Sold on a Monday: A Novel

One look at his father’s scowl, and Ellis saw the mistake in his choice. Accepting help from an Irish mobster would have had fewer repercussions than what now lay in store.

The fact that it was past ten at night—a blatant violation of his father’s early-to-bed, early-to-rise regimen—was cause for a foul mood. His need to shell out fifty whole smackers was the greater issue.

Amazingly the sergeant hadn’t inflated the price for a release outside of the clerk’s hours. But then, Ellis’s father had spent decades as a supervisor. He knew how to reason with people, to speak their language and find solutions. Unless you were Ellis.

At the front desk of the police station that connected to the jail, his father jammed a folded page into his coat pocket. Tangible proof, at last, of his son’s many failings. This much was clear by the way he shook his head at nothing in particular, even after Ellis thanked him again.

“It’s done,” his father said.

No other greeting. No questions about a court date. No asking what had happened.

Did the man even care?

Ellis followed him out of the station, a flashback to their trudge from the principal’s office. Back in junior high school, Ellis’s rebellious period was brief and virtually harmless. Pranks like rubber cementing a teacher’s chair—Mr. Cullen objectively deserved far worse—had succeeded in capturing his father’s attention. Just not long enough to make the gags worth the trouble.

The difference now was that Ellis wasn’t a kid, and recognition of this sort was the last thing he wanted. Why couldn’t his father see that?

Why couldn’t he see Ellis as anything but an inconvenience?

“Like I said on the phone, Pop, I’ll pay you back soon. All right?”

In the glow of the gas lamp, his father was descending the concrete stairs, several steps ahead. “You’re the one with all the dough.”

A cheap shot, given the circumstances.

“I told you, I just gotta straighten it out with the bank.”

“Yeah. So you say.”

Ellis slowed at the base of the stairs, still on edge from the Millstones. He didn’t need this too. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

His father continued toward his truck, ignoring him. The concept was nothing new, but this time Ellis refused to let it slide. “You think I’m lying?”

At the lack of an answer, Ellis stopped cold. Yeah, he’d screwed up with the picture of the kids. But now he was struggling to do the right thing. His life was imploding because of it, and his own father didn’t give a damn. “Well, do you?”

It had to be the most he’d ever raised his voice to the man, but he didn’t regret it. Not even when his father swung back around, the surprise in his eyes snapping to anger. “You’ve made it clear what you think of my opinions.”

A grudge from the supper club. Granted, accusing his father of jealousy was an ugly claim, one with little substance. Jim Reed was the prideful type, never envious. But Ellis, feeling knocked to the floor, had scraped for any ammo within reach.

Evidently, his father was still carting around that bullet.

Recognizing this, Ellis tried to tamp his emotions. “Pop, I’m sorry. The things I said to you last time… I didn’t mean ’em. Can’t you understand? I just wanted to show you how well I’d done. Let you see what I’ve accomplished.”

“Oh, I understand plenty.” His father hitched his hands on the hips of his trousers. “And I’ve got enough smarts to know that if you keep up with all these fancy ambitions of yours, you’ll be in Leavenworth next. Or maybe that’s what you want. Anything for a headline. Ain’t that the business?”

Why wouldn’t he ever listen to Ellis? Really listen. “Look, I know how you feel about newspapermen. I’ve heard all about your run-in with the reporter at the mine, the one you quit over. But we’re not all like that.”

His father flinched, caught off guard.

“I’m not like that.”

Ellis wasn’t being strategic, only honest. Still, the lie in the claim pinged his conscience.

He couldn’t deny the dollars he’d sprinkled here and there, making deals, trading for scoops. Truth of it was, he’d taken pride in separating himself from the vultures who’d do anything to anyone to land a story. Yet ever so steadily, that line had blurred.

“Then why in God’s name,” his father said coolly, “am I here bailing you out of jail?”

It wasn’t a real question, just another jab. Another assumption.

Ellis was too worn, in every way, to hold back the hurt and frustration compounding inside. “You want another apology? Fine. I’m sorry for letting you down tonight, and for quitting at the plant. I’m sorry my job at the Examiner meant working for peanuts. I’m sorry for every goddamn time I wasn’t good enough for you. Most of all, I’m sorry that when my brother died, you lost the wrong son!”

And there it was.

The unspoken had finally tumbled out.

His father stared at him wide-eyed. This time, there was no one around to ease the tension, no mother’s hands to tenderly, deftly hold the family together.

Somewhere in the distance, a dog howled. Head lamps flashed as a taxicab passed.

“Get in the truck.” His father’s voice gave up nothing. He just turned and plodded toward the driver’s side.

Ellis was shouting in his head, That’s it? That’s all you’re gonna say?

The futility of it all left him bare and raw. Defeated. And so, in silence, he climbed inside. His father started the engine, anxious to leave.

