Black Orchid Blues

by Persia Walker

  “Thank God.”

  I shifted topics. “I heard that you guys went through Queenie’s dressing room.”

  “So, you were over at the club, were you? Trying to sniff things out on your own? Now, you know you’re not—”

  “I went to interview the club owner. Part of the regular follow-up.” I leaned forward. “What were you looking for in the dressing room?”

  “I could ask you the same thing.”

  “I didn’t say I was in there.”

  “Were you?”

  “Of course.”

  “Why?”

  “To get a sense of him. You know, for the column.”

  “Of course … the column.” He gave me a cynical smile. “So, what did you find?” I repeated.

  “Nothing in particular. Actually, nothing at all.”

  That jived, when I thought about it, with what I’d found. A strange sense of nothing at all.

  “Look,” he said, “there is one thing I can tell you.”

  “And what’s that?”

  “Another one died today.”

  My smile faded. “Another victim?”

  “I was taking the call as you walked in. She was twenty-five. Took a shot in the throat.”

  “Oh God,” I murmured. After a moment, I took out my pad and pencil. “What’s her name?”

  He shook his head. “Family’s asking us not to release it.”

  “Also rich, also—?”

  “No, they won’t be bothering us. The father said she was better off dead than to be doing what she was doing.”

  “Which was?”

  “Sinning with the sons of Ham.”

  “He actually said that?”

  “He’s a preacher. Has very firm ideas about blacks and whites and how ne’er the twain shall meet. It’s in the Bible, don’t you know?” He rubbed his eyes and shook his head in disgust.

  For a moment, we both fell silent. Then my gaze drifted back to Blackie’s file. I was usually good at reading documents upside down, but the type was too small and my eyes too tired.

  “What’re you guys thinking?” I asked.

  “You know I can’t tell you that.”

  “Come on, give me something. I’ve got to keep the story moving. And given the pressure you’re under, so do you.”

  “Keep it moving, huh?” He narrowed his eyes. “Maybe it’s me who should be asking: What have you been up to? What have you found out?”

  I smiled. “Don’t you think I’d tell you if I’d found out anything, anything useful?”

  He guffawed. “Hell no! Of course you wouldn’t. I like you, Lanie, but I know how you are, how you all are. When it comes to you guys, what’s yours is yours and what’s mine is yours.”

  “Do I hear the pot calling the kettle black?”

  “But seriously, Lanie, what’ve you got?”

  “Who says I’ve got anything?”

  “You always got something. Every cop knows that. You always got something.”

  I paused, then leaned on his desk and said, “Okay, supposing you’re right. Maybe I turned over a rock and found a worm or two, maybe even got a name. Why should I share it with you before I share it with Sam?”

  He shrugged. “Cause I’m the cop who can put you in jail for obstruction and withholding evidence?”

  I nearly burst out laughing. “Wrong answer.”

  “It’s always fun talking to you, Lanie.”

  I glanced at my watch. The clock was working its way well past two. “Time for me to take my leave, kind sir.” I got up to go. “Get some sleep, Blackie. That’s what I’m going to do.”

  “Back to that big empty house of yours, huh?”

  “It’s not empty to me.”

  “Full of memories, right?”

  “Good memories.”

  He sighed. “You’re too young for that to be enough.”

  CHAPTER 13

  It was long past Christmas. That was my first thought upon seeing the paper-wrapped parcel. It had been left leaning against my front door, illuminated by the spill of light from the lamps overhead.

  Big things come in small packages. That was my second thought, and it caused a ripple of anxiety.

  The rectangular package was about eight inches long, five inches wide, and maybe two deep. The sender had wrapped it in plain brown paper and secured it with yellow twine. When I picked it up, I found that it was hard and the contents had heft. It smelled strongly of cigars.

  A mistaken delivery?

  Maybe. There was no way to tell: The wrappings were blank. There was no address—not mine, not the sender’s. Nothing. Just wrapping as plain as plain could be.

