The Devil's Own Rag Doll

by Mitchell Bartoy

  “If anybody had a beef, we could send them to Mitchell.”

  “I’m not worried about anybody beefing,” said Bobby. “I’m just thinking that it wouldn’t be worth the commotion.”

  “So you think”—I had exhausted myself somehow, though I hadn’t really done a thing—“we can take Walker’s judgment on this? This guy doesn’t have anything to tell us?”

  Bobby let the question hang in the air for a moment. Then he shrugged his shoulders and said, “Sure. I think we ought to send Walker around on his own to see what he can find out with his people.”

  I looked sharply at Bobby and blurted, “You think that’s all right?”

  “I think Walker’s a man who knows when to talk,” said Bobby. “Am I right, Walker?”

  We all looked at Walker intently. He looked from man to man and then nodded slowly.

  “I’m telling you, Pete, Walker’s our man.”

  I thought for a moment. Though I had set up Johnson to dig for me without telling Bobby, I felt that I had lost some footing, like I was the odd man out instead of Walker—and I wasn’t sure that didn’t make sense. All of it rattled around in my head for a moment, and then I said, “You don’t have a car, do you, Walker?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Well, Bobby,” I said, “are you going to send Walker out by himself in a scout car? How do you think that’ll go over with the boys in the garage?” I knew that to the men on the force, the few colored officers trickling in represented the cowardice of Mayor Jeffries in the face of pressure from Jenkins and other civic leaders pressing for change. If we took Walker to check out a scout car, it would surely mark the first time a colored officer had been allowed to take a car alone, and probably the first time a colored officer had even been allowed to drive one. I couldn’t help thinking that men had been lynched for less. And if something like that came along by the time we had finished all our business, wouldn’t everyone suppose I had a hand in it?

  Bobby stood up and wafted his hat back and forth, brushing it against his leg. Then he let a big grin burst over his face and said, “We’ll find out, I guess!”

  * * *

  I had never touched a colored man in friendship. I had rousted dozens over the years, cracked a few heads, arrested my share, and shot more than one colored man dead. I guess a colored criminal didn’t feel so much different to me from a white hoodlum. Certainly they were no filthier. But standing there, with my mind bugging out, and with everyone waiting on me to say yea or nay, I couldn’t remember ever so much as shaking the hand of a colored man. Certainly, I had never been known to be the chummy sort. I hadn’t ever laid my hands on a great number of white men, either, to put it that way. If my father hadn’t been such a terrific backslapper, I could say it was something in the way I’d been raised. Finally, as I could see they were waiting for me to say something, I muttered, “You better go with him, Bobby. They’ll dump a load on him if you don’t.”

  “You should go instead,” said Bobby. “I’d like to see the look on Farley’s face if you and Walker came up together.”

  “Piss on that fat bastard.” I just shrugged. “He’s been a pain in the ass since before I was on the force. My old man used to take me in there and Farley would try to scare me with his stories, rolling his fat ass around on that chair of his. How can a man spend his whole life on the job sitting down?”

  We all walked out and stood to the side of the building, where the early sun bounced off the marble and the sidewalk and wanted to cook us from every angle. Bobby and Walker crossed the street to the garage.

  When they were out of earshot, Johnson said, “What should I do with the boy if I find him?”

  “Take him out for ice cream,” I said.

  “I mean how should I handle it? What should I tell the people at the church if he’s there and I take him away?”

  “Johnson, you are a police officer. People will do what you tell them, if you can look ’em in the eye. You carry a weapon. You wear a uniform. If you can act like you’re in charge, then you’ll be in charge, and you won’t have to take any guff from anybody.”

  That shut him up. Johnson said nothing more as we waited for Bobby and Walker to return. He followed as I sidled toward Bobby’s car, which was parked, as usual, blocking the hydrant in front of headquarters. We watched as the scout car pulled out of the garage with Walker behind the wheel. I could see Bobby’s white hands moving inside the cab, directing Walker to pull up right in front of the building. Bobby jumped out and slammed the door, but stuck his head immediately inside the open window and began talking excitedly to Walker.

  I walked up and rapped my knuckles on Bobby’s bony back.

