by Larry Karp
The girl stood, smoothed her nightgown, then walked slowly across the room, rubbing at her leg, and plopped onto the edge of the bed.
Alan stood over her, waited.
She brushed a handful of curls away from her left eye. “I’m really…well, it’s embarrassing, Alan. You’re the most interesting thing that’s happened in this stupid town since I can remember, coming half-way across the country like you did, all by yourself, with an important book that might make history. I just wanted to see what was in that book.”
“You could’ve asked me.”
“Would you have shown it to me?”
Silence.
“Well, see?” Her eyelids moved like butterfly wings. “I didn’t think you would, and I was so jazzed up, thinking about it, I couldn’t sleep. So finally, I thought why don’t I just come in here on my tiptoes, take the book back to my room, read it, and then bring it back. I didn’t think that’d do any harm. Oh, Alan, I’m sorry, I really am. I like you. You’re fun. I hope I didn’t mess everything up.”
“Just my night’s sleep,” Alan muttered. “Look, I’m sorry I hurt you, all right? You’ve been nice to me, and I appreciate it. After I get the journal to Mr. Campbell, I’ll ask him if it’s okay to show it to you.” He got off the bed, walked to the door, opened it a crack. “See you tomorrow.”
As she sailed past him, she whispered, “Meanie!”
He closed the door behind her, then trudged back to bed, but his eyes wouldn’t stay shut. It seemed like everybody in Sedalia wanted to get their hands on Scott Joplin’s journal, and if Mr. Barton was right, Brun Campbell wouldn’t be coming in for another whole day. How could he keep the journal safe in the meanwhile?
He looked around the room. The desk where he’d left his stuff? It had a solid back; the journal would fit behind it. He threw back the covers, but stopped before his feet hit the floor. Probably not the best idea to hide the journal in his own room. Where, then?
A thought came to him, but he’d have to wait a little while. He slid back under the covers.
His mother had a saying about how watched pots never boil, and it seemed to take the little clock four hours to get to half-past two. When it finally did, the boy got up, walked out into the hall, and crept down to Eileen’s room at the far end of the corridor. He turned the knob, opened the door slowly, slipped in, shut the door.
From the bed came the sound of regular deep breathing. He smiled. Across the room was a dresser, the tall, wide kind that girls need to hold all their clothes. Even better, it sat directly on the floor. Perfect. Alan started toward it, but enthusiasm outstripped caution, and he caught his toe on an old steamer trunk at the foot of the bed. He fell heavily against the bedpost, muttering a curse as he saw the figure in the bed sit up. “Eileen,” a groan. “Don’t scream. It’s me, Alan.”
“Alan? What—?”
“I couldn’t sleep. I felt bad about the way I talked to you, and I thought you might be awake. I want to say I’m sorry.”
“Well, you might at least come up here where I can see you when you say it.”
“Wait a minute, I’ll be right there.”
“What do you mean, ‘you’ll be right there?’”
“Eileen, jeez. Wait just a minute. I banged my big toe and it hurts like hell.”
“You want me to kiss it for you? Make it all better? Bring it over here.”
“Hold on a second.”
“Alan!”
He limped alongside the bed. “All right, I’m here, see? I’m sorry I was rude to you, Eileen, I apologize. Okay?”
Her teeth gleamed. “That’s a start.” She threw back the covers. Come on in and tell me how sorry you are.”
“Eileen…”
“Hey, it’s cold with the covers off.” She patted the bed. “Bet you could warm me up.”
***
Brun Campbell sat in the Milner Hotel’s restaurant, alternating forkfuls of bacon and eggs with mouthfuls of coffee and pulls at a cigarette. Yesterday had been a waste. Nothing open except churches and a few restaurants. He’d pounded the streets, but none of the teen-aged boys he’d talked to was the one he was looking for. He’d been glad to see Tom Ireland, of course, though finding out they were on opposite sides of the fence troubled him. He had to get his hands on that boy and the journal before Ireland did, or it’d probably be gone forever, and the Scott Joplin Ragtime Museum right along with it.
Sedalia was giving him the creeps. Everywhere he went, he saw ghosts. Was that John Stark down the street? Mrs. Stark? Mr. Higdon, Mr. Hastain? Was that Otis Saunders at the table across the room?
