The Black Stiletto: Black & White

by Raymond Benson

  That gave me pause. “What happened?”

  “She accused Mike of raping her, which was a goddamned lie. He never touched that woman. Never. He didn’t look twice at her. It was in Central Park. She was put up to it by a bunch of white men who had it in their heads they were going to get themselves a ‘nigger.’”

  I hate that word, but I didn’t say anything.

  “It was 1942. Mike was minding his own business, walking through the park on his way home as he always did that time of evening. He heard a woman calling for help behind some trees. He ran over there, and the white woman was on the ground with her clothes pulled up and ruffled. Three white men were with her. Mike claims he heard one say, “There he is, right on time.” Then one of the men clubbed Mike on the back of the head. When he woke up, he was in handcuffs, in police custody. The girl accused him of attempted rape, and the white men told police they rescued her. It was his word against four whites. Mike went to prison for fifteen years. If it had happened in the South, he’d have been lynched. Believe me, I thoroughly studied Mike’s case before I hired him as an informant. It’s the truth.”

  I was aghast. “How do you know all this?”

  “My father was Mike’s lawyer.”

  “Really?”

  “Yeah. The incident happened in Poughkeepsie. He knew the truth, and I believe it.”

  I didn’t know what to say. “Freddie said a crooked manager drugged him before a fight ’cause he wouldn’t throw it, so Mike beat him up. The mob didn’t retaliate ‘cause the manager was cheating them.”

  “That actually did happen,” John said. “But the police never knew Mike was the one who beat him up. He was never arrested for that. He was sent to prison by a lying, prejudiced white woman.”

  I felt terrible. It’s no wonder Mike didn’t trust me. Every time he looked at me, he saw her. I’d always thought the reason Mike didn’t like me had something to do with my race. Now I know. He harbored a grudge against white women, and I have to say I can’t blame him. As for Freddie covering up for his friend, my “lie detector” instincts didn’t raise any flags when he told me Washington was in jail for manslaughter, because Mike really did beat up that manager. It just didn’t happen in the way it was couched. Freddie hadn’t lied, he just altered the truth.

  John held up his hand again as he listened. “No. Oh, no. Mike’s blown. Damn it! God, we have to do something. They’ll kill him.” He turned to me again and asked, “Will you help me?”

  “Sure. What do you want me to do?”

  “We have to get inside.” He drew a gun from beneath his suit jacket, removed the magazine, checked it, and shoved it back in. “Let’s go.”

  We got out of the car. I told him Mike had gone in with two other men on the other side of the building. As it was the only feasible entrance, that’s where we headed. John opted to cross through the alley, though, rather than move in front of the building on 128th. Yuck.

  At least the door on the west side of the building was in shadow. The light fixture above it was either burned out or broken. John drew his gun and held it with both hands, commando-style. Then, just as I was about to open the door, we heard two gunshots inside the building. I immediately cracked open the door to a small, darkened room with a low ceiling. We stepped inside, closed the door, and waited a moment to get our bearings. The space must have been a break room when the shop was operating. There was an old Coke vending machine that looked like it’d seen better years, a couple of chipped Formica tables and chairs, a sink, and a refrigerator that must have dated from the early ’40s. A bathroom—the door was long gone—was in an alcove to the right. There was no seat on the toilet. Corridors led both left and right against the outer wall, and another door opened to the center of the building. Next to it, attached to the wall, was a fuse box. The switches were labeled— “Work Lights,” “Loading Door,” “Lunchroom,” “Offices,” and so on. I moved closer to the door while John checked the corridors in both directions.

  “Clear,” he whispered. “These hallways go around the circumference of the building, one to the front and one to the back.”

  I opened the door just a sliver and looked out. Just as I thought, the shop was a large, cavernous space. A few overhead work lights in the tall ceiling cast dim illumination on a horrific scene. I counted five colored men standing in the center, surrounded by broken-down machines—table saws, drill presses, and the like—still bolted to the concrete floor. One of the men was Carl Purdy. I thought I recognized a couple of the others as his bodyguards.

  Mike Washington was on the floor, lying in a pool of blood and groaning in pain. Purdy had a gun in his hand. John’s informant had just been shot in the legs, but he was still alive.

