Downtown Strut: An Edna Ferber Mystery (Edna Ferber Mysteries)

by Ed Ifkovic

  “Read it,” he said softly.

  I did: “‘To cousin Roddy, thanks for telling me about these brave men and for telling me to do this book.’” The dedication was followed by some handwritten lines of poetry in a cramped, chaotic penmanship. The ink had smudged and some words were barely decipherable. In parentheses Lawson had scribbled, “‘Harlem,’ by Roddy Parsons.”

  I read the scribbled words:

  Saturday morning Harlem says nothing at all

  Yet the hum and whisper of night lingers

  The echo of a midnight saxophone

  The poet sits in shadows

  Waiting for Truth.

  “Very moving tribute,” I told Waters. “What I can make out.” I read the lines again, their import now cryptic, revelatory, as if these words by the dead poet possessed a weight I couldn’t grasp. That last line: Waiting for Truth.

  “It’s a poem Roddy wrote last year. We all liked it.”

  I placed the manuscript on the coffee table. “We’ll see.”

  Waters looked disappointed. What did he expect me to say?

  ***

  That night, around six, a cab dropped me off at Carl Van Vechten’s apartment on West 55th Street. I’d declined Carlo’s invitation to his annual pre-Christmas cocktail party, bothered as I was by Roddy’s death; but some of my favorite people planned on going, especially Mary and Louis Bromfield, staying in town for Christmas, and Neysa McMein, the illustrator whose covers you saw on Good Housekeeping and Women’s Home Companion. George Kaufman said he’d drop in with his wife Bea. So, dressed in my new black taffeta dress with the cascading sequined fringe, with the rhinestone dog collar I’d bought myself but had never worn, and with my sequined lavender cloche, I hoped I looked like a ravishing flapper, a jazz aficionado, and ten years younger than my forty-one years. Of course, I didn’t.

  “Edna, you surprise me.” He grabbed my hand. “A delight.”

  “Hello, Carlo.” I used the nickname everyone called him.

  He always insisted I be at his parties, which flattered me. He adored my novel The Girls, he once told me, my nearly forgotten saga of three generations of Chicago women, a piece of fiction I particularly favored and used as a gauge to judge the quality and character of those souls who said they loved my work. Carlo not only read it, but he’d committed some passages to heart, a gesture I found not endearing but curious. A photographer and magazine critic, Carlo threw dazzling parties attended by both exotic and drab celebrities in a scintillating mixture of the avant-garde and the mundane. His ballerina wife Fania Marinoff, a delicate eccentric blossom, sat by herself in a chair and looked like a hothouse flower as she watched her husband circulating from one group of men to another.

  An aficionado of Harlem life, a man who roamed its streets and clubs, Carlo peopled his gatherings with a mixture of Negroes and whites, something taboo in many quarters. He didn’t care and cultivated vigorously the outré pleasure. A plumpish man, silver-haired and cherub-looking with prominent buckteeth, prone to flamboyant, wild gestures, he dominated his own parties with his roaring exuberance and his peals of high nervous laughter.

  There was always someone new at his side—the young Parisian pianist or the new iconoclastic Negro artist, or, once, an American Indian, a leathery-looking man who wore, at Carlo’s insistence, an embarrassing headdress. Carlo loved to celebrate the primitive, and Negroes, I gathered, were his chief affection. Rushing about the living room dressed in a ruffled ivory shirt, his diamond rings catching the overhead light, he was always the darling of any party.

  For an hour I hobnobbed with the smart set, exchanged a few words with George Kaufman, who warned me that Jed Harris might show up. Because George had spent the afternoon with him at the theater, he was sharpening his butter knife and his caustic wit for the evening encounter. “Particularly odious, that young man,” he hummed in my ear. “Our own Napoleon.” Later I saw George and his wife Bea slipping out, doubtless headed home because Bea was never happy at parties, especially glittering soirées. The Bromfields, my good friends, had begged off because Louis had to catch a train to Cleveland. When I realized all of my friends had left, I headed to the guest bedroom to retrieve my fur and purse.

  A finger tapped me on the shoulder, and I stopped walking. A rich, velvety voice, tentative, murmured, “Miss Ferber.”

