Yardbird

by Mark Slade

  Scratch guessed there were three other people in the basement. Not being able to see anything, brought on memories and anxieties. Part of Scratch knew where he was but another part of him feared a light would turn on and reveal he was be tied to a chair and that old Korean man was standing over him with hot shrapnel ready to slide it into the wound on Scratch's leg.

  A familiar smell assaulted Scratch's nostrils. Hair relaxer and Barman's Vex, a popular aftershave with young black men in Darktown. He heard sobbing. Begging. A loud scream echoed. Scratch knew the voice.

  “I didn't mean to kill no one,” Felix Crump said. He sobbed more, tried to correct that with a manly, “So what?”, but he was already broken and the sobbing interrupted his short attempt at being tough or hard. “It was just a game, I swear –I didn't know what I was doin'… Please… please…”

  Scratch stood on the last step, Dozen snickering behind him. One naked light bulb connected to a tangled wire swung back and forth making everyone's shadows bigger than their souls. One of Dozen's henchmen had a long jagged-bladed knife, the kind used for gutting fish. The blade sliced Felix's chest, dragged across other knife wounds. He screamed as his skin opened up and revealed what was inside him. Felix gurgled and whined. His body convulsed from going into shock.

  Scratch turned his head. Then he pushed Dozen out of the way and trotted up the stairs.

  “Scratch!” Dozen called out. “Scratch! C'mon! I thought you'd like to see some justice for your uncle's murder!”

  “There are steps for doing that, Dozen. Laws.”

  Dozen snorted contemptuously. “White man's laws. You know how we do things in Darktown. We don't need laws invented by white people. We take care of our own, no matter how… unpleasant the shit is.”

  “You said you know where my car is.”

  “Scratch, you can stay here… work for me. I ain't Homer. You can trust me.”

  Scratch was silent. He didn't even look at Dozen.

  “OK,” Dozen said softly, patting Scratch on his lower back. “I'll get Zeke to drive you. Not far from your sister's house.”

  “Drivable?” Scratch asked.

  “Yeah. You can drive it. From what I understand, your girlfriend is in Mercy Hospital.”

  “Why did they take her there and not Johnson Medical?”

  “She didn't want to be in a hospital with negroes,” Dozen said. “Her words.”

  26

  It seemed Scratch couldn't get away from that Frank Sinatra song In the Wee Small Hours of the Morning. The radio in the Cadillac was blaring it and Zeke was furiously trying to match the volume.

  Zeke kept trying to start up a conversation, but Scratch wasn't interested. He would either nod, grunt, or answer in one-word sentences. For the first time in a long time, Scratch didn't care what happened next. He didn't care if he ever solved the case, he didn't care what was in the hatbox. He didn't give a rat's ass about Oliver Spiff.

  He did want to see Betty. For some reason, he wanted to see her, let her know he wasn't mad about her taking his car, or helping Shaw blackmail him and Immy. He wanted to tell her he loved her. None of this shit mattered.

  No one mattered.

  Not Spiff. Not Shaw. Not Homer. Or any-fucking-body in Odarko, or Darktown. Just them. Betty and Allan. I'd let her call me Allan, if she wanted…

  “Hey look, Allan,” Zeke said, looking at Scratch in the rearview mirror. “I know we have some bad blood, but I ain't holding no grudges against you.”

  Scratch snorted. “That's good to know.”

  “C'mon, motherfucker.” Zeke was exasperated. “I'm tryin' to be amicable. Pleasant, even. Make up, and all that shit, and all I get from you is high-hat.”

  “Sorry I'm hurting your feelings,” Scratch said.

  Zeke sighed, shook his head. “Lord, Jesus. There ain't no getting' through to this son of a bitch. All he wants to do is agitate me. What should I do?”

  Is he talking to me or who? Scratch thought.

  “What the hell are you doing?” he asked.

  Scratch had to ask. He'd never witnessed anyone doing that except old Miss Winters, the woman who used to help look after him and Immy sometimes when his mother worked late. She had her hands lifted, eyes raised to the sky, asking God, or Jesus what was wrong with her life. Sometimes the conversation was 20 minutes, sometimes it was four hours. Old Miss Winters never let anyone interrupt her talks with a higher being to sort things out.

  “You mind? I'm talkin' to Jesus, not you!” Zeke raised his voice. “So sit back, and shut up!”

