Hex: A Ruby Murphy Mystery

by Maggie Estep

  “Sure, officer,” I say, giving her my number, glad to know that I won’t be reachable, as I’m heading straight to the Hole to ride Prince until nightfall.

  “You got a cell number, Ives?”

  “No, ma’am, I’m afraid not,” I say.

  The little lady doesn’t look like she believes me, but what can I do? She turns and walks back over toward the office, and I turn back to Miss Yashpinsky.

  “You interested in riding on the beach at Jamaica Bay?” I ask her all of a sudden, not even realizing I’m about to ask her.

  “The beach?” Asha frowns a little, seeming confused.

  “I got my horse out at a place called the Hole, out on the border between Brooklyn and Queens, not too far from JFK and Aqueduct out there. I ride him on the beach at Jamaica Bay most nights. It’s a nice ride. There are a few horses out there you could ride.”

  “Yeah?” Asha tilts her head.

  “It’s nice out there,” I tell her. “It’s where the Federation of Black Cowboys hang.”

  “Oh yeah, those guys.” She nods. “But I’m not black, Sebastian,” she says, laughing.

  “That’s okay, you can be an honorary black cowgirl,” I tell her, and the fire-headed woman lights up at this prospect.

  I finish up with evening chores, then Asha comes with me as I pop my head in the office. Gaines and Ned are still surrounded by cops and the both of them are looking strained.

  Gaines glances up at me and shrugs. “Yeah, go on home, Sebastian,” he says, and I’m not about to protest.

  Asha and I walk over to where I’ve got the Buick parked. I open the passenger door for her, which seems to surprise her a little. I go around to the driver’s side and get in, noticing how good Asha looks with her red hair against the tan insides of the car.

  A half hour later, after a peaceful drive—where we’ve both managed to talk about most everything under the sun while steering clear of what happened at Belmont today—we’re approaching the Hole.

  I show Asha the Dip sign that stands at the main road down into the Hole. I drive through the dip slowly and then nose the Buick ahead, past a half-dozen little stable areas and off to the left, where I keep Prince in a tiny but clean stable run by my friend Neil, a big Jamaican fellow I’ve known since he was a youngster.

  Asha is wide-eyed, staring all around, reacting the way most people do seeing stables surrounded by projects and highways. It ain’t exactly horse country.

  I disarm Nunu, Neil’s rottweiler, letting the dog know that Asha’s okay as I unlock the padlock securing the big gates.

  “Heavy security, huh?” Asha grins, looking from the gate to Nunu, who, now that I’ve let her know Asha’s all right, has put her fangs away and is licking the woman’s pale freckled hands.

  “Yup,” I concur. “We don’t take chances around here.” I motion toward the projects, which I know well, considering I grew up in one of the stumpy run-down tenements that was a precursor to the tall bleak buildings.

  I lead the way into the little four-stall barn and throw open the back door, letting light pour in over the four horses living in here.

  Prince whinnies at me and shakes his big white head, as does Dalton, Neil’s horse, who almost looks like Prince’s twin, what with being almost all white but for one pale splotch of yellow on his neck.

  “This is Prince,” I say, introducing Asha to my horse, who, proving his good taste, shows instant approval of Asha by licking her on the forehead—a thing he normally doesn’t do until he’s known someone a bunch of months.

  “And this is Dalton,” I say, rubbing the horse under the chin. “You can ride him, or you can take Ellen, the little Arabian mare there. My friend Neil just bought her off some kid who couldn’t handle her. She’s a little wild but a nice ride.”

  “I’m up for a quiet ride. I’ll take Dalton,” Asha says. “And who’s this?” she asks, going to stand in front of the fourth stall, looking fondly at the huge retired carriage horse.

  “That’s Hanover. He used to pull a carriage in Central Park. He’s almost thirty now. Neil puts his nephew on the horse’s back once in a while but that’s it. Old guy’s had a full life. Deserves a little peace and quiet.”

  Asha spends a long while scratching Hanover’s face, obviously smitten with the huge horse.

