The Lost Brother (7 page)

Joan Price has grown up here in Prince George’s County. She sees the hair, the forty, knows how black is crime in this county, doesn’t call 911. Gets an unregistered handgun she’s had for years. Gets in her car. Drives. Deep into the city. Slowly down a block. The right block. The wrong one. First and Kennedy Northwest.

A black man sees her. Waves her down. Assumes she’s after what white women driving around here at this time of night are usually after.

Hey baby, what you looking for? I got what you need.

Joan looks around. Sees no one else. Asks the man for what she knows he’s got.

He says, Yeah, you know I got that.

She says, Good, boy, that’s good.

His eyes widen at the “boy,” but it ain’t no thing, just business.

She reaches in her handbag.

He thinks it’s for money.

Quick is that gun in his face.

She stares at him. Devil in her. Hate.

One, two, three, four seconds go by. She stares at him, not breathing, not shaking, not scared.

He starts to say something. Doesn’t get to.

When his body is found the next day, it seems to be just another clueless drug kill.

She goes home and calls 911 to report finding her family murdered. And as she waits, in the bloody house, with that unregistered gun in her hand, for the police to arrive, she holds that gun to her own head. What if she’s wrong about who killed her family? She’s panicking, thinking of that. What if she’s wrong? She knows it isn’t only blacks who might have kinky black hair, it isn’t only blacks who buy forty-ounce beers, and it isn’t only blacks who commit murder. She decides to kill herself if she’s wrong.

Her family’s killer was quickly identified. A black man. He’d been visiting cousins down the street, and when those cousins, nervous about him anyway because they knew his history, heard about the murders, they called the police, intuiting that their visitor might have had something to do with it. He was easily found, instantly confessed. He’d done it before, been caught before, confessed before, been sentenced before. He said he needed money. Targeted the Price house. Climbed in through a second-floor window after seeing that Mr. Price and his daughter went down to the basement. He said he hadn’t wanted to kill anyone, but when the girl had come back upstairs and caught him, he’d had to silence her. He’d beaten her instead of shooting her to keep the noise down, but when he’d then heard her father calling up for her, he’d forced him at gunpoint back down the stairs and shot him.

At the killer’s sentencing hearing, Joan was allowed to address the court. She ignored the court.

She spoke to the killer. Screamed at him. Held nothing back.

Her testimony, taped, was played first on local television, then nationally. It was captivating. The black man sitting passively, stone-faced; the white mother and wife, devastated, ferocious.

Joan received letters afterward, even donations. Sympathy.

She had a personal meeting with the director of the FBI. He asked what he could do for her. She told him she wanted a special assignment.

“Name it,” he said.

“LTC,” she said.

“The white organization?”

“Right.”

“That’s interesting. We’ve already been working on a plan to investigate it. We’re in every other white supremacist group. LTC hasn’t actually been proven to be racist, but we’re under pressure to show that it is.”

“Let me do it.”

“Why you?”

“I’ve heard from them. Been invited to speak to them.”

The Director smiled. Said, “Great. That’s perfect. You’ll have to publicly resign from the FBI first, because you’ve been identified as an agent by the media. A false resignation, of course, and just for the duration of the assignment.”

“When can I start?”

“Right away?”

“Okay.”

“Let’s have you report directly to me.”

“Okay.”

“Take your time on this. Work your way in slowly. Give that speech. Do some homework first, so you’ll have a better idea of what they want to hear. Earn their trust. Work your way up their ladder.”

Joan did that. Earned LTC’s trust. Worked her way up the organizational ladder. Only she didn’t do it slowly. She was too good. Her enthusiasm was too sincere, her talent too obvious. She kept media attention because she proved such a good guest on talk shows, with her articulate expressions, her victim’s résumé, her compelling presence. Someone called her a white Malcolm X. The tag stuck. Joan Price. Joan d’Arc Price. FBI special agent supposedly on an undercover mission to find and expose criminal conduct at LTC.

