“The bars have closed,” Grave Digger said. “We’d better take a look in the valley before checking in.”
“What about Jake?”
“He’ll keep. But first let’s look see what’s cooking in all this heat.”
They got into their little black sedan and drove off, looking like two farmers who had just arrived in town.
3
It was 3:30 a.m. before they finally got back to the precinct station to write out their report.
The heat had detained them.
Even at past two in the morning, “The Valley,” that flat lowland of Harlem east of Seventh Avenue, was like the frying pan of hell. Heat was coming out of the pavement, bubbling from the asphalt; and the atmospheric pressure was pushing it back to earth like the lid on a pan.
Colored people were cooking in their overcrowded, overpriced tenements; cooking in the streets, in the after-hours joints, in the brothels; seasoned with vice, disease and crime.
An effluvium of hot stinks arose from the frying pan and hung in the hot motionless air, no higher than the rooftops — the smell of sizzling barbecue, fried hair, exhaust fumes, rotting garbage, cheap perfumes, unwashed bodies, decayed buildings, dog-rat-and-cat offal, whiskey and vomit, and all the old dried-up odors of poverty.
Half-nude people sat in open windows, crowded on the fire escapes, shuffled up and down the sidewalks, prowled up and down the streets in dilapidated cars.
It was too hot to sleep. Everyone was too evil to love. And it was too noisy to relax and dream of cool swimming holes and the shade of chinaberry trees. The night was filled with the blare of countless radios, the frenetic blasting of spasm cats playing in the streets, hysterical laughter, automobile horns, strident curses, loudmouthed arguments, the screams of knife fights.
The bars were closed so they were drinking out of bottles. That was all there was left to do, drink strong bad whiskey and get hotter; and after that steal and fight.
Grave Digger and Coffin Ed had been held up by an outburst of petty crime.
Thieves had broken into a supermarket and had stolen 50 pounds of stew beef, 20 pounds of smoked sausage, 20 pounds of chicken livers, 29 pounds of oleomargarine, 32 pounds of cooking lard, and one TV set.
A drunk had staggered into a funeral parlor and had refused to leave until he got “first-class service.”
A man had stabbed a woman because she “wouldn’t give him none.”
A woman had stabbed a man whom she claimed had stepped on the corn on her left little toe.
Then on their way in they got held up again by a free-for-all on Eighth Avenue and 126th Street. It had been started by a man attacking another man with a knife in a dice game in a room back of a greasy spoon restaurant. The attacked man had run out into the street and grabbed a piece of iron pipe from a garbage can where he had cached it for just such an emergency before joining the dice game. When the man with the knife saw his erstwhile victim coming back with the iron pipe, he did an about-face and took off in the opposite direction. Then a friend of the man with the knife charged from a dark doorway wielding a baseball bat and began to duel the man with the pipe. The man with the knife turned back to help his friend with the baseball bat. Upon seeing what was happening, the cook came from the greasy spoon, wielding a meat cleaver, and demanded fair play. Whereupon the man with the knife engaged the cook with the cleaver in a separate duel.
When Grave Digger and Coffin Ed arrived at the scene, the hot dusty air was being churned up by the slinging and slashing of weapons.
Without engaging in preliminaries, Coffin Ed began pistol-whipping the man with the knife. The man was staggering about on the sidewalk, holding on to his knife which he was too scared to use; his legs were wobbling and his knees were buckling and he was saying, “You can’t hurt me hitting me on the head.”
With his left hand, Grave Digger began slapping the face of the man with the baseball bat, and with his right hand fanning the air with his pistol to keep back the crowd; at the same time shouting, “Straighten up!”
Coffin Ed was echoing, “Count off, red-eye! Fly right!”
Both of them looked just as red-eyed, greasy-faced, sweaty and evil as all the other colored people gathered about, combatants and spectators alike. They were of a similar size and build to other “working stiffs” — big, broad-shouldered, loose-jointed and flat-footed. Their faces bore marks and scars similar to any colored street fighter. Grave Digger’s was full of lumps where felons had hit him from time to time with various weapons; while Coffin Ed’s was a patchwork of scars where skin had been grafted over the burns left by acid thrown into his face.