  Bobby pulled his head out of the car. “Priceless, Pete, I’m telling you straight. Farley’s eyes popped right out of his head when I gave Walker the keys. He says, ‘You can’t let that darky drive! He’s not certified!’”

  “What did you tell him?”

  “I told him Walker was my chauffeur,” said Bobby.

  “You’re a laugh riot. It’ll be even funnier if they find Walker with his toes pointing up.” I leaned toward the window of the scout car so Walker could hear as well. “I’m thinking, now, with what’s happening, maybe we should be looking for Toby Thrumm, too. You know anything about that name, Walker?”

  Walker shook his head.

  “It was Thrumm that set us up to find Pease. Seems after we got done talking to him, he got the tar kicked out of him and ended up in the hospital. At least that’s the story we got from Jenkins.”

  “Jenkins!” Walker perked up. “You mean Reverend Jenkins?”

  I said, “Is that funny to you, Walker?”

  “Not funny exactly.”

  “Well, what is it, then?” I had intended just to send Walker on his way, and now found myself engaged in a conversation that seemed likely to drag on. My neck began to ache from craning my head into the car’s window.

  “Reverend Jenkins, there’s a man who went from nothing to something in a hurry, that’s all I’m saying.”

  “I hear he’s a real big shooter down in the neighborhoods,” said Bobby. “Has a line on everything.”

  “Now he does,” said Walker. “You all probably don’t remember how it was maybe ten years ago with Jenkins. That man knows how to talk is all. Back then he wasn’t much more than a street-corner minister, if you catch my meaning. But when the unions started coming in, and all the organizers and such—Communists and all, they were—when all those boys started coming in, wanting to stir things up, they couldn’t find anywhere to talk. No sir, none of the colored churches would touch ’em. Mr. Lloyd saw to that. Time was, a colored man could only get a job if he was going to church regular, and then the minister might put him on the list for Lloyd’s.”

  “And Jenkins found a place for the union boys to have their meetings, that right, Walker?” Bobby let loose a wide grin.

  “That’s right. See, back then, he wasn’t anything but a talker. He didn’t have anything to lose.”

  “So our Mr. Jenkins is quite a gambler, then,” said Bobby. “Now he’s up there with the big boys because he jumped on the bandwagon when it was just starting out.” He slapped his palm on the roof of the car. “See, Pete, it’s what I keep telling you. You have to try to look forward a little, see what’s in the wind.”

  “Never mind all that,” I said. “Walker, I want you to sniff around, talk to your people about Pease, see if you can come up with a location for Toby Thrumm. Receiving says he’s busted up pretty bad, somehow he slipped out, they don’t know where he is. Don’t talk to Jenkins. Try to get back with Johnson here after lunch. Got all that?”

  “Sure, Detective. Should I bring Thrumm down if I find him?”

  I looked at Bobby.

  “Well,” said Bobby, “see what you can get out of him, if he’s around. Maybe … it would be better not to bring him down here.”

  “Try to get a description of the boys who messed him over,” I said. “And tell h
im I said hello.”

  “All right, then. Okay.”

  Walker drove off carefully. I was aware that we had drawn a crowd. All the uniformed officers and detectives trickling from the building glared at the car until it passed from view.

  “Okay, Pete, why the bum’s rush for old Walker?” said Bobby.

  “Johnson’s got a lead on a colored boy that I saw in Pease’s apartment building. Seems the boy’s gone missing. Now, if I can find him, he may not know much, but at least I’m sure I can make him tell us what he did see. Since I know him by his face, he can’t clam up about being there.”

  “Maybe it would have been better to let Walker talk to him.”

  “Maybe. Maybe not.”

  “Walker’s all right, Pete. We got to talking. He says he’s getting it bad from both sides. Colored folks down there calling him Uncle Tom and all of that. One old lady got so worked up cussing him out that her dentures came flying out of her mouth. Spit all over his uniform, you know.” Bobby let loose a laugh and a deep cough. “Can you picture that?”

  “Nobody twisted his arm to join the force.”

  “Jesus, Pete, you can lighten up a little. Not everybody’s out to get you! I’m telling you, Walker’s decent enough.”

  Johnson said, “If it’s trouble, I—”

  “Get to it, Johnson,” I said. “You won’t have the same trouble getting a scout car. Farley knows you’re Mitchell’s nephew, I’m guessing.”