  I turned and faced the poet Langston Hughes, who was carrying his overcoat over his arm, his fedora cradled against his chest.

  “Mr. Hughes,” I said, “are you arriving or leaving?”

  “If you’re leaving, as you seem to be doing, then I suppose I shall be leaving, too. The party’s over.”

  I laughed and he joined in. “Ah yes, I’m the cynosure of all these merry men.” For, indeed, there were few women in this male enclave of writers and editors and journalists. “But keep up the flattery, which, you know, never goes out of style.”

  “Stay a bit,” he implored, and I nodded.

  He dropped his coat in the guest room, returned, and the two of us sat with cocktails in a corner, our two chairs pulled in close together.

  I liked this bright young man, who’d sought me out a few weeks back at a party, and confided his discovery of my working-class short stories when he was in high school in Cleveland. I’d been immensely flattered. Now, leaning into me, he was talking about his new fascination with Theodore Dreiser. I watched him closely, taken with his warm, smiling face.

  Here was a man who seemed a tad uncomfortable with his height, with his long, stringy body, a gangly adolescent’s body, all jutting limb and angle, constantly readjusting itself into the soft contours of the chair. Dressed in a sharp-pressed gray conservative suit, with a bland gray necktie, he looked the Wall Street up-and-comer, the man ready to take on New York. A handsome face, with a rigid jaw line and a high, sloping forehead, his prominent cheekbones under a rich copper-hued complexion, he appeared a shy man, reserved, deferential. Only when his eyes caught yours, infrequent and sudden, did you notice the wariness in them, a look that suggested a desire to like you that was tempered by suspicion that he was in the wrong place.

  “Are you back in the city for the holidays?”

  He nodded. “A break from studies. Some poetry readings.”

  The young poet—what was he? twenty-five?—had gone back to college in Pennsylvania, despite publishing an acclaimed collection of poetry last year. The Weary Blues. One of the faces of the Harlem Renaissance, he still struck me as a young lad, thrilled that his verse was now appearing in national magazines. And yet, driven, he went to classes, determined to get his degree.

  “I was just talking about you,” I began. “About meeting you a few weeks ago.”

  He raised his eyebrows. “To whom?”

  “Some young folks. A group of young Negro…”

  But I stopped, struck by the look in his eyes. “I’m sorry,” he began, “but your words just reminded me of…Miss Ferber, I have to say that it was strange seeing your name in the Mirror. That murder up in Harlem. The young man…”

  “Roddy Parsons.” I looked around the room and shuddered. “It was so horrible, that.”

  “The article in the paper, of course, had no details, but I gather he was a singer in the Negro Chorus of Show Boat, and a writer…”

  “A budding writer.”

  “Such a sad story.”

  “Tragic,” I added. “I’m still rattled by it.”

  “Were you his patron?”

  “Lord, no.” I flashed to an image of some big-bosomed Fifth Avenue matron, awash in barrels of dirty cash and guilt, smiling her noblesse oblige superiority on the young struggling Negro lad. “Heavens no!”

  Langston smiled. “I’m living in that white shadow now. It’s not…ennobling for either party.” He nodded toward Carlo, who was recounting some escapade to a small cluster of guests. “Carlo would like to be patron to all of Harlem.�
��

  “You don’t seem happy with that idea.”

  He reflected, “Carlo is my good friend.”

  I told him about Waters, son of my housekeeper, a boy obsessed with becoming a writer—how he’d become part of a group of young Negroes up in Harlem, including Roddy, most in their early twenties, who met in coffee shops, at the YMCA, in church basements. I mentioned how, last summer, intrigued by Waters’ description, I’d invited them to my apartment, and I became interested in their work.

  “Mentor,” he commented.

  I smiled. “A better word than patron, certainly.” Then I added, “They’re not much younger than you. Roddy Parsons was just twenty. I liked him.”

  At that moment, wildly, my mind tunneled to images of Roddy, Lawson, Bella, Ellie, and even Harriet and Freddy. Somehow, in that second, staring into the serene face of young Langston Hughes, I didn’t think of their talent for music, the stage, for literature—or their desire to succeed—instead, I thought of their rivalries, their romances, their fabrications, their—their angers. And at that instant, unwanted, I found the word murder echoing in my head.

