Street of Angels

by Joe Derkacht

  A choking sound came from the direction of the short man in black, and Lamarr’s eyebrows went up.

  “Odoms is a white honky, racist pig--” A string of profanities followed.

  Lamarr glanced at Rev. Champion, unfazed by the words but shocked that he was hearing them in this room, which had always been the closest thing to a holy of holies one could find at Alliance Baptist. Worse, they came from the lips of a minister. Reflexively, Lamarr opened and closed his fists, itching to take the smaller man by the collar to toss him out, but fully expecting Rev. Champion to rise--like the wrath of God--to do the job himself.

  “Our brother here has had some disagreements with Captain Odoms,” Rev. Champion spoke with forced mildness.

  “Captain?” Winfield snorted. “The only title he should hold is Grand Wizard of the KKK! He deserves to be hung by the heels and have his white skin stripped off his white bones.”

  “I think I should be movin’ on, sir,” Lamarr addressed Rev. Champion. Yesterday, after talking and working with Chance Odoms, he had come away thinking the man was racist, too. Especially after his remarks about talking differently. But if Odoms was racist, it wasn’t one-tenth of what he felt spewing from Winfield.

  “I’ll come with you,” Rev. Champion said, abruptly rising from his chair.

  Lamarr stopped just short of the office doorway.

  “Brother Winfield,” he said.

  “Yessir?”

  “I know Chance Odoms. He helped me do repairs over at the McIlhenny’s place yesterday and had lunch with me and my mother after.”

  “It’s not like you was marryin’ his daughter, boy,” he shot back.

  “She was there, too,” Lamarr said, kneading his powerful fists. “We even sat on the same blanket.”

  Winfield glared rabidly, his hatred palpable, perhaps holding his tongue only because of Lamarr’s implied threat.

  Rev. Champion glanced between the two men and touched Lamarr on one arm, signaling that they should go. Neither spoke as they retraced their steps through the church, Lamar wondering if the place would ever feel the same again, or if his confrontation with Brother Winfield would forever foul its memory. Expecting only to be seen to the door, he was surprised that Rev. Champion followed him out and gestured for him to have a seat on the concrete steps.

  “Sometimes you have to let a man have his say, as unpleasant as it may seem,” the minister told him, settling on the top step, heedless of his black suit pants.

  “Chance ain’t no racist, not really,” Lamarr said, his eyes on the morning traffic, two beat-up old pickups, both of them sporting more rust than paint, crossing in opposite directions.

  Rev. Champion stared at Lamarr, wondering about his use of Odoms’ first name. “To you he’s not a racist,” he said. “And to me he’s not a racist, least not like some. But to--to him and a lot of others, he’s racist.”

  “Why would that be, sir?”

  “A long time ago Odoms shot and killed his older brother.”

  A thrill of recognition ran like electricity down Lamarr’s spine. While raised with the belief that Chance was the bogeyman, and as familiar as anyone with the sight of his guns, until now the stories he’d heard of his killing people had never struck close to home.

  “I remember it, but the name wasn’t Winfield, was it? I don’t think I was even in school, yet.”

  “That’s right.”

  “Was it in the line of duty?” He asked, looking thoughtful. “Was the brother doin’ the crime?”

  “That’s the point, son,” Rev. Champion said. “Those kinds of questions don’t matter to most folks.”

  “But was he--?”

  He silenced Lamarr with a disbelieving squint. “It so easily slips your mind that most of us don’t think like a policeman?” He shook his head and sighed deeply. “The boy was robbin’ a liquor store--he was totin’ a Saturday night special.

  “But like I said, it doesn’t matter, not if you’re the one looking from the inside out. Life is much easier when you’re the one looking from the outside in, demanding justice.”

  “That don’t make him racist.”

  “Oh, there’s racism enough in all of us to go around,” Rev. Champion said wearily. “But I know you didn’t drop by this early in the morning to hear the brother spout off about Chance Odoms.”

  “I just come to say goodbye,” Lamarr told him. “I’m leavin’ and then I’ll be headin’ off to Korea.”

