able to contain herself, she leaned forward: “Who’s the pretty boy with Dahlgren?”