Murder in the Choir (The Jazz Phillips Mystery Series)

by Joel B Reed

  I nodded and the issue was settled. Then Jones spoke. “You didn’t come all the way out here to just talk about this. How can I help you?”

  “I need information,” I said. I told him about my sense that understanding the murder meant knowing something about the history of the young men in the choir. “With Luther dead, that gives me only

  two sources of information: yourself and Slide Jones.”

  The pastor nodded. “So is Luther—Slide—a suspect?”

  I told him the truth.“Yes and no. I tend to believe him when he said he didn’t do it, but I can’t clear him, either.”

  Jones nodded. “That’s the sad story of his whole life, I’m afraid. I believe Slide is a good man in the depths of his heart, but I can’t prove it. He’s done some evil things. Yet, I wonder if his circumstances had been different...” He broke off. “That’s idle speculation. He did what he did and is who he is, and only God is wise enough to judge him. What do you want to know?”

  “Why don’t you start with what you know about him? Not just what you know for sure growing up together, but what you may have heard and believe to be true.”

  A look of distaste crossed Jones’ face. “I really don’t care to pass on gossip, Jazz. It’s murder by character assassination.”

  “Well, why don’t you stick to what has a high probability of being true and label speculation as just that? Maybe start by telling me if you’re kinfolk.”

  The pastor nodded. “That sounds fair enough. Luther Jones and I are first cousins. Our fathers were brothers, and mine was the elder. We’re also distant cousins to Wilbur Jones—Smiley. You wouldn’t know it to look at us, but Luther bears a much closer resemblance to Wilbur’s side of the family.”

  He started to say something else, then stopped. I asked what it was, but he shook his head. “No, that was pure gossip and not worth being repeated. Even though we were first cousins, I didn’t have much to do with Slide or any of the other Luthers until later on when we were in the choir. I was almost three years older and had my own friends. Like all kids, I didn’t really want to hang around with brats younger than me.”

  I nodded and he continued. “Slide—I don’t like the name, but I’ll call him that to save confusion—Slide was the one in his family who was always getting in trouble. I can tell you his daddy didn’t like him much. There were reasons for that, and I’m not going to get into that. The point is, he got acquainted quite early with his daddy’s belt, and there was a while when he seemed to need to get reacquainted more than once a week. He was also his mother’s favorite, so you can see how confusing it might have been for him. I think it got better after he started school. He did very well there, and he was able to stay out of his father’s way. When his mother got sick, it was Slide who took care of her and his younger brothers and sisters. That’s something that’s not commonly known.”

  Albert paused to collect his thoughts. “So things started to go better for Slide, and when Wilbur put together the young men’s choir, he was included. As small as he is, he had a very deep, clear voice when he sang, and he was our lead bass.” Tears gathered in the corners of the pastor’s eyes. “It still moves me to remember him singing ‘Go down, Moses,’ though the one the white people we sang for always asked for was ‘Old Man River.’ He could rattle the windows.”

  The pastor sighed. “Then Goodie was shot. He was Slide’s closest friend of any of us. There was something between them…something special. Goodie was a baritone, and when they did duets, it was like one voice singing two parts. When Goodie was killed, it was like something died in Slide. He never sang again to my knowledge, though he was asked. He wouldn’t even sing at the funeral, and he could hardly stand to be around Luther Adams. Wouldn’t even look at him.”

  The pastor lapsed into silence, and I felt Mason’s eyes on me. When I looked his way, I knew he had the same question I did. I nodded, and he spoke up softly, so softly I could barely hear his words. “Do you think Slide killed Luther?”

  Albert Jones didn’t answer right away. A long moment went by, and then another. Mason was about to ask it again when Jones finally spoke. “I have to admit, I wondered that. I wondered if he shot Wilbur, too. There was bad blood between them, though I believe Slide tried to reconcile.” He looked up. “What I cannot understand is why he waited so long to act.”

  “Sometimes resentment grows with age,” I suggested. “Maybe it just got unbearable. Maybe he went off the deep end.”