  Johnson nodded.

  “Then get to it,” I told him.

  Johnson wanted to say something but held it back. He turned from us and made his way across the busy street to the garage.

  “Let’s go,” I said to Bobby. “I feel like we’re putting on a show out here.” I slipped into Bobby’s unmarked car.

  “Where to?”

  “I say we head over to niggertown on the west end and see if we can spot any familiar faces leaning on lampposts, maybe roust a few, kick up something about Pease.”

  “Hey! What about Mitchell?”

  “Hell with Mitchell,” I said. “If he’s looking to knock us down, he could get plenty on us without all of this. I figure he’s telling us to stay away to cover his ass if it gets too ugly. Let’s go. I want to wrap this thing up and put it away as soon as we can manage it.”

  “Okay,” Bobby said. “I’m game. It’s good to see a little initiative out of you. Could be I’m starting to grow on you a little bit?”

  “When something like you starts to grow on me,” I muttered, “I chop it off with a hatchet.”

  CHAPTER 7

  Bobby let the car into gear and eased slowly into traffic. He took the car through a nonsense route of side streets and back alleys that left me wondering at times where we were. I gripped the top of the door with my good hand to hold myself steady.

  I couldn’t get a handle on the numbers, but it seemed like there were too many people in the city, especially with so many men off to the war. Detroit was a big magnet, sucking people up from all over. Though I had lived in the city my whole life, and though I had been thrilled to see the great skyscrapers come up in the twenties and all the other changes, I thought that the city had become too big to keep track of. As a child, I had roamed all over, thumbing rides or hitching on the streetcars, and I felt like I belonged anywhere Bobby went, except on the property of the old auto barons. You always knew where there was too much money and where they wouldn’t let you just walk around free. I thought I knew every corner of the city. Maybe it was Bobby’s careless driving, circling, speeding up and slowing down, but I looked out now at the streets that had become strange and wondered how I had lost even my feeling of home. I caught glimpses of street signs and began to realize that we were far south of where we should have been on the trip westward.

  “You need to stop and ask directions?” I said. “This ain’t exactly the best way out.”

  “Well,” said Bobby, “it’s just a little business I need to check up on. The way things are, it’s been a few days.” He turned and leaned to poke his elbow into my shoulder. “Listen, Pete,” he said, “you strike me as a man who can keep his mouth shut.”

  I said nothing but looked at him and raised my eyebrows dully.

  “You don’t make me for a chump who’s going to work all his life, do you? Don’t answer that.” Bobby sucked in a deep, shaking drag from his smoke. “See, I got a little thing going on the side. It’s not much for now, but give me a couple years. I got a place rented out, it’s just down here if you want to swing by and have a look.”

  “Sure,” I said. I thought with wonder and worry about the endless vitality my partner seemed to have. It seemed bad to keep on hustling when your juice had to be run out. I wondered if it wasn’t eating Bobby up from the inside, or storing up bile to turn into cancer or something. For myself, I had decided long ago that a slow and steady course was best and in fact the only one possible.

  “Flavored syrups, that’s the racket,” said Bobby. “Watch where it gets me.”

  “I’m not following.”

  “See, I’ve got this little thing going. I get the flavorings and the bottled water and the sugar. I pay a couple Polack ladies to mix it all together. These babushka ladies can work hard, but you have to keep an eye on them or they just sit and gabble in Polish. I sell it to Pops Brunell over in Paradise Valley, he puts a little fizz in it, a little water, bottles it up, and sells it to all the colored kids on Hastings Street.”

  “You’re selling syrup?” I loosened my tie and ran my palm over my forehead.

  “Well, I know it sounds like a dope’s racket. But the markup I’m able to take is—well, it ought to be illegal. I got these ladies doing the messy work, and all I’ve got to do is set things up on the business end. This way I get to keep my hands clean, know what I mean?” Bobby considered his pink fingernails over the steering wheel.

  “Don’t you need a license for that sort of thing?”

  “Ordinarily,” Bobby grinned.

  “Well, where the hell are you getting all the sugar?” We both knew that dodging the ration system could bring federal dicks swarming around like ants at a picnic. And the federal dicks wouldn’t have any reason to smile at Bobby’s antics.

