I think that Charlie smiled then, very faintly, very quickly. “Yessuh. North.”
Boyle smiled and said, “See anybody else on the street?”
“Nosuh. Only Mr. Hornsby.”
“Where were you going, Mr. Peterson?”
“See Miz Cooper, over to Burnside. Had a chicken for her she ordered from me.”
“That was the thing in the bag you were carrying?”
“Yessuh. Poh-lice axe me that too. You axe Miz Cooper I didn’t bring her no chicken.”
Boyle smiled. “Take your word for it. But just so’s I get an idea, where’s this Miss Cooper live?”
“Three-one-two Burnside. You go ahead, you axe her. She tell you.”
“No problem, Mr. Peterson. Burnside is what—two, three blocks up from Mrs. Burton’s house?”
“Yessuh. Fremont, and then Sheridan, and then Burnside. Three blocks.” Charlie sucked on a tooth. “North, that is.”
Boyle grinned. “That’d be away from downtown, I guess, huh?”
Charlie did not smile, but for an instant his eyes seemed brighter. “Yessuh. That direction.”
“What did you do after you gave Miss Cooper her chicken?”
“I goes back to Water Street and walks down that till I comes to Grant, and then I goes up Grant to Main Street and gets the buggy.”
“Where was the buggy?”
“I leaves it by the Woolsworth.”
Boyle nodded. “Okay. So you came back down on Water Street. You passed Mrs. Burton’s house again. You see anything this time?”
Charlie glanced at me, glanced back to Boyle. “Nosuh. I tole you. I don’t see nothin’ at Miz Burton’s house.”
“You see anything else at all while you were on Water Street?”
“Nosuh. Like I tole the poh-lice.”
“Are you sure, Mr. Peterson?”
“Nosuh. I keeps tellin’ you, I don’t see nothin’ at Miz Burton’s house.”
“But did you see anything along the street? Or on Burnside? Anything strange, anything unusual?”
Charlie cocked his head, his lower lip protruding. “Nosuh. Don’t believe so.”
“Nothing? Everything exactly like it always is?”
“Yessuh.” Charlie shrugged. “’Cept for the Packard.”
Boyle frowned. “The Packard? What Packard?”
“Parked on Burnside, under the trees. Half a block down, across from Miz Cooper’s.”
“A two-door Packard?”
“Nosuh. Onliest two-door Packard in town, that be Mistuh Childers’s from Boston. I know that car, I be bringin’ Mistuh Childers a chicken every week. This a four door.”
“You’re sure?”
“A four-door Packard,” Charlie said. “Black. Parked right there on the south side of the street, plain as day.”
“You tell this to the cops?”
“Sure.” He shrugged again. “They axe me did I see any strange cars. I tells ’em bout the Packard.”
Boyle nodded. “Okay, Mr. Peterson. Getting back to Mrs. Burton’s house—”
“I tole you, I don’t see nothin’ at Miz Burton’s house.”
Boyle nodded. “I remember. But you were standing right outside the front door, right? So while you were there, did you hear anything? Anything from inside the house?”
Charlie’s glance darted at me again, darted back to Boyle. “Nosuh. Don’t hear nothin’, don’t see nothin’.”
Perhaps it was the way he had slipped a look at me—three times now when our house was mentioned—that made me feel he was not telling the truth. “Are you sure, Charlie?” I asked him. “It’s really important.”
He looked at me, his eyes sad. “Miss Amanda, best thing now, you leaves this be. Do your grievin’, do your prayin’, and then you moves on. Nothin’ good come of all these questions.”
“But Charlie,” I said, “we really want to know.”
Slowly he shook his head. “Nothin’ good come of it.” He turned back to Boyle. “Like I tole you, I don’t hear nothin’, I don’—”
He turned around to look off to his right.
Another Ford came bouncing and bucking down the road, a cloud of brown dust billowing behind. As we watched, it braked abruptly, tires skidding, and pulled in behind Boyle’s and lurched to a halt. The doors popped open and four white men spilled out and gathered together at the edge of the lawn, about twelve feet away on the far side of the low picket fence. I recognized the two who had tumbled from the backseat, although I did not know their names. They had been part of the crowd that threw tomatoes at Miss Lizzie. And I recognized the driver, a big man, weaving slightly, a wide grin on his broad face. It was Hornsby.
