He turned and went back into the school, headed for the janitors’ room, where Samuel was having his lunch. It was time to go to work. Not to do this bullshit work right here, but to do the work of a man.

Willis stepped into the cramped room, poorly lit by one bulb. Samuel was sitting at a table, eating a sandwich his wife had made him, drinking one of those little cartons of milk he’d gotten from the cafeteria, the way he did every day. Him and those baggy-ass clothes, with those clown patches of gray around a bald-ass head.

“I feel poorly,” said Willis, putting a palm to his stomach.

“That right,” said Samuel.

“Tellin’ you, I’m sick.”

“Uh-huh.”

“I just came from the bathroom, man. Didn’t know so much could drop out of one man.”

“Maybe you got yourself a worm.”

“Sumshit like it, that’s for damn sure.”

“You better go home, then,” said Samuel in a tired way.

“Thanks, boss.”

“Don’t forget to punch yourself out.”

Okay, thought Willis. I’ll go ahead and do that now. You just sit there, eating your sad-ass, sorry-ass sandwich, and let me go. Shoot, blind man in a coffin could see he wasn’t sick. Strong as he looked? Now Samuel was gonna stick around, making his pennies, while he, Willis, went on that thing with his cousin and scored some real cash. Wasn’t no trick to getting free to do it, either. You could fool this fool here every single day.

Samuel Rogers watched Kenneth Willis punch his time card, then watched him walk from the room. He chuckled under his breath. Boy thought he was fooling him. He didn’t mind giving Willis the afternoon off, even if it meant more chores for him. Rogers plain didn’t care for Willis. Him with his sleeves rolled up to show his muscles, and that hungry-wolf way he looked at the women and even the little girls. Him hiding those soiled magazines in the office, back behind the lockers, like he was getting away with something. Not knowing enough about himself to admit what he was.

Through the years, Samuel Rogers had seen many of these slick young ones who thought they were too smart to work. Them thinking he was some kind of fool for sticking with it. Them who were in such a big hurry to get in the unemployment line. Samuel just did not like to be around that kind.

Man wore his pants too tight, too.

OLGA VAUGHN STOOD beside her husband, Frank, who was seated at the kitchen table, having a coffee and a smoke. They had just finished lunch. Olga had gone up to their bedroom and returned with a new pair of boots, looked like something out of the 1930s, on her feet. She had drawn a cigarette from Frank’s pack and was moving it, unlit, to and from her mouth in a cigar smoker’s pantomime. She had her free hand cupped alongside her hip, as if she were holding a tommy gun.

“Whaddaya think, Frank?”

“Who you supposed to be?”

“Faye Dunaway!”

“She’s a blonde. You got hair like the ace of spades.”

“I’m talkin’ about the look.” Olga glanced down at her feet so that Frank’s eyes would go there, too. “I got ’em down at the Bootery on Connecticut. They’re called gunboots.”

“You don’t say.”

“They go with my Capone stripes. You know, the pants suit I got last week at Franklin Simon?”

“The one came with the hat?”

“It’s a beret. Don’t you know the difference?”

“Sure. Like the painters wear.”

Olga wiggled one foot. “You likee?”

“Me no sabbee,” said Vaughn, tapping ash off his cigarette. He’d be glad when this bullshit Bonnie-and-Clyde craze was done.

“Oh, Frank,” said Olga with a roll of her eyes.

Olga tied an apron around her waist, went to the sink, and began to wash their dishes. Frank watched her with affection.

From upstairs, he heard the thump of bass coming from the stereo in Ricky’s room. It was Vaughn’s own fault if it was driving him nuts. He’d bought the system for Ricky himself, a birthday present and also a little something to kick off his college education. It was a Zenith component setup, eighty watts, had a feature called “Circle of Sound.” The salesman at George’s, over there on Queen’s Chapel Road, said it was a nice “unit,” then said it was “only” one hundred and sixty-nine. When Vaughn heard the price he felt like grabbing his slacks and telling the guy, Turn around, I got a nice unit for you right here. But he just smiled politely and said he’d come back. Vaughn got his fence friend down off 14th to find a Zenith just like it, or one that was damn close. And it didn’t cost him no buck sixty-nine. Course it was a little on the warm side. Only thing it didn’t come with was a box and a warranty card. But for twenty-five dollars you could do without the cardboard and the serial number.

Vaughn had felt a little bad that the kid was living at home while some of his friends went off to school, so buying the system for him was like, what did you call that, a consolation prize. But now Vaughn had to pay the price.

When Ricky wasn’t listening to music, he was gabbing about it with his friends. Talking about a group named Flavor at the Rabbit’s Foot on Wisconsin and, all last summer, a guy named Hendrix who’d played the Ambassador and then “sat in” with another guy named Roy at a place called the Silver Dollar, and on and on. The kid could talk on the phone. He was like his mother that way.

“Does he ever study?” said Vaughn.

“He must,” said Olga. “He got decent grades last fall.”

“Three hundred dollars a semester and he’s up there playin’ that shit all day. He oughtta have his face buried in the books.”

“Frank.”

“That’s not why I’m humpin’ it out here,” said Vaughn. “So he can live off my tit and listen to music.”

“You bought that box for him,” said Olga, “remember? You’ll see, he’s doing fine in college.”

Anyway, thought Vaughn, it’ll keep him out of the war.

Vaughn crushed out his smoke as Olga turned, drying her hands on a dishrag. She untied her apron, hung it back on its hook, and looked him over. He was wearing one of his Robert Hall suits. It was early for him to be dressed for work.

“Aren’t you gonna take your nap?” said Olga.

Usually, he got some shut-eye after lunch while Olga watched what she called her “afternoon menu” on channel 7: The Newlywed Game, The Baby Game, General Hospital, Dark Shadows, and Mike Douglas. Around the time she was looking at that crazy vampire show, he’d dress, slip out the house, and get on his way to his four-to-midnight shift.

“Not today,” said Vaughn. “I’m gonna get out early. Want to visit a few garages before they close.”

“For what?”

“This young guy got hit-and-runned last night. I’m looking into it.”

“He was killed?”

Vaughn nodded. “The car that was involved musta got smashed up good. It’s gonna need repairs.”

“You don’t work accidental deaths.”

“It’s a homicide until I learn different. I think it was a race killing. Whoever did it, it was like they were joyriding. You know, having fun. The boy was colored.”

“Frank.”

“What?”

“What color was he?”

“Huh?”

“He was black, wasn’t he?”

“Okay.”

“Then call him black.”

“Christ, Olga.”

He had to stifle himself now. Olga and her girlfriends. He bet they had taught her to use that comeback on him when he called someone colored. What color was he? Clever. Them, who had no black friends. Them, whose only contact with black people was with their black maids and the black man at the A amp;P who loaded their groceries into the back of their station wagons. And here they were, with their nails and their pool memberships and their mah-jongg tiles, thinking they were gonna teach him something, when he was out there in the actual world every day.

“What’s wrong?” said Olga.

“Nothin’, doll.” Vaughn’s eyes crinkled at the corners. “You just make me laugh sometimes.”