The Murderer Vine

by Shepard Rifkin

  Next morning I was about five miles west of Okalusa, drinking a Coke in a gas station. I heard a faint roar far down the road. It quickly became a scream. I shoved open the screen door in time to see a yellow blur go by. The noise bursting from its twin chrome-plated exhaust pipes was so high-pitched that it sounded like the blare of a bugle. I had never seen a car go so fast outside of a racetrack.

  “Jesus Christ Almighty,” I breathed. The owner of the gas station hadn’t even gotten off his chair.

  “That’ll be Ray,” he said calmly.

  “The bus driver?”

  “Yep. He cain’t do over sixty with the bus or he’ll git fired, so on his days off he goes up an’ down here considerable faster. He built that car hisself outta junk parts.”

  Ray was someone I might get involved with in a business way someday. He chatted away. I drank the rest of my Coke thoughtfully, paid for my gas, got into the car, and looked at the speedometer. After all, Milliken County’s specialty was forcing strangers’ cars off the road into a ditch and shotgunning them.

  The number at the extreme right end said 110. I had best make sure it was telling the truth. I got out and had the guy get her up on the lift. The king-pins, the linkage, and all the front-end steering was okay. The tires were good.

  The lift hissed and she came down. He refused my offer to pay for his services, and I drove off with a wave of my hand.

  I drove to a road that ran straight as an arrow through the swamp. No side roads, no intersections, just a deep, wide ditch on both sides. No deer could make a sudden leap out of the bushes and wind up going through my windshield, flailing around with its razor-sharp hooves.

  I wanted to find out what I had under me and what it would do when I might ask it to sit up and stretch out.

  I pushed the accelerator to the floorboard. She picked up speed like frozen glue, coughing like an old man with bronchitis. Then she began to go to work. Reluctantly. At fifty the steering began to wobble a little.

  It could do eighty-three. Eighty-three wasn’t bad. But it wouldn’t do in Milliken County, where the kids began to fool around with Wolverine push rods and Mickey Thompson pistons at an age where Northern kids were graduating from stickball games into poolhalls.

  The gas station man had told me that Ray’s yellow rocket had a big 401-cubic-inch Buick engine mounted on a ‘31 Ford Model A chassis. It had a Hilborn injector atop a GMC 4-71 supercharger, and all that power was being transmitted to the ground via a pair of M and H Raccmaster 9.00 by 15 tires.

  Eighty-three? What I needed was a simple Ford chassis with a Chrysler engine cunningly hidden inside it, and some of the glamorous accessories hanging around at the Mille Miglia.

  And with that I might be able to walk away from anything the county could produce. The only trouble was that I couldn’t see how a poor scholar like me might have such a jalopy. So I would have to live with that 83 m.p.h. albatross slung around my neck with the hope that I would play my cards right, and ease out of Milliken County as easy as a ripe apple falling from a tree — when the time came.

  26

  Two evenings later we drove to the country club. Kirby was driving. Washboard roads and mud can tire your back and shoulder muscles when you spend all day on them.

  I slumped down in the seat beside her and looked at the top of the magnolia trees that were sliding by overhead. They lined the winding drive that led to the club. Every hundred feet another lamp lit up the dark green leaves. A moon hung low on the horizon like a big yellow balloon.

  “How did it go today?”

  “Umm.”

  “No, really.”

  “All right. I’m getting sick and tired of going into crossroads grocery stores where the blacks who come in take off their hats and wait to be spoken to by some tobacco-chewing slob who lets them know he’s going to finish reading the paper or serve some white first who came in after them. It sort of spoils the air.”

  “An’ all you want from now on is beautiful people?”

  I waved a hand.

  “Just bring me beautiful people,” I said.

  She was wearing a green dress. I had never seen the dress. She looked like a million dollars in it. I rolled my head against the back of the seat to look at her again. Her hair was exactly the same color as the low yellow moon.

  Kirby parked in the lot back of the club. It had a graveled surface raked in neat parallel lines. Trash bins were placed at regular intervals around the edge. It was full of Caddies and Jags. The patio was filled with tables, each one with a hurricane lamp and a candle burning inside. Trees in the patio were festooned with lights.

