Black Orchid Blues

by Persia Walker

  There they were, the bouncer and the coatcheck girl, so terrified they could barely put one foot in front of the other.

  Death march. I flashed on stories my late husband had told me about the war, stories of soldiers and civilians marched to their execution, of whole villages lined up against a wall and shot. A chill went through me. I tried to think, tried to restrain the fear and think.

  A million questions raced through my mind.

  Was this the result of some bootleggers’ war? Or was it supposed to be a robbery? If so, would he take the money and run? Or was he the type to kill us all just for the hell of it?

  He was covered. That meant he wanted to make sure no one could identify him. Did that mean that if no one did anything stupid, just gave up the jewels and wallets and fancy timepieces, he’d let us all live to tell the story?

  I glanced across the crowded room, at the white faces peering out of the smoky gloom, and didn’t see a hero among them, thank God.

  The gunman shoved Spooner and Ralston to the small open space just before the stage and had them stand side-by-side.

  “Everybody, wake up!” he yelled. “Take your seats and show your hands.”

  But we were all too scared to move.

  “I will count to three and then start shooting—for real. One … two …”

  My heartbeat was pounding a hot ninety miles a minute, but my hands and feet felt cold. From the corner of my eye, I glimpsed Queenie slipping his right hand under the table. The gunman saw it too. He swung around and leveled his weapon on us.

  “Bring it out,” he said. “Nice and slow.”

  Queenie gave him an insolent look and mouthed the word No.

  I was stunned. I’d talked to Queenie long enough to know he thought he could handle anyone and anything, but what the hell was he thinking? Okay, so he had pride. He didn’t want people to see that he was scared. But this was not the time to act all biggety and try to impress people. He could get us killed.

  “Queenie,” I hissed, “do as he says.”

  “No.”

  The gunman’s lips twitched, but he said nothing. He looked Queenie in the eyes, made a slight adjustment in his aim, and squeezed the trigger.

  Copper-jacketed pistol rounds erupted from the muzzle in a sheet of flame; a shower of shiny brass cases rained down from the breech. The bullets found Spooner and ripped a trench in his chest. Blood splattered everywhere. The Ralston kid crumpled in a dead faint. People shrieked. Some ducked down again, but others raced for the door. They were screaming, tearing at each other.

  “Shut up and get back here!” the gunman swung around and yelled. “Shut up or I’ll mow you down!”

  The bouncer pawed at his ravaged chest. He plastered his big hands over his gaping wounds, as if he could hold in the blood. Then he looked up at me, in mute sadness. He stumbled forward a step and his heart gave out. He sagged to his knees and fell, facedown.

  The gunman stared at the dead man before pointing an accusing finger at Queenie. “You!” he said. “You made me do that!”

  Queenie had gone gray under his elaborate makeup, ashen and speechless. He finally understood. This was not one of his tall tales, where he could play the star. This was real.

  “Back to your seats everybody!” the gunman yelled. “Get back in your seats and show your hands. Do it, or I’ll start shooting. And I won’t stop till the job’s done.”

  This time, folks moved. They scrambled to get back in place.

  The killer turned to Queenie and me. “Come over here, the both of you, where I can see you.”

  We stood up and edged around the table, keeping our distance from him.

  The gunman was taller than me, but not by much, which made him short for a man. The coat seemed to have padded shoulders, but I had the feeling that he would’ve appeared broad even without them, that he was built like a quarterback, muscular and stocky.

  For the most part, he’d successfully concealed his face, but some of it showed above the mask. His eyes had a distinctive almond shape and they were light-colored: blue or gray, I couldn’t be sure. And the band of skin showing over the bridge of his nose, it was light too. In other words, this was a white guy. Last, but not least, I detected an accent. European, northern European, perhaps. So, not just any white guy, but a European white guy. He’d sure traveled a long way to cause trouble.

  “Now, you,” he told Queenie, “take the heater out or she’s next.” He pointed the gun at me.

  I half-turned to Queenie to see what he’d do. Please, don’t do anything stupid.

