What It Was

TWELVE

Frank Vaughn pushed his plate aside, picked up his deck of L amp;Ms, and shook out a smoke. He lit the cigarette with his Zippo, placed the lighter atop the pack, and pulled an ashtray within reach. Before him was a notepad and pen.

“I’ll have some more java, Nick.”

“Sure thing, Marine.” Nick Michael, owner and operator of the Vermont Avenue diner, took Vaughn’s empty and moved to the big urns, where he drew a cup of fresh coffee. He returned to the counter with the full cup and placed it in Vaughn’s saucer. To the young black man with the thick mustache and broad shoulders, seated beside Vaughn, Nick said, “How ’bout you, young fella, want me to warm that up?”

“I’m good,” said Strange. He had already devoured his eggs, scrapple, and onions fried in hash browns, and sopped up the yolk with toast. Nick removed both of their plates and walked toward a bus pan down by the register.

“You get in that building all right?” said Vaughn.

“Thanks to you.”

“Wish I’d stuck around.”

“I was lookin through a di ~ttlivuckrty window, mostly, so I didn’t have the best view.”

“And you saw…”

“Two white men. One dark and on the big side, one thin and fair skinned. The big guy carried a shotgun. The other one had some kind of pistol.”

“What about their vehicle?”

“Black late-sixties Lincoln with suicides.”

Vaughn wrote that down on his pad. “Sounds like a match. Two white men visited Roland Williams and tortured him in D.C. General yesterday. A nurse gave us a rough description that’s close to yours.”

“Tortured him for what?”

“Williams says he doesn’t recollect. I’m guessing they were after information on the whereabouts of Red Jones. If I’m right, Williams gave up the location of Coco Watkins’s whorehouse. That’s what they were doing there-looking for Red.”

“Who are they?”

“Button men from up north,” said Vaughn. “Italians. Williams copped heroin on consignment from a guy up in Harlem who was connected to the Organization. So Roland Williams, in effect, owed money to the Mob. Jones took off Roland’s stash. Now the Italians are looking for Jones to settle the debt.”

“You know this?”

“Williams told me just enough to put it together. It makes sense.”

“Red Jones is leaving behind a trail of fire.”

“He’s bold,” said Vaughn. “Him and his partner, little dude named Alfonzo Jefferson, compelled a Lorton escapee, Dallas Butler, to come into the station last night and make a false confession to the murder of Bobby Odum.”

“Compelled him how?”

“They beat the shit out of him and threatened to murder his mother. Butler’s on the way back to jail, and happy to catch the ride. I did get one bit of information before I shipped him off.”

“What’s that?”

“Jefferson drives a sixty-eight Electra, gold exterior, hardtop with fender skirts.”

“Deuce-and-a-quarter?”

“Uh-huh. Case you see it on the street…”

“I know. Proceed with caution.”

“I’m guessing Jones is cribbed up with Jefferson somewhere,” said Vaughn. “Coco’s trick pad is way too hot.”

Strange borrowed a pen from Vaughn and wrote down the description of Jefferson’s car on a napkin. He folded the napkin and slipped it in the pocket of his slacks.

“You happen to find Red,” said Vaughn, “I wouldn’t try to talk to him about any missibouheing jewelry.”

“Someone’s gotta end this cat sooner or later.”

“It’s coming,” said Vaughn. “Jones has a big set of nuts and he gives a good fuck about exactly nothin. But he’s gonna bite it. Guys like him think they’re taller than they are. They step on the wrong toes, and then it’s assassination time. Darkness.”

“Maybe you’ll find him first.”

“I hope I do,” said Vaughn. He hit his cigarette and studied it as he exhaled smoke. “I think I’m startin to love this guy.”

“What’s next?”

“I ran Alfonzo Jefferson through the system. He’s got priors but he’s no longer under supervision. Father deceased, no siblings on record. If his mother’s alive, there’s no record of her whereabouts. Prob’ly has a different last name than he does.”

“Find the Electra, you find Jefferson.”

