Prohibition is the law of the land, but Nellie needs cash - after socking a gangster in the face, she's got ten days to make it right. Frightened and caught empty-handed, Nellie turns bootlegger.
She accepts a job from her sly friend Lola to pick up...
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WEDNESDAY, MAY 13 1925
I get everything all ready and packed for our trip. Just in case we happen to arouse anybody's suspicion our story is that my dear family friend (Felix) is driving me up to Grand Haven to visit my ill grandmother (Imaginary), a dotty old thing who has taken a turn for the worse.
I check myself quickly in the mirror—my sensible traveling outfit is just that—sensible. I tug my hat more firmly over my ears and then struggle with my suitcase and basket down the steps.
Felix waits by the car. He leans against it like he owns it, and I'm a little surprised he's not a bundle of nerves. I take a moment to remind myself that this car is mine—bought and sold with the money I earned with my small-time trading business and big-time tutoring. Granted it came along with a certain number of favors owed, but favors I can handle.
"I brought my tools," he says, "Just in case."
I nod. He stows my things in the back. I ran out to the deli early that morning to buy us some food to tide us over. Felix lifts one corner of the cloth covering the basket and I roll my eyes.
"That's for our break," I say, "We need to make it halfway first."
It's easier said than done. There's a snarl of traffic getting out of the city. Construction on Wacker Drive is almost done, and it's supposed to help things along. A double-decker street—I'd never heard of such a thing before.
But Felix doesn't complain about all the cars.
"Maybe they're going away for a weekend," I suggest.
Felix shrugs. He's wearing his cap low to shade his eyes. Like me he's gone for sensible and drab for the trip—nothing to make us memorable.
It takes us the better part of an hour and a half to get out of the city. We've fallen into companionable silence. I watch the buildings float by on the South Side. There's a ton of beer brewed in this part of the city, and a whole lot of trouble, too. Capone's Gang owns the South Side and has an eye on expansion. Things have been getting tense between him and the North Side Gang for months now.
But soon we leave the soot-stained buildings behind. And the paved roads.
I'll be sore by the end of the day. I know I will. But the air is fresher here. Birds sing and flit through the trees. Just like that, we've left the apartments and steel mills behind us.
"Enjoying yourself?" I say, after Felix makes a comment about stopping at a filling station.
"Yes." He guides the car to the right, to allow a larger truck to pass us by going in the opposite direction. The roads are narrow and rutted from the last rain storm; a lapse in attention could easily mean disaster. "It's a fine automobile."
He's kept our speed even—almost forty. Alongside the road are the train tracks that wind across the entire country, carrying freight and dry goods.
