"You know as well as I do Carter has no business doing such a thing," Velma said. "For starters, Margaux wouldn't let him in. One, she's suspicious of young men and two, she hates the police. Put a young black detective on her front doorstep and you might as well put Delia in a high tower with no doors. Delia would be smart to keep her mouth quiet as to the subject of Carter.
"Besides, I wouldn't be surprised if Margaux's trying to stake a claim on Delia. Once her grandmother passes, I wouldn't be surprised if Margaux steps in and tries to get Delia to care for her in her old age. The notion of Carter would probably put Margaux in a fit, especially if it stood in the way of her plans."
She looked at the clock on the mantle, a wedding gift that a former employer had given Lamont and Velma. It was a delicate thing, beautiful and ornate. It ticked ever so quietly.
"I'll send a telegram to Margaux," Velma said, with a renewed energy and suddenly feeling clear-headed. "Then it'll be settled. No point in discussing it further, Lamont. Besides, if I wait until the child pulls herself together and comes back from the kitchen, we'll be right back where we were and there'll be more tears." There was a tenderness in her woods that surprised Lamont. For all of her fussing, there was a part of her that felt a maternal tenderness toward Delia. In fact, Lamont noted, Velma had never referred to Delia as "the child."
In fact, the only other time he recalled Velma using that term in regards to Delia was when they were about to marry, when she said, "Lamont, I promise I will do my duty by that child. I'll love her like she was my own." Granted, Velma had little chance to do her duty by Velma, mostly because of the ironclad possessiveness Delia's grandmother had shown, fueled in part by the notion that no woman was good enough to replace her deceased daughter in the role of mother.
"What about Mr. Lockhart?" Lamont asked as Velma turned to leave. Velma hesitated. She was so eager to resolve the Delia situation, she had momentarily forgotten Mr. Lockhart. It explained the clear-headed relief she had manifested moments earlier.
"Just go up, knock on the door and say I'll be back in a few minutes. He's a very reasonable gentleman, you know." She went into the backroom closet to retrieve her hat and coat. It was getting colder and the Charleston heat and humidity were waning as the days grew shorter.
Lamont intercepted her as she was about the leave the backroom. "Give me a kiss, woman," Lamont said. Velma turned up her face to Lamont. "What has gotten into you?" she asked with a playful tone. They kissed and Lamont drew her close to him, pressing her soft body against his. Almost immediately, he felt an erection beginning to form.
Velma was about to pull back from the kiss but Lamont persisted. He wanted more. He wanted a longer kiss. A more passionate kiss.
"Delia might see us," Velma said, in-between Lamont kissing her full lips.
"Good," Lamont said. "She should see what it looks like for a husband to love his wife."
In that moment, guilt returned to Velma's heart. She thought of the infidelity on her part with Mr. Lockhart. Even now, it seemed like another lifetime ago and another person who committed such sinful deeds... even though it had only been a short while ago.
She prayed that those torrid events would be swept away, that Lockhart, in his eccentricities, would think no more of it and neither would so. As if it had never happened. As if she had never sucked his cock or experienced the deep pleasure of that same cock penetrating her in a way that made her come repeatedly.
In guilt, she channeled that smoldering sexual release she felt into kissing her husband, the only one she should have done such things with, the things she had done with Lockhart several times.
Suddenly, Velma closed the backroom door, immersing she and Lamont in darkness. He chuckled as they kissed, when Velma then went to her knees and began fumbling to undo Lamont's pants. It took a moment in the dark, before she was able to unclasp his belt and unzip his trousers.
"Whoa, what are you doing, woman?" Lamont said, incredulous at what his wife was doing, incredulous at his good fortune. "If I had known you'd be up for this, I would have kissed you sooner."
Velma said nothing, for she had found Lamont's stiffening penis and began stroking it. Lamont let out a sigh and gave a low moan. Without another word, Velma wrapped her lips around the tip and began licking and sucking ever so gently.
Lamont reached for the nearest wall to brace himself. His eyes adjusting to the dark, he looked down to see Velma's head moving ever so slightly back and forth as she took him in her mouth, her tongue an untamed animal gliding up and down the shaft.
She removed her hat and coat and began hiking up her dress, unsnapping her garter belts and sliding out of her panties. She turned and pressed her buttocks against Lamont's throbbing cock, sliding it between her smooth, full buttocks. "Put it in me, now," she whispered. Lamont obliged, pushing his cock in-between the wet lips of her pussy. He began sliding in and out, slowly at first.
Velma leaned forward, placing her hands against the wall, gyrating her hips and buttocks in a slow grind that almost made Lamont come right then and there. Lamont's hands instinctively went to her waist and he began sliding Velma up and down his cock as he stood still. Now, Velma let out a low moan before biting her lip.
