“The law,” Grave Digger said, flattening himself against the wall beside the door. “Detectives Jones and Johnson. Come out with your hands up.”
Before he’d finished speaking Coffin Ed was sprinting down the corridor between the benches to go outside and circle to the rear windows.
“You can’t have her,” Reverend Short croaked. “She belongs to God now.”
“We don’t want her. We want you,” Grave Digger said.
“I’m God’s instrument,” Reverend Short said.
“I don’t doubt that,” Grave Digger said, trying to hold his attention until Coffin Ed had time to approach the rear windows. “All we want to do is see that you get back safe and sound into God’s instrument case.”
The shotgun blasted from inside, without the warning sound of being cocked, and blew a hole through the center of the door.
“You didn’t get me,” Grave Digger called. “Try the other barrel.”
There was a sound of movement inside the room, and Dulcy screamed. The sound of two shots from a .38 revolver coming from the courtyard in back followed instantly. Grave Digger turned on the balls of his big flat feet, hit the door with his left shoulder and rocketed into the room with his long barreled nickel-plated .38 cocked and ready in his right hand. Reverend Short was sprawled face downward across the seat of the wooden chair beside the bed, trying to reach the shotgun, which lay on the floor half underneath the table. He was reaching for it with his left hand. His right hand dangled uselessly at his side.
Grave Digger leaned forward and hit him across the back of the head with his pistol barrel, just hard enough to knock him unconscious without braining him, then turned to give his attention to Dulcy before Reverend Short had rolled over and fallen to the floor.
She lay spread-eagled on the bed, her hands and feet tied to the bedposts with clothesline. Her torso and feet were bare, but she still wore the pants of a bright red slack suit. The bone handle of a knife was sticking straight up from the crevice between her breasts. She looked at Grave Digger from huge black terror-stricken eyes.
“I bad hurt?” she asked in a whisper.
“I doubt it,” Grave Digger said, then looked at her closer and added, “You’re too pretty to be bad hurt. Only ugly women ever get hurt bad.”
Coffin Ed was tearing off the chicken-wire screen from the rear window. Grave Digger crossed the room and raised the window and finished kicking it out. Coffin Ed climbed inside.
Grave Digger said, “Let’s get these beauties to the hospital.”
Reverend Short was taken to the psychiatric ward of Bellevue Hospital downtown on First Avenue and 29th Street. He was given a shot of paraldehyde and was docile and rational when the detectives went in to wind up the case. He sat propped up in bed with his right arm in a sling.
Detective Sergeant Brody from Homicide had ridden downtown with Grave Digger and Coffin Ed, and he sat beside the bed and did the questioning. The police reporter sat beside him.
Coffin Ed sat on the other side of the bed and stared down at the chart hanging at the foot. Grave Digger sat on the window sill and watched the tugboats chugging up and down the East River.
“Just a few little questions, Reverend,” Brody said cheerfully. “First, why did you kill him?”
“God directed me to,” Reverend Short replied in a calm, quiet voice.
Brody glanced at Coffin Ed, but Coffin Ed didn’t notice. Grave Digger continued to stare out at the river.
“Tell us about it,” Brody said.
“Big Joe Pullen found out that he was her husband and they were still living in sin while she was supposed to be married to Johnny Perry,” Reverend Short began.
“When did he find that out?” Brody asked.
“On his last trip,” Reverend Short said quietly. “He was going to talk to Val and tell him to clear out, go to Chicago, get his divorce quietly and just disappear. But before Joe Pullen had a chance to talk to him he died. When I came to help Mamie arrange for the funeral she told me what Big Joe had found out, and asked me for spiritual advice. I told her to leave it to me and I’d take care of it, being as I was both her and Big Joe’s spiritual advisor and Johnny and Dulcy Perry were members of my church, too, although they never attended the services. I telephoned Val and told him I wanted to talk to him, and he said he didn’t have time to talk to preachers. So I had to tell him what I wanted to talk to him about. He said he’d come and see me in my church the night of the wake, and we made an appointment for two o’clock. I think he was preparing to do me injury, but I was prepared, and I put it to him straight. I told him I’d give him twenty-four hours to get out of town and leave her alone or I’d tell Johnny. He told me he’d go. I was satisfied he was telling me the truth, so I went back to the wake to comfort Mamie in her last hours with Big Joe’s mortal remains. It was while I was there that God directed me to slay him.”
“How did that happen, Reverend?” Brody asked gently.
Reverend Short took off his glasses, laid them aside and ran his hand down over his thin bony face. He put his glasses back on.
“I am give to receiving instructions from God, and I don’t question them,” he said. “While I was standing in the room where Big Joe’s mortal remains lay in the casket, I felt an overwhelming urge to go into the front bedroom. I knew right away that God was sending me on some mission. I obeyed without reservation. I went into the bedroom and closed the door. Then I felt the urge to look among Big Joe’s things …”
Coffin Ed slowly turned his head to stare at him. Grave Digger turned his gaze from the East River and stared at him, too. The police reporter glanced up quickly and down again.
“As I was looking through his things I came across the knife laying in his dresser drawer among his hairbrushes and safety razors and things. God told me to take it. I took it. I put it into my pocket. God told me to go to the window and look out. I went to the window and looked out. Then God caused me to fall—”
“As I remember it, you said before that Chink Charlie pushed you,” Brody interrupted.
