by Lionel White
It was done, over and done with, and now he was climbing into the front seat of the ambulance, hitching his shoulders in the white intern’s coat, pulling the visor of the ambulance driver’s cap over his eyes.
He was reaching for the ignition key when he heard the siren and he hesitated, turning to look up into the rear-vision mirror. The police car was rapidly approaching and he knew it for a police car by the red rotating light on the top, the alternating, flashing red lights behind the radiator grill.
He didn’t panic, didn’t even feel any small passing sensation of fear.
Just play it cool, wait for it to pass.
But it didn't pass, it was slowing down, coming abreast of him.
He still didn’t panic. There was nothing to panic about. The ambulance was legitimate, he had the right papers. He had the right driver’s license and registration, forged, of course, but who could know that?
There was nothing at all to panic about.
This, too, had been taken into consideration long in advance, the possibility that he might be stopped for one reason or another.
The fact that there was some six million dollars in stolen money within a few feet of him and that a police car was pulling along side, a man in the front seat motioning to him, didn’t faze him in the slightest.
He was a professional and professionals think of everything. Down to the most minute detail. Professionals don’t blow their cool. They handle situations as situations arrive.
5 BARNEY waited until Manuel had slid away, edging toward the rear window which led to the fire escape in the back of the building. And then, as the other boys stood still frozen after the terrible scream from somewhere downstairs, he pulled Snookie, his little brother, over to the side of the room and whispered to him.
“You follow Manny,” he said. “Get out that window. When you get on de ground, you take off. Go find a policeman, you heah? Get a policeman. You tell him ta come here. You tell him what happenin’ downstairs. You unnerstan’ me, Snookie?"
His brother stared up at him and slowly nodded.
“You sho’ now? You unnerstan’?”
Again his brother nodded.
“Go now,” Barney said. “Quick. An’ be careful, Snookie. Don’ tell nobody else, jus’ a policeman. A man wif a badge, that’s what you gotta find, Snookie."
But his brother was already sliding toward the window.
He turned back to the others and a second scream came from below, weaker this time. There was the sound of a man cursing.
“I'm goin’ down," Barney said, his voice barely a whisper. “I’m goin’ down. We gotta stop it. We gotta stop it before he kill ’em. Miss Vargle and Miss Candle.”
“How?” Cy asked. His own voice was a hoarse whisper, a whisper caused not by caution but by fright.
“I don’ know,” Barney said. “But we gotta. Gimme a can of beer. A couple of cans. And the rest of you, each of you take some cans a beer. I’ll show you. We get that light out down there, then maybe we be able to do somethin’. I dunno what but maybe. That Parky can’t see in the dark. He’s tough, sho’. But he ain’t got cat’s eyes. He and Joe, they won’t be able to see us if I can knock that candle out.
He hefted a can of beer which Cy handed him.
“We gotta do somethin’ before he kills ’em,” he said.
Two of the boys drifted off, heading for the window at the back of the room and Barney hesitated for a moment and then he moved himself. Starting for the head of the stairs.
Still doubled over, Joe wiped the blood and flesh from the knuckles of his closed fist. “You bitch, you black-assed bitch,” he said. “That teach you to put you teeth in me!" His other hand was still buried between his legs, holding his genitals as he spit out the words. “Now, you got no teeth, you got no face much at all left.”
He tried to straighten up but the pain was too great so he dropped to his knees and he again lifted his closed fist and as Shirley Candle tried to raise herself, he again hit her full in her already shattered face.
She managed to get out a weak scream as she fell back unconscious.
Parky was doubled over with laughter.
“Man, oh man,” he said, “but ain’t you the one, Joe! Why didn’t you knock out her teeth before she get them into you, huh? Whyn’t you straighten up, boy? You ’fraid you balls goin’ fall off? Ain’t gonna do you no good beaten her teef out after she get you. Shoulda done it first. You ain’t very smart, Joe. Now, this one hyer, she ain’t gonna bite me wif her perty white teeth.” He reached over and slapped his hands across Caroline Vargle’s naked breast. “No, sah, she ain’t goin’ use those teef on me, is you, baby? I’m gonna use mine on her, but she ain’t gonna use hers on me.”
