His voice sounded shrill, making Mrs. Jones feel even more uneasy. Why was he asking so many questions about Katherine Peterson’s only son? she asked herself. “I don’t know much ‘bout cars, Mr. Sanford,” she said not catching the irony of just having rode one block in a limousine.
He smiled at her awkwardly sensing her nervousness. “Please, Mrs. Jones. Just tell me what you can.”
“Alright! I think it’s a … you know, one of them pretty new shiny cars.”
“A Chrysler?” he nudged.
She leaned in further on her cane clearly needing to take a seat, but just before she could give Sy her answer, she had to excuse herself as a staff person needed her assistance in the back. It was an emergency.
“I’m sorry, Sy. I’ll return shortly, and we can finish our talk,” she said apologetically. Then she was gone.
Sy turned and looked back into the crowd for Peterson. He spotted him quickly. Sy carefully made his through the crowded dance floor over to where Jeffrey was talking to a group of people his age.
Just as he was about to speak to Jeffrey, William Sessions stepped in front of him, blocking Sy from Jeffrey and exclaimed rather loudly even under the circumstances, “It’s a … a darn sh … shame ‘bout that Young girl. You … you gots any mo’ info’mation on her, Sanford?” He had obviously been drinking a little too much as he was swaying from side to side, slurring his words. His tuxedo looked rumpled and his brown eyes were shiny and glazed over.
Sy was taken aback to see the old man in such a state, and a little peeved. “No, sir, I haven’t got any more news for you yet,” he snapped as he watched Jeffrey out of the corner of his eye.
Jeffrey was whispering in the ear of a pretty little cocoa brown-skinned woman who giggled at what he was saying to her, oblivious to the conversation going on a few feet from him between Sy and William Sessions.
“Well, don’t you let me catch ‘em. I’ll whip ‘em from here to New York, the sick bastard,” and at that, spittle hit Sy’s lip. Sy quickly wiped it off with the sleeve of his tuxedo and glared at Sessions in disgust. He was about to push him to the side and walk away from Sessions when Preston Miller intercepted him.
“My apologies, Sanford. These murders have got us all a little riled up now. Mr. Sessions, we need to speak with you in the back.”
William Sessions’ eyes rolled to the back of his bald head. “For what? I’m not done talkin’ to Sanford,” he said a little too loudly again. People standing close to the trio were starting to stare at the men. People were always on their best behavior at the ball. He shook Miller off of him, heated brown eyes staring he and Sy down. “We’re fuckin’ ruined if’n you don’t catch the … the whoever’s killin’ em. You know that, right? Nobody wants to fuckin’ say it out loud, but … but you ain’t doin’ shit to help us!” he spurted out vehemently while fighting to keep his balance.
The guards at the door stared in their direction. They had their orders; anyone who looked as if they were about to step out of line – anyone - was promptly removed by those large dark men who guarded the doors, and were now heatedly looking in their direction.
Sy could see the veins throbbing in Miller’s forehead. Sweat had started to roll down his face as he grabbed Session’s arm and drew him close. Drunk or not, Sessions knew that they did not need for Sheriff Mason to have an excuse to shut them down.
“Come on, Sessions. You’re beginnin’ to make a scene and we don’t need that right now,” he whispered so that only Sessions and Sy heard him.
Sy had had enough. “Mr. Miller, please get him out of here. He’s gonna mess things up,” pleaded Sy as he tried yet again to walk away from Sessions and get closer to Jeffrey whom he had noticed had now left the room with the pretty woman. “Damn! He’s gone!”
“Who?” asked Miller as he too looked in the direction Sy had his eyes on.
“I gotta go find him!” exclaimed Sy as he walked hurriedly away from Miller who was now practically holding up Sessions.
Miller watched Sy exit out the front door of the ball. He shook his head in regret and proceeded to help a now helpless Sessions out of the ballroom just as Roy Johnson’s Happy Pals, one of the oldest Jazz Quartets in Richmond, hit the stage and started up a rousing rendition of “Happy Pal Stomp.” The crowd cheered and danced enthusiastically as the Richmond natives sent the Ward into a night to remember.