  “A little early, but I understand, son.” Pulling Lamarr close, Rev. Champion wrapped an arm around his shoulders. “Almighty God,” he prayed, “I ask for this boy’s protection wherever he goes. Let your grace always be upon his life, your strength within him, the resolve to do what’s right in the face of evil, your word to guard his footsteps, and your Spirit to keep his soul. In the precious name of Jesus, you know we love him, Lord. Amen.”

  Lamarr opened his eyes and saw Rev. Champion brush away a tear.

  “Let us know how everything is with you in Korea, son,” the minister said, as both of them pushed to their feet.

  “Oh, you all be hearin’ from me, that’s for sure,” Lamarr said, and descended the stairs. He turned to wave one last time before heading home, where his suitcases were packed and ready to go. It was 6:30 and he had a bus to catch at 7:00. While he had gone to the church to say goodbye because of his mother’s wishes, his real hope had been to ask advice from Rev. Champion. After talking with Chance Odoms the day before, he had thought he would like a different perspective on things.

  But Rev. Champion’s views weren’t new to him. He had heard them thundered from the pulpit (and all around it) and expounded at close quarters in small Bible studies most of his life. He wouldn’t likely forget them anytime soon.

  One thing Lamarr was glad of, though, not once had he called Brother Winfield sir.

  ****

  Part Three

  Chapter 8

  After a day and a half in the hospital, Stella Jo came home, none the worse for the wear with a diagnosis of hyperventilation. She would have come home sooner, except that the hospital staff was shorthanded because of the weekend and wanted to wait for the local heart specialist to return from his fishing safari on the Gulf before ordering a series of tests. Since her mind had skipped a beat or two because of her ordeal, she didn’t notice the front door of her house had been replaced and a different screen door installed, or that the porch, so recently acquainted with the front end of a late model Chevy Camaro, had been expertly repaired. Neither did she notice the patch job on the fence where the Chevy plowed its way into the yard. Perhaps it’s needless to say, too, that she failed to notice the nearly miraculous lack of damage to Angel’s statues.

  In fact it was five full months before Stella Jo noticed any of it. She and Ioletta and Angel were in her kitchen, working on Sunday dinner, with Stella hacking away at four plump chickens sacrificed for the occasion (actually Piggly Wiggly’s had acquired them from somebody else who’d done the sacrificing). Ioletta tenderly ministered over okra and a mess of greens, since she was justly proud of her reputation for fixin’ the aforesaid vegetables. And Angel, sitting at the table set for twelve but likely to expand by a few card tables, labored over a mountain of freshly picked snap beans.

  Stella let drop the meat cleaver and sat down beside her son. Ioletta, her sister in the spirit, looked up from her work, wondering if something was wrong. The iron skillets were out, bacon grease waiting, but Stella had not yet dredged the chicken pieces through her favorite blend of flour and spices.

  “Ioletta.”

  “Ummh?”

  “Who fixed my front door and the porch after that dreadful night?”

  Ioletta rocked back on her heels a moment. She could think of only one dreadful night in recent memory. “You’re axin’ me now?”

  “Yes,” she said, her eyes growing big with the realization that she had somehow blocked the events of that night from her mind. �
��And you know why?”

  “No, honey.”

  “Because that crazy Mr. Rames was watering his vegetable patch last night at midnight.”

  “Midnight?” Ioletta said, indignant. “I’d be afraid of rape! What was the fool doin’ in your yard at midnight?”

  “Oh, he said some crazy thing about water evaporation,” she answered, not even blinking at the imagery of anyone attempting to molest Ioletta. “I think the man had been drinking.”

  “I hope you called the police on him. Cain’t believe he was watering at midnight--and him not even from our street.”

  “Well, I did tell him I was calling Captain Odoms if he didn’t go home right then and there--which was just about the time he ran into one of Angel’s statues.”

  “I hope it was the one I think it was,” Ioletta said, her eyes lighting with mirth.

  “Well, it is right next to his summer squash.”

  Ioletta could see the statue in her mind’s eye, the angel lying on its back, half-emerged from stone, one arm upraised, the hand just at about hip level.

