And the rookie center fielder’s name? Well, of course it was.

And who else would remember it but a native, a kid who was living and dying with his hometown team the way only hometown kids can? Once that was figured out, it wasn’t so hard to narrow the location down even further. I could hear the groaning from my backyard, he had said. Which explained why, after I arrived, I rented a car and headed down the parking lot that was I-90, looking for the exit that would take me to the part of Chicago on the North Side known, for obvious reasons, as Wrigleyville.

There weren’t that many Pfeffers listed in Chicago. The one who lived in Wrigleyville had moved there three years before, after living for years in New Jersey. Of the others, there were a few who knew a Bob Pfeffer here or there of the approximate right age, but none that matched closely enough the description of my dentist.

“Does Dr. Bob have relatives that you know of?” I had asked Carol Kingsly after my Pfeffer search came up blank.

“He never mentioned any,” she said. “How does that fit?”

“It’s a little tight.”

“That’s good. Tight is good.”

“It’s not very comfortable.”

“Honey, it’s a shoe. Try wearing these for a day.” She exhibited her shapely leg, showing off a red patent leather pump with a narrow spike. I got her point. It wasn’t so much that her shoes were uncomfortable, rather that if I wanted to take them off her feet again with my teeth, it was time I changed my footwear.

“But there are no laces,” I said.

“Isn’t that wonderful? Buckles are fabulous.”

“I feel like Buster Brown.” I looked at the salesclerk who had shaken his head with such despair at my thick-soled black wingtips. “What is this again?”

“It’s a Compton,” he said, “from Crockett & Jones.”

“Weren’t they the cops on Miami Vice?”

He sniffed. “It’s a British manufacturer, sir.”

“How much?”

“Four hundred forty dollars, and a steal at that.”

“I suppose it is, for Mr. Crockett. Do you have anything else, maybe something on sale?”

“Daffy’s is just down the street.”

“Then how about something just a little less buckle-ish, maybe.”

“I understand,” he said. “I’ll check the synthetic leathers.”

“You sure do know how to impress the help,” said Carol after the clerk left to return the Comptons to the back room.

“What is a Pfeffer anyway?” I said. “It sounds like a smoker’s cough. Pfeffer. Pfeffer.”

“I think it’s German.”

“For what, pain?”

“Don’t be silly. Pfeffer is German for pepper.”

Driving around Chicago is a little like looking for drinks in Salt Lake City, you pretty much need to be a local to get where you want to go. And it didn’t help that I had the usual rental-car sense of dislocation; how could I find the right street if I couldn’t even find my turn signal? But I had a map and a plan. I left the highway at Belmont, followed Belmont down to Clark, and then Clark up until I eventually arrived at the marker I was looking for. The Cubbies were out of town, so traffic was light and the corner of Addison and Clark was empty except for the massive white structure with its great red sign. WRIGLEY FIELD / HOME OF / CHICAGO CUBS. As if we didn’t know. I looked at the map, and from there it was a breeze. Up a bit, over a bit, just about three blocks west of third base, and there it was.

It was an old shambling two-story house on a block of old shambling houses, with only narrow walkways between them. But this house was smaller, darker, meaner than the rest. Some of the homes had been freshly painted, some had lovely lawns, new windows, a nice car parked out front, but not this one. It was owned by a Virgil Pepper. It had been owned by Virgil Pepper for forty years. Three Peppers were listed at the address: Virgil, James, and Fran.

The door was opened by Fran. “What do you want?” she said. She was short and heavy, wearing the sort of well-worn housedress that indicated she wasn’t planning to go out that day. Based on the state of her hair, the paleness of her face, the way she squinted into the sunlight, she wasn’t planning to go out tomorrow either.

“I called,” I said. “My name is Victor Carl.”

“You’re that lawyer fellow, right?”

“That’s right,” I said.

“What is it you wanted to talk about again?”

“I wanted to talk about your brother,” I said. “Your brother Bob.”

58

“We thought he was dead,” said Jim Pepper, leaning back on his recliner, wincing as he shifted his position.

“We hoped he wasn’t,” said Fran.

“Of course we hoped he wasn’t,” snapped Jim. “What kind of fool wants his little brother dead?”

“I was just saying,” said Fran.

Fran sat on a sagging, mud-colored couch. I was sitting stiffly on a stiff fold-up chair. Both Jim and Fran spoke with a slightly southern accent, more a West Virginia twang than the flat prairie accent of Chicago.

“When was the last time you saw your brother?” I said.

“Let’s see, now,” said Jim, talking over the television that remained on, a daytime drama with perfect teeth and concerned faces. “He was seventeen, I think. A real hippie-dippie, hair down to his ass, into the drugs and the causes.”

“Bobby was a hippie?”

“Sure. Grapes. Something about grapes, I remember, and a Mexican feller he was all up in arms about. Times was tough around here, what with our mother gone and our father away and our father’s sister trying to take care of us. She was a bitter old witch, less than useless, with a mouth on her.” Jim raised his chin to the ceiling, raised his voice to a shout. “Did you hear that? Less than useless.”

There was a bang from upstairs, as if a wall had been slammed in response.

“No one ever accused Bobby of being quiet,” continued Jim calmly. “One day the two of them, they got into a fight, and things was said. That night he just took his guitar and left. This was like 1975 or so.”

“It was 1978,” said Fran.

“Something,” said Jim, shooting his sister an impatient glare. “We got a couple cards, something from Albuquerque, but then nothing.”

“You would expect that he’d keep in touch,” said Fran. “Visit for Christmas or the anniversary, but no.”

“We thought he was dead,” said Jim.

“Why wouldn’t he come back to say hello?” said Fran. “Tell us he’s alive, at least? Daddy would have liked to hear from him.”

“When did your father die?” I said.

“He ain’t dead,” said Jim with a snort. “He’s upstairs.” Jim raised his voice again. “Nothing but a useless bag of bones anymore.”

An angry grunt came from above, and then another, more plaintive.

“Hold your horses,” shouted out Fran. “We got a guest.”

Another grunt, and then a bang.

“You want some tea, mister?” she said, smiling sweetly.

“That would be nice,” I said. “Thank you.”

“Bobby just disappeared off the face of the earth,” said Fran, without making any effort to rise up and boil some water. “No letters, no calls. But that was always like him, so concerned for the world, without no care for his own family. Couldn’t he at least a done something to let us know he was still alive?”

I shook my head in agreement, even as I wondered that he had stayed as long as he had.

However dark and forbidding the Pepper house was outside, the inside was worse. Greasy wallpaper, collapsing furniture, lights dim, shades drawn. Jim was puffy and pale, about fifty-five years old but already a physical wreck, wincing in his chair, fiddling with his cigarette. Wearing sweatpants, a flannel shirt, dingy socks, he lay stiffly on his recliner as if he had been screwed in place. When he died, forget a coffin, just set the chair on full recline and lower them both into the hole. His sister leaned back on the couch, her bare, venous legs crossed so that one pilling slipper was hoisted in the air, bouncing back and forth to some twitchy rhythm. And everything smelled of smoke and cabbage, of mice urine and green beans, of the browning scent of decay and death.