A Negro and an Ofay (The Tales of Elliot Caprice Book 1)

by Danny Gardner

  More than a couple pawn shops littered the landscape, but the best return always came from Majestic Loans. They even kept hours on Saturday and Sunday, which offended Southville’s Jews and Christians alike.

  Mamie’s Grub And Git offered the finest peasant food for the best price. Her eight tables and counter seats were never empty. There was no chance getting in during the dinner rush, so the Caprices would have to take their chances at Duffy’s Tavern, where they’d likely order the gigantic corned beef sandwiches and colcannon. They enjoyed the wild tales spun by raucous patrons at the top of their lungs, like an old Dublin pub. Or they could watch brawls. Sean Duffy only stepped in when real blood was spilled, otherwise, all he did was buy the winner a round. Generally, the sheriff wouldn’t venture inside, but stood outside the vestibule, which was a good place to arrest whomever stumbled onto the pavement.

  They parked Lucille at the top of the strip to walk the boulevard, partly to enjoy the cool night air, but mostly so Buster could get in Elliot’s head.

  “You lucky that hag broke our game up.”

  “You should show her some respect.”

  “I pay our rent on time every week.”

  “The woman been survivin’ this world longer than you been in it,” Buster said.

  They walked a little farther until they had to stop for some drunks in the sidewalk.

  “I think you visited upon ol’ Betts at some point in your youthful meanderings,” Elliot said.

  “She wasn’t always so bitter.”

  “Before or after the continents split?”

  “You ain’t the only one seen ugly, boy.”

  “That old battle-ax has never missed an opportunity to give me hell.”

  “To be fair, you wuz a bad kid.”

  “What’s that say about you?” Elliot gave Buster the side-eye.

  “Says I reached my natural limit.”

  Across the street, a ruckus spilled out of Le Chateau Du Paree, the burlesque house on the row. The name of the place meant nothing in French. Suddenly, a customer barreled out the front door. Another was thrown out by George. He slammed the perpetrator into the side of his cruiser’s door. His buddy bolted down the street.

  “You got nuthin’ on me, spook! I was mindin’ my business!”

  Misty Munroe, a regular performer at Le Chateau, approached.

  “Every night this week, this asshole comes in here gettin’ all grabby!”

  “Bullshit,” the drunk said.

  “Shut up!” George leaned his body weight on the drunk, whose foul breath left his lungs in a huff. A bouncer walked over expecting far more respect than his job afforded him.

  “He’s been warned twice tonight, Sheriff. You need to do something about these hillbillies from the next county.”

  George tried not to focus on the indignity of it all. The drunk got squirrelly.

  “That’s enough!”

  “Get stuffed, nigger sheriff. Figures this piece of shit town would have a coon as the law.”

  He spat in George’s face, which finally provoked his wrath. George pulled a blackjack and rapped the man on his left temple. Before the drunk could fall to the cobblestone, George took him by the lapels. He kneed him in the ribs. Even Misty was shocked. Elliot ventured over to help when he noticed the first man returning, this time with a double-barreled shotgun.

  “Georgie! On your right!”

  George looked up, threw his coat back and pulled his revolver. Before he could get a shot off, a blast rang out from the opposite end of the alleyway. The man holding the double-barrel went down like a sack of potatoes. Misty ran back into Le Chateau. George spun around to see Ned Reilly holding a twelve-gauge.

  “I was around back.”

  George felt the heft of the pistol in his hand. His adrenaline slowly dissipated. Even in self-defense, the ease with which he drew his weapon on a bigoted white man frightened him. Ned walked over to the first man and kicked him.

  “Not what you’d thought you’d be gettin’ in Sugartown tonight, huh?” Ned held up the shotgun for George to see. “Rock salt.”

  Buster and Elliot walked over.

  “Ned. Nick of time, huh?”

  “Heard you were back,” Ned said, without eye contact. For his elder, he smiled.

  “Mr. Caprice.”

  “Youn’ fella? How’s ya mama?”

  “Old.”

  “Ain’t we all.”

  George was silent while he cuffed the drunk. The gunman was still moaning on the ground a few feet away.

  “Christ, shaddup! You’d think I shot you with lead.”

