“We’ll take care of that at the hospital,” said the medic, as he began putting things in place in his van.
“One question,” I said to Asaan. “Was Anthony here?
“Yeah. He was inside earlier. Don’t know if he came outside. As soon as they heard the sirens, all the kids took off.”
Paris nodded, and the medic closed the doors to his van. Within a minute, lights flashing, it had pulled out, maneuvered its way around the squad cars that lined the street, and accelerated in the direction of Forbes Hospital. While Denny and Paris conferred for a minute, I used my cell phone to call Larretta. She picked up on the second ring. Our conversation lasted less than a minute, and when it was over, I turned back to Denny.
“Anthony’s mom?” he asked.
“Yeah,” I said. “She heard about the fight on TV. Station ran a crawl at the bottom of the screen. Fifteen minutes later, Anthony comes in, goes up to his room, won’t talk to her.”
“He okay?” asked Paris.
“No signs of any physical injury,” I said. “I told Larretta I’d go over and try to talk to Anthony. She’s worried, says he’s never refused to talk to her before.”
“The department’s gonna have a heavy presence in both Links’ and Gates’ neighborhoods tonight,” said Paris. “Still, I don’t like the idea of your driving through those areas by yourself.”
“How about this?” said Denny. “I’ll have an officer drive JB over there and wait while he talks to Anthony, then bring him back here to pick up his car.”
Paris thought about it for a minute, then said, “Okay. But if Anthony says anything that might be of help to us, I wanna hear about it ASAP.”
“Fair enough,” said Denny. Turning to me, he said, “I think I saw Todd Geter on the way in, JB. Gimme a minute.”
Five minutes later, I was in the front seat of Todd’s police cruiser, riding through the now nearly-deserted streets around the Center.
Todd glanced over at me and said, “Detective Wilcox says you and he grew up together, JB.”
I nodded and said, “Yeah, Homewood-Brushton area. We met in third grade.”
“Neighborhood integrated then?”
“Pretty much,” I said. “The white flight to the suburbs hadn’t really started yet, people mostly got along with each other. What about you, Todd? You a city boy?”
He grinned and said, “Oh, yeah. My family lived on Frankstown Avenue. I went to Westinghouse High School.”
“Any gang problems at the ‘House then?”
“Nope. I was there after the city had cleaned out most of the gangs. Besides, everybody at the school came from the same neighborhoods, so there weren’t any territorial disputes, and everyone was black, so there weren’t any racial problems.”
He paused for a minute, then smiled and said, “Wouldn’t have mattered anyway, at least not for me. No way was Lillian and Richard Jeter’s son gonna get into trouble.”
“Kept a tight rein on you, did they?”
“Yeah, when they had to, but mostly they were just good parents. My mom’s a secretary at an accounting firm downtown. My dad’s the head custodian at the Cathedral of Learning. Mom’s got more formal education than Pop, but they both made sure I took my schooling seriously. My pop, he’s a reader, you know? I mean, he’s always got a stack of books on his nightstand. Says his books are his friends. They take him places he might not get to otherwise.”
Todd paused again for a minute as we turned onto Patterson Avenue. There were two other police cars already on the block.
“Thing is, JB, the kids I deal with every day, most of them don’t have anyone in their lives. I was lucky. Still am.”
He pulled to a stop in front of Anthony’s house.
“How ‘bout this kid?” Todd asked. “He got someone in his life?”
I could see Larretta’s silhouette behind the curtains in the front window.
“Yeah,” I said. “He does.”
Chapter 31
Larretta opened the door before I reached the porch. She looked tired and worried.
“C’mon in, Mr. Barnes,” she said. “I told Anthony you were coming. I asked him again what happened tonight at the Center, but he wouldn’t talk about it, just said he didn’t do anything wrong.”
“I’m sure he didn’t, Larretta,” I said, “but the police have to know what happened, which means questioning everyone who was there. The detective in charge agreed to allow me to ask Anthony some questions. That’s better than him having to go to the police station tonight.”
Larretta nodded and said, “I know, and I appreciate it, Mr. Barnes. Anthony’s in his room. You can go on up.”
Anthony’s room was down the hall on the second floor, with a window looking out onto the small backyard. His door was open, and I could see Anthony sitting at a corner desk, playing some kind of game on his computer. His shoulders were hunched, and I could sense the tension in the room. I paused at the doorway and said, “Mind if I come in?”
He didn’t look up from the computer, but he said, “Okay,” and after a minute, he hit his keyboard a couple of times and the screen went black.
I stepped into the room and looked around. In addition to the desk, there were a bed, chest of drawers and an old stuffed chair. The walls were covered with posters of professional athletes, as well as one of a singing group whose name I couldn’t even pronounce.
I sat on the edge of the Anthony’s bed, next to the desk. His chair was one of those swivel things, and he turned it so he was facing me and said, “My mom said you wanted to talk to me.” His voice held just a hint of a challenge, but there was something else there, too. I’d had enough conversations with teenagers over the years to know when one of them wanted to talk. Anthony had all the signs.
“Yeah,” I said. “I do. You were at the Center tonight, so you’re on the list of people the police want