But Joan Price was a step ahead of the Director on that. Because there was no way she was going to hurt LTC. She wouldn’t gather evidence against them, because it was her role as an undercover agent that was false. Her work for LTC was her true mission. She would not again settle merely for killing a drug dealer, because the killing of whites was a minor part of the race war she thought blacks were waging. Politics was the bigger part. So it was through politics that she’d give them the war she thought they wanted. She’d give them a war they wouldn’t believe. Joan Price. White Malcolm.

She records the
New Africa
show. Stays on the channel as a rap video program comes on. Notes the portrayal, in one video, of Jesus as a black man, Satan as a white. Notes, in another video, critics of rap portrayed as incredibly ugly, obese whites. In several others, white cops as oppressors, black suspects as innocent.

She reads
Emerge, Ebony, Jet
magazines and clips examples of what she sees as their black-is-better egotism.

Reads the black local columnists in the
Washington Post
with what she sees as their white-hating diatribes.

Reads black-authored novels in which whites are evil cartoon-like characters, hatred of whom is justified.

Watches movies made by black directors, which she sees as excusing of anti-white violence, supportive of white-blaming conspiracy theories, contemptuous of white culture, mocking of white fears.

Joan Price pulls it all together into an incredibly effective presentation, which she can give without referring to notes, she has it down so pat. A presentation effective in “proving” that blacks hate whites. That the war is on. That “we” have to fight back. That “they” hate “us.”

KEYIN KELLOGG IS SPLAYED BACK on the tattered green couch in his office, settled into the cushions crushed under his huge butt. He’s watching the Chief’s news conference, held at the BTN studio, at which the Mayor has also showed, happy to get the spotlight of what he expects to be a positive moment.

The Chief states the case, which is that the tape Ells made of the murders proves he acted alone, at least for the actual killing. Whether he had conspiratorial aid has not been convincingly determined, but as yet no evidence has turned up. The FBI will be handling the continuing investigation into Ells’s possible white supremacist connections. As to the boy, all efforts have been made to find him, but as yet nothing has turned up. The tape Ells made—which will
not
be released for public viewing, out of consideration for the victim’s family—does show the boy at the crime scene, just after Ells stepped out of the picture. But then the tape ends. Our best supposition, the Chief says, is that Ells grabbed the boy, and (his voice changes, from distantly professional to personal) because we have not been able to locate the child and have searched everywhere, with the community’s help, for which we are grateful, we have to assume that Ells killed the boy. Ells killed the Jameses before midnight and was himself killed the next morning. That would leave plenty of time for him to take the boy away, dispose of the body somewhere, and come back. Our prayers are with this missing child, and we
will
maintain due vigilance in our continued search for him. But we have no leads.

Reporter: What about the LTC connection? Any more word on that?

Chief: As I stated, the FBI is handling that investigation. They have looked into the possibility of a kidnapping, and their treating the case as a possible kidnapping will give them specific jurisdiction. But again, I don’t want to give false hope.

The Mayor steps up, puts his hand on the Chief. Both are upper-middle-aged black men, gray-haired, pudgy. They have little else in common.

The Mayor: My brothers and sisters, let us begin the healing process with a minute of silence.

His all-black, mostly female staff bend their heads on cue. About thirty seconds pass.

The Mayor: This has been a great tragedy for our city, and yet it is not a surprising tragedy. Words have meaning, and the vile hate talk of Republican politicians and white male radio hosts is ultimately responsible for this murder. Henry James was not a perfect man, but he was a black man, and even though he was seduced away from us, he was still one of us, as is the boy, his child, lost to us but found in God’s great hands. The blame here is not with Henry James but with the hatemongers, the bigots, who want to go back to a time of hate, who want to take back our affirmative action, who impose upon our city the overseer council of Uncle Toms who, as we suffer here today, can only think about how to fire more of us from our jobs. These are terrible, frightening times for African America, but Henry James and his child are not to blame. Maybe we won’t ever be able to prove that LTC is behind the killings. They are a slick outfit and surely thought this assassination out in advance. But we know in our hearts how evil they are, and even if the proof is not found, or is found but not made public, we
know
words have meaning, and those who push for hate are to blame.

Reporter: Mr. Mayor, are you saying the Republicans are to blame for this?