Charlie had stood away from the wall of the porch and turned to face them. Boyle stood up now, as I did, and Boyle said quietly, “You got a bird gun in the house, Mr. Peterson?”
Charlie said sadly, “Nosuh, I sure don’t.”
“Uh-huh,” said Boyle:
“Goddamn!” Hornsby said, and his broad face was bright with pleasure. “It’s fatboy! How you doin’, fatboy? Told ya I’d see ya again.”
Boyle nodded. “Ace.”
Hornsby laughed. He turned to the other three. “This here’s fatboy. I told ya ’bout fatboy.”
The men nodded and grinned. One of them called out, “Hey, fatboy!” and then doubled over, made helpless with laughter by this witticism. His two friends, evidently sharing the same sense of humor, slapped each other on the back and guffawed. They all appeared quite drunk.
Hornsby said, “I’ll tell ya what, fatboy. It’s so good to see ya, I’m not even gonna pound your ugly face in.” He waved his big hand magnanimously. “You go off and do whatever ya want. We got business to take care of here, me and my friends.”
“What kind of business?” Boyle asked him.
Hornsby hooked his thumbs over his belt. “Nothin’ serious. We’re just gonna take ole Charlie here for a little ride, ask him some questions.”
Behind Hornsby, one of his friends guffawed again.
“What kind of questions, ace?” Boyle asked.
Hornsby laughed. “What kinda questions?” Grinning, he turned to the others. “He wants to know what kinda questions?”
The three men laughed at this. Boyle turned to me and said under his breath, “Anything starts to happen, you run. All the way home. Got me?”
I nodded.
When Hornsby rounded on Boyle, he was no longer grinning. “I’ll tell ya what kinda questions, fatboy. The kinda questions that ain’t none of your damn business. This here is our town and we don’t need no fat Pinkertons to handle our niggers for us. You just get in your car and take the girl with ya and get outta here before ya get yourself hurt.”
Boyle shook his head. “Don’t think so, ace.”
Hornsby laughed again, harshly, heavily. “You don’t think so?” His face went cold. “Listen, fatboy, that nigger killed a white woman. He ain’t gonna get away with it. Not in this town.”
“Sounds to me,” said Boyle, “like you and your friends got seriously misinformed.”
“Sounds to me,” Hornsby said, “like you’re gonna get your fat ass kicked.”
Boyle nodded. “Maybe. Maybe not.”
He stepped off the porch. Hornsby turned to the other three men, jerked his head toward Charlie’s house, and the four of them moved forward, stepping over the picket fence.
A car horn honked off to the left, and for a moment everyone froze.
A long sleek black Cadillac sailed down the road. It slowed as it purred past the two Fords, and then it swung off the road and parked before them. The far door eased open and Mr. Slocum stepped out.
Tall and slim and (as usual) spectacularly well groomed in another white linen suit, he sauntered around the front of the Cadillac and up to the four men. Two of them, the two I recognized from Miss Lizzie’s house, still straddled the picket fence; Hornsby and the fourth stood on the lawn.
“Mr. Hornsby.” Mr. Slocum smiled. He stop
ped walking and he nodded amiably, slipping his hands into his pockets. “What a pleasure.” He gazed round at the others. The two at the fence swung their legs over it and stepped back sheepishly, away from the house. Mr. Slocum said, “And Pete Dirkson, and the inestimable Farley brothers. Captain Hardee’s entire crew. Are you people by any chance lost? The harbor’s in that direction.” He nodded toward the east.
Hornsby said, “Get outta here, Slocum.”
Still smiling, Mr. Slocum said, “Afraid I can’t do that, old man. Have to transact some business with the people up there. Tell you what, though. How about you trot back to town right now, all of you, and then we’ll meet later, aboard Captain Hardee’s boat, and toss back a pint or two of ale, or grog, or whatever. How’s that?”
“You’re lookin’ for trouble, Slocum,” Hornsby said, turning to face him directly.
“Really?” Mr. Slocum smiled. “What gives you that idea, old man?”
The two of them were only seven or eight feet from the porch; consequently, even though Hornsby lowered his voice now, I could still hear him clearly. He said, “Get the fuck outta here, faggot.” And then he struck out, straight-armed, palm forward, fingers splayed, and smacked Mr. Slocum in the chest.
