Pea gives her a wry look. “And neither do you.”
Tamara shrugs with imperial disdain. “It would be disrespectful.”
“Tammy, Phyllis,” Walter says, “why don’t we all sit down with a bottle of wine and some dinner and have a conversation?”
Tamara slides Walter a look of exasperation and fondness. She puts her arm around Pea’s shoulders.
“Pea, have you gone completely country up on this muddy hill or do you have something to wear?”
Pea’s glance at me is a submerged laugh sparking with challenge. “Do I look naked to you?” she asks Tamara, who clucks her tongue.
“Do you at least have shoes?”
Pea puts her hand on her hip. “And a python and a grass skirt.”
Tamara’s laugh brings blood to my cheeks. It’s the memory of what that bright sound used to mean to me, but it’s the living reality, too. Walter just watches us.
“Be right back, Dev,” Pea says and pecks my lips. She sounds breezy, cheerful. Her fingers press a four-point warning onto my goose-pimpled flesh. I nod slightly to show her I understand—she doesn’t know I called him. They walk into the house. I love the way Pea matches her grace to Tamara’s: a viper arm in arm with a bird of paradise.
“You took your time calling about that letter,” Walter says.
“I called my old handler first.”
He laughs. “And I see how well that went. The fuzz is a bad bargain for folks like us, Dev. Like the army.”
“They didn’t always do badly by me.”
“And I’m sure you’ll do just fine with the colored troops.”
The humor does not escape us. Walter smiles with a hard-eyed flash of teeth that makes rookie runners shit their knickers. I smile back. The memory of killing Victor may sicken me, but that is a debt Walter will spend a long time repaying.
“Do you really believe in Tamara’s cards?” I ask. “Did they predict something dire?”
He shrugs. “When our Tammy starts laying those cards down, something gets into her, I won’t deny it. But maybe she just missed Pea.”
I look back at the house. “But we should be safe here.”
“You haven’t told her about the draft.”
I like Walter, I always have, but I haven’t felt so close to violence since I hammered a throwing knife into his boss’s right temple. I slap my palm into the Packard’s chrome, right beside his shoulder. His gaze doesn’t leave my face.
“She. Stays. Out.”
“That’s her choice, isn’t it?”
“Not if I’m her reason for getting back in.”
“And you think she will if she finds out?”
Pea’s laugh spills from her open window, with a thread of words, “… as if you wouldn’t know, all you’ve done…”
Pea with dirt on her hands, instead of blood. Pea who laughs. Pea who plays with the knives she once used to slaughter. Walter wasn’t there—she let me kill Victor.
“You kill enough,” I say, so softly that my voice is gravel, “and you wake up one morning without a soul.”
Walter tilts his head. “Doesn’t affect us all the same way, now, does it?”
But his throat vibrates faintly. His breaths are too deep, too steady. Walter leans against a dead man’s car, but that doesn’t mean he has the dead man’s heart.
“Do you ever miss him?”
He jerks. Doesn’t even pretend to smile. “Why the fuck would I do that?”
“You were friends, once. Had to have been some good times.”
He takes a breath, lets it out. His hands go flat against his thighs. “So if I don’t miss him, I’m already a monster? You imagine this matters to me?”
I don’t answer.
Walter had come into that room, I’m not sure how long after. I remember his conversation with Pea.
“He did it?”
“Dev, baby, you gotta get up. Walter, where are the cops?”
“Taking their sweet time. Christ, it smells foul in here. Did Victor shit his pants?”
“Cost of business, Red Man.”
A pause. “Yeah. I know. But that boy’s a mess. Is he having some kind of fit? Why the hell’d you let him do it?”
“He’s hardly a boy anymore.”
“Thanks to you, Pea.”
Pea had lifted my hand to her cheek. I couldn’t feel much, but the warmth of her had shocked me like boiling water. I flinched away. Later, I would understand how much that must have hurt her but at the time the only one I could hold was myself.
In front of my house, far from that dirty city, Walter steps away from me and the car in one fast, fluid motion. He watches the silhouettes of the two women in the window.
