by Alice Duncan
"A shooting!"
Miss Petrie forgot to whisper, and I felt guilty. A quick glance around the room reassured me that we were still alone, however. I hastened to amend my stark statement. "No one was hurt. I think—the police have yet to confirm this—that Klan members used a Thompson submachine gun to shoot up Mr. and Mrs. Pinkerton's gatehouse. The Klan has been harassing their gatekeeper, Joseph Jackson, ever since Mr. Jackson's brother, Henry, moved here from Tulsa, Oklahoma. They're a Negro family, and the Klan went so far as to burn a cross on their lawn last Monday night."
Slapping a hand to her probably palpitating heart, Miss Petrie said, "Oh, no!" She appeared harried for a moment, then said, "His side of the family is from Tulsa."
"Good heavens!"
"The rest of my family is perfectly fine, but Roland's side is iffy. Roland himself is a cad. I wouldn't be surprised if he's the culprit who's been harassing that poor family." Then she sat up straight in her chair. "I'm glad he broke his stupid leg. I'm sorry it wasn't his neck."
"Now that you've told me about him, I am, too."
We stood gazing into the distance for a moment before Miss Petrie broke the silence. "Um, Mrs. Majesty, I know you are friends with a detective on the Pasadena police force." She licked her lips and swallowed. I got a sinking feeling in my innards. "I know, because I've read the newspapers, that twice in the past couple of years, you've received a commendation from the police chief for assisting them in their investigations."
It was a good thing Sam wasn't with us. He'd have set her straight in a split-second about my "assistance" in his cases—although I had been instrumental in helping the police department in both of those incidents. I murmured a tentative, "Yes?"
"I don't suppose you could ask your friend to look into the real-estate deal Roland's involved with, could you, as well as his Klan membership? I know I don't have much information, but perhaps I can get more. I just am so afraid he's going to lose the last of my aunt and uncle's savings. They don't have much, you know, and the economy has been so hard on people these past few years."
It sure had been. It seemed to me, back in those days, that there were maybe ten Mrs. Pinkertons who had more money than was good for them, in the good old USA, to every ten thousand of us just plain folks, who struggled every day to put food on the table. Mind you, I'm not including my family among the latter, mainly because Ma, Vi and I were gainfully employed, and I made scads of money through the few of Mrs. Pinkerton's type extant in the City of Pasadena. Still, things weren't fair, and I knew it as well as did Miss Petrie.
But could I enlist Sam Rotondo to help me smash a phony real-estate ring? Much less turn on one of his own?
I'd have laughed sardonically if I weren't ensconced in the severe silence of the Pasadena Public Library.
Nevertheless, I felt sorry for the good side of Miss Petrie's family, so I said, "I'll see what I can do. If you can gather any more particulars, it would certainly help. At this point, I fear my detective friend would only be annoyed if I told him there was some kind of criminal real-estate bunco crime going on in Pasadena. If you see what I mean."
"Of course, I do," said Miss Petrie, who was sharp as a needle. "Men seldom believe anything women tell them. I'll see what I can find out. Roland loves to boast, so I might be in luck."
Until that moment in time, I never would have believed Miss Petrie could produce such an evil smile, but she sure produced one that day.
"In fact, I do believe I'll visit the poor boy in the hospital. They did take him to the hospital, didn't they?"
"I truly don't know. The last I heard, he'd just that minute broken his leg. I expect they'll take him to the Castleton, since that's the hospital nearest where the accident happened." If it was an accident, thought I, and not a voodoo curse come to life.
"If it was an accident," said Miss Petrie, startling me. "I wouldn't hold it against Mr. Jackson to shove him off a roof, given what Roland's been up to lately."
Merciful heavens! "Oh, but Mr. Jackson would never do anything like that."
"Pity, that," said Miss Petrie with a sniff.
It was then I decided to forego separating iris bulbs for another day or two and pay a visit to Mrs. Jackson, voodoo mambo extraordinaire, and tell her what had happened as a result of her sticking a pin in that Klan juju's leg. Maybe I could get her to stick some pins in a Stephen Hastings juju or an exalted cyclops juju. I'd probably need the name of the cyclops, and I still doubted it was Mr. Hastings, but perhaps she could put a general, all-around hex on the entire Klan. Of course, I knew only the bits and pieces of voodoo lore Jackson had told me about, so I didn't know if a hex had to be specific in nature. I fingered the juju hanging around my neck through the fabric of my dress.
