Oldest staffers, maybe. Respected? I didn’t see anybody out at those desks who looked teary-eyed or heartbroken or anything. A little blindsided, maybe, and uneasy talking to cops—so what else was new?
“When I got here,” Jackson was saying, “the back room was swarming with blue uniforms who’d let themselves in somehow. I couldn’t catch the Reverend before he left home, so his drivers delivered him right into the middle of a three-ring circus, cops, lab techs, photographers. Those men out there in our work space are interrogating our people. Can you imagine?”
Didn’t seem strange to me.
“No,” I said, “I can’t.”
“And the worst part of is…I can tell this from the nature, the tenor of their questions…they think this is some kind of…drug deal. Drug deal gone wrong.”
“No,” I said.
“Obviously, that’s not what it is.”
“Obviously.” What the fuck else could it be?
“This violence toward one of the Reverend’s staff members,” he said with a world-weary sigh, “indicates the extent of racial discontent in this community.”
“You mean, that black people are discontented?”
“No! Well, of course, certainly black people are discontented. But what I mean is, the racists, the White Supremacist lunatics who would do to the Reverend what was done to Dr. King.”
“Murder him, you mean.”
He flinched at the word “murder,” and his echo was whispered: “Assassinate him, yes. And this movement doesn’t need another martyr. Did you hear about this neo-Nazi maniac, Starkweather, turning up dead this morning?”
“No.”
And I hadn’t. I mean, obviously, I knew he was dead, just not that he turned up.
Jackson was saying, “He was found burned head to toe, shot in the head.”
“Found where?”
“Dumped behind the church where he preached, in Ferguson.”
“Wait, Starkweather was the preacher at that church?”
“Certainly.”
Had to hand it to the late Commander. He had a lot of things going.
“Obviously,” Jackson said, “he was murdered by one of his own people. These hate groups are highly competitive. His ‘Klavern’ was only one of several in the area, none sanctioned by the official Klan.”
“Well, the official Klan wouldn’t want to take on just anybody,” I said.
That stopped him for a moment, but he picked right up. “And of course it’ll be the black community that gets the blame for Starkweather’s much-deserved death. Which will stir up the race hate even more.” He paused dramatically. “And we have the big rally coming up this Saturday, with the Reverend as the main speaker. I personally think we should cancel, but he won’t hear of it.”
“You’ll need heightened security.”
“We’ll have it. Local, federal…but as a great man once said, ‘If history has taught us anything, it’s that anyone can be killed.’ ”
Truer words.
“What great man?” I asked.
“John F. Kennedy.”
I nodded. He would know.
I started to rise. “Well, you must have plenty to deal with without wasting time on a grunt like me….”
He held up a stop palm, half-rising himself. “No, Jack! Please sit down. I brought you back here to ask your help. To ask that you, in our time of crisis, go above and beyond the call of duty.”
I sat back down. “Okay. What exactly?”
He settled back in his chair, too. “The Reverend has two regular handlers…bodyguards, who I’m sure you’ve noticed.”
The two big black guys packing heat? Yeah, I’d noticed.
“Believe so,” I said.
“Well, you’re an ex-Marine. Bronze Star winner. I would imagine you can handle yourself. And know your way around a firearm.”
“I know which end to point.”
He flashed a smile but his eyes couldn’t have been more serious. “We could use some additional security ourselves, and you’re the only person on staff who qualifies. Would you be willing to go over to the Reverend’s home this evening, and essentially be a third bodyguard?”
“Glad to,” I said.
“Should I see about getting you some kind of weapon?”
“I own a handgun. It’s in my suitcase. I can use that.”
“Well, Jack, that would be fine. But surely you aren’t licensed in the state of Missouri…?”
I gave him half a smile. “I’m not licensed anywhere. But I’ll risk it if you will. Should some son of a bitch make a move on the Reverend, and I have to shoot him? I have a hunch all will be forgiven.”