  As soon as we stepped through the French doors opening into the club, a man came up and greeted us. He had the most sincere handshake I had ever encountered up till then. I thought I had left those kind of greetings behind when I eliminated Harry Gilbert from my circle of associates.

  “And you must be the Wilsons!”

  My hackles rose. They’re the small hairs at the back of your neck and you can actually sense them sort of stirring when you’re angry if you can bend your mind to it next time you feel mad. I guess it’s an inheritance from our animal days when we used to erect our fur to make us look bigger and more threatening. Since I wanted to make everyone like me, I was glad those pre-dinosaur days were over. Else he would have known right away that I would have liked to sink my fangs in him. There must be something prehistoric in me which can’t stand the Harry Gilbert sort of person. I don’t know why it is. I will admit it’s a serious defect; lots of people don’t object to that warmth even though it’s produced by forced draft. They even feel flattered.

  I suppose it’s because I don’t like being handled as an object. Because that’s what these people do, they regard everyone as a sort of a bolt that moves along an assembly line. You take the bolt, shove it through a properly machined hole, twist a nut onto the other end, give it nine turns with a wrench and there aren’t any problems from the bolt. It’s even supposed to like being treated like the other bolts. And it’s supposed to love the sensation of having a nut squeezed against it.

  I haven’t been machined. I don’t want to be treated as a great guy when I might be a son of a bitch. I don’t give out love when I’m stroked that way. I’m not a cow’s udder to yield milk when someone smiles at me. As far as the country club was concerned, I might very well be harboring evil thoughts.

  But I put on a very convincing smile when he was pressing the flesh.

  “I’m Rich Cravens the third,” he said, and beamed.

  “Third what?” I asked, puzzled. I was pushing it, and Kirby nudged me warningly. She was right. I had better ingratiate myself and not try to be funny.

  “Why, Rich Cravens the third,” he repeated carefully. He explained that his grandfather had the same name, and so had his father. That made him the third, he went on. I listened patiently while he made it clear.

  “I’m the club secretary. Mrs. Garrison told me to take special care of you two fine people, an’ that is what I’m goin’ to do, you can bet on that! You come ’long now, y’ hear?”

  He took Kirby by her left hand and me by my right. He still hadn’t let go of it from the time he had begun to shake it. He must have been operating on the principle that if seizing one hand is good, grabbing two is better.

  He took us into a huge room. There were handsomely draped curtains at the windows and on either side of the French doors, and three big chandeliers with thousands of crystals. Buffet tables lined one wall. Chairs were grouped around low tables filled with fresh flowers in vases, and two bars were busy working. People wandered in and out with drinks in their hands, nodding pleasantly as they passed.

  He draped a heavy arm around my shoulders. I don’t like to be touched. I held back an impulse to throw it off. He put his arm around Kirby. That one I really wanted to fling away.

  She sent me a quick warning glance. I rearranged my face into a shy, amicable look. He took us to the bar and presented us with mint julep
s in iced silver mugs, introduced us to the few couples at the bar and waved a fat hand and disappeared.

  After two juleps I found myself talking to him once more. He had circled around the room and had returned with a tall red-headed man and a thin, sulky, dark woman. She had short black hair, a deep cleavage, and several necklaces.

  “I looked all around,” Cravens said, with one heavy arm draped around me once more and the other arm around the shoulders of the red-headed man. “An’ I brought two of ouah members ovah. Mr. an’ Mrs. Owen Brady!”

  Brady looked at Cravens with distaste. Mrs. Brady looked at Cravens’ arm as if it were a snake. He took it off and clasped his hands together and stood there, flushing. No one said anything. I felt affection for the Bradys.

  Kirby said immediately, “I think this place is simply marvelous!” I could recognize her instinct for saving situations. Mrs. Brady gave her a sour look.

  Cravens said, “Mrs. Wilson, we’re real proud of the club. We think we’re pretty advanced in just about everythin’ we do here. We — ”

  “Sure,” Mrs. Brady said. “Where are the black members?”