  “He yelled so loud I was afraid he had broken it off--the angel’s hand, I mean!” Stella finished quickly, both women exploding in giggles, which were really more like what most people would call hoots and hollers. Anyone on the street could have heard them, even though the kitchen was at the back of the house, and the house sat back thirty yards from the sidewalk. Stella glanced guiltily at Angel, who was humming one of his hymns as he transformed the mountain of beans into a pyramid.

  “I don’t think he’ll be comin’ over in the dark again,” Ioletta remarked, finally controlling herself.

  “No, surely not,” Stella said.

  “Midnight!” Ioletta clucked. “We cain’t be lettin’ people from just anywhere come in to garden here--they have to find a patch over on their own street.”

  “But it reminded me, woke me up, Ioletta. Was it Lamarr who fixed my door?”

  “Him and Captain Odoms.”

  “I didn’t even thank Lamarr,” she said, sadly shaking her head. “Or Captain Odoms, either.”

  “Oh, Lamarr, he understood. It’s not like he’s used to receivin’ thank you notes. And I’m sure Captain Odoms has seen that kind of thing before.”

  “I should have paid him--he’s always been such a help--but how do you thank somebody for saving your life and fixing your door?”

  “That was a terrible night,” Ioletta commented. “I thought you was goin’ to be killed. You thought you was goin’ to be killed. Lamarr thought he was--I s’pose even your Angel thought he was to be killed.”

  Stella’s eyes stared distantly.

  “You ever hear what happened to that boy?” Ioletta asked.

  “No, I imagine he’s been put in prison, by now.”

  “Prison!” Ioletta exclaimed. “You don’t know nothin’ about the law, do you?”

  “What I’ve seen on TV,” she said, unoffended.

  “What, Perry Mason?” She said, sniffing loudly. “You’ve lived a sheltered life, Stella Jo. If you was black, you’d know the courts don’t work like that. I’m sure they will have you come up to the trial and testify and everything when it’s time, meaning when they feel like it and not a minute before. They’ll want to know what the boy did, and what you said and he said, afore he met up with my Lamarr and tried to cut his heart out with that knife.”

  “You mean they’ll ask me to testify against him?”

  “Well, yes, that is the point, ’course they’ll ax you twenty different ways, like to prove you’re not deaf and all. And that’s the man on your side. Then the defense will try to tear down everthin’ you said, and they’ll argue back and forth, doin’ their bestest to figure out what you really meant and if it’s possible for a man to do what they say he did.”

  “Is it that bad?”

  “That bad? It’s worse!”

  “But what about the boy, what have they done with him in the meantime?”

  “Oh, he’s in jail somewheres, all right. But you just ax Captain Odoms, he’ll tell you what you need to know.”

  Stella was silent, her gaze again faraway. Chance Odoms was not the kind of man to say much, even if she did see him in church most Sundays for twenty or thirty years. If there was anybody on this side of town feared by the forces of evil and a terror to anyone else in the city bent on criminal misdeeds, he was it. But he was something of a prickly pear among the righteous, as well.

  “Will you go with me, Ioletta?”

  “To talk to Captain Odoms, honey?”

  “Nooo--I can talk to him myself. What I was wondering is if you would go to the trial with me?”

  “When they put you on the stand? I wouldn’t miss it for the world!”

  “No, I meant the whole trial.”

  “The whole trial?” Ioletta asked, her eyes widening in surprise. “Why would you want to do that, girl? And how would you beg off work from the bus company for so long?”

  “Oh, I don’t know,” Stella said, uncomfortable with not being totally honest with her friend. “But I think they’ll give me a couple of weeks, if need be.”

  Ioletta chewed her lower lip. “I think we best talk to Captain Odoms,” she said abruptly. “That boy was a strange one, and I don’t know if it’s such a good idea, when you taken to considerin’.”