The Mayor: Black people didn’t kill Henry James.

Reporter Two: Mr. Mayor, are you taking questions about the New Africa Security Contract?

The Mayor, scowling: That is not the issue here. Why do you bring that up? That is a perfectly legal contract to a righteous organization.

Reporter Three: Mr. Mayor, what about the Chinatown land-deal kickback? New allegations—

The Mayor, interrupting, indignant: That land deal was perfectly legal, and the people of this city know it.

Reporter Four: Any comment about the work done on your house—

The Mayor, interrupting again, angry: Why is it that anytime a black man tries to get ahead in this country you whites have to drag him down? Why are you so afraid of a black man’s success? I will not be a party to the further persecution of African America by the racist media.

He storms off the stage, followed by his staff.

Michael Ottaway comes on. Announces that the press conference is over, thank you all for coming. The station cuts to a commercial.

Kellogg, seeing Ottaway, thinks about that. He was told that Ottaway would be promptly dismissed, yet here the man is, still working. It might not mean anything more than that BTN just hasn’t found the right moment to fire him, or maybe Ottaway is involved in a project that they need to have him finish, or maybe he just talked himself out of trouble. But Kellogg thinks about it anyway. About being paid cash. Hasn’t stopped thinking about that. Kellogg, jaded, cynical, from all the ugliness he’s witnessed as a cop and as a private investigator, sees life in terms of schemes, manipulations, lies, and cover-ups. Prides himself on seeing those things. On seeing the truth behind the requests the world makes of him. He doesn’t mind being a party to other people’s schemes. He just minds not knowing what the real scheme is. And by instinct, he’s never been satisfied with what BTN was up to when they hired him to document Ottaway’s sexual harassment and then paid him cash. He isn’t even sure it’s fair to say that BTN hired him at all, because he dealt with only one person there, a woman in the Human Resources office. He checked that she did indeed work there. But he was always surprised that the owner was not involved in this himself. The woman said that the owner wasn’t comfortable investigating Ottaway because they were old friends.

Kellogg drinks from his coffeepot. Rubs out one cigarette, lights another. Thinks. Calls Ottaway, who isn’t back to his office. Leaves a message on his voice mail.

Kellogg, with Sue Cline, goes downstairs to the coffee shop, bringing his cellular phone. But except for Passer calling to say she’s up (it’s noon) and ask if she’s working today (she is), there are no calls.

Back in his office, Kellogg again calls Ottaway. This time he leaves a message that he’s calling about “Sheila,” which was Passer’s undercover name in the case.

The phone rings a minute later. Kellogg answers. “Kellogg Investigations.”

Silence.

“Mr. Michael Ottaway, how are you? This is Kevin Kellogg. Recognize my name?”

“You’re the motherfucker who framed me with that bitch Sheila.”

“Her name’s not Sheila.”

“I know that now.”

“And she’s not a bitch.”

“Who gives a shit?”

“Fine. Mr. Ottaway, we need to talk.”

“Why?”

Kellogg laughs. “Because I’m the motherfucker who framed you.”

“So what do you want?”

“What do you care? Just come over. And on the way, think about what
you
want.”

“Tell me what you want.”

“No, Mr. Ottaway. Your phone’s tapped.” Kellogg doesn’t actually know that, but it might be true. Ottaway goes quiet.

Kellogg gives him his address. Says to be there in one hour. Hangs up. Calls Passer, who’s still home, waking up. Tells her to come in now, because he needs her to do something before Ottaway arrives. She’s there twenty minutes later, in sweat clothes and sneakers.

Kellogg gives her one of the glossies of her with Ottaway. Tells her to write a note on it and sign it. Tells her what to write. Tells her he’ll explain later, wait downstairs.

Ottaway enters the front room. Doesn’t speak.

Sue Cline says, “Hello, Mr. Ottaway, you can just go on in. Mr. Kellogg is waiting for you.” She points to the door.

Ottaway enters Kellogg’s office. Looks around the room as if it’s diseased. He’s dressed in a very expensively tailored suit. He’s tall, handsome, affectedly austere.