MATTHEW HENSON
AND THE ICE TEMPLE OF HARLEM
GARY PHILLIPS
The following is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or used in an entirely fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2020 by Gary Phillips
Cover and jacket design by Chuck Regan
ISBN 978-1-947993-86-0
eISBN: 978-1-951709-24-2
Library of Congress Control Number: tk
First trade paperback edition July 2020 by Agora Books
An imprint of Polis Books, LLC
44 Brookview Lane
Aberdeen, NJ
PolisBooks.com
Losing your way on a journey is unfortunate. But, losing your reason for the journey is a fate more cruel.
H.G. Wells
CHAPTER ONE
Her tiny eyes blinked rapidly behind the heavy lenses of her glasses. She was on tiptoe looking through the peephole. “Yes?” she asked, frowning. Then, gasping in disbelief, “My goodness, you’re…him?” she exclaimed.
“I am, ma’am,” said the voice familiar to many Harlemites.
“Bless your heart,” she replied. “Me and a few of my friends from our ladies’ auxiliary enjoyed that talk and slide show about the ancient library at Timbuktu you gave at First Baptist last year.”
“Thank you. Would you mind if I used your living room window?”
“Oh, yes, yes, come on in, Mr. Henson.” She unlatched the door and opened it wide. The elderly light-skinned black woman wore a quilted housecoat and slippers.
Matthew Henson wasn’t particularly tall. But at a shade under six feet and what with his sturdy build, he gave the impression of being larger as he regarded the older woman’s modest apartment. The diaphanous curtains were ironed, and bright white doilies were scattered about. There was a built-in sideboard containing what he presumed were the dishes and silverware only brought out for her ladies’ auxiliary meetings.
“You look loaded for bear,” she said, eyes wide behind her glasses, noting his appearance. He filled the doorway in his workingman’s clothes, a rope knotted at intervals connected to a grapple coiled around his substantial chest. There was also an ice axe, an ulu in the Inuktitut language, a small utility knife, and other such items attached to a custom-made tool belt he had on. He came farther into the room and the older lady quietly closed the door.
“I’m sorry to intrude on your quietude, Mrs…?”
“Celow. The late mister was a railroad man. Oh, child, he traveled all over this country on them rails.” She looked off toward a mantle with various framed photos on it as well as a good-sized Santa Fe railroad enameled shield.
“Yes, ma’am, where would we be without the railroads?” He eyed the window across the room but wasn’t going to rush things and make her more nervous. No matter what might be transpiring just below them. He’d learned long ago in far harsher climes to pace himself.
“Lord yes,” she went on, “‘our peoples’ means of freedom in many ways, isn’t that right?”
He prayed they weren’t about to have a revival. “That is so.” He inched forward a notch.
“Would you like some tea?” she offered but instead of the kitchen, she glanced toward her sideboard and its lead glass cabinets. “Though I imagine an outdoorsman like yourself might want something a might more bracing.”
“About that there window, Mrs. Celow.”
“Oh, yes,” she started as if waking from slumber, “you didn’t come here to chitchat.”
“Maybe some other time when the clock’s not against me.”
She beamed up at him. “Really? Would you come speak to the auxiliary as my special guest?”
“I would be delighted.”
“The ladies would be beside themselves, Mr. Henson.”
“Matt will do.”
She clapped her hands together appreciatively. “Fine, fine.”
He went on past her to the window. He undid the lock and slid it up easily. After moving her easy chair and lamp aside, he secured his pronged grapple hook on the frame and sill. The sharp ends dug into the wood and would leave gouge marks but there was no helping that. Mrs. Celow didn’t raise a fuss, being too polite, he figured.
“Is this a government mission, Mr…Matt?” the widow asked as he put a leg outside the open window.
“No, this is a private engagement, Mrs. Celow.”
“I see,” she said, her dubiousness evident.
Henson was aware there was a persistent rumor that many believed he was an operative for an outfit called the International Detective Agency. There was no such organization, but he knew the source had been a serialized story in a magazine several years ago called the Black Sleuth. Elements of the popular story got transferred from the page, as these things do, into speculation in conversations in cafes and beauty salons throughout Harlem and elsewhere. From there, over time, fiction took on the trappings of gossip which always had its own reality.
“I’m thinking once you’re gone, you’re not coming back tonight.”
He was half out the window. “Unlikely.”
“How do I get in touch with you?” she asked.
“Just leave word for me at the May-May’s Diner.”
“Over on Lenox?’
“Yes, near 132nd. Now if you would, once I’m outside, please don’t go near the window,” he added, figuring she might take a gander as he descended. He also hoped bullets wouldn’t be coming through to ruin her nice flooring from the story below.
“Very well,” she said resignedly. He was depriving her of some of the excitement of having Matt Henson in her apartment, but she’d still have more than enough to tell her church ladies.
His booted soles firm against the building’s bricks, Henson, who’d slipped on supple seal skin gloves, held himself in place on the rope a few inches below the older lady’s window. He’d lowered the sash, cognizant the warmth of the day was giving away to the early evening and not everyone liked the cold as he did. From where he was now, the window he wanted was below him to his left. He clambered down and cursed under his breath. The curtains were drawn—no way to tell what was going on inside, except a slight gap between the curtains showed the lights were on.