  “I don't mind you talking to Jesus,” Scratch said. “Just don't talk to him about me, especially in front of me.”

  “You ain't got no choice, Jack,” Zeke said. Scratch saw large brown eyes with burning embers staring at him in the rear-view mirror. “Now, we can stop this car right now, and I help you get closer to Jesus and you can ask him how he feels about this conversation. But you'll also be tasting rare earth from a grave. Your choice, Jack.”

  Scratch didn't have anything to say to that. Mere seconds later, a bizarre spectacle would catch his eye.

  The Cadillac eased into the town square. A body was hanging from a flagpole in front of the post office and the general store. The body swung back and forth in the gentle morning breeze. A noose of thick, coarse rope was around the man's broken neck, and his flopping arms were tied loosely behind his back. At first, Scratch thought the Klan had slipped in late at night and strung up somebody from Darktown, as they had done a few years ago, and when he was a little boy. Seeing a lynching always made Scratch feel sick to his stomach.

  But the closer the Cadillac got to the scene, the easier it was to see the body hanging from the flag pole was a white man. Then Scratch saw his uniform. Instantly he realized it was Deputy Shaw. Overwhelming guilt slid up from the pit of Scratch's stomach and rose up into a lump in his throat. Only… it had been him or Shaw. Or had it? Could it have gone another way?

  Probably not.

  Events from last night came to Scratch in snapshots.

  Then they'd fade away and a migraine would start. All Scratch could see in his mind was the old Korean man screaming at him and spitting in his face. The Korean man smacked Scratch. He showed Scratch a long, thin stick and pointed it at Scratch's eye. The stick touched the surface of Scratch's eyeball and he jerked away. The Korean man smacked Scratch on his left shoulder with the stick. Scratch screamed.

  The Cadillac stopped.

  Zeke turned completely around in his seat and glared at Scratch.

  “What the hell is wrong with you?” Zeke demanded.

  “What?”

  “You back there hollering like somebody chopped off your big toe or something!”

  Scratch rubbed his face, removed his fedora, rubbed his head and returned the fedora, lowering the brim over his eyes.

  “Nothing, Zeke,” Scratch said. “Don't worry about it.”

  “Oh, I'm gonna worry about it,” Zeke shook his head pityingly. “Got a crazy person in the backseat…”

  “We're a pretty pair,” Scratch chuckled. “You talkin' to Jesus and me screaming at ghosts.”

  Zeke snorted. “Yeah, only Jesus is real. Ghosts ain't.”

  Scratch thought about that. Profound or a foolish thing to say? He didn't know the answer any more than Zeke did, except Zeke was sure of what he was saying and nothing could shake him loose of his faith. Scratch was a whole other animal altogether. His faith or faiths, or lack of, could always be challenged, and dismantled with a whisper or an atomic explosion.

  “Why'd you stop the car?” Scratch asked.

  “We at your car, fool,” Zeke said. “Look yonder.”

  Betty hadn't gotten far. The lake was on the right, but the road she took would have led her back into Darktown. The '48 Dodge was parked in front of the church. The front end was bent to hell. Other than that, the car was in remarkable shape to have been in a head-on collision.

  “Thanks for the ride,” Scratch opened the door.<
br />
  “Hold up,” Zeke said. “Look under the backseat.”

  Scratch reached under and put a hand on hard cardboard. He pulled out a hatbox.

  “Dozen was going to give it to you,” Zeke said. “But you ran out before he could.”

  “Where he get it?”

  “Me and Moses found it next to your car,” Zeke replied.

  “My car is in good shape to have hit another car,” Scratch said.

  “Who told you that?”

  “Dozen.”

  “He don't know. He wasn't there,” Zeke said. “Me and Moses was sitting in this Cadillac drinking some rum. We went to collect from a few businessmen. We were sittin' right here. Your car came up. I said, 'Hey, Moses. Look, it's old Scratch burnin' up the roads.' Moses said, 'He got to be runnin' from a woman's old man or from a woman!' We laughed hard at that. I'm sure the rum had its effect on our sense of humor. Your car sailed by us and swiped a tree. Your girl got out and started running. This red Fury came hot-trottin' and WHAM! Caught your girl, sent her sky-high.

  “That's when this '53 Crestline came up and chased that Fury.”

