The RagTime Traveler

by Larry Karp

  Tom nodded.

  The boy was surprised at the woman who answered Saramae’s knock; she was well-proportioned, probably pushing eighty, an inch short of his own height, with an elegant beehive of black hair. Not even close to the clone of Aunt Jemima he’d pictured when he heard the name “Granny Elvira.” So much for prejudice.

  She gave Tom a quick up-and-down, then turned a questioning face onto his companion. “What’s goin’ on, Saramae?” she asked. “You got manners enough to introduce your friend?”

  “This’s Tom Chandler, Granny Elvira. I met him downtown, and he lookin’ for JJ in a big way. Says it’s real important.”

  “Oh, is it? Tom Chandler…this be the boy ol’ Calvin call me about. You don’t give up easy, do you, Boy?”

  “No, Ma’am, I don’t. And I don’t mean to bother you, but it really is important for me to talk to JJ.”

  “You gonna tell me what it be about?”

  Saramae elbowed Tom in the ribs and gave him a quick nod.

  “It’s about Mickey Potash, Ma’am.”

  “Hmm. That old boozehound. What about him?”

  Tom took a deep breath. He didn’t see any suspicious bulges in the woman’s dress. In for a penny, in for a pound. “He’s dead, Ma’am. Murdered.”

  He could see that got Elvira’s attention, but she caught herself quickly. “Well, I guess I’m sorry to hear it—he been good to my boy. But why’s it so important you talk to Jackson about it?”

  “Few things. One is that the cops are going to find him and want to talk about the murder. And…well, Mickey and my grandpa are friends from way back, they both play ragtime piano. Mickey’s got some music he wanted my grandpa to see. We were over there last night and met JJ. So we figured that with…what happened, we ought to talk to him about the music.”

  “Grandpa? And you a Chandler?” Elvira’s hand flew to her mouth. “You tellin’ me you be Alan Chandler’s grandson?”

  “Yes, Ma’am.”

  “Greatest ragtime piano player on Earth. Maybe the greatest ever. Don’t think I’ve missed hearing him play at one single Joplin Festival since they begun, and when I go up and tell him how much I like his music, he just so nice, almost bashful.” She squinted to get a better look at Tom. “An’ you the boy been playin’ with him these last years. His grandson! My! You know how lucky you are?”

  “Yes, Ma’am. And I’m not as good yet as my grandpa, but I’m working on it.”

  The woman laughed, a silvery-bell sound. “However good you be, you got a way to go.”

  “Yes, Ma’am. I know that. But Alan also says I shouldn’t ever aim low.”

  Elvira nodded, and motioned behind her. “Come on in. I’ll wake Jackson up for you.”

  “Thank you, Mrs….”

  “Jackson. But you call me Granny, like all of his friends. He live here with me—he’s all I got and the other way ’round too.”

  She led Tom and Saramae into a bright living room and motioned for them to sit on a sofa with a bright blue cover dotted with yellow flowers. “I’ll be right back,” she said, and walked off into a hallway to the right.

  “You don’t care if I stay, do you, Tom?” Saramae grinned. “Ain’t nothing this much fun ever happened to me.”

  “No, it’s fine.” What else can I say? “You live around here?”

  She shook her head. “No, way back in the sixties, my family move down on Moniteau Avenue, south of Broadway. Got white folks to each side.” She flashed a sly smile.

  “Cool. Want to give me your address and phone number?”

  “Why? Am I important, too? Like JJ?”

  “You just might be. One never knows…do one?”

  The girl broke into a raucous laugh. “You could be Fats Waller, ’cept you white and you ain’t fat.”

  “And I’m alive.”

  “Yeah, that too.” She reached into her backpack, pulled out a notebook, and scribbled on a page. When she finished, she tore it out and passed it to Tom.

  “Hmmm. Saramae Blackstone, 000 Moniteau Ave.” He looked up. “Zero, zero, zero?”

  “What kinda girl you think I am? Givin’ out my address to some white boy I just meet? Hell, we ain’t even been properly introduced!”

  Tom snickered. “But you’ll smooch me on the sidewalk?” He shook his head. “Phone number’s just as good.” He balanced the paper on his knee, fumbled his iPhone out of his pocket, and tapped the screen.

