Blockbuster

by Richard H. Smith

“What do you mean, who’s this? Wake up and get your butt over here. I’m serious. There’s already a crowd.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes, really!”

  “Holy shit.”

  “Move it. Double time.” I hung up.

  After hauling out two sets of stanchion posts and ropes, I asked the people in line to move back as I cordoned off space in front of the window with one set. With the other set, I created a path directed toward the rear of the theater building where there would be much more space for the line to expand. The crowd cooperated, taking the edge off my worry. But I had to admit that I was making it up as I went along, half pretending I knew what I was doing. For once, I missed having Bullock’s years of experience in the theater business.

  I made two signs. One said “Box Office opens at 4:30” in big letters, taping it from the inside of the cashier window sign. The second said, “No Advance Tickets. Tickets Go on Sale One Hour before Shows Start.”

  “Have you seen it yet?” asked a guy who looked college age. He wore a faded, tie-dyed tee shirt with a peace sign on the front. A bandana across his forehead kept his shoulder-length hair in place.

  “Yeah, have you seen it?” asked another guy who resembled a skinny version of Jim Morrison of the Doors.

  “We previewed it yesterday. It was great. Fantastic.”

  “Scary?”

  “You bet.”

  I talked with a few more people, sharing my observations about the movie. Kenny’s Fairlane tore into the parking lot, the bottom of the chassis scraping the pavement. I thought about the pot. I needed to remove it from his car, but figured I could deal with it later that evening after dark. Kenny parked in one of the reserved spaces, exited, and stared at the line. He mouthed the word, “Dayum.”

  My thinking exactly. But I regretted my panicked call because I’d never seen Kenny so unfit for serving the public. I considered asking him to return home to take a shower and find cleaner clothes.

  “Nate, this is mind-blowing. I’m getting a cold sweat.”

  “It’s not so bad, so far,” I said.

  “You sure?”

  “They’re well-behaved. But, Kenny, you need to go back home and make yourself presentable. I can handle this for a while. I panicked over the phone. I felt I was flying blind.”

  He hesitated.

  “Damn it, Kenny,” I continued. “I mean it. Go home and get yourself put together. Sorry to have you scramble out of bed.”

  “I know, I know, I look like the Gill-man. I’m so dirty I’m leaving tracks.”

  I’d seen The Creature from the Black Lagoon. Viewed with the 3D glasses too. He did conjure up the amphibious Gill-man.

  “All three dimensions of him, Kenny, to be honest,” I said.

  “Four dimensions. Stink like a swamp. I’ll go home and try it again.”

  “Shower and fresh clothes, Kenny,” I said with emphasis. He was right. He could gag a maggot.

  “Aye, aye, ayatollah.”

  “Sorry I yelled at you.”

  “I’m good. Right now I’m as welcome as an outhouse breeze.”

  He returned to his car and drove off.

  I noticed Detective Riggs peering through the lobby glass. I let him in and closed the doors, pretending not to hear someone call out, “Can you sell us some drinks?”

  “Couldn’t get through. Just got that recorded message about starting times. So, I came by,” Riggs said.

  “It’s been nonstop calls since I got here. That’s why we have the message. Never seen anything like this.”

  “Intimidating,” Riggs said. “How are you at crowd control? Maybe we need an officer over here.”

  “You ain’t kidding. We don’t open until four-thirty. I mean, look at it. It’s around the building.”

  “Blockbuster, I suspect, is the operative term.”

  “Exactly.”

  “But we need to talk,” Riggs said.

  “Sure.”

  We went to my office and settled into chairs. We heard Spence’s voice,

  “Nate, you up there?”

  “Yeah, Spence, come on up.”

  “Mr. Reeves,” said Riggs, doffing an imaginary hat before Spence had a chance to remove his.

  “We’ve got ourselves a mess of folks out there,” Spence said.

  “Damn right, Spence, but have a seat for a second. Detective Riggs was about to fill me in on something important.” Spence took the empty chair. He carried a small duffle bag with him, and he placed it on the floor.