  “Oh, God,” I whispered. John joined me and peered through the slit and drew in a deep breath.

  “What now?” I asked.

  He studied the scene as the men spoke in low voices. “Look, there’s the heroin,” John whispered. I crouched beneath him so I could look, too.

  Several stacks of bricklike packages, wrapped in plastic and tape, sat on the floor near the men. Each one was not quite the size of a shoebox. Behind them were pieces of smashed furniture—dressers, chests of drawers, and nightstands. An axe leaned up against one of the dressers.

  “The drugs were already here,” John said quietly. “They were hidden in that furniture. It must have been shipped by boat from France and then brought here by truck. Mike’s information was slightly off. I wanted to catch them delivering the stuff, but I’ll bet they’re waiting for another truck. They’ll load the heroin into it and distribute it to the far corners of the country. Or at least Harlem, but that’s an ungodly amount of narcotics.” He looked at his watch. “We have eight minutes before the cavalry arrives.”

  “Wait a second.” I reached into my backpack and pulled out my camera. “I’ll get some shots of this. You can use them as evidence.” I snapped several pictures and then replaced the camera.

  Then, suddenly, we heard a bell ring. One of the men said, “It’s here,” and went over to the loading dock rolling door. He pushed a button and the steel barrier began to rise.

  John said, “We have to stop them. Keep them busy until Haggerty gets here.”

  I reached over to the power box and switched off the toggle marked “Loading Door.” The rolling steel curtain stopped about a foot off the floor.

  “What happened?” Purdy asked.

  The man at the door pushed the button several times. “I don’t know. Hold on.” He fiddled with the controls and then said, “Must be the fuse box. I’ll check it.” Then he started walking our way.

  “Here goes,” I said. “You stand back. I’ll take care of him.”

  John flattened himself against the inner wall by the door. I stood directly behind it, at the hinges, as I heard footsteps coming closer. The door swung open, blocking John and me from the gangster. I heard him mutter a curse word on the other side as he examined the fuse box. I gently pushed the door closed. He turned, saw me, and before he could shout an alarm, I punched him hard in the face. Surprisingly, he didn’t go down. Dazed, he took a few steps back. I then had enough space to perform an ushiro geri—back kick. My boot slammed into his chest with such force that I’m sure his sternum cracked. Unfortunately, he reflexively reached out to one of the dining chairs that stood nearby, taking it down with him as he collapsed to the floor. The chair made a loud racket.

  John and I looked at each other with concern. Then we heard the men inside the shop call out, “Walt! You trip over your left foot?” Laughter. I jerked my head toward the corridor, so John and I bolted. “You gonna fix the door or what?” Purdy shouted. We rushed into the dark hallway that led toward the back of the building. Along the sides were a couple of half-open doors, revealing empty offices. As we turned the corner, the corridor emptied into the larger area of the shop. I held John back and put a finger to my lips.

  By now, one man was already on his way to the break room to check
on “Walt.” John checked his watch. “Six more minutes,” he said. “If Haggerty’s on time.”

  “I don’t think we can stall any longer,” I whispered.

  The man entered the break room, took one look at the floor, and shouted back at Purdy and the others. “Walt’s down! Someone’s here!”

  Immediately the other three men drew guns and went on alert, their eyes scanning the entire shop. The scout ran back to the group and also drew a weapon. Someone said, “Spread out, let’s find ’em.”

  “No,” said Purdy. “Stay where you are.”

  He walked over to Washington and aimed his gun at the man’s head. Then he called out loudly, “You better show yourself or your rat gets his head blown off!” He reached into his pocket and pulled out a little box with wires on it. “I found this strapped to his chest, underneath his shirt. Come on out. You NYPD? FBI? I count to three and you better show yourselves with hands up.”

  “I have to go out there,” John said.

  “No. Let me do it.”

  “One!” Purdy called.

  “It’s too dangerous!” John whispered.

  “Shut up!” I quickly evaluated the situation. The four men were twenty to thirty feet away from the corridor opening. There were a few big metal machines between us.

  “Two!”