  Elvira came in, carrying a little wooden tray with two glasses of lemonade and a plate of cookies, which she set down on the small coffee table in front of the couch. “Here you go,” she said. “Can’t talk about murder and music on an empty stomach. I’ll go get the boy for you.”

  As she walked away again, Tom entered Saramae’s name and phone number. He started to reach for a cookie, then remembered what he’d promised Alan. Here he was, sitting inside a house no one knew he had gone to, a house owned by a woman who allegedly packed some mean heat and didn’t take well to white boys coming to her door. And now she was serving him food and drink. But she’d left the glasses for each of them to pick up, and there was only one plate of cookies.

  Don’t think she’d take a chance of poisoning Saramae. Better be polite and take a cookie.

  ***

  Alan groaned as he crossed the lobby toward the elevators. Detective Parks was leaning on the front desk, talking to the clerk. He considered trying to sneak past, but gave up when the clerk aimed a finger in his direction. As the detective walked toward him, Alan let his shoulders slump, stopped trying to ignore his tiredness and the ache in his back, and plastered on a cordial-through-the-pain smile.

  “Mr. Parks. I was wondering when I’d hear from you.”

  “Wondered how long you could avoid me, I’m sure. Nobody ever wants to see me when it comes time to give a statement.”

  “Strange, isn’t it?” Alan shrugged elaborately. “Is this something we can do up in my room? I need to sit for a bit.”

  “Sorry, Mr. Chandler. I need you to come down to the station. Procedure.”

  “Then you’ll need to give me a couple of minutes to leave my grandson a note and take my pills.”

  “I can do that.” The detective gestured toward the elevator. “After you, Sir.” After a couple of steps, he went on with a carefully casual air, “Where is your grandson? Tom, right?”

  “‘Around’ is the best I can tell you.” Alan’s reply was equally casual. “He’s upset. Tom’s known Mickey since he was a little boy; they were very fond of each other. He needed some time to himself. I told him to take a walk around town, burn some energy. Do something so he can…what do the shrinks call it? Process. So he can process what he saw. I was the same way at that age.”

  “Mmph.” Parks didn’t look like he was buying what Alan was selling, but he wasn’t walking out of the store either.

  Alan unlocked the door and tossed Tom’s backpack on the bed, trying to make it look like the pack was unimportant. He stepped into the bathroom and selected a Compazine, a Vicodin, and another Imodium from an impressive lineup of small brown bottles on the counter next to the sink.

  “Quite the pharmacy you’ve got there, Mr. Chandler.”

  Alan eyed the line of bottles with disgust. “And not a one of them does anything interesting. Cancer’s no fun, and neither is the medication. If you need to copy the list…” He fished out his pocket notebook, started to flip through it.

  “That shouldn’t be necessary. It’s not like Mr. Potash was poisoned.”

  Alan nodded and sat at the desk. He dashed off a note to Tom— “Gone to visit Detective Parks. Back soon. Wait for me.”

  “That’s Tom’s backpack, isn’t it, Mr. Chandler?”

  “It is.”

  “Mind if I have a look inside?”

  “Go ahead. Nothing in it you didn’t see earl
ier.” Alan finished writing, then turned to Parks. “Like I said this morning, that’s how Mickey got me out here,” Alan said before the detective could speak. “Sent me the music with a note that didn’t really say anything. Tom and I got on the first plane we could get, and here we are.”

  “And why is your grandson carrying it around town?”

  “I’m not going to leave this music—a major discovery—sitting in a hotel room where a maid could mess with it or someone could break in and grab it. After what happened to poor Mickey, I’m keeping it where I can see it.”

  Parks flipped through the pages. “Looks like music, I suppose.” He slid them back into the envelope. “I could impound these as evidence in Mr. Potash’s murder. Probably should.” He held up a hand, cutting off Alan’s outburst. “I should, but I won’t. If.”

  “If?”

  “Let me take pictures for the case file and I’ll let you hold onto them.”

  “Absolutely.”

  “But if I find any evidence you’re lying about how and when you got these, your name goes straight to the top of the list of suspects, and you go straight behind bars. Hear me?”