“That was what I thought then,” Reverend Short said in his quiet voice. “But since then I’ve come to realize it was God who pushed me. I had the urge to fall, but I was holding back, and God had to give me a little push. Then God placed that basket of bread on the sidewalk to break my fall.”
“Before you said it was the Body of Christ,” Brody reminded him.
“Yes,” Reverend Short admitted. “But since then I’ve communed with God and now I know it was bread. When I got out of the bread basket and found myself unhurt, I knew right away that God had placed me in that position to accomplish some task, but I didn’t know what. So I stood in the hallway downstairs, out of sight, waiting for God to direct me what to do—”
“You’re sure it wasn’t just to take a leak,” Coffin Ed cut in.
“Well, I did that, too,” Reverend Short admitted. “I have a weak bladder.”
“No wonder,” Grave Digger said.
“Let him go on,” Brody said.
“While I was waiting for God to instruct me, I saw Valentine Haines crossing the street,” Reverend Short said. “I knew right away that God wanted me to do something about him. I stood out of sight and watched him from the shadows. Then I saw him walk up to the bread basket and he down as though to go to sleep. He lay just as though he were lying in a coffin awaiting his burial. I knew then what it was that God wanted me to do. I opened the knife and held it up my sleeve and stepped outside. Val saw me right away and said, I thought you went back upstairs to the wake, Reverend. I said, no, I’ve been waiting for you. He said, waiting for me for what. I said, waiting to kill you in the name of the Lord, and I leaned down and stabbed him in the heart.”
Sergeant Brody exchanged glances with the two colored detectives.
“Well, that wraps it up,” he said, then, turning back to Reverend Short, he remarked cynically, “I suppose you’ll cop a plea of insanity.”
“I’m not insane,” Reverend Short s
aid serenely. “I’m holy.”
“Yeah,” Brody said. He turned to the police reporter. “Get a copy of that statement typed for him to sign as soon as possible.”
“Right,” the police reporter said, closing his notebook and hurrying from the room.
Brody rang for the attendant and left him with Grave Digger and Coffin Ed. Outside he turned to Grave Digger and said, “You were right after all when you said that folks in Harlem do things for reasons nobody else in the world would think of.”
Grave Digger grunted.
“Do you think he’s really crazy?” Brody persisted.
“Who knows?” Grave Digger said.
“Depends on what you mean by crazy,” Coffin Ed amended.
“He was just sexually frustrated and lusting after a married woman,” Grave Digger said. “When you get to mixing sex and religion it will make anybody crazy.”
“If he sticks to his story, he’ll beat it,” Brody said.
“Yeah,” Coffin Ed said bitterly. “And if the cards had fallen just a little differently Johnny Perry would have got burned.”
Dulcy had been taken to Harlem hospital. Her wound was superficial. The knife thrust had been stopped by her sternum.
But they kept her in the hospital because she could pay for a room.
She telephoned Mamie and Mamie went to her immediately. She cried her heart out on Mamie’s shoulder, while telling her the story.
“But why didn’t you just get rid of Val, child?” Mamie asked her. “Why didn’t you send him away.”
“I wasn’t sleeping with him,” Dulcy said.
“It didn’t make any difference—he was still your husband and you kept him there in the house.”
“I felt sorry for him, that’s all,” Dulcy said. “He wasn’t worth a damn for nothing, but I felt sorry for him just the same.”
“Well, for God’s sake, child,” Mamie said. “Anyway, why didn’t you tell the police about Chink having another knife instead of getting Johnny to kill him?”
“I know I should have done it,” Dulcy confessed. “But I didn’t know what to do.”
“Then why didn’t you go to Johnny, child, and make a clean breast and ask him what to do?” Mamie said. “He was your man, child. He was the only one for you to go to.”
“Go to Johnny!” Dulcy said, laughing with an edge of hysteria. “Imagine me going to Johnny with that story. I thought he had done it himself.”
“He would have listened to you,” Mamie said. “You ought to know Johnny that well by now, child.”
“It wasn’t that, Aunt Mamie,” Dulcy sobbed. “I know he would have listened. But he would have hated me.”
“There, there, don’t cry,” Mamie said, caressing her hair. “It’s all over now.”
“That’s what I mean,” Dulcy said. “It’s all over.” She buried her face in her hands and sobbed heartbrokenly. “I love the ugly bastard,” she said sobbingly. “But I ain’t got no way to prove it.”
It was a hot morning. The neighborhood kids were playing in the street.
Johnny’s lawyer, Ben Williams, had got him out on bail. The garage had sent a man down to the jail with his fishtail Cadillac. Johnny came out and got in behind the wheel and the man from the garage sat in back. The lawyer sat beside Johnny.
“We’ll get that manslaughter charge nol-prossed,” the lawyer said. “You ain’t got a thing to worry about.”
Johnny pressed the starter, shifted to drive, and the big convertible moved off slowly.
“That ain’t what I’m worrying about,” he said.
“What is it?” the lawyer asked.
“You wouldn’t know anything about it,” Johnny said.
Skinny black kids in their summer shifts ran after the big flashy Cadillac, touching it with love and awe.
“Fishtail Johnny Perry,” they called after him. “Four Ace Johnny Perry.”
He threw up his left hand in a sort of salute.
“Try me,” the lawyer said. “I’m supposed to be your brain.”
“How can a jealous man win?” Johnny said.
“By trusting his luck,” the lawyer said. “You’re the one who’s the gambler, you ought to know that.”
“Well, pal,” Johnny said. “You’d better be right.”
The Crazy Kill Page 17