“Right. There’s a few Buicks in the city that match the description, but none under his name. I’ll go out on the registration list and see if someone’s carrying the paper for him. Talk to my informants, like that. You?”

“I’m thinking about taking a closer look at my client.”

“Maybelline Walker? I don’t blame you.”

“I’m curious, is all.”

“That broad’s got a bag of cats under her dress. I met her, remember?”

“It’s not like that,” said Strange.

“Yeah, I know. You like her.” Vaughn’s grin was canine. “Deep down inside.”

“Sayin, I’m spoken for. Got a date tonight with my girl, matter of fact. We’re going to a show at Carter Barron.”

“I took Olga there to see Henry Mancini and Harry Belafonte a few years ago. Mancini played ‘Moon River,’ and I acted like I cared.”

Nick laid down the check between them, and Strange reached for his wallet. “I got this one.”

“Stay in touch, Derek.”

“I will.”

Vaughn crushed out his L amp;M. Strange palmed a couple of dollars over the counter to the grill woman and settled up with Nick.

Red Jones and Alfonzo Jefferson sat in the gold Electra, parked nose east on Oglethorpe Street, in a neighborhood called Hampshire Knolls in Northeast. Their clothing was brightly colored, their heels were high, and the collars of their shirts were laid out wide across their chests. Jones had his.45 on the seat, resting against his leg. Jefferson’s police-issue.38 was fit snugly between his legs.

Small homes, attached to one another in pairs, lined the block. The houses, built in 1950 and sold under the GI Bill, had originally gone for $12,000, with a mere $500 down payment the ticket in. Nearly all of those veterans and their young families were gone now, having moved out to suburban Maryland in search of better schools, safer streets, and whiter neighborhoods.

Mid-street, under the shade of a government oak, a boy buffed the milky film off a current-year Cadillac that he had washed and waxed. An older man sat in a folding chair in the same patch of shade, having a cigar while he watched the boy work.

“He up in that semidetached on the right,” said Jefferson. “Ward visits the same woman, same day, every week about this time. Has that boy shine up his Caddy while he hits that thing.”

“Kinda early for that, isn’t it?”

“Man likes his morning glory.”

“You do your homework, Fonzo.”

“I try to.”

“How long we got to sit here?”

“Boy’s near finished. That means Ward about to come out.”

Jones dragged on a cigarette, then let his smoking-hand rest on the lip of the open passenger-side window. “They say he buys a new short every year.”

“Man’s got to do somethin with all that cash.”

“He spends plenty, but not all of it,” said Jefferson, studying the Eldorado as if looking at it in a dream. “That’s a sweet-ass car.”

Sylvester Ward’s latest had been purchased with cash. It was a triple-green coupe with an opera window, rear skirts, spoke wheels, and wide whitewalls. His vehicles were bought at Capitol Cadillac on 22nd Street in Northwest. He liked to say that he traded them in “when the ashtrays get full.” If it was an exaggeration, it was not much of one.

Ward, a rotund man in his early forties, came out of the duplex. He walked with confidence and had the easy gait of a man who carried his weight naturally. He wore a forest-green suit with white stitching on the lapels, a textured white shirt, white shoes, and a white belt. The outfit was a deliberate complement to his car. Ward was dark, mostly, with small patches of beige on his cheeks and forehead, and spots of beige and white all over the backs of his hands. He had been afflicted with a skin condition since childhood.

“I see why they call him Two-Tone,” said Jones.

“Look more like three to me,” said Jefferson.

“Let’s take him.”

They gathered their guns, slipped them under the tails of their shirts, got out of the Electra, and commenced to cross the street. Jones paused to crush his cigarette under one of his Flagg Brothers, then deep-dipped forward.

Ward took note of the low-rent strangers as he descendeas spod the concrete steps of the row home. He showed no fear if he felt it, and when he hit the sidewalk he continued on toward his Cadillac. There they all met, standing around the car in that tight atmosphere that said some kind of conflict was about to go down. The boy dropped the chamois cloth he held in his hand and took one step back. The older man gripped the arms of the folding chair and stared straight ahead.

“What you two want?” said Ward tiredly.

