“She’s a fine automobile,” says the man outside. “I’ll give you ten grand for her. Cash.”
I walk to the window and peer through the curtain. He’s a large white man with a pot belly, a short-sleeved striped shirt, and sunglasses. I open the door, “Ten grand, huh? I guess you’ll be wanting a test drive?”
“No, that won’t be necessary,” he says. “You seem like a guy I can trust.” His right hand goes behind him and comes back with a pistol. “Open up.”
I back up and he kicks the door closed. He keeps the gun on me. With his free hand, he reaches under his shirt and tosses a pillow— that used to be his belly—on the floor. The hat and sunglasses follow too. Pete just stares at me with his mouth open and jaw jutting forward. “I want to know if you’ve seen my daughter,” his lips barely move.
“I have no idea where she is. We can talk, but you don’t need that,” I say motioning to the gun.
“You’re right,” he says and places the gun on the table, still closer to him than to me. He then walks over and punches me hard in the chest. I let out a blast of air and stumble backward. My throat feels drinking-straw-narrow. It hurts like hell, but I’m still standing.
Pete frees a deep breath as I search for my own. “See, that’s the problem with niggers,” he says. “When they try to get smart they just get dumb.” He clenches his fists. “It took me a while but I figured it out. I didn’t recognize you when you came to my doorstep that day, but when you showed up with Mathis the other night, it all came back to me. I thought something was strange about you, and when all those coloreds started moving into the neighborhood, you were all I could think about. And then I get this picture,” he pulls the photo from his pocket, unfolds it, then tosses it at me. It’s Mathis with Lucinda. “So I did some digging in the public records to find out who was buying up all the houses and selling them to niggers. That’s right, I found out about that fancy nigger and that coon’s nest you hang out at. And it didn’t take much effort. I went there and asked some spook with a cut-up face if he’d ever seen you before, and he gladly told me where you live. So here I am. Now, where’s my daughter?”
Finally, I catch my breath. “How the hell should I know?”
“Did you send me that picture?”
I take a moment, searching for the answer that won’t get me killed. I thought the better part of me prevailed that day, and I saved a young girl from harm. But I was only deluding myself; no such part exits.
“Goddamnit! Did you send me the picture?”
“No . . . I don’t know.”
“Start talkin’. Where is she?”
“I’m tired of playing this game. I don’t know where she is, but we both know who she’s with.”
“He kidnapped her? Goddamnit, she’s just a child! That crazy son of a bitch. Where is he?”
“I don’t know. He’s taken her away, and I honestly don’t know where to. Back to New York, maybe. He says that they are in love.”
“In love? Oh, really? He confessed all this to you? Everything? Even him lusting after my daughter? He confided in you? I bet his dirty little stories got your top spinning, listening to him talk about her like she’s some sailor’s whore. He told you all his secrets? Did he, nigger?”
“Listen, you stupid bastard. You’ve been done a favor. Someone let you know a man was screwing your daughter, and you did nothing. You sat on your hands, and now she’s gone. You’ve been helped enough already.”
He goes over to the table and picks up his pistol. “Well, I guess you’ll have to give it another shot. You find out where Mathis has taken my daughter. I give you till tomorrow.”
“How the hell can I do that? I’ve already told you everything I know. If you want to find your daughter, she’s with Mathis. Where’s Mathis? I don’t know. The man is an FBI agent. I’ll leave it up to you to track him down.”
“You tell me where she is. The man who took those photos knows how to find what he’s looking for. Twenty-four hours. One minute later and I start telling folks that you’re the reason my daughter’s gone missing.”
I pack my things, which doesn’t take much time. Just the essentials, like clothes and money—the rest can stay. A dead girl, a crazy Klansman, and the amazing unraveling agent—I should have been long gone by now. I get in my car and drive. Within moments, I realize I have nowhere to go. I’ve dreamt of escaping to many places, but now, as I try to leave this city behind, they seem like fading dreams, distant and fanciful. I turn back around once I reach the city limits.