  I turned it over gingerly and gave it a little shake. I had a fleeting thought that it might be a bomb. Schhwwwuush. Something shifted softly inside.

  I tucked the parcel under one arm and went inside. I left it on a side table in the vestibule with my purse and hung up my coats, the one I’d worn and the one I’d retrieved from the Cinnamon Club. Then I took the package into the parlor and sank down on the sofa. I couldn’t undo the knot in the twine, so I went downstairs to the kitchen, fetched a butcher knife, and slit the string. The paper fell away to reveal a wood cigar box.

  Hmmm.

  La Imperial Habana was etched into the top cover. A strip of olive-green labeling that wrapped around the edges bore the words Grandfrabrica de Tabacos, 1925. A washed-out Henry Clay tax stamp appeared on the lower right-hand corner.

  I lifted the lid. A heavier smell of old cigars—and of something else, something slightly foul—wafted out. The protective separation paper that would’ve normally covered the cigars was still in there. A white envelope lay on top. The envelope was ordinary; you could get one like it at any stationary store.

  The good news was that it was addressed; the bad news was that it wasn’t to me: 534 West 139th Street. I was at 543.

  That alone didn’t necessarily mean that the package wasn’t intended for me. Mixing up house numbers happened all the time, especially with a typed address like this one. But this envelope included the name Bernard—a family that lived across the street, the one whose light had been burning when I arrived home the night before—and that clearly meant it wasn’t for me.

  Perhaps I shouldn’t have done what I did. An inner alarm bell certainly told me not to. But I’ve always been curious. I set the envelope aside and removed the separation paper.

  Even as I recognized it, suspected what it was, I wanted to deny the sight of it: why would anyone wrap a cigar in a bloody handkerchief?

  I used the handle of a spoon to nudge back the flaps of stained linen and reveal what truly lay within.

  It was somebody’s finger, his or her ring finger. Despite being slightly shriveled from blood loss, it looked rather fresh.

  I dropped the spoon, covered my mouth with my hand, and turned away. I had suspected something terrible, but seeing it, actually seeing it, was different. Chills ran up my spine. I told myself to toughen up. Calm down. Take a deep breath and focus. You can only help Queenie if you focus.

  The digit had been cut cleanly at the base. Though grayed from the loss of blood, the skin on the finger was clearly brown. The fingernail was polished and feminine, but the size of the finger was distinctly masculine. It wore a ring, a thick gold-colored band with a large yellow diamond surrounded by clear crystals.

  There was no mistaking it. Queenie was inordinately proud of that yellow diamond ring, which I could now see was fake. He wouldn’t have parted from it without violence.

  An image flashed through my mind. Of men restraining Queenie, shoving his hand against the edge of a table, extending his ring finger while pressing down the other digits. Of a meat cleaver being raised and then—bam! He struggles, screams, and realizes with horror that it’s too late. The deed is done.

  The image was so strong and swept across my mind with such force that it took my breath away, left me feeling dizzy and sick.

  I had seen incredible things done to the
human body. While covering the police beat for the Harlem Age, I’d reported on shootings, stabbings, strangulations, even state electrocutions. I was there when the cops found corpses infested with maggots or swollen beyond recognition after being pulled from the river. I’d witnessed enough to inspire nightmares for the rest of my life. But none of it got to me the way the sight of that finger did.

  With all the others, there had been distance. They were strangers. I’d never heard their laughter, seen their smiles. This time, I had. This time, I knew the victim.

  Had they sent me the finger of a corpse?

  The kidnappers wanted to sell Queenie. They knew it would be best to keep him alive, at least for a while, in case people asked for verification. But they were also willing to maim him to prove they meant business.

  I glanced back down at the finger, felt a wave of anger, and dropped the lid on the cigar box.

  Get a grip. You’ve got to believe that he’s not dead, not yet.

  Question: why would the kidnappers send this to that nice, conservative family across the street?

  The Bernards were prominent and well-to-do. Alfred Bernard was a much-admired pediatrician, known for his generous donations of time and energy when it came to tending to orphans and street children. He was the main force behind local efforts to stem the spread of tuberculosis, a leading cause of death among our young.

