Farewell, Amethystine

34

“Why you want to provoke that man?” Anatole asked.

We were standing on the curb in front of the empty house. Sergeant Carr and Patrolman Powell had already gone.

“You let somebody sock you in the head, kick you in the ribs, and then sit you down in handcuffs till your bladder ’bout to bust. Do all that and then let me dare to ask you about provocation.”

Anatole took it. He knew the procedure. So instead of arguing, he asked, “Where’s Commander Suggs?”

“You talked to him. Didn’t he tell you?”

“No.” The word passed his lips like a kidney stone.

“You didn’t trace the call?”

“Anything I do about Mel is off the books.”

“Then I can’t help you.”

“We need to bring this problem to a conclusion, Rawlins.”

My car was parked ten feet away. I considered jumping in and driving off without engaging the cop-out-of-water. But, like it or not, I had to work with the Irish fashion plate.

“Did Laks talk to you directly about the trouble Mel was in?” I asked.

“No.”

“Who did?”

“I can’t tell you that.”

“Why not?”

“It was a confidence.”

“It was a lie.”

Anatole’s beautiful blue eyes bored into me, looking for the meaning of this accusation.

“Come on, man,” I said. “He told you there was a warrant out on Mel but there wasn’t, was there?”

Anatole’s whole demeanor halted, like an engine with a gas tank full of sand.

He balled his left fist, held it up to his lips, and said, “I have to look into this for myself.”

“What you got to do is pick a side.”

This was my day for stumping law enforcement. Everything I was telling him he knew to be true; the only thing was, the answer I offered felt to him like betrayal.

“Look,” I said. “Laks had Tommy Jester killed. There’s no question about that. You can bet your pension he’ll do the same to Mel.”

“I thought you didn’t know Jester.”

“Slipped my mind.”

“Even if you did know who he was, how can you possibly know that Laks killed him?”

