Memphis Noir

by Laureen Cantwell

  * * *

  Inside the screened porch of her historic home in Annesdale, Esther Stein Carter hung up the phone and returned to her knitting. Her son, Prosecutor Stephen Stein Carter, stood nearby.

  “Who was on the phone, Mother?”

  “Anna Jean. She will work the party tomorrow.”

  “Good ole Cousin Anna Jean. Our former maid is coming out of retirement and to our rescue from Queen Mae.”

  Mrs. Carter frowned.

  Stephen said, “After all, Father and Anna Jean did have the same great-grandpappy. Now didn’t they?” He laughed and slurped his bourbon.

  “Somebody sure needs to save us.”

  “Mother, please.”

  “Why did she name that child after me?”

  Stephen did not reply. He stirred his drink with a finger.

  “Has Emily returned?”

  “No, my wife headed off to her mother’s.”

  “Perhaps you should go there and console her.”

  Ice clinked against the sides of Stephen’s glass. “Mother, I am not in a consoling mood.”

  “Is she coming back for the event tomorrow?”

  “Of course, my wife wouldn’t miss Boss Crump and Senator McKellar.”

  “Did you let that girl go, like I told you?”

  Stephen laughed. “You and I know this is not the time to release Mae.” He stared at her. “I did fire Solomon Cooper, and he’s on notice to not cross me again.”

  “So, you think your wife is going to continue to allow her to work in our household, now that she knows?”

  Stephen sipped from his glass. “Why not? Isn’t that the Southern way? Besides, Mae wants to move west. Solomon Cooper is the problem, not Mae. The little black weasel should have kept his mouth shut.”

  “Have you lost your mind? Let her go. I am glad your father is not here to see this.”

  “Perhaps, Mother, but I am not doing anything Father and most of his cronies didn’t do.”

  “Stephen, you’re drunk.”

  “Mother,” he laughed, “I shall leave you in the peace between your Jewish and Protestant Sabbaths while I work on my campaign and get drunker.”

  “There’ll be no need for that if you don’t handle this.”

  He downed his drink and walked into the parlor and toward the front stairs.

  Mrs. Carter put her knitting aside, turned off the lamp, and rose to her feet. She pulled her shawl around her small shoulders and grabbed her purse. The seventy-year-old walked into the parlor, headed to the kitchen, and retrieved the automobile keys from the hook beside a cabinet.

  * * *

  Sergeant Smith held up a pistol by a pencil in its barrel. The slender white man wiped the sweat from his forehead and dried his hand on his shirt. “Dr. Walls, looks like this short .38 is the murder weapon.” He handed the gun to a man in a white coat with Coroner stitched on the pocket.

  Dr. Walls removed his glasses and adjusted his comb-over, which had wilted in the humidity. He bent over the body. “Shine your flashlights on her. Black powder. She was shot at close range. These two bullet wounds in the back appear to be the cause of death. I’ll autopsy her first thing in the morning.”

  The coroner handed the gun to Aaron.

  “Boy, hold it by the pencil!” the coroner barked, then turned Mae’s body over.

  Aaron grasped the pencil and stared at the gun.

  Smith said, “Somebody roughed her up, but she’s a pretty colored gal . . . dressed mighty fancy too.”

  Ernest Withers’s camera flashed.

  “Anybody know her?” Smith looked at Aaron.

  Aaron squatted beside him. “She’s Mae Clark and works with me at the Carters. Mae grew up in my neighborhood.”

  “When you last see her?” the sergeant asked.

  “Dropped her off at the Hipp just befo’ I saw you in the Peabody alley. Got back in time to catch her last two numbers. I was supposed to drive her home, but the bartender told me she left with her boyfriend, Solomon Cooper.”

  Both stood, and Sergeant Smith looked up at the six-foot-two Aaron. “I heard you had a fight with Sol out back of the club earlier this evening.”

  Aaron said, “Yes sir,” and handed over the pistol.

  “I got eyes all over this town.”

  “Then you ought to be able to help me find out who killed her.”

  “Washington, I know you been unofficially helping Prosecutor Carter with his cases, but this town ain’t ready for colored cops to investigate murders.” He removed his cap and ran his fingers through his oily black hair. “Solomon Cooper, I locked that boy up befo’. Ain’t he from over there in South Memphis?”

