by Ralph Dennis
I pointed Hump toward the raised parking lot at the side of the Mission. Hump parked and went around to the main entrance to see if Benson was in. He knew me but he didn’t know Hump. It would be Hump’s job, if Benson was in, to con him into coming outside. I’d take over after that.
Hump returned alone a few minutes later. “He’s not in and they don’t know where he is or when he’ll be back.”
“Might be a long wait,” I said. I looked at my watch. One-thirty. The bars were open for another two and a half hours.
“A cold one too,” Hump said.
“If the liquor stores were open I’d pop for a bottle.”
“Is that all holding us back?” Hump pushed the door open and got out. “I know a bell captain at the Inn down the street. Scalps pint bottles for big prices. After hours, of course.”
I got out my roll. It was getting thin. I peeled off a twenty.
Hump hesitated before taking it. “Are we still doing expenses? I’m not even sure who we’re working for anymore.”
“I’m not either,” I said, passing him the bill. “Simpson up in Chapel Hill, I guess.”
“Cognac for you, scotch for me.”
“Don’t be long. If this Benson starts running you’ll have to chase him. I’m wore down below the nub.”
“Ribs bad?”
“I think they’d be better barbecued.” I said.
Assuming Frank Benson was the old man in the park, he didn’t show while Hump was gone. Now and then one or two’d come stumbling down the street from one direction or the other. The usual ritual was to finish off the dregs before they went inside. Peach wine or Thunderbird or whatever. Maybe they weren’t allowed to bring bottles in the Mission. At any rate they’d gulp down the last of their bottle, prop the empty against the side of the building or drop it in the gutter, and straight-backed as they could they’d march into the Mission.
Winter must be a bad time for a wino. In the spring and summer there were doorways and abandoned cars and empty buildings where they could sleep. That meant fifty or seventy-five cents more for wine or beer. But beer and wine wasn’t much good when the temperature dropped under thirty. And tonight it was in the twenties.
Hump dipped his head and got back in the car. He passed me a half pint flask of Hennessey. I broke the seal and got the cap off. I rolled a swallow of it around on my tongue. Burn and sting and God, it felt good burning its track down into my stomach. Relaxing while I waited for the warmth to spread.
“Someday,” I said to Hump, “we’re going to take a trip to Europe and rent us a house right next to a cognac distillery.”
“Scotland for me,” Hump said.
“Six months in France, six in Scotland.”
“Deal,” Hump said. He lowered the pint of scotch and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. He looked past me, through the side window. “One coming now. He’ll be under the street light in a second.”
I capped my flask and turned. The street light was on the corner, a distance away, and he was only in the full glare of it for a short time. It was enough. It was the old guy from Orme Park. He had a good load going and the drinks had him talking to himself. His arms were out wide, gesturing, and then he was past the light and in the shadows.
“That’s the one,” I said.
“Hold my scotch,” Hump said. “I brought some bait with me.” He reached into his topcoat pocket and brought out a pint of peach wine. “The bell captain, Billy, thought I was going bad or something.”
I watched as Hump turned up the collar of his topcoat. He broke the seal on the pint of peach wine and poured about a third of it on the ground. He walked to the front corner of the building and stopped there, partly in the shadow and partly out. He waited until Frank Benson began his cut across the street toward the Mission. Then Hump lifted the bottle and let a bit of the peach wine trickle down his throat. After the scotch the wine must have tasted like pancake syrup.
Benson’s angle placed him near the corner of the building where Hump was. As soon as he touched the sidewalk, Hump lifted the bottle again and took another slug. When he lowered the bottle he must have said something to Benson. Benson stopped and came over to him. I guess Hump was offering him a drink because the old guy nodded and reached out his hand. Hump put the bottle in his hand and turned him and eased him into the darkness at the side of the building. They were only a few yards away from the car. Benson lifted the bottle to his mouth and Hump put a friendly hand on his shoulder. Then the hand wasn’t friendly and Benson let out a squawk and dropped the bottle. It shattered. Half-lifting, half-pushing, Hump brought Frank Benson over to the car. I reached back and opened the back door. Hump rammed Benson in head first and slipped into the seat next to him.
I slid over behind the wheel and started the car. I backed out of the lot. Behind me Benson said, “If this is a robbery …”
“No robbery,” Hump said.
“If it ain’t a robbery …”
Benson must have kicked out or swung at Hump. I looked up in the rearview mirror and saw that Hump had him by the back of the neck, shaking him. “Easy or I’ll break it,” Hump said. “And it won’t be much of a chore.”
“You want something from me?” Benson asked.
“Some words,” I said.
I could see he was leaning forward, trying to get a look at me. Maybe he thought he remembered my voice. “Do I know you?”
“We met in a park,” I said.
“Hardman?”
“That’s the one,” I said. “The one who’s going to break your neck is Hump Evans.”
“You wouldn’t do that,” Benson said.
“Of course I’m not,” I said. “Hump’s going to do it for me.”
“Whenever the man says do it, I’ll do it,” Hump said. He reached out his arm and I put the scotch where he could reach it. He held the bottle between his knees and got the cap off with his free hand. “Like I’d wring a chicken’s neck,” he added before he lifted the bottle and had a drink.
