Sammy looked up at the silent group behind me. ‘Hey, fuck off, you lot. Go on, vamoose. This none your fuckin’ business!’
Nobody moved and I stood my ground, my leg protecting Hector’s body.
‘Ah, the hell wid it, let him go,’ Sammy snarled to his two minders, jerking his head in the direction of the passage that led to the parking lot. But then he suddenly stopped and, turning to me, said in his low, gravelly voice, ‘You’ll keep, piano boy, you’ll keep. And don’t think Lenny or the greedy bitch can help ya. This between you and me now, nigger lover!’
‘That so?’ I tapped his chest with my forefinger and grinned. ‘Just you and me, eh. Happy to oblige, Sammy. How about we go into the parking lot right now?’ I nodded at his two offsiders. ‘Let’s sort it out man to man, without these two bums.’ I was too angry to care if I damaged a piano hand smacking the bastard’s ugly lopsided mug.
‘Fuck you!’ Sammy spat, backing away from me with his two gorillas jumping in between us in case I made a grab at him. They started down the corridor walking backwards, just in case; then Sammy halted at the door and shouted, ‘Hey, nigger, I ain’t forgot about that porterhouse. I’ll be back. Take my advice and get the fuck outa Nevada! Take that whore of a daughter, too, ya hear? I ain’t forgot. Sammy Schischka don’t forget!’
Mr Joel waited for the door at the end of the passage to shut, then ordered two staff members to help Hector into the kitchen. Then, with a sweep of his right hand, he asked the staff to return to their workstations.
We sat Hector on a chair, so I could have a good look at him. He was a real mess, nose bleeding profusely and clearly broken, both eyes rapidly closing and his jaw jutting to the left – almost certainly broken. I knew it might be a while before he could speak. He was pressing his right side with both hands, sobbing, obviously in real pain from the kicks to his kidneys. I guess Sammy had learned to do this stuff from experts while in Fort Leavenworth – he’d given Hector a thorough going-over. God only knows what would have happened had I not arrived. The beating was not only vicious but systematic. Sammy and his henchmen knew what they were doing.
Mr Joel was fussing around, digging into the first-aid box.
‘Here, let me,’ I offered, ‘you’ve got a kitchen to run, food to prepare for tonight, early customers already coming in.’ I smiled, trying to settle the staff.
‘You done this before, Mr Sarsaparilla?’
‘I was a medical orderly during the war.’ I turned to one of the guys who had helped him in. ‘Get his shirt off, Casper, I want to see if his ribs are okay.’ I called over to a scullery maid, ‘Georgina, bring me damp towels and ice.’
Hector didn’t appear to have any broken ribs – Sammy obviously hadn’t reached them yet – but he had been kicked savagely and the skin in the lumbar region had turned a deep purple. I was worried about his kidneys; from the look of his lower back, he’d be pissing blood for a week.
I turned to Mr Joel. ‘He needs to see a doctor, to check out his internal injuries, set his nose and jaw. Ring emergency and get an ambulance. From the appearance of the bruising on his lower back and side, he’ll have kidney damage.’
Mr Joel shook his head. ‘I don’t think Mr Lenny, he gonna like we call no ambulance. Maybe you be better just walkin’ on by? We kin take care of Hector ourself.’
‘I’m the medic here and I decide. Please get someone to call the ambulance!’ Hector needed urgent attention and I’d suddenly lost patience. Sammy had so blatantly abused the hotel rules that I didn’t even concern myself with checking first with Bridgett or Lenny. ‘It’s my call, Mr Joel,’ I said, ‘I’ll take care of the consequences with management.’
I turned to a busboy. ‘Hey, kid, go and tell Miss Bridgett I’ve been delayed. Tell her to cover for me in the GAWP Bar. I’ll start half an hour late.’ I turned to several of the helpers. ‘Okay, let’s go. We’ll get Hector out the front for the ambulance.’
A look of sheer panic appeared on Mr Joel’s big, round face. ‘No, Mr Sarsaparilla. I call the ambulance, but better we take him out the back way. They don’t want to upset the customers, they see somebody beat up around the hotel.’ He paused. ‘That number-one rule for ab-so-loot certain.’
‘You know something, Mr Joel? I don’t care.’ We began to get Hector, who was obviously in a lot of pain, ready to move.
‘Nossir, we cain’t do no ambulance.’
‘Where’s the phone?’ I demanded.
‘Chef Napoleon Nelson’s office,’ Georgina-May said, holding the wet towels and a bowl of ice cubes.