Sy walked outside to find Jeffrey. He was barely out the door when he spotted the well-dressed young man opening the door of his car for the young woman who had found him entertaining earlier. Jeffrey had parked across the street from the parlor facing north towards Chamberlayne Street. Sy quickly ran and hid behind an old Ford Model T parked adjacent to Jeffrey and watched as he drove off in a Chrysler Imperial. Cold air escaped from Sy’s nose like it was running for its life. He stood up and with his hands on his hips, he stepped onto the sidewalk. He had his man, he just knew it. But he had to have more evidence.
He decided to go back in and ask around about Jeffrey Peterson. For a moment, he thought that Jeffrey might hurt the young woman who had left with him, but then he remembered that she was of the wrong class. Jeffrey killed forgotten, working class women, not women from his class – the wealthy. A frown suddenly crossed his face. “But why Sara Young?” he asked himself.
Sy walked back into the ballroom just as Ellington’s band began playing a soft blues tune. The dance floor was crowded as people slow danced and whispered in soft murmurs. Sy looked at the sea of smiling faces, and a dark scowl flashed across his brow. He had fought in the war to help save the world from the Germans and their allies.
Thousands of young Negro men – and white – had lost their lives, dying on the battle field abroad – thousands of miles away from home - with and without honors. Yet, when those who survived had come back home to America – to freedom – they found that it still was not available to them and those Negroes that they had left behind were now caught up in the world of haves and have nots. They wanted what the white world had – money, comfort, material things – and those desires were not bad, but then they forgot one very important thing: brotherhood.
Here, tonight, dancing to Ellington’s Jazz and cake walking, Jackson Ward’s finest - 69 years out of slavery - pretended not to belong to a race of people that had been considered disposable and worthless for more than a century now. Sy watched as they smiled and laughed gaily while outside the doors of the ballroom, the not so well off of Jackson Ward and other parts of Richmond suffered immensely at the hands of hateful whites and the dismissal of these, their brothers. Mrs. Jones and her friends had only hired him because their businesses were being financially and socially affected by the murders, not because innocent working class Negro women were being killed. “No,” Sy murmured under his breath in rhythm with the chord of a line, “Things ain’t changed at all.”
And as much as Sy felt sickened by the sight of the ballroom events, he felt more than ever the urgency in solving the case. Squaring his shoulders and pulling down on his tuxedo jacket, he prepared to dig in. Sy spent the next two hours learning about Jeffrey Peterson and his family from very willing informants.
What he discovered was that Jeffrey had a passion for fast things – women in particular. He also had a bad gambling habit. He owed money to just about all of the young people Sy spoke to who had remained at the ball long after the older folks had retired to their comfortable homes. The hypnotic music and the champagne had their tongues flowing freely. And to think these same rich folks have the nerve to say the working class gossip, Sy said to himself as he smoked a cigarette with a pretty dark skinned girl with thick red lips who was once engaged to Jeffrey – so she said.
“Jeffrey’s parents paid off most of his gambling debts, but every time one was cleared, another popped up,” she rambled on between sips of her fourth glass of champagne. His favorite place to gamble was “the Source Club on East Marshall and Second Street,” she told him before she stormed off to dance a jig with a
rather diminutive young man with very large hands.
Sy learned a lot from the young folks in the few short hours he had spent with them as they liked to talk and brag about how different their generation was from their parents. Isn’t that what every generation thinks about themselves – that they are better than the previous? Sy mused in his head as he went back outside to smoke another cigarette. But the generation of The Roaring Twenties was indeed something different. Carpe diem was the order of the day.
Consequently, the information he had gathered had given him a pretty good picture of Jeffrey Peterson and his life. But the last bit of information he had learned of tonight, really cemented things for Sy. Mrs. Jones had mentioned it to him earlier that night, but his mind had thrown it into the back of his brain once he had learned that Jeffrey had met Lena.
Mr. Peterson had died later that night. Sy found it ironic and somewhat scary that the young man was at the ball picking up women instead of at the hospital mourning the death of his father. In fact, Jeffrey had lost both parents in the past few weeks and his attitude towards their deaths had left many feeling distant and weary of the young man who had graduated from Virginia Union, but had not taken a job anywhere nor left very far from home. Sy heard several older folks talking about it as he had walked the ballroom that night.