Henson worked the rope around his veined forearm, holding his body in place. His other hand free, he got his axe lose. He had one of his miniature smoke bombs with him as well as an incendiary type. The latter was based on a grenade developed by the Germans toward the close of World War I. He wasn’t of a mind to start a fire in the room beyond—at least if he didn’t have to, but better to be prepared.
Henson clenched the axe handle between his teeth and, unlimbering the rope, got both hands on it as he slipped down again. He came to rest just above the curtained window, not worried if those inside detected movement or not. What had that blowhard Peary always barked? “Find a way or make one, Henson.”
“Well, shit,” he smiled thinly as he pushed backward once, twice, and on the third time, muttering, “Whoop halloo,” got enough arc as he swung back toward the building and let go of the rope. His boots and legs burst through the glass. Though it looked like he would land on his butt, the airborne Henson tucked his body into a ball and he landed neatly in a roll. One side of the curtains ripped from its pole as the material caught in the fold of his leg.
A hood who’d been sitting in a chair eating a sandwich gaped at the unexpected entrance. He spat roast beef and tomato from his mouth, his hand darting for a .45 in
a shoulder holster draped on the back of a chair. He got the gun in his fist, but too late, Henson was upright and sprang on him.
“You goddamn jumping jigaboo,” the white gunman blared.
“Jump on this,” Henson said as he punched the man in the side of his head. He stumbled sideways, dazed. A pocket door to another room slammed home. A second gunman in a garish tie came out firing a drum-loaded Thompson machine gun. He raked the room in a sweep of bullets, hunks of wood, cloth and porcelain flying everywhere as the rounds blistered furniture and exploded the bric-a-brac.
“Watch where you’re shooting, Eddie,” the one Henson had struck yelled. He’d crawled behind a wingback chair.
“Aw, stop being a crybaby,” Eddie groused. He looked around, not sure where their intruder had gone. There was a swinging door to the kitchen, and several bullet holes had penetrated the door.
“The darkie must be in there,” said the first hood.
“He’s as good as on the slab,” Eddie, staring forward, sent another burst through the door. His companion, gun in hand, joined in. The door now hung loose, the plaster and frame now nearly non-existent. From inside the kitchen, it got kicked all the way off and fell on the machine gunner.
“Goddammit,” Eddie said knocking the door away from his body.
But Henson had already deployed his smoke grenade, and the thick stuff spread quickly through the compact quarters.
“The hell,” the hood with the .45 said, “can’t see shit.” He waved his hand before his face seeking to part the pall. The ice axe whistled through the dissipating cloud, sailing end over end, until the blade sunk into the center of his forehead. Eyes rolling back, his brain ceased functioning by the time he collapsed to the floor. The smoke lifted from around the fresh corpse, crawling upward to the ceiling like ghostly tendrils. The occupants of the apartment were revealed. Water could be heard dripping into the pan beneath the ice box in the kitchen. Henson stood stock still on the plain carpet.
Eddie, positioned just beyond the archway of the open pocket door, pressed the barrel of his weapon against the side of a pretty woman in a fashionable skirt and midday blouse. “You go back and tell Daddy Paradise you failed, shine. Take another step and this here fine brown gal gets ventilated like Swiss cheese.” The girl looked nervous but not overly so, Henson noted, cool-headed.
“They hurt you any, Destiny?” Henson asked.
“Oh, they crowed and strutted like roosters do, but nothing that’ll give me nightmares.”
“Hey, cut it out.” He jabbed the barrel into her for emphasis. “You got any idea who I work for, huh?”
Henson said, “I know exactly who you work for.”
“Then you best skedaddle. You messin’ in white folks’ business and you already in way over your head.” His gaze flitted toward the dead man then back in Henson. “You gonna pay for what you did.”
“If not in this world, then the next.”
“What?’ he began, but didn’t finish.
In a motion that confounded the thug, Henson whipped his empty hand across his body like a magician’s flourish. From out of his sleeve flew a shuriken—a throwing star. Two of its five razor-sharp points embedded deep in the wrist holding the Tommy gun. More from surprise than pain, the hood reacted, his grip loosening on his prisoner though he managed to hold onto his weapon. She drove a heel into his foot and he gritted his teeth.
“Goddamn black bitch,” he wailed.
He twisted, leveling the gun back on her, but Henson had already closed the distance between them. Henson grabbed the barrel as a burst of fire leapt from the Thompson. Rounds ripped into the couch, cotton stuffing erupting from the destroyed cushions.
“Let go,” the hood rasped, hitting Henson in the gut, surprised his fist met packed muscle. And just that quick, Henson batted the machine gun away while taking a step back as it fell to the floor.
“You gonna get yours now, boy,” the hoodlum said, his fists up in a boxer’s stance. “I don’t need no gat to teach you a lesson.” He charged forward, swinging. In three blurry moves from Henson the criminal was down on his back on the floor, blinking hard at the man standing over him. Face blank, Henson’s heel crashed down on his face, sending him under with a broken nose.
