He was touching in his earnestness. “Why don’t you want to go home?”

“I need to figure some things out. Some things about my family.” He shut his mouth tightly.

“What did you mean by that message to your father, about you calling the shareholders if he kept looking for you? I gather it’s upset both him and your grandfather.”

“That’s one of the things I need to figure out.”

“Were you threatening to call your major shareholders to say that By-Smart was going to allow union activity?”

His soft face hardened in indignation. “That would be a lie: I don’t tell lies, especially not one like that, that would hurt my grandfather.”

“What, then?” I tried to smile engagingly. “I’d be glad to lend an ear, if it would help to have someone to talk them over with.”

He shook his head, his mouth shut in a thin line. “You may mean well, Ms. War-sha-sky. But right now, I don’t know. I don’t know who I can trust, besides Pastor Andrés, and he is really helping me, so thank you, but I think I’ll be all right.”

“If you change your mind, call me; I’ll be glad to talk to you. And I really wouldn’t betray you to your family.” I handed him a card. “But do Josie a favor: find somewhere else to stay. Even if you don’t sleep with her, your grandfather is bound to find you here, especially with a car that stands out like yours. People in this neighborhood notice everything, and plenty of them will be willing to tell your dad or your grandfather they’ve seen you here. Buffalo Bill’s-your grandfather’s-angry; I know you know he threatened the pastor with deportation just because you and Josie had a Coke together. He could cause Rose Dorrado a lot of trouble, and she needs a job right now, not more trouble.”

“Oh. Now that Fly the Flag is gone-I didn’t even think.” He sighed. “All I thought was, What difference does it make?, and, of course, it makes a terrible difference to the people who worked there. Thank you for reminding me, Ms. War-sha-sky.”

“All you thought was ‘What difference does it make?’” I repeated sharply. “What do you mean by that?”

He waved his arms in a vague gesture that seemed to mean the South Side around him, or maybe the world around him, and shook his head unhappily.

I turned on my heel to cross the street, then remembered the frog soap dish. I pulled out the baggie again from my bag and showed the frog to him.

He shook his head again. “What is it?”

“To me, it looks like a soap dish in the shape of a frog. Julia Dorrado says she bought it, or one like it, at By-Smart last Christmas.”

“We carry so much stuff, I don’t know our whole inventory. And I only met Josie this summer, when my church did the exchange. Where did you find it? I hope you aren’t trying to say we sell things that are this dirty.”

He was so serious all the time that it took me a moment to realize he was trying to make a joke. The license plate, and now a joke: maybe there were depths in the Kid that I was overlooking. I smiled dutifully, and explained where I’d picked it up.

He hunched a shoulder. “Maybe someone dropped it there. There’s always a lot of garbage around these old buildings.”

“Maybe,” I agreed. “But judging from where it was lying when I picked it up, I think it came shooting out when the windows in the drying room blew. So I think it was inside the factory.”

He turned the baggie over in his hands several times. “Maybe someone wanted it, like, as an ornament on a flagpole. Or maybe one of the ladies who worked there used it as a mascot. I see that a lot down here, people have funny things as mascots.”

“Don’t be a wet blanket,” I said. “It’s my only clue; I have to pursue it enthusiastically.”

“And then what? What if it leads you to some poor person down here who’s already spent their whole life being harassed by the police?”

I narrowed my eyes. “Do you know who put this in the factory, or why?”

“No, but you, you’re treating it like it was a game, like you’re in Crossing Jordan or something. And people down here-”

“Don’t keep talking to me about ‘people down here,’” I snapped. “I grew up in this neighborhood. For you, maybe this is a game, living among the natives, but for people like me, who never spent a dime we didn’t work like dogs to earn, this is not a romantic neighborhood. Desperation and poverty push people to do mean, spiteful, sordid, and even cruel things. Frank Zamar died in that fire. If someone set it, then I will be happy to lead the police to him. Or her.”

His soft young face tightened again. “Well, people who are richer than anyone also do mean and spiteful-and-and cruel things. I am not playing a game down here. This is the most serious thing that has ever happened in my life. And if you tell my grandfather where you saw me, it will be-mean and cruel. And spiteful.”

“Relax, Galahad, I’m not ratting you out. But he found you at the church on his own this morning, and it won’t take much for him to find you here.”

He nodded again, his anger disappearing into his serious good manners. “You are giving me good advice, Ms. War-sha-sky. I do appreciate it. And if they can trace my car as easily as you say, I guess I shouldn’t hang around here.”

He looked forlornly at the battered building for a long minute, then climbed back into his little sports car and took off. I looked up at the apartment, wondering if Juliet had been on the lookout for Romeo. I was tempted to go back inside and reassure her-he came to see you, but one of the Capulets was lurking. It was a silly fantasy-with Rose’s economic woes, the Bysen family, Pastor Andrés, and all those young hormones, I definitely shouldn’t meddle.

I was crossing the street back to my own car when the cabin-cruiser Cadillac turned south onto Escanaba. The driver did a laborious U-turn and pulled up in front of the Dorrados’ building. Young Montague had escaped in the nick of time.

The chauffeur put on his peaked hat and opened the middle door to help Mr. Bysen from the backseat. Mr. William, who’d been sitting in the third row of seats, climbed down to assist his mother.

I crossed Escanaba back to the boat. “Hi, Mr. Bysen. Great service, wasn’t it? Pastor Andrés is a truly inspired preacher.”

Buffalo Bill pulled his cane out of the middle seat, made sure he was standing erect, and puffed air out at me. “What are you doing here?”

I smiled. “Sunday after church is when we all pay social calls. Isn’t that what you’re doing?”

I heard a ripple of malicious laughter and peered inside the Caddy. Jacqui was sitting in the front seat. Her husband, who was in the third bank of seats, called out a sharp reprimand to her, but she just laughed again, and said, “I never knew Christian worship could be so dramatic.”

“Will you make your wife behave?” William snarled at Uncle Gary.

“Oh, yes,” Jacqui said, “‘as the church is subject to Christ, so let wives also be subject in everything to their husbands.’ I have heard that verse quoted once or twice, Willie, once or twice. Just because you and your father want it to be true doesn’t make it true.”

Buffalo Bill put the crook of his cane over my shoulder and jerked me around to face him. “Never mind all that squabbling. I’ve come to find my boy. Is he here?”

I took the cane from my shoulder and pulled it out of his hand. “There are easier ways to get both my attention and my goodwill, Mr. Bysen.”

He glared at me. “I asked you a question and I expect an answer.”

“Oh, Bill, never mind all that.” Mrs. Bysen had come around the back of the Caddy to where we were standing; she spoke to her husband but looked at me. “We haven’t met, but William told me you were the detective he’d hired to find our Billy. Do you know where he is? Is this where that Mexican girl lives? Jacqui thinks she knows something, so she asked one of our people to find their name and address.”