Where is the widow’s mite? Gertrude Sommers, a God-fearing woman, a churchgoing woman, a taxpaying woman, lost her son. Then she lost her husband. Must she lose her dignity, as well?
Ajax Insurance cashed her husband’s life-insurance policy ten years ago. When he died last week, they sent their tame detective, V I Warshawski, to accuse Sister Sommers of stealing it. In the middle of the funeral, in front of her friends and loved ones, they shamed her.
Warshawski, we all have to make a living, but must you do it on the bodies of the poor? Ajax, make good the wrong. Pay the widow her mite. Repair the damage you have done to the grandchildren of slaves. Birnbaum, give back the money you made with Ajax on the backs of slaves. No Holocaust restitution until you make the African-American community whole.
I could feel the blood drumming in my head. No wonder Ralph was angry—but why should he take it out on me? It wasn’t his name that was being slandered. I almost jumped out of the line to tackle Alderman Durham, but in the nick of time I imagined the scene on television—the EYE team wrestling with me as I screamed invective, the alderman shaking his head more in sorrow than anger and declaiming something sanctimonious to the camera.
I watched, fuming, as the circle of marchers brought Durham parallel to me. He was a big, broad-shouldered man in a black-and-tan houndstooth jacket which looked as though it had been made to measure, so carefully did the checks line up along the smooth-fitting seams. His face gleamed with excitement behind his muttonchop whiskers.
Since I couldn’t punch him, I folded the broadsheet into my purse and ran down Adams toward my car. A cab would have been faster, but my rage needed a physical outlet. By the time I reached Canal Street, the soles of my feet throbbed from running in pumps on city pavement. I was lucky I hadn’t sprained an ankle. I stood outside my car gulping in air, my throat dry.
As my pulse returned to normal, I wondered where Bull Durham had gotten the money for custom tailoring. Was someone paying him to harass Ajax and the Birnbaums—not to mention me? Of course, all aldercreatures have plenty of chances to stick their fingers in the till in perfectly legal ways—I was so furious with him I wanted to assume the worst.
I needed a phone, and I needed water. As I looked for a convenience store where I could buy a bottle, I passed a wireless shop. I bought another in-car charger: my life would be easier this afternoon if I was plugged in.
Before I got onto the expressway to track down my client—ex-client—I called Mary Louise on my private office line. She was understandably upset at my leaving her holding the bag. I explained how that had happened, then read her Bull Durham’s broadsheet.
“Good grief, he’s got a nerve! What do you want to do about it?”
“Start with a statement. Something like this:
“In his zeal to make political hay out of Gertrude Sommers’s loss, Alderman Durham overlooked a few things, including the facts. When Gertrude Sommers’s husband died last week, the Delaney Funeral Parlor humiliated her by halting the funeral just as she took her seat in the chapel. They did so because her husband’s life-insurance policy had been cashed some years ago. The family briefly employed investigator V I Warshawski to get at the facts of what happened. Contrary to Alderman Durham’s claims, Ajax Insurance did not hire Warshawski. Warshawski was not at Aaron Sommers’s funeral and did not see or meet the unfortunate widow until the following week. It is inconceivable that Warshawski would ever interrupt a funeral in the fashion the alderman is claiming. If Alderman Durham was utterly mistaken about the facts of Warshawski’s involvement in the case, are his other statements open to the same questions?”
Mary Louise read it back to me. We tweaked it a few times, then she agreed to phone or e-mail it to the reporters who had been calling. If Beth Blacksin or Murray wanted to talk to me in person, she should tell them to come to my office around six-thirty—although if they were like the rest of the Chicago media, they would probably be camped outside the doors of members of the Birnbaum family, hoping to accost them.
A cop tapped my parking meter and made an ugly comment. I put the car in gear and started down Madison toward the expressway.
“Do you know what the Birnbaum part of Durham’s handout is about?” Mary Louise asked.