“No, Lynn.”
“Because Mr. Oglethrope goes real berserk if I get recorded.” She shook her head. “You and Whitman really have him flummoxed. We were told it was only her, and maybe a backstop. Now he doesn’t know how many…Please hurry, Mr. Dunford.”
He put his right arm back into his shirt. “Listen, Lynn, wait here a minute.” She had decoyed him.
“Where’re you going?”
“I have to go…to the infirmary.”
“Don’t worry, Mr. Dunford. After Mary-Joan, the authorities called us back for adjustments.” She patted the bunk. “Honest, Mr. Dunford, in three years both on the north and south Atlantic run—”
He opened the door, stepped out. “I’ll be right back.” He ran.
“Stop, Mr. Dunford!” Lynn followed him into the hallway. He glanced back, saw the pistol’s hole between her breasts, made the corner, hoping he could find the slaves again, and save Wendy.
One level up, he stopped running, reasoning that Lynn would have to dress. Besides, he did not exactly know the way. The first time, he and Wally had happened onto the slaves, or Wally had led him. And Wendy had guided the second time.
He tried to follow Wendy’s way, finding the narrow spiral stair they had reached from the deck. But why take her way? Perhaps the Family also dealt in slaves. She had not hesitated to call him nigger. Why even want to save her? Because he knew her.
Halfway down, he realized a door waited at the bottom, then a foyer, off the passageway. He stopped and tried to think of a plan. After a few moments he gave up. He did not know enough to plan, would have to walk into the passageway, and improvise.
In the foyer, he began to hear voices, two men arguing behind a closed door. He stepped out into the passageway. The voices grew louder, Oglethrope and Wally. He tiptoed to the door of the cabin where he and Wendy had found the slave manifest.
“You’re all wet, Mr. Oglethrope.”
“I been at this longer than you, kid.”
“I’m telling you, if we do it your way, it’ll jam. The TYO480 won’t accept it. Honest, Mr. Oglethrope, this is something new.”
“Back off, Wally. I’ve done these things since the war, and I know how to make them short and brief. You think I’m not acquainted with the agent who reviews our work? We know how we operate; we got an understanding.”
“This is a new procedure. They don’t want just plain cancels. They want us to report in detail.”
“That’s the stupidest thing I ever heard, Wally. We fill in the blanks and go back to work.”
“Well, all right, Mr. Oglethrope. I can’t dispute my superior, but I think it’s only fair to say I’m planning to submit my own report.”
“You got your channels, and I got mine. But don’t take credit for my cancel.”
Their argument finished, Oglethrope grunted and Wally whistled. Chig left the door and crossed the hall. Perhaps he would find Wendy with the slaves. He twisted the knob to the padded room.
“Ready for some exercise, Mr. Dunford?” Lynn had crept up behind him on her pink sneakers. She had dressed herself in blue trousers with sewn-in creases and a white T-shirt, TIWAZ YOUTH ORGANIZATION misshapen across her breasts. “What muscles you want to start with?”
He looked for her pistol, did not find it. “You have a key?” He made a joke, hoping he would not have to hurt her.
“Sure, Mr. Dunford.” She reached into her back pocket, pulled out her key, bent to the lock, and opened the door.
A punching bag hung from the pink wall; a leather exercise-horse waited welded to the padded floor. Gloves curled in the corner, a medicine ball not far away.
Lynn closed the door behind them. “We have to talk fast, Mr. Dunford. Were you kidding in the cabin?”
He had not yet recovered from the room, nodded.
“Yes?” She whispered. “Don’t be mean now, Mr. Dunford.”
Every trace of the Africans had disappeared.
She put her square little hand on his arm. “I’m real sorry you lost this game, Mr. Dunford. Did you know her well?” From her pocket, she produced a stub of pencil, went to a pad of paper hanging on a chain near the parallel bars. “I would never get a feeling for Wally. When he got cancelled, I’d be sad.”
He did not move. “Wh…Whitman’s cancelled?”
“Sure, Mr. Dunford. So I’m giving you my address in New York in case you change your mind.” She tore off a sheet of paper, then sprawled on the padded floor, her knees bent, her feet wagging, her tongue clamped between her lips, and began to write. “Were you in love, Mr. Dunford?”