  Queenie slipped his hand through the slit of his dress. And lingered there. He was going to try something dumb, like shoot from down there. I could see it in his eyes.

  Don’t do it. Don’t do it.

  Queenie looked at me and I looked at him. If he pulled a stunt like that and I managed to survive, then I was going to kill him myself. That’s what I was thinking and that’s what I put in my eyes.

  I guess he got the message.

  He eased out a small black handgun and aimed it downward. My lungs expanded and I inhaled big gobs of sweet relief.

  “Put it on the floor and kick it over here,” the gunman said.

  Queenie did as told. He kept his eyes on the submachine gun the whole time. I still didn’t trust Queenie not to try something and I guess Mr. Tommy Gun didn’t either, so I understood why he was keeping his weapon trained, but I wondered why it was trained on me.

  “Get over here.” The gunman indicated the space right in front of him.

  Queenie glanced at me. His eyes held doubt, fear, and resentment.

  “Do what he says,” I whispered. “Please. Just do it.”

  “Come on,” the gunman growled.

  Queenie’s gaze returned to the gunman. Stone-faced, he held up his gown, then stepped delicately and ladylike over Spooner’s body. He stood before the gunman, chest heaving, eyes narrowed, and said with tremulous bravado, “Well?”

  The gunman slapped him. He was a full head shorter than Queenie, but wide and solid. Queenie swayed under the blow but didn’t stumble. He seemed more stunned than anything. His hand went to his lip and came back bloodied. His jaw dropped in alarm.

  “My face! You piece of shit! You hurt my face!”

  The gunman slapped him again. This time Queenie went down. He tripped backward over Spooner and landed on the floor in a pool of blood. He scrambled away from the body with a horrified cry, and got to his feet. His hands and dress were smeared red. From the expression on his face, all resistance had finally been knocked out of him.

  The gunman gave me a nod. “You! Come here.”

  Queenie and I exchanged another glance. Then I took a step forward. The gunman produced handcuffs from his pocket and tossed them at me. I caught them instinctively.

  “Cuff up the songbird,” he said. “You,” he told Queenie, “hands behind your back.”

  If there was one thing I’d always told myself I would never do, it was to be an accomplice to a crime. I had read, and written, so many stories in which victims had cooperated with their killers. They had done so in the minute hope of surviving, but all they had really done was make it easier for their killer to get them alone, isolate them and do what he felt needed doing.

  I’d always said I would resist. I wouldn’t make it easy. Oh no. Not me.

  But now here I was and things appeared differently. They weren’t so cut and dry. Someone else’s life was at stake, not just mine.

  I could refuse or cooperate. If I refused, then he’d probably shoot me and cuff Queenie himself—or worse, shoot someone else. If I went along and bided my time, there was some hope I’d survive and that everyone else would too.

  Everyone, but maybe not Queenie.

  “Well,” the gunman said, “who should I shoot next?” He glanced down at the Ralston girl, still unconscious on the floor. “How about her?” He turned his gun, took aim.

  “No!” I pulled Queenie’s hands behind his back and slip
ped on the handcuffs.

  He flinched at the touch of cold metal. “Please, no, Slim. You—”

  “It’ll be all right,” I said, trying hard to sound calm.

  I snapped the cuffs shut, and when the gunman ordered me to step back, I did.

  He made Queenie stand next to him and checked the cuffs. “Good.” Then he grabbed Queenie and started backing out. He slinked to the rear exit, backstage left, and kept the singer in front as a shield.

  Queenie panicked. “Oh come on now, people! Y’all ain’t gonna let him take me like this, are you? Somebody do something. Please!”

  People stayed frozen to their seats. No one was willing to play the hero. Not in the face of that weapon.

  Queenie’s eyes met mine. “You! Slim, you—!”

  The whine of police sirens rang through the air. The cops were probably headed to another emergency, but the killer assumed the worst. He pushed Queenie aside and sprayed the room with gunfire. All hell broke loose. People stampeded toward the door. Wall sconces exploded. The room fell dark. Plaster and dust showered down.