‘Clean him up as much as you can,’ I instructed her. ‘Go easy, his nose and jaw are probably broken.’ I reached out and took a wet dishcloth, then, grabbing a handful of ice cubes, quickly made an ice pack. Hector, unable to talk because of his suspected broken jaw, was moaning and clutching at his kidneys. I lifted his hands and placed the ice pack against his side. ‘Hold it there as long as you can, Hector. I’m calling for an ambulance.’
Like in every major kitchen anywhere in the world, pinned to the corkboard in Chef Napoleon Nelson’s tiny cubicle was an emergency number. I lifted the receiver and dialled it and waited for a response but, before anyone could answer, it was snatched from my hand. ‘Here, let me, Jack,’ Bridgett said, slightly out of breath. Then she added, ‘Thank you, but I’ll take over from here. You have a near-full room waiting, lots of newcomers, it’s a big night.’ Emergency must have responded because I heard her instruct them to send an ambulance, giving the address and adding, ‘It’s to come into the parking lot at the back, there will be someone waiting.’ Her voice, while crisp, showed no sign of anxiety. I wondered what it might take to cause this remarkable woman to panic.
‘Don’t you want to know what happened?’ I asked.
‘Later, Jack. I already know enough for now. Please hurry, you’re late.’
The following morning I arrived at the Westside Hospital, the shabby institution that took care of the coloured folk who lived on the wrong side of the tracks. As I entered the ward, I saw that Hector was in a bed four from the door on the left, Chef Napoleon Nelson at his bedside. Also there was Booker T., the railway porter I’d met on that first day seemingly so long ago when I’d wandered into the bar for a hamburger and ended up in a jam session that led to my joining The Resurrection Brothers.
Hector looked a mess, both eyes closed, nose broken and, as I’d suspected, his jaw fractured. But I felt certain the worst damage lay under the sheet, with his kidneys and the internal bleeding.
After I’d said my greetings, I took my place beside Hector’s bed and touched him lightly on the shoulder. ‘Buddy, I feel ashamed. I’ve hardly slept all night. I should have insisted they call the police. They would have been forced to take note of me, together with Miss Bridgett and Mr Lenny.’
Chef Napoleon Nelson looked horrified. ‘No, no, Mr Jack, don’tcha do that thing. They already bin to see Hector, take ev-ee-dence, the case already closed tight shut.’
‘But Hector can’t even speak!’
‘I done talk for him,’ Chef Napoleon Nelson replied.
‘That’s ridiculous, Chef Napoleon Nelson! You weren’t there! It was your night off, Mr Joel was on duty.’
‘Sure, Mr Joel come see me early this mornin’. We done decidin’ together.’
‘So, what is it Hector’s supposed to have said?’ I asked, my frustration beginning to make me very angry.
Chef Napoleon Nelson looked at me, his eyes sad, tired; the look you see on people’s faces when they have no real power, no real say in how their lives are to be conducted. ‘He say he ain’t seen nothing.’
I jerked my head back in exasperation. ‘Oh, I see, as usual some bullshit story, a bolt of lightning struck him several times while he was walking down the corridor towards the kitchen.’
Chef Napoleon Nelson didn’t answer but simply looked directly at me and said, ‘Jack, you ask him the same question. He gonna nod, use his hands, but it gonna ’mount to the same
thing. He ain’t seen nothin’. They knock him down, kick him, then vamoose. It all happen so quick, he ain’t seen nothing ’cept somebody got black shoes.’
‘Nice touch! Everybody in the whole world wears black shoes! Not black-and-white two-tone like Sammy Schischka?’
Chef Napoleon Nelson continued to ignore my indignation. ‘Police, they satisfy it some coloured folk thing happen. They ain’t got no interest no more.’ He spread his large hands. ‘Enquiry officially close. Them two policemen, they don’t even open their notebook.’
Disgusted, I shook my head. ‘Jesus! All this about a porterhouse steak cooked years ago!’
Chef Napoleon Nelson looked surprised. ‘Who say that?’
‘Sammy . . . Sammy did. I remember it clearly. “Hey, nigger, I ain’t forgot about that porterhouse. I’ll be back. Take my advice and get the fuck outa Nevada!” Then he mentioned Hector’s daughter and said, “I ain’t forgot. Sammy Schischka don’t forget!”’
At this stage, Hector was shaking his head as much as he was able and making a kind of gargling sound, pointing repeatedly at Chef Napoleon Nelson, and opening and shutting his right hand to emulate a mouth speaking, urging him to tell me something.