“I won’t tell her,” he says.
“Does Tamara know?”
He shrugs. “Maybe her cards told her. But if she’s guessed, she won’t tell.”
My hands are shaking. I put them in my pockets, not to keep Walter from seeing—of course he has—but so that Pea might not notice if she looks down from the window.
Pea and I never speak about New York. I sleep with the door locked. Every night I smell spilled whiskey and meat dumplings and the dying curse of a man I have damned myself in killing. Better mob muscle than a soldier’s gun in my hands. Better Walter’s service than leaving Pea with a box of my effects and bitter memories.
Pea and Tamara come back to us perfumed and city dressed. Pea has wrestled her hair into a bun and bandeau, dark blue to match the beading on a dress I’m sure I remember, but not on her curves.
“It’s Tamara’s,” she says, smiling. She knows I already know. “But for a wonder it fits. What do you think, Dev? Do I clean up?”
She does, and I love her, and she loves me so much that she won’t let me tell her so. In her own way, I could tell Walter, Pea doesn’t trust me either.
We get in the car and drive to town. We’re a little early for dinner at the Riverview Inn, but there’s already a party at the big table: Mayor Bell and the Junior with two other middle-aged white men, sharply dressed. I peg them as the Astor investors whom Mayor Bell was so keen to please when I paid my visit. Their wives share the end of the table, in pearls and jewels that play subtle games with evening light. I watch Tamara guess the worth of these objects and deflate. Marnie, hovering by the table with an open bottle of wine, widens her eyes when we climb the porch steps. She has run the inn since I was a boy, and has never approved of me.
“Perhaps you’d like to sit inside,” she says, though none of the other outside tables are occupied.
“Gracious, Marnie,” Pea says, the drawl thick enough that I nearly laugh. I know what’s coming and I don’t particularly care. “Of course not. We’ll sit right here.”
She pulls out a chair from the table nearest the Bells and sprawls into it, graceful as a cat. I guess that Marnie’s heard the rumors about Pea, which is why she doesn’t tell her to bring her colored self inside. Tamara watches this interplay with a dawning smile.
“They know,” Tamara says, sitting beside Pea. “You let them know.”
“The hair,” Pea says.
Tamara shakes her head, still smiling. “Not just the hair.”
Walter orders wine for the table with his Red Man voice. Marnie shakes a little as she nods and hurries inside. The Bells slide glances at us. Their guests stare openly until the Junior leans forward and whispers something. Their gazes snap away from our table like a broken rubber band. There are benefits to associating with a well-known gangster. Even this far up the river.
Tamara and Walter tell stories over the meal. Old stories we all know, new ones being shaped in the telling. Their natural melancholy somehow twists into humor so sharp it hurts. Tamara is very good at this. She tells of the first time she tried dancing with the snake:
“He started going around my neck, you know, like the gaudiest necklace you ever saw, and poor old Georgie he’s so slow he couldn’t strangle a Thanksgiving turkey without a nap in between, but there’s Victor smi
ling with that mouth full of silver and this python sliding past my jugular and I just start hollering. You all heard me by the bar, didn’t you?”
“First time I ever heard your voice,” Pea says.
“I didn’t think you were speaking English,” I say.
She throws her head back as she laughs. “Lord, I don’t think I was either. I think it was tongues, like in church. Anyway, it stopped old Georgie. Victor just kept smiling, like he was waiting for something. And then I heard Walter behind me—remember, Walter?—and he said, ‘For God’s sake, girl, you gotta dance. George won’t know any better otherwise.’ And I stopped screaming, and I got my tongue back, and I turned right around and there was Walter, crouched a few feet away with a machete in his hand, and Victor said, well, something impolite—”
Walter twists his lips. “Give a white man a machete and he’s just a man with a knife—”
“And give a black man a machete and he’s got a bullet in him,” says Pea.
“Well,” says Tamara, “you remember how Vic liked to talk. And I said, ‘If you lunatics want me to dance, play me some goddamned music!’”
We laugh, Pea most of all. “I took one look at that snake and told Victor to find another girl. You asked for the band!”
