The James Deans

“That was quite an improvisation. My compliments. But that little act in there, it could blow up in your face. You understand that?”

“Next to murder, what does it matter?”

“Murder! Moe, yes we will leave town with a little bit more information than we arrived with, but we’re a million miles away from murder.”

“We’ll see. Do you have that list Farr gave us with the names of the families who moved out of town after Carl Stipe’s death? Read off the names.”

Wit complied: “Kenworth, Hitner, Lawrence-”

“Curiouser and curiouser,” I said.

“It proves nothing.”

“I’m sure Kyle Lawrence’s death started the chain of events that led me here. It’s a place to start.”

“Start what, Moe? That was twenty-seven years ago. Lawrence is dead. The case is closed to almost everyone’s satisfaction.”

“Is it? Let’s go ask Carl Stipe’s mother.”

“Point well taken. However, I would be remiss not to alert you to the fact that in spite of your rousing speech in the mayor’s office, word is going to leak back to Brightman.”

“I’m not an idiot, Wit. I know that. When it leaks back to him, we’ll just have to figure out how to use it.”

It was turning dusk when we plopped ourselves back in my car parked in front of the Hallworth Herald. I turned the ignition and pulled the transmission into drive, but Wit clamped his hand around my right forearm.

“Wait! Farr’s niece is waving us into the office.”

I put it back in park and left the car running. “You stay here, okay?”

Wit didn’t protest. He was tired and badly in need of a drink. In any case, after the little coup I’d pulled off in the mayor’s office, I think he trusted me to deal with Annie.

She was alone in the smoky office, a new cigarette dangling from her lower lip. Sitting across from her, I noticed that she was actually attractive in a bohemian sort of way. She wore no makeup, and her washed-out brown hair was just drooped over her rounded shoulders. The limp hair disguised sparkly brown eyes, a pleasantly sloped nose, and a strong jaw. As close as I was, I now figured Annie to be in her early forties.

“My uncle treats me like I’m not here, and I guess sometimes I let him,” she said. “I should have introduced myself before.”

“That’s okay. My name’s Moe Prager.”

“I know who you are and so does my uncle Micah. You didn’t let that aw-shucks small-town-reporter act fool you, did you? You’re that investigator from the city that cleared Steven Brightman.”

“How’d-”

“I know this is Jersey, Mr. Prager, but we get the same TV stations as you. That was big news in this town. My uncle and I watched the news conference when they announced that you had found that woman’s killer. It was front page of the Herald the following day.”

“Is that what you wanted to tell me, that my trying to keep a low profile didn’t work?”

“No, I wanted to tell you some things about Steven Brightman.”

I tried not to react, but in trying, I gave myself away. I went with it. “What about him? To hear the people around here tell it, he was a nice boy who got good marks and played Little League.”

“That’s because you talked to people who were adults when we were kids. Not that Steven was public enemy number one or anything, but he was a fourteen-year-old boy once.”

I recalled what her uncle had said to us earlier in the day about how reporters were ill-equipped to research the lives of kids.

“Surprise me, Annie,” I challenged her.

“Steven was in a gang.”

My first reaction was to laugh at her, but I didn’t. I had been a fourteen-year-old boy once myself. I remembered the intense desire to belong. It almost didn’t matter to what, as long as my friends belonged too, and I was accepted. The intensity dimmed after I grew out of my awkwardness and girls appeared on the horizon.

Annie misread my silence. “Not a gang like in the city. There were no Sharks and Jets in Hallworth. It wasn’t the Episcopalians rumbling with the Lutherans on Railroad Avenue at midnight. Maybe ‘gang’ isn’t the right word. It was more of an ‘us’ and ‘them’ thing.”

“Did they have a name, this gang?”

“The James Deans. The JDs for short.”

“Juvenile delinquents. How perfectly fifties.”

“But it was the fifties, Mr. Prager, and James Dean was a Hallworth kind of antihero. The boys in an affluent town like this couldn’t relate to guys who played it tough like Brando or Lee Marvin or even Vic Morrow, but James Dean … And when he died in a car crash, it just sealed the deal. You’re probably a little too young to remember the stir he caused. In college, I wrote a paper comparing his career to that of the Romantic poets. I mean ‘romantic’ in the sense of the long ago-”

“-and the far away. Byron, Shelley, Keats, and company. Some cops go to college, Annie.”

She apologized. “I didn’t mean to condescend. Forgive me.”

“Forget it. So Brightman was in this club or gang or whatever. Do you remember any of the other kids who were in the JDs?”

“There weren’t many,” she said, lighting up another cigarette. “Let’s see, there was Jeffrey Anderson, Michael Day, Kyle Lawrence, and Pete Ryder.”

“So few. Why?”

“Even in the midst of the baby boom, Hallworth was a small town. And like you said, Mr. Prager, it was the fifties. Conformity was still like everyone’s second religion.”

“Do any of the other James Deans still live in town?”

“Kyle died a few years back. Pete Ryder went to West Point and was killed during the Tet offensive. Jeff Anderson left years ago, California someplace, but I’m pretty sure Mike Day’s still around.”

“How sure?”

“I used to be married to the prick.”

The houses on Conover Street were the smallest houses in Hallworth, but their lawns were just as green and their hedges as trim as in the rest of town. Maybe Micah Farr wasn’t kidding about the lawn police. I wouldn’t know. Local code enforcement isn’t a huge deal in Brooklyn. There’s such a mishmash of tastelessness and beauty in the County of Kings, it’s hard to discern where the one started and the other one ended.

Number 23 Conover was a clapboarded saltbox set on a little bluff. Darkness had come in force, and climbing the steps up from the street was a bit of a challenge for Wit and me. Wit looked haggard, his age and addiction to alcohol showing in his face and posture. I wasn’t too sure I would have withstood a close inspection myself. It had been a tiring day, long on hints and traces, but short on substance. Mike Day met us at the front door. Annie had called ahead.

He didn’t look anything like I’d expected he would, given the appearance of his ex-wife. Mike stood an inch above six feet. He was still quite tan, athletic, good-looking, dressed in chinos and a golf shirt embroidered with the name of a big Wall Street brokerage. He welcomed us in and offered us drinks. I thought Wit might click his heels and scream, “Hallelujah, praise the Lord.” I took a beer. Wit made do with a few fingers of Maker’s Mark.

“So, gentlemen, Annie tells me you think I might be able to help you,” he said, showing us into his living room.

“Maybe. Wit’s doing a follow-up piece for Esquire on an old friend of yours.”

Day’s face brightened. “Stevie’s going places now that that ugliness has been cleared up. I always knew he would. He has some set of balls on him.”

“Does he?” Wit, now feeling his oats, joined the conversation. Day proceeded to regale us with tales of the young Steven Brightman’s bravery and daring. He swam across the reservoir at the age of nine even though it was illegal and most adults wouldn’t have dared. He jumped off the rocks at Indian Falls into Iron Creek although the creek was only a few feet deep at most points.