  Spence said, “Well, that’s good—because I’ve wanting to do the same in your direction. Called over at the police station, and they told me you’d be here. But Detective Riggs, why don’t you share what you’ve got first.”

  “Okay, I will. Now, we’ve been made aware of a girl who accused Mr. Burton of assault down in Georgia,” Riggs said.

  “Sue Ellen Bullock told me about her,” I said. “Whatever happened to her?”

  “Samantha is what’s happened to her,” Riggs said.

  “What?” I said. Spence seemed unmoved.

  “Talked with Mrs. Bullock. She had no memory for her last name, but we tracked it down through my contacts in Atlanta. Turns out she went by the name of Lucille Lamar. We think she and Samantha are one and the same. And she’s dangerous, which is why I need to fill you both in on these details.”

  “Lucille Lamar,” said Spence, with a sense of prior familiarity.

  Riggs paused, staring at Spence.

  I filled the silence and said, “Wouldn’t Bullock have recognized her?”

  “Porked up,” Spence said, as if he were the one telling us the details. “Hair’s a wig. And fake glasses. Keeps quiet and changes her accent too.”

  “I can see it now, Spence. She almost never talks.”

  “She hated him,” said Riggs.

  “Wanted to flatten him. Like a freight train,” Spence said. “And since Mr. Bullock wouldn’t recognize her, she could find the opportunity to do it—”

  “Without suspicion, yes,” Riggs said. “And it turns out the theater where she worked last, The Regal, was robbed a week after she left. She and Hooker are probably a team.”

  “Bonnie and Clyde. Well, sort of, without the good looks and charm,” I said.

  “So it appears,” Riggs said. “And this thing with Bullock was likely personal.”

  “You’re not kidding,” I said.

  “She bided her time,” Riggs said.

  “Can you arrest her on this?” I asked.

  “Ah, we’ll bring her in for more questioning. Perhaps we can get a confession. We’re working on the hard evidence.”

  “No weapon?” Spence asked, his eyes bright with anticipation.

  “That’s a problem. Nothing at the scene. Except a cigarette butt. We’re going to try to bring her in this evening. Want to watch her for a while. Hooker too. We still don’t know where she lives.”

  I said, “That’s right. She’s never given us an actual home address. Just a post office box.”

  “Figures,” Riggs said. “She can work the first show, but that’ll be it. We want to pick up Hooker too. We don’t know where he lives either.”

  “I understand, but, excuse me a second, I need to find another cashier. This is the worst timing.”

  Fear swept over me. On this of all nights, losing our main cashier was a disaster. At least we’d have Samantha for the first show, but how could we handle the second two shows?

  I tried calling our part-time cashier, but there was no answer.

  Chapter Forty-Three

  I tried calling a few more times but no luck. Spence distracted me by reaching into his duffle bag and taking out two plastic bags. One contained a cigarette butt, and the other, an envelope. He fished out a piece of paper too.

  “What’s all this, Spence?” I asked, half putting the phone down.

  “The butt is a Camel, like the one you found, Detective Riggs, near them juniper bushes. It’s Hooker’s,” Spence sa
id. “The envelope, it’s addressed to a one, Lucille Lamar. Post office box address downtown. Haven’t opened it. You might want to do that. And this here piece of paper says where she’s staying.”

  We both exchanged glances and stared at Spence

  “Mr. Reeves, where did you get these?” Riggs said, clearly amazed by what Spence had produced.

  “I took them from that little snake’s pickup.”

  “Spence,” I said, almost yelling. “How did you pull this off?”

  “Gentlemen, let me tell you a story.” He would answer our questions in his own way and at his own pace. Spence was in a different region of time and space.

  “See, Spence Reeves ain’t the name given me.”

  Spence paused and stared past us both, unseeing, deep in memory.

  “I don’t say that name,” he continued, almost angry. “It won’t me, and won’t who I imagined I would be. About the time I decided I’d be a Buffalo Soldier, I’d already decided I would be a Reeves instead.”

  We settled back in our chairs. I’d have to wait to make more calls.