“Some goddamned music,” I repeat, shaking my head. “Did he give you any?”
She shrugs. “Georgie slid off my neck like he’d just had enough of the whole affair and Victor told me I had a job.”
“That’s mostly how I remember it,” says Walter, dryly. “But you, sweet Tammy, aren’t much of a lady when the spirit takes you. Goddamned was the least of it.”
Tamara blushes. The rest of us invent implausible curses while Marnie flinches in the doorway. We all enjoy it—ruining an evening that white people assumed would be reserved for their pleasure. Pea’s hands relax against the table, for once free of the tension that has plagued them since we came here.
The balance of power has swung temporarily in our favor. It tastes very, very sweet.
It snaps.
Two shadows walking down the street. Both slim, one markedly taller than the other. They resolve: Alvin, with Craver. They walk silently in step. Like soldiers. Marnie doesn’t have a chance. They march up the stairs and to the Bells’ table. The balance wobbles once again, slips, careens wholesale off the cliff.
“Mr. Astor,” says Craver to the older of the guests, a man with dye-brown hair, a thin nose, and drooping cheeks, wearing a ruby tie pin to match his wife’s necklace. The Astor’s gaze slides wetly. He’s drunk.
“Ben Craver,” says Bell Senior, smiling that smile that presages explosions. “I don’t recall that I invited you here. Or your Negro boy.”
Alvin stands just to Craver’s right, his back rod straight and his gaze defiant. But there’s a hesitancy about him. He keeps those hands in his pockets. I catch his eye, but he just twitches and looks away. Was I right? Is he here to try to kill Junior? But that doesn’t quite explain Craver.
“Friend of yours, Mayor Bell?” the second man says, with a nervous laugh. “Didn’t realize how integrated your little town was. I’m as much for equality as the next man, but within reason. We don’t want to scare off good money when we open.”
Craver takes a step closer to the two men. Bobby Senior stands. “Ben,” he says, “whatever this is about, this is not the time.”
Alvin shifts his weight and eases his hands into the dim light. I hope no one else notices, but I reach for Pea. She tightens her hand around mine without looking away from the other table.
“We’ve known each other all our lives, Bobby,” Craver says calmly, “but I don’t think there’s any sense in us having another word together.”
The elder Bell has a voice tempered by decades of stump speeches. It is capable of a great volume. “Goddamn it, Ben—”
Craver drops to his knees, grabs the sharply pressed slacks of the drunken Astor.
“Sir, that land, the church’s land, it is not yours to develop, it belongs to God, to the good Lord Jesus Christ who suffered for our sins—”
I assume he continues to mine this vein, but Mayor Bell’s bellow drowns it. The Astor looks panicked and disgusted. He swats at Craver’s upturned, tear-streaked face.
“Get a hold of yourself, sir!”
Bobby Junior grabs Craver’s elbows and attempts to haul him back.
Alvin raises his hands. “Don’t you touch him!”
Bobby Junior freezes. The drunk tries to stand, then falls back into his chair. Alvin reaches—for whom, for what, impossible to know. We only see his hands, those living weapons, those holy gifts, about to illuminate another man’s sins.
A threat jumps from Pea’s fingertips to my wrists, but she has pulled away by the time I register its faint, muddy warning. Walter stands, pushes Tamara behind him. He reaches for his gun at the same time as Mayor Bell, but only one of them intends to use it.
Pea grabs Alvin by his shoulders. The mayor shoots. The two women—already plastered against the back wall—start to shriek and the drunk man slides onto the floor.
Then I see the blood.
Not everything desired beneath night’s blanket has a place in living reality. I might have lusted after the taste of my own blood on Pea’s lips, but the idea of reliving that nightmare of three months ago, her blood soaking the jacket I pressed against her chest—
I go for Mayor Bell. Calmly, carefully, full of a rage that tells me precisely when he sees me, and exactly how much he will hesitate when he raises that piece again.
I grab it. Hand around the warm barrel, a sharp tug away from his trigger finger—mine. Behind me Pea says, “Well, fuck, Dev.”
