by Ed Ifkovic
In my workroom I picked up the card Detective Manus had given me, and dialed the precinct number. As I expected, he was off duty. “No, I have business with him,” I informed the operator. No, I didn’t need to speak to anyone else. Instead, I dialed his home number, scribbled on the card. He answered on the second ring.
“Yeah?” His gentlemanly opening.
“This is Edna Ferber.”
A deep intake of breath, a slight hint of a cough from an inhaled cigarette. “You remembered something?”
“I remember a lot of things, but nothing that you want to hear.”
“So, you’re calling me because…”
“Because I’m concerned for my young friend, Waters Turpin.”
“Your sidekick?” I could detect the tickle in his voice.
“You’ve watched too many Tom Mix one-reel Westerns, Detective Manus.”
Again, the cigarette rattle. “’Cause the good guy always wins in the movies. It gives me something to believe in, Miss Ferber.” He waited a second. “Nobody is accusing the boy.”
“Mr. Porter, the super…“
“Is a foul-mouthed, lousy drunk with a rap sheet from here to Detroit, where I wish he’d move to, in fact. With that Bible that he uses as a weapon. He tried to smack an officer with it. Praise Jesus he missed, or he’d be in jail right now. Divine intervention, I guess. Getting info from him was like striking up a conversation with a mongrel dog—the breath will kill you if the fangs don’t get there first, and in the end you got nothing.”
“Be that as it may,” I broke in.
“Look, lady. The fool said he heard music from Roddy’s apartment early that morning, thought Roddy walked up front to check for mail, and says he thought Roddy was alone when young Turpin came looking for him, with you keeping the old motor running. The getaway car. But the medical examiner says rigor mortus was setting in long before noon, frankly, and he suggests the murder happened at two or three in the morning.”
“So Waters…”
“Is clear. Unless he was in on the planning stages…”
“Absurd.”
“Most things are.”
“Well, It seems we’ve found an issue we can agree on, Detective Manus.”
“Hey, I’m an easy person to get along with.”
“I’m not. Purposely. Less wear and tear on the soul.”
Noise in the background: I could hear a toddler whimpering, crying out. He spoke louder. “Since I got you on the phone, I might as well make your day. We pulled in a suspect a few hours back. You’ll read about it in the morning, and probably see a mug shot, front and sideways, as well as the gentleman, cuffed and cursing, being put into a squad car.”
I held my breath. “Is it someone I know?” Stupid, those words, but they simply escaped my mouth.
“Given your recreational companions, I’ll hazard a guess—yes. But it’s a gent named Harold Scott, a.k.a. Skidder Scott, aged forty-nine, these days a familiar homeless derelict who sets up shop in an alley off 134th Street and Seventh Avenue, in an abandoned building, keeping out of the cold. A squatter. In fact, Mr. Scott is well known to the police, a colorful figure, given his occasional drunken tirades delivered at subway stops, his crazy and non-stop protests against the invention of the automobile. He’s been known to stand in the street and…”
I was impatient. “How do you know he…”
“Well, he made it easy for us. I should send him a thank-you card. First, he’s a documented felon, having a prior for armed robbery when he was a young man, spending a bunch of years upstate. Second, he’s been known to frequent Roddy’s neighborhood, simple breaking and entering, petty thievery, pawnshop stuff. A break-in next door, in fact. This seems to be one break-in that went way off-track. Maybe it was the cocaine dripping from his red, red nose, or the bottle of bootleg whiskey in his hip pocket. Clever enough not to leave fingerprints—winter gives folks an excuse to wear gloves, lucky us—but somehow he dropped a battered pack of cigarettes, Chesterfields no less, by the bed, probably tumbling out of a breast pocket as he plunged a knife into Roddy, who probably woke to find the scum pocketing his bureau change. And there’s the issue of some cheap gold ring, property of Lawson Hicks, as well as some cuff links that were once owned by Mr. Roddy Parsons himself, found wrapped in rags in a corner of the decayed building Mr. Skidder Scott calls home sweet home.”
“So that’s it.”
“Strings tied. I can sleep well tonight.”