He drew deeply at the cigarette, set it onto the corner of the ashtray, and shoveled in a mound of eggs. But before he could swallow, he saw a woman with a beehive of gray hair, standing on the opposite side of the table, studying him from behind rimless glasses. He hadn’t heard her walk up. She looked familiar, another ghost? Then, recognition hit. Brun coughed, choked, reached for his glass of water. He took two giant swallows, wiped at his eyes, and looked up.
“I beg your pardon, Mr. Campbell,” the woman said. “I didn’t mean to startle you.” She paused, seemed to be weighing alternatives, then added, “Fifty-two years is a long time. Do you remember me?”
Brun scrambled out of his chair, stood awkwardly, shifting from one foot to the other. “If I ain’t mistaken, you’re Miss Luella…” What the hell did Tom Ireland say her name was now?
“Rohrbaugh,” the woman said. “But you knew me as Luella Sheldon.”
Brun scanned the fingers of her left hand; she caught him. “I’ve been a widow for twenty-five years. I stopped wearing the ring a long time ago.”
“Oh. Well, I’m sorry to hear that.”
“Thank you.”
Her face gave nothing away. Neither did her tone of voice. Brun thought a moment, then said, “I’m only gonna be in town a couple days, for the Scott Joplin ceremony at the high school. Then you won’t never see me again. I hope you’re not gonna make me any trouble.”
She raised a hand. “I’m not here to trouble you in any way, Brun. What happened in 1899 was a long time ago.”
“But I am sorry, Miss Luella.” Brun caught himself at the antiquated way he’d addressed her. The woman couldn’t stop a wan smile. “I really am sorry for what happened, Mrs. Rohrbaugh. Always have been.”
“I’ll wager there have been other incidents which left you feeling sorry,” the woman said. “You were an impulsive boy. You acted without forethought, or considering consequences, but I’ve long since forgiven your rash behavior. In any case, please feel free to call me Luella.” She smiled, a formality.
Brun motioned to the chair she stood beside. “Would you like to sit down? Have some breakfast?”
“I’ve had breakfast, hours ago,” Luella said. She pulled out the chair. “But I will sit. I have some information I believe will interest you.”
Brun hustled around the table to pull the chair out for the old woman, then went back to reseat himself.
“I heard you were coming to town,” Luella said. “You’re going to play piano at that ceremony, and you’re going to show the crowd a certain diary that Scott Joplin kept, in the hope of persuading them to build a museum downtown for him and his music.”
Brun studied the woman. Fifty-some years had carved channels like river beds into her cheeks. “How do you ever know that?”
“This is a small town, just as it was in 1899. I happened to meet a young man last evening, an Alan Chandler. He has that journal in a shoulder bag, which he won’t let out of his hand for an instant. He’s looking for you, but has no idea where you are, or how to find you.”
Brun’s food was forgotten. “Do you know where he is?”
“I’m quite sure I do, and I’m equally sure I don’t like it. I teach a Bible class, which I imagine doesn’t surprise you. One of my students, Eileen Klein, brought your young man to our Sunday evening supper last night. She said he
was a family friend from New Jersey, and that he was staying with the Kleins. But Otto Klein is not a man I’d expect to have anything to do with a ceremony in honor of a colored man. In fact, Mr. Klein has long been active in the Ku Klux Klan. Alan seemed like a nice boy, and I wouldn’t want to see him get into a bad situation. So I decided I’d try to find you.”
“How’d you know where I’m staying? I only got in last night.”
“A simple process of elimination. I asked at hotel registration desks. The Milner was my third stop.”
Brun was half-out of his chair. “You know where that kid is, then? I was gonna try and find Abe Rosenthal, the guy who’s in charge of the program, and get a few things straight about my part, but I can sure wait on that till after I see the kid.”
“I know where Otto Klein’s machine shop is, and I’ll be glad to take you there,” Mrs. Rohrbaugh said. “Just as soon as you’re finished eating, if you’d like.”
Brun took a swallow from his water glass, then pushed away from the table. “I’m done.” He threw a dollar on the table, then trotted around to help Luella out of her seat. “Let’s get a move on.”