  “Well,” he went on, “I’m an upholder. That’s what I am. I’m an upholder of tradition.”

  “Of course.”

  “I mean, I can’t allow any niggers in here. An’ I’m not prejudiced. I want you to un’er’stan’ that. I am not at all prejudiced. It’s only that I’ve got to stand in with the old traditions.”

  “You betcha,” Mrs. Brady said. “Then how come they’re out there parking cars and in here serving drinks?”

  “Oh, well,” he beamed, “anytime any one of them wants to work here, they’re welcome if we have a job openin’.”

  Mrs. Brady cocked an amused eye at me.

  “Richie boy,” she said, “you know what you are? You are stupid.”

  Brady looked amused but embarrassed. Cravens said, as if in total explanation, “Mrs. Brady is from Milwaukee, Wisconsin.”

  “Well, for Christ sake, what other Milwaukee is there?” she demanded. She turned to me. “I ask you, don’t you get tired of people who always tack on the state? You ask them where they’re from and they say, ‘Los Angeles, California.’ Or they say something you never knew, like ‘New Orleans’ — now hear this startling news — ‘Louisiana.’ž” She turned back to Cravens. “Come on, Rich, give the man credit for knowing some geography!”

  He said uneasily, “Well, folks, I got to circulate.”

  Mrs. Brady folded her arms and stared at him as he disappeared. When he was mingled with the dancers, she said feelingly, “Jesus.”

  She turned to me. “What do you think of that, Wilson?”

  I grinned. Kirby said to me, “Darlin’, would you like to get me a puffectly delicious sandwich, honey?”

  Mrs. Brady stared at her, loathing stamped on her face. I murmured, “Excuse me,” and left for the buffet table.

  Owen Brady was standing there eating a roast beef sandwich.

  “What do you think of our local fun an’ games?”

  “Nice people.”

  He had a wide, friendly smile. I liked him.

  “An’ what do you think of our local Babbitt?”

  “He seems very pleasant.”

  “You know, Mr. Wilson, under that bland no-offense position which you feel you must assume, I seem to sense that you think he’s a pain in the ass.”

  “No comment.”

  A small man entered the room. He moved across the floor, stopping and chatting from time to time. He emitted a feeling of power the same way that radiators give off heat. He would give that impression, I felt sure, even if he were alone in a room, but what made it very clear was the way the people he talked to would hold themselves. Their upper torsos were always bent a little toward him, as if they were on the verge of bowing.

  “Who’s that?”

  Brady had been idly shaking an ice cube around and around in his glass.

  “Who?” His back was to the man.

  “The one everyone’s groveling in front of.”

  “Why, I can answer that without turnin’ around. That is A.B.C. — Amory Blanding Carlyle. He’s small an’ has smooth white hair. Am I right?”

  “Yes.”

  Brady turned.

  “He important?”

  “You might say that. He owns the best farms, the best plantations. He owns the best banks. He controls all the political patronage in northern Mississippi. No one goes to the legislature down in Jackson or goes to Congress from around here or sits in the governor’s chair without his lil ole permission.”

  “He looks like it would spell trouble if he was crossed.”

  “Understatement of the year. He isn’t the best educated man you ever saw, an’ he’s a damn sight smarter than nine tenths of the college grads around here. An’ just about everyone down here’s afraid of him.”

  “You’re not joking?”

  “A man who controls the patronage controls the tax assessors. So he can break any farmer or property owner or industrialist he wants. Any black man who starts out in business an’ does too well or shows signs of friendship to the NAACP will find it’s real hard to get along. The labor or health inspectors will keep findin’ violations. An’ when he wants to renew licenses, he’ll run into all sorts of trouble. He doesn’t like women. He doesn’t like men, either. He doesn’t like food. He only likes politics.”

  I watched the deferential smiles flowing around A.B.C. as he approached us.

  “Look at the bastard! He’s as well-adapted to the Southern rural environment as an alligator is to livin’ in a muddy river.”