  I heard screams. I heard cries. I dove under a table and covered my head. Bullets ripped up the floor two inches from my face. I couldn’t believe they didn’t touch me.

  “Motherfucker! Get your hands off me!” Queenie cried.

  I heard the back door bang open. I heard a scuffle and a scream. Then the door slammed shut and all I heard was the heavy thumping of my terrified heart.

  CHAPTER 2

  Five seconds went by. Five eternal seconds. I counted them down. One one-hundred. Two one-hundred. Three one-hundred. Four … I was still trembling from head to toe, but my breathing was approaching normal. The police sirens were getting louder and I finally crawled out from under the table.

  Despite the shadows, I could detail the destruction. The bullets had torn open bodies as well as furniture. Four people lay sprawled over their tables or slumped in their booths. Blood and shattered glass covered everything. The air was thick with gun smoke.

  Now others emerged from their hiding places. Stunned patrons staggered to their feet. The musicians, who had flattened themselves on the floor, slowly straightened up. The sirens drew nearer.

  I couldn’t risk being found here. If I were spotted, I’d end up at the police station instead of the newsroom, where I needed to be, writing my story.

  It was colder than a mother-in-law’s kiss outside. I was wearing a thin black cocktail dress with lace at the shoulders and hemline. Sexy as all get-out, but no protection against the cold. I needed my hat and coat, but they were at the check-in. I couldn’t risk going back over there.

  I felt around for my purse, found it on the seat, and made for the back exit. I pushed open the door and gasped at the sudden rush of frosty air. I stumbled outside, shivering, and took a moment to get my bearings. It was well after midnight and the only light came from the stars above. The city landscape seemed foreign, filled with shadows I could barely identify. Garbage, milk crates.

  If Queenie’s body had been at my feet, I would’ve stumbled over it before I saw it.

  Pressing myself against the side of the building, I moved swiftly toward the street. Snow and ice blanketed the ground. The wind pierced me to the bone and I shivered from head to toe. I could hear the rumble of curious and confused voices. I could see the flashing beams of a patrol car. I made it to the corner, ducked down, and peeped around the edge.

  The first cop car screeched to a halt in front of the buildings. So those sirens had been for us. Who called the coppers? Maybe one of the waiters.

  A crowd had gathered and the folks who’d been on the inside were starting to stumble out. The bulls pushed their way through and seconds later ran back out. Soon, there would be more cops and then detectives and they would have questions.

  My car was parked half a block away. Earlier, I had been annoyed at not finding a space closer to the club. Now I was grateful. I had a better chance of reaching it on foot and driving away unnoticed than of trying to start it up right there.

  So I hustled off, teeth chattering, and remained well behind the crowd. My luck held. No one noticed and no one called out my name.

  I paused at a pay phone and rang Sam Delaney, my editor. He answered on the first ring. I could imagine his face, his dark eyes, his strong hands, as he gripped the phone.

  “Lanie? Where are you? I just heard over the police band. Are you all right?”

  “I’m fine, Sam. Fine.” I told him the details and dictated the setup for the story.

  “You coming in?” he asked.

  “I’m on my way.”

  I hung up, shivered and rubbed my upper arms, then hopped into my car. Sam would phone downstairs and tell the guys to hold the presses. Then he would start writing the story. By the time I got there, he would have all the basic stuff down.

  I made myself focus on the story. Set all emotions aside. There was no time for them. No time to feel anything. That would came later, but right then and there, I didn’t want to feel anything, anyway. I wanted the comfort of detachment and reason.

  Sam was the only one in the newsroom when I arrived. The place was as silent as a tomb. During the day, it was a human beehive. You heard typewriters clacking, phones jangling, and radios blaring. You heard the wire service printers thumping out endless reams of print and the whomp of the pneumatic tubes shooting final edits down to the typesetters. In short, it was so loud the noise hit you like a wall when you walked in.

  But in the evenings, the newsroom was deserted and the heavy silence had a tangibility of its own. Normally, you would’ve at least heard the rumble of the printers downstairs. But that night they were paused and waiting for the story of the Black Orchid kidnapping and the Cinnamon Club massacre.