***
“Mrs. Campbell?”
May looked up into the face of the man who’d just rung her doorbell. She nodded. “Yes?”
He held a billfold out toward her. “Detective Robert Magnus, Los Angeles Police. Your husband’s not in his barber shop today. Is he at home?”
May shook her head, then stuffed all her exasperation into an extravagant sigh. “He went to San Francisco Friday night. He’s been trying to get a movie produced about Scott Joplin, you know, the ragtime piano player. Friday afternoon, Brun got word that someone in San Francisco was interested in making the movie and needed to see him right away, so off he went. Hardly took time to pack his suitcase.”
The detective called on every second of his professional training and experience to keep from screaming. “Have you heard from him since then?”
Another headshake. “We don’t have a phone.”
“Right. Mrs. Campbell, do you know a woman named Bess Vinson? A colored woman, she lives in Santa Monica?”
May shook her head. “I don’t know many colored at all. My husband does…oh, wait. That’s the woman who came looking for him, just a few days ago, and I sent her over to the barber shop. Brun told me later that she claimed to be Scott Joplin’s daughter, and wanted to sell him Joplin’s diary for five thousand dollars, can you imagine?”
“Did he buy it?”
“I don’t think so. I have no idea where he’d get anything like five thousand dollars.”
Now, Magnus sighed. Bess Vinson hadn’t said anything to him because he hadn’t found her. The druggist downstairs from her apartment had told Magnus he hadn’t seen her for a day or so, and had no idea where she might be.
“All right, Mrs. Campbell.” The detective gave May a business card. “If you do hear from your husband, please let him know I need to talk to him. And then you call me.”
May looked from the card to the detective. “Is Brun in some sort of trouble?”
When I get my hands on him, he’ll be in trouble like he’s never seen, Magnus thought. But he smiled and said, “I just need to ask him some questions. Thank you.” Then he hotfooted back to the station, and got a sergeant on the phone to check into movie producers in San Francisco.
***
Slouched low in the cab of his pickup, Jerry Barton watched Rowena Klein, shopping bag in hand, leave her house and walk briskly along East Fifth toward downtown. He waited till she’d covered a good three blocks, then jumped out of the truck, trotted down the street to Klein’s, pushed the button next to the front door. No answer. He leaned on the button a second time, and pounded on the door. “Come on, you little bastard,” he muttered. “Open up.”
***
Before Mrs. Klein left, she pressed a book into Alan’s hand. “The House of Fear,” she said. “It’s a mystery story by a man named Robert W. Service. Do you know him?”
Alan shook his head.
“Oh, he was so popular when I was a girl. He was a great poet who wrote the most interesting verses about all those places up north. This book should be just right for a boy your age. It’s a grand story.”
It took less than five pages for Alan to decide it stank on ice. When the doorbell rang, he set the book down gratefully, started toward the door, but stopped after just a couple of steps. All he could do was tell whoever it was that Mrs. Klein would be back in an hour.
The bell rang again, long, loud, followed immediately by a series of heavy knocks. “All right,” Alan called, then hurried across the room and pulled the door open.
Jerry Barton grinned at him. “Ready to wow the committee chairman, kid? When I told them about your journal last night, they got all worked up. Mr. Rosenthal wants to talk to you before the program gets printed.” Barton pointed at the blue bag next to Alan on the couch. “Come on, grab your book there, and I’ll drive you over to his office.”
***
Otto Klein, working at a huge lathe, pulled back his hands and swiveled his head as he heard the little bell that sounded when someone opened the door to his shop. Christ, that old bitch, Luella Rohrbaugh. What the hell was she doing here? And who was that coot with her? Klein snickered. Maybe Luella had stuff going that nobody knew about. A guy would have to be pretty desperate. “Be right with you,” Klein shouted.
He set down the chunk of metal he’d been shaping, and flipped the switch to turn off the lathe. Then he wiped a shirt sleeve over his forehead as he walked to the counter. “’Morning, Mrs. Rohrbaugh,” he said. “Mister…?”
“Brun Campbell.”
Klein looked like a person trying to put his finger on a missing piece of a jigsaw puzzle.