  “The thing is, I’ve been talking with Slide for the last couple of years,” the pastor told us. “I can’t say much about it, except to say that Luther Jones—Slide—is not the same man he was even a year ago. Yes, he still has bad habits like we all do. He still drinks and smokes and hangs out with loose women. Yet, he is trying to forgive and be forgiven and to set things as right as he can. That’s about all I can say.”

  I looked at Mason and saw the same reserve in his eyes that I imagine was in mine. There are a lot of jailhouse conversions, and while Slide had not gone to jail, this seemed a little like that to me. Oddly enough, the one thing that made me believe that might possibly be real was Slide’s obvious lack of concern with trying to conceal his faults that remained. A hardened felon becoming a goody two-shoes overnight bears the burden of proof with me. I’ve seen far too many of them repent of their repentance and return to their old ways once they are out of prison or off parole.

  “Tell me more about the accident,” I asked. “Did all of you go hunting together very often?”

  “Yes, we did,” Albert Jones said. “Nor was it for sport. When we went out it was for the meat, and we had to be careful with our shells. They cost money.” He thought a moment. “Normally, we’d let the best shot take the game, but that day we’d done well. We had six squirrels and two rabbits. Like I told you and everyone but Luther had bagged something. Luther wasn’t very good, but it was an easy shot, and Goodie handed him the gun and backed off. Luther tried to shoot, but the gun was on safe and when he took it off, the squirrel moved. Luther was looking up, moving around and trying to sight him when he stumbled. The gun went off when he fell, and Goodie was standing in exactly the wrong place. He must have been dead before he hit the ground.”

  “So Goodman had the rifle,” I said. “Was he the best shot?”

  Albert Jones shook his head. “No. The best shot among us by far was Slide. He was the one who took all the hard shots, and he almost never missed.”

  Whether he knew it or not, Albert Jones was building a strong case against his cousin. What I couldn’t understand was my own reluctance to believe that Slide was the shooter. All the evidence seemed to be pointing that way.

  As if he read my thoughts, Albert Jones nodded. “I know it must sound like I’m in denial, but I can’t believe in my heart Slide killed Wilbur and Luther. He’s done some wicked things, but he’s not an evil man.” He sighed. “Maybe I just don’t want to believe it.”

  “The man’s your friend, pastor,” I heard Mason saying gently. “Of course you don’t want to believe it. I wouldn’t, either.”

  “Had it been a crime of passion, then I could understand him doing it. At one point, he had a terrible temper, but this was a cold, calculated killing. It just doesn’t fit with what I know of Slide.”

  “I have a couple more questions about Slide,” I said. “I understand that he had to leave town quite suddenly. I understand he had a falling out with some of his partners in crime.”

  “You’re thinking someone else may have mistaken them?” Jones asked. I nodded. “Well, I had the very same thought,” he told us. “With each passing year Wilbur and Slide looked more and more alike, and it’s possible someone mistook Wilbur for Slide. Some of the people he used to deal with were certainly quite capable of something that cold blooded. They’re very wicked people. Some of them I would call completely evil.” He shook his head. “I’ve never understood why our Father allows such folk to walk the earth.”

  “Can you give me names?”
I asked.

  The pastor nodded and rattled off a list of a dozen names. “Some of them are dead now, of course, but those who are have children who would take delight in killing a black man. Any black man. They take great delight in selling our children poison, and I can’t imagine them hesitating to eliminate one of their distributors who quit.”

  “You are sure that Slide quit?” I asked.

  “He told me he had quit long before he ever came to talk with me the first time,” Albert Jones said. “I suppose that’s breaking a confidence, but not to his detriment. He wasn’t there every time the church doors opened, but I’m given to understand he began to attend regularly in the last two years. That wasn’t here, of course, but in Hot Springs.” He shrugged. “That information didn’t come from Slide, either. It came from one of my colleagues in Hot Springs.”

  Mason caught my eye and raised an eyebrow. I nodded. “These people he used to distribute drugs for, do you know if they were connected to the Klan?”