  “Why Reeves you might ask? I’ll tell you why. Well, you don’t know this but maybe the best lawman in the outlaw West was a man named Bass Reeves. Born a slave in Arkansas, but ended up working over thirty years as a US Marshal in Oklahoma Indian territory. Before Bass hung up his guns, as an old man, they say he brought in over three thousand outlaws.”

  Spence’s eyes, dreamy but intense, kept focused on a point in space, willing us to go back in time and enter into the historical record, as if a diorama of sepia-tinged images projected from his pupils, an opening to the past.

  “Most of these desperadoes, he tracked down, caught, and brought in alive. Bass could shoot the rifle and the pistol, a legend who lived up to the legend. He tangled with the real dangerous gunslingers, the mean desperados. Fact, he killed fourteen, they say, even though he claimed never to have been wounded bad himself. But killing wasn’t his way. When he killed, it was self-defense.”

  “Spence, people should know more about this guy,” I said, regretting my interruption.

  Spence paused again and seemed to shift out of his dream state. He shook himself, and his eyes bore down on me, then at Riggs. His demeanor suggested he wanted to make sure we didn’t have any doubts about what he was relating. Then he continued,

  “Detective work, that made him most prized by the federal judges. I’d hear such stories about Reeves when I was a little boy. I met a man who had known Reeves. Learned all I could. I wanted to be just like Bass Reeves. After turning ten in 1910, that’s when I started using the name. Chose ‘Spence’ for my first name, because there will never be another Bass Reeves. I liked the name. Went good with Reeves.”

  Spence paused again. I had questions. I’m sure Riggs did. But we let him keep going.

  “My daddy, he humored me. Never knew my mother. Soon, Spence Reeves was who I was. Later, the Army didn’t care. Didn’t have no birth certificate, anyway. At fifteen I was big and tall. All that mattered to the recruiters. Found out afterwards that Bass died in 1910. Makes you think, though I don’t believe in reincarnation. Now, you’re wondering what this has to do with Jesse Hooker and Lucille Lamar?”

  We nodded.

  “See, Bass Reeves was a master of disguise. He studied each situation hard and came up with a plan, oftentimes pretending to be someone else—if that’s what it took to round people up. Bass preferred being his own snazzy self, with two Colt pistols, butts looking at you, for the quicker draw. But he might be a farmer, a tramp, gunslinger—even an outlaw—whatever it took to bring ’em in. Course, this was one case where being a Black man was an advantage. Always under-es-timated.”

  He stopped and gave each of us stares. “Figured it out yet?”

  “Ah, no,” I said, shaking my head. “Honestly, Spence, I have no idea where you’re heading. No idea whatsoever.” I had long ago realized that leaps of imagination for me were ordinary thoughts for Spence.

  “Detective Riggs?”

  “Not a clue.”

  Spence reached into his bag again, and this time pulled out something wrapped in a towel. He unfolded it to reveal a black wig and two strips of hair.

  “Spencer Damn Reeves. Superfly! Of course!” I blurted out.

  “Superfly?” Riggs said.

  “Yeah, you, you were the guy talking with Jesse Hooker last night. I mean, you looked like a Harlem drug dealer. Spence, you got in that pickup with Hooker?”

  “As you say it, Nate.”

  “Would someone explain this to me,” Riggs pleaded.

  “I’ve been watching the goings-on around here,” Spence said. “Been hearing things. Jesse Hooker, he had all the signs of a small-time drug dealer. Looks like a coke head too. Seen enough of it in my time, though I’ve never touched the stuff myself. Anyway, been pondering things, and I decided I would get the skinny on Hooker and Samantha—well, Looocille. Found me this getup and got to talking with Jesse. I told him I didn’t want to meet around the theater. Neither did he, so we took a ride. Found me the chance to take one these cigarette butts and slip that letter into my coat pocket.”

  “Damn,” Riggs said, shaking his head.

  “Amazing, Spence,” I added.

  “How about the address?” Riggs asked. “How did you get that?”

  “Turns out Jesse liked the idea of doing business in the colored side of town, Haiti, we call it. Before too long, I got his confidence.”

  “Weren’t you scared?” I asked.

  “Of that bony thing? Had me a weapon. And I got him wanting something from me. He could see from my threads I was doing well.”