“You helped con me tonight,” I said. “I don’t like being conned. I don’t like it at all. Hurts my reputation. First thing you know people’ll start thinking they can con me anytime they want to. They’ll laugh behind my back. That’s why you’re good as dead right now. That’s why they’re going to find you in the morning with a very funny looking neck.”
He was beginning to buy it. But he had to try one more time to see if he couldn’t talk himself out of the corner. “I’ve heard about you, Hardman. They say you’re straight. Killing me wouldn’t be your style.” He put as much front on it as he could. “And that’s why you’re not going to kill me.”
“You’re not listening, Benson. I didn’t say I was going to kill you. Hump’s doing it for me. He owes me a favor.”
Benson believed it now. “I think I can make this straight with you, Hardman. Nothing’s so bad we can’t talk it out.”
“You’ve been staying on at too many prayer meetings after you ate the soup,” I said.
“No, I mean it.”
“I think he means it,” Hump said.
“You backing out on me, Hump?” I made it hard and nasty. “If this is the way you pay back a favor …”
“You know me better than that,” Hump said. He sounded like his feelings were hurt.
“You said you wanted some words,” Benson said.
“That was before I changed my mind,” I said.
“You want to know how to find the girl, Peggy. That’s right, ain’t it?”
“I don’t need your help finding her.” We reached the split in Peachtree, where it divided into Peachtree NE and Peachtree NW. I took the northwest fork. “They’re building a new wing on Crawford Long Hospital. That’s a good place to dump him.”
“Everybody’s trying to find her and I’m the only one knows where she is,” Benson said.
“Construction site’s always good,” Hump said.
“Is it a deal,” Benson asked, “is it?”
“Y
ou already conned me once today. Why should I believe you this time?”
“I give my word.”
Hump laughed. “He’s a stand-up comic too.”
“Is it a deal?”
“Tell me and I’ll see if it’s worth anything,” I said.
“A deal, right?” He was beginning to freak out because I reached Crawford Long and made my turn that would take us by the side of the new wing under construction that faced Peachtree NE.
“We’ll see,” I said.
“I’m going to take your word,” Benson said. “We’ve got a deal so I’m going to trust you to keep your part of it.” He sucked in a deep breath. “You’d never find her in a million years. Nobody’d find her.”
“That’s enough whipped cream.” I pulled to a stop beside the construction.
“She’s in Underground Atlanta,” he said quickly.
“Hanging around down there?” Hump said.
“She’s living there. You know where the tracks go through?”
“I know the place,” Hump said.
“Across the tracks hasn’t been built up much. No shops or bars yet. One black tried and went broke over there. Started a soul food kitchen. Called it Aunt Edna’s Soul Food Kitchen.”
“Got it,” Hump said.
“She’s living there, in the boarded up restaurant. Her and her little girl and the guys who work with her.”
“How many guys?” I asked.
“Two when I left there a while ago. Sometimes there’s more.”
I pulled away from the curb and turned onto Peachtree NE, heading back downtown.
“I knew you’d keep your word,” Benson said.
“For tonight,” Hump said. “If you lied to us we’ll be back.”
“Tell him what we want him to do,” I said.
“We’re going to drop you at the Mission. You go to bed, pull the covers over your head. Don’t go out and don’t make any phone calls.
“I swear it,” Benson said.
We rode in silence the rest of the way. I stopped across the street from the Mission and Hump opened the door for him. “Remember,” he said.
Benson bobbed his head and said, “Yes, I swear” and then he scooted across the street and into the Mission. I waited a minute and when he didn’t come back out I headed for the closest entrance to Underground Atlanta.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Before and after the Civil War the main thing that Atlanta relied upon was its importance as a railroad center. It caused one big problem. It got so that people couldn’t get from one side of the tracks to shops on the other side. Overpasses were built. In time these overpasses were extended until the tracks were below the streets. While this made crossing downtown streets easier, it stranded, below the streets with the tracks, dozens of shops and warehouses.
For years these shops and warehouses were boarded up, abandoned and almost forgotten. Until a group of men formed an association and began encouraging others to open bars and restaurants and shops down there where the main business district of Atlanta had once been. The food ran from French to Middle-Eastern. In the shops a tourist could buy a box of candy or a mink coat. Or a red-necked t-shirt from the Lt. Governor’s shop and get it autographed for another seventy-five cents.
It was, I always thought, something of a tourist rip-off place. The prices were geared for expense accounts and throw-it-away vacation money. And lately, there seemed to be gangs of young hoods hanging around the entrances, waiting to roll a drunk or rip off a cash register from one of the small shops. That’s crime in Atlanta. Can’t do much about it.
I parked in the lot at the corner of Alabama and Pryor. Hump and I ducked through the narrow entrance and followed the ramp until it leveled out. It was going toward closing time, the crowd thinning, and I guess it had been a bad night. In front of the Crepes de Paris a girl was handing out copies of the menu and price list. I could count the goose pimples on her bare legs.