One more good reason to visit Mrs. Jackson, by gum. So I did.
Mentone Avenue wasn't far from the library, which was on the corner of Raymond Avenue and Walnut Street, so it only took about ten minutes for me to drive there. When I arrived, I saw no children playing, but that ugly black burn mark on Jackson's front lawn was definitely noticeable. I shook my head in disgust as I exited the Chevrolet.
Mrs. Jackson, the voodoo mambo herself, answered my knock at the door. Her face held not a single hint of an expression for the first several seconds of our meeting. We just stood there and gazed at each other. Then a slow smile creased her face.
"Come in, child. Tell me what's happened. You still got your juju?"
Once more I fingered the little doll hanging on its string beneath my day dress. "Oh, yes. I never go anywhere without it."
She nodded. "Good thing. Keep wearin' it. You's gonna need it."
I was? I swallowed the lump that had formed in my throat. "I will? What's going to happen that I'll need it?"
"Oh, you just never know about them things," said she. Big help. "But you got news to impart, so you jest go on and impart it. Come into the kitchen with me, and I'll fetch us some tea and beignets."
I wondered what a beignet was when it was in Pasadena but didn't ask, figuring I'd learn soon enough.
And, boy, did I! I carried the tray Mrs. Jackson had loaded with tea and a plate of beignets into the living room and set it on a table between two chairs. Mrs. Jackson took one chair and I took another, and she waved at the plate of pastries, so I took one and bit into it. In case you don't know, beignets (I think that's a French word) are the sweetest, most delicate and delicious doughnut-type pastries I've ever eaten.
"This is wonderful," I told Mrs. Jackson after I'd swallowed my first bite.
"They's from New Orleans, child. The recipe is, I mean." She pronounced the city's name "Nawlins" just like Jackson.
"Um, I don't suppose you'd care to give me the recipe? My aunt is a wonderful cook, and she collects recipes."
"I knows who your auntie is, child. Jackson's been tellin' me 'bout her good cookin' since I moved to this here city."
It made me proud that Jackson had bragged about my aunt's cooking skills to his mother, who clearly had magical skills in the kitchen herself.
"And I'll be glad to give her my receipt. 'Course, it's rightly not mine, but my great-grannie's, but that don't make no difference."
"Thank you very much."
"Pshaw, child. Now you go on an' tell me what's happened. I 'spect somebody got his leg broke." She gifted me with a knowing smile.
"You're precisely right. A policeman named Roland Petrie fell off Jackson's guardhouse and broke his leg. I don't know how bad a break it is, but it's going to hurt for quite a while, I expect."
"Amen," said Mrs. Jackson, and she took a bite of her own beignet. They weren't particularly easy to eat, being covered with powdered sugar, which dripped all over one's front, but Mrs. Jackson had provided napkins for us. "And now you're gonna tell me who gets the next juju, am I right?"
"Well, as to that, I'm not quite sure yet. I'm sure there are probably other police officers who belong to the Klan, but who aren't telling anyone. But there's something else going on.
Miss Petrie, who's a librarian friend of mine and Roland Petrie's cousin, is worried that he's involved in some sort of real-estate swindle."
"The boy be a grifter, do he? He gots a black heart, that young man."
I wasn't sure what a grifter was, but I was pretty sure Roland Petrie qualified if it was something slimy. Therefore, I said, "Yes." I thought for a moment how to phrase my next question.
Mrs. Jackson beat me to the punch. "You thinks you knows something else 'bout the swindle, don't you, girl?"
"Well, I'm not sure. But Mrs. Stephen Hastings telephoned me yesterday and wants me to meet with her. Her husband's a big cheese in Pasadena. He's a rich attorney, and she's worried about something he's involved with."
"No doubt," muttered Mrs. Jackson. "Them lawyers is all made of the same dirty linen."
Not sure about that, but unwilling to argue with my hostess, I only said, "If he is involved in the real-estate deal, I might find out on Monday, and then I can tell you more."