  “He’d probably appreciate a little walk and some brushing, if you want,” I tell her, and the girl looks delighted, like I’ve just offered her a bucket of diamonds.

  “I’d love to,” she purrs.

  As I get to work tacking up Prince and Dalton, Asha takes Hanover out of his stall and starts fussing with him, clacking her tongue with disgust over the layer of dust on the big chestnut’s coat.

  “He ain’t neglected,” I advise her. “Old guy likes to roll. Even at his age. Can’t keep him clean five minutes before he goes getting into something.”

  It takes a while for Asha to feel satisfied with her handiwork on Hanover. Only after I’ve promised her she can give Hanover a nice long walk when we get back does she finally lead Dalton outside and get up in the saddle.

  I haven’t ridden Prince in three days and he’s letting me know it, acting like a damned thoroughbred, looking around at everything, snorting at Nunu like he’s never seen a dog before. I talk to the gelding and hold him with my legs, keeping only light contact with his sensitive mouth as we head out toward Linden Boulevard.

  Asha looks less than thrilled at the prospect of crossing Linden Boulevard on horseback but I assure her both Dalton and Prince do it almost every day. I’m surprised to see her nervous. Exercise riders aren’t exactly prone to such things, but neither are they used to riding across highways.

  Asha relaxes once we’ve reached the other side of the road and are cutting through quiet back streets, heading out toward the bay. By the time we’ve got the two geldings onto the beach, Asha is radiant, her pale eyes bluer than usual, the setting sun adding red to her hair.

  We keep the horses at a walk for a while and talk some more. Miss Yashpinsky tells me about her childhood growing up in Queens with her parents, who ran a ballet school.

  “How’d you end up on a horse, then?” I ask her.

  “Yoga,” she says.

  “Yoga?”

  “I started taking it to help with flexibility—a dancer’s hips get tight. There was a guy used to come to my yoga class who was an exercise rider at the track. I’d ridden when I was a tiny kid, when my folks’ school was doing good business, but then things got lean and no more riding lessons for me. I dunno. I got to talking to Jim, the exercise rider from yoga, and one thing led to another and I came out to Belmont one day. Guess I rode enough as a kid to have some good basics. And I just loved the track. The horses. I never turned back.”

  I tell her my own horse history, how, growing up in East New York long before the Black Cowboys started building stables in the Hole, the only horses I ever saw were occasional cop horses, but I always was drawn to ’em. Then I went off to college down South on a scholarship and there were horses everywhere. I rode whenever I could and would spend hours around stables. Graduated and went back to Queens to teach high school English for ten years. By then the federation had its stable set up not far from where I lived. Pretty soon I was going by there every day. Helping out. Then that wasn’t enough. The pull of horses got so strong I hung it up with teaching and went out to the track to walk hots. Worked my way up and probably could have been assistant trainer to any number of fellows I’d worked for but I didn’t want the pressure and dealing with owners. I like being a groom.

  “I’m forty-seven, you know,” I tell Asha after I’ve finished with my story.

  “Yeah?” she says, not seeming to fall off her horse in shock at my advanced age. “I’ll be thirty-six next month,” she tells me.

  “Thirty-six?” I say.

  She laughs. “I know, it’s the baby fat on my cheeks,” she tells me, reaching up to pinch one of her lovely, slightly plump cheeks. “Makes me look not a da
y over twelve, right?”

  “Well, twenty-five, maybe,” I say, feeling relieved because ever since I’d started noticing Asha, I’d been a little upset with myself; not only was she a white girl, but I figured she was a couple decades my junior. Thirty-six ain’t so bad.

  “You wanna lope?” Asha says then, and I agree that yes, Prince could probably use it, and the two geldings break into a soft canter without any urging, both of them with their ears forward, Prince throwing a little buck of appreciation.

  We go quite a ways before I feel Prince tiring and I pull him back to a trot and then a walk. We turn around, heading back toward the Hole at a leisurely pace.

  “Stop a second,” Asha says.

  I do as she asks, bringing Prince to a halt.

  She steers Dalton so close to Prince that mine and Asha’s knees are touching. She looks at me. She’s smiling a little.

