Shell Game by Sara Paretsky

Author:Sara Paretsky
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2018-10-15T16:00:00+00:00

34

The Accused

Before I got into my car, I craned my neck to stare at the corrugated tube overhead. It wasn’t made of cardboard but layered metal beams whose rusted bolts made it look unstable.

ICE had detained Rasima Kataba, threatening her with deportation because she wouldn’t tell them where her father was. My own mother came to America in 1944 at nineteen, illegally, after her Italian-Jewish mother was taken into custody by the Fascists. Gabriella’s life here hadn’t been easy, but no one had tried to throw her out, throw her back to certain death. How had we become the country that imprisoned children for the crime of not having a birth certificate?

I called Felix.

“Now what?”

I put a finger in my ear as a train roared overhead, rattling the rusty joints. “If you haven’t told Martha Simone about your friend, you should. Martha can find out where she’s being held and get her the legal support she needs.”

“How—who—” He choked.

“Dean Pazdur told me what happened. I’d rather you not say anything else on the phone: your calls are almost certainly being monitored. I’m still on campus—do you want me to stop by before I leave?”

“No. I have class in twenty minutes. Vic—thank you, Vic.” His voice cracked—perhaps relief that he wasn’t carrying his grief alone. “Could you call Martha for me?”

I used a burn phone to call the lawyer. Communications with Simone were privileged, so even if someone listened in on my calls, they couldn’t use them, at least not legally.

Simone promised to get on the case as soon as possible. “Is Dr. Herschel going to cover these charges?” she asked.

Of course Simone couldn’t work pro bono. “Add your fee for Ms. Kataba to my bill with Freeman,” I said.

My six-figure bill for legal fees was a guarantee that I’d be working until I was older than Mr. Contreras.

“Before you hang up, I need to be able to prove I’m on the side of the angels,” I said. “I’m on my way to Rasima Kataba’s apartment and it would help if you sent me a document stating you represent her and that I’m assisting you, so that her neighbors believe me when I tell them I’m not with ICE.”

“It would have to be right this minute? Okay.” I could hear her typing as she talked. “How did you get her address?”

“Felix made a beeline for her building after we left the woods last Wednesday,” I said. “But I don’t know what surname she uses on her door.”

“So Felix went straight to her but didn’t think to mention it to his counsel? What else is that young man hiding?”

I didn’t try to answer. As I started my car, I couldn’t believe it had been only last week that all this had started. Felix and the dead Fausson in the woods, followed instantly by Harmony’s appearance at my front door. I felt seven years older, not seven days. I looked at my face in the rearview mirror. Gray hollows under my eyes, almost like misapplied eye shadow, deepened my hazel eyes to a matching gray.

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