  Aaron stared at Mae’s body and nodded.

  Smith said, “I’ll send a car to pick up Solomon. Meet me back at the police station by two.”

  In the glare of the flashlights, black pools replaced Mae Clark’s beautiful brown eyes. The camera flashed. Aaron Washington put his hands in his pockets and moved through the crowd across the cobblestones.

  “Mae, Mae, whoever did this is going to pay.” He pulled out and opened the pink compact. Its mirror was broken. And Aaron thought back to earlier that evening . . .

  * * *

  Solomon Cooper paced back and forth behind Club Hippodrome, a cigarette hanging from his lips. His anger rose with each syllable Mae sang. He turned when he saw Aaron Washington striding through the parking lot.

  “Policeman, you working for Mista Whitey tonight or you here for personal reasons?”

  Aaron slowed but kept moving.

  “Ain’t you heard me, Mista Police Chauffeur?”

  Aaron turned and closed on Sol. “Boy, don’t get hurt tonight.”

  “Don’t be wolfing me. I can handle things if the white man and his toy police stay out of my business!”

  “Sol, I walked the black forests in the Ardennes alone. Keep yo’ damn mouth shut,” he pointed into the man’s dark face, “or get your 4-F ass ready to go to war.”

  Sol drew back to take a swing at Aaron, who blocked the punch before it was thrown, grabbed Sol, and slammed him to the ground.

  “You got enough, or you want some mo’?”

  Sol moaned.

  “I’m gonna whip on you till you say we done.”

  Solomon breathed hard. “We done . . . we, we, done.”

  Aaron adjusted his suit and turned toward the Hippodrome’s rear door. Inside, Queen Mae was singing “Don’t Sit under the Apple Tree.”

  Solomon Cooper put his hands on the ground to get up, and his left hand closed on something. He slipped the pistol into his pocket with a smile.

  Across the parking lot, someone inside a shiny black Lincoln watched and waited.

  * * *

  Solomon Cooper was picking gravel from his clothing and his hair when Mae stepped through the rear door of the Club Hippodrome.

  “Mae, what’s going on?”

  “Nothing, Sol. Just waiting for Mr. Calloway to start his show.” She pointed at Sol’s bleeding hands. “What happened to you?”

  “Colored police brutality.”

  “What you and Aaron into it about?”

  Sol looked at Mae and answered her question with one of his own: “Can you take a ride with me?”

  “I don’t know, Sol. I want to hear the show.”

  “We need to talk ’bout that move you want to make.” He flashed a roll of bills.

  Mae smiled. “Why can’t we talk tomorrow?”

  “’Cause I want to talk tonight, right now.”

  She pulled out a Lucky Strike. Sol obliged with his lighter, and Mae exhaled that first big puff. “Where’s your car?”

  Sol offered his arm and led Mae to his ’39 Ford.

  Emily Carter sipped the last of the Double Cola. Her companion took the bottle, and it rang against the whiskey when he placed it in a brown paper bag.

  Emily said, “My husband and I used to come down here, back when we were lovers.”

  The man said, “Well you he
re with a better lover now.” He pulled her close into a long kiss. “Mrs. Carter, no more talk about the prosecutor.” He kissed her again.

  * * *

  Aaron used his key to enter the shotgun house on Euclid.

  From the middle room, Miss Anna Jean Washington called, “Aaron, is that you?”

  “Yes, Mama, it’s me.”

  “Good, guess I can put my pistol back under the pillow.”

  “Where and when did you get that .25?”

  “Miss Esther had Mr. Stephen give it to me while you were at war. He bought ’em for his black mama, his white mother, and his wife.”

  “What did he get his black wife?”

  “A cute red baby.”

  They both laughed.

  Aaron said, “You know how to handle that thing?”

  “Old womens knows all kinds of things.”

  Aaron hugged her.

  “What time is it?”

  “Three thirty a.m. Mama, I got bad news.”

  “Mae dead, ain’t she?”

  He sat on her bed. “How you know ’bout it?”