She nodded. "In the meantime, I'll just get some of my jujus ready. You know more 'bout who's doin' the KKK things to the Pinkertons' gatehouse and my poor Henry and his babies?"
"Not yet, but I'm working on it," I said. It was a feeble admission, since I really had nothing to work on yet. Then I thought of Charles Smith. "However, a friend of my father's is in the Klan, and Detective Rotondo, Pa and I went to talk to him the other day. That very evening, his neighbor was shot and killed as he went outside to collect his newspaper."
"Gotta stick another pin in that bad boy's juju," said Mrs. Jackson darkly.
"Well, nobody knows for sure if the shooting had anything to do with—"
"I do."
"Oh." She sounded certain, and who was I to gainsay her? She knew a whole lot more about voodoo juju—and the workings of the Ku Klux Klan, for that matter—than I did. "Have your grandchildren suffered any more near misses or anything?"
"No, but that's because Henry's took 'em to my daughter's home in Los Angeles. This here Klan don't know where they be. And it's goin' to stay like that. I don't want nothin' to happen to my boy or my grandbabies."
"I can certainly understand that." Curious, I asked, "Do you know precisely why the Klan in Pasadena is after Henry and his kids? I mean, he said he saw something, but even he said he isn't sure what it was."
"He saw a Klansman murder another Klansman," Mrs. Jackson said as if she knew whereof she spoke. "Henry, he don't like to admit it, but it's the truth. And the murderin' Klansman's got relations here in Pasadena. He saw Henry see him."
"But Henry—I mean Mr. Jackson—told me he wasn't sure what he saw."
"Huh. That boy always done been a fence-sitter. He tol' me what he seen, and I know what it was, if he don't. He ain't the brightest candle in the box, my Henry. And he's got a good heart, but when you fightin' people with no hearts at all, you gotta be firm."
"That's a fact," I said, meaning it. Still, I couldn't help but wonder if Mrs. Jackson hadn't interpolated her own meaning onto what her son told her.
"And don't you go doubtin' me, neither, girl. I know them people, and I know what one of 'em done to the other."
Shoot, the woman could read minds. "It's not that I doubt you—"
"Yeah, it is. But you got no reason to. I know what Henry seen."
"Do you know the names of anyone involved? Wasn't the murdered man's name McIntyre?"
"It was. And the killer was another one of your Petries." Mrs. Jackson gave me a smug smile.
"Another one?" Flabbergasted might be an appropriate word to use to describe my sensation at that moment, but there's probably a better one somewhere that I can't think of offhand. "How do you know that if Henry doesn't?"
"I knew them people," she said. "Ask your librarian friend. Ask her if her family done come from Tulsa."
Thinking back to the conversation I'd recently had with Miss Petrie, I said, "You're right. Miss Petrie told me they did."
"Told you so. I know they did the killin'. And so does Henry, but he's afeared."
"For good reason."
"Maybe." Mrs. Jackson sniffed as if she didn't approve of her son's state of fear. I didn't blame Henry one bit for being afraid.
I thought of something else. "Mrs. Jackson, do you have any idea who the exalted cyclops of the Pasadena Klan is? Someone told me he's the same wealthy Pasadena lawyer who might be involved in the real-estate scheme, but I know a good deal about the man, and I can't see him heading an organization like the Klan."
"Exalted cyclops." Mrs. Jackson gave a wicked chortle. "The top man in this here city ain't no rich lawyer. He be an ordinary, every-day sort of man, only with a bad heart. He be a small man wantin' to be a big one, only he don't have the talents to rise by his own merits."
My thoughts precisely. "I don't suppose you know his name," I asked, not expecting much. Which is exactly what I got.
"Naw, but I know good and well he's good at pretendin' he ain't what he is."
"Yes. He must be. Well, thank you, Mrs. Jackson."
"You're welcome. And don't forget your juju, and next time you visit, I'll have that receipt all writ out."
"Thank you very much."
I left Jackson's place with my head spinning. Another bad Petrie in the wood pile? Or maybe it was the same Petrie. Only Roland Petrie looked so young. And Miss Petrie had said most of the rest of his family wasn't bad, like he was. Good Lord. Life could get awfully complicated while one wasn't looking, couldn't it?
