Memphis was distracted. All day long he replayed his meeting with Theta, the excitement of their narrow escape from the police. The way she’d looked at him when it was clear they’d made it, with gratitude and a little shyness. Memphis had wanted nothing more at that moment than to sweep her up into a romantic kiss. In fact, it was thinking about that kiss that had nearly gotten him in trouble. That morning when he’d gone to Mrs. Jordan’s beauty shop to write their slips, he’d mixed up Mrs. Jordan’s regular gig with Mrs. Robinson’s washerwoman’s gig because his mind was elsewhere.
“Memphis, where is your head?” Mrs. Jordan had tutted good-naturedly, and Memphis had apologized and run their numbers to Floyd’s Barbershop just ahead of the clearinghouse posting.
Papa Charles had called a meeting at the Dee-Luxe Restaurant, one of his own, to discuss the previous night’s disastrous raid. He assured everyone that the situation was minor, a misunderstanding that was already on its way to being worked out, and that the padlock would be off the doors of the Hotsy Totsy very soon. But Memphis could tell that beneath Papa Charles’s elegant manners and calm speech, he was nervous. He had that tic in his jaw that Memphis had seen a few times before, when he’d had to deal with a drunken, belligerent customer or a hopped-up bootlegger. But still, Memphis’s thoughts were on Theta.
Theta, Theta, Theta. He’d met the girl of his dreams—a girl who had the same dream he did—only to lose her in the crowd. Just as it felt his destiny was shaping up, it was lost again. He didn’t know where she lived, where she was from—he didn’t even know her last name. And that crazy bird was back, dogging his every step.
“Shoo!” Memphis waved his hands at the crow. “Go on, Berenice! Git!”
Now Memphis was late to pick up Isaiah from school. He entered the classroom with apologies, but Isaiah wasn’t having any of it. On the street, his brother’s mood was stormy as he kicked a rock ahead, then chased it into the gutter so he could kick it again. “You were ’posed to be here at three o’clock!”
“I had some business to take care of, Ice Man.”
“What kind of business?”
“My business. Not yours.”
“Next time, I’ma walk myself home.”
“I won’t be late next time.”
“Prolly stepping out with that Creole Princess,” Isaiah grumbled.
Memphis stopped. “Where’d you hear that?”
Isaiah laughed. “Saw it written in your book from last night. Memphis got a gir-rl! Memphis got a gir-rl!”
Memphis grabbed Isaiah’s arm. “You listen here: That notebook is private. It belongs to me. You understand?”
Isaiah’s chin jutted forward. “Leggo my arm!”
“Promise me!”
“Let go!” Isaiah tore away, running ahead on the busy street. He was unpredictable when he was mad, and just as likely to tell Octavia everything as not.
Memphis softened. There was no need to take out his frustration on Isaiah, no matter how annoying he was. He hurried to catch up, saying, “Don’t be mad, Ice Man. Come on. Let’s go over to Mr. Reggie’s for a hamburger. You can sit at the counter, on the stools that turn around. Just don’t turn too much and vomit up your hamburger.”
Isaiah stopped. His nose was running. “I want chocolate.”
“Then you’ll have chocolate,” Memphis promised.
Memphis worried about Isaiah. It was by accident that Sister Walker had discovered Isaiah’s special talents. About six months ago, she’d moved to Harlem and come around to pay a call on Octavia. She said she was an old friend of their mother’s and was saddened to hear that she had passed.
“Viola was a fine woman,” Sister Walker had said.
Octavia had sized her up and found her wanting. “Funny, she never mentioned you to me. And we were close as can be.”
“Well, I expect even sisters keep some secrets,” Sister Walker had answered. That hadn’t sat well with Octavia, Memphis could tell.
But when Miss Walker offered to tutor Isaiah in arithmetic, a subject that gave him trouble, and to do it for free, Octavia relented. One day, while Sister Walker used the cards to teach him multiplication, Isaiah started calling out the cards ahead of time, and Sister asked if there were other things he could do. She said it was a skill that might help Isaiah in the world, and she started pushing him to work at it like it was a subject in school. Memphis didn’t see how Isaiah’s skill was something that could move him up in the world, like wailing on a trumpet the way Gabe did or solving mathematical equations like Mrs. Ward up at school could do. And if Octavia ever found out what really went on at Sister Walker’s house, she’d pitch a fit the likes of which they’d never seen. But it mattered to Isaiah. It made him feel special and happy like before, when their mama was alive and playing hide-and-seek with them while hanging the laundry from the clothesline in the garden they’d shared with the Touissants in the house on 145th Street. Memphis could still hear his mother’s laugh as she’d say, “All right, now. Let’s see if you two are as good at putting away these sheets as you are at hiding yourselves in them.”
Those had been good times, their father coming home from his job with the Gerard Lockhart Orchestra with a jovial, “Well, well, well, what have the Campbell brothers been up to today?” Memphis missed the smell of his father’s pipe in the front parlor. Sometimes he’d walk in front of the tobacco shop on Lenox Avenue just to light the memory of it in his mind.
“Watch out for Isaiah,” his mother had said to him. She was skin and bones then, lying in the front room, the sickness robbing her of the playfulness he’d always loved about her. Her eyes had a hollow look. “Promise me.” He’d promised. Three days later, they’d buried her out in Woodlawn Cemetery. The Gerard Lockhart Orchestra relocated to Chicago, and Memphis’s father with it, until he could save enough to send for Memphis and Isaiah. But there never seemed to be enough, and there they stayed, in the back room at Octavia’s. Isaiah was all that was left of those happier times when their family was all together, when you only had to walk through the door to hear somebody laughing or calling out, “Who’s that knocking at my door?” and Memphis held tightly to his brother. If anything happened to Isaiah, he wasn’t sure he could survive it.
But all that was the past, and he wasn’t going to dwell there. The night before with Theta had given him new hope. She was somewhere out there in that city, and Memphis meant to keep looking until he found her again.
At the pharmacy, he and Isaiah took two seats at the counter and Mr. Reggie put their order on, pressing two hamburgers against the grill with a spatula, making a comforting hiss of grease and heat. He scooped them onto plates and served them up, along with a soda for Memphis and a chocolate shake for Isaiah. Isaiah got to work spooning the thick ice cream into his mouth, dribbling half down his chin.
“Looks like I’m just in time.” Gabe dropped onto the stool next to Memphis. He grabbed Memphis’s hamburger and took a generous bite from it. “Mr. Campbell. Just the man I wanted to see. Alma’s having a rent party. We going. Oh, and get us some good hooch.”
Gabe handed him a thick wad of bills.
“Not in front of Isaiah,” Memphis whispered.
“He doesn’t know what we’re talking about. He’s enjoying that shake,” Gabe said.
“Don’t know what?” Isaiah said.
Memphis flashed Gabe a You see? look.
Gabe pursed his lips and folded his arms across his chest. “Little man, you got some kind of magic ears over there?”
Isaiah grinned. “No, but I do have powers.”
“Isaiah,” Memphis warned.
“Oh, do you now? I see how it is,” Gabe teased.
“I bet I know how much money you got in your pocket,” Isaiah said, turning all the way around on his bar stool.
“Isaiah, Gabe doesn’t have time for your games now,” Memphis said sharply. “Eat your food.”