  “My phone started ringing two hours ago. Tried to tell Mae to slow down, but she wouldn’t listen.”

  “Mama, looks like Solomon Cooper did it.”

  “Have they arrested him?”

  “Yes ma’am, and he’s been placed at the scene with her.”

  “Did he say he done it?”

  “They roughed him up pretty good, and he admitted to killing her. They found his fingerprints on the gun.”

  “What Sol doing with a gun?”

  “He got if off me in a fight this evening.”

  “Boy, when you get a pistol?”

  “This evening. Mama, I’m a policeman, and I need a gun out there.”

  “Maybe you need to quit the force.”

  “Well, I haven’t, and now Mae Clark’s dead.”

  “Aaron Washington, I told you not to fool ’round with that gal. She got a baby by Mr. Stephen, and now this fool Sol done told Miss Emily all ’bout it.”

  “How you know that?”

  “Miss Esther done called to tell me.”

  “How often you talk to that old hag?”

  “She calls eve’y day.”

  Aaron laughed. “I told you the Carters wouldn’t know what to do after you retired. Did you talk to Miss Esther this evening?”

  “She awful upset. That woman talked and talked and talked ’bout how mad she is ’cause Mae named her daughter after her.”

  “Three years later and she’s still having a fit. And the judge is probably turning in his grave over at Elmwood.”

  Miss Anna Jean laughed. “I had to work somewhere, and he just happened to be kin and white. Son, they’re good folks. But I’ll never get the twisted ways that makes a person mad about your only grandchild being named after you. It’s a sickness that takes a long time for even the Holy Ghost and Jesus to cure.”

  Aaron said, “Mr. Stephen came to the police station this evening.”

  “How was he?”

  “Shook up, angry, really mad. He plans to go for the electric chair.”

  “Huh, that young gal done put a spell on him.”

  “Wonder what’ll happen to Mae’s daughter now.”

  “Her grandmama’ll keep on raising her.”

  Aaron walked to the front room, disrobed, and lay down on his bed. “Mama,” he called through the door, “she wrote me all those letters while I was away.”

  “Aaron, I know you cared ’bout Mae. I cried when I wrote to tell you she was with child by Mr. Stephen.”

  As Aaron lay there, Mae’s face flashed before his eyes. Just hours ago she was alive and in his life. His breathing slowed. The memory of her voice reverberated.

  “Mae dedicated her last song to me, ‘The Very Thought of You,’” Aaron said as he drifted off to sleep, remembering how he got that revolver . . .

  * * *

  When Aaron pulled the Hudson into the alley behind the Peabody Hotel just before nine, three Negro workers stood in his headlights. Cigarette smoke rose in the night air, and their banter echoed across the brick, mortar, and paved urban space. Aaron killed the lights and motor.

  One of the men pitched two dice against the wall, then said, “Watch out, boys! Here come the colored police.”

  The group laughed, but stopped when Aaron walked around the car and stood over the man. Aaron pulled a pack of Camels from his pocket, thumped out a cigarette, and placed it between his lips. Another porter popped open a lighter and kicked the flame to life. Aaron leaned into the man’s hand and inhaled.

  The dice shooter stood and looked up into Aaron’s piercing brown eyes. Aaron blew smoke into the man’s face, opened his palm, and the man placed the bones into Aaron’s hand.

  “Yeah, I’m the colored po-lice.” He took another drag on the Camel and pocketed the dice. “If you boys want to spend a few days in jail, keep on in this alley.” He found the eyes of each man in the dim light before bursting into laughter.

  One by one, the four men shook hands.

  Another worker, dressed in a red jacket, spoke: “You working tonight?”

  Aaron said, “That’s a fine thing for the Peabody’s Duck Master to ask. It’s Saturday night, and most of us coloreds, including us police, is working.” He found their eyes again. “And y’all be careful ’cause a bunch of them white-boy cops out here too!”

  A car sped toward them from the west end of the alley.

  Aaron said, “Here comes one right now.”

  A black-and-white cruiser came to a stop next to the men. The policeman spoke through the window: “What you boys doing out here?”

  Aaron spoke up: “Evening, Sergeant Smith.”

  The white cop leaned through the window. “Washington, didn’t recognize you, boy. Everything all right wit’ this group?”