Sy decided that he was going to make a visit to the hospital now; it was late in the evening, but the ball was almost over and hospitals never closed. He wanted to talk to the attending physician about Mr. Peterson’s health. Sy’s instincts were telling him that the elder Peterson’s sudden death might have been just a little too soon. He was also going to visit the Source Club to see what he else he could learn about young Peterson.
Chapter 29
Sy stepped outside for the third time that evening into the cold, wet night. St. Philip’s Hospital was only a few blocks from the Price Funeral Parlor, so it only took a few minutes of brisk walking for Sy to get there. But as he walked, he thought of Lena again and wondered if she were alright this evening. He didn’t like how it had ended between them and vowed to himself to never leave her out again. He’d always tell her what he was feeling and what was going on. He also made a vow to stop drinking. Sy made a lot of vows on that walk to St. Philip’s.
The fact is, Sy still had high hopes that she’d now marry him and leave Richmond with him. The Ward was not where he wanted to be and he realized that the more he worked on this case. He wanted a simple life, free from death and darkness. “I want Lena and peace,” he said to the shadow of the moon as he crossed over Seventh Street, a few more blocks to go.
Perhaps he could have saved some time and rode in the car with Deputy Brody who had been watching Sy ever since he had left his apartment for Mrs. Jones’ home. Sheriff Mason had ordered Brody to follow him around because he didn’t trust Sy. He knew in his gut that he had something to do with the murders, and “I means to find out what that is,” he had snapped at Deputy Brody after giving him his orders.
But the deputy didn’t think Sy had anything to do with the deaths of those five innocent women. However, he couldn’t say that out loud to Sheriff Mason. He was just a poor stupid farm boy from Dinwiddie, the sheriff liked to remind him every chance he got to put him down. He couldn’t tell him that he had seen it in Sanford’s eyes the day they discovered Miss Young’s body that he had nothing to do with the murder. That man had been in the war; he had more than likely participated in his fair share of the killing of the enemy. But that was the Germans, not women.
It was cold inside of the Ford; there was no working heat. So, Deputy Brody had to blow on his fingers to keep them warm as he waited outside of the A.D. Price Funeral Home. When he saw Sy come out of the building for what would be the final time and begin to walk away from where he lived, Brody got excited. He finally was going to be able to move and maybe Sy would go to some place warm and where the deputy could get out and stretch his legs.
When Deputy Brody saw the hospital sign, he gave a thousand thanks to the Lord and parked his car near the entrance to the hospital just a few feet from where Sy had gone inside. “I wonder why he’s goin’ in here,” the young deputy asked himself as he ran inside to the warmth of the hospital.
The hospital was practically empty considering it was a Saturday night. It was common to find victims of stabbings and bar fights from dangerous places like Johnson’s Hall littering the hallways. That place sent more patients to St. Philip’s Hospital than car or buggy accidents.
Sy asked a nurse for the doctor who was Mr. Elijah Peterson’s personal physician and then waited patiently in the sitting room as the nurse went to go find the doctor for Sy to speak to him. The smell of bleach and death filled his nostrils.
“I’m Doctor Howard,” a voice stated from the doorway. Doctor Howard was a tall, gaunt light-skinned mulatto man with bifocals and a conk with a part down the top of his head. He looked like one of those strange wooden puppets in a freak show to Sy.
Sy stood up to greet the doctor and to shake his hand. The doctor reluctantly shook it. “Dr. Howard, I’d like to speak with you for a moment about Mr. Peterson,” Sy started to say.
“Are you family, Mister …?” he voice trailed off.
“Sy Sanford, and no I am not family, but I am investigatin’ somethin’ that might affect the family. I just have one question, doctor.”
Doctor Howard looked at Sy stiffly. He huffed and looked down at his pocket watch which was tied to a gold chain sitting in his medical coat pocket. “What is it?”
“He had stomach cancer, right? Was you really expectin’ Mr. Peterson to die so soon?” asked Sy carefully as he twirled his fedora hat in his hands.