“I wish I could.” I breathed in. “I know Roddy Parsons as a decent, talented young man who…”
He cut me off. “Miss Ferber, he was a decent, talented young man.” He hung up the phone.
***
Restless, I tottered about my apartment, debated calling George Kaufman or Aleck Woollcott, but my mind kept ricocheting back to Jed Harris, that imp of the perverse. Call him, I thought. I needed to talk to someone. He’d seen Roddy at my apartment. He sat at the same table with him at that chop suey joint up in Harlem. Images of Bella and Lawson and Roddy and Ellie intermingled with quick snapshots of Jed in my living room and uptown. His feigned indifference to Bella. His hostility…His contemptuous attitude that afternoon in my apartment. So what? Like Ellie and Bella and Lawson, even Freddy and Harriet, Roddy was there, the tall lad with the grin and the baby cheeks. There, then not there. Yet Jed’s darkswept look annoyed me. It made me think of Roddy, the grotesque, bug-eyed corpse, that dagger in the pale chest.
Rebecca fixed me a bootleg martini. She was always good at reading my mind.
Later in my workroom, I fiddled with letters I had no intention of answering and was relieved to hear two low-rumble voices coming from the kitchen. Waters and Lawson had stopped in. Though Rebecca knew I didn’t welcome impromptu visits to the apartment, especially socializing in the evening, I bustled into the kitchen, almost frenzied, in need of conversation.
“I’m sorry, Miss Edna,” Waters began, “but we won’t stay. Mom just wanted me to let her know I was all right, and Lawson…”
I cut him off. “Stay a while. Sit down. Please.”
“I told my cousin Mary I’d be back right away. She’s worried about me.” When Waters visited his mother in the city, he stayed with relatives in an apartment in New Jersey, an old couple distantly related to his mother’s second cousin.
So we sat in my living room, behaving as though nothing had changed in our lives, Roddy not cruelly butchered in his peaceful bed. Rebecca served us hot cocoa and crispy soda biscuits, turned to leave, but I insisted she sit with us, a shifting of household protocol she always had trouble with, this unorthodox blurring of lines. No matter. I’d come to relish the brief, sensible talks the two of us had, often late at night when neither of us could sleep. Or restless early mornings when the fireball sun over the East River pierced the shadows of the living room.
Staring at both young men, I was intrigued by the overnight transformation. Waters, the overly serious, indeed, often ponderous, young boy, so earnest and yet always incredibly boyish, seemed now older than Lawson, as he assumed the role of comfort giver. He kept glancing at his friend, his eyes old with compassion. Lawson, that fashion-plate hero with that matinee-idol affect, looked crushed, rattled, slumped in a chair with his shoulders drawn forward and hunched up; his face, light-complected to begin with, now seemed delicate parchment, breakable. As he leaned forward into the lamplight, I noticed small flecks of white, bits and pieces of tissue, perhaps, or lint. A disheveled young man, wholly consumed by a confused and insidious grief. I had trouble looking at him.
But I needed to. “Lawson, how are you?”
He looked up, smiled thinly. “I’m all right, Miss Ferber.” Clearly he wasn’t.
“What’s going on at the apartment?”
Waters answered for him. “Lawson hasn’t gone back. He won’t go back there now. I picked up some clothes and things for h
im. He’s staying with an uncle in Queens. Temporarily.”
Lawson muttered, “Better.”
“What?”
“Better that way.” A heartbeat. “I had to deal with Roddy’s father, who is, you know, somehow related to my father.” He sucked in his breath. “He wanted nothing to do with it. Arrangements and all. He didn’t even want to show up. Just…indifferent. The cops told me he walked out on them. Like…Roddy was dead…years before.” Lawson stared into my face now, the eyes wide. “He was horrible.”
“You’re not doing well, Lawson,” I offered.
A wispy smile. “Big surprise, no?” He looked at Waters. “I’m sorry about the way I acted yesterday morning. I’m sorry, Miss Ferber. I don’t know why I was so out of it, dizzy and all. I felt like I was walking in a fog or something.”
“I noticed that.”