The difference was they had the pistols, and everyone in Harlem knew them as the “Mens”.
The cook took advantage of this situation to slip back into his kitchen and hide his meat cleaver behind the stove. While the man with the pipe quickly cached his weapon inside his pants leg and went limping rapidly away like a wooden-legged man in a race of one-legged men.
After a little, peace was restored. Without a word or backward glance, Grave Digger and Coffin Ed walked to their car, climbed in and drove off.
They checked into the precinct station and wrote their report.
When Lieutenant Anderson finished reading the statement of the janitor’s wife as to the reason Pinky put in the false fire alarm, he asked incredulously, “Do you believe that?”
“Yeah,” Grave Digger replied. “I’ll believe it until some better reason comes along.”
Lieutenant Anderson shook his head. “The motives these people have for crimes.”
“When you think about them, they make sense,” Coffin Ed said argumentatively.
Lieutenant Anderson wiped the sweat from his face with a limp dirty handkerchief.
“That’s all right for the psychiatrists, but we’re cops,” he said.
Grave Digger winked at Coffin Ed.
“If you’re white, all right,” he recited in the voice of a schoolboy.
Coffin Ed took it up. “If you’re brown, stick around …”
Grave Digger capped it, “If you’re black, stand back.”
Lieutenant Anderson reddened. He was accustomed to his two ace detectives needling him, but it always made him feel a little uneasy.
“That might all be true,” he said. “But these crimes cost the taxpayers money.”
“You ain’t kidding,” Grave Digger confirmed.
Coffin Ed changed the subject. “Have you heard whether they caught him?”
Lieutenant Anderson shook his head. “They caught everyone but him — bums, perverts, whores, tricks, and one hermit.”
“He won’t be too hard to find,” Grave Digger said. “There ain’t too many places for a giant albino Negro turning black-and-blue to hide.”
“All right, let’s stop the clowning,” Anderson said. “What about this charge against a drug pusher?”
“He’s one of the big sources of supply for colored addicts up here, but he’s smart enough to keep out of Harlem,” Grave Digger said.
“When we saw him choking, we knew he’d been eating the decks he had on him, so before he could digest them we got enough out of him to convict him of possession anyway.”
“It’s in that envelope,” Grave Digger said, nodding toward the desk. “When it’s analyzed, they’ll find five or six half-chewed decks of heroin.”
Anderson opened the end of the brown manila envelope lying atop the desk which the detectives had turned in as evidence. He shook out the folded handkerchief and opened it.
“Phew!” he exclaimed, drawing back. “It stinks.”
“It doesn’t stink anymore than a dirty pusher,” Grave Digger said. “I hate this type of criminal worse than God hates sin.”
“What’s the other stuff with it?” Anderson asked, pushing the mess about with the tip of his pencil.
Coffin Ed chuckled. “Whatever he last ate before he started eating evidence.”
Anderson looked sober. “I know your inte
ntions are good, but you can’t go around slugging people in the belly to collect evidence, even if they are felons. You know that this man has been taken to the hospital.”
“Don’t worry, he won’t protest,” Grave Digger said.
“Not if he knows what’s good for him,” Coffin Ed echoed.
“Every precinct’s not like Harlem,” Anderson cautioned. “You get away with tricks here that’ll kick back in any other precinct.”
“If this kicks back, I’ll eat the foot that did it,” Grave Digger said.
“Talking about eating reminds me that we ain’t ate yet,” Coffin Ed said.
Mamie Louise was sick and the other all-night greasy spoons and barbecue joints had no appeal. They decided to eat in the Great Man nightclub on 125th Street.
“I like a joint where you can smell the girls’ sweat,” Coffin Ed said.
It had a bar fronting on the street with a cabaret in back where a two-dollar membership fee was charged to get in.
When the detectives flashed their buzzers they were made members for free.