  “Yes sir, everything’s top shelf.”

  “Ain’t you posted at the Hippodrome this evening?”

  “Yes sir, getting ready to head back over now.”

  “See you do that right away.” He looked at the other men. “You boys get back inside the hotel. Wouldn’t want y’all doing something y’all might regret.”

  Smith hit the side of his car and zoomed away. The men watched his brake lights turn red at the end of the alley, then the cruiser turned north onto Third toward Union.

  One of the porters adjusted his bow tie and white jacket. “How you work for that dude?”

  Another in identical garb replied, “Officer, le’ me answer that . . . The same way we do for that fool inside.”

  The four men laughed. The two porters walked away.

  Aaron turned to Edward Pembroke, Duck Master. “Ed, you got it?”

  Ed looked around before pulling a revolver from his pocket. He handed it to Aaron who kicked open and spun the bullet-filled chamber.

  “Thanks, man. Colt Detective Special .38. Where you get it?”

  “Found it on the hotel roof, next to the duck pens.”

  “Sure enough,” Aaron said. He snapped the gun closed and put the pistol into his right front pants pocket. “Now I’ll have some help out here. How you like teaching those ducks to march?”

  “It’s a lot better than raising cotton.”

  They both laughed.

  Edward Pembroke said, “Who’s at the Hipp tonight?”

  “Queen Mae’s opening for Cab Calloway.”

  “Whooo, that pretty gal and Mr. Hi-Dee-Hi-Dee-Ho.”

  “I better get back befo’ some fool lose his mind.”

  * * *

  The sun was already hot at nine thirty a.m. on Sunday when Aaron and Miss Anna Jean stopped a block east of their shotgun at the home of Sallie Clark, Mae’s mama.

  Miss Anna Jean said, “Look at all those grandchildren.”

  Ten children ran back and forth, chasing a ball, pushing an empty bicycle rim with a stick, playing jump rope, or digging in the dirt. One looked to be around three. Her sandy-brown hair was thick, curly
, and moplike. She had skin that was a golden tan, too light for black and too dark for white.

  Aaron said, “Think Mae’s baby knows yet?”

  “Thank the Lord she too young to understand.”

  A ten-year-old approached. “Hello, Miss Anna Jean! You come to see my grandma?” He stood on the passenger-side running board. Several of his cousins joined him. Mae’s daughter squeezed between the boy and the front passenger door.

  Miss Anna Jean said, “Hello, Stein, how are you? You have the prettiest green eyes.”

  “Thank you,” the child responded. “Do you know my mama? Grandma says she went to heaven last night.”

  “Yes, Stein, your mama sure did,” Miss Anna Jean said.

  Aaron got out of the car and reached into the backseat for the box of Miss Anna Jean’s fried chicken.

  Miss Anna Jean whispered, “Stein, I’ve seen eyes like yours but on another face.”

  The young child’s eyes widened and she smiled. “My mama says my other grandma’s eyes are just like mine.”

  She and her cousins scattered when Aaron opened the passenger door to help Miss Anna Jean from the car. She paused to look at Aaron. “Son, looking at that baby gives me the green-eyed blues.”

  * * *

  “Emily, where were you last night?”

  “Why do you care?” She brushed her thick auburn hair.

  Stephen exhaled. “We got a house full of guests arriving. Much is riding on this event.”

  “I was at my mother’s last night.”

  “Yes, but you were not there at one thirty a.m.”

  “So, are you acting as prosecutor, judge, or loving husband?”

  “I drove by on my way to the police station to interrogate Sol. Your Lincoln was not there.”

  “So you’re tracking me by my Lincoln . . . guess that’s why you begged your mother to purchase one for me, you, and her. I bet you and Solomon had a great visit.”

  “There wasn’t anything nice about it. I am charging Solomon with first-degree murder and going for the electric chair.”

  “That ought to help you win the white and black vote while avenging poor little Mae.”

  “You act like such a bitch.”

  “The most skilled bastard in Memphis taught me how.”

  Stephen jerked the knot into his necktie and put on his suit coat. He reached for the door.

  Emily asked, “What kind of gun killed our Queen Mae?”