  “The address?” Riggs pressed the issue.

  “Told him I needed a sample of his stuff. He’s dumb as a pine cone. We stopped by the place. I stayed in his pickup and watched.”

  “How did you figure she lived there too?” Riggs asked.

  “Easy. He told me his girlfriend was working at the theater. Anyway, he came out with a sample. I told him I’d get back with him tonight. Meet him behind that warehouse near the theater, eight o’clock. Oh, and here’s the sample.”

  Spence produced yet another plastic bag, this one containing a section of what looked like tin foil, folded over a few times.

  “Here you go, Detective.”

  “Don’t know what to say, Mr. Reeves,” Riggs said. Neither did I. I felt goosebumps.

  “I had me some fun. Done more stranger things.”

  “I’d like to hear about them. Truly would,” Riggs said. “But, gentlemen, you and I need to part company. Spence, you say eight, at that warehouse across the way?” Riggs pointed in the direction of the warehouse.

  “Yep,” Spence said.

  I said, “And if you both don’t mind, I’m going to try again to find me a cashier.”

  “Got things to do too,” Spence said. He folded back the cloth over the disguise and returned it to the duffle bag. He and Riggs left the office together.

  “Superfly,” I said. “Catch you on the flip side.”

  We all felt revved up and supercharged. I know I did.

  Chapter Forty-Four

  By four o’clock, except for Samantha, everyone scheduled to work had shown up—and early like I’d asked. Kenny had returned and cleaned up. The line stretched to the end of the building and doubled back around.

  Both popcorn machines were popping at full tilt, and we had already filled extra popcorn boxes in advance of the first show. The lobby was thick with the aroma that would leave most customers helpless. The candy was replenished in neat rows, from Milk Duds, Reese Cups, and Raisinets to Junior Mints, Dots, and Kit Kats. I had checked the Coke, Sprite, and Dr Pepper syrup and carbonation canisters. The blades in the grape and orange drink machines were turning, the butter vats were topped up and bubbling, and the ice machines were sending hunks of crushed ice into the ice chests.

  Carrie helped with the popping and whatever else was needed. We exchanged looks, causing my imagina
tion to go wild.

  Samantha had never been late, and I figured this meant she wouldn’t show, leaving me relieved and worried both. Who knew what she was capable of doing—even with Dupree, Riggs, and others being on guard? I didn’t want any of us in her crosshairs. Hooker was a wild card too. Maybe she wouldn’t show up at all, if she suspected her cover had been discovered?

  But I tried again to get through to another cashier. Still no luck. Damn. It would be me doing tickets. Kenny was error-prone with money. Kaywood Turrentine had warned me about this. He would forget whether someone gave him a twenty. We might be short a hundred or more for this reason alone.

  Wait a second, I thought. I went up to Carrie and said, “Carrie, you’re doing tickets.”

  “Nate, I’ve never done it,” she whispered, intensely.

  “It’s easy. I’ll show you. We’ve got plenty of time.”

  “But…” She glanced toward the long line and back at me.

  “You’ll be great at it. Trust me. You’ll like it too.”

  “Where’s Samantha?”

  “Samantha’s not coming in. You’re it.”

  “How about Kenny?”

  “I need him to keep a watch on the projector and other things.” In a low voice I added, “Honestly, he’s not good with giving change.”

  She looked scared, her eyes wider, showing more white around the stunning blue.

  “Listen to me,” I said. “It’s easy. I’ll start, and you can watch me. Then, you take over.”

  “But—”

  “I promise you. It will be fun.”

  Carrie reflected for a second, took another look at the line, and said, “Show me.” Her natural confidence was in full gear.

  I’d finished showing her the basics when Owen appeared, standing right in front of the ticket window. Carrie gave him a murderous stare.

  “Listen,” Owen said, after Billy Gossett had let him in, “I’m just here to apologize to everyone. I’ve been a butt hole. I know it. And, I wanted to see all this. It’s crazy man, crazy.”

  He looked sincere. And I had another idea. I could use him.

  “Owen, you owe me one, right?” I led him over to the side, near the water fountain.