The Devil's Only Friend Read Online Free

should be to a man. He knew that I had fallen away.
    â€œI’ll try to help you, Walker,” I said. “I doubt it’ll come to much.”
    â€œI can’t pay you.”
    â€œPay me!”
    â€œFor your time. I don’t ask for charity. If there is some service I can do for you … my Emily puts together a fine meal…”
    â€œListen, Walker, don’t think about it. I’m only saying I’ll ask around. That don’t cost anything.”
    â€œI appreciate this, Detective. But let me say—not to be frontways with you—you might want to clean yourself up a little before you head out in the world.”
    â€œYah,” I said, drawing my hand over three days of jawbone stubble.
    It grew quiet enough for a time to hear a telephone ringing somewhere in the building. My feet scraped over the dusty wood floor as I shifted from side to side.
    â€œWell,” Walker finally said, standing up. “I’ll leave the photograph. If you can, I’d like to have it back.”
    â€œSure.”
    Walker turned away and walked carefully to the door like an older man with an ache throughout the body. I felt a sudden shame that I hadn’t even thought to offer him anything to drink, not even a glass of water.
    â€œI’m sorry about your sister,” I said. “I know how that goes.” I was thinking about my brother Tommy, really—not two years gone. But then the memory of my own baby sister came back to me. Twenty years had gone by since the influenza had taken her, more than twenty years—and now I had fallen to such a state that even that sharp memory had begun to fade.
    â€œYou don’t need to be sorry,” said Walker. “It wasn’t any fault of yours.” He let himself out and pulled the door shut. His footsteps seemed to drag away forever.
    I wanted to crawl back into my bed, but the bright light of morning washed away the idea. Walker’s sister seemed to stare out at me accusingly from the photo, and so I had to turn it over on the table. This, too, made me feel a pang of guilt, like the woman was alive and could take it as an insult; but I was used to it. I worked hard to squander the rest of the day, thinking and stewing in my little room. I reasoned that I could hold the photo for a day or two and just tell Walker that I had failed to turn up anything. Nobody had ever believed that I could be credible as a police detective anyway, and Walker had seen it for himself. Everything I had tried to work on had been botched in one way or another. My partner had been killed, Walker had lost his position on the force, and I had failed to do anything to prevent the riot and the flames that had scorched Detroit.
    I could forget about helping Walker. He would not blame me. His sister was gone, and there was nothing to do for her. During the remainder of the day—Good Friday—I didn’t go out. I kept myself occupied by listening to the radio, dialing away whenever news of the war broke into the music. It became another whole day I had wasted in my life. By dusk I had convinced myself to shirk it off, and by the time darkness really took over I thought I had forgotten about the bucktoothed woman. But I had to keep inside my apartment because I did not want to think about meeting Ray Federle again on my little landing, and by Saturday morning the thought of Walker and his sister had worked me over hard enough to push me up out of bed with some intention. It burned in my gut whether or not I wanted to think about it. It was his sister, after all, and there were children, too.
    This was how it had started the other time. I had let my feelings get strong after Bobby and I found young Jane Hardiman killed in the nigger’s apartment. Why should I have cared so much about that rich man’s girl? There was nothing to be done for her, and it had not ended happily for anyone. I wanted to shrink back from the feeling that Walker,