Wisdom of the Bones

by Paul Christopher

  ‘Where?’

  ‘Just past Allen Street. East side. Little joint. Between a butcher shop and some place on the corner. Pool hall, I think.’

  ‘She go in there a lot?’

  ‘Some. With me. Little money to spare we go there for ice cream or some of those green leaf things. Liquorice whips and such.’

  ‘What if someone had money and took her in there? Would she go?’

  ‘She might. A friend of hers maybe but she was pretty proud about not having money. Neither one of us is of a mind to take charity.’

  ‘What if she found a penny on the street?’

  ‘Sounds like you’re trying to convince yourself, not me, Detective. I just want my daughter back, not tales about finding pennies and if she went into Pop Mercier’s or not.’

  Ray nodded and looked down at his notebook. He had enough, more than enough perhaps, but he thought he’d fly something else past this Danny Coulthart. ‘Know a man named Ruby? Jack Ruby?’

  ‘Owns the Carousel Club,’ said the black man. ‘Sure, I know him to nod to him. Why?’

  ‘Ever work for him?’

  ‘No. Carousel’s a strip club, Mr Duval. I don’t work strip clubs.’ He paused. ‘Or whorehouses neither. Not any more.’

  ‘So how do you know Ruby?’

  ‘Jack Ruby knows everyone. Came to the Lights Are Blue one night and started talking big about record deals and how he had people he knew in Chicago and Detroit could do us a lot of good.’

  ‘He ever come through with anything?’

  ‘Lot of people talk, Mr Duval, not very many come through with anything.’ The remark was obviously pointed in his direction. Ray pulled himself up out of the La-Z-Boy with some effort. He tried not to breathe too hard as a wave of dizziness swept over him.

  ‘You okay?’ asked Coulthart, getting up from the couch.

  Ray nodded. ‘Haven’t eaten enough today.’ He snapped the notebook closed and slipped it back into his pocket. ‘One more question.’

  ‘Sure.’

  Ray tried not to imagine the growing fan of Polaroid pictures in his other pocket, tried not to think of the greying thing he’d seen on the table at Parkland or the flecks of hardening tissue fusing with the blood on Jackie Kennedy’s suit. ‘Does Mar’Ellen have any scars, any distinguishing marks?’

  Coulthart gave him a strange look, his eyes becoming wary and apprehensive again. ‘Matter of fact, she does. A scar on her thigh. Not where you can see it. Scar like a little half-moon. In the schoolyard two, three years ago. Playing horseshoes and she fell on the piece of pipe, cut right through her dress.’

  ‘A half-moon scar.’ Ray nodded. He could taste bile at the back of his throat. He turned towards the door.

  ‘You’ll let me know if you hear something?’

  ‘Of course,’ said Ray. Coulthart opened the door and Ray stepped out into the darkness. He went down the steps and back to the car. He stood in the darkness for a moment and just before he opened the door to the Bel Air he thought he could hear the sound of Coulthart’s guitar coming, faded, towards him in the mournful evening. Even after all these years Ray could still remember the words, especially the last verse.

  Run, get me my shotgun,

  Put two shells in my hand.

  Please run get my shotgun,

  Put two shells in my hand.

  I’m gonna kill my baby

  And blast and blast her fancy man.

  He drove down Commerce Street and pulled over at the Carousel Club. There was a badly painted sign on a piece of shirt cardboard stuck into one of the street-level display cases that simply said CLOSED TONIGHT. It was easy driving; there was almost no one on the streets and by the time he reached it the triple underpass was open again. Everything was dark and silent except for the lights still burning on the sixth floor of the Texas School Book Depository. The lights flashing on the Hertz billboard said it was 7:10. He took the Houston Street Viaduct to Zang and then Zang down to Jefferson. By the time he parked in front of Inky’s it was seventy thirty. Like Ruby’s place, he’d expected the restaurant to be closed but the lights were still on and he could see Rena at the counter by the cash register, smoking, a newspaper spread out in front of her. All the booths and the tables down the middle of the restaurant were empty and none of the counter stools were occupied.

