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What should I do? Should I tell Taylor and Cliff and Annabeth I’d seen Barry in the Volvo? Or would that endanger Dan? I guess it was possible the others already knew, that I was the only one not in on the secret.

No, I was being paranoid. Wasn’t I?

I hustled through the Jackson Street station, heading for the exit at Adams. I’d have to come above ground and then switch to the Ravenswood line. My thoughts were all over the place. I don’t know how many times the young black man walking beside me had spoken before I realized he was talking to me. But now he was shouting in my face. “Goddamn. I said, ‘Hello, sister.’ ”

I blinked at him.

“You sisters going up north are some stuck-up bitches,” he called as he turned around and headed in the other direction.

I stood there like a clown, watching him until he disappeared around the bend. I guess I’d gotten so good at antagonizing my people that I no longer even had to do anything; my existence was enough to piss them off.

I was talking to Wilton once, probably bellyaching about some long-ago humiliation I’d suffered on the playground at Champlain Elementary School. I don’t know, maybe the kids were goofing on my ugly brown shoes or the spastic way I was running after the volleyball. Anyway, when Wilt made fun of my misfortune, I gave him one of those Et tu, Brute looks.

“Cassandra,” he said, “niggers have it so hard. They need somebody to laugh at.”

“They have white people to laugh at, don’t they?”

“I mean, besides whitey. See, the part that assimilated Negroes like you and me play? We actually give them somebody to feel superior to. And they’re right, Sandy. They’re better than us.”

5

A black-and-white was parked near our building, a cop lolling behind the wheel. But I didn’t pay him any mind. I was heading for the apartment lobby like a guided missile: My bladder was about to burst.

But then I saw Nat, his kindly face full of concern for me. I suppose my move was to run into the shelter of his arms. But I wasn’t having any of it. I’d been dodging him ever since the murders. I put my hands up, palms out in a halt! gesture. “Get out of here, Nat,” I said.

“Cassandra, are you crazy? Why won’t you talk to me?”

“Go away.”

“Go away? What am I, a dog you trying to get rid of?”

I didn’t answer.

“Am I your fucking dog, Cassandra?” Not a trace of De Lawd’s paternal solicitude, only venom.

“Look, I don’t want to see you.”

“Why is that?”

Because Wilton’s dead and you’re alive. But of course I couldn’t say that. I spoke quickly to push the ugly, unreasoning thought out of my head. “I’m not going to get into it, Nat. Just leave me be. I need to go upstairs now.”

“I’m coming with you.”

“No!” The cop was interested in us now. He rolled down the window on the passenger side of the front seat. I smiled his way in an attempt to assure him there was no trouble, then lowered my voice. “You’re not coming with me, Nat. Go home.”

He stepped toward me, oblivious to the cop. “You stupid little girl. You got no goddamn idea.” His voice was as far from the usual wheedling as it could get. Now it seemed to have a deadly black undertone.

“No idea about what?” I said.

He took another step forward, reached out. I took two steps back. He came at me again. I looked over at the cop, who was reaching for the door handle now. But before he could open the car door, and before Nat could lay hands on me, I turned and began to run. It didn’t much matter where.

From the way Nat was calling my name, it sounded like I was doing the smart thing. It sounded like he wanted to strangle me.

6

I leaned into the doorbell. Rang it so hard I may have broken the damn thing. Please, Owen, I prayed. Please be there.

He had recently moved to the apartment on Menomonee, the upper floor of a townhouse with lots of black iron grillwork and a little balcony. It was nicer than his old place, and several blocks closer to the commune. However, he was now located on the fringes of Old Town, which was expensive, tourist