Lamont's hands found her breasts and began squeezing them with his large hands, gently yet firmly. Velma reached up and unbuttoned her blouse, exposing her breasts clad in a brassiere. She reached between her breasts and unclasped the hook. Lamont's hands ran over her warm, smooth skin as he cupped her breasts before stroking the nipples with his fingers as he began to quicken his pace, rocking back and forth now as she began circling her hips, grinding against Lamont's cock.
She felt herself getting wetter and wetter as they continued. She began squirting wetness against his cock, which in turn led him to stroke faster and faster until they both exploded in a massive orgasm. She reached back, hungry for his lips and they kissed, their tongues darting at each other as Lamont came and came, squeezing out each drop of come inside her, letting out a long sigh.
They both were breathing heavily as she slid forward. She reached for some of the spare towels they kept in the backroom and she handed one to Lamont. He began cleaning himself off, as did she. His cock was still sensitive from the friction of fucking his wife and he shivered.
Once cleaned, Velma dressed herself, thinking she was probably a sight to go out. But once she remembered Delia and wanting to avoid any further deliberation on what to do regarding Margaux's letter, she quickly excused herself from the backroom and made her way out the door to send the telegram.
As she walked along the cold pavement, she found herself thinking that perhaps those moments of passion with her husband in the backroom would erase the blemish of what she'd done with Mr. Lockhart. It didn't and she felt herself utterly foolish for having thought such a thing.
She thought about everything that had transpired in the past couple of days and began thinking about how strange Mr. Lockhart had been lately, more so than usual. He was unlike himself... much as he had been a couple of weeks previously... just before the double murder took place.
When Delia had told Velma all about the evidence room Carter and her father had visited, Velma had heard Mr. Lockhart moving around upstairs. It sounded as if he had been pacing in his sitting room.
When she had delivered his supper, she had listened outside the door while Lockhart read what he seemed to find such delight in: Scripture that painted horrific pictures of what happened to those committing terrible acts upon others.
It was these thoughts that possessed Velma as she walked, taking her mind and eyes off of where she should have been looking. Suddenly, she bumped into a young woman. She jolted, nearly leaping from her skin, dazed as the woman apologized and continued on her way.
Velma felt a sense of relief that Delia was going away for a few days, because it made the thought of Mr. Lockhart and his strangeness less overwhelming. She felt remorse for talking so harshly to Delia, for she truly felt fondness for
the young girl.
The night before, Velma hardly slept. She had laid in bed, listening for something that never came. Mr. Lockhart was as silent and still as the grave. Apparently, Mr. Lockhart had chosen to remain in his nice warm bed. She knew because the bed was directly above hers and Lamont's.
As she talked to send the telegram, she decided to stop dwelling on Mr. Lockhart, both his odd nature and the sexual transgress in which they'd indulged. She decided to remove him from her mind, lock, stock and barrel.
She walked past a newsstand and saw the newspapers repeating the same words: THE HANGMAN. It seemed strange that the murderer had been inactive for some time now, given the alarming frequency in which he dispatched his victims. Velma had regarded the Hangman as some sort of dark shadow of a man, hiding in the light of day, always changing shape and form. He was a faceless entity, something out of a terrible story that had become flesh and bone in reality, yet as evasive as a wisp of smoke in the wind.
Velma came to the corner that led to the post office where she could send a telegram to Margaux. She stopped, a sudden feeling of self-rebuke and self-loathing filling her. She had wished the newspapers were claiming the Hangman struck again last night, taking another victim or two! She felt shame for thinking such a thing.
But there had been no news at breakfast of such a horror, no newsboys shouting in the streets. And further, she felt a complete hypocrite for scolding Lamont for his timid lament that the Hangman had seemed to have stopped his murderous spree or taken a brief respite from the ghoulish mess.
Nothing had happened last night. All had been quiet.
She dismissed any further thinking on the subject and shifted gears to Carter. She thought back to the sudden pang of sexual longing she'd felt for the young man when he'd shown up on the doorstep, seeking more time with Miss Delia. He was a good boy, a kind young man, who would no doubt be good for Delia and together, they would raise fine looking, sturdy children.
Early on, when the Hangman business began, she felt worry and yes, even fear, when Carter would come calling. She wondered why, but deep down, she suspected she knew. Yet, she could not crystalize the thought yet. It was too... terrible to ponder.
She thought about the absence Carter would experience once Delia was gone for a few days and felt sorry for him, but she also remembered that she and Lamont experienced a much longer absence in their younger days, when they were separated by work for nearly three months.
She'd experienced for herself that indeed absence made her heart not only grow fonder for Lamont, it made her innermost parts burn with passion for him. They were sooner married after they reunited, and not a moment too soon, for their mutual desire nearly destroyed them with passion on their wedding night. It was, among other things, the first time Velma had let Lamont experience her in every possible way, even ways that would have been deemed utterly scandalous, if not illegal, in 1930s Charleston.