Noise, heat and orgiastic odors hit them as they entered through the curtained doorway. The room was so small and packed that the celebrants rubbed buttocks with others at adjoining tables. Faces bubbled in the dim light like a huge pot of cannibal stew, showing mostly eyes and teeth. Smoke-blackened nudes frolicked in the murals about the fringes of the ceiling. Beneath were pencil sketches of numerous Harlem celebrities, interspersed with autographed photos of jazz greats. A ventilator fan was laboring in the back wall without any noticeable effect.
“You want stink, you got it,” Grave Digger said.
“And everything that goes with it,” Coffin Ed amended.
Some joker was shouting in a loud belligerent voice, “I ain’t gonna pay for but two whiskeys; dat’s all I drunk. Somebody musta stole the other three ’cause I ain’t seen ’em.”
Behind a dance floor scarcely big enough to hold two pairs of feet, a shining black man wearing a white silk shirt kept banging the same ten keys on a midget piano; while a lank black woman without joints wearing a backless fire-red evening gown did a snake dance about the tables, shouting “Money-money-money-honey,” and holding up her skirt. She was bare beneath. Whenever someone held out a bill, she changed the lyric to, “Ohhhweee, daddy, money makes me feel so funny,” and gave a graphic demonstration by accepting it.
The proprietor cleared a table in the back corner for the two detectives and showed them most of the amalgam fillings in his teeth.
“I believe in live and let live,” he said right off. “What you gentlemen wish to eat?”
There was a choice of fried chicken, barbecued pork ribs and New Orleans gumbo.
They chose the gumbo, which was the specialty of the house. It was made of fresh pork, chicken gizzards, hog testicles and giant shrimp, with a base of okra and sweet potatoes, and twenty-seven varieties of seasonings, spices and herbs.
“It’s guaranteed to cool you off,” the proprietor boasted.
“I don’t want to get so cooled off I can’t warm up no more,” Grave Digger said.
The proprietor showed him some more teeth in a reassuring smile.
They followed the gumbo with huge quarters of ice-cold watermelon which had black seeds.
While they were eating it, a chorus of four hefty, sepia-colored girls took the floor and began doing a bump dance with their backs to the audience, throwing their big strong smooth-skinned hams about as though juggling hundred-pound sacks of brown sugar.
“Throw it to the wind!” someone shouted.
“Those hams won’t stay up on wind,” Coffin Ed muttered.
The tight close air was churned into a steaming bedlam.
The temptation was too great for Coffin Ed. He filled his mouth full of watermelon seeds and began spitting them at the live targets. It was a fifteen-foot shot and before he got the range he had hit a couple of jokers at ringside tables in the back of their necks and almost set off a rumpus. The jokers were puffing up to fight when finally Coffin Ed’s shots began landing on the targets. First one girl and then another began leaping and slapping their bottoms as though stung by bees. The audience thought it was part of the act. It was going over big.
One joker was inspired to give an impromptu rendition of “Ants in your pants.”
Then one of the black seeds stuck to the cream-colored bottom of one of the girls and she captured it. She held it up and looked at it. She stopped dancing and turned an irate face toward the audience.
“Some mother-raper is shooting at me with watermelon seeds,” she declared. “And I’m gonna find out who it is.”
The other three dancers examined the seed. Then all four of them, looking evil as housemaids scrubbing floors, began pushing between the tables, roughing up the customers, shaking down the joint for someone eating watermelon.
Grave Digger had the presence of mind to whip the plates containing the rinds and seeds from atop the table and hide them on the floor underneath their chairs. No one else was eating watermelon, but Coffin Ed went undiscovered.
When finally the dancing was resumed, Grave Digger let out his breath. “That was a close shave,” he said.
“Let’s get out of here before we get caught,” Coffin Ed said, wiping his mouth with the palm of his hand.
“We! What we?” Grave Digger exploded.
The proprietor escorted them to the door. He wouldn’t let them pay for the dinners. He gave them a big fat wink, letting them know he was on their side.