“Yes.” Again, he had taken too long.
“That’s nice. Maybe I’ll fall in love one day, but never inside TYO. And Family fellows are out of the question.” She made a face. “They showed us movies of Mary-Joan Dinley.”
He remembered the name, guessed. “She lived with an African?”
“I guess so. He was Family Center. You’re Family Westnorthwest, aren’t you?”
He nodded, afraid to speak.
“What Family was she, Mr. Dunford?” She finished writing, jumped to her feet, waving the paper at him. “I told Mr. Oglethrope she was Family Center-north, but—”
“Wendy’s Family?” Wow.
She shook her head. “You mean you didn’t know either? This was really some game.” She smiled sweetly, lowered her silver eyes. “It’s the most interesting since I joined.”
“So you lost this game, Dunford.” Oglethrope stood just inside the now open door. “Next go, maybe you’ll get the breaks. But not against this TYO Team.” He slapped his stomach. “For a while, your offensive had me fooled. I was looking at another colored girl.” He winked his seeing eye. “A ginger-cake. Where’d Whitman say she was from?”
“Virginia.” He could not help smiling: Wendy came from Virginia, had worked for the Family, had died. He had heard it all in the nigger, but had not seen her through her skin. “Family West-northwest.”
Chig turned to Lynn, who still held her address in her hand. “You finished with that, Lynn?”
“Finished, Mr. Dunford.” She looked at Oglethrope, crumpled the directions in her fist. “Maybe next time.”
“Right! This game is over.” Oglethrope cleared his throat. “Dunford, I know you’re new in the game, and maybe it’ll surprise you that through the years some customs, you might call them, have grown up between TYO and you boys. You might wonder why we didn’t cancel you. Simple. We transferred the cargo, so why spill oil we don’t have to?” He hesitated. “Anyway, after we take the prize we usually offer you boys a beer, you know, and we all toast the cancelled. So I’m hoping you’ll join us.”
He looked at the ex-athlete, then the girl. They outnumbered him. “Thank you, Mr. Oglethrope, but not tonight. I couldn’t possibly.” He shook his head. “No.”
28
“HE SAID WHAT?” He still could not believe it. “When he tell you this?”
Mrs. Johnson coughed, a squack on the wire. “Today he said he leaving on the evening plane.”
“Stupid motherfucker.”
“What?” He did not repeat himself. “It’s you, Carlyle Bedlow, you and your fast mouth!”
He hung up on her, wondering how her round brown face had looked. For a moment at least, he had made her forget worry.
So Hondo had decided to give his body to the Devil, so the Devil could sell it back. For his mother’s thousand? Probably not. But perhaps the Devil knew how much Cooley Johnson earned each week, knew of Cooley’s connection to Bumper Henderson, who might pay not to get squeezed. Hondo might have a value of as much as fifty thousand dollars to somebody.
“Me.”
Thinking of his clean head, he chose his clothes, light gray-green wool pants, a sky-blue turtleneck sweater, rubber-soled walking shoes for moving quickly, then put on his camel’s-h
airs and tied the buckleless belt. He would need a driver, a man who did not look suspicious. He called Butterfly.
“But the Salon’s steaming with business, customers waiting. There’s not one chair vacant.”
“How long it take you to make thirteen thousand dollars?”
“Baby, how you talk!”
They agreed to meet at the Salon. By the time Carlyle arrived, Butterfly would have searched through his old copies of The Citizen to find the ad that had hooked Hondo. The Devil probably ran a loan company as a front for kidnap. He would investigate anybody who came in, and if he found hidden money in a background, would launch the Devil game. Hondo’s mother, Carlyle realized, always got sick, always got well, always felt pain somewhere, but always worked. Like his own mother.
He pulled the spread over his unmade bed, went out into the kitchen and put his uneaten plate into the refrigerator.
He still did not believe in Hondo’s Devil, but on his way out of his home, he broke off a clove of his mother’s garlic, buried it in his pocket.
The taxi ride took thirty minutes; he sat back on the hard plastic seat and closed his eyes, but did not sleep.