He grinned, and got up and held out his hand, which was a very nice way to say I’d been dismissed.
I shook it, then at the door paused to say, “I’m gonna grab some lunch. Would you tell Friday and Gannon that I’ll be back by one? To answer whatever questions they might have.”
“Jack, I’d be happy to.”
The two cops didn’t notice me head out. They were busy, now that many of the staffers from the weekend trip were starting to drift in. No sign of Ruth yet.
I caught lunch, alone, at a place called the Ladle, where I had the chicken-pot-pie soup with a puff pastry floating on top. Very good, but this was another of these Central West End hippie-type joints—art glass, Goodwill furniture, church pews, colored tablecloths. I ate slowly, thinking, letting the comfort-food soup warm my belly and encourage my mind.
Like Duff’s, the Ladle had indoor old-fashioned telephone booths, a row of four right out of a ’40s train station. I’d come up with the beginnings of a plan, but it couldn’t include Boyd. Not a double-cross, that’s not my deal. But something that might work best single-o.
I closed myself in a booth and put in a collect call to the Broker. This time I did get some fucking flunky and so I had to sit in there and wait for him to get back to me.
I took the opportunity to reflect on how the money worked with the Broker, at least on a usual job, and this admittedly wasn’t that. But generally he received a down payment from the client that covered his end and enough more to give Boyd and me—or any of his two-man teams (those basketball jerseys popped into my head again)—an advance.
I’d received five grand up front and I assumed Boyd the same. The rest of the payoff—Boyd’s second five grand, and my twenty—would be made a night or two before the hit. Procedure was to call the Broker and report that everything was in place and the job about to go down. The Broker would contact the client, instruct him or her to make the drop, the client providing a time and place, of course, which would be passed along to me.
Finally the Broker called. “Yes?”
Was he a little peeved, hearing from Boyd and me so often on this contract? Was I interrupting a secretarial blow job? Was he playing cribbage at his club? Okay, so I don’t know what cribbage is and didn’t know what club that would be, but you get the drift.
“I found my window,” I said.
Of course, I hadn’t. But I was heading over to the Reverend’s place tonight, wasn’t I? And I bet the house had windows.
The Broker perked up. “Good, good. I was afraid, with this difficulty that cropped up…”
He meant the late André.
“…that you might not be able to deliver. Certainly Boyd, when he called this morning, indicated the possibility.”
“No. I’ll make it happen.”
Maybe I would. Not sure yet. Still bobbing and weaving, when I should be floating like a butterfly and stinging like a bee.
“So,” he said, “this is the payoff call.”
No pompous phraseology when we were this down-to-business.
“Yeah,” I said. “I still have to go in the office and deal with the cops. You’re sure my cover story will hold?”
“For now, yes. Long-term, of course, doubtful.”
That meant no.
“Tell the client,” I said, “to arrange the drop for me to pic
k it up tonight at four A.M.”
“Why four A.M.?”
“I have things to do until then.”
“Sounds like another busy night.”
“I do try to make good use of my time.”
We hung up.
Back at Coalition HQ, I found Ruth finally at her desk. But one of the detectives was interviewing her. I was on my way to my usual post when a hand wrapped around my arm. Not firm, not gentle.
I turned and looked into the beautiful if troubled, heart-shaped face of Mrs. Raymond Wesley Lloyd. Big brown eyes, apple cheeks, gentle slope of a nose, bright red-lipsticked full lips, lovely mahogany complexion, shoulder-length processed curls. She wore a fur-collared gray topcoat beneath which a black dress with pearls peeked.
“Excuse me, young man,” she said. I had a hunch she might be twenty years older than me, but it might have only been ten. “Are you Mr. Blake?”
“John Blake, yes, ma’am.”
She beamed, beautifully, but it didn’t make the pain in her eyes go away. “Could I speak with you? Could we perhaps step outside?”
Nobody ever asked me to step outside so sweetly before.