Once I’m deep into the city, her voice returns. It’s already lost that ghostly quality, but it reminds me of the business I’ve left unfinished. I stop by my parents’ house, but I don’t go in. I just watch their silhouettes flicker behind the curtained window.
When the polio first struck and I was still hospitalized, I would pretend to be asleep when my parents came to visit. The nurse would keep the curtain that surrounded my bed drawn. I could see their outlines through the gauzy fabric, and I would watch them, undetected, waiting to see what secrets they might reveal.
Candy’s dance record rests in the passenger’s seat. I hold it, looking at her face as it once was—that’s when I notice the note folded inside:
John,
By now, you know the truth of what happened. I never meant any harm to you or such a great man, but Count promised me a lot of money—too much to turn down no matter how bad I knew it would make me feel later. Of course, he never paid because of Lester. He even took more than he promised me. I guess that’s why Lester got so mad. When he saw that envelope full of money he lost it. I never should have come here. I love him and I’ll go back to him. Lester has a gentle soul. He just needs some time to cool off. I know you hate it when women apologize, so I’ll just write it so that you’ll never have to hear it again . . .
I am sorry if I hurt you.
Love,
Candy
Hadn’t I known it all along? How many times have I watched her strut across the stage? That swaying rhythm, just as much a part of me as my own pulse. I knew it in LA as I watched her leave Martin’s room—no blond wig could hide it. No, she never had me fooled. I knew her too well. I should be angry with Martin, but I’m not. Didn’t I bring them together? Didn’t I want him to be envious of me for once? But I didn’t do this alone. Count’s jeweled hand guided me at every step. Now, with that hand withdrawn, I know exactly what I need to do.
I fold Candy’s letter, force it back into the record sleeve, and drive downtown. I get a room at the Fauntleroy, one of the few hotels in Atlanta that is friendly to Negroes. After getting settled, I step out for a bite. I haven’t eaten much in the last few days, so I get a well-done steak with lots of butter. After the steak, I head to the pawnshop and buy a gun.
At first, the image is murky. Many glossy black shapes moving around. Then these shapes sharpen and coalesce, and I realize that they are glass bottles with silver tops, arranged side by side and filled with a dark liquid. Now I see that they are labeled. Each bottle says the same thing: MARTIN LUTHER KING: TYPE O. For some reason, as I sit at the table across from these bottles they begin to inch toward me. Now they are not just many bottles, but hundreds, thousands of them, coming at me like shiny black beetles. They surround me, filling all the negative space in the room, until they are no longer bottles, but people, marching, and I am no longer in the room, but on a dirt road. These people, millions of them, walk right over me. I hold up my hands for them to stop, but they keep coming, trampling me as I cover my face until the weight of their footsteps fades, and there is no one there except Martin in a hospital bed, IV in his arm, tube from his nose, and a large bandage on his chest. I reach out to him, and then I see that it is not Martin, but me in that bed. Then I feel it—the rough itch of rope scratches and snakes around my neck, growing tighter and tighter . . .
I open my eyes.
There it is. The ringing. I used to think of it as some sort of internal alarm, but now I know that it’s a
siren. A rescue call, screaming to the aid of a helpless man.
I roll over and hear the rustle of the hotel’s coarse bedsheets.
I’ve been at the Fauntleroy for two days.
Two days since I last saw Lester . . . and Count.
“Negro Nightclub Owner and Two Others Found Dead”
That’s what the paper said. How can a few words capture such a fucked-up situation?
I came here as soon as I left Count’s. Hiding seemed like the only thing that made sense.
The burden of it all anchors me back to sleep.
It’s strange how relieved I felt, when it became clear that I didn’t have to take the reins. In some way, I think it absolves me for what was about to happen. Yes, I brought my gun, and I intended to use it, but Count’s blood is not on my hands. I empathized with him, but that won’t bring Candy back. Someone had to pay. I’ve been fooled by his moments of compassion before, but I feel he did not love her. His oppression of her had to be met with some sort of retribution. I just wasn’t the right man to deliver it.