“I found it.” Butterfly waited at the door, handed him a neatly clipped advertisement, the size of a matchbox. “See? We loan to anybody.”
He memorized the address. “Come on, man.”
They good-byed Butterfly’s barbers, who stopped their scissors to bat their eyes, then walked out into the street. “You’re so grim and beautiful, baby.”
He nodded. “You carrying a gun?”
“Sorry. It’s at my apartment. We could go there.”
“We running too late.” The streets shone slick with melting snow.
“You’re terrible.”
Butterfly’s car gleamed lemon-yellow in the early darkness, its windshield bright with sky. They opened the doors, climbed into the black leather coach.
“You know where we going, Butterfly?”
“Yes, baby.” He whirled the wheel, steering them out into traffic. “But why?”
“Somebody trying to kidnap my man Hondo.”
“So he’s my rival.”
“Your rival, man, be women.”
Butterfly stopped for a red light. “Only men really understand the problems of men.”
“A woman don’t got to understand. She just got to listen real good.”
“Who listens better than me?”
“Probably nobody, man.”
They crossed two avenues. Butterfly beat the light of a third before he spoke again. “Then aren’t you interested?”
Carlyle shook his head. “Not until women stop.”
Butterfly sighed. “And they so many of them too.”
“Millions, man.” He and Butterfly had to come to an agreement before going into battle. “But, you see, it’s my duty.”
Butterfly glanced at him, did not comment.
He took a deep breath. “Man, all I hear all the time, there be more women than men, women walking around looking for men, and they not that many men. So anytime women come your way, you got to do them, understand what I mean? All these women wandering around looking for men, if you don’t do them, they’ll see they doing all right by themselves. Then, they’ll stop looking for men, and settle down, seven and eight to a room, living all in the cities. Then, man, they’ll see they in the majority and vote themselves into power. And when that happen, where will you be at?”
Butterfly poked out his lips. “Well, what can I do?”
“Tie them down, man. Knock them up and give them something to think about. You dig it? Make men, man.”
“But, baby, I already did that.”
Carlyle laughed. “Then you understand what I’m talking about.” He stared at Butterfly. “Right?”
Butterfly waited to answer. “I hate to lose you.”
He placed his hand on Butterfly’s arm. “You ain’t lost me, baby. You just found me. We can be friends.” He paused until Butterfly had turned to look at him. “Now ain’t that some simple shit!”
Butterfly began to laugh, offered his right hand for a slap, then made a left into the Devil’s street. Carlyle watched the numbers, searched the doorways of dark warehouses, until straight ahead, he found the limousine, brake-lights aglare, waiting at the corner for the signal to change. He pointed. “Move up, Butterfly.”
Without a lurch, Butterfly gave them speed, carried them close enough to see the out-of-state license: WC-5, rusted symbols on a plate of dark-red, and above it, through the oval window, the back of Hondo’s head. “They got him.”
Butterfly sucked his tongue. “What do we do now?”
“We follow.”
The limousine took a right, going south, stopped at the corner of the street, went right again, passing bars: B.Q.’s, Hare’s Lair, The Brown Turtle, The Oasis Palm, Jesse B.’s Joyce Club, Brown’s, Mr. Mitey’s Blessed Diner, Melvin’s Jazzmatazz Gallery, Smokey’s Smoother Room, Rinehart’s Restaurant, T.M.’s Dream Room, Sonny R’s Boom Bar, The Johnson Jones Jail House, all of them open, flashing, and filling up—until a light caught them at the clock by the diamond store.
They turned north on the Avenue; they would pass the Grouse. “Pull up on the right of them.”
Butterfly swung out, moved up, inches away. Ma Buster drove, the chauffer’s cap mashed over her curls. The Devil sat in the rear, directly behind her. Hondo sagged in the backseat’s center, his neck and shirt-front ablaze with points of light. “When we reach in front of the Grouse, smash them.”
“Thirteen thousand dollars, Carlyle?”
“If you wreck the car, man.”
“You’re sweet.” Butterfly squealed, swerved to his right for an angle, then guided his lemon fender, crunching low and hollow, into the limousine’s front door. Ma Buster opened her mouth, but nothing came through the glass. Butterfly floored the pedal now, bulldozed the limousine sideways into the stone divider running down the middle of the Avenue. The cars stopped.