  Ray stepped into the restaurant, letting the door swing closed behind him. Rena looked up and recognised him and smiled.

  ‘Guess you can pick your own spot,’ she said.

  Ray sat down in the same booth he’d taken before, right in the front window, looking out onto the street. Rena folded up her paper, grabbed a menu from the stack by the register and came over to him.

  ‘Your regular?’ she said. She had a way of cocking her hip while she stood that Ray found attractive.

  ‘I didn’t know I had one,’ he said.

  ‘Sure you do,’ said Rena. ‘Chicken fried steak with some okra on the side and a Tecate.’

  ‘You remember what everybody orders?’

  ‘Just some people.’ She smiled. ‘You want the beer now or with your dinner?’

  ‘With dinner if that’s okay.’

  ‘I don’t mind long as you’re willing to eat my cooking. There’s no chef. Boss said he could go home early because of the assassination. He said I could go too if there weren’t any customers. I was about to close up.’

  Ray made a little movement to stand up. ‘Hey, I can go somewhere else if you’re in a hurry.’

  Rena put a hand on his shoulder. ‘I’m in no hurry. You just stay where you are.’ She moved away and Ray watched her back as she moved. There was a little swing to her hips but nothing out of line, like she was trying to make a point with her ass or something. The last time he’d seen her the blonde hair had been swinging long and free but now it was done up in some kind of twist and held there with a pair of combs. She went through the doors into the kitchen and disappeared. Ray looked out the window, not seeing much except his own reflection.

  The water pills had certainly worked on his face. The meat of his cheeks and jowls were gone, leaving him looking haggard, his eyes starting to sink into his head. He gave himself a weak smile in the glass. Whatever thoughts he’d entertained about Rena could be flushed down the crapper with a face like that. Not that he’d really expected much beyond the smile he’d already gotten and maybe some talk if there was time enough to get to know her better.

  A few minutes later she came back with the steak and the okra and the Tecate and put them down in front of Ray. She reached into her pocket and took out a paper napkin with cutlery rolled into it and laid it down neatly beside the plate.

  ‘There you go,’ she said. She seemed to hesitate.

  Ray unrolled his cutlery and used the fork to point to the seat on the other side of the booth. ‘Sit down if you’d like.’

  ‘Really?’ she said, obviously pleased.

  ‘Really,’ said Ray. ‘Unless you’ve got some pressing duties elsewhere.’

  ‘I’ll get my coffee.’ She went back to the counter, picked up a Corey pot and topped off her cup, then brought it over to the booth. She put it down on the table and then slid into the seat. ‘Inky’d have a fit if he saw me doing this.’

  ‘Not supposed to fraternise with the customers?’

  ‘Something like that.’

  ‘Maybe he’d make an exception today,’ said Ray. He sliced off a piece of steak and forced himself to eat it, most of his appetite gone somehow. He followed it with a slug of beer.

  ‘Such a terrible thing,’ said Rena. ‘Just a big hurt, nothing else.’

  ‘Meaning?’

  ‘The President gets killed but what does it really do?’ There’s another president now. Everything goes on, not much changes, except Caroline and John-John and Jackie have to be full of grief, to live with it.’

  ‘Murder’s not about changing things,’ said Ray, thinking out loud. ‘Murder’s not about the person who dies, that’s just incidental.
It’s about the person who does the killing. Shows he has power over the victim and when the victim’s dead the killer’s won, because he’s still alive, even if he knows he’s going to get hung or go to the electric chair. All this stuff going on and just about the only person who doesn’t give a damn is President Kennedy. He stopped caring a split second after the bullet hit. Like a curtain going down. For him it’s over.’

  ‘You think about this kind of thing a lot or is it just today?’ Rena asked. ‘Little morbid, don’t you think?’

  ‘I’m a homicide cop,’ he said and smiled. ‘They pay me to think about those kinds of things.’

  ‘No kidding. I’d never have thought.’

  ‘What did you think?’

  ‘I didn’t.’

  ‘But you remembered my regular.’

  ‘I didn’t mean I didn’t think about you, I just meant I never thought about what you did for a living.’ She made a little blowing noise, her cheeks going red. ‘You’re getting me all tangled up.’