  “Miss Ferber, what?” he asked, nervous.

  “What?”

  “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

  “Perhaps I have.” I shook my head. “I was thinking of that sad young man, Roddy.”

  “That must have been horrible—finding the body.” He saw the look on my face and immediately stammered, “Sorry.”

  “It’s all right.”

  But I stood and mentioned leaving. After my thank you to Carlo, I left the apartment, escorted downstairs by the young poet who insisted he hail me a cab. Outside it had started snowing, a light, fluffy mix, pleasant, softening the shrill edges of glittering New York so that the streetlights formed fuzzy halos around the traffic. He shook my hand. Just before I got into the taxi, I asked whether he might meet with Waters and his friends. I mentioned how much they venerated him and how Roddy had considered The Weary Blues his Bible.

  “I’m too young for sainthood,” the poet quipped, to which I replied, “Assume the mantle when you’re young, young man; when you’re my age the devil lurks around every corner, pitchfork at the ready.”

  He agreed, yes, after the New Year, he’d love to spend an afternoon at my apartment with them.

  I thanked him and as I floated away in the cab, I smiled at the notion of Waters’ young face trembling at the delicious Christmas present I’d scheduled in. With echoes of Langston Hughes’ honey-toned voice in my ears, I swelled from the pleasure of that man’s company.

  ***

  That night, sitting up in bed, I reached for a novel on the nightstand. Elmer Gantry, an inscribed copy sent to me by my old newsroom buddy, Sinclair Lewis, whom I still affectionately called “Red.” But my eye caught the pile of Lawson’s manuscript on the bureau. I’d forgotten I’d carried it into my bedroom from the workroom, and now, in the dim light, that pile of poorly typed sheets encased in a torn accordion file beckoned. Let me at least read a chapter or two, hopefully not so soporific I’d drift asleep and scatter the sheets to the floor. Lawson’s manuscript did not need a second spilling onto anyone’s floor.

  I felt a tug at the heart as I read the simple, heartfelt dedication to Roddy, and once again read Roddy’s verse. What was there about those simple words that bothered me? I had no idea. The poet sits in shadows / Waiting for Truth. I began reading the novel about a happy-go-lucky Harlem boy named Leroy Watkins who is recruited from a cigar store on 132nd Street, joining a revolutionary regiment of idealistic, excited young men. The opening scene, a little sentimental, nevertheless gripped me with its bold, staccato language and its crisp diction. I thought of Langston Hughes’ vernacular poetry as I moved through smudged and wrinkled pages. One page was missing its bottom half. At one point I found myself smiling: Lawson had described the handsome young protagonist—an especially talented and personable young man, ambitious and clever—and I realized he was describing himself.

  The next thing I knew it was dawn. I had stayed up all night until, weary-eyed and dizzy, I put down the last page. I never stayed up all night, good book or not; but I found myself moving to a boudoir chair, at one point reaching for a forbidden cigarette. The hero drank and smoked too much, and Lawson’s description of the intake of cigarette smoke filling his lungs had convinced me I needed one myself. I’d wrapped myself in my flannel robe. The pages piled up next to me. It was, quite frankly, a marvel, this wildly erratic book. It was a war novel with all the obligatory battle scenes, stark and gory, but what propelled the book—indeed, what made its language soar—was the sheer exhilaration behind it.

  The Negro soldiers, I learned, were the first Allied unit to reach the storied Rhine. I didn’t know that. What white person did? What did we know of Negro life? The prose oozed pride and joy and terror and heartache and despair; it captured the plight of the Negro who excelled on the battlefield, brave to a fault, and then returned home to find, not the equality he’d expected and earned, but a wall of intolerance, discrimination, ignorance. The same old dreadful dismissal as inferior. Lawson had fashioned a gripping scene of the massive company phalanxes marching up Fifth Avenue, led by a jazz band, only to experience jeering and hooting. Yet, in Harlem, they marched under a banner that proclaimed: OUR HEROES WELCOME HOME! The scene tugged at my heart. My eyes teared up.

  I thought of Bella and the others, rejected by the downtown producers…groveling for a meager part…mocked by Jed Harris.