“Absolutely,” I said, and instinctively took her arm and stepped outside into a chilly but not windy afternoon. Did I sense Ruth’s eyes following us, or was that my imagination?
“Young man,” she began, but I interrupted.
“Mrs. Lloyd,” I said, “please make it ‘Jack.’ When a woman as lovely as you calls me ‘young man,’ I feel like the world has passed me by.”
She gave me a wide white smile, and maybe her eyes weren’t quite so sad now. Not quite.
“I’m going to impose on you,” she said. “I don’t know you at all, but I want to ask you something personal, if I may.”
“Impose away.”
She smiled again, but she’d put her dazzling white teeth away. “You were on the weekend campus trip.”
“I was.”
“I’ve heard from…my spies…that you and, uh, the young lady…Ruth…are something of an item.”
“We’ve been spending some time together.”
“Did you spend time together on the bus trip?”
“We did.”
“Did she…did she spend any time with my husband?”
“She did not.”
“You’re quite sure?”
“Can you keep a secret, Mrs. Lloyd?”
“You have my word.”
“I hate to kiss and tell, but Ruth and I spent the night.”
Relief flooded her face. “Well…thank you. Though I hope I don’t seem catty if I make another comment, which is that it doesn’t surprise me she found someone to sleep with in such short order.”
I grinned. “You have a right to that opinion, and I’m not offended. But if you knew me better, you’d realize with someone as irresistible as me, Ruth took a lot longer to fall into bed than is usual with the ladies.”
That stunned her momentarily, then she smiled so wide it made her apple cheeks even fuller than before, and she tapped me on the chest lightly with a small fist.
“I believe you’re telling me the truth,” she said.
“Oh, I am. The females fall all over themselves trying to get next to me.”
That made her laugh. No sadness in her eyes now.
I said, “By the way, you’ll be seeing me tonight.”
She frowned in confusion. “I will?”
“Yes, I’m going to be a house guest of yours, at least this evening. Because of these violent events, I’ve been added to your husband’s security staff.”
“That’s an excellent idea, Jack, but I won’t be there tonight. Because of this violence.”
“Oh?”
She nodded. “Raymond is concerned for me. I’m staying with my sister tonight, away from the house. And…” She added this with a twinkle. “…apparently away from temptation, since you’ll be there.”
She pinched my cheek and went off down the sidewalk, smiling.
My good deed for the day. Perhaps I shouldn’t admit it, but this encounter was making me question the Reverend’s sanity. That was a woman any man could love, in all the word’s meanings.
I stepped back inside HQ and Ruth was right there, looking worried, even alarmed. “What was that about?”
“Oh, Mrs. Lloyd wondered if I was available for dating. I hated to disappoint, but I told her no. That you and I were going steady.”
She smiled big at that, but didn’t pinch my cheek. She did slap me on the chest, not gently, and say, “Oh you.”
Still, I was charming them left and right, wasn’t I?
I told Ruth about my addition to the Reverend’s bodyguard contingent and she was glad to hear it, but advised me to be careful.
She frowned. “You heard about that neo-Nazi in Ferguson? And poor André, right in our backyard?”
Back alley, actually, but I nodded.
She shook her head glumly. “When did America get so violent?”
“Right around the time,” I said, “my ancestors were throwing your ancestors into chains in the bottom of ships.”
Her eyebrows went up. “Good point. But do be careful. It’s getting crazy out there.”
“I noticed.”
Then one of the cops wanted to talk to me. The interview took three minutes. He was really impressed by my Bronze Star.
FOURTEEN
The Reverend lived in the Ville, a residential and business district just northwest of downtown. According to Ruth, it was for many decades an African-American cultural center, dating back to when the neighborhood was one of a handful where blacks could own houses and business properties, or even rent them.
“In that small area, of less than a square mile,” she told me at Coalition HQ, “there were black businesses, schools, community groups, a hospital…stayed that way till maybe ten years ago.”
“No kidding,” I said.
I must not have seemed suitably impressed, because she added, “Chuck Berry and Tina Turner grew up there.”
