“So do I.” The way Mike said it didn’t bother me at all.
On the way down to Southeast, we stopped at a mall and bought Etta some gift certificates at a department store she had mentioned fancying. Welfare recipients are supposed to report any windfall they receive. I wanted to give her some share in my own windfall, but in a way that wouldn’t get her into a hassle with the county. Gift certificates was the best I could come up with.
“You mean they’re going to pay our rent?” Mike asked, scowling his disbelief as I explained Lana’s offer.
“A big part of it. You can start socking away more of your salary for retirement.”
His sly glance was a tip-off. “So, you do plan to stay put for a while. Every time I go home, I check the closet to make sure your stuff’s still there.”
“You do not.”
He didn’t seem very happy, so I didn’t press him.
It was about one when we got to Etta’s. There didn’t seem to be anyone home. I wrote a note telling her where she could reach me at four, and was tucking it into her screen door when I heard her call out.
“Look at who’s here.” Etta, dressed as for church in a flowered sheath dress, tottered toward us on her high heels. She had a beer can in one manicured hand. “Girl, I been tryin’ to get ahold of you for two days.”
“What’s up?” I asked. But she turned her attention to Mike.
“Won’t you give this lady some sugar, Sugar?” She pressed her impressive bosom against Mike. “Been such a long, long time.”
“You look nice, Etta,” I said, asserting my presence. “Where’s the party?”
She preened. “Party’s at Miz Rhodes’ house. Had the memorial for Hanna this morning after church, asked some of her closest friends to come by for a little lunch. That’s where I was when I saw you knockin’ at my door.”
“Is that what you called about?” I asked.
“No. I wanted to tell you I don’t care no more if that motherfuckin’ Pinkie gets out the jail or not. Tyrone copped him a plea. He’s goin’ to jail his own damn self so I don’t have to worry after him no more. He don’t need no father where he’s goin’. And he damn sure don’t need no Pinkie, neither.”
“What did he draw?” Mike asked.
“Much as he could. He’s goin’ to the Youth Authority till he’s twenty-five.” Etta finished her beer. “Hope he uses that time to turn himself around, finish school maybe.”
“I hope so,” I said, though I couldn’t imagine how growing to manhood in that hole could change the course he had set for his life.
Etta crumpled the empty can. “Don’t stand out here. Come on in and pay your respects to Miz Rhodes, get yourself a little refreshment.”
“I’ve been trying to reach Mrs. Rhodes. I want to talk to her about Hanna,” I said. “But maybe this isn’t the time.”
“No time better. I told her all about you.”
I took a camera from the back of the car, loaded it with a new tape and a battery fresh from the recharger, and passed it to Mike. “Best way to get a closer look at what I do is to look through the lens. Just remember that the camera has a slower eye than you do. If you make abrupt movements, you get blur.”
“That’s it?” he said, fiddling with the buttons.
“We’ll work on the fine points later.” I caught up with Etta.
Outside the Rhodes apartment there were a few guests sitting on folding chairs, holding paper plates heaped with food. They nodded to us, made low remarks to Etta that I didn’t catch and she ignored.
The living room held maybe fifteen more people, about half that number again in the kitchen and dining alcove. Etta parted the crowd and led us through.
“Miz Rhodes,” she said in mournful tones. “Look who’s come to pay respects.”
Mrs. Rhodes was a small, attractive woman wearing a simple black dress. She looked young to be mourning a granddaughter.
I started to say something like how sorry I was for her loss when she set upon Mike.
“Why, officer,” she said, her voice rising in pitch at the end. “You was such a nice lookin’ young man. How’d you get so old?”
“Hello, Mrs. Rhodes.” Mike combed his fingers through his white hair. “It’s been a while, hasn’t it?”
“Not that long. What happened to you?”
He blushed. “Guess it’s my line of work.”
There was general polite laughter. Mike shook a few hands that were offered, exchanged greetings with old acquaintances, let himself be led to the buffet table.
Mrs. Rhodes took me aside. “Etta says you were asking about my Hanna. What was it you wanted to know?”
“About what she saw the night Officer Wyatt was shot.”
“Lot of people been asking me about that. Hanna was living with her mama back then, so I don’t know anything about it except what people talked about later. I don’t think you can trust in the truth of a story once it gets told over and over so many times. Do you?”
“Not usually,” I said. “Who has been asking you about Hanna?”
“Well, the police, of course. Someone came, said she was with the district attorney. Little tiny girl. I couldn’t figure her as a district attorney.”
“Was it Jennifer Miller?” I asked.
“Something like that. There was someone else from the district attorney, wanted to look through Hanna’s room, but Hanna didn’t have a room here. Then the other officer-not Officer Flint-he came by, too. What’s his name? I’m not thinking very clearly today.”
“Officer Kelsey?”
“Could be.” She nodded. “And some people came, said they were from the newspapers or the TV. Etta says you’re from the TV.”
“In a way. I know it’s a bad time to ask you for anything. But Hanna is one of the subjects in the film I’m working on. If you have any pictures of her, I’d like very much to see them. Maybe old school pictures, something more recent.”
“Mm hmm.” She puffed out her bottom lip, furrowed her brow and studied me. “Why?”
“I want Hanna to be more than a corpse on someone’s front steps. She was someone’s little girl once. I want people to know that.”
Mrs. Rhodes nodded while I spoke. “I lost all I had in a fire some years ago; that’s when I moved out to California to be near my daughter. But maybe there is something. Hanna left a little box of things with me when she went to prison. I don’t know what’s in it; private things, you know. I was going to look at it later, but you might as well see, too. It’s in the closet in the other room.”
I walked with her down a short inner hallway to her immaculate bedroom. The double-size bed was covered with handbags and hats, a few wraps-just like parties at my parents’ house.
Mrs. Rhodes reached up to the shelf of her small wardrobe and took down a carton that was about a foot square. She cleared a space on the bed so we could sit with the carton between us.
“When Hanna’s mama died, Hanna started using my address, but she never really lived here except for a day or two off and on.” She pulled off the brittle old masking tape that sealed the carton and pried up the flaps. “I had rules, you see, about the way a young lady should behave in my home. Hanna preferred the streets to my rules.”
Mrs. Rhodes lifted out a folded Girl Scout scarf and a few faded construction paper folders that looked like school projects. There was a blonde Barbie doll with matted hair and a few of her outfits, all of them frayed with use. And mementos: a pencil from Disneyland, some seashells, several movie ticket stubs, a candy cane reindeer with pipe-cleaner antlers, a matchbook from a Sizzler, a ceramic box with “Be My Valentine” painted on the chipped lid.
Mrs. Rhodes said, “When something special happens to a young girl, she likes to keep a souvenir of it.”
I found the small store of treasures to be very sad. Was this as special as it ever got for Hanna?
Cheap costume jewelry filled a coffee can. While Mrs. Rhodes sorted through what looked like report cards, I went through the coffee can. Plastic baubles, adjustable rings with colored glass jewels, dangly earrings all tangled together. I pulled them out in a mass, dragging out with them a long bead-chain, and started to separate them to keep my hands busy.