“Well, Bella and I…the night before. You know, we drank too much, got into a fight, but, I don’t know, I’ve passed out lots of times before, but this time I woke up so groggy, like I didn’t know where I was. I sort of stumbled home.” A pause. “Home.”
Waters commented, “You’re gonna die from that bootleg gin you drink.”
Another slight smile. “That’s what’s for sale in Harlem.”
Waters frowned. “Another fight with Bella?” He shook his head.
“She told me it was over. We’re done. Like I didn’t know that. But she was serious this time. So we drank and we fought and…well…”
“The police kept asking me why I was there with you, Miss Edna,” Waters suddenly said.
“I know. They’re baffled by all human behavior that doesn’t fit onto an index card.”
“I talked to Harriet when I went to pick up some of Lawson’s things,” Waters began. “The cops interviewed her and I guess she was belligerent.”
“But why?”
“She doesn’t trust them.”
“Surely she wants Roddy’s murderer caught?”
“I guess so, but…it’s hard to explain, Miss Edna.”
I grumbled. “I don’t get it.”
“She told me that her father, Mr. Porter, gave the cops a hard time. Just like the way he treated us, you know. He wouldn’t open the door at first, then fought against giving an interview. He told different stories—claimed he heard music in the apartment just before I went in. Then he changed his mind. What’s clear is that he didn’t like Roddy. He doesn’t care that he’s dead.”
I narrowed my eyes. “But why?”
A shrug of the shoulders. “Who knows?”
“Well, there has to be a reason.” I looked at Lawson. “Any ideas?”
He shrugged his shoulders. “They argued over things.”
“Like what?”
“I dunno. The rent was late. Often. Roddy mocked Mr. Porter—the way he never lets go of that Bible.”
“Roddy didn’t believe…”
“Roddy said Mr. Porter is an old-fashioned Negro, the kind who thinks everything is copasetic, you know. Swell. Don’t rattle the chains.”
“Did Harriet say anything else?” I asked Waters.
“Strangely, she seemed, well, happy when she told me about her father, who is a man she fights with and ignores. But I guess his belligerent attitude with Detective Manus made her look at him differently.”
“This is making little sense.” I bit my lip. “I can’t imagine that gentle boy arguing with anyone.”
Lawson looked up, startled. “Roddy could be gentle, yes, but he could be real stubborn, too. Ornery. He liked things a certain way. The fact is he always thought the super was a fool and was always ready to tell him so.”
“Well, I think he is a fool, and I scarcely know the man, but…”
“You know, I didn’t see much of Roddy lately because I stayed at Bella’s.” He looked into my face. “I mean, I sleep on the couch there…late at night. Most times Roddy was at work. But he did tell me that Mr. Porter was on his case.”
Waters got up, stretched, and began walking around the room. His mother, who had been silent, watched him, her eyes wary. He stood by the dark window and stared down into the city streets. Then, suddenly, his shoulders convulsed and he started sobbing.
“Waters,” his mother called out. “What, honey?”
He faced us. “Harriet told me something else. Roddy was stabbed with his own knife. I didn’t know he kept a knife on his nightstand. He was afraid of something.”
“Lawson?” I asked.
He nodded. “There’ve been break-ins on the street. A month back, a prowler came in through the back window, which Roddy’d forgot to lock. It looks out on the alley. He took some cash. I guess twenty dollars. Some junk stuff. Since then Roddy kept the knife there. I joked that he’d never use it. I mean—Roddy? Can you imagine Roddy fighting off someone with a knife? But he felt safer, I guess. Especially since I started spending my nights at Bella’s. He was alone.”
“He didn’t manage to fight off his murderer,” I commented. “From what I saw, there didn’t seem to be any signs of struggle. He was asleep, I guess, and woke to find a knife plunged into his heart.”
Slumping back into his seat, Lawson moaned. Immediately I regretted my words. I wasn’t painting a pretty picture. “I’m sorry, Lawson.”
“They’ll get him,” Rebecca announced. “They have to.” She motioned to Waters, who sat down next to her. She leaned into him, affectionately.