He wasn’t the only one.

Ellis envisioned returning to the school, retrieving his car, and clambering into bed. He’d try to forget, for even a few hours, the decisions awaiting him tomorrow.

But then he noticed the truck sat idle. Hands on the steering wheel, his father was gazing out the windshield. Across the street, moonlight streaked the courthouse.

“Pop?” Ellis managed.

For a second, he questioned if his father was breathing. When the man spoke, it was as if to himself. “A shaft collapsed at the mine.”

Ellis waited for more, confounded.

“Took thirty hours to get the men out. I’d just gotten home when you fell from your bike. Broke your arm. Your mama took you to the doctor while the baby was napping. I must’ve drifted off, ’cause next thing I heard was your mama yelling. ‘Henry’s not breathing,’ she was saying and holding him. And his lips were blue, and his face—” On this, his voice broke. His strong, calloused hands held a tremor.

Ellis sat in shock, as much from the story as the sight of tears in his father’s eyes.

“I was twenty damn feet away. If I’d looked in on him, just once…”

The sentence dangled, the alternate outcome going unsaid.

Ellis looked out into the night, and a collage of memories whirred through his mind. They zipped and collided like fireflies in a jar. From a kid’s view, he’d seen the day so differently. The past two decades, for that matter. The distancing, the gruffness. The fourth chair at the dinner table, always vacant but full. He recalled the late-night pacing that had woken him as a kid, footsteps weighted by grief—and guilt.

How on earth was Ellis to respond?

He considered his mother’s words. How babies can stop breathing for no good reason. How his brother was at peace, living with the angels. His father had surely heard it all, even stowed it in the logical part of his brain. But this wasn’t about logic.

On the steering wheel, his father’s grip shifted. Ellis feared that this moment, a tenuous bond connecting them, would end.

“I can understand,” he offered.

The assurance rang empty without specifics.

While aware his own burden could never compare, it seemed fitting to reciprocate with what he had. A dark truth that ultimately had led them here tonight, literally to this spot.

Without another thought, barring any censor, Ellis backed up to the beginning. It was a story that went beyond his summary to Lily, before his overheated engine and two boys on a porch. At the true start were his youthful aspirations for both acceptance and vanity.

His father’s attention edged his way.

As Ellis moved on to the highlights of his feature and the Dillards, the commonalities he shared with his father emerged: their tales of tragedy and children and a longing to right irreversible wrongs.

When at last he’d finished, a thick quiet settled between them. For once, that silence didn’t feel like judgment.

“What’ll you do?” his father asked.

A real question.

“I don’t know. Can’t give up, though. Not till those kids are safe.”

His father nodded. “You’ll figure something out.” There was a certainty in his voice, a glint of faith in his eyes that meant more to Ellis than perhaps was intended, but he revered it all the same.

In a typical talkie at the cinemas, this would be when the father embraced his son, or at minimum gave a squeeze to the shoulder. There was none of that here. They simply drove on toward Ellis’s car. Outside the school, however, stepping down from the truck, Ellis turned to extend his hand. And his father shook it. Not just kindly. As more like an equal.

“You know where to find me,” he said to Ellis, who warmed at the words, spoken like a promise.

“I do, Pop.”

• • •

On the drive back to the Bronx, Ellis thought of his parents, his mother in particular. All these years, she’d never said a word about his father’s guilt. Could be that she didn’t view it as her story to tell. Maybe she was trying to protect Ellis, whose accident that fateful day was the reason they’d left the house. Or maybe, quite simply, she’d yearned to move on, telling herself that what was done was done.

Unlike the case of the Dillards.

Ellis couldn’t help feeling for the Millstones’ loss. Nevertheless, he’d do whatever it took to help Ruby and Calvin—in part for his father. So long as it wasn’t too late, as it was for Henry, he’d find a way to reunite the family.

Geraldine yearned for the same. Ellis knew it in his heart without her having to spell it out. Lily was right about that all along.

It occurred to him to tell her so when she phoned that night, mere minutes after he’d gotten home. But given the hour—it was well after eleven—his concern shot to her son.

“Oh gosh, no,” she told him. “Samuel’s just fine.” Her gratitude projected through her near whispering. He pictured her in the quiet of her boardinghouse. “I wouldn’t have troubled you so late. It’s just that I’ve been trying to reach you all evening.”

“Sorry about that,” he said. “I guess it’s been a long day.”

She paused. “Are you all right, Ellis?” The question brimmed with worry, but it was the comfort of her voice that muted all else.

“I’ll be fine.” He had no inkling if it was the truth, but at least she made him feel hopeful. “What about you, Lily? Is there something you needed?”

“Oh. Yes.” She seemed to forget for a second. “I have to tell you what I’ve learned. It’s about finding Calvin—it’s good news.”

After the day he’d had, Ellis could definitely use some of that now.