  I sat back in the chair, exhausted. An unfinished manuscript, I acknowledged, in parts too flowery, other parts sketchy; but mainly an achievement. A loud and vibrant celebration. A roaring hymn to Harlem, writ large. It needed an editor’s sure and deliberate hand, but the essence lay on the white pages: majestic, triumphant, splendid. My fingertips tingled on the typed pages. This book needed to be heard. It was a voice that cried out: Listen. I’m here. I’m here. I’m a Negro man. I am a man.”

  I lost my breath.

  I slept for a couple of hours, ignored Rebecca’s polite knock on the bedroom door, and rose blurry eyed at ten. I hadn’t done that since…well, I never had. Ever. Usually I woke before the sun decided to rise.

  Bathed, refreshed, I called Waters, told him I needed to see Lawson.

  At four that afternoon, Waters and Lawson strolled into the apartment.

  I hadn’t seen Lawson since the memorial service for Roddy. Then grief had given him a wasted, lost look. Now, time passing, that grief had made him sickly, his earlier cocksureness and hungry eyes lost to an ashy, drawn face, his eyes sunk deep in their sockets so that he looked famished. Where once he swaggered about, his looks displayed like a birthright, he now slumped in a chair, bent over. He looked, well, exhausted. He’d lost weight, I noticed. Unshaven, in unpressed corduroys and scuffed shoes, he scared me. Here was a young man spiraling downward as though he’d been slammed in the gut.

  “Lawson,” I exclaimed. He looked up at me. “Are you all right?” A ridiculous question, I knew, but one that needed saying. Waters sat beside him, nodding rapidly, alarm in his face.

  “Lawson hasn’t been eating.”

  “But you need to deal with…” I faltered. What? The death of his cousin, grotesque in that final bed?

  Lawson tried to smile. “I’ll be all right. I just can’t seem to get any…steam.” For a second he closed his eyes, ready to fall asleep.

  “Lawson, I asked you here this afternoon because I read Hell Fighters. I know it’s not done and perhaps Waters was unwise to put it into my hands.” I glanced at Waters, none too happy with my remarks. “But it’s done—the deed. You captured something here, something glorious, something…” I paused. “What?”

  “It’s not ready, Miss Ferber. Next year, maybe. I need to do more research…dealing…”

  “Yes, yes,” I said in a hurry. “There are holes. Weaknesses. But ov
er all, it’s a strong work.”

  He smiled. “You know, they said that about my play but then no one wanted to produce it—turned it back to me. ‘Wonderful job, young man.’”

  “But this will be published.”

  His glance was quizzical, unbelieving. “Not now,” he whispered, swallowing his words. Suddenly he glanced at the pile of manuscript I’d foolishly positioned on the coffee table. His eyes narrowed, then widened, as though he were staring into a brilliant sun. “Roddy said it wasn’t ready. He was gonna help…”

  “I agree, but…”

  He stood up and fumbled with his overcoat, then wrapped a scarf around his neck. “Published.” Not a question, but hardly an affirmation. Then in a peculiar twist, he recited the lines from Roddy’s poem that he’d used in his dedication. “‘The poet sits in shadows / Waiting for Truth.’” The same lines that stayed with me, haunted me. “Tell that to Roddy.” Without another word, he turned and walked out of the apartment.

  Dumbly, I turned to Waters. “Is that a yes or a no?”

  Waters shrugged his shoulders. “Dunno.”

  “He looks ill.”

  “Miss Edna, I know why he won’t go back to that apartment. He told me.”

  “For Lord’s sake, why?”

  “He’s afraid the murderer will come back.”

  “But why?”

  “He thinks someone wants to kill him. They got Roddy. Now him.”

  “But what proof?”

  “He says, well, the way they tore up the rooms—and his room—somebody they know wanted something. Somebody wanted them dead. He’s afraid to stay there.” A pause. “I think he’s afraid of Mr. Porter.”

  “Such a hateful man…”

  “But he also mumbled something about his friends.”

  “You mean, Ellie or Bella or…”

  Waters cut me off. “Although he won’t say it, I think he’s afraid one of them is a murderer.”