Walkin The Dog

Socrates nodded again.

“I think she was in love with him. That's what Dottie Monroe told me. Dottie said that when Luvia talks about Right she just loses it. Even now he been dead almost a year all you got to do is ask her about him and she can't get out but a few sentences 'fore she choke up.”

“Yeah, well,” Socrates said. “Right was a good man. He never let the world break him down. He was old and crippled but he'd still stand up to anyone'a these young cowards you got runnin' around out here. I'm just surprised that he made it as long as he did.”

“You gonna pay half?” Milton asked.

“Halfa what?”

“I charge fifteen dollars for the ride up here an' back to ten o'clock service. I figure wit' you here she could save a little.”

Luvia's church was on Sixty-third Place near Hooper. It was a large salmon pink building with a white cross, almost three stories high, rising from its roof.

The congregation was coming from all over the street into the three double doors that stood atop the building's wide stone staircase. There was the flowery smell of women's perfume in the air. Socrates and Milton both got out of the car to help Luvia but she pushed them away.

Many well-dressed parishioners took a second look at the big ex-convict in his army fatigue pants and tight black T-shirt. His big hands and stern features marked him out from that God-fearing crowd.

“See ya in a few weeks, Miss Prine,” Milton said. He gestured as if he were doffing his hat but he did not do so.

“You're welcome to come into church, Milton Langonier,” Luvia said.

“I got to get another fare, Miss Prine. Maybe next week.”

Luvia turned quickly toward Socrates, almost, he thought, like a frightened leaf eater who suspected a predator stalking from behind.

“You could come to church too, Mr. Fortlow. They made church for sinners. And it's only God can tell them no.” Her left eye shut for a moment and her gloved hands made themselves into fists.

“Thank you, Miss Prine, but not today. I appreciate it though.”

Luvia actually sighed in relief. For the first time Socrates saw gratefulness in her eyes.

“Wanna go down to MacArthur Park?” Milton asked when they were driving again.

“How much that gonna cost me?”

“I'm off duty now, boy. You know I only do one ride on a Sunday and the rest I take off.”

They sat together on an iron bench that was painted pink. Milton brought out a pint bottle of peach-flavored schnapps and they passed it back and forth taking small swigs and gasping from the alcohol burn.

“She used to sit right over there on that bench,” Milton said, pointing to a tall pine tree.

“What bench?” asked Socrates.

“It ain't there no more. That was thirty-five years ago when I was a mail carrier and I used to come here on Fridays with my boss Moses Goldstein. Jewish man.”

Socrates took another drink and remembered that he hadn't eaten that morning. A warm fuzzy feeling nuzzled in around his ears.

“But who was sitting on the bench?” he asked.

“Cherry Winters,” Milton said. He took a drink and then lit a cigarette.

It was a sunny day and there were more than a few people out strolling in the downtown park. Pedal-boats were gliding across the man-made pond. Two young men were throwing each other long passes with a football. Socrates thought that they were imagining playing in the big game on TV, dreaming that they were sports stars running and passing to the shouts of a whole stadium full of fans. He could almost hear the cheers himself.

“Yep,” Milton said. “She used to sit right under that pine tree. It was smaller back then.”

“Who was she?”

“Black girl. Real real black and ugly from the way I looked at things. She used to sit right over there every Friday and me and Moses used to sit down at a redwood bench near the pond.” Milton smiled at the memory. “Yeah, yeah. We'd sit down on the bench and he'd bring peach schnapps and we'd pour it in these little Dixie cups. I was just a kid really. Moses was more than fifty. It took me a long time realize it but he had a reason to come down here with me. It was that Cherry.”

“What about her?”

“Moses was married. Had three kids and one grandchild. And here that fool falls in love with the ugliest black girl I could imagine. You know the kinda girl don't even style her hair but just comb it straight back and tie it up with a rubber band. Skinny and big lipped.You know back then I thought beauty was Sarah Vaughan or Dorothy Dandridge. That child just wore a one-piece dress and brown shoes that laced up like a man's shoes.”

“An' she would eat here on Fridays while you an' Moses was drinkin'?” Socrates asked. He was enjoying the way that Milton's story unfolded.

“Yeah. One day I figured out that it was because'a that girl that Moses brought me out here,” Milton said with wonder in his voice. “You see I was one of the few blacks they had workin' in his area. He'd been comin' down here for over a year already, watchin' that child.”

Socrates felt his mouth come open the way that it did when he was on the way to drunk. He smiled and looked up at the false horizon line of the trees, that jagged line of pines underscoring blue.

“He was in love,” Milton said.

“Love?”

“Crazy. That's what I said. Crazy. Here you got a old big-bellied Jewish man in his fifties actin' like a school kid over a black girl he ain't ever even been within arm's distance of. But that's what he said. After we been comin' to the park about two months. I guess he had a little too much peach schnapps that Friday an' he told me how much in love he was. I said, ‘Moses, why'ont you go ovah there an' say hey.’ You know I wasn't a day over twenty-five and arrogant the way young men can be. Moses just shook his head and blushed. Blushed!”

It was that last word that made Socrates understand that this long-ago talk had stayed with him, like that Lincoln Continental.

“I yelled over to the girl. Moses said not to but he really wanted me to call her. Why else did he bring me here? I yelled over for the girl to come to our bench. She was a little shy but I guess she figured what could we do in broad daylight in the park?”

Socrates was watching two young lovers, a dark-skinned Hispanic man and his fair Asian girlfriend. He didn't want to hear any sad story right then. The schnapps working its way through his brain only wanted candy colors and a pleasant nap.

“I told her that my friend liked her and she said go on but she sat down anyway. When I left Moses was still on the bench with that girl. I had to lie back at work and say that he ate something bad and went home.” Milton stopped there to take the final drink from the bottle. He lost the thread of his story with that last smacking swallow and sat still staring at the boats gliding across the lake.

“Right Burke was my best friend,” Socrates said. “It feels good to say that. You know? That somebody is your friend. Your best friend. Even though he's dead it's like he was here.”

Milton nodded.

A pair of policemen wandered by on horseback.

“It's nice here in the park, man,” Socrates said.

For a long while after that the two men sat in silence.

“So what happened?” Socrates asked.

“What?”

“With your boss and that girl?”

“Oh. Moses and his girl on the side.” Milton squinted his eyes, trying to remember. “Yeah. He set her up. Got her a little place down offa Adams. Went to see'er every day almost. She had a baby. Named him Moses. And you know I had it made after alla that. I mean Moses loved me almost as much as he did Cherry. After all it was me broke the ice. Every time a promotion was due I got it. I was his second in command after only three years. That way I could cover for him when he was spendin' the afternoon over with her.