Doctor Howard’s eyebrows rose an inch, Sy noticed, but the rest of his body remained still. A few seconds passed before the doctor finally answered Sy’s question. “Yes, but it was still a rather unpleasant surprise. I had thought he at least had a few more days, but then who knows with these things,” he said as he shrugged his shoulders in defeat.
Sy cleared his throat. “Well, who was the last person to see Mr. Peterson alive?”
Doctor Howard’s bifocals started to fog. “I don’t see what that has to do with anything—” he started to complain.
“So, his son, Jeffrey Peterson, was the last person to see him alive,” interjected Sy matter-of-factly.
The doctor’s tone now softened. “Listen, Mr. Sanford. This young man has had a traumatic year. First his mother dies unexpectedly of a heart attack and now his father of stomach cancer.”
“A heart attack, you say. I heard she was found at home in her bed. Did she have the heart attack there?”
“Yes! She died at home. Why are you asking these questions?” the now irritated mulatto doctor barked.
“I told you. I am investigatin’ a case related to the family. Now, please just one more question. Was Jeffrey Peterson the last person to see his father?”
“Yes, Mr. Sanford, far as I know. Look, I wasn’t on duty yet. What I mean is, the doctor on duty pronounced him dead.”
“And Jeffrey Peterson was there when the doctor did this?”
“I presume. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a lot of work to do,” said Dr. Howard heatedly, and he stormed off down the hallway to check on his patients, presumably.
Sy watched the back of the gaunt doctor stroll down the hallway. He was thinking hard, something which his commanders always told him would get him into trouble one day. “All that damn thinkin’ gonna bring you nothin’ but trouble, Sanford. Niggers should act, not think,” one of his white superiors had told him once.
He shook his head to drop the memory. “I gotta stay focused,” he said to himself. He inhaled deeply and tugged at his coat, then adjusted his hat. Peterson has killed more than just five women; he’d killed his father, too. Sy knew he couldn’t physically prove it, but it didn’t matter no more now. Elijah Peterson was going to die anyway. No one was going to go back and try to prove that it was too fast, especially not
the impatient Doctor Howard.
Sy placed his fedora on his head, hugged his coat tight to his body and headed back out into the night. He headed to the Source Club on Marshall Street. A light drizzle began to fall as he walked along the muddy street only looking up when he came to a corner or to avoid running into a fellow pedestrian heading in the opposite direction as he. The roar of car horns and the whinnying of horses pulling heavy loads fell into the backdrop as well as he thought about the club and what else he might learn about young Peterson there.
He’d been to the club a few times for a drink on those nights when he couldn’t get to sleep. It was a local club that catered to all classes of Negro so long as you had the money to pay for your order ‘til late in the morning. Located in the residential section of Marshall Street, its large windows were covered by curtains which gave the appearance of the house being a family home, but those in the neighborhood knew differently. Although they were not happy about the type of business that went on in the neighborhood, they left it alone as the owner gave generously to the local charities and he kept the building clean and the lawn well-manicured so as not to draw too much attention to the place. And that’s how things went down in the Ward. If you wanted to open a business there, it had to give back to the community and the grounds had to be kept clean.
In the basement of the house was an extensive gambling casino replete with blackjack tables and craps. The police knew about the place, but rarely busted its occupants. Sheriff Mason felt it was a waste of time arresting niggers for illegal gambling when he could get them on better charges that would send them “up the river” where they belonged. The sheriff wanted the rapists and murderers of whites. Besides, the owner paid him a nice sum of money weekly to turn his head the other way.
A few minutes later, Sy stood wearily outside of the club. In there, lay two vices that he wished badly to not have to confront tonight: gambling and alcohol. He looked up at the dark starless sky; “Lena,” he whispered. He cupped his hands and exhaled cold misty air into them. He took a quick look around the neighborhood; only a few people were on the street, men rushing home to be with their wives, perhaps. Sy knocked on the door and a pair of black eyes greeted him through a rectangular peephole.
Murder on Second Street: The Jackson Ward Murders (Sy Sanford Series Book 1) Page 17