  “I have no proof, but it’s my belief that most of them were. I think their intent was to make a profit destroying young black men. I also think the Klan may have provided some protection for them doing so.” He shook his head. “God forgive me, but if one of those man ever walked across my sights...” He left the thought hanging.

  I nodded. “I understand your sentiments, but none of them are worth it, Pastor,” I told him.

  “I don’t even have a gun,” he told us. “People tell me I’m a fool, but I won’t have one in the house. After what happened to Luther Goodman, I never have.” He sighed and shook his head.

  “Please, bear with us just a bit longer,” I asked him. “This is very helpful. Is there anything else you remember about the people Slide dealt with? Do you know who was in charge?”

  “Slide mentioned one other name. He didn’t say much, but I could tell it was someone he really feared. He said it was an evil old man named Smith—Jim Smith. Those were his words, not mine, ‘an evil old man.’ However, I don’t know who he was talking about.”

  James Mason gave me a grim look. I nodded back. Albert Jones saw the exchange and asked about it. I told him about the incident in the records office and what I had learned from Tanner, but not revealing the source. “That old man?” the pastor exclaimed. “I knew he has a reputation for being unpleasant, but he’s always been courteous to me. Not cordial, but polite. There are many who make no effort to disguise their contempt.”

  “Then you’re among the privileged few,” I replied. “With the rest of us, Smith is downright nasty.” I told him the last thing Smith said before I arrested him, and the pastor shook his head.

  “Well, it is a common name. I just never put the name with the face.” He looked at Mason.

  “I’ve seen him with his sheet on,” the deputy told him. “Just before he put on his hood. It’s him.”

  My jaw must have dropped. James Mason smiled at my consternation and shrugged. “A sheet and a hood covers a multitude of diversity,” Mason told us. “It helps to scout out the enemy.”

  “What about your hands?” Albert Jones demanded.

  James Mason laughed. “With doe skin gloves, who can tell the difference?”

  “You’re crazy,” the pastor said. “You could get yourself lynched.”

  “I’ve saved some other folk getting lynched,” Mason answered. “Man can get lynched minding his own business.”

  I admired his courage, but wondered why he was breaking cover. This was apparently John Tanner’s source of information, and the first rule of undercover work is staying hidden. I could understand him trusting the pastor, but not why he chose to reveal himself in front of me.

  The pastor was thinking along the same lines. “This information needs to stay in this room,” he said. “James, you could get killed shooting your mouth off like that in front of the wrong folk.”

  James Mason nodded and glanced at his watch. I took the hint, wondering if he needed to get back to town. “How about Edward Posey?” I asked. “What can you tell me about him?”

  “As I told you, I don’t know what ever came of him. I know he was drafted and I heard he was sent to Vietnam. I think that was in the paper. Later, I heard he was missing in action, but no one really knows for sure. I do know he wasn’t there for his mother’s funeral, and I think he would’ve been if he were alive. I suspect he’s most likely dead, but I don’t know for sure.”

  I nodded. “I realize that, but I need to understand the choir. Can you give me a sense of him as a person?”

  Albert Jones nodded. “Edward was our tenor. He had as fine a voice as Art Garfunkel, in my opinion. He and Slide used to sing that Scarboro Fair rendition Paul Simon made famous. Some people thought he was doing lip-sync.”

  The pastor sighed. “Edward was the child nobody ever saw and everyone forgot about. He was very good looking but he had a way about him of not being noticed, and he was never one to blow his own horn. Unless you paid attention, you would never notice him. I used to think he was shy, but now I know it was something else. It was Edward’s way of protecting himself. His father was a terrible alcoholic and a violent man. He mistreated his wife and his children all the time, and they learned to stay out of sight when he was drunk.”

  Albert Jones paused, collecting his thoughts again. “Edward was incredibly bright, and he did well at school. I always wondered why he was always third or fourth in his class until I realized it was deliberate. The other kids weren’t as quick as he was, but he always saw to it they did better. As a matter of fact, the valedictorian that year later told me that Edward tutored him.” He paused. “Is this what you wanted?”