Jones lifted his shirttail and showed Ward the butt of his.45. The boy’s eyes widened and he felt his heart beat pleasantly in his chest. Nothing this exciting had ever happened to him and nothing would again. When he was a crushed and disappointed middle-aged man he would often bore his friends with the story of Red Jones, tall and proud, tight bells, tall stacks, big old Afro, who came up on him and his uncle, showed his heater, and took off numbers kingpin Sylvester Ward.

“You comin with us,” said Jones. “Right now.”

“Don’t you know who I am?” said Ward, his voice a husky match to his size.

“Matter of fact, we do.” Jefferson gave him a gold-toothed smile. “We ain’t about to take no poor motherfucker off the street.”

“Let’s go,” said Jones.

Ward gestured to the vehicle with incredulity. “What about my ride?”

“Leave it,” said Jefferson. “The boy can watch it.”

“Pay him for his time before you go,” said Jones. He gave the boy a short nod.

Ward peeled off some bills from a roll of cash he drew from his pants pocket before walking with Jones and Jefferson to the Electra. Jones got into the backseat with Ward, drew his gun, and held it loosely in his lap.

Jefferson settled in behind the wheel of his car and turned the ignition. Looking in the rearview mirror at Ward, he said, “You stay over in Shepherd Park, right?”

“Holly Street,” said Ward, just above a mumble.

Jefferson pulled away from the curb. “That’s a nice El D, Two-Tone. What you got in that, a six?”

“Shit,” said Ward. “That’s a five-hundred-cubic-inch big-block V-eight.”

“What do they call that color, ice-green, somethin?”

“Willow- green. It’s new for this year.”

“Pretty,” said Jefferson.

That cut the conversation to nothing for a while. Jones drove south on New Hampshire, where he turned right onto Missouri Avenue and headed across town.

“Y’all kidnapping me,” said Ward, as if it had just come to mind. “You know that’s a capital crime.”

“So?” said Jones.

“I got rid of my wife, and my kids are full grown and gone. They got nary a nickel from me, case you tryin to hold me for ransom…”

“We don’t have the time for that,” said Jones. “And you ain’t all that important.”

Little more was said for the rest of the ride. Ward sat looking out the window, his hands in his ample lap, his lower lip thrust out like a hurt child’s. Sylvester Ward was not frightened, but a piece had been chipped off his pride.

Ward lived on one of the tree-and-flower-named streets of Shepherd Park, the northernmost neighborhood before the Maryland line, west of Georgia and east of 16th Street. Most recently, its residents had actively resisted blockbuster realtors who had preyed on the fears of whites in post-riot D.C. Here, middle- and upper-middle-class blacks and whites lived side by side, and sometimes they lived under the same roof. It was one of the few uptown, upscale areas friendly to interracial couples. At one time, Jews who owned nearby Georgia Avenue businesses couldn’t live in Shepherd Park. But that restriction, too, had been buried long ago with the other rotted corpses of the past.

When it came to women, Ward was tolerant running to liberal. He kept company with all kinds, but he was no political activist. He simply liked this area, with its brick and shingled single-family homes, large yards, shade trees, and flowery shrubs. He had paid cash for his house, as he did for everything he owned. He could have easily afforded a residence on the Black Gold Coast, down on North Portal Drive, with the professional, educated types, but he preferred to stay in Shepherd, which was nice but more down-home. He felt it was wise to remember where you came from and not pretend to be something you were not. The high branches of the tree die when the roots get cut. Like that.

Ward had been one of the city’s top numbers men for some time. He didn’t deal in ponies or the sports book. He had no knowledge of or interest in the drug or prostitution trades. He had come up in the policy game, where three-digit tickets could be bought for pocket change. He had runners all over the city; his employees were government messengers, dishwashers, janitors, and, in the old days, elevator operators. They were black men and they sold to all colors. They worked for a cut and were often tipped heavily by sentimental and superstitious winners. Above the runners were several men who kept the books and collected. The daily take, after the winning combination was paid out, was divided from small denominations and coin between Ward, his employees, and the New York Syndicate via a man in Baltimore whose nickname suggested royalty. It was claimed that there was no organized crime to speak of in D.C., and this was true in a sense, if one meant Mafia and Italian. But the Mob had long had their hands in the pockets of Washington’s criminal element. The out-of-town payoff money was said to be well spent, as it kept the Syndicate at arm’s length.