Joe groaned and turned away, reaching his hand out for the whiskey bottle which lay on the floor next to Shirley.
“Been some time since that black gal sank her fangs in you, Joe,” Parky said. “You was out like a light. If I hadn’t hung onto her for you, she’d a got plumb away. Come on now, man, straighten yo’self up—if you can, dat is.”
He took a drink from the bottle on the table, wiped his lips, saying, “This stuff don’ do nothin’ fo’ me.” He knocked the bottle off the table with a sweep of his arm.
“Gonna light me up a joint,” Parky said. “Gonna light me a joint, get me a little high, an’ then I’m gonna have me a time.”
He took the brown twist of paper out of his pocket and, putting it between his lips, leaned forward to ignite the end from the candle on the table in front of him. He was drawing in, taking a deep breath to get the weed started, when the beer can flew across the room, end over end.
It caught him full in the mouth, smashing the cigarette into his face, and the candle flew off the table, sputtering out as it struck the floor.
Over and above his outrageous roar, Caroline dimly heard the voice crying out from somewhere in the darkened recesses of the back of the hallway.
“Git away, Miss Vargle! Git away an’ hide!”
For the first time since that terrible paralysis of fear and horror had frozen her into a semicoma Caroline began to come out of that dreamlike state of shock which had thrown a wall of protection around her sanity, if not around her physical body. Without really thinking or understanding, she obeyed the command. She got to her knees and started crawling in the direction of the voice which came out of the darkness.
Parky’s hand still might have reached her, but at that moment there was the sound of the explosion in the distance and the whole building shook in its reverberation. He hesitated, looking toward the door as the sound of the shattered glass from the windows reached him and, by the time he’d turned back, she was already several feet away and the overturned card table kept him from seeing her as she moved into the dark of the room.
eleven
1 HAD Carlton Asmore left the Cosmos Club, as he had started to do, after the tremendous roar of the explosion which demolished the public library, Captain Harry Parker never would have found the police cruiser to substitute for his own car, which froze up and came to a stop a quarter of a block away.
The district attorney was already fumbling with the latch on the front door of the club when Johnny Marathon hurried up and grabbed him by the arm.
“Your uncle,” Johnny said. “In the library. Something’s happened to him. Don’t know whether he fell off the couch or what, but someone just went in and found him on the floor. Unconscious.”
For a second Carlton hesitated. There was Caroline, somewhere over in the colored section, at the Youth League clubhouse. He had to get to her. There was this terrible explosion, somewhere not too far away. That’s where his duty lay as a public servant, to find out about this latest disaster. And there was his uncle. He couldn’t just rush out, at least not before finding out what had happened to the old man. Good God, he’d only left him seconds ago, apparently in perfect health. It couldn’t be anything too serious. But still he had to go and find out.
It took
a good twenty minutes.
Cass Asmore was back on the couch when he reentered the library. A half dozen men, several holding candles, surrounded the couch as Asmore pushed his way into the room.
The old man lay there, his eyes wide open, staring sightlessly at the ceiling. His breath was coming in short gasps and his face was dead white. Someone had pulled a blanket over him and a man whose name Asmore didn’t remember, but whom he recognized as a new member, a dentist who had recently settled in Oakdale, stood at the side of the bed holding the elder Asmore’s wrist in one hand while he looked at his wristwatch.
He looked up as Carlton pushed his way to his side.
“Could be a stroke,” he said. “I’m not a medical doctor so I can’t be sure. We should get him a regular doctor.”
“They’ve gone for some wet towels and some brandy," someone said.
“You won’t find any doctors around loose tonight” someone else said.
“Should get him to a hospital.”
