The Game of Love and Death(62)

Henry snapped the suitcase shut and moved it off the bed. “What if we did leave together? As soon as I have the money to pay my share?”

Ethan looked up at him. “My father would never permit it.”

Henry immediately felt guilty. “I’m sorry. I know. And I’d never want for you to leave all this. You’re lucky, you know.”

“It doesn’t feel that way most of the time.”

Henry lifted his suitcase. Everything he had, minus his bass, he could carry in one hand. “You’ll come visit me. I won’t be far. And I can help you with anything you need. Your father — he never needs to know.”

“Henry,” Ethan said, his voice growing strained. “I admire your courage. You should have your music. But you must look the part, if you’re to play.” He opened Henry’s suitcase and slipped the tuxedo inside. Then he picked up the case. “You get your bass. Hang my father and whatever he has to say about it.”

Annabel burst in. She crashed into Henry, her face pink and wet from crying. “Henry! You can’t leave! I won’t let you!”

He squatted so they were eye to eye with each other.

“I won’t be going far,” he said. “We’ll ride bicycles together in the park.”

“Promise?” she said.

“I promise. And I’ll send you loads of letters. Now where’s your handkerchief? Let’s get you cleaned up.” She took Flora’s hankie out of her pinafore and Henry pressed it against her cheeks, his fingers touching the letters of the name sewn into the fabric. He wondered what Flora was doing, whether she was thinking of him. He’d had no time to contact her since that awful moment at the jail, and he didn’t know when he’d next be near a telephone or able to walk to her house.

He folded Annabel into his arms. She smelled like grass and peanut butter, and the thought of not hearing her noise every morning and answering her annoying questions and watching her grow up in slow motion … He exhaled quickly, released her, and stood.

Ethan was waiting outside the door with his suitcase.

“Ready?” he said.

“As I’ll ever be.”

Helen waited at the bottom of the stairs. She wore a white skirt and sweater set, and a rope of pearls, which she held between her teeth. She spit them out to ask him a question. “Where are you two going with that suitcase?”

“None of your business,” Ethan said. “I’m sure you already know, anyway.”

Henry felt embarrassed by his situation. Not that he’d ever seriously considered Helen. But this would mean he’d never be with a girl like her, one with pearls and a soft sweater and shining hair. In the most superficial way, she reminded him of his mother, although without the warmth that suffused his memories. He couldn’t tell what he felt about her, or anything else. The numbness went all the way through. Knowing she’d find out at some point, he opted for the truth. A quick drop of the guillotine, forever severing his life from hers.

“I’m moving to Hooverville,” he said.

The look on her face was puzzling. Dismay and then anger.

“Excuse me,” she said. Her breath and the air around her smelled of smoke. She started up the stairs, pausing halfway. “I’ll be seeing you again. Soon. That’s a promise.”

He doubted that. He doubted it very much. He lifted his suitcase. On their way to his car, Ethan tried to talk Henry out of staying in Hooverville. “I have some money saved up. That place isn’t fit for any man.”

“James lives there,” Henry said, putting his suitcase in the trunk.

“James — he’s different.” Ethan grabbed Henry’s arm, as if he could physically keep him from leaving. “Things don’t seem to bother him as much.”


He slipped out of Ethan’s grip and walked to the carriage house to get his bass, hoping it wouldn’t be stolen or turned into kindling the second he turned his back on it in the shantytown. “It won’t be long before I have enough saved up for a room somewhere. Hooverville isn’t my destiny.”

The drive to the encampment was short and silent. Hooverville looked much smaller than the first time Henry had seen it.

“At least take some money for food,” Ethan said.

Henry tucked the money into his billfold. “I’ll pay you back.” He hated owing Ethan any more than he already owed.

“Not on your life.” Ethan looked around in dismay. “Why aren’t you at least asking for another chance?”

Henry didn’t answer. He didn’t want to say the truth, that it was almost a relief that what he’d feared most had finally come to pass. As long as there was still Flora, as long as there was the Domino, then nothing else could hurt him.





HENRY adjusted to the rattle and heat of the pressroom in less than a day. The chaos kept him from most of his own thoughts as he loaded rolls of newsprint into the oily flatbed press. The spinning, the noise, the flying of paper: All of it helped distract him from everything else. So much loss. For Flora, her grandmother. For himself, his home. It felt as though some unseen blade were slicing off the edges of their world, leaving them with little ground to stand on.

He’d set up temporarily at Hooverville, where at least James had been helpful. Almost too helpful, really. He’d clung to Henry like a shadow, even giving him a small shack that smelled of sawdust and tar. In those moments when Henry did stop and listen and breathe, he felt a certain shiver in the air, as though everything solid were about to crumble.