As soon as I walked in, Claudel approached me, only inches away, with a rigid jaw. “Don’t even think about it,” I said to him. “I’ve got something for you.” I opened my jacket and showed him the heater I had bought at the pawnshop. “You look surprised to see me . . . learn to keep your mouth shut.” Count’s office door was open. “I’m here to see Count,” I said loud enough for him to hear.
“Let him through, Claudel,” he called out.
I inched past Claudel and went inside. Count leaned forward as I took the seat across from his desk.
“I meant it when I said I didn’t want to see you anymore, little man, but you got a nervous look on your face, so I guess it’s important. But this is the last time. After this, it won’t matter that I don’t want to see you, ’cause you damn sure won’t want to see me.”
“I won’t take long, Count. I just came to tell you a story, and then I’ll be on my way.”
He leans back and lets out a sigh. “What the fuck are you talking about?”
“Let me tell you a story about someone I know who gets into trouble with some government types. These government types force him into making secret tapes of a reverend of prominence. He does it, of course. He likes his life on the outside. But there is a girl involved. His girl. A girl he says he loves. He puts her up to it—to seduce the reverend. Now she’s on the tapes. He tells her she has to do it to get him out of trouble. So she does it. But then she meets a man, and she falls in love—for real. Someone wants to take care of her, but the gangster can’t take it. He’s too humiliated. So even though his debt is paid to these government types, he tells her she has to do another tape. Then when she does, that is still not enough, because now he just wants to humiliate her. And then she winds up dead. The end. What do you think of that story, Count?”
“Well, you’ve got a wild imagination, I’ll give you that, but I think you should stick to accounting.” He looked me over, loosely interlaced his fingers, and let out an uneasy smile. “I don’t know anything about no secret tapes, man. I was told to facilitate a fucking introduction, and that’s all I did. They just wanted me to throw pussy at the preacher until he gave in. Who knew it’d be so easy?”
“So why the blackmail scheme?”
“The situation wasn’t profitable for me—and you know that’s a problem. If the feds get dirt on King, so what? How does that help me? But I wasn’t about to step on the government’s toes.”
“But it was your plan. You laid the whole thing out for me, twice.”
“Yes and no. It was my idea, but your plan. You was my consultant. I said let’s hit King, and you said no way, it won’t work. But then I said what about the queer, and you found a way to pull it off.”
“I don’t care how you spin it, this is your fault,” I said.
“I get it. Realizin’ how fucked up you are is a hard pill to swallow, but once it goes down, you get numb.”
“She’s dead because of you, Count. You could have sent any girl that works to LA. Then Lester would never have laid eyes on her.”
“Please. She jumped at the chance to be with him. What woman wouldn’t screw a man on the cover of Time magazine? I didn’t have to convince her—she volunteered.”
“It’s your fault she’s dead. You brought Lester into it, not the agents.”
“Well, you were supposed to be busy with Lester while she was busy with the preacher. But somehow you found a way to give that stupid motherfucker quality time with my woman.”
“No. You’re responsible. You didn’t have to let her stay with Lester. You knew how crazy he was. You saw the way he came in here like some one-man army. You could have killed him where he stood. But you didn’t, because you wanted to teach her a lesson . . . and so did I.”
The way he looked at his palms, touching as if praying. “You’ve already gone too far. You need to stop.”
“Every day that you kept her caged, she died a little. You pushed her. She had to escape. You made it impossible to live. Why’d you let it go so far, Count? Why didn’t you stop us?”
He shook his head, smiling, then snapped into a rage, “Because she hurt me.” The crystal ashtray, carved in the shape of an elephant’s head, hints of silver for the eyes, went whizzing past my head, smashing into the wall behind me. I made it a point to stay perfectly still. “No one hurts me without getting hurt back. After everything I’d done for her, she chose that dumb son of a bitch over me. She got what she deserved.”
