Now he asked if she objected to the radio, and she said no. She reached forward and pushed one of the buttons. They were climbing the hill behind Bay Slope and the lanes of traffic pulled upward before them for more than a mile. In the darkness of the boulevard he could see the aging frame houses in one of the oldest sections of Port Smith. It was a Negro neighborhood now, one and two steps up from the downtown ghetto. Where the houses were not owner-occupied, the managing agencies had them painted yellow and tan and dusty green. By some covenant in the real estate business, Negroes were to be prevented from living in white houses. Until the end of the war this part of the city had been a white area, then it had been busted, block by block, and millions had been made. When Leland’s father had toyed with the idea of buying his own home, he had looked here. It did not seem as if that could have been the 1930’s, so long ago. Once a neighborhood changed over, it could not change again. The banks would not extend credit to white men who wanted to live in a Negro neighborhood.

The radio came on with the traffic report. The major arteries, including this one, were normal for the rush hour. There was an accident on the Northport Expressway and motorists were advised to use Central Avenue or Shore Boulevard as alternate routes. A jingle for a loan company came on as the boulevard tightened to four lanes divided by a narrow, treeless curb. The Cadillac stopped at a traffic light. The tailpipes of the crossing cars towed banners of steam. On the corner three people waited for the downtown bus, looking quite cold. As the light changed and the Cadillac charged forward, engine sucking, hydraulic couple spinning, gears slickly shifting, the radio played a set of beeps and buzzes, followed by a very grave voice intoning that it was time for the news.

“With the discovery this afternoon of the mutilated body of the little seven-year-old Mary Shoftel, the Port Smith Police Department launched the greatest manhunt in modern times for James Scanlon, a sixty-eight-year-old drifter who roomed in the house whose basement gave up the little girl’s body at three-thirty P.M. today. Just minutes ago it was revealed by Detective Lieutenant David Schoenstein that Scanlon has been missing since the night Mary disappeared. Preliminary medical examinations show that the girl had been sexually assaulted. She was found at Six forty-seven East Lincoln Street, six short blocks from her home, where her mother collapsed upon hearing of her discovery. She is in serious condition. Mary was found in the corner of the cellar, buried under rags and cardboard cartons in a makeshift grave—”

Norma turned the radio off. “You don’t have to hear that, do you?”

“No, I don’t think so.”