“You know Alfred Gulla?”
The image of the brutal man with the name not his own hanging from his chest sidled into Ptolemy’s mind.
“Reggie’s wife’s boyfriend.”
“Yeah,” Billy said. “Reggie found out that Nina was still seein’ Alfred and he decided that he was gonna move with her an’ the kids down to San Diego. He asked me if I could find somebody to look after you, because he didn’t trust Hilly either. But before we could make plans, he got shot.”
Ptolemy tried to slow his mind down, to make himself believe that he didn’t yet know enough to say who had killed his great-grandnephew. He tried to make his mind muddy again so that confusion would wash away the words that Billy was saying. But he could not turn his mind’s eye away from the ugly man that had his arm around Reggie’s woman.
“When did they shoot my boy?” Ptolemy asked.
“Eight weeks ago yesterday.”
“What time?”
“It was four in the afternoon.”
“Bright day?” Ptolemy asked.
“Yeah.”
“Out in the open?”
“Car drove by and opened fire. Every damn bullet hit Reggie.”
Billy looked up into Ptolemy’s eyes. The truth was there between them, like a child’s corpse after a terrible fire that no one could have prevented.
Billy parked the car in front of Ptolemy’s apartment building. After hearing about Melinda Hogarth, he offered to walk his friend’s great- uncle to his door. A man shouted at them from across the street.
“Hold up!”
It was a big dark-skinned man with bright eyes and a nose that had been broken more than once, a man who wouldn’t be daunted by a ninety-one-year-old man swinging a steel pipe. Behind him was Melinda, her finger wrapped in thick white bandages and gauze.
“You done attack my girlfriend,” the man said to Ptolemy.
The old man wasn’t afraid. His revelation about Reggie had taken up all of his feelings and pain. The blustering man in army surplus pants and purple T-shirt was nothing to him; death was nothing to him. All he wanted to do was remember if Reggie had talked about going to San Diego.
In his oversized gray sweater Billy didn’t look powerful or strong. He was shorter than Melinda’s brute, but he still moved into the space between Ptolemy and the big man, who, on closer inspection, was past fifty and paunchy.
Ptolemy expected Billy to say something, to warn off the thug boyfriend of the woman mugger. But instead Billy threw a straight punch, hitting the man in the throat. After that the bodybuilder kicked and bludgeoned the big man until he was on the ground, crawling away down the sidewalk. There was a streak of blood on the pavement behind the bully, and the only sound was the beaten man coughing, trying to catch a breath through his bruised windpipe.
“Go on in, Mr. Grey,” Billy said in a mild, friendly voice. “I’ll stay out here and watch these mothahfuckers until you inside.”
Ptolemy saw that Melinda had retreated across the street. She wasn’t complaining or even trying to help her
“Mr. Grey?”
“Yeah, Mr. Strong?”
“If you need it, I’ll come by an’ get you anytime, ya hear?”
“Yes sir, I sure do.”
Inside the apartment Ptolemy thought about Robyn, who was so quick to fight, and now Billy, who didn’t even utter a warning. He could see that the world outside his door had become more dangerous than it was when he was a younger man. Poor people had always fought and killed each other, but it wasn’t so fast and unpredictable. People shot out like rattlesnakes on these modern streets. There was no warning anymore.
The phone rang at 7:27 that evening.
“Uncle Grey?”
“Yeah, Robyn.”
“I’ma be home late, okay?”
“Sure it’s okay. But be careful when you come back in. That Melinda got her some boyfriend threatened me.”
“What you do?”
“I was wit’ Billy Strong. He beat the bejesus out that man.”
“Billy? He’s nice.”
“He said the same about you. What time you comin’ home?”
“’Bout eleven.”