  “That’s the sweet part! I’ve got this guy up north, outside Mio—you know where that is? Twice a month I borrow one of the paddy wagons and make a pickup down there over the weekend. Sugar beet country, that’s all them hicks got up there—”

  “That’s your big idea? Selling syrup? How much could you be making on all of that?”

  “You’d be surprised, Pete, let me tell you. It adds up to a pretty penny. Pops sells a truckload of that stuff because it’s cheaper than the Coca-Cola. Maybe you haven’t been up to the Valley in a while—I know you’re not exactly welcome—but the darkies up there are falling all over each other, it’s packed in so tight. And they’re plenty thirsty.”

  “I guess I’m having trouble seeing it,” I said.

  “Open that eye up a little wider. This is just the start of it, see? If I can put up three or four setups like this, I’ll be making enough to quit the force and concentrate on the business. No more dirt under these fingernails. No more hustling punks for information. I’m telling you, Jasper Lloyd was forty years old before he ever—hold on, here it is.”

  It was an old warehouse from before the turn of the century, fitted out now for a number of small businesses. I knew that the area had once been Jewish, and I figured that the places were all rented out now by Jews up in big houses in Oak Park or farther out. The front of the structure filled half a block and ran along the alley all the way back to the next street, and it made me wonder how many bricks had gone into the face of the building. I fixed the place at no more than sixty years old, but already the bricks were cracked and the mortar had started to crumble in places. It would have suited me to think of bricks as something like stone, good for thousands of years. Still, I thought, enough of it’s still holding together to keep it up for a w
hile.

  Bobby pulled into the alley and left the car there, midway between the sheer walls of two four-story buildings. He pulled out a key from the watch pocket of his trousers and opened the door. I felt the flush of hot, wet air on my face as I entered and smelled the sweetness of thick sugar bubbling. A few heavyset Polish ladies padded around in house dresses and flat shoes, toting heavy bags of sugar, dropping them into big kettles lined up along a sturdy bench with gas burners built in. There were six kettles, and one of the ladies moved slowly from one to the next, lifting a long wooden paddle at each and patiently stirring the brew. All the ladies seemed cut from the same cloth: bow-legged, thick about the shoulders, hips, and forearms, and each squinting through the drooping flesh above her eyes, peering out briefly at Bobby and me through dark pinholes. I couldn’t decide if the faint trace of cabbage smell came from the ladies or from Bobby’s makeshift setup.

  A fan blew out through a high, narrow window to the alley but didn’t do much to cut the thickness of the air inside the room. I sauntered along, eyeing the setup. It reminded me of some dank scene from the Old Country. I put it together. Except for the running water of the washbasin and the spigot set on the wall for washing out the kettles, a century might not have passed, to judge by what I could see before me. Canvas sacks tight with sugar had been piled up neatly along one wall, enough, I judged, to be worth a pretty penny on their own. Everything, all the benches, tables, and stools, seemed to be made of heavy, oil-darkened wood, and the lights overhead seemed yellow enough and threw light dimly enough to be mistaken for candles or torches. The papers that Bobby searched through on the little desk seemed yellow and curled and were in general written out by hand—often in the crabbed hand of the Polish women, marking production.

  It felt bad to me. I propped myself against a wall under a window, where I could feel the slight breeze from the tilted pane pass over me. Maybe Bobby’s sugar supplier had given him the stuff on credit as a way of lessening the risk of selling it; maybe Bobby really had the sway to fix up such a sweet deal on his own. I wasn’t much for figures, but I couldn’t help wondering how a farmer could make more money selling on the black market than by selling on a fat government contract. It occurred to me that perhaps Bobby had some sort of hold on the farmer; it was easy enough to imagine how a big-city police officer might dig up dirt bad enough to nudge things along that way. But it seemed like too much trouble to go through, too much risk, and too much complicated hustling for the profit that might be involved—especially for a man like Bobby, who had a nose for the dirty stuff and could easily amass a small fortune in well-placed graft and hustling. I knew plenty of officers, even beat cops, who had done just that. Certainly a few muddy bills had crossed my own palm. What it boiled down to, I finally decided, was that I did not trust Bobby’s judgment enough to allow that he could run something like this without something going bad in the end.