  Phyllis Bernard was a former nurse, a Phi Beta Kappa alum of the University of Chicago, a prominent clubwoman active in the 135th Street YWCA, the Movement, and the Charlotte Spokes Day Nursery. She had founded the Gifted Ladies Club, a housing initiative for young working women.

  Despite all of this community involvement, the couple rarely entertained. And when they did, they invited only a chosen few, the best of the best. The very distinguished Bryan Canfield, head of the Movement, was one such example; and George Ramsey, my managing editor, was another.

  I had once been among that select group. It was because of Hamp, who had been a highly respected surgeon. He’d worked with the Harvard-trained physician Louis T. Wright, the first black surgeon for the New York Police Department, the first black physician to join the staff of any New York hospital, and the first black clinic director at Harlem Hospital. Through Wright, Hamp and I had come to know the Bernards. The three men had sat on several medical committees together.

  After Hamp’s death, I had slowly distanced myself from this particular circle. I don’t think I did it consciously. In retrospect, I can only say that I had a strong need to forge new social ties, ones that weren’t based so predominantly on my role as a doctor’s wife, especially now that the doctor was gone. In short, I don’t think I wanted their pity.

  For a moment, I was caught in that past. I came back to the present with a shiver. Did I know anything about the Bernards that would explain why they’d be the recipients of this ghastly package? No, nothing that I could think of. They wouldn’t have been caught dead in a place like the Cinnamon Club. I wouldn’t have dreamed they knew of Queenie Lovetree’s existence.

  It was time to open the envelope.

  I raised the lid, found the letter inside. Like the envelope, it was type-written. The message was brief and brutal:

  Here is the proof you asked for. We want $20,000. Unmarked bills, used tens and twenties. Numbers should be nonconsecutive and authentic. When ready, place ad in personal classifieds of the New York Daily News. Sign it Margie Winthrop. Expect ad Wednesday. Pay and keep your mouth shut. Or you’ll be picking him up in pieces.

  It was the ransom letter that everyone had been waiting for—and it had been sent to the Bernards, not Lucien Fawkes.

  I read the note again. It was standard fare, with all the usual ingredients: the warning against going to the police, the demand for payment, instructions about the money itself; but nothing about the time, place, or method of delivery. The kidnappers would get to that later.

  Nothing unusual there. The twist wasn’t even the severed finger, which, as horrid as it was, wasn’t all that surprising. After all, the kidnappers had to prove they were serious. Neither was the twist in the letter. Instead, it was in the delivery of the letter to me and the addressing of it to the Bernards.

  Here is the proof you asked for.

  This suggested that the kidnappers had already communicated with the Bernards at least once, and that the family had balked. It also meant that the kidnappers remained confident that the Bernards would pay if confronted with this grisly “proof” of their victim’s identity.

  But why did the kidnappers believe that the Bernards would care enough about Queenie Lovetree to pony up twenty grand? Then there was the more immediate question: if the package was intended for the Bernards, why had it ended up on my doorstep?

  Could the kidnappers have simply reversed the house numbers by accident? As for the fact that I lived across from their intended target, in a kidnapping that I’d also witnessed—it was one of those odd coincidences that could happen from time to time.

  However, I didn’t believe in coincidences, not of that degree.

  The kidnappers wanted me in on the case. They were still making me an accomplice. I didn’t like that idea, but I was also intrigued by the possibility. Sooner or later, they would miscalculate and the access they were giving me would become a weapon I could use against them.

  The delivery of the box not only granted access but conveyed information. The kidnappers were trying to tell me something, and I thought I knew what.

  I read the ransom note again. Apparently, the Bernards hadn’t definitively said no, and clearly hadn’t reported the demand to the police. Instead, they had asked for proof. So the Bernards not only knew Queenie, but had a vested interest in his well-being.