  ‘Sorry. I took advantage of you.’

  ‘Oh yeah?’

  ‘Sure. I knew I thought you were pretty and I liked your name and I already knew you were a waitress at Inky’s Restaurant on Jefferson Boulevard.’

  ‘Charm boy. What do you do for an encore, sing a Bobby Vinton song?’

  ‘Maybe Perry Como.’ He smiled.

  ‘You really are a cop.’

  ‘Yup. For a long time.’

  ‘The guy they picked up at the Texas. You think he killed the President?’

  ‘Not my case.’

  ‘You’re not interested? This is the crime of the century!’

  ‘Maybe, but it’s not mine.’

  ‘You have a case?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Interesting?’

  ‘To me.’

  ‘Murder, I guess.’

  ‘That’s right. Two of them in the last couple of days. Nine others that go back to the thirties.’

  ‘And you think they’re connected?’

  ‘Yup.’

  ‘You do anything else other than being a cop?’

  ‘Work you mean?’

  ‘Hobby more like. When I get a little time, holidays, I like to sew, make clothes.’

  ‘I collect old radios. Try to fix them so they work again.’

  ‘So you think about things other than dead bodies?’

  Ray reached into his pocket and touched the Polaroids again. He took his hand away and put it flat on the cracked vinyl seat beside him. ‘Yeah. I think of other things once in a while.’

  ‘Married?’

  ‘Nope.’

  ‘Ever married? You look like the kind of guy who’d be married.’

  ‘Years ago. She ran off with a crook and got herself killed.’

  ‘More murder?’

  ‘Automobile accident.’ He paused. ‘Now you’re the one who’s sounding like a cop.’

  ‘Just like to get things straight before…’

  ‘What?’

  ‘In case you hadn’t noticed women have to make the moral decisions because the guys don’t know how.’

  ‘All guys?’

  ‘Most of them in my experience.’

  ‘What moral decision are we talking about?’

  ‘The one where I justify that because the President got shot we’re all in shock and tonight we all need someone to be with… that moral decision.’

  ‘We don’t even know each other.’

  ‘But we want to. I want to and I think you do.’

  ‘I’ve never had a conversation like this.’

  ‘Me neither. Only happens in empty restaurants just after the president of the United States has been assassinated.’

  ‘The headshrinkers probably have a name for it.’

  ‘Probably.’ Rena reached out with one hand and covered Ray’s with it. For somebody who worked as a waitress all day it was remarkably smooth. She didn’t move the hand or the fingers, just lay them on top of his.

  ‘I should tell you something,’ Ray said.

  ‘Is it important?’

  ‘Maybe.’

  ‘Then tell me.’

  ‘I’m dying, Rena.’

  ‘You look okay to me.’

  ‘It’s called congestive heart failure.’

  ‘Is there some kind of cure?’

  ‘You die, that’s the only cure.’

  ‘It’s true you have this, it’s not some kind of joke? Because if it is, it’s a pretty sick line, especially on a day like today.’

  ‘No joke.’

  ‘How long?’

  ‘I don’t know exactly. Six months. A year, maybe less.’

  ‘How long have you known?’

  ‘Couple of months.’

  ‘Jeez.’

  ‘I just didn’t want you to say anything or do anything you might regret. I’m not very good boyfriend material, if you know what I mean. I’m pretty sure it’s going to come out at my physical next week and then I’m probably going to be out of a job.’

  She let her fingers run between the knuckles of his hand, rubbing lightly. She smiled. ‘Why don’t we see how things go along and just leave it at that.’

  ‘Okay.’

  ‘Time to go,’ Rena said, sliding out of the booth. ‘I’ve got to close up.’

  ‘I’ll drive you home.’

  ‘No need,’ she said. She picked up Ray’s plate and headed through the kitchen. She was back out a moment later, wiping her hands on her apron. ‘You can walk me. I only live around the corner.’