  “You ever kiss a white girl?” she says.

  “Nope,” I say, although this isn’t entirely true. I did kiss a white girl once when I was nineteen, but that was it, just a kiss.

  “It’s not all bad,” she says, leaning over, putting her pretty pink mouth to mine.

  And she’s right. It’s not bad at all. Kind of makes the world slip away entirely. And it’s not until many hours later, after I’ve given Asha a ride back to her place in Queens and am finally home, that I come down from the pull of that kiss and remember about poor Little Molly. I feel pretty shitty about it, but that kiss was the kind of kiss to soften any blow.

  Ruby Murphy

  19 / A Black Wish

  When I get back to Stillwell Avenue, it’s close to seven and Coney is in full bloom. Most of the ride operators have come slinking out of hibernation, the lights are on and pulsing, the rollercoasters are chinking up their tracks, the night carries sounds of shrieking girls and barking game touters.

  I put my key in the front door, then climb up the stairs. Ramirez’s door is closed—which I hope means he and Elsie have gone out to dinner, as opposed to something ominous having happened with Elsie’s chest.

  Entering my apartment, I step into a strange clean world. I’m not a completely reprehensible slob but I don’t keep the place spick-and-span. Oliver, it seems, has taken exception to my housekeeping skills. The place is sparkling.

  “Oliver?” I call out, but there’s no sign of him.

  No sign of the cats either. Which means Oliver must have fed the beasts. I put my bag down, sit on the couch and rest my head in my hands, trying to block out the images of Little Molly’s body that keep flashing before my eyes.

  And I’m still sitting like this, struggling through these mental images, when Oliver comes in.

  “You’re home!” he says, putting down an armful of groceries.

  “I am,” I concede.

  “Look,” Oliver says, reaching into his grocery bag and proudly proffering a container of tofu, “and look at these,” he adds, wielding bumpy pale vegetables I’ve never seen before. I don’t know where he found tofu in Coney Island. It’s not like the locals are soybean-consuming types. “I thought I’d cook up a feast. Turn Ramirez and Elsie on to tofu. What do you think?”

  “I think Ramirez is out. He and Elsie go out to dinner most Saturdays. And how the hell do you have all this energy, Oliver?”.

  He frowns at me like it’s an asinine question, a question that he ignores: “I’ll cook for us, then.”

  I’ve never known Oliver to cook anything, and the idea of him trying here and now isn’t a soothing one.

  “How about we go ride the Cyclone? I need it. I saw a dead person today,” I say, not necessarily trying to be dramatic, just wanting to get it out without fuss.

  “What?” Oliver squints at me.

  “Dead person. An apprentice jockey. She was nineteen. Had a heart attack.”

  My friend’s jaw drops.

  I tell him the whole story.

  He frowns harder and harder as I go on. Then, when I’ve reached the end of the tale: “I think you’d better stop doing what you’re doing.”

  “Why?”

  “Why? Someone died, Ruby, don’t be stupid. This could be life and death. It’s not a joke.” Oliver’s brown eyes go black and his mouth turns down at the edges.

  “I’ll figure it out,” I say softly. I let a few moments pass. “On a more frivolous note,” I say, “the Cyclone’s open. Can we go ride it?”

  Oliver badgers me a little more about my dangerous pursuits but finally agrees that yes, if I’ll eat his cooking, he’ll ride the Cyclone with me.

  I go pour myself a bath and soak in it, leaving him to his dubious kitchen practices. Again I run through the bank of images from this afternoon.

  Eventually, I get out of the tub. I dry off, put sweatpants and a T-shirt on, and in spite of being exhausted, roll my yoga mat out in the living room to do ten sun salutations and a few standing poses to help me face Oliver’s culinary debacle.

  Strange smells are wafting in from the kitchen, and as I stand on one leg, holding my other leg before me in the air, Oliver comes in, sees me wavering on the one leg, and comes to assist me, putting his hand under my airborne foot, helping me get the leg so high it practically smashes me in the nose.

  “Enough circus tricks,” he says, dropping the leg. “Time to eat.”