  Stella didn’t say anything, as she rose wearily from her chair and lighted the gas burners to heat the skillets. Ioletta looked on, wondering if she should press the issue of what was really on her friend’s mind. But sometimes it was just as well to let things alone. The woman couldn’t keep it in forever. One thing for sure, though, it had to have something to do with that boy. Ioletta glanced at Angel. It must be hard on Stella, what with her tender heart and the boys lookin’ so much alike.

  ****

  Chapter 9

  Chance Odoms stared after Stella for a long moment before closing the front door of his house on her departing figure. Even as Ioletta had chewed her lower lip while talking with Stella at the kitchen table on the day before, he chewed at his, wondering what she could be thinking. She had asked what he knew about the case of the intruder, to which he told her that the boy’s trial was coming up any day now. She would be called soon enough to testify. Normally people were nervous about such affairs, wondering how they would act when interrogated by some shifty lawyer in front of a roomful of strangers, but Stella McIlhenny did not seem to display any such concern. She seemed, rather, much more interested in the perp and what would happen to him. Had they discovered drugs on him or in his car? Did he have a long history of crime? Had he ever killed or hurt anyone else? Did anyone know his parents?

  Over coffee at the breakfast table and his first morning cigarette, a filterless Camel (a habit he privately acknowledged as filthy but acquired while he was still a boy in the Marines, and even yet not severely warned against by the United States Surgeon General), he figured he best get his ducks in a row. There was something about the woman’s sense of urgency that sent up a red flag. A neighbor just didn’t come over and ask those kinds of questions this early in the morning, even if she was involved, when she could have picked up the phone or broached the subject at church. Was she afraid of party lines or someone overhearing their conversation at church?

  “You look very serious this morning, Clarence,” Anna Lee commented from across the table. The rest of the world might call him “Chance,” but you wouldn’t catch her stooping to their level. She had married well below her station when she shared vows with Clarence Odoms but was otherwise a very proper Southern woman, and even at 50 years of age people still remarked on how she reminded them of Rita Hayworth, which she invariably denied--with fetching blushes belying her ladylike composure.

  But returning to Clarence, or “Chance,” as he preferred, especially since it was much more manly sounding and projected an image he liked as the city’s top homicide cop, his wife was one of the few people on earth
who could recognize he looked very serious as opposed to the customary look of sobriety pasted over his face.

  “I’m leaving a bit early,” he said, pushing coffee cup and saucer away and rising from the table to give her a goodbye peck on the cheek. “Just a minor question concerning that little problem of Widow McIlhenny’s.”

  “A dreadful affair,” she said, knowing he was not about to share further details of the case with her. He was never one to burden her with his work, when such was not fit for the ears of a lady.

  “A strange affair,” he said, correcting her. “Which I hope to God does not turn any stranger.”

  Her eyebrows arched in surprise. But he had grabbed his suit jacket and was headed for the door.

  “Be careful, darling,” she called after him.

  Careful? he thought, though it was always her parting shot. In spite of his nickname, he was always careful and did not take chances without being prepared and having backup plans arranged ahead of time. That was why he needed to arrive early at the office. He would have to make a few calls to find out what the cops had said in their reports that night about the arrest of Stella’s intruder. He had wisely, he thought at the time, left it in their hands as the arresting officers and largely diminished his own role in defusing a bad situation. It wasn’t like he needed the collar, and taking credit from the boys in blue would only have added insult to injury and possibly further endangered Lamarr. Besides, one didn’t always know who was related to whom in this city.

  Which said nothing about the boy in jail. Since Stella Jo McIlhenny seemed unusually interested in him, it might be wise to find out what he could about him. His guess was that there would be a rap sheet on him as long as his arm, and his guesses were usually pretty good.

  ****

  Chapter 10

  “Seeing in a glass darkly” described Stella Jo’s mental estate pretty well at times (sometimes for years), especially when triggered by events such as Leonard’s early passing and the tragic circumstances surrounding Angel’s birth. But if some terrible thing could be lost or misplaced in her brain, eventually a stray shaft of light would re-illumine it, bring it back to the foreground. That’s why Stella Jo had to do what she did. On the day of her visit to Captain Odoms to find out what she could about her intruder and his date with the court, she began making phone calls.