“Live and let live, that’s my motto,” he said.
“Yeah. Just don’t think it buys you anything,” Grave Digger said harshly.
It was pressing 5 a.m. when they came out into the street, almost an hour past their quitting time.
“Let’s take a last look for Gus,” Grave Digger suggested.
“What for?” Coffin Ed asked.
“For reference.”
“You don’t never give up, do you?” Coffin Ed complained.
It was 5:05 when Grave Digger drove past the apartment over on Riverside Drive. He kept down to Grant’s Tomb, turned around and parked on the opposite side of the street, three houses down. Gray dawn was slipping beneath an overcast sky and the sprinklers were already watering the browned grass in the park surrounding the monument.
They were about to alight when they saw the African come from the apartment, leading the mammoth dog by a heavy iron chain. The dog wore an iron-studded muzzle that resembled the visor of a sixteenth-century helmet.
“Sit still,” Grave Digger cautioned.
The African looked up and down the street, then crossed over and walked in the opposite direction. His white turban and many-colored robe looked outlandish against the dull green background of foliage.
“Good thing I’m in New York,” Grave Digger said. “I’d take him for a Zulu chief out hunting with his pet lion.”
“Better follow him, eh?” Coffin Ed said.
“To watch the dog piss?”
“It was your idea.”
The African turned down steps descending into the park and passed out of sight.
They sat watching the apartment entrance. Minutes passed. Finally Coffin Ed suggested, “Maybe we’d better buzz her; see what’s cooking.”
“Hell, if Gus ain’t there, all we’ll find is dirty sheets,” Grave Digger said. “And if he’s home he’s going to want to know what we’re doing busting into his house when we’re off duty.”
“Then what the hell did we come for?” Coffin Ed flared.
“It was just a hunch,” Grave Digger admitted.
They lapsed into silence.
The African ascended the stairs from the park.
Coffin Ed looked at his watch. It read 5:27.
The African was alone.
They watched him curiously as he crossed the street and pressed the bell to the apartment. They saw him turn the knob and go inside. They looked at one another.
“Now what the hell do
es that mean?” Coffin Ed said.
“Means he got rid of the dog.”
“What for?”
“The question is, how?” Grave Digger amended.
“Well, don’t ask me. I’m no Ouija board.”
“Hell with this, let’s go home,” Grave Digger decided suddenly.
“Don’t growl at me, man, you’re the one who suggested this nonsense.”
4
Pinky peered through the plate-glass window of a laundrymat at the corner of 225th Street and White Plains Road in the Bronx. There was an electric clock on the back wall. The time read 3:33.
The sky was overcast with heavy black clouds. The hot sultry air was oppressive, as before a thunderstorm. The elevated trestle of the IRT subway line loomed overhead, eerie and silent, snaking down the curve of White Plains Road. As far as he could see, the streets were empty of life. The silence was unreal.
He reckoned it had taken him more than an hour to get there from the Riverside Park in Manhattan. He had covered part of the distance by hopping a New York Central switch engine, but afterwards he had slunk along endless blocks of silent, sleeping residential streets, ducking to cover when anyone hove into view.
Now he began to feel safe. But his body was still trembling as though he had the ague.
He turned east in the direction of the Italian section.
Apartment buildings gave way to pastel-colored villas of southern Italian architecture, garnished with flower gardens and plaster saints. After a while the houses became scattered, interspersed by market gardens and vacant lots overgrown with weeds in which hoboes slept and goats were tethered.
Finally he reached his destination, a weather-stained, one-storied, pink stucco villa at the end of an unfinished street without sidewalks. It was a small house flanked by vacant lots used for rubbish dumps. Oddly enough, it had a large gabled attic. It sat far back of a wire fence enclosing a front yard of burnt grass, dried-up flowers and wildly thriving weeds. In a niche over the front door was a white marble crucifixion of a singularly lean and tortured Christ, encrusted with bird droppings. In other niches at intervals beneath the eaves were all the varicolored plaster saints good to the souls of Italian peasants.
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