Case Closed by Jan Burke Page A

she brought him his coffee and toast.
    â€œI like being able to help,” I said, before she could answer.
    We both waited for him to come over and cuff me one for arguing with him first thing in the morning, but he just grunted and stirred a bunch of sugar into his coffee. He always put about half the sugar bowl into his coffee. You’d think it would have made him sweeter.
    That morning, it seemed like it did. Once he woke up a little more, he started talking to her like a guy in a movie talks to a girl just before he kisses her. I left the house as soon as I could.
    Before I left, I told my mom that I might be late home from school. I told her that I might catch a matinee with some of the other kids. I never do anything with other kids, and she seemed excited when I told her that lie. I felt bad about lying, even if it made her happy.
    All day, I was a terrible student. I just kept thinking about the matchbook and about Mary Theresa’s father and Harvey and leopards that don’t change their spots.
    After school, I took the city bus downtown. I got off at South Street, right in front of Topper’s.
    The buildings are tall in that part of town. There wasn’t much sunlight, but up above the street, there were clotheslines between the buildings. The day was cloudy, so nobody had any clothes out, although I could have told them it wasn’t going to rain that afternoon. Not that there was anything to rain on—nothing was growing there. The sidewalks and street were still damp, though, and not many people were around. I was a little nervous.
    I thought about going into Topper’s and asking if anybody knew a guy named Mackie, but decided that wouldn’t be too smart. I started down the street. The next address was 1405, Linden’s Tobacco Shop. I had already noticed that sometimes they skip numbers downtown. I stopped, thinking maybe that was where Harvey got the smoke on his clothes. Just then a man came out of the door and didn’t close it behind him as he left the shop. As I stood in the doorway, a sweet, familiar smell came to me, and I felt an ache in my chest. It was pipe tobacco. It made me think of my father, and how he always smelled like tobacco and Old Spice After Shave. A sourpussed man came to the door, said “No minors,” and shut it in my face. The shop’s hours were painted on the door. It was closed on Sundays.
    I moved down the sidewalk, reading signs, looking in windows. “Buzzy’s Newsstand—Out of Town Papers,” “South Street Sweets—Handmade Chocolates,” “Moore’s Hardware—Everything for Home and Garden,” “Suds-O-Mat—Coin-Operated Laundry.” Finally, I came to “The Coronet—Apartments to Let.” The address was 1417 South Street. The building looked older than Mary Theresa’s mother.
    Inside, the Coronet was dark and smelled like a mixture of old b.o. and cooked cabbage. There was a thin, worn carpet in the hallway. A-3 was the second apartment on the left-hand side. I put my ear to the door. It was quiet. I moved back from the door and was trying to decide what to do when a man came into the building. I turned and pretended to be waiting for someone to answer the door of A-4.
    The man was carrying a paper sack and smoking a cigar. The cigar not only smelled better than the hallway, it smelled exactly like the smoke on Harvey’s clothes. It had to be Mackie.
    Mackie’s face was an okay face, except that his nose looked like he had run into a wall and stayed there for a while. He was big, but he didn’t look clumsy or dumb. I saw that the paper sack was from the hardware store. When he unlocked his door, I caught a glimpse of a shoulder holster. As he pulled the door open, he saw me watching him and gave me a mean look.
    â€œWhaddaya want?” he said.
    I swallowed hard and said, “I’m collecting donations for the Crippled Children’s