A Dangerous Road: A Smokey Dalton Novel

by Kris Nelscott

“Would it be normal in such correspondence to explain why someone would get such a bequest?”

  “Most people know why they would get such a bequest.”

  “What about anonymous bequests?”

  “Most anonymous bequests prefer to remain anonymous. Doling out any information about the bequest might destroy that anonymity.”

  I’d had enough of the games. “So all these years, you’ve only had a letter instructing you to find me and give me the money? No explanation, no nothing?”

  “I’ve told you that much before, Smokey.” Shelby’s chair was tilted so far back the edges of his gray hair brushed his bookcase.

  I sighed and returned to my chair. “Didn’t you investigate who this money came from?”

  “I knew,” Shelby said. “I just couldn’t tell you. And I still can’t, although I think you have some suspicions.”

  That was as close as he would ever get to confirming what I knew.

  “You have no explanations?”

  “None, and even if I did, I wouldn’t tell you.”

  Although he would have tried, now that the daughter was here, now that she was looking for me.

  “Why didn’t you send someone out to investigate this?”

  “There’s no point, Smokey. Attorneys handle anonymous payments all the time. It’s not ours to question why. It’s ours to do the job.” He ran his fingers through his hair and dislodged the pencil. It tumbled down the side of his head before he caught it against his suit. “Smokey, is there going to be trouble between you and this Laura Hathaway?”

  I froze. No matter how much you trusted a man, he could still ask a question that made you doubt everything about your relationship. “Trouble?”

  “If she doesn’t give you the money—”

  “I think she has to. She wouldn’t be here otherwise. I’ll wager giving me that cash is tied to her getting the rest of the estate.”

  He smiled and set the pencil on his desk. “You’d’ve made a good attorney.”

  “Because I see things?”

  “Because you understand human nature and how it pertains to the law.” He stood, clasped his hands behind his back, and made his way around the desk. “What if she does have to give you the money?”

  “I won’t take it without knowing why. Forgive me, Shelby, but I won’t be beholden to a white woman for anything.”

  “If she has to give you the money, that might be trouble in and of itself.” He stopped near me. The scent of cherry tobacco wafted off him. It wasn’t so offensive when he wasn’t smoking.

  We were the same height, something that always startled me. He was heavier than I was, and the net effect was to make him look shorter and rounder.

  “I really don’t expect to see her again,” I said. “I think she just wanted to check me out, and now that she knows I have no idea what this is about, she’ll disappear.”

  “But she told you about the money.”

  “She saw my office.”

  “Meaning?”

  “She knows I can’t hire an attorney to come after her.”

  Shelby’s smile grew. “I’d take the case, on a contingency basis. It’s intriguing enough.”

  I patted him on the arm, then headed toward the door. “No need, Shel. Taking someone else’s money once in my life was plenty. I’m not sure I want to do it again.”

  His smile remained. It made him look eerily like the Cheshire Cat. “Then why did you come here?”

  “Because this thing has bothered me for eight years, and I thought I might finally get an answer from you.”

  “And?”

  “I hate a mystery,” I said, putting my hand on the doorknob.

  “Yes.” His smile faded, followed by a look of such deep compassion that I had to turn away from it. “But there are some things in our lives that will remain a mystery forever.”

  “I know that,” I said. “But I don’t like it.”

  “Someday you will have to accept it.”

  I turned back to him a bit more fiercely than he deserved. “I’ve been told all my life to accept things, and usually they are ugly, unfathomable things. I decided a long time ago to accept nothing.”

  “Then you’ll be tormented, my friend, by things that most people would never give a second thought to.”

  I wasn’t his friend. I took a deep breath so that I didn’t snap at him. “I’ll make a deal with you. If Laura Hathaway reappears and offers me the money, I’ll find out why her mother felt I deserved it.”

  “And if you don’t find out?”

  “I’ll take it anyway. I’ve done my best.”

  “You’ll live with the mystery.”

  “I’ll have to either way. At that point, taking the money is the sensible thing.”

  His smile returned. “I’m glad you see it my way.”

  “Actually,” I said, “I think you’re beginning to see it mine.”

  FOUR

  I DROVE BACK to my office slowly, watching for Jimmy and thinking about my conversation with Shelby. I always felt frustrated after leaving his office, even though this time he had given me more information than he ever had before.

  I parked in front of the office, on Beale. The street was a mess; garbage piled against the curbs, people stepping over it. The city had hired scabs to pick up the garbage, but the crews were small and unable to hit all the neighborhoods. Of course, the black sections of town got the least attention, partly, I believed, to hasten the end of the strike, but others thought it was yet another example of discrimination.

  I got out and went inside, half expecting Jimmy to be sitting in front of the locked door. He wasn’t. I stared at the frosted glass for a moment. I had a lot of work to do, but I didn’t feel like doing any of it. Most was report writing, which I hated, even though it meant I would get a much-needed check, and the rest was legwork on half a dozen small cases that I had pending for the black lawyers and insurance agents who hired me regularly.

  I turned away from my door, went outside, and walked east to Wilson Drug.