Ward’s lottery business grossed millions of dollars a year. After the employees got paid, after New York got their cut, after Ward shelled out to locals of influence and power, he netted a hundred, a hundred and fifty grand annually. But he was good with that. His was an unexpectedly rewarding life. Ward was as cock-of-the-walk as it got for black Washington. He wasn’t worried about jail or persecution. He was protected.

Which is why, walking into his house with his two abductors, Ward was more perplexed than angry. He wasn’t used to being treated this way.

Ward removed his green jacket and draped it over the back of an ornate dining-room chair. Jones, gun in hand, kept his eyes on Ward while Jefferson took in the opulence of his surroundings. Looked like a museum in here to him: crystal chandeliers, furniture with scrolled arms, oriental carpets, and plaster statues of naked white women and white men whose nuts hung lower than their dicks.

“I smell money,” said Jefferson.

Ward shook his head slowly. “Obviously, y’all ain’t done your due diligence.”

“Huh?” said Jones.

“There ain’t nothin here of value to speak of,” said Ward. “Not the kind of payday you’re looking for, anyway. Walkin-around money is all I got.”

“We’ll take what the fuck you got, then,” said Jefferson.

“Get it,” said Jones.

“It’s up in my bedroom.” But Ward did not move.

“You mean you ain’t gone yet?” said Jones.

Jefferson drew his piece and pointed it to the stairs. Ward headed in that direction and Jefferson followed.

Jones went to a bar cart and chose a bottle of scotch that looked expensive. He poured amber liquor into a thick, etched tumbler and drank. Its velvet taste closed his eyes.

Jones had a second drink, and as he killed it, Ward and Jefferson returned to the living room. Jefferson had a fistful of cash in his free hand.

“Twenty-four hundred,” said Jefferson. His tone was not exuberant.

“That’s all?”

“I took his watch, too,” said Jefferson. “Got diamonds around its face.”

“That’s cut glass,” said Ward. “A bitch I know gave it to me as a present. I only wear it when she comes to visit.”

“Gimme that watch on your arm, then,” said Jones. “I know that ain’t fake.”

Ward laboriously removed a gold Rolex from his wrist. Jones slipped the timepiece onto his own wrist and examined it. It fit loose, the way he liked it.

“Now you done took everything I have,” said Ward. Annoyance had come to his face.

Jones felt his pulse drum. “You got a roll in your pocket, too, fat man. Give it here.”

Ward started to speak but bit down on his lip. He withdrew the cash, held together with a silver clip, and Jones slipped it into the patch pocket of his bells.

Jones looked Ward over. looked ovelipAnyone ask you, it was Red Jones who took you for bad.”

“Ain’t nobody gonna ask,” said Ward with naked contempt.

“Is that right.”

“Ain’t nobody care about you or what your name is,” said Ward. “Ain’t nobody gonna remember you when you’re gone.”

Jones’ eyes were flat and he said nothing.

“You want my advice-”

“I don’t,” said Jones.

“Go on, then,” said Ward, slashing his hand toward the front door of the house. “Get.”

The barrel of the.45 was a blur as Jones’s arm flared out. Its sight clipped Ward’s nose and cut the bridge. Jones grunted as he put more into it and hit Ward squarely and violently in the same place again. Ward, too big to fall, staggered and gripped the arm of a chair for support. Blood flowed from his nostrils as it would have from an open spigot. Jones laughed and kicked the chair out from under him, and now Ward fell. He lay on his side on the hardwood floor, blood on his fine white shirt, one hand covering his nose, its cartilage smashed. Tears had sprung from his eyes and they were streaking down his face.

“Shouldn’t have kept talkin,” said Jones. “A man with spots, tryin to tell me what to do.”

Red Jones and Alfonzo Jefferson left the house. They cut the cash up in the car.