  That was Shaw's car, Scratch thought. Dobro and me must've been in it, taking Shaw to his fate.

  “I could've swore I saw you in that car. I just shook my head and wondered why the hell you weren't driving that '48 Dodge you love so much? Then again, ain't none of it my business.”

  Scratch didn't say anything. He wanted to say thank you and you've been a big help. Scratch didn't like Zeke at all. Never did. He tried to date Immy when they were all younger. All he was interested in was having sex with Immy. He was abusive in the way he talked to her and Scratch always suspected the bruises on Immy's arms were because of Zeke.

  “I know who owns that Crestline,” Zeke said.

  “Oh yeah?” Scratch said. “Who?”

  “Deputy Sheriff from Coleman County.” Zeke sneered. “Naw, I told myself. Scratch Williams don't deal with those boys from Coleman County. Just Odarko. That's why I thought it was strange I thought I saw you in that car. Hmph! It was dark and I was drunk as hell. I was just seeing things.”

  “How do you know it was Shaw's car?”

  “Your uncle had some dealings with him before,” Zeke said, picking at a nostril with a long thumbnail. When it hit on something, he flinched and withdrew the thumbnail. “And… I've seen him go in Immy's house a bunch of times. Looks like she likes guys with your pale complexion.” Zeke laughed. “Shit, I saw him picking up Immy yesterday.”

  Scratch felt anger pulsating through his veins. Zeke could see it in his eyes. Zeke was a little afraid. He wasn't the confident Jesus-talking street punk he appeared to be a few minutes before.

  “Hey, Scratch.” Zeke fumbled his words nervously. “I have to get. Dozen has some things for me to do… Uh… do me a favor?”

  “What?” Scratch growled.

  “Don't open that hatbox until I'm way down the road.”

  “I haven't even thought about opening it…” Scratch looked down at the hatbox sitting between his legs. He considered tossing it in the ditch and telling Spiff any lie that popped into his head. Nothing mattered anyway. When he got through with Immy, they were going to hang him for her murder. “Yeah, Zeke,” Scratch said, opening the car door. “I'll wait until I see your exhaust pipe before I open this box.”

  Zeke smiled and waved to Scratch. Scratch slammed the door, and the Cadillac roared off.

  Scratch stood in the street, holding one of two hatboxes that had caused death, humiliation, and a whole lot of misery.

  27

  He stared at the box for a long time.

  It sat on the dashboard of his '48 Dodge. An ominous, eerie feeling came over Scratch. Thoughts of the events of the past week entered his mind. Some things just didn't add up. People involved in this case – cases, actually – and their motives didn't make sense. Old man Spiff sends Scratch to make sure his daughter's boyfriend gets out of town. The boyfriend is murdered after a fight with Scratch and no one is in a hurry to solve the murder. Someone hits Scratch from behind and takes his glass eye. Teenagers are riding around in a red Fury killing pillars of Odarko and Darktown..? Why? The owner of a newspaper commits suicide and old man Spiff wants that investigated as a murder. Why? He himself is blackmailed by Shaw, and thinks Betty is in on it, but turns out…

  Scratch sighed. Closed his eyes. “Really Immy was his partner,” Scratch opened his eyes and smacked the steering wheel. “Why, Immy? Why?”

  And how does this hatbox fit in with it all?

  “Wait,” Scratch said aloud. “That's not the same hatbox.”

  Same black vinyl box, minus the gold initials SS. Zeke had warned him not to open the box around him. Why?

  “I know,” Scratch said to himself. “I'm asking a lot of questions, and so far I have come up with few answers.”

  He sat the hatbox on the seat next to him and took the lid off. At first, Scratch was dumbfounded. When he realized what was in the hatbox, tears formed in his eyes. Bones. Skeletal remains of a baby wrapped in a discolored cloth. He quickly placed the lid back on the hat bot and shoved it across the seat far away from him.

  Scratch broke down again, weeping hard, shaking his head violently.

  28

  Immy opened the front door of her house and discovered Pita-Paul standing in her kitchen. He stepped aside and she saw Gilmore sitting at her kitchen table, his leg in its plaster cast propped on another chair. She dropped her bag of groceries on the floor. A loaf of bread fell out, followed by two apples and a chicken breast.

  “You didn't think you'd see us, huh?” Gilmore said.