We went straight through. It wasn’t a long walk. We reached the stairs that led down to the tracks. There wasn’t much light across there but enough so that we could see the boarded-up front of Aunt Edna’s Soul Food Kitchen. To the right of the Kitchen there was a wide walkway, angling down, that ran up to the streets, the parking lots up there. To the left we could see the dark fronting of as yet undeveloped property.
“That’s it,” Hump said.
“Looks likely,” I said.
“Doesn’t it, though?”
I stepped away from the railing. “I’m going to call Art.”
“While you do that …”
“Yeah?”
“I’ll check the back, the street side, for ways in and out.”
I watched him start across the tracks. Then, feeling the urgency, I went looking for a pay phone.
I didn’t see Hump anywhere. I’d been gone about ten minutes and that should have been time enough for his scout around.
“Here,” Hump said behind me. He handed me a hot dog and a cup of coffee. “You reach Art?”
“Should be here in ten minutes or so.” I took a bite of the hot dog and guessed it was one-fourth meat and three-fourths cereal. I washed it down with the coffee. “What’s it like over there?”
“Confusing,” Hump said. He motioned across the tracks. “What we’re facing is really the back door. Oh, I guess when the kitchen was open you could enter from this side. But the real entrance is up there, on the street. Big glass windows and a big doorway.”
“What’s confusing?”
“I don’t see how they’d get in and out. This entrance and the one up there on the street … they’re boarded up tight. No way out unless they’ve found a way to get through boards.”
I pointed over toward the undeveloped area to the left of the Kitchen. “Might be some connection between the Kitchen and the blank front over there.”
“Maybe.” He finished his hot dog and drank the rest of his coffee. He looked around for a trash can. Not finding any, he wadded the hot dog wrapper and put it in the cup and threw them over the side, down to the tracks. “I’ll give it a look.”
I waited at the railing. This time Hump angled to the left, bypassing the Kitchen fronting. After he was beyond the tracks he stepped up onto a narrow walkway. He put out a hand and ran it over the wall, moving slowly to my left as he did it.
I checked my watch. Still some time before Art would arrive. When I’d talked to him he’d seemed eager to rush light over. The search for Turnage and Winters had drawn a blank. Neither had been at their apartments and now it looked like the questioning might have to wait until they showed up for the regular shift in the morning. Even that was “iffy.” There was always the chance the word had gotten to them about the inventory. If it had they’d probably headed for tall cover. Art would probably get to them sooner or later, but I knew how much Art disliked the chance that it would be later.
Across the tracks Hump turned and made the gesture of turning a door knob and pushing a door open. So there was, after all, some kind of door in the fronting even if it didn’t show from a distance.
It would be a step ahead, knowing that, when Art arrived with his raiding party. In our talk he’d said he send one car to cover the other side of the Kitchen and he’d come in the way I had and meet me at the railing beside the track. I looked in that direction. Still no sign of Art. It was getting close to time.
When I turned back to look across the tracks toward Hump I got my first sense of it getting away from us. The two men, I first thought, were a couple of tourists coming down for a last couple of drinks. And, as they came out of the walkway and into the light, I got a prickling, a warning. One of the men was big, hulking, and the other slim, very slight. The two cops gone bad, Turnage and Winters. Then, as if to make it certain, they didn’t cross the tracks. Instead, they did a sharp right and stepped up onto the narrow walkway.
They weren’t looking in my direction. I was shouting it under my breath, look over here, Hump, but he had his back to me, ex
ploring the door frame. He didn’t look around. There wasn’t anything I could do without blowing the whole operation wide open. If I yelled I’d warn Hump but I’d also warn the two rogue cops. Except for the fact that Hump was right in the middle of it, all of our eggs were very obligingly getting into the same basket. We couldn’t have planned it better. So I said, under my breath, sorry about that, Hump, and watched helplessly while Turnage and Winters walked right up on Hump and took him.
I didn’t see a gun but I assumed there was one from the way Hump let it happen. He was cool, knowing I was across the tracks and Art was on the way. Otherwise, he might have made a try. He stood very still while the big man frisked him.
I put my back to the tracks and walked away. I knew they might look across the tracks. If they did I wanted them to see the back of some heavy-set tourist who was on his way to another bar before closing time. At the same time I wasn’t just walking away. I was looking. I settled upon a young couple. They seemed sober and they didn’t seem in any hurry. I tagged them as being in their twenties. He looked like he’d dressed for a big night and she, wigged and badly made up, was overdressed too.
“You want to make a quick ten dollars?” It wasn’t a good opening, but I didn’t have much time.
It offended him. “What do you mean …?” The girl swung away and edged behind him.
“Police business,” I said.
“Well …” He looked back at his girl.
I got out the ten and put it in his hand. “Stand over by the stairs. In a minute or two three or four cops are going to get here. Ask if one of them is Art Maloney.”
“Art Maloney,” he repeated after me.
“Tell him the two cops he’s looking for are already over there and they’ve got Hump. And I’ve gone over there.”
“The two cops he’s looking for … they’ve got Hump … and you’ve gone over there.”