  Obviously, he was related to them. The thought took some getting used to, but it made sense. For one thing, it explained Queenie’s secrecy and maybe even the Bernards’ reclusiveness. But just how closely related was he?

  He was the right age to have been their child, but the wrong sex. The Bernards had only one child, as far as I knew, and that was a rather plain daughter. Up until a few months ago, I hadn’t even realized she existed. She was a prim and proper girl in her early twenties, demure and soft-spoken.

  I had lived on the block for four years and in that time had never seen the girl, not until one day the prior October, when the Bernards were all out walking along West 139th Street. They usually just gave a nod and strolled past—but that day, I tripped over the uneven sidewalk and spilled my groceries. Even though they knew me, the older Bernards didn’t break their stride. But the young woman with them stopped and started to help me gather my things. It was only then that the others, including the young man with her, jumped in.

  Introductions followed. I was stunned to learn that she was their daughter, Sheila; the fellow, her husband, Junior Holt. The couple had moved back six months earlier, after graduating from Howard University, Dr. Bernard said. Sheila was homesick after spending four solid years away in Washington, D.C., with nary a visit home. She’d always been too busy to come back on holidays and had spent summers in Europe, Mrs. Bernard added. Traveling was fine and good when you were a student, but when studies were done, it was time to grow up and take on the mantles of responsibility. So Sheila and Junior had moved home to New York, where they could find work.

  It was Dr. Bernard who did most of the talking. He was in his sixties, tall and handsome, about six-foot-two, with salt-and-pepper hair, beautifully groomed and elegantly dressed. He had a reputation for being gruff and controlling with medical staff. But when he considered himself among social equals, he exuded charm and wit. Clearly, he was a well-educated man used to influencing people.

  As for Phyllis Bernard, she was the perfect Strivers’ Row matron: from the top of her gray-streaked hair, dressed in finger waves, to the tips of her black kid shoes, she was perfectly made up and attired. She was the type of woman who follows her husband’s every lead. Like a politician’s wife, she gave polite nods or made
small interjections to accentuate what he said, but rarely came out with a comment of her own.

  Alfred and Phyllis Bernard always conveyed an impression of longstanding marital happiness. Despite whatever troubles they might have faced along the way, they were still deeply in love. It was there in the way he took her hand and gave her a glance or a smile every now and then, as if seeking her affirmation about what he said.

  I remembered feeling a pang at seeing their silent communication. This was the kind of enduring marital love I’d hoped for. I’d had the right man; we could’ve gone the distance. Then death got in the way.

  But now I resolutely put such thoughts aside. It was important to recall everything I could about that October meeting. It was the one and only time I’d seen the Bernards all together.

  Sheila resembled neither of her parents, at least not at first glance. The most striking thing about her was her sweetness, gentleness, and apparent deep love for her husband. She had a distinct though faint Southern lilt to her speech.

  What about Junior? He’d said so little. I could summon up only a vague image of a tall, slender fellow with dark, sad eyes. I recalled the truism that girls always marry their father. He showed none of Dr. Bernard’s polished confidence, but he did have that same sense of physical grace about him.

  Meeting Sheila and Junior had cleared up one mystery. In the months prior, I’d often heard music when walking past the Bernards’ residence. Someone in that house was an accomplished pianist. He or she loved to play Chopin and Brahms. Someone sang opera too. Sometimes I heard Enrico Caruso playing on the Victrola, most often his recording of sacred music by Rossini. I would also hear the pure, thrilling live voice of a young, male tenor singing along. It must’ve been Junior and Sheila: he singing and she at the piano in accompaniment.

  It all made for a pretty picture: fine, upstanding parents. A plain but obedient daughter, properly married, and a respectful, dutiful son-in-law. Queenie wouldn’t have fit in. Queenie must have been the secret son, the prodigal they never saw, never spoke of.

  Hmm.

  I recalled the night before, seeing the lights burning in the Bernards’ window. I had wondered why they were awake when all others on the block were asleep. To think I’d envied them. They’d probably already heard from the kidnappers. They were probably terrified.