  “Loud and clear. You can see the address and postmark on the envelope.” Alan plucked the envelope out of Parks’ hand and tapped the postage sticker in the corner. He tucked the envelope back into the pack and swung it over his shoulder. “Can you bring me back here when we’re done, or should I drive myself to the station?”

  ***

  As JJ came through the door with Elvira, Tom lowered his glass and held his breath. JJ hadn’t bothered to change out of his blue-and-black-striped pajamas. His hands were empty, eyebrows at half-mast; he shuffled forward in bedroom slippers. No concealed weapons there.

  “Sorry to bother you,” Tom said. “But I figured this was real important.”

  JJ answered with a shrug, then plopped into a padded chair facing the sofa. “So, okay,” he muttered. “I’m here. Talk.”

  “Well, it’s about Mickey.”

  “Tha’s what Granny Elvira say. What about Mickey, huh?”

  Tom blew out a deep breath. “JJ, I don’t have any good way to say it. Mickey’s dead. Somebody murdered him last night.”

  The change in JJ’s demeanor was astounding. He straightened to attention in the chair, eyes bulged. He leaned forward past the lemonade and cookies to grab Tom’s shirtfront. “Man, you better not be trying to pull something on me.”

  Tom wriggled himself free. “No, it’s God’s truth, and I’m sorry to have to be the one to tell you. But…” He waved his hand, trying to summon the right words. “My grandfather and me found him this morning. Cops’re all over it, so I figured I’d better find you and let you know. Good thing Saramae could get me here.”

  The girl flashed a quick grin at his recognition of her contribution.

  JJ shot Tom a suspicious glare. “That ain’t the only reason you come by, now, is it?”

  “No.” Tom’s voice softened. “My grandfather and I flew out here yesterday because Mickey wanted his help figuring out who’d written some old music manuscripts. We went to see him last night, when we met you, and were supposed to go back this morning to do some work with him.”

  “Yeah, I get that. You still ain’t tellin’ me why you sittin’ here today with me.”

  Tom made a quick decision to shade the truth a little. “After you left, Mickey told us that you were the best friend he had, and you knew where he stashed the music when he wasn’t looking at it. That a good enough reason for you?”

  JJ’s face hardened. “It’s gonna be good for you, sure. But how do I know it’s good for me? And not maybe bad.”

  Tom wondered whether he should go ahead without Alan’s agreement. But I’m here and Alan’s not… “Try starting with this: we could play ball with the cops or we could play with you. And I’m here.”

  “But how do I know you ain’t playin’ on the cop team?” He leaned forward in the chair. “Pull up your shirt, Man. Let’s see if you carryin’ a wire.”

  Tom did as he was told. “We’re not playing with the cops. My grandpa wants that music, and he also wants to nail the bastard who killed Mickey. You’re our best hope.”

  JJ took a moment to think. “You never did tell me how they got Mickey. Gun? Knife?”

  Tom shook his head. “He was strangled with a piano string.”

  “Piano string?! You ain’t shittin’ me, are you?” He took a moment to study Tom’s face. “No, you ain’t. Fuck.”

  Disgust covered Saramae’s face. “Piano wire? That be all kindsa messed up shit!”

  “JJ, do you have any idea who might have done it? And where that duffel bag with the music is.”

  “Well, it ain’t here, if that’s what you’re thinkin’.” JJ sat back. “Mickey wouldn’t never let it out of his own hands, not for a minute, not for nothin’.”

  “I believe that.”

  “But yeah, I know where he keep it.” The young black man considered, decided to go on. “He give me the key, jus’ to be safe. That hall closet, were it still locked?”

  Tom shook his head. “No, it was open.”

  “Well, hell. I tell Mickey that stupid padlock were a piece o’ crap.”

  “The lock was still locked. Whoever it was ripped the thing out of the wall.” Everyone was silent for a few seconds, then Tom added, “So the music’s gone. Damn.”

  “Maybe, maybe not,” JJ said slowly. He held up a hand, Stop, as Tom rose halfway out of his chair. “I ain’t gonna tell you everythin’ just like that. Here’s what we gonna do: tonight, late, we gonna go by that house an’ take us a look. You an’ me. An’ if we finds it, we gonna do some heavy talkin’. An’ if we don’t find it, we gonna talk maybe even heavier.”