Illegal made her think back to Carter and his work as a detective. He seemed to be good at what he did for a living. It was a job and he was respectable and commanding in his work as law enforcement. While he wasn't like the detectives Lamont would read about in some of the more lurid crime stories he sometimes indulged in reading, Carter seemed a sensible type who could suss out the facts and details essential for his work.
Except... for all of Carter's questioning over the years about Velma, Lamont and now Delia, he'd never really once asked much about their tenant, despite being aware that Mr. Lockhart had proven a real boon for the Barneses, at a time when their fortunes had all but run completely dry.
Velma pulled herself together, straighten up and moved on to the Post Office as quickly as she could. Lamont would begin wondering about her if she was gone much longer.
Once inside the Post Office, she filled out the telegram form, addressing it to Margaux at the Columbia address, with the words: "Will be with you in time for lunch tomorrow. -- Delia."
A sigh of relief came over Velma as she re-entered the street. It was settled. If anything terrible was to happen in Charleston over the next few days, it would of no great concern to Delia since she wouldn't be on hand. Not that there was any real danger for the young lady. Velma felt certain of that.
On the way back home, Velma began recounting the stories of the Hangman -- specifically, how many murders committed. She stopped around nine. Nine murders and still no capture. Surely, he was finished. Whatever the Hangman had sought to avenge, perhaps he was finally finished?
Velma hurried home. It wouldn't be long before Mr. Lockhart would ring for her. Lamont had no clue as to how to manage the tenant, especially if Lockhart was in one of his bizarre moods.
At her doorstep, Velma slid the key into the front door lock and stepped inside. Her heart stopped at the sound of voices, ones she did not recognize, in the sitting room.
She stepped into the doorway and took in a deep breath.
It was Carter. Carter, Delia and Lamont, talking. They stopped talking at the sight of Velma, but not before she'd heard Carter say, "I'll run out and send another saying you can't go, Miss Delia."
The oddest smile came over Velma's face. In the distance, she thought she heard the shouts of newsboys as they made their way down the block.
"Well," she said, catching her breath. "Carter, I suppose there's some news for us? They've found another?"
Carter blinked at Velma. "No, not at all, Velma." He paused and heard the newsboys himself. "Oh, those fellas have to have something to cry out about, to sell papers. There's been an arrest. An Irish sailor turned himself in last night. He'd be drinking and carrying on and said he was the Hangman. But it turned out to be just another drunk feeling self-loathing for something or another that had nothing to do with the Hangman. Honestly, we've had at least two dozen clowns like that one, all claiming to be terrible murderers and it's only the liquor in them talking."
"Velma, if I didn't know better, I'd say you look disappointed," Lamont said with a laugh. "But I get it. Seems to me the Hangman's been taking enough of a break. Time for him to try again and get caught this time, eh, Carter? I know you'll be glad when this is all over and behind us."
"In a way," Carter said reluctantly. "I definitely want us to catch him, but one never wants to think that a creature such as the Hangman remains at large, or that they even exist in our world."
"I'll go and see to Mr. Lockhart's meal," Velma said as she removed her hat and coat before leaving the three to themselves in the front room.
A feeling of disappointment and depression came over Velma as she stood in the backroom, putting away her things. She could still smell the sex and feel the humid muskiness of her copulation with Lamont in this very space, and that only deepened her feelings of darkness.
Delia would be going, regardless of Carter's comments before Velma entered the room. Lamont would not openly or actively dissent as far as that issue stood. Surely, he would remain polite and allow Carter a chance to vent his concerns, but it would go no further than that.
Not only that, Velma suspected that Delia had enough sense to know that if she ever wanted to be the wife of a detective in Charleston, she should first remain in Aunt Margaux's good graces.
When Delia came into the kitchen, Velma felt her heart soften even more, because Delia had gotten everything ready perfectly. There was nothing left to do except boil the eggs Mr. Lockhart preferred.
Velma felt more cheered by the turn of events, more so than in quite a while, and so she took Mr. Lockhart's tray upstairs.
"It was getting late, so I didn't wait for you to ring, sir," Velma said, returning to formality. No more first names on her part she determined.
Mr. Lockhart looked up from the table where he intently, almost painfully, studied the Bible. "Absolutely, Mrs. Barnes. I was stuck on contemplating a verse: 'Work while it is yet light.'"
Even Mr. Lockhart had gone formal and given up speaking to Velma on a first-name basis.
"Yes, sir," she said.
"'The
spirit is willing, but the flesh... the flesh is weak,'" he said with a sigh.
Velma looked away from him as she set down her tray. She would set it down and leave quickly.
Sugar in Her Bowl Page 13