  I’m frightened at this prospect but I’m starved. I roll my mat back up, then go into the kitchen, where I’m stunned to see he’s lit candles on the tiny table and has steaming plates of food waiting for us.

  I’m even more stunned to find the food is actually delicious.

  “Unsuspected talents, huh?” He grins after watching me shovel many forkfuls into myself.

  I nod enthusiastically.

  After cleaning up and giving ourselves time to digest, we venture out onto Surf Avenue to go ride our beloved Cyclone.

  X

  A ROUND-FACED older guy I’ve never seen before is taking tickets at the rollercoaster. Though I’d heard that the former ticket taker, a man named Gary, died in January, it somehow hadn’t hit home until now. I give my ticket to this new guy, who doesn’t even look up. Gary would always wish me a nice ride. Nothing more. Never a “How are you today?” just the simple wish for a nice ride. From the first time I ever got on the monstrous wooden contraption at age twelve, right up to last October when, on closing day, I came over and rode eight times in a row.

  “We’ve gotta wait for the front car,” I tell Oliver, parking us behind two girls who are staking out the spot on the platform where the front car will pull up.

  “Yes,” Oliver agrees as we fasten our eyes on the two girls. They’re tough-looking hefty girls with sizable asses packed into thin stretchy blue jeans.

  One of the girls flips her hair back and turns to glower at me and Oliver. He smiles at the girl and she melts. They all do.

  The coaster comes clanging up to the platform and stops. Oliver and I wait, watching the girls squeeze into the front car and, as a slum-bum-looking Spanish kid endeavors to close the security bar over their immense laps, girl number one looks up at Oliver and waves coyly.

  Oliver smiles.

  The white-haired rollercoaster hand is an immense man who once told me he hadn’t been able to fit on the Cyclone for seventeen years. But he runs it just fine. He now shoves his wooden control lever forward, setting the train on its course.

  The wood and steel structure groans and thrashes. Its victims scream into the bright evening. After two minutes the little wooden train pulls up in front of us once more. We see that the hefty babes are still in there, paying a reduced fee to ride again, but they graciously move back to the second car, freeing the front for me and Oliver.

  “We didn’t wanna be pigs about the front car,” girl number one says, offering Oliver a tiny smile that’s at odds with her huge, tough countenance.

  “You couldn’t if you tried,” Oliver says, winking at the girl.

  We settle into the front car and the white-haired man pulls his lever, sendin
g the train chugging up the imposing first hill. The train stops and careens, holding its breath before diving down the perilously long first drop. Oliver lets out a scream as we plummet wildly, the track rushing toward our faces. My stomach drops. And then the train climbs the second hill. I feel my mouth spreading into a huge grin. I can hear the hefty babes behind us, squealing. And then, before I’ve had time to completely bask in the horrifying deliciousness of it all, the ride is over and Oliver and I are handing over another three bucks each to ride again.

  After four more rides, we get off and wobble through the turnstile back to the street. It’s getting close to ten now, and though I wouldn’t mind a few games of Skee Ball, I have to get up and go back to the track in six hours. Though he claims to feel fine, Oliver looks a little pale, and I suggest we go on back home.

  We’re heading back toward my place when someone behind me calls my name. I turn around and find myself face-to-face with my boss, Bob, from the museum.

  He’s wearing an orange T-shirt and Kelly green pants. His long gray hair is shooting out of his head in angry kinks.

  “Bob,” I say, “you remember my friend Oliver?”

  The two nod at each other.

  “No time to work but time enough to party, huh?” my boss says—even though he didn’t seem to mind when I told him I’d need a bit of time off from the museum to pursue my unlikely new job.

  “Come on. Be nice. I put in something like fourteen hours of physical labor today and I saw a dead body.”

  “Body?” Bob says, tilting his head, interested.

  “Body of a dead jockey. Little tiny mean blond girl.”

  “Oh my,” Bob says.

  I give him some of the details, and though he’s intrigued, he doesn’t seem alarmed at the idea of my involvement. He asks when I think I’ll be back to work, and when I tell him soon, he shrugs, wishes me and Oliver a pleasant evening, and wanders ahead into the night.