  “Yes, thank you,” I answered. “Were you aware that Edward was Wilbur Jones’ love child?”

  The pastor nodded. “I’d guessed that. I didn’t mention it because it didn’t seem relevant. Do you think it is?”

  “Only if someone was offended by it and acted on his feelings. More than anything it opens up a line of investigation.”

  Albert Jones looked at me as if he was seeing me for the first time. “So you do have reservations about Slide being the killer, don’t you? My experience is that most police go with the obvious solution and inconvenient facts be damned.”

  I shrugged. “That’s why they hire me. I seem to think outside the box. It may be Slide, but it doesn’t feel right to me. All the facts have to fit. That’s why I like a Klansman for the killer.”

  “The white folk who were at Wilbur’s birthday celebration struck me as being anything but the right sort of folk to kill that way,” Jones replied. “Of course, the killer wouldn’t wear a sign around his neck, either, would he?” He shook his head. “I’m glad you have your work and I have mine.”

  “What about Eddie’s family?” I asked. “What can you tell me about them? Were they there the day Smiley was shot?”

  “Goodness, you are persistent, aren’t you?” the pastor answered. “But to answer your question, no. The children scattered after Edward’s father—step-father—died. Edward was long gone by then.

  What surprised me was that only one of them came back for the funeral. She told me she couldn’t reach the rest of her brothers and sisters.” He shook his head. “That whole family was so sad.”

  “Eddie’s got an aunt and uncle living here,” I responded, mentioning their names. “Maybe they’ll know something.”

  The pastor shook his head. “I doubt it. They’re not related by blood or in law. I know that may seem a little confusing, but they were close enough friends to Edward’s mother to be called that. They were very much like what Catholics call godparents. Edward grew up calling them aunt and uncle, but he was never close to them later on. They knew him as the child, not the man.”

  “Well, ‘the child is the father of the man’,” I quoted.

  To my surprise, Albert Jones nodded and recited the poem by heart. “Yes,” he added when he was done. “It’s a wonderful way to approach life. Yet, there’s a more excellent way.”
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  We talked for a few more minutes, but there was nothing useful that Albert Jones could add to what he already had told us. I thanked him for his time and for his candor, and he asked if I would keep him informed. I told him I would as much as I could, but not to expect much. I told him I was in as much a fog as everyone else on this case.

  “I suspect what you call clear as high noon on a dry day is about like fog to the rest of us,” he answered. “I wish you well in your investigation, and I’ll pray for your success. Regardless how it may turn out.”

  James Mason and I drove back toward Nashville in silence. About halfway there, I asked him why he had broken cover. “I thought it might give us some leverage with the pastor,” he said. “I think it did. He seemed to join with us after that. Before, he seemed adversarial.”

  “I didn’t pick up on it, but you may be right,” I replied. “But what about me? I could be the guardian of the grand lizard’s balls in the Klan.”

  “I guess you could,” he said,“but you aren’t. Cowboy would know. He told me to let you in on who I was, and that seemed as good a way of breaking the ice as any. I wish you could have seen your face.”

  “Cowboy? You mean John Tanner? Is that what you guys call him?”

  Mason laughed. “No, I mean Sam McKee. I work for him.”

  I kept silent. McKee had not mentioned James Mason at any point when we talked. As a matter of fact, he had said I was the only person in Nashville who would be calling him.

  “Don’t take my word for it,” Mason said. “Call him at the number he gave you when we get back to town.”

  “You say you work for this Sam McKee. Does Tanner know?”

  “Yes. That’s how Tanner can afford me. McKee pays my salary. I’m a federal agent.” He looked at me. “I even have a DEA card, but that’s about as real as a four dollar bill. I work for McKee.”

  I nodded. “It’s hard to imagine what a federal agent would be after here in Nashville, Arkansas.”

  “I’m after the Klan,” he told me. “What the pastor said about them using drugs to kill our kids was right on the money. They’ve been doing it for a long time now. I’m here to put a stop to it.”