“So she leaves it with her ma, same as you would if it was you. If Gabriella was still alive, I mean, being as how she always wanted the best for you. And Cerise’s ma is just the same. Nothing too good for Cerise and she’ll risk getting thrown right out on her rear end”-Elena smacked her own behind to emphasize the point-“if it’d help Cerise here make a decent life for the baby.”
When I didn’t say anything she repeated her last point sharply.
“Great,” I managed.
Elena beamed. “So her ma is kind of a pal of mine. We’ve knocked back a few beers together, not that I drink, you understand, nor does she, just a few beers now and then in a sociable kind of way.” She stared at me defiantly, but I didn’t challenge the statement.
“So Zerlina-that’s Cerise’s ma-is watching the baby while Cerise is out of town Wednesday night when we have the fire. Now Zerlina’s vanished-poof-and poor Cerise can’t find out if her dear little baby made it out of the building alive.”
She slapped her hands together for effect and watched me expectantly. All I could think was that it was Sunday night, almost four days since the fire-why was Cerise surfacing only now?
“So I told her you’d help,” Elena prompted me impatiently.
“Help do what?”
“Well, Vicki-Victoria-she needs to find the poor little thing. She’s afraid it’ll get her ma in trouble if she goes to the police. You know, for keeping a baby in the room. Maybe she’d never be able to find another place. I said you were just the person for her.”
“Why has it taken this long for Cerise to miss the baby?” I demanded.
“I been out of town.” It was Cerise’s first contribution to the conversation since she’d asked about the calamari. “Otis, he the baby’s father, he took me up to the Dells. We trying to work things out, you know, I want him to marry me and make a home for me and Katterina and he don’t want to do it. So he promised me a vacation.”
I rubbed my forehead, trying to push the more harrowing images of her life out of my brain. “And you just got back today?”
“I went to the hotel,” she burst out. “I went straight there. People say I don’t love Katterina, leaving her with my mother and all, but I do. I just can’t look after her and have my own life too, not twenty-four hours a day. I can’t even get a job if I got to stay with her all the time. But I went there first thing, Otis dropped me there, you can ask him, that was yesterday. And I saw about the fire, and I hunted all over for my mama and finally I found Elena this afternoon. But she don’t know where Mama is. Except maybe in the hospital where they took the people who was hurt in the fire.”
“Maybe the fire fighters found Katterina,” I offered. “Maybe she’s with DCFS. Have you tried calling them?”
“I can’t call them. They just want to take my baby from me, say I’m an unfit mother.” She started to cry, her long red earrings bobbing into her shoulders.
“There, there.” Elena put a soothing arm around her shoulders. “That’s what we need you for, Vicki. We need someone who knows how to talk to all these people, who can handle it without getting Cerise or Zerlina in trouble.”
It didn’t sound to me as though there was much hope that Katterina had made it through the fire. If a baby had been found there, surely the newspapers would have trumpeted it.
“I’m sorry,” I said helplessly to Cerise. “Sorry about Katterina. But you really are the best person to go to the police and to DCFS-you’re her mother, you’re the only one with a right to ask questions.”
She kept crying without looking up at me. I tried explaining that the police were not going to care that Zerlina had had a baby in the room with her, that they couldn’t keep her from renting a room ever again, but it washed over both Cerise and Elena like the tide.
I thought of the woman I’d talked to at the Emergency Housing Bureau, the despair she’d shared with the other people in the room, the few rooms and the many people to fill them. If you were that helpless, the police might become another bureaucratic menace, ready to use their power to keep you out of a place to live.
“Okay,” I finally said. “I’ll make some calls for you tomorrow.”
Elena took her hand from Cerise’s shoulder and came over to where I was sitting in the armchair. “That’s my girl. I knew I could count on you. I knew you was too much your ma’s daughter to say no to a fellow human being in trouble.”
“Right,” I agreed sourly. I looked at the clock on the bookshelves. It was ten. Even if I sent Elena over to the Windsor Arms this late she couldn’t take Cerise with her. Gritting my teeth, I pulled out the sofa bed, dug around in my drawers for a long T-shirt for Cerise to sleep in, and locked myself in my bedroom.
9
The Lady Is Indisposed
I woke up early the next morning. My dreams had been of crying babies and fires; I’d jerked awake twice feeling suffocated by flames. When I got out of bed it was again with the feeling that someone had dumped a load of gravel in my head, this time without bothering to crush it too fine.
It was only six. Cerise and Elena were still asleep on the sofa bed, Cerise lying spread-eagled on her stomach, Elena on her back snoring. I felt like a captive in my own home, unable to get to my books or television, but if I woke them, it would be worse. I shut the door softly, put on my jeans, and went down the back stairs. It was too early to wake up Mr. Contreras to take the dog for a run. And even though exercise may be the best cure for a sandy head, running sounded like the last thing I was in the mood for.
I walked the half mile to the Belmont Diner, open twenty-four hours a day, and had the cholesterol special, pancakes with butter and a big order of bacon. I lingered as long as I could, following the saga of the search for the Bears new stadium through all three papers, even taking in every word on the latest zoning scandal to beset the mayor’s chief supporters. It’s boring to read about zoning scandals because their revelation never has any impact on election results, so I usually skip them.
Around eight I finally trudged back to my apartment. Life was stirring on Racine Avenue as people headed for work. When I got to my building the banker was leaving for the day, his thick brown hair lacquered to his head.
“Hi,” I said brightly as we passed. “Just getting off the night shift. Have a good day.”
He pretended not to hear me, crossing to the east side of the street as I spoke. Try to be neighborly and you only get stiffed for your pains.
Like LBJ or the Duke of Wellington, Elena could sleep anywhere, anytime. When I opened the kitchen door I could hear her snores oozing from the living room. I also caught my favorite smell, cigarette smoke. Cerise was at the dining-room table, staring moodily at nothing, chain-smoking.
“Good morning,” I said as politely as I could. “I know you’re really upset about your baby, but please don’t smoke in here.”
She shot me a hostile look but stubbed her cigarette out in the saucer she’d been using. I took it to the kitchen and tried to scrub the tobacco stains from it. After a few minutes she followed me in and slumped herself at the table. I offered her breakfast but she wanted only coffee. I put water on to boil and got the beans out of the freezer.
“What floor did your mother live on?”
She looked at me blankly and rubbed her bare arms.
“At the Indiana Arms. I’ll probably need that information if someone is going to search for Katterina.”
“Fifth floor,” she answered after another long pause. “Five twenty-two. It was hard on her on account of the elevator didn’t work, but she couldn’t get nothing lower down.”
“When did you leave the baby with your mother?”
Again she stared at me, but this time I thought there was an element of calculation in her gaze. “We did it Wednesday. Before we left town.” She rubbed her arms some more. “It’s too cold in here. I need to smoke.”
It felt warm to me, but I was dressed; she was still in the outsized T-shirt I’d lent her. I went into my bedroom