There was a ruckus outside his office—glass breaking, a gunshot, but no confession of pain. I had an idea who might be out there, but I didn’t offer any theories. Count grabbed his gun, got up, and opened the door.
Claudel was already on the floor. His head seemed to be looking completely and grotesquely over his shoulder.
“Aw shit,” said Count, running out into the bar with his gun drawn. He looked around. The front door of the place was wide open. He looked out to see if someone was running away, then came back in, closing the door behind him.
“What the fuck is going on? You trying to ambush me?”
“Not me, Count. Maybe it’s Candy. Maybe you should go to wherever she is buried, find her, beg her—or get on your knees right now and do it, beg Candy for her forgiveness.”
He put the gun to my forehead. “Just one more word. I dare you. I’ll bury you down here, and no one will ever find you.”
I only heard the sound of my breathing as I looked over Count’s shoulder and saw Lester appear in the doorway, stealthily, like some jungle animal about to leap upon its prey. Candy never had a chance. Lester and I were involved in a strange kind of dance. I could see him, but I didn’t give Count any physical tells. I was proud of myself in that moment—not so much now—because even as Lester raised his weapon, I showed no emotion. I maintained eye contact with Count, and he didn’t suspect a thing.
As I told Count to go to hell, he cocked his pistol. I closed my eyes, but not before Lester brought down a lead pipe against the back of Count’s head.
Count’s body lay on the floor. Lester stood above him, chest heaving, breathing loud punches of air. He swung at Count a few more times. I didn’t look. I only heard the sound that it made.
I stared at Count, lying there dead and defeated. The relief I thought would come did not. I feel pity for him to have fallen in such a way. Lester struck the blow. I did not bloody my hand, but I find solace in knowing that I outsmarted him. I wish I could briefly resurrect him, just to the edge of consciousness, so I could whisper in his ear, “I won. I beat you.”
I looked at Lester and drew my pistol. I’d never used a gun before, and wondered if I could even pull the trigger. He had Count’s gun in his hand, but was he pointing it at me or just holding it?
“Well, what now? Are you staying or going?” I asked him.
“Looks like I might need to stay.”
“Just remember that gangsters get killed every day by other gangster
s. You know you’ll be in trouble after this, Lester. May not be any coming back.”
“Yeah, I know.”
“Yeah, Lester, it’s going to be rough out there. Maybe you should just stay here.”
“Yeah, that may be best,” he said. “I still got to pay for Candy. I know Count already paid for the bigger things, but someone has to pay for the smaller things too. I think I’ll stay here.” Lester walked over to Count’s desk, felt the leather of the chair, and sat his big frame in it. I remember how the chair let out an exasperated squeak as he spun around in it, like a little boy in a tire swing. When he stopped spinning, he faced me. He was filthy and smelled like week-old mushrooms. Hair wild and wooly, he looked like a madman.
“I been out there in the woods, hiding, and thinking about whether I should just end it all and kill myself. You know how much I loved her and didn’t want no harm to come to her, but somehow, being out there in the brush, not hearing no other voices except the ones in my head—memories of what I used to sound like. Nobody telling me what to do. There’s something about being out there . . . living how I guess an animal would live. Things started to make sense. I thought about everything, and I realize this ain’t really my fault. I mean it is on one hand, but on the other it ain’t.”
I wasn’t moved. I just kept the gun on him, wondering if it would even fire or if I could handle the recoil when I pulled the trigger.
“There was this envelope from Count, full of money. I know he gave it to her, but she just kept saying he didn’t. So I kept saying don’t lie to me, don’t lie to me . . . but she just kept on lying. So I hit her in the mouth . . . just to get her to stop lying. I meant to hit her once, but I just kept hitting her and hitting her. Before I knew it, she wasn’t lying no more, but she wasn’t breathin’ no more either. I’m sorry.” He put Count’s gun to his head. I knew what was coming next, so I just turned and walked away. I didn’t want to see it. I heard the gunshot, and my neck jerked at the sound, then I heard the muted thud of Lester’s head hitting the desk.
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