Another man, turning away from the bed, said, “What in the hell was that explosion? Sounded like the whole Goddamned city went up.”
“I’ll get him to the hospital," Carlton said. “Does anyone know what...”
The man who was taking his uncle’s pulse dropped his wrist.
“I don’t know whether it would be advisable to move him,” he said.
Carlton thought of the hospital, which he had left not long before—of the hundreds of wounded and injured stacked up and waiting for attention, of the harried doctors and nurses.
“Isn’t there something ...”
“If it is a stroke, and I am pretty sure that’s what it is, the best thing would be just to keep him covered and quiet, until we could get a doctor here to look at him,’’ the dentist said. “But, of course, it is up to you.”
So it was a good twenty minutes before Carlton Asmore left the club. He did everything he could, dispatched a couple of friends to try to find medical help and only left when he was sure everything that could be done was being done.
He was opening the door of the police cruiser in front of the club, planning on making a quick stop at the hospital, where he would try to get an ambulance to pick up his uncle, before driving over to the Youth Center and checking up on Caroline, when Captain Harry Parker came running up.
Parker said, “Mr. Asmore, am I glad to see you! I need this car, mine just broke down a half block away.”
Asmore hesitated a moment.
“I need it myself,” he said. “My uncle is inside and I believe he has just had a stroke. Have to get over to the hospital.”
Parker hesitated a moment, leaning into the car as Carlton put his key in the ignition switch.
“I could go over with you,” he said, “and maybe I could take the car. That explosion—something happened over by the tracks and I ..
“I’d like to oblige you, Captain,” Asmore said, “but unfortunately, I am really going to need this car for awhile. The minute I leave the hospital, I am going to have to go over to the Youth Center. A friend of mine—Miss Vargle, she runs the center—is over there I understand and I am afraid she may be in trouble. I simply have to get there and ..
Parker stared at him a moment.
“You wouldn’t be able to get within blocks of the place tonight,” he said. “Why, Mr. Asmore, a white man would probably be killed before he ..
“Look, Captain,” Asmore said. “I tell you there’s a white girl ...”
“I don’t like to argue with you,” Captain Parker said, “but no white man would be safe in that district tonight. And a police car —why, man, they’d turn it over and set you on fire a block from ..
He hesitated a moment and then stepped back a pace, running his hand through his hair. “Did you say you know the woman who is supposed to be at the Youth Center? The white woman?”
“I did. Miss Vargle. Miss Caroline Vargle. And I must get over..
“That's a funny coincidence,” Captain Parker said. “I just hope she isn’t a personal friend. I left headquarters a few minutes ago.
I picked up a young colored boy who told me some sort of weird story about some white woman over there who was being murdered. Good God ..
Asmore felt the blood drain from his face.
“Get in, Captain,” he said. “Get in. We’ve got to get over there as fast..
Parker shook his head. “I tell you man,” he said, “we wouldn’t have a chance ..
“You’re a police officer,” Asmore said. “I tell you to get in this car. Goddamn it, I . .
“And I tell you, sir, we wouldn’t have a ...”
Parker hesitated a moment and then he quickly leaned forward.
“Listen,” he said, “listen, I just passed an ambulance a couple of blocks down the street. It had stopped in front of the First National Bank to pick up a heart patient. There’s a chance that it still might be there. Now, if there is one chance in a thousand of getting into nigger town tonight, it just might be in an ambulance. That’s about the one kind of car those bastards would let through. If you want to take the chance ...”
“Get in, Captain. Quick.”
It was still there, standing at the curb, when Carlton Asmore jammed on the brakes three minutes later and the tires screamed as they came to a halt. The driver was behind the wheel, ready to throw the engine into gear.
“I was talking to the driver only a few minutes ago,” Parker said as he opened the door of the police cruiser. “If he has his patient, we can drop him at the hospital on our way.”
A moment later he jerked open the front door of the ambulance, holding his flashlight on the face of the man behind the wheel.