At that moment I realized I’d not mentioned Detective Manus’ conversation with me earlier. Quietly, I summarized: the arrest of the homeless felon named Harold Skidder Scott, the discarded cigarette pack, Lawson’s gold ring and Roddy’s cuff links, hidden in the bundle of rags. I sat back, satisfied. But if I expected both young men to look relieved or gratified, I was wrong because both wore quizzical expressions, dumbfounded.
“What, for heaven’s sake? I would have thought this news would please both of you.”
Waters muttered, “Him?”
Lawson scoffed. “Skidder Scott?”
I gasped. “You know him?”
“Everybody knows him. I didn’t know his name was Harold. He’s one of those guys who are always around the neighborhood. You know he’s up to no good. A junkie, drunk, you know. Begs for money, food. He stands outside the Catagonia Club when people are going in or out. He crashes rent parties. Steals small stuff.”
“Well, the police found his fingerprints…and your ring, Lawson.”
“I don’t see it,” Lawson said. “My ring was worthless. Not gold. I wouldn’t leave something good out like that.” A pause. “I just don’t see him hurting Roddy.”
Waters was nodding his head up and down. “Skidder Scott. God, even I know that man. He’s, well, harmless. A local character. He stands and yells at the cars going by. He hates…cars. Roddy even said he’d put him into a short story someday. A Harlem drunk in an alley…or something. A big bushel of a man, but harmless.”
I bristled. “Apparently not.”
The two young men glanced at each other, Lawson still looking puzzled. “Skidder always runs from a fight. Yeah, he takes stuff but not when someone is home…sleeping. I suspected he was the one who broke into our apartment and took the money Roddy had on the bureau. But the cops wouldn’t even come out when we called them.”
Waters added, “He’s a big beefy man, true, but he looks kind of weak. You know, a soft sponge of a guy. Roddy, waking up, could fight him.”
“Not if he’s startled when he’s been sleeping.”
Suddenly Waters jumped up, nervous, and looked at his mother. “I wonder if there’s more to the story, Ma.” Then he looked at me. “Miss Edna, Skidder Scott did things for money, but if he broke in that door, Roddy would have heard him, no? He would have yelled out. And Skidder would beat it out of there.” Waters circled the room, frenzied, his mind clicking away. “
Skidder wouldn’t come into the apartment like that—rush at Roddy. He shuffles along. You know, I think somebody else planned this.” He turned to Lawson. “That’s it, Lawson. Think of the Skidder we know. Lord, people make fun of him. This is…”
I interrupted. “Lawson. Waters. Come on, let’s be realistic. A felon, notorious for breaking and entering. It’s inevitable his luck would turn and he’d find someone home…”
“Lawson, tell her,” Waters pleaded.
“What?” Lawson asked.
“Do you think it’s Skidder?”
Lawson stood up and stared out the dark window. For the first time since he’d arrived he acted…alive. He swung his arms crazily, and his dark eyes, wide now, were lit by fire. “Listen to Waters, Miss Ferber.”
“Somebody killed Roddy,” Waters stated dramatically. The words hung in the air, choice and rich. “Somebody else.”
“Waters…”
“Help us, Miss Edna.”
“For Lord’s sake, Waters…”
“You know people,” Waters said. “Lots of people. People will listen to you. No one will listen to us. To me and Lawson. You can talk to people. Someone has to talk to Skidder. There’s a story behind this.”
“Someone had it in for Roddy.” Lawson’s voice was quiet and low.
Waters was nodding.
Grimly, I thought: the Negro Hardy Boys, young men in a hurry, driven, excited, an adventure now, something to distance themselves from the awful grief and the nagging horror. Boys at their games, macabre though they were.
“No.”
“Miss Edna, please.” Waters’ eyes looked into mine.
Lawson was nodding in counterpoint to Waters’ pleas.
“No,” I repeated. “No.”
Chapter Seven
No, of course not.
As Rebecca leaned into the breakfast table the next morning, pouring my hot coffee, with a generous wash of whipped farm cream, she whispered, “Now, Miss Edna, don’t pay those boys any mind.”
I smiled as I reached for the cinnamon toast. “Your son is such a serious lad, Rebecca. And he does have a winning way about him.”