  I stepped out of the corridor with hands up and said, “Here I am. Don’t shoot.”

  The men whirled around and pointed their guns. It was just like what happened when I met Don DeLuca at that warehouse. The difference there, though, was that DeLuca ordered his men not to kill me. I had no idea what Purdy was going to do.

  “Huh. So it’s you,” Purdy said. He smiled widely, revealing one gold tooth amongst shiny white ones. “You here by yourself, lady?”

  “Of course,” I answered.

  He nodded and then said, “Kill her.”

  My reflexes saved me, dear diary. I immediately dropped and rolled to a position behind a machine I think was a lathe. At the same moment, the men unleashed a volley of bullets that ricocheted off the machine and concrete floor. I squeezed myself into as small a form as possible, fully protected by the steel object.

  Then John went into action. He edged around the corridor corner and fired, hitting two men. The other two, including Purdy, leaped to the floor and crawled like madmen for cover behind other machinery. Once they were safe, they directed their aim toward the corridor entrance. I was trapped in the middle. One of the guys John hit wasn’t dead, so he joined in the foray as he lay on the floor, holding his bloody gut. After a few seconds, the gangsters had emptied their handguns and were forced to reload. John took that opportunity to lean out from behind the wall and shoot again. This time he put the wounded man completely out of action. I jumped to my feet and ran toward Purdy and his buddy. Purdy was behind a dilapidated table saw; he saw me just as he finished feeding his weapon, and he aimed. Although I hadn’t performed such a move since I was in gymnastics back in Odessa, I leaped for the table saw just as Purdy fired, barely missing me. With my palms on top of the machine, I managed to vault into a handspring. My legs soared up and over, and I collided feet first on top of Purdy! We tumbled to the floor and he dropped the gun. I swiveled on my right hip and kicked the weapon across the room.

  The other gunman made the mistake of rising from his cover in order to shoot me. John picked him off with a carefully aimed round to the head.

  Dear diary, I wasn’t accustomed to this much gunplay. To tell you the God’s truth, I was scared. Bullets had flown everywhere, and all I had with me were a couple of knives. For a few moments there, I was out in the open—and only now, as I sit in my bedroom and write this, do I realize how utterly vulnerable I was.

  Anyway, there we were. It was just Purdy, John, and me. Purdy was unarmed and on the floor. So what did I do? I jumped on him. I wanted to make sure the guy wasn’t going anywhere. I drew the stiletto and pressed the blade against Purdy’s neck.

  “Don’t move. You know I mean it,” I told him.

  John approached, his gun still trained on Purdy. He went over to Washington, whom I thought had passed out. He kneeled and examined the bloody body.

  “He was hit by a stray bullet,” John said. “He’s gone.”

  Before I could react to that news, I saw that John was wounded. Blood covered his right upper arm and he was holding the gun in his left hand.

  I couldn’t help it. I said his name. “John, you’re hurt.”

  “It’s all right,” he said. “In two minutes backup will—” And then a new voice boomed out, echoing in the cavernous machine shop. “Richardson! We’ll take over here!”

  A chubby guy in a suit stood in front of the break room; none of us had seen him. I didn’t know who he was. Three other men in suits stood beside him. They were young, good-looking, and well-dressed—exactly how I always imagined what an FBI agent looked like. Obviously they were the chubby guy’s inferiors but possibly more dangerous since they had guns aimed at us. Dear diary, for a single evening out as the Stiletto, I had a heck of a lot of guns pointed at me!

  “Haggerty!” John said.

  The fat guy was John’s boss. I thought—this doesn’t look good.

  The three armed agents moved around us, the guns pointed mostly at Purdy and me. The man called Haggerty ordered me to drop my stiletto, which I did. Then he said, “Put away your weapon, Richardson, we’re taking over. Two in one bag, not bad. Good work. Your little plan worked. You caught her. Lured her into the trap, just like you said you would.”

  What did he say? John’s ‘little plan’ worked?

  Oh my God, dear diary. I thought I couldn’t bear the betrayal. I felt as if I’d been stabbed in the heart. I wanted to collapse on the floor and just start bawling. But I didn’t.