Chef Napoleon Nelson nodded. ‘Mr Jack – Hector, he want you should know the whole real story. Ain’t got nothin’ to do wid no porterhouse steak. It ain’t even to do wid the kitchen.’
‘Oh?’
Chef Napoleon Nelson leaned back in his chair. ‘You know what is a high yella?’
‘Well, no, not really.’
‘It a person wid light skin. Like Hector’s oldest chile. She near got white blood – blue eyes, hair like red brown. You know her – Sue, she the waitress once work at the El Marinero Longhorn Room. She go to the Flamingo when we all come to the Firebird.’
‘Sue? You mean Sue Stinchcombe?’ I asked, taken aback. I glanced over at Hector, who was attempting to nod his head. ‘You never told me that she was your daughter. Stinchcombe . . . that’s not your surname, it’s Brownwell.’
Chef Napoleon Nelson sighed. ‘It one those things we decide best for her,’ he said. ‘That Hector’s wife maiden name.’
‘We?’
‘Miss Bridgett, Hector and me also, on account I her godfather. We decide when she was fourteen.’
‘What? I don’t understand . . . Why?’
‘Well now, Jack, it a long story. Goes back some. She come to the El Marinero to work in the kitchen when she fourteen, scullery, garbage, dish washin’. Miss Bridgett soon see Sue she got herself a bunch’a brains, got above av-e-rage in-tell-lee-gence; she don’t need to be no kitchen hand. She got two more years to finish high school, but Hector and his wife Linda, they got nine other children. So, Sue gonna have to leave school and go to work help support their fambly. So, Miss Bridgett says she’ll pay Sue her salary if she go back to finish high school to complete her twelfth grade. But she also arranged for Sue to sit for a trial examination for one o’ them private prep school, only white folk go there, but sometime excep-tion-nal they also take one or two black chile. Sue get her a place that fancy white folks’ school, two year later she graduate top the school, vale-dic-torian, and Miss Bridgett wants to pay she goes to college. But Sue say, “No, ma’am, not yet. I don’t want you to pay no more. I’m gonna earn ’nough to put myself through college and also help mah fambly.” She don’t want no more charity.’ He grinned. ‘She . . . she, what’s the word . . . ?’
‘Headstrong?’
‘Yeah, she don’t take no crap from nobody. My goddaughter, she got herself a strong mind.’
‘But waitresses at the El Marinero – anywhere in Las Vegas – they’re all white . . .’
Chef Napoleon Nelson nodded. ‘Well, that when we do the secon’ decision. Miss Bridgett, she say that Sue got good manners and in that fancy school she done learn to speak like a white girl. She also very beautiful – white man’s way o’ seeing women – and Miss Bridgett say if Sue can be white, she kin work as a waitress at the El Marinero and get good pay, tips, so long we don’t tell nobody she black. She tell us it ain’t nothin’ shameful, it jes prac-ti-cal.’
I thought of Bridgett and how she herself had been ‘practical’ and turned herself from a mountain hillbilly to a proper classy lady. This idea for Sue’s betterment in this racist desert community was yet another reason to admire her.
Chef Napoleon Nelson shook his head and chuckled. ‘So, now Sue come back to the El Marinero and she learn drink waitressing in the Longhorn Room, also cocktail mixing – Barney bin teachin’ her as his star pupil. Then the Flamingo make her a great offer – she gonna be their head drinks waitress – and Miss Bridgett says she gotta take it because now she can save more for going to college next year.’
‘Well, I’ll be damned!’ I exclaimed. ‘I don’t know whether to laugh or cry.’
Chef Napoleon Nelson shook his head. ‘Jack, it ain’t no laughin’ matter now. What Mr Sam done to Hector, it got nothin’ to do wid porterhouse. Sue the reason Mr Sam gone try to kill Hector.’
‘Eh? What do you mean?’ Completely mystified, I glanced at all three men. ‘You’re saying Sammy attacked Hector because Sue passed herself off as a white girl? Surely not!’
‘Nah, that not the real reason. Like I said, Sue the boss girl and also she very popular wid the other hostesses. That because she don’t take no shit from nobody and she got herself respect. She don’t do no hanky-panky wid white man. Nossir, she a leader them girls do the cocktails, take care the gamblers. Now, they got themselves some problem in that waitress section, they don’t got no union rights. So, Sue she go to see the union wid the other girls selectin’ her so she be their re-pree-sent-tay-tif. The union man go see Mr Loose Spring. When the union man leave, he call Sue in his office and ask her about this union business. She say it Culinary Workers’ Union business. She polite, but he say all the girls get tips and that’s enough, then he shoo her away.