“What was that you did?” Destiny Stevenson asked Henson. “I’ve been to prizefights, but I’ve never seen boxing like that.”
“It’s called wing chun.”
“What is that?’
“A kind of fighting technique, Chinese style of combat.”
“You learned it in Chinatown?”
“China,” he said tersely. He gathered up her jacket, purse, and cloche hat and handed them to her. “Like the man said, we better skedaddle.” He also retrieved his axe and throwing star.
“My father sent you?”
“Yes.”
They were at the door. More than one head poked out of an apartments in the hallway, then retreated.
Stevenson pointed at the throwing star Henson slipped back up his sleeve, securing it in place. “That part of that wing chop-chop?”
The throwing star was of Japanese origin, but it was better not to be too literal. “Yes,” he answered. He undid a gunny sack from his tool belt and put the belt, axe, his remaining firebomb and a few other items inside. He carried it as they headed toward the rear stairwell.
“You’re not part of fathers’ following, are you?’
“How can you tell?”
“You don’t have that glazed-over look they get when his name is mentioned.”
He chuckled as they descended. “He has his ways. A lot of people respect him.”
“Ain’t that something.”
He glanced at her, not sure how to interpret her remark. They reached the ground floor and Henson held up his hand. He cracked the service door open and scanned the thoroughfare. He signaled for her to exit and they did, staying close to the building. There was no way the gunshots hadn’t been heard, and there was a smattering of people loosely bunched in front of or across the street from the building.
Henson and the woman went farther along the gloomy passageway between the buildings. Even in the near dark, he deftly guided her around trash cans and discarded pallets. They stopped at the rear door of the building opposite.
“Why aren’t the police coming?” the woman wondered aloud, given the absence of a siren.
Henson pushed against the door, eaten around the edges from termites and rot. It gave in easily. “I’m guessing they were told to stay away. Mr. Flegenheimer has influence in certain circles.”
“Oh, isn’t that—”
“Yep, he’s better known as Dutch Schultz. That’s why your father hired me to fetch you back.” The two made their way through a murky storage room filled various steamer trunks, broken furniture, and several large standing radios including Atwater Kents and Crosleys.
“I see,” she said without rancor. They paused at another door and she touched his arm. “You some kind of circus strongman? But you’re all sleek and move like, I don’t know, a dancer.” She liked his thick mustache and his chiseled face but didn’t want to seem too forward.
“My ex says I got two left feet.”
“Ex, is it?”
“Mm-hum. Come on.”.
The storeroom took them into hallway next to a set of stairs leading up to other apartments. They left the building, the people gathered next door not paying them any attention as they walked away in the opposite direction. One block over, they were on 119th Street and Henson pointed toward Madison Avenue.
“That way, then we can walk or catch a hack. We got to get further uptown.”
“You taking me to him, the deliverer his glorious dang self?” She smiled sweetly.
“He wants to see you.”
She huffed but didn’t say anything else.
He said, “For somebody who’s just been kidnapped by a couple of mobsters, you don’t seem that rattled. You ha
ndled yourself pretty well back there.”
“For a girl, you mean.”
“For anybody.”
She regarded him.
They passed a restaurant where diners ate at tables next to a large plate glass window looking out on the street. A band played moodily over a radio from an open window of one of the overhead apartments in the building. A big man, six-three and chest like an anvil, in a suit, bowler hat, and a cigar perched on the side of his mouth, stepped out of the eatery into their path. An ostentations diamond on his little finger caught the light from the bulb over the doorway.
“Matthew ‘Polar Bear’ Henson, how’s the world treating you?” he said heartily. The man touched the brim of his hat nodding at Stevenson. “Ma’am.”
“I can’t call it, OD, you?”
Oscar Dulane hunched his broad shoulders. “Fortune smiled on me today. Tomorrow, who knows?” Among OD’s pursuits was that of a bouncer brought on at clubs like Smalls Paradise and Hayne’s Oriental when the staff needed beefing up for special events.
Henson gave him a half-salute and he and the woman continued on.
“Matthew who did he say?” Stevenson asked as they walked, having heard his last name. “You’re the one.”
“That’s me.”
“Well I’ll be. The one who was with them white fellas who discovered the North Pole?”
In a snow blind white haze, he saw the weathered faces of his friends, Ootah, his brothers Egingwah, and Seegloo, Ooqueah—even Peary appeared before him. As one the fur coated men gestured for him to join them as the snow storm nearly obliterated their forms. They were the six men who reached the North Pole. It would turn out only one of them would get lasting credit for the hard-earned goal.
“Uh-huh,” was all he drawled returning to the present.
They hailed a Checker cab and rode further north into the heart of Harlem to be let off at a brownstone along Striver’s Row. The cabbie, who wore a button on his lapel identifying him as a member of the Universal Negro Improvement Association, and recognizing Henson, let him stand outside on the running board as the explorer wanted to be on alert. Arriving at their destination, Henson rang the doorbell. A bronze-hued woman with almond eyes of an undetermined age opened the front door. She was dressed modestly and broke into a grin at the sight of the younger woman. A spray of lilacs and gladiolas was in a vase behind her on a stand in the foyer
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