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“It’s not important.”

It didn’t feel right to have that phrase hanging in the air between us. I didn’t want that to be the last thing I said to her. I wanted to tell her I needed no snapshots of him, my life would be over before I forgot Wilton. But while I was trying to figure out some beautiful way to say it, the door closed behind me.

Looking closely at the dense, ice-laden moss on the facade of the house, I could see there were tiny Christmas tree lights intertwined with the greenery. But of course, they were dimmed now.

I walked back to the car. When I didn’t get in immediately, Sim looked out at me, waiting, but said nothing.

I was thinking about the quiet little town of Kent. One of those posh villages, like Martha’s Vineyard, where moneyed blacks had established an enclave in the early part of the century, the houses passed down from one generation to the next.

Evidence. Whatever it was that Oscar Mobley found at the house, it had sent him into a real tailspin. And as for the so-called friends Wilton had been partying with up there—who were they? He’d surely never invited anyone from the commune, not even Mia. I wasn’t just feeling left out, though; I was feeling betrayed. Here was another secret he hadn’t let me in on.

Tough. I had to get past that. I said I was willing to face the truth no matter what came out. If I hadn’t meant it before, I did now.

Jack Klaus had intimated that Wilton may have burned a drug connection. I didn’t buy it. But I knew who might have done something like that: Barry Mayhew.

Oscar Mobley found out there were some funky dishes and funky doings at the house in Kent. But maybe the people up there weren’t partying. Maybe they were cooking up something else. Better living through chemistry. That was a slogan my little generation had taken to heart. Find an isolated spot and put a couple of talented chemistry students to work. There was a fortune to be had. That sounded like a possibility, too. Once again, I smelled Barry. Maybe he had been the one member of the commune to be asked up to Kent.

I opened the car door. Not the rear door, the passenger side in front. Sim asked no questions except, “Where to?”

3

The winter sun caromed off the deluxe apartment buildings along Lake Shore Drive. Not to get too sappy about it, Lake Michigan can be pretty damn thrilling sometimes. But the majestic expanse of it is no watery womb. Stretching on forever, frozen blue, it looks ungiving, fatal.

“The lake’s amazing, isn’t it?” I said. “Do you ever just sit and stare at it?”

“Naw.”

I was looking at the water. Sim was looking at the road.

“You know Skip’s Tavern, on Indiana?” I asked as we cruised past the 25th Street exit.

“Uh-huh.”

“How about having a drink with me at Skip’s?”

“I don’t know about that.”

“Because of Woody, you mean. He lets you take a break sometimes, doesn’t he?”

“Yeah, I take a break. But not to drink.”

“Lunch then. We could go to Champ’s and you could get something to eat there. My treat. You like their ribs?”

“They okay.”

He found a place to park on Forest Street. Just my luck.

When he stepped out of the car, he seemed to emerge in sections. His chest was massive, his thighs like pillars, canoe-size feet in dark-brown boots.

“See that next block?” I said to him. “I was born on that block. Or somewhere near. Anyway, that’s where I used to live, with my grandmother.”

He nodded.

At the red Formica table we hooked, Sim papered his starched yellow shirtfront with napkins and tucked into the ribs. I marveled at what a fastidious eater he was, not a drop, not a splash of barbecue sauce on him. I ordered a dish of banana pudding, only two or three million calories’ worth.

He never asked why I was so eager to buy him a meal. I guess he knew that I was after something. While he ate, I got up and went over to talk to the waitress and the fry cook. Sim didn’t ask why I was doing that, either.

“How long have you been with my uncle?” I said when I came back to the table.

“Since July.”

“You