“Captain Parker,” he said. “Remember, I was talking with you a couple of minutes ago? I’m sorry, but we are going to have to confiscate this vehicle, doc."
Patsy August dropped his hands at his side and turned. He shook his head.
“Why, yes, Captain,” he said. “Yes, of course. But really, I am afraid I can’t let you have the ambulance. I have a very sick man in the back here and I am not authorized ...”
“This is an emergency," Captain Parker said. “We can take your patient to the hospital and then ...’’
“But, Captain,” Patsy said, “as an employee of the medical staff I have no authority . .
Parker’s light again went to the driver’s face and Carlton Asmore suddenly pushed next to Parker and stared into the face of the man in the visored cap and the white coat.
“Why,” he said, “why this man is no ambulance driver. I talked to him only a short time ago and he told me that he was some sort of private detective, that he had been temporarily assigned to guard the . .
He never did get to finish the sentence as the door of the ambulance was suddenly pushed open, jamming into Captain Parker and pushing him back so that he fell against Asmore.
Asmore went to his knees, not quite understanding what had happened, and by the time he had braced his hands on the pavement and was trying to push himself erect, a gun blasted not a footfrom hisface, half blinding him.
That first bullet, from Pasty August’s thirty-eight automatic, grazed Captain Harry Parker’s forehead on the right side, opening a gash a quarter of an inch deep and dazing him for the fraction of a minute.
And then the one contingency happened which neither Patsy August nor even Mr. Carpender could possibly have foreseen. Patsy took his time, pushing the snout of the automatic into the Captain’s left side, and pulled the trigger, simultaneously squeezing the back of the butt of the automatic. There was the sound of a dull click and nothing else.
Patsy released the trigger and again pulled it and this time there was nothing at all as the second shell he had fired, being defective, had jammed the gun.
There was no time for another chance, no time to reach for the other gun, a thirty-two special which he carried in a holster on his right thigh. Even as his hand reached for the gun, the slug from Captain Parker’s special was already enter
ing his forehead directly centered between his eyes and an inch under the visor of his chauffeur’s cap.
A hundred yards down the street, Charlie, staring into the rear-vision mirror of his darkened car, his hand on the submachine gun which rested in the seat at his side, was able to make out only the twin headlights of the ambulance and the police car which had pulled adjacent to it, when the single shot rang out. He was lifting the gun when it was followed a moment later by a triple blast and he turned in his seat, leaning out the window.
He saw the figure in the white coat stagger several steps and slump to the pavement.
His hand lifted the submachine gun, but even as it did, he realized that there was almost no chance that it would be effective at that distance.
He quickly snapped on the ignition and, as the engine caught, shoved the car into gear. He swung wide, making a U-turn. The gun was cradled in his arm as he headed back toward the ambulance, driving with one hand.
Crouching at the left side of the heavy machine, Captain Harry Parker saw the snout of the gun poking out from the driver’s side of the careening car, full in the glare of the headlights, as it approached. Had Charlie thought to turn on his own headlights, he would have blinded the police officer, but he’d had no time to think about it.
Captain Parker balanced his arm on the front fender and squeezed the trigger of the gun which had sent three bullets into Patsy August. The first one shattered the windshield of the oncoming vehicle, the second hit Charlie in the shoulder and the wheel swung wildly out of control as his arm dropped. The third went wild, burying itself in a retail dress shop’s door a half a block away. But it wasn’t needed.
The Lincoln Continental swerved in a semicircle and plowed into a live oak tree on the far side of the street, catapulting Charlie through the so-called shatterproof windshield and virtually decapitating him.
2 IT WAS the roar of the blast which rocked the entire city, cracking windowpanes and literally shaking the more fragile old tenements in the ghetto district, which brought them out of the houses again and onto the streets. They could see the flames reaching high into the sky to the north, somewhere near the railway tracks, and they stood in awe, watching and wondering, wondering if those flames would spread and begin consuming those buildings which were still left standing after the early hours of fire-bombing and burning.