  Sam waved me into his office, the man-sized fish tank that sat at the far side of the newsroom. He was as handsome as always, and impeccably dressed. He wore a blue-gray shirt and a finely printed dark blue silk tie under a gray vest. He was at his typewriter, pounding the keys with a viciously accurate two-fingered hunt and peck. I tossed my purse into a chair and started reading over his shoulder.

  I double-checked what he’d written, suggesting where to add color and detail. Then we switched seats and it was he who edited over my shoulder, smoothing phrases, rounding out sentences, making the copy strong, the telling swift and neat.

  I couldn’t have worked this way with everyone. Sam was a wonderful editor, one of the best. He wasn’t just your advocate, but the advocate for your story. He helped untangle complicated ideas and pushed you to think of new angles. He saw potential, both in you and your piece. He was patient; he was funny. He was smart and he was kind. He was also the first man I’d dared to care about in the three years since my husband died.

  Hamp had collapsed on a Seventh Avenue street corner, not ten blocks from our home. At thirty-seven years of age, he’d died of a heart attack. It came without warning, just one day out of the blue, like a hammer from the heavens, and he was gone.

  Hamp’s passing had not only broken my heart, but left me terrified to love again. I hadn’t realized how much until Sam took over the newsroom. Now I was learning bit by precious bit to stop using grief as a wall against future pain and disappointment.

  As Sam leaned over my shoulder, his clean male smell filling my nostrils, I felt a surge of joy, a terrified joy. I could’ve been one of the unlucky ones. It could’ve been me who caught a bullet and was on my way to the morgue. It could’ve been me who was stretched out with a tag on one toe. Instead, I was alive and here in my newsroom with Sam.

  “He was jumpy,” I said of the killer. “Shot up the place for no reason.”

  “Sounds like an amateur.”

  His office phone rang and he snatched up the receiver. From his side of the conversation, I gathered that it was the typesetter wanting to know how much longer we’d be. I glanced at the wall clock. We had another five minutes, tops, to get the story done. The whole paper was on hold. An entire c
rew was waiting.

  But that’s not what worried me.

  Sam hung up. Over the next four minutes, we checked the copy once more, and I took comfort in his nearness as he read along with me.

  “That last paragraph,” he said, “it—”

  Outside Sam’s office, the main newsroom door banged open. I looked up and saw the source of my worry stride in. Detective John Blackie. I knew him from when I covered crime for the Harlem Age. Now I worked for the Chronicle, but our paths still crossed, because every now and then my writing about highbrow Harlem meant writing about highbrow crime.

  “Sam, you might have to finish this without me.”

  He didn’t answer.

  Blackie rapped sharply on Sam’s office door, but didn’t wait for an invite. He stepped inside, saw what we were up to, and said, “I hope you’re done with that, Lanie, cause I’m gonna need you to come with me.”

  “Give me just a minute.”

  He shook his head. “Sorry, it can’t wait. I got a boatload of witnesses who say you were there tonight, at the Cinnamon Club. You saw the whole thing.”

  “Sure I did, but what about the witnesses? They weren’t just looking at me.”

  “None of them got as close to the shooter as you did.”

  “What about the Ralston girl? She stood right next to him.”

  “Are you kidding? The poor kid’s scared witless. She can barely remember her own name.”

  There was no use in arguing. I glanced at Sam.

  “It’s okay,” he said. “I’ll finish up here, then I’ll join you.”

  “No need for that,” Blackie said. Then he saw the look in Sam’s eyes. “All right, but don’t expect me to wait till you get there.”

  I picked up my purse and went to Blackie, my reluctance obvious.

  “Where’s your coat?” Sam asked.

  “You ran out and left it, didn’t you?” Blackie said.

  Sam took his coat down from the rack and draped it around my shoulders. “Don’t worry, I’ll take care of your baby here.” He nodded at the type-written pages. “Then I’ll come to the station, make sure everything’s going all right.”