Carlyle climbed out slowly, shouting: “Devil, you a menace!”
On the sidewalk in front of the Grouse, two boys in leather coats, sunglasses, and an old lady with a brown paper shopping bag halted, interested.
“Get out that car! Let me teach you something!”
Ma Buster stared, her cap crooked on her head, trapped. The back compartment seemed empty until Hondo rose from the floor, blinking, opened the door, and tumbled out onto the black asphalt. Around his neck, he wore a bejewelled dog’s collar, the leash swinging free.
The Devil appeared, stepped down, in a dark suit, pink shirt with big cuff-links, dark tie, polished, pointed black shoes. His face had not changed. “What is this?”
“Never mind talk. Get ready to go for your gun!” Carlyle yelled, looking back at the sidewalk, where a crowd of people gathered, a man with a metal loaf-shaped lunchbox, another man rolling a newspaper, two short ladies in short wool coats. The boys in leather had begun an inspection of the point of impact. “You see that mother fender curl man?”
“Why did you destroy our car?” The Devil stepped closer, eyes narrowed, his breath colder than the air. “Tell us your name.”
“No.” Carlyle paused, thought, then smiled. “You don’t know my name?”
“Now just a minute, young man.”
“Just a minute, your mama.”
Hondo had managed to sit now.
“Get on your feet, Mr. Johnson!” Carlyle made his voice stern. “Your master speaks to you!”
“Yes, sir.” Hondo shook his head, put his hands on the asphalt, and struggled to stand. He recognized Carlyle—who winked, then smiled at the Devil.
“I don’t like nobody running my game. You understand?” He turned away, addressed the crowd on the sidewalk. “You know what he just said? That he’s the Devil.”
“He do?”
Carlyle whispered to the Devil. “There can be only one Devil. You or me. You can’t have it both ways.” He turned his back, hollered at the crowd. “Who saw what this devil did?”
A giant black man in a leather cap stepped forward. “I seen it, bubbah, and it was him!”
They all stepped forward then, pressed in around the two cars. “I seen it too men came right out of where he did like that time we went over to Tennessee it come up here in his big black lemon car!”
The Grouse had emptied, ten or fifteen men he knew standing up on the Avenue divider, toasting him with their drinks.
Butterfly rested his head on the steering wheel, sobbing for his beautiful machine. “But look, it’s junk now.” Several of his gentlemen friends from the Grouse had filled the seats, consoling him.
The streetlight came on. “What I always heard right there the most accidents happen when I seen it went all the way over out his chauffer laid there behind the wheel out some drinks, Jim!”
Carlyle threw the Devil a shrug, patted the lump in his pocket. “If the Devil’s me, you’ll never make it. And if he’s you, you still might not make it.”
“Listen, him and Everett Cooper be riding along one night when Coop have his coupe with the leathertop of the grade, they saw a great big grizzly bear standing in the tunnel as much as you please, man, but move out the way! I can’t see nothing neither nigger get so upset his whole chassis slipped all over every which place. But it was him.”
The Devil frowned, bit his upper lip, nodded, then climbed back into the limousine. He pulled the door behind him, and pressed down the button on the windowsill. Ma Buster swiveled in the driver’s seat, smiled at her passenger. Then the inside of the limousine burst bright with fire, burning.
“Jump back! That car gone in and take my jacket, Jackson. I don’t need it. This mama hotter than a mammyjammy. Stand back, baby, or you’ll get your boobies hatching! Get that kid out the night come these two cars here up the Avenue and me be peeping from behind the park, when for no reason, that black one go after the ambulance, man, but I think them people trapped. I didn’t see the beginning, but from the ending what I think happened that a young married couple on they honeymooning got lost. I wondered why that devil went in his car, but couldn’t get it started. Then they got a flat. The cat fixed the tire before they could get moving again, the motor exploded. So they had to walk up that hill to this castle. And it was cold, rainy and knocked. The door open and sheee, what a beautiful woman with long black hair playing that girl everybody says passed in a nightgown, fine as fantabulous!”
Dunfords Travels Everywheres Page 14