“Together?” I asked, and got another “Oh, you!” look out of her. Truth was, that was impressive.
But driving my Impala through this black neighborhood in the early evening, I wasn’t impressed. At least not favorably. The Ville was pretty rough now. Buildings were tumbledown with windows boarded over, and junkies prowled the streets like rats looking for garbage cans.
The two-story white-trimmed red-brick house, however, was on a block where the homes were generally well-maintained. Sitting on a modest lot, the Lloyd residence had an open porch with a swing and a row of three windows above the overhang. A matching freestanding garage waited at the end of a cement drive. Out front the familiar black Grand Prix was parked.
Ruth said that the Reverend could afford to move out of the neighborhood, but he wanted to show solidarity with other residents of the Ville.
I pulled the Impala in behind the Grand Prix and got out and was soon up the brick steps and at the front door. The nine millimeter, which I’d been requested to bring, was in my waistband, under a new navy windbreaker; my light-blue sportshirt, jeans and sneakers were new as well. Nothing like getting drenched in blood to prompt freshening up your wardrobe.
The big black guy who answered the door was familiar to me from Coalition HQ. This imposing figure was Terrell, who with his associate, Deon, did more than just help chauffeur and bodyguard the Reverend—they also played cards and listened to soul music in the back room. Good gig.
Terrell had a head the size of a gallon paint can, only more rounded, with hair cut close to the scalp; he sported a Rosie Greer goatee. He wore the standard black undertaker suit with a dark blue tie, his expression narrow-eyed and glowering, but that was misleading. Really he was a pussycat. A pussycat with a .45 automatic under his arm.
“Jackie boy,” he said in a friendly growl, the corners of the wide mouth turning up slightly. “I hear you gonna run interference for brother Deon and me, that it?”
“More like quarterback,” I said.
He smirked and let me in. “Careful you don’t get rushed.”
The vestibule opened onto an area with a hardwood floor shared by a staircase and a hallway back to the kitchen. Open doors were on my either side, study and dining room, plaster walls a pale green, woodwork handsome and dark. This house had been built a long time ago, early in this century, by fine craftsmen for somebody with dough.
Terrell abandoned me to go into the dining room, where his “brother” Deon was waiting. I didn’t know whether Deon was really his brother or just a brother in the other sense.
In the medium-sized study, the Reverend—in rolled-up shirtsleeves and black-framed glasses—sat at an ancient walnut desk with a dark leather top, writing in longhand on bond paper. Wadded-up balls of the stuff surrounded a wastebasket nearby. Built-in floor-to-ceiling shelves bore books, not fancy leather-bound stuff for show, but hardcovers and paperbacks of assorted vintage with a worn look, somewhat haphazardly stacked. A working office. He did not acknowledge my presence. That was nothing new—the best I’d ever got from him at HQ was a nod.
The somewhat formal dining room, with china cabinet and sideboard, was set up for Terrell and Deon, who were not sleep-in help—like me, they were here for security concerns born out of André’s passing. Him, and the dead Nazi who turned up in a church parking lot.
That I got rid of both those pricks would have come as quite a shock to Terrell and Deon, and the Reverend, too. But not as big a one as the noise suppressor tucked down in my left windbreaker pocket.
Is that a silencer or are you just glad to see me?
The two massive men were playing gin rummy at one end of the long dining-room table; Deon, a little bigger than Terrell, modest Afro, no beard, was keeping score. Mid-table like a centerpiece, sat a small portable TV with rabbit ears with an extension cord trailing off; right now Laugh-In was on, Arte Johnson in a German army helmet saying, “Very interesting…but stupid.”
Without looking at me, Deon asked, “You eat?”
“Now and then.”
“Smart-ass white boy,” Deon said, but he was smiling. Also a pussycat. Also packing a .45, which was obvious because his black suitcoat was hung over the back of his chair, the shoulder-holstered weapon out in the open.
Quarry in the Black Page 14