18
His gray eyes squinted a hundredth of an inch, maybe 19
less, but it was enough to say that he wasn’t going to hire 20
me. Even more than that, the pained wince said that he 21
wouldn’t hire me, not because there was no job but be-22
cause there was something wrong somewhere — some-23
thing wrong with me.
24
“You would?” He smiled. There was a yellowy tint to Ry-25
der’s teeth too. All that yellow made me feel a little nauseous.
26
“Yes, sir,” I said, hating myself for it.
S 27
The squint again. This time a little more pronounced.
R 28
3rd Pass Pages
ManInMyBasemnt_HCtext3P.qxd 10/24/03 8:16 PM Page 20
Walter Mosley
1
There were men working on one of the excavations be-2
hind the builder, to his right. One man had stopped dig-3
ging and was looking at me. He was black, I could tell 4
that, but I couldn’t make out his features in the distance.
5
“You worked at that bank, didn’t you, Chuck?”
6
“Charles,” I said. “My name is Charles. And yeah, I 7
worked at Harbor Savings.”
8
“Why’d you leave there?”
9
“Let me go. I don’t know. Downsizing, I guess.”
10
Ryder’s eyes were very expressive. He was the man in 11
charge and not used to lying. I could see that he was won-12
dering if I believed my own words. That, of course, made 13
me question myself.
14
“No jobs,” he said with a one-shoulder shrug.
15
I could tell that Ryder wanted me to disappear, just as I 16
had felt about the white man at my door the day before.
17
But I wasn’t going to go away that easily. My family had 18
given Wilson’s grandfather one of his first jobs. My grand-19
mother delivered Wilson’s brother and sister. He couldn’t 20
whisper two words and expect me to go away just like 21
that.
22
“Well?” he said.