  I had a handful of regular places that I stopped by for a meal or a beer. I’d been on Beale a long time and had a large network of acquaintances, even though I once vowed I would have no roots. The way I met people, it seemed, was in restaurants and bars. Somehow it seemed to work.

  Three blues musicians braved the cold in Handy Park. They were jamming, playing something rhythmic and dark, completely lost in their music. I tossed some coins into the guitar case—I always tossed in money, because I wanted the musicians to come back—and then I moved on.

  The music followed me past the New Daisy Theater and all the way to Wilson’s. Wilson’s had been around since the 1940s, and still had that sweet plastic odor that newer drug stores lacked. The pharmaceuticals and personal items were just inside the front door, but to the left was my favorite part of Wilson’s. The soda fountain.

  The soda fountain was in its own section, complete with counter and a ledge on which six swivel stools rested. Just beyond that, hiding behind the combs, barrettes, and plastic rain bonnets, were five tables and two wooden booths, built against the wall.

  Martha, the day waitress, came up beside me, her rubber shoes squeaking against the tile. She smelled faintly of sweat and perfume. I smiled at her. She was an old friend. She was married, although not happily, and struggling to make ends meet.

  “You have company,” she said, nodding at one of the booths.

  I looked at the booth. Reverend Henry Davis had squeezed himself into it. Henry was probably my best friend in Memphis, although neither of us acknowledged that. We were too different. He had his parish to run, and I had my own quiet life.

  Lately I’d been avoiding him. He’d been getting more and more involved with the strike, and he wanted me to get involved too. He’d asked me to go with him to several union meetings, and each time I had been conveniently busy.

  I suppressed a sigh and then glanced at Martha. “You still got soup left?” I asked.

 
; She nodded.

  “Bring me some and half a turkey sandwich.”

  “I could have guessed,” she said.

  I raised my eyebrows.

  “It’s Monday.”

  “I’m not that predictable.”

  She grinned and turned away. Apparently I was that predictable. I went to the booth and sat down.

  Henry was finishing the last of a cheeseburger. “I was beginning to wonder if you broke routine and went to the Palace.”

  He meant the King’s Palace Cafe, which was right next to my office. I shook my head. “I was tracking down some information.”

  He took a final bite and wiped his mouth with a paper napkin. “I thought I’d keep you up to date.”

  “Henry, I don’t want to be up to date.”

  “No one would have been injured Friday if you’d been in on the planning,” he said.

  I smiled. “You’re trying to flatter me.”

  “I’m telling the truth.”

  “I thought the march was an impromptu thing that happened after the Council meeting.”

  “You’d have counseled against it.”

  “You wouldn’t have listened.”

  It was his turn to smile. He had a broad, friendly face, and warm eyes. His congregation loved him, even though he wasn’t a good orator, in a town filled with excellent orators. He had compassion, which I always thought was in short supply, and he had heart.

  “What did you think I needed to know?”

  He leaned back as best he could in the small space. “James Lawson has put together a biracial committee of ministers to work on this strike. We’re going to bring both sides together and get the community even more involved.”

  “The community is involved.”

  “Not in any constructive way.”

  “And what do you think you’ll accomplish?”

  Martha stopped with my soup and sandwich. The soup was depression soup, one of my favorites. I took a large spoonful of tomato-based broth, hamburger, and okra.

  “We’re going to get this settled,” he said.

  I swallowed. “Does the mayor know that?”

  “The mayor doesn’t approve of anything. The more people who get involved, the better off we’ll be,” Henry said.

  I set down my spoon. “And you’ve come to me because…?”

  “Like it or not, Smokey, you’re a well-known member of the black community. Your support would mean a great deal.”

  I shook my head. “You know I don’t get involved in political issues.”

  “Yes,” Henry said, “and I don’t understand why.”

  Our gazes locked for a moment, and then I looked away. “I don’t like to be noticed.”

  “Like it or not, Smokey,” he said, “you always get noticed. And right now, everyone’s noticing that you’re not helping.”

  “This one’s explosive, Henry. I don’t like where it’s going.”

  “I know,” Henry said. “That’s why we need cool heads.”

  I smiled at him. “You’ve got one.”

  “It’d be nice to have another.”

  I had no response to that. I wouldn’t be pressured into working on this strike. I cleaned up messes. I didn’t help create them.

  He sighed and picked up his check. “Promise me you’ll think about it at least.”

  “I can guarantee the answer won’t change,” I said.

  He shook his head. “I hope it will someday, Smokey.” He slid out of the booth and walked to the counter, handing Martha a dollar for his meal and tip.

  I finished my soup and sandwich. I did have a level head, but part of it came from my detachment. That detachment let me look at the world clearly, and it kept other people from looking at me.

  I had avoided attention as long as I could remember, and my foster parents believed it was their fault. They kept my presence quiet for the first year I was with them, following the Grand’s suggestion. They were trying to protect me, and I believe they did.

  But as I got older, they regretted the way they’d kept me close. My foster mother even told me once that she believed their influence was the reason I never used my prodigious education.