  John, said, “Haggerty, this wasn’t—” As he lowered his gun, he looked at me and said, quietly, “I didn’t, I swear—”

  Haggerty addressed one of the armed male models. “Take Purdy out to the paddy wagon,” and then spoke to a second, “Load the evidence in the truck. Don’t open the loading door. Take it out the way we came in. I don’t care how many trips it takes you!”

  So one agent took hold of Purdy, got him on his feet, and walked him out through the break room. The other guy piled seven or eight wrapped “bricks” in his arms and followed his buddy outside.

  Haggerty’s remaining soldier continued to point his gun at me. I started to stand, but Haggerty barked, “Stay on your knees!”

  I did. I even raised my hands. My stiletto was on the floor, two feet away from my right knee. The armed agent moved around and put the barrel of the gun against the back of my head.

  “Cuff her,” Haggerty ordered. The agent deftly swept handcuffs on my left wrist and twisted my arm down and behind my back. I didn’t resist ’cause he did it with one hand—the other hand still held a gun to my skull. He then pulled down my right arm behind my back and locked the other cuff.

  If you thought I was scared before, dear diary, I was terrified at this point.

  Then Haggerty said, “It was a great plan, Richardson. Sleep with the Black Stiletto, get her to trust you, and coax the spider into the trap.”

  Oh, my God. I couldn’t believe it. John had betrayed me in more ways than one. I was shocked, frightened, and angry. I thought my heart was going to shrivel and die.

  Haggerty continued. “We gotta get you to the hospital. But first let’s unmask this bitch, what do you say?”

  It just gets worse, doesn’t it, dear diary!

  “No!” John said. “Let her go.”

  “Let her go? Don’t tell me you actually fell for the slut, Richardson. I realize she must be pretty good in the sack, but she’s the enemy.”

  The words I was hearing were the bullets that missed me earlier, dear diary.

  Suddenly John raised his gun at the man behind me and pulled the trigger—but the gun clicked empty.

  “Richardson, damn it,” Haggerty said. “Why’d you have to go a
nd do that? Now we gotta arrest you, too.”

  I could see that John was angry, confused, and in pain. “Are you mad?”

  Even though I was still reeling from the sudden realization that John had betrayed me and the fact that I was on my knees and about to be unmasked, the situation struck me as awfully fishy. Haggerty had given the order to a single agent to escort Purdy out, and he was also confiscating the heroin. Was that FBI standard operating procedure? What was going on?

  The agent doing the carrying came back for a second load.

  “Before we cuff you, Richardson, we’re gonna unmask her. Please continue, Agent Briggs.”

  Time stood still. I swear. I thought the Black Stiletto was finished. Over. Done.

  And then John did something which at first I thought was puzzling, and then just plain cowardly. But it turned out to be neither. He bolted and staggered-ran back toward the corridor! Agent Briggs swung his gun to John, but Haggerty snapped, “Keep your weapon on her, Briggs.” So he did. Then Haggerty shouted, “Where you going, Richardson? Don’t you want to watch? You won’t get far, you know.”

  I felt the agent’s hand on the top of my head, grasping my hood. Could I fight back with my hands cuffed behind my back? Did I have a fighting chance if I attacked the agent with my head and shoulders? Would I be able to knock away his gun and avoid being killed?

  Those questions were answered for me.

  “Pull it off, Briggs,” Haggerty commanded.

  The agent tugged on my mask, removing it from my head—just as the work lights suddenly went out. The place went pitch black.

  And I thought—I can do this. All that training while wearing a blindfold paid off. Soichiro did right by me. I propelled my body backward into the agent’s legs. The gun went off above my head—it was terribly loud, but I also heard the bullet ricochet off the cement floor. Before Briggs could react, I mentally pictured where my stiletto was on the floor, grabbed it behind my back, and then rolled to the side, out of the agent’s reach.

  He couldn’t see me. But I could sense him. I knew exactly where he stood. There in my mind’s eye I saw the precise position of his head. So I breathed deeply, assumed the stance, and performed a back kick that struck the guy hard. I heard him drop, stunned and hurting. His gun recoiled again, but I had no idea where the bullet went that time. It was nowhere near me, that’s for sure.