Something in her tone, though, said she wasn’t sure of her own claim.

• • •

The orphanage was in Clover. It was two hours west of Hoboken. Close enough for the housekeeper to get there and back within a school day. Far enough to easily hide ties to the Millstones.

A vision of Calvin recognizing the lie of his outing—his terror and confusion of being dumped for convenience—renewed Ellis’s anger, shoving out sympathy. For Sylvia and Alfred both.

Even if Alfred had been kept unaware, as the housekeeper indicated to Lily, wouldn’t he have suspected something? Did he just not want to know?

At the Tribune, Ellis set the possibilities aside. It was nearly three on Wednesday. He needed to focus long enough to finish his piece about a stamp trader’s fraudulent scheme. More than anything, it diverted him from any doubt over defying Sylvia’s deal.

In an hour, he’d head out to meet Lily in Clover. Over at the Examiner, the instant the chief left for the day—right around four, she’d said—she would jump on the very next bus.

For Ellis, ditching another day of work wasn’t all that dim-witted. It was just a matter of time before his career fully unraveled, either by Sylvia’s doing or on its own. One way or another, Mr. Walker, now off meeting with Governor Roosevelt, would learn of the arrest. A permanent blot on a résumé for a reporter barely getting by.

Until then, Ellis would savor this moment, hunched over his typewriter, making calls and asking questions, surrounded by story hunters and truth seekers. Ink slingers trying to make a difference, as Ellis had wanted to do from the start.

“Got a big tip here.” Dutch tossed a paper onto Ellis’s desk. “Involves a cop.”

Ellis bristled. He half expected the page to be a receipt for his bail from striking an officer. But it was just notes in Dutch’s usual chicken scratches.

“Four cops to be exact. Dry agent says they helped twenty gangsters escape with trucks loaded with beer.”

“You’re right. That is a big one.”

“It’s yours.”

Ellis was puzzled until he figured it out. A mercy scoop. His downward spiral had become that pathetically obvious.

“I appreciate it, Dutch. But really, I can’t take that from you.”

“Already have. When you missed yesterday’s meeting—off back-alley sparring, from the looks of you—I said you were out working on the piece. Walker said he wants it by day’s end. So, you sure as hell better get busy, or it’ll mean my hide. These notes’ll give you a good start.”

Reminded of the scrape on his face, now bruised, Ellis also recalled why he couldn’t make that deadline. “I wish I could, believe me. There’s some personal stuff I gotta see about today. Can’t guarantee when I’ll be back.”

Dutch had every right to think he’d lost his marbles and to say so outright. Instead, he appeared uncertain about commenting before leaning forward with a furtive look. “Reed, if you’re in trouble—from playing the track, taking a loan, whatever—you can tell me. I had a brother-in-law who got in deep with a group like the Black Hand. So, if there’s something going on with you, and I can help in some way…”

It was a reasonable deduction. What with Ellis’s inquiry on the topic, his erratic behavior, not to mention the scuffed-up face, it definitely added up.

“It’s nothing like that. Honest.” Ellis wanted to divulge more, but he’d burdened enough people already.

Dutch blew out a sigh before retrieving his notes. Wisely, he walked away.

• • •

An hour later, Ellis quietly gathered up to leave. He’d submitted his piece on the stamp trader’s racket, a half-decent article at best, and boarded the elevator. As the door closed, he caught the stink eye from Mr. Tate, a warning. Likely Ellis’s last. But with Lily already en route, he couldn’t turn back.

A block down from the paper, Ellis cranked the engine of his Model T. The motor barely sputtered.

“Christ. Not today.” Sweat beading along his hairline, he pitched his hat into the car. He blew out a breath, then clutched the fender for leverage and tried again. The clunker coughed to life, dying a few seconds later, but it was coming around.

“Need some help, pal?” The offer came from a suited man with a hefty build. He dangled a cigarette low at his side.

“Nah, thanks. Motor’s just stubborn sometimes.”

“How’s about we give you a ride?”

Ellis was about to decline when he caught the “we” in the question, raising his head.

“C’mon. Chariot’s right over there.” The man gestured to a black Packard parked two spaces back. The driver’s eyes were indistinct, partially shadowed by the brim of his hat, but his face struck as familiar. Specifically the pockmarked cheeks. He was the driver who’d trailed Ellis to the school.

Ellis hadn’t been paranoid after all. He tightened his hold on the crank, preparing to pull it free.

“As I was saying,” the stocky one pressed, “how’s about that ride?” He opened his jacket, exposing a holstered pistol. The smirk on his face was more of a dare than a threat, as if wanting Ellis to try. For the sport of it. For kicks.

Ellis surrendered his grip and came upright. He didn’t know who the men were or what they wanted. But he did know one thing.

Sitting in the back seat of a Packard had undeniably more appeal than being stuffed in the trunk.