His face awry, the lawyer jerked his hands from his pockets as he backpedaled. He caught himself, regained his balance, and straightened up. He smiled mildly. “You know,” he said, “I was rather hoping you’d do something like that.” Carefully, so as not to crease it, he took off his suit jacket.
Boyle was standing at the entrance to the porch. I scurried over to him. “Mr. Boyle, you’ve got to stop this.”
He shook his head. “Can’t, kid. Not now.”
Mr. Slocum folded his jacket at the shoulders, brushed it off, and turned to the other man standing on the lawn. “Mr. Dirkson, would you hold this, please? Good man.”
He turned back to Hornsby just in time for his face to collide with Hornsby’s roundhouse punch.
TWENTY-SIX
HORNSBY’S FIST CAUGHT Mr. Slocum square on the left cheek. The lawyer spun away, off his feet, and crashed full length to the ground, rolling twice along the lawn. He lay there, his back to the grass, and for a long cold moment I feared he was dead. My breath stopped; and, I think, my heart as well. Then, slowly, his hands pushing against the ground, he sat up. He looked around himself, mildly puzzled, like someone waking up in a strange room.
Hornsby laughed. “Had enough, Nancy?”
Mr. Slocum rubbed the left side of his face. He glanced down at his hand. From the porch I could see the smear of red along his fingers. His lip was split.
I moved forward, trying to slip around Boyle, who stood at the porch entrance. I cannot imagine what I intended to do; wipe the blood off, perhaps, with my dress. Boyle put his hand on my shoulder and squeezed it once, firmly. “Not now,” he said.
“But—”
“Give it a minute,” he said, and released me. I stayed where I was.
Mr. Slocum looked at Hornsby and smiled. It was the same bland amiable smile he had smiled before. He drew his feet in and levered himself to a standing position. He took a deep breath, let it out, raised his fists, and began to move them in small tight circles in the air, the left somewhat forward. His spine straight, his head canted slightly back, stepping lightly on his toes like a dancer, he advanced on Hornsby.
Grinning, Hornsby called out over his shoulder to the men behind him, “We got Gentleman Jim here.” Mr. Slocum jabbed him in the nose with his left fist.
Hornsby did a little backward jig, blinked his eyes, and shook his head. More startled than damaged, he reached up to touch his nose. Mr. Slocum knifed his right fist into Hornsby’s stomach, just below his rib cage.
Hornsby’s eyebrows dived downward and his hands clapped at his stomach. Mr. Slocum’s left hit him again on the nose, once, twice, three times, very quickly.
Hornsby staggered back. A bright-red trickle ran down his chin. He shook his head again and wiped the blood away with the back of his hand. Suddenly he growled deep in his throat and lunged forward and swung another roundhouse right at Mr. Slocum. Mr. Slocum ducked below it. As Hornsby tried to recover from the momentum of his swing, Mr. Slocum rapped him twice more in the face with his left.
Hornsby flailed out with his right arm, as though to sweep the lawyer off the face of the earth. Mr. Slocum swayed back, dodging it, then leaned forward to swing a fast angled left at the corner of Hornsby’s jaw.
Hornsby rocked to the side. Then, all at once, he lowered his head and rushed toward the lawyer, his hands but, his fingers spread.
Mr. Slocum danced aside and Hornsby hurtled past him.
Hornsby checked himself and whirled around, nearly slipping on the grass. He had his hands up now, closed into fists, and apparently he planned to try beating Mr. Slocum at what was clearly Mr. Slocum’s own game. Slowly, eyes wary, he moved toward the lawyer.
Boyle turned to me and said comfortably, “He’s gonna try something dirty now. You watch.”
I watched. Boyle was right. As soon as he was close enough, Hornsby lashed his foot out, toward Mr. Slocum’s groin. The lawyer sidestepped, swerving his torso, but the kick scraped against his thigh. He stumbled, and Hornsby came in.
Mr. Slocum’s right shot out and smacked into Hornsby’s mouth. Hornsby jerked back, and Mr. Slocum jabbed a fast left into the mouth, and then another. And then the lawyer’s right fist, cocked down at his side, shot up like a piston and slammed into the bottom of Hornsby’s jaw.
His arms windmilling, Hornsby went back too quickly for his legs to keep him vertical. When he landed flat on his back, I could feel the vibration through the soles of my shoes.