‘But Sue ain’t no pussycat. She say he can ban tips if he want, they just want their union rights – pension plan, medical insurance, full union rates of pay.
‘He get pretty mad. “Get back to your job or you dismissed.”
‘Sue don’t take no shit from nobody. “Am I fired or all of us waitresses?” she say.
‘“You threatening me, girlie?” he shouts.’
‘Jesus, what a deadshit!’ I say. ‘But how did all this get Hector beaten up?’
‘Well, like I said, Hector’s daughter, she ain’t scared nobody. She go back to the union man and she say they want to go out on strike. He explain he try to talk to Mr Springer, who tell him to get his fat butt outa his office, the Mob got influence in the Culinary Workers’ Union. He ’pologise to her and he say if he gonna call a strike, he a dead man.’
Chef Napoleon Nelson paused and smiled. ‘Sue ain’t happy, so she arrange a meeting for all the Culinary Workers’ Union and they decide they gonna walk off in-def-in-ate-ly. You remember, Mr Sarsaparilla. It affect all casinos. Mr Springer, he try to call their bluff, but next shift there ain’t no girls check on, also the next. Now, all the casino bosses, they angry. Croupiers, cleaners, they fetching the drinks – ain’t nobody happy, least of all the clients.’ Chef Napoleon Nelson smiled broadly and shook his head in wonderment. Even Hector was trying to smile, and Booker T. was shaking his head and grinning in admiration.
Of course I knew about the strike and its cause because it had also involved The Phoenix. I didn’t know about Hector’s daughter at the time. Besides, her name and role as the organiser didn’t come up. I simply assumed it was something that had started on the Flamingo gaming floor and spread to the other casinos. I had asked Bridgett about it and she said, by some anomaly, the casino cocktail waitresses were regarded as freelance hostesses. She explained that Lenny had talked to our local union boss but he claimed he couldn’t interfere in another union’s business.
The girls at the GAWP Bar didn’t suffer, though. I explained the situation to my ladies and they seemed
happy to go directly to the bar to collect their own drinks, thinking it great fun, and they thoroughly sympathised with the striking cocktail waitresses. I guess some of them would have started life in similar jobs. Anyhow, when the gals returned to work, Bridgett and Lenny quietly paid their wages for the time they were on strike. The hostesses had won and every casino in Las Vegas had to provide proper working conditions and entitlements.
‘What about Sue at the Flamingo?’ I asked.
‘She keep her job,’ he answered. ‘Ain’t nobody gonna fire her case they cause another big, big problem. Mr Loose Spring, he ain’t the most popular manager in town.’
‘I’m beginning to understand. Someone told Loose Spring about Sue being Negro, and about her being your daughter; is that right?’
Chef Napoleon Nelson nodded. ‘You got it, Jack. Why you think the police, they don’t want no fuss about what happened to Hector? Mr Loose Spring knows he cain’t see no harm come to Sue, but Hector a different matter. He gets Sammy to beat up Sue’s daddy real bad, teach her a lesson. Sammy, he only too happy to oblige.’
‘And the police have been paid to sweep the whole business under the carpet?’
Chef Napoleon Nelson shook his head. ‘I cain’t say, Jack. But it ain’t necessary. If we tell the truth on Hector’s behalf, he ain’t coming out this hospital and I don’t like Mr Joel’s chance, nor even my own neither. Lotsa niggers buried in the desert for causin’ less trouble than this gonna be, iffen it get out.’
‘But this means Hector’s not safe.’
Chef Napoleon Nelson glanced at Hector. ‘Doctor say internal bleedin’, he gotta stay here two weeks. We done decided Hector got to leave Nevada. We gonna take a collection plate in the church Sunday.’ He glanced up at the railway man. ‘That why Booker T. here.’
‘Where will you go?’ I asked Hector, and turned to Booker T. for the answer.
‘We ain’t decided, Mr Sarsaparilla. He kin hide someplace, maybe east. For coloured folk, that not too much a problem. But he afraid for his daughter. She want to go to college, get herself a good job. But she young, she very headstrong. When we seen her last night, she cryin’ but she mad as hell. She ain’t gonna do no hiding the truth now they gone hurt her daddy so bad.’
Jack of Diamonds Page 53