Chapter 12
After all my meanderings and consultations that Saturday, it was an exhausted Daisy Gumm Majesty who greeted her ecstatic dog, said good-day to her father, and then went to her bedroom to lie down and take a nap with Spike. Vi was napping, too, so I didn't feel guilty.
However, after I woke up, I took Spike for a walk sans Pa, who'd gone to a friend's house to help him work on his motorcar. When I got home again, Spike and I separated a whole bed full of irises, and I decided to ask Jackson if his mother might like to plant some of them. See? I don't spent all my time snooping.
During Spike's walk, and as I separated iris bulbs, I pondered the many questions swirling in the air in Pasadena recently. Was Petrie a member of the Klan? Had he or another member of his family murdered Mr. McIntyre in Tulsa, Oklahoma? Was he involved in a phony real-estate scheme?
The Jackson children had heard someone—I believe they'd said it was the villainous driver of the Cadillac—call out something that sounded like eats or feets. Could the driver have called out the name Petrie? Definitely a possibility, although I don't know where the S at the end of the word came from.
And then there was the exalted cyclops. If Mr. Hastings wasn't the exalted cyclops of Pasadena's Klan, who was? If he was one of the men in the Cadillac, he was chubby. "Fat" was the word the Jackson children used, but how much could they have seen, really, as they raced to get out of the Cadillac's way? How the heck could I know? Anyhow, if the man in the car was the exalted cyclops, he wasn't Stephen Hastings, who wasn't fat. Maybe the exalted cyclops had minions to run down kids for him, but I still couldn't quite feature Hastings in the position. He didn't mingle with the riffraff, and I think he considered policemen and people like Charlie Smith, who worked at the water department, riffraff.
Then there was Charlie Smith's dead neighbor. Who had shot him and why? Could he have been a member of the Klan, too? If so, why hadn't Mr. Smith told us so? If he wasn't in the Klan, who'd want to shoot him? Had they shot him when they'd meant to be aiming at Mr. Smith? Why would they want to kill Mr. Smith?
Oh, bother.
It was getting close to dinnertime, so Spike and I went indoors, I removed my gardening gloves and apron, washed my hands, and noticed dirt clinging to the hem of my ratty old day dress. So I changed into another ratty old day dress and asked Aunt Vi if I could help her with anything in the kitchen. I don't know why I always did that, because the kitchen and I are mortal enemies, but I did it anyway.
"You can set the table, sweet
heart," said she. "Set an extra plate. Sam's coming to dinner this evening."
"Oh." He was, was he? I swear, Sam might as well live at our place. But I didn't mind. "What's for dinner?"
"Nothing very exotic. Chicken fricassee with peas and carrots and onions. The butcher at Jorgenson's gave me an extra chicken when I ordered for the Pinkertons. He's a nice man, Mr. Putnam."
"Mr. Putnam's the butcher?"
"Yes, indeed. He's nice about giving me bargains and extra chickens and suchlike when he has meat he needs to get rid of. You know. Before it spoils."
Hmm. Looking closely at my darling aunt's face, I didn't see a trace of pink, but I wondered if there might be a romance brewing there, between her and Mr. Putnam. They'd make a perfect couple, a butcher and the best cook in Pasadena. I didn't ask, not particularly wanting to annoy Aunt Vi.
Then it dawned upon me why Mr. Putnam gave Vi meat, and I hoped he didn't allow whatever he gave her to hang around his butcher's counter too long. None of us had died of ptomaine yet, so I guess he didn't.
"So I should set out bowls instead of plates?" I asked, which was a nice, neutral question.
"Probably. And little plates for the biscuits."
"No dumplings?" I wasn't really disappointed. I loved Aunt Vi's biscuits as much as, or more than, I loved her dumplings.
"No. I decided to have biscuits. You can split a biscuit, put it in your bowl and spoon fricassee over it if you want to."
"No, thanks. I'll have my biscuits with butter." Needless to say, Vi made the best biscuits in the world. Then I remembered the beignets. "Oh! I forgot to mention that I stopped by the Jacksons' house this afternoon. Mrs. Jackson is going to give me a recipe for beignets."
Vi beamed at me. "Oh, my! I've wanted a recipe for beignets for the longest time!"
"You have?" Boy, among the other imponderables in life, you never knew what would make people happy, did you?