  I felt as if I were using that education. I had a bachelor’s from Howard and a masters from Boston University, and I got better training in the army after I completed both degrees. I discovered that I liked solving puzzles and being active, and a man couldn’t do either as a professor at one of the nation’s few black colleges. I didn’t make the living they expected, and I didn’t have three point four children like the culture said I should, but I was content with my life. It was small, it was contained, and it was mine.

  Still, my foster parents’ disappointment in me, subtle as it was, distanced us. I rarely spoke with them and I hadn’t visited them since they moved to Atlanta a few years before. They were good people, but I felt as if all we had in common was our history.

  I finished lunch and headed back to the Gallina Building, feeling better than I had earlier. The musicians had left Handy Park and in their place was Jimmy. He sat on the cold concrete beneath the statue of W.C., and he looked as cold as the stone. His coat didn’t quite fit any more. He clutched a schoolbook in one hand, but he wasn’t looking at it.

  “Jimmy?” I asked.

  He raised his head, then ducked when he saw me. I came over and crouched beside him.

  “I’ve been looking for you. What did you want this morning?”

  He shrugged as if it were no longer significant.

  “You can tell me,” I said.

  He pressed his lips together. In the hours since he’d come to me, something—or someone—had changed his mind about talking.

  “It seemed important this morning.”

  His hands clutched the school book tightly. It was an ancient American history text, its cover scratched and ink-covered. The binding was ripped and some of the pages were coming loose.

  “Jimmy?” I asked again.

  “Who was that lady?” He looked up at me, his brown eyes wide.

  “A client,” I said.

  “She wadn’t no cop?”

  I smiled. “Did she look like a cop?”

  He shook his head.

  “Were you worried because you weren’t in school?”

  He looked down again. Wrong question.

  “Was it something else, then, Jimmy?”

  “I didn’t ʼspect to see no one, s’all.”

  I rocked back on my heels and studied him. Thinner, blue shadows under his eyes, skin gray with fatigue. He wasn’t ill, but he would be if he kept this up.

  “Have you had lunch?” I asked.

  “Naw.”

  And probably no breakfast either. I put a hand on his shoulder. I could feel the bones. “Come on,” I said. “Let’s see what they’ve got at King’s Palace.”

  His eyes lit up, then he lowered his lids and shook his head. “I gotta wait here.”

  “For what?”

  “Joe.”

  “Why?”

  Jimmy shrugged. What did Joe have him involved in? I remembered the man in the beret, and didn’t like how this was going.

  “I’m sure he won’t mind if you have lunch,” I said.

  “He said I gotta wait.”

  I squeezed Jimmy’s shoulder. “You’re cold and hungry. I think you’ve waited long enough.”

  He sighed as if he’d been hoping someone would say that. Then he got up slowly, the cold making him move like an old man.

  We crossed the street and entered the arched doors. The restaurant was mostly empty. We took a table near the bar, and when the waitress came, I ordered a meal along with Jimmy so that he didn’t feel the weight of my charity.

  He didn’t talk much, and he kept glancing over my shoulder as if his brother were going to come in and drag him out. When the food finally came, he ate like he hadn’t seen food in a week.

  “It’s getting late,” I said. “Too late to take you back to school. You want to come home with
me?”

  Jimmy wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. I could see the longing in his face. Then he shook his head. “Gotta see Joe.”

  “Can I come with you?”

  “No.”

  I stared at him for a moment. He still had one hand on the history book as if it were a lifeline. He and I had talked about the importance of school several times. He was one of the smartest kids I knew, and I was afraid that the circumstances of his life would prevent him from using his mind.

  “All right.” I couldn’t quite keep the disapproval from my voice. “How about I pick you up in the morning, get you some breakfast and take you to school?”

  “Don’t need you feedin’ me all the time, Smokey.” The protest sounded half-hearted.

  “It’s an excuse for me to have a big breakfast. What do you say?”

  Finally, he grinned at me. A little boy grin, full of mischief and delight. “Okay.”

  Then, as quickly as it appeared, his grin faded. He was looking past me again, and I knew that he had seen Joe through the restaurant’s large windows.

  “Gotta go,” Jimmy said, slipping out of the chair. “See you tomorrow, Smokey.”

  “All right.” I put some cash on the bill and then walked to the door, making sure it didn’t look as if I was following Jimmy. He was already in the park. Joe was shaking a finger in his face. I debated crossing the street but was afraid I’d make things worse for Jimmy. Then Jimmy handed Joe a small brown package.

  My heart sank.

  Joe grinned and clapped his brother on the back. Then he led Jimmy through the park, and they disappeared into the alley behind Paul’s Tailoring.

  If I followed, I wondered if I’d see a man in a beret. I wondered if he would get the small brown package and then hand Jimmy another package to deliver to someone when he should really be in school.

  But I wasn’t going to follow. I didn’t dare let anyone see me. I was Jimmy’s last hope and he had to trust me. He wouldn’t do that if I got his brother in trouble.

  Still, it was hard to cross the street and pretend I hadn’t seen anything. By the time I got inside the Gallina Building, my stomach was in knots.

  Most of the day was gone and I still hadn’t done my reports. I unlocked the office and let myself inside, catching the familiar scent of dust and Mississippi River mold. As I shut the door behind me, the phone started ringing.