  Brady went on, eyeing A.B.C. sourly. “Now, an alligator is downright interestin’. Sometimes, after a good meal, it’ll set on a bank and open its jaws wide. There’s a little bird that hops inside. An’ this bird pecks at the lil bits of meat between those long, sharp teeth. The alligator lets them clean out what they can find.”

  “And these are the birds?”

  “Some are. Some would like the honor.”

  Brady went on about alligators. He knew a great deal about them. I listened, fascinated.

  Brady filled his glass and went on.

  “A man like A.B.C. has got to keep his power base in line. He does it pretty easy. He does favors for those poor whites, an’ they vote for him an’ keep the blacks from the polls. It works all right for everybody. If the blacks ever get to vote, they’ll just jerk that nice comfortable rug right from under A.B.C. So to keep settin’ on it, he sort of helps along the White Citizen’s Council.”

  “With money?”

  “You’re damn well right, with money. Here’s the old son of a bitch now, sneakin’ up on us.”

  “Evenin’, Owen.”

  “Evenin’, Amory.”

  “How’s my lib’ral opposition?”

  “Fixin’ to get you one of these days.”

  “Anytime you want to spread around what the Voter Registration nigras say ’bout me, go right ahead. You jus’ write a big long letter to the papers.”

  “You know they won’t print it, Amory.”

  “Goodness me! Why won’t they?”

  “Any other jokes for tonight?”

  “Nope. You might consider printin’ leaflets an’ stickin’ ’em in all them rural mailboxes, Owen. No one’ll read them ’round here, ’cept you and eleven others.”

  “I’m glad you pay it no never-mind, Amory. You’d have trouble with them big two-syllable words I’d be usin’.”

  A.B.C. grinned. He turned to me. “Evenin’, sir.”

  “Good evening.”

  Now that he was close, he had the same feeling of power held in check that Parrish had.

  “Visitin’, sir?”

  “Yes, Mr. Carlyle. I’m doing research in Southern speech for my Ph.D. project.”

  “You’re the feller goin’ around tapin’ my dirt farmers?”

  “Yes.”

  “Any time you want to tape a Southern reactionary politi
co, you tell Owen here an’ he’ll arrange it. I hope you like it down here?”

  “Yes, sir. I like the people very much. Everyone has been helpful.”

  “Yes.” He had wide, pale eyelids. The little blood vessels glowed in them. “We’re a hospitable people. Owen, you come on over on the seventeenth an’ bring Mr. Wilson along. I hear there’s a Mrs. Wilson.”

  “There she is.”

  He looked at her dancing with Cravens.

  “A handsome woman. I hear she’s from Georgia.”

  “Yes, sir. It’s a Northern victory, but since I’m Canadian I hope you’ll forgive me.”

  He clapped me on the back. “You be sure to bring her, now!” He left and resumed his slow, triumphant tour of the room.

  “He’s got a sort of charm,” I said.

  Brady gave me a dry, ironic look.

  “Remember those three kids who were killed down here?”

  “Those Voter Registration volunteers, you mean?”

  “Yes.”

  “Sure. But how do you know they were killed?”

  “Oh, come on, Wilson. This is the South, and this is Mississippi, it’s not Connecticut or Wisconsin. The last night they were officially in existence, if that’s the approach you prefer, they were arrested by the sheriff for exceedin’ the speed limit inside the town limits of Okalusa. That isn’t plausible, because these VR people are very careful not to give any police officer the slightest excuse to get picked up. Now, the word I get around here is that the sheriff held the boys until he got off a few phone calls. While the kids were in the cells, he went out an’ broke the right-hand bright light bulb in their car. They paid their fine an’ he released them. Two cars were waitin’ for them three miles south of town; they recognized the car because of the single headlight, an’ forced it off the road. The sheriff followed a minute later. When the FBI came by an’ asked to look at the police blotter, there was no mention on it of the arrest. Nothin’. An’ why?”

  “Why?”

  “Your friend and mine, Amory B. Carlyle, had told the sheriff not to enter any arrest on the blotter without askin’ him first. Without any official record of the arrest, it’s awful hard to prove any official connection with the murders. That’s Amory’s charm for you. You just keep your head out of his jaws.”