I already knew she was safe—not enough blood—but still that voice, half-appalled, half-amused, goes through me like an electric spark.
I assess the situation. Walter levels his gun at Bobby Junior, Bobby Junior keeps his piece up, the younger Astor presses against the back wall with the women. All three are quiet and horrified. Craver shivers on the floor beside Alvin and the fainting man. Alvin touches the spreading stain beneath the burned edges of his torn shirtsleeve.
“Is he dead?” I ask Walter. The man’s pants are wet, and a sharp scent testifies to the reason.
Walter shrugs. “Sauced. Scared shitless.”
Pea sniffs. “Walter, does anyone ever laugh at that?”
“Couldn’t help myself. Tammy, how you doing?”
“Christ, Pea, don’t you know how to relax?” Tamara’s voice is breathy but reasonably controlled. She’s getting better at this.
“Now,” Walter says, “I’m going to put this down on the count of three. And then we’re all going to stand up and go our separate ways. I don’t know a damned thing about what’s going on here, and I don’t care. No one’s been hurt—”
Alvin lifts his head. “That mother shot me!”
“Badly,” he continues, “and we’re going to keep it that way. Right? I see that piece you got there, kid, so don’t look at me like that. Put it on the table and we all walk out easy. Agreed, Mayor?”
Mayor Bell has been unusually silent through this. But then, Walter’s power is clearly his equal. He glances at his son, then squares his shoulders. “Sounds reasonable. Junior, you heard him, put that gun on the table.”
“But Dad, what if that boy tries to touch us?”
“Alvin won’t touch anyone,” Pea says, weary. Alvin stares at her, then remembers to nod. Bobby Junior grimaces and slides his gun over the tablecloth, amid the mess of Marnie’s best dinner.
“Davey, are you planning to keep that?” The mayor gestures to the piece I’m still holding like a dead snake. “It was my father’s, and I know you know the importance of those sorts of keepsakes.”
I slide his gun across the table. Having any common ground with the Bells makes even my rusted soul feel dirty.
Then Walter counts to three, holsters his gun, and hauls Tamara up by her elbow. Craver gets to his feet, trembling and glassy-eyed. T
he Bells and their guests hurry to the side of the Astor groaning on the floor. The rest of us look at one another, clear in the same understanding—better to leave before he wakes up.
“Alvin,” Pea says, “come with us, will you? That needs looking after.” After a moment she adds, grudgingly, “You’re welcome too, Mr. Craver.”
Alvin looks up at her like he’s been struck with light on the road to Damascus. “You—I—all right.”
Craver shakes his head mutely and walks down the steps. Back in the street, he is unsteady, shrunken, a wobbling silhouette that dances among the long shadows of the houses until they swallow him whole.
* * *
Pea explains about Alvin’s saint’s hands in the car on the way back. Tamara shifts a few inches closer to the window. Even Walter looks disconcerted.
“That’s a powerful charge,” he says, after a moment. “A heavy one. Your parents had the right idea, keeping it a secret. But I assume you had your reasons to tell?”
Alvin’s expression is a tangle of desire and wonder, wrapped around that kernel of fury that has defined him from the moment we met. It illuminates him now. “I did, sir.”
I wonder how Alvin would describe the events of the fundraising party, what he saw that passed beneath Junior’s notice, or what Junior had chosen not to tell. But I know that Alvin would never tell me. There is a mother’s ferocity in his anger. Something that he is fighting to protect.
When we get back to the house, Pea tends to Alvin’s shallow graze with matter-of-fact expertise. She offers no sympathy and he watches her unflinching, dazzled.
“You’ve been shot before,” he says.
“A few times.” She tapes down the gauze she’s wrapped around his upper arm. “There. You’re fine, kid.”
My heart bends to look at them. No matter how I met Pea, I would have loved her. I’m still falling. I can’t help it any more than Alvin can, trying not to look at her as he puts back on his shirt.
“Why ain’t you afraid of me like the others?”
I leave the kitchen but not fast enough to avoid Pea’s response, “Because I already know whatever you could tell me, and so does…”
Trouble the Saints Page 16