  Saturday

  November 23, 1963

  Chapter Fifteen

  Ray woke up to the sounds of someone else making coffee and for some reason he found it embarrassing; in fact he felt almost everything about the situation he was now in was embarrassing. An older man with a much younger woman and he doesn’t even have the decency to tiptoe out of bed after they’re done so they can avoid the inevitable embarrassed conversations. He took a deep breath and let it out slowly.

  The bedroom was relatively dark, located at the back of the apartment. From what he’d seen the night before it was a living room/dining room combination at the front overlooking Zang, a tiny galley kitchen, a bathroom and then the bedroom, all running off a central passage. Everything looked neat and tidy, if a little poor. The chest of drawers in the corner looked as though it came from another age and the dark green velvet curtains on the back window looked like they came from a church or a funeral home.

  Ray heard Rena coming down the hallway, spoons and cups clattering on a tray, and pulled the sheet up higher around his chest. He felt stupid doing it since they’d been naked as jaybirds the night before but it made him feel a little better to be covered.

  She appeared carrying a tray of coffee things, which she set down on the edge of the bed. She was wearing Ray’s shirt with nothing else under it and when she knelt down on the edge of the bed to pour the coffee he could see the firm round shape of her ass and the furry cleaving between it.

  ‘You peeking?’ she asked, looking over her shoulder.

  ‘You bet.’

  ‘Good. Girl likes to be appreciated.’

  ‘Believe it, Rena, you’re appreciated more than you know.’

  ‘Well, so are you then, Ray. I had a very nice time last night, I must say.’ She squirrelled around, handed him a cup of coffee and took one for herself, sitting cross-legged on the bed, the tail of the shirt the only thing covering her.

  He sat up straighter on the bed, pushing a pillow up so he didn’t get a Brylcreem stain on the wallpaper. He felt his breathing ease and wondered if it was his heart or the fact that he could see right up between her legs to the soft bush of hair between them. He smiled a little because he couldn’t remember a single time he’d been with Lorraine when she hadn’t been covered, at least part of that time.

  ‘You’re smiling. That’s nice. I bet you don’t smile a lot.’

  ‘Probably not.’

  ‘So, a penny for your thou
ghts.’

  ‘Just thinking it’s nice here. Feeling a little embarrassed.’

  ‘Too late for that, Ray.’

  ‘Some of the things we did last night when I couldn’t get… couldn’t get…’

  ‘Hard?’

  ‘Yeah. I’ve never done those before.’

  ‘Tonight you’re going to do some of those things to me.’

  ‘Tonight?’

  ‘You think we were just going to do this once?’

  ‘I thought that’s all it would take,’ said Ray.

  ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

  ‘We’d go it once, you’d get a good laugh and that would be that. You got to admit, Rena, I wasn’t very good.’

  ‘Good enough for me and bound to get better.’

  ‘Nowhere to go but up?’

  ‘There you go, putting yourself down again.’

  ‘I don’t have much experience at this kind of thing.’

  ‘Most men in your place would’ve got up in the middle of the night and tiptoed away.’

  ‘Why? You’re a nice person.’

  ‘Maybe they didn’t want a person. Maybe they just want to get laid.’

  ‘That’s not my way.’

  ‘I know that, stupid. You may have a bad heart but you’ve got a good one.’

  ‘Didn’t know you can find both in the same people.’

  ‘Oh, shut up and drink your coffee.’

  ‘Doctor says it should be decaffeinated.’

  ‘Sanka? Stuff tastes like mud.’ Rena watched as Ray took a long sip of the strong aromatic brew she’d brought to the bed. ‘That’s my man. Live dangerously.’

  Ray sat back against the pillows, the cup and saucer in his lap, feeling a little rivulet of contentment coursing through him. Last night had been a great gift, even if there had been a moment or two when he thought his heart was going to tear in two like some old piece of cloth washed too many times; the hard, drumbeat hammering had kept on long after they’d done. But it had been wonderful.

  Rena finished her own coffee quickly, then came up from the end of the bed and sat beside Ray, one hand coming out to lie across his chest, her long slim fingers threading through the thick patch of silver and black hair that ran between his nipples. ‘You’ve got a mane like a lion,’ she said.