  Immy turned to run out the front door, but two Oklahoma Highway Patrolmen appeared on the threshold. She back-pedaled, stepped out of her left heel and tripped. Immediately she burst into tears.

  “I don't know anything,” Immy said, sniffles slurring her words. “I don't know anything.”

  “Come on, you don't expect us to believe that? You and that deputy from Coleman County was blackmailing everybody!” Gilmore laughed, his eyes surveying the disarray of the house. “By the looks of it, he got most of the damn money. Your dark meat must not have been that special.”

  “I don't know anything,” she repeated.

  Gilmore snarled and snapped his fingers. Pita-Paul shuffled over and kicked Immy in the ribs. She screamed and rolled over on her back, holding her left side. Immy had several coughing fits. Pita-Paul was about to kick her again when Gilmore snapped his fingers again. Pita-Paul put his foot back on the floor and went back to a rigid stance.

  “Give me one of those apples,” Gilmore barked an order at one of the OHPs. The highway patrolman hopped to it, scooped up the bruised red apple and marched it over to Gilmore. Gilmore looked the apple over and took a huge bite of it. “You been in the town square yet?” Gilmore asked, chewing vigorously.

  Immy shook her head, weeping silently.

  Gilmore swallowed, didn't waste time taking another bite of the apple. He chewed quickly, sloppily. Bits of apple fell to the front of his shirt. He swallowed hard and glared at Immy. “Shaw is swinging from a pole for all the niggers in Darktown to see.”

  That disturbed Immy's weeping for a moment. She managed to say: “What-what do you mean?”

  “Your boyfriend! The one who's married to a skinny, tiny little woman and has three small kids – they live at a house on Berget Street in Coleman County! The white man you been fuckin' since the middle of last year! He's dead…” He pointed the apple at Immy. “You two were stupid as shit. Can you believe this?” He asked Pita-Paul. The question fell on deaf ears. So he directed his enquiry to the state patrolmen. “Can you believe this shit? They try to blackmail the governor of Oklahoma. Not just him, but all these people involved in dirty pictures. Holy shit… it's… beguiling. I know – big word for me – but I'm always intrigued – there I go again, oops, flauntin' my college education from the U of Oklahoma – again, let me say, in a way that a nigger can understand.
People who think they can get somethin' from those who control everything, and think that their brains are so big and get these ideas, the devil planted those ideas in their heads. The devil is a nigger, you know that, right? God is on our side, the white man. What I'm tryin' to say, is you got two strikes against you to make sure you won't get ahead in life. 1: You're a nigger. Plain and simple. 2: You're a woman…” He let the words trail off. Gilmore sighed deeply. He shook his head and laughed. “I mean, don't you understand that you are a nigger, which means dumb to begin with, right? Yes, yes, yes, yes… it does. I mean, I see what Shaw liked in you. I mean, if I liked nigger women, that is,” The state patrolmen laughed along with Gilmore. “You're almost white. But you aren't. I have to know something. What fascinates me is when two dumb people get together to hatch a plan to move them up in society. You see, Shaw, he was as dumb as they came. I know, I played against him in high school football. He was a quarterback and I was on defense, and all we had to do was make out like we were going the left and he would throw to the right, and there I was, with an interception. Every time. One game, I had four touchdowns.” Everyone laughed but Pita-Paul. He stared blankly at Gilmore. “How did you and Shaw know about the governor being involved with that kidnapping of that old actress's baby?”

  Immy got herself together. She fixed her dress, moved strands of light brown hair from her face. She raised up, but stayed on her knees. “His sister told us about it.”

  “Who's his sister?” Gilmore asked. He looked at Immy as if she were lying. “I didn't know Shaw had any siblings. I just remember he was an only child.”

  “Betty Klein,” Immy said.

  Gilmore laughed. “She's a Jew. Shaw ain't Jewish. You're making this up.”

  She stood, kicked off her right high heel. She smiled at Gilmore alluringly. She batted her eyes and licked her lips seductively. Gilmore wasn't interested. He scowled. From the look on his face, he was disgusted by Immy. “No, he told me he was. Shaw was adopted when he was five. Betty was two. His father was a gambler from New Jersey. They moved here to get away from the mob. His father owed a lot of money. Somebody came down here and shot his father and mother. Left him and Betty in the house with their dead parents. When they got adopted, she was shipped off to an orphanage in Texas. He stayed here.”