  Uncle Buster observed Ned’s handiwork as he cuffed the gunman. He lifted him off the pavement. Elliot helped George put the unconscious drunk in the back seat of the cruiser.

  “How you doin’ there, Preacher?”

  “I hate this job.”

  “It ain’t a job, Georgie. It’s a calling.”

  “Third night this week,” George said. “Hell, every week. I don’t know how they expect only the two of us to get it all done.”

  “They expect you to go along to get along.”

  Ned dragged the first man over to the cruiser.

  “This one is gonna need Doc Shapiro to come by,” Ned said. “He ain’t bleedin’, but it’s better to be sure.”

  “He drew on the law. He’s going to Stateville.”

  Uncle Buster walked over brandishing his silver flask. He took a swig and handed it to George.

  “We wuz just headed to Duffy’s for a sangwich,” Buster said.

  “I’ll get these bums to the jail. You gotta call the state boys,” Ned said.

  “I’ll scoot by on the way home.” George smiled as best he could.

  Elliot patted George on the shoulder before they walked off.

  “Ned Reilly don’t like you,” Buster said.

  “Aw, he’s sore at me over all the shit I gave him when we were kids.”

  “Why wuz you mean to that boy?”

  “He was the onliest one of the gang whiter than me.”

  Elliot and Buster walked into Duffy’s when it was in a mood. Somber murmurs of conversation revealed the passing of Johnny Calloway, an aged veteran of both world wars. Elliot took off his hat out of respect. He knew what it meant to be too faithful. To give too much.

  They took their seats in the rear. Not that anyone discriminated in Duffy’s. It was more due to how people care to socialize themselves. If you walked in looking for a colored fella, you’d most likely find him at the tables in the back. If you wanted to be alone, you took the end of the bar by the door. If you were a regular, you grouped around Sean. He was a happy drunk. If he imbibed enough, he was certain to buy rounds. Sean’s daughter Molly worked in Duffy’s at least a few times per week. She was shortish, with a long neck and smooth, pale skin. She had tiny freckles underneath her deep-set eyes. Whenever she received compliments on them, her standard reply was “Oh, what these Irish eyes have seen here in Southville.” She’d put a slight lilt on the phrase for added affect. The only effect was that it made the men all swoon.

  Elliot caught a crush on Molly the first time he saw her in Doc Shapiro’s office. Sean’s wife Molly, after whom his daughter was named, died of exposure shortly after she was born. When Little Molly’s womanhood came calling, Sean immediately rushed her to St. Margaret’s for counsel from the Sisters. Molly was so horrified at their edicts, she nearly belted one in self-defense. Once Doc entered the picture, he kindly filled in the gaps in Sean’s understanding. From that day, Elliot and Molly were tight.

  They were enjoying their sandwiches when Elliot decided to go to the bar for a Coca-Cola.

  “My flask is empty,” Buster said. “Brang me a whiskey.”

  Johnny’s memorial had lightened considerably. Molly was up to her neck in pours. As he waited patiently for her attention, he heard a familiar voice behind him.

  “Elliot Caprice. I’ll be damned.”

  There are men in the world for whom a nem
esis in the strictest sense exists. For Elliot, Chester Williams was that nemesis. As dark as Elliot was fair-skinned, Chester was the first taste of an enemy Elliot had in his life. The two had plans to kill each other going back to the schoolyard. Elliot managed to avoid any awkward homecomings his two months back. Now the conditions were right for one to happen, in spades.

  “Never figured I’d run into you,” Chester said. His grin revealed a gold tooth in the upper left of his mandible. He had a mustache that was trimmed so thin, it looked penciled. He was dressed in a black pea coat and matching derby. A large bear of a man in identical dress stepped behind him. He was equally dark complexioned. He wore the same dress. The uniformity reminded Elliot of the Nazis.

  “This our man?” asked the big fella.

  “Him? Naw. This here is Elliot Caprice, one o’ Soufvil’s finest. We go waaaaay back. Elliot, this here is Gimp.”

  “Gimp, huh? Ya mama give you that name?”

  “High yella here is a joker,” Gimp said.