Luella’s face turned severe. “Mr. Campbell is here from California to meet a young man from New Jersey who has a book Mr. Campbell needs.”
Klein shrugged. “Okay.”
“Mr. Klein! I’m talking about the young man who’s staying at your house, the one who escorted Eileen to the supper last night. She introduced him to me as a family friend. Alan Chandler.”
Light came into Klein’s eyes. “Oh, yeah, sure. Alan. Sorry, I don’t know what I was thinking.” He pointed toward the lathe. “I got a real rush on that piece, and I guess I was concentrating.” He glanced at the big clock on the wall to his right, quarter past eleven, good. Jerry’d have the kid away by now. “Well, I’m glad you’re here, Mr. Campbell. Alan’s probably sittin’ over in my house, being bored, so whyn’t the two of you just go on over. I’d take you myself, but…” He pointed again toward the lathe. “This guy’ll have my ears if I don’t get that work to him by noontime. Hear him tell it, his whole farm’s sittin’ and waitin’ on it.”
Luella glanced at Brun. “Very well,” she snapped. “Thank you for your time, Mr. Klein.”
Klein shrugged. “Glad to be of help, Mrs. Rohrbaugh. Mr. Campbell.” He went back to the lathe, turned it on, picked up the workpiece.
After the bell rang and the door slammed shut, the machinist counted to fifty, then shut off the lathe, took the piece of steel from the chuck, and stashed it under a cloth beneath the lathe. It’d take those mossbacks at least ten minutes to get to his house, and that long to come back. Klein turned the sign in the door to CLOSED, hurried out, locked the door, ran to his car, and drove off, leaving a cloud of gray smoke in front of his shop.
***
Alan cracked the window of Barton’s truck. The weather was turning nicer, sunny and warming a bit. Barton smiled. “Air out here smells different from back where you live, huh?”
The boy nodded. He clutched the bag in his lap, wondered what to say to Mr. Rosenthal to explain why he didn’t have the journal with him. He’d think of something. He always did.
The grassy smell from outside the truck struck Alan odd. They’d driven out of Sedalia, up through the colored section where Mr. Ireland
lived, across Highway 65, and now they were cruising along the Georgetown Highway, which was actually just a two-lane country road like the ones in western New Jersey, farms all along both sides. “Mr. Rosenthal’s office is out here?” Alan asked.
Barton shrugged. “Why not?”
“I don’t know. Just seems like an office’d be in town.”
“That’s the trouble with you east coast yokels.” Barton snickered. “You think if something ain’t in the city, it ain’t worth thinkin’ about. Mr. Rosenthal sells oil to farmers, so he has an office out close to his clients. Lot of us farmers do all we can to not have to go into the city.”
Barton turned onto a dirt road; Alan bounced in the seat. This wasn’t right. The boy started to ask what was going on, but decided to hold his tongue. He looked all around, trying to fix the route in his mind.
They drove through a meadow and into a stand of trees. A hundred yards in, just like that, the road ended, dense forest on three sides. Barton stopped the truck, shut off the motor, set the brake.
***
Some twenty-five yards into the woods, Richard Curd, Jr. stopped digging, and listened. Nothing. He was sure he’d heard a car, but who’d be coming out here this time of day? Not that it mattered. Mr. Armstrong used to let his daddy dig here every spring, and when Daddy died, Mr. Armstrong told Richard, Jr. he could dig in the woods. “Don’t want to be responsible for half the people in Sedalia to die without their spring tonic,” Mr. Armstrong had said. Curd shrugged, and went back to work.
***
Barton gestured toward Alan’s book bag. “Give here.”
Alan pulled the bag away, grabbed at the door handle.
“Uh-uh,” Barton snarled. “Get both of your hands on the bag. Now.” He reached inside his jacket, and Alan found himself staring into the barrel of a pistol that looked as big as a cannon. “Open up that bag,” Barton said. “Gimme the book.” He snickered. “And I tell you what, you piss on my seat there, you’re gonna lick it up before I blow out your brains. Now, do like I tell you.”
Slowly, Alan undid the catch, slid his hand inside, then put on the best look of amazement he could manage. “It’s not here.”