After a moment, it became obvious that Hornsby was not going to get up. Mr. Slocum lowered his hands, stepped over to the man holding his jacket, and took it back. The man merely stood there, staring at Mr. Slocum. The lawyer jerked his head toward Hornsby. “Get him out of here.”
Draping the folded jacket over his left arm, he walked up to the porch.
“’Bout time you finished him off,” Boyle said.
Mr. Slocum smiled. He turned to me. “Hello, Amanda.”
“You’re bleeding, Mr. Slocum,” I said. “Your lip is hurt.”
He reached up, touched it with his fingertips, glanced down. He shook his head. “Nothing serious.”
Mr. Slocum was not the sort of man to swagger, but his standing there, calmly dripping blood onto the grass, was itself a kind of boast. Men enjoy the marks of a victorious battle, their red badges of courage; and I have always found this profoundly irritating. It never occurs to them that physical courage, as opposed to the moral kind, is usually nothing more than a failure of the imagination.
He was also, I think, enjoying the audience. What he really needed was someone to take him home and clean him off and tend to his wounds. And wash his shirt and slacks, both of which were stained with soil and grass.
He looked across the porch. “Hello, Charlie. Sorry about all that.” He waved his hand toward the lawn. Beyond the picket fence, the three men were loading Hornsby into the back of their Ford.
“You ain’t got no reason be sorry, Mr. Slocum,” Charlie said. He was grinning, displaying what remained of his teeth. “That an exhibition. You a boxer, Mr. Slocum.”
Boyle smiled at him. “Wouldn’t stand a chance against Jack Johnson, though.”
“Different weight,” said Charlie. “Jack Johnson, he be a heavyweight.”
“If he were a midget,” said Mr. Slocum, “he’d still be out of my league.”
One of the men cranked the Ford’s engine astart, then ran around the hood, climbed into the front seat, pulled the door shut behind him. He glanced back at us as the car pulled away.
“Now,” Mr. Slocum said to Boyle. “What was that all about; exactly?”
Boyle said, “Hornsby and his buddies wanted to talk to Mr. Peterson here. Hornsby had this idea Mr. Peterson killed Mrs. Burton.”
Mr. Slocum
nodded, looked over to Charlie. “Are you all right, Charlie?”
Charlie grinned. “Yessuh, just fine. You ever fight like that again, Mistuh Slocum, you let me know up ahead. We sell tickets, make us a fortune. You thirsty now? I get you a drink? Some lemonade?”
Mr. Slocum smiled, tugging a handkerchief from his back pocket. “You wouldn’t happen to have anything stronger, would you?”
“Nosuh, sorry, I sure don’t.”
Nodding, Mr. Slocum wiped the handkerchief against the knuckles of his left hand. It came away red. His hand too, I thought.
“His or yours?” Boyle asked him.
“His, I think.”
“What I figured. He never laid a finger on you, champ.”
“Funny, though,” said Mr. Slocum, dabbing the handkerchief at his lip. “For a moment there, I thought he had.”
“Sucker punch,” said Boyle. “Doesn’t count.”
“Ah.”
Boyle said, “So what brought you out here?”
“Hmm?” said Mr. Slocum. “Oh. I was just leaving the office, on my way out to Mortimer’s for a drink, when Fred Spencer called. It seems that the other Pinkerton, Foley, may’ve discovered the identity of the man who gave the Burton boy a ride into Boston.”
I had been gazing up at him. Now, suddenly excited, I said, “He found him?”
“Not him, exactly,” Mr. Slocum said. “His name. Or what might be his name.” He turned to Boyle. “Norton. Wilbur Norton. He sells shoes, works for a wholesaler in Boston. He matches the description, and he was in town on Tuesday morning. In any event, I telephoned Miss Borden to tell her, and she mentioned that the two of you were out here. It’s on the way to Mortimer’s, and I decided to drop by. I thought Amanda would like to know the news.” He smiled at me. The green of his eyes was really quite uncanny. A deep green, the color of emeralds, and lit from within.
I discovered, once again, that I was blushing. “Thank you, Mr. Slocum.”
Mr. Slocum held out his hand to Boyle. “My God, would you look at that?” His fingers were trembling.
“Happens all the time,” Boyle told him. “Afterwards. No big deal. Just don’t do any brain surgery for a while. Tell you what, though. Why don’t we head over to Mortimer’s and get that drink.”
Miss Lizzie Page 22