  “But won’t the cops have a watch on the house?”

  JJ laughed. “Prob’ly not. What for? They doin’ what they got to do there now, an’ no reason for them to keep a man sittin’ on his ass all night. An’ it won’t take but no time for us to know if the duffel’s there or not.”

  “But if you work nights—”

  “I gets an hour for dinner, three a.m. to four. Won’t be no trouble a’tall to do what we gotta do in that hour. You’se probably a virgin, but I knows what we gonna have to do.”

  I’ll bet you do. Tom nodded his head. “I’ll have to talk to my grandpa—see if he wants to be there, too. But figure it’s a go.”

  “Just one minute now, boys.” For the first time, Elvira broke into the dialogue. “You don’t think I’m just gonna sit back and let my boy go on by hisself with that monkey business. I be there with you; best you have a lookout while you’se pokin’ around inside a hot house like that. An’ I ain’t no virgin either.”

  Saramae tried, but couldn’t stifle a snicker. Elvira reached across to punch her arm.

  “Yeah, Granny, okay.” JJ smiled. “So let’s figure we meet at, oh, ten minutes pas’ three, on Third, halfway between Lafayette and Washington. Everybody wearin’ black, right? An’ not together. Tom, you be on the south side of the street, I be on the north, and Granny, you gonna be on the Lafayette corner. If a nice ol’ lady, goin’ first, see somethin’ she don’t like, she let us know: two hands up in the air, we all go back and tomorrow we gets together here, after my shift—say nine o’clock—and figure what’s next. Got it?”

  Nods all around.

  JJ stood, stretched, yawned. “Good, then. Now if you all ’scuse me, I gonna go back an’ finish up my beauty sleep. Gotta be at my best tonight.”

  Saramae snickered again. “Think you gots’nuff sleep time ’tween now an’ then? Gonna take more’n a few hours to make you beautiful, I’m thinkin’.”

  JJ glared at her. “Knock off that crap, Girl. Straight-A student like you got no damn business talkin’ like some country nigger ain’t never seen the inside of a classroom. You oughta be �
�shamed—your daddy be the editor of the paper, he talk beautiful English, an’ I knows you did too, up ’til maybe a couple a years ago. I wish I could talk good as you, an’ if I could, I sure as hell would.”

  Saramae shot a quick glance sideways at Tom, and blushed slightly. She held up both hands in an “I surrender” gesture and mumbled, “Sorry.”

  ***

  Detective Parks dropped the typed copy of Alan’s statement on the table. “Check it over, and if there are no mistakes, sign here and initial each page.” He sighed. “I will need to take a statement from Tom too.”

  Alan looked up from the stack of paper. “You really think he could have done that to Mickey?”

  “What I think is beside the point, Mr. Chandler. According to your statement, Tom was the first to see Mr. Potash’s body, and he was alone at the time.” He dragged the phone on his desk a little closer. “Is he likely to be back at the hotel by now?”

  “Probably.” Alan glanced at the clock. “Almost certainly, by now.”

  “Good. Ask him to come down here. We’ll take his statement, then give you both a lift back.” He dialed the hotel, identified himself and asked to be put through to Mr. Chandler’s room. While the phone was ringing, he handed it to Alan.

  “Alan!” Tom cried. “Is that you? Are you okay?”

  “I’m good. Good enough, anyway. How’re you doing, Thomas? Holding up?”

  “I’m okay.” Tom sounded wary, as though it was a trick question.

  “Glad to hear it. Listen, I hate to make you do this, but Mr. Parks insists on taking your statement. Can you bring yourself down to the station?”

  “I guess so…If you’re sure I should.”

  “I do. Detective Parks is being careful and thorough.”

  “Gotcha, Alan. See you in a bit.”

  ***

  On their way back from the police station, statements given, Tom’s hangdog expression faded, replaced by a broad grin. Alan muttered, “You did good, but hold on now until we get to the room. Don’t blow it.”

  As they got out of the Bothwell elevator, Tom turned down the hall, away from their room. “Hang on a second, Alan,” he said. A short way along, the boy stopped before a vase in a decorative niche. He tipped the vase up on edge, pulled a small envelope out of the cavity on its underside, and set the vase back down before he rejoined Alan.