  Fightin’ words. Elliot took off his hat and laid it atop the bar. Molly motioned to Sean. Elliot noticed her tremble. He added that to his long list of reasons to kill Chester.

  “Some folk named for what they do. Farmer this. Skipper that. You wanna guess why they call him Gimp?” Chester said, smiling. Baiting. Gimp looked Elliot up and down.

  “This the Jew’s nigga?”

  “Oh, not no mo’. This one here come home from the war, go on the straight and narrow. Ain’t that right, Elliot Caprice?”

  Elliot took a step toward Chester.

  “Collectin’ for The Turk, huh?”

  “You of all people know how good the work pays.”

  “That’s rather civic-minded of him. Hirin’ straight out the penitentiary.”

  Elliot grinned. Chester didn’t. Everyone knew he always had been inside more than out. It was a sore spot.

  “I figure after all your trouble in Chicago, you’d learn a thing or two about puttin’ ya mouth on the next man’s bidness.”

  Elliot balled up his fists.

  “It’s out on the wire, is it?”

  “If’n you know who to ask.”

  “You wanna see what else I learned in Chicago?”

  “Shol’ do.”

  Elliot lunged forward at the same point George Stingley stepped between them. He was still wearing his badge. Elliot remembered the blackjack.

  “Chester. Not your usual place to have a drink, is it?”

  Chester smiled wider, feeling validated by the show of authority.

  “Naw, Reverend Sheriff. I’m here on other bidness.”

  “Perhaps you want to get to it,” George said. He looked over to Gimp. “Unless you and your big friend want to continue your conversation down at the jail?”

  “Alright, Georgie. Alright.”

  Sean motioned over to Chester. Chester walked to the bar. Sean handed Chester an envelope. Molly watched, sadness written all over her face. Elliot and George watched Molly. Chester returned, still grinning with that one gold tooth.

  “If you were anglin’ to go back to collectin’ fo’ the Jews, you’re too late. Hear he’s gettin’ out of money lendin’. Take care of yourself, light-skin.”

  Chester and Gimp disappeared as Elliot and George watched.

  “Sorry about the wait, boys,” Molly said. She eased her nerves by wiping the bar. “What can I getcha?”

  “Bourbon,” Elliot said, holding up three fingers, sideways. It would be the first of far too many that night.

  The next morning, Elliot vomited once in the shower before he walked to where he had left Lucille parked in Sugartown, where he vomited again. He cursed himself for allowing Chester to push old buttons. Such is the hazard of leaving small towns, for when a man returns, it is usually to the old self he tried to leave behind.

  He stopped at Mamie’s for coffee to go, but she took pity on him. She gave him a bicarbonate. Once she saw he could keep it down, she served him a light breakfast of eggs, a biscuit, and tea. Elliot grabbed an old newspaper, put it over his face and napped for at least thirty minutes, right there in his booth.

  He ached so bad, he hated everything. He put on a pair of mirrored sunglasses he kept in the glovebox to prevent the daylight from harming him further. His drive wasn’t to the bank, but Kenilworth.

  She had no way of knowing, but Mrs. Margaret McAlpin was in for one hell of a meeting.

  CHAPTER 9

  To avoid Chicago, Elliot headed north to Rockford. From there, east through unincorporated townships until he was safely fifteen miles away from the city. It was worth the extra hour on his commute to ameliorate the risk of being spotted. He had wondered if anyone cared anymore what happened. Folks die all the time in Chicago, even policemen. Perhaps, in all this time, he could be the only one still keeping score. How much distance would one need to put murdered cops behind him? Better to take Sheridan Road down to the McAlpin Place and enjoy the Lake Michigan shoreline. The drive was pretty enough.

  Before the turn of the century, a household oil man named Sears visited the English countryside and fell enchanted by its beauty. And snobbery. When he returned to Chicago, he acquired two hundred thirty acres of undeveloped wetlands, woods, and pastures on which his beloved Kenilworth would be established. Even the town’s moniker was appropriated from the title of a historical novel written by an English baronet. None of the residents seemed to care that the book was replete with inaccuracies. Elliot could understand how folks in this town would be taken in by a proper-acting limey broad. It fit their illusion of themselves. Cobblestone streets. Gilded gas lamps. Quaint cottage shops. Restrictive covenants.

  Along roads lined with oak, hickory, and butternut trees, Elliot passed multi-building estates, trussed up in pedimented-stone window heads. There must have been a run on marble columns. Coach houses and seven-car garages took up more land than the domestic help could ever afford to live on outright.

  Indian summer lent everything an idyllic tint as if it were filmed in Technicolor. Wild blackberry bushes were a staple in every yard. The top down, Elliot could smell their fall ripeness as he cruised down streets named Abbotsford and Warwick. He finally reached Essex Road, hung a left, and coasted up the main drive that was nearly as long as the farm where he was raised. The joint was so big, to get anywhere on time, one would have to leave ten minutes early just to allow what it took to get off the property. He stopped Lucille at the end of the private cul-de-sac next to a large fountain at its center. This was once the home of the late Jonathan McAlpin, one of the Midwest’s wealthiest swells. Now it belonged to the luckiest frail that ever lifted the family silverware. The one time Elliot had seen wealth like this up close, he was on a police guard detail at a ball at John Creamer’s Prairie Avenue family mansion. He wondered if they were friends with the McAlpins. His stomach sank at the thought.

  The first thing he noticed was the two-story domed rotunda. It had windows so large they seemed to reflect every ray of the late morning sun. The grounds were so large, the lawn had a lawn. Sculpted hedges lined the perimeter at each arched window like sentries on guard.

  Elliot rang the front doorbell but soon realized he forgot the leather document envelope underneath the passenger’s seat. As he walked back to Lucille, he noticed he was being watched by someone peering out from the far end of the grounds. He couldn’t make out a face. His vision was still blurry. His hangover had him off his square.

  When he arrived at the door, he was greeted by the current maid of the McAlpin household, a youngish colored woman named Sally, which was embroidered into the lapel of her uniform.

  “Hey there, darlin’. Margaret McAlpin home?”

  She was dressed not as if she was a trusted member of the household staff but on duty cleaning rooms at a hotel. It was little details such as those that Elliot took as tells. The new boss woman couldn’t be bothered to remember the name of the gal she hired to do her old job. She welcomed him inside. Sally was just his type: big-legged,
deep brown skin, a bright smile that just had to be straightened by an orthodontist. She had kind eyes. Her thick coarse hair was dressed in a smart bun. He wondered what she looked like when she let it down.

  “You need to use the service entrance,” said a similarly complexioned fella, medium build, in a dark blue maintenance uniform. He walked in from a side door. Elliot noticed his name was not sewn on the front. He was dressed for harder work but wasn’t dirty, except for grease on his shirt. He was clean shaven. He wore his hair high and tight, like a military man. Or someone used to harsher institutions.

  “Do I seem like a servant?”

  “Chauncey. This man is here for Missus McAlpin.”

  “Chauncey, is it?” Elliot smirked in a manner the handyman didn’t appreciate. Chauncey’s disdain for waiting on another colored man was apparent.

  “What’s your business?”

  “Look here, Sally’,” Elliot said. “What’s say you let Mrs. McAlpin know that Elliot Caprice is callin’ on behalf of Attorney Michael Robin. See if that gets her down to the foyer, hmm?”

  “May I take your hat? Perhaps something to drink?”

  At least Sally was all manners.

  “I’ll hang on to it, thank you. And no thanks. Had more than enough last night.”

  Elliot winked. Sally gushed ever so slightly, which further agitated Chauncey. She sashayed off to her task. Once she was out of sight, Chauncey shut the rolling doors that separated the foyer from the receiving area.

  “As Master McAlpin has passed on, we’ve seen our fair share of callers. A young woman comes into a huge inheritance; she’s bound to encounter con-artists.”

  Whether it was the use of the term master or the references to we and our—as if the house boy somehow had a personal stake in things—Elliot immediately detested Chauncey.

  “Glad you’re on the case, Cap’n. What else do you do around here when you’re not the guard dog?”

  “I throw out assholes.”

  Chauncey was angling for a toe-down. Elliot was surly enough to oblige.

  “How long did it take you to learn that Mid-Atlantic accent, Chauncey?”