Page 38 of A Week Away

“That’s young.”

“It’s not hard.”

Yeah, screwing over poor people never is.

He unlocked the anti-theft bar and took it off the steering wheel, turned the key and pressed the button that put the car in reverse. We were on our way.

Carla and Rose Amato were both still single. They lived together in a two-story, white clapboard house just outside the Eastern Market area. The neighborhood had seen better times, but their house was well-kept. Neat and clean.

One of them answered the door, I wasn’t sure which. She was just passed forty, had coal black hair that might have been dyed, very pale skin and eyes like a cornered cat. She wore a gray pants suit with a pale peach blouse underneath, and smelled of three or four mismatched beauty products. She’d obviously just come from church.

“Hey Carla,” the boy said, standing slightly behind me.

“Well, hello Cassidy. What are you doing here?”

“I want to find out what happened to my dad.”

“We have no idea. If we did we’d have said so by now.”

“You might be able to set us in the right direction,” I said. “If we could come in, just for a few minutes.”

“And you are?”

“I’m a private detective. I’m not charging Cass. I’m doing this pro bono.” Not what he’d told his aunt, but whatever.

“Isn’t that big of you. Do you have a card?”

“In my other jeans.”

And then her sister was behind her. “Carla, what’s happening?”

Rose looked younger than her sister, had dark brown hair and eyes to match. Her skin was every bit as pale as Carla’s.

“They want to talk about Dominick.”

“All right. Carla, move over so they can get in. There’s no reason to be unfriendly. We don’t have anything to hide. Do we?”

The women stepped aside and we were immediately in a small living room with a couple of reclining chairs and an old gray sofa. Beyond the living room was an open dining room with a nice wooden table and six chairs.

“There’s coffee,” Rose said. “We always have coffee after church.” Then she scooted out of the room.

We stood uncomfortably, until Carla finally said, “Well, sit down then.” She gestured toward the dining room table. As I sat at one end of the table, Carla sat at the other while saying, “I don’t know what you think you’re going to find out. I can’t say we knew Dominick all that well. He wasn’t popular with our family.”

“And why was that?”

“Well, he was a Mick for one thing. That’s what my grandfather would have said. It’s not a term I use often.”

“He didn’t like the Irish?”

“Hated them. No, no one was happy when Dominick and Joanne got married. She could have done worse, of course. My family hates coloreds and wetbacks more than Micks. A lot of girls back then, well… not that it would have mattered.”

“Was that the only thing wrong with Dominick?”

“Joanne didn’t help things. She was always complaining about him. He wasn’t ambitious enough or smart enough or good-looking enough or basically anything enough.”

“What did you think?”

“I thought Joanne was a brat. Her expectations weren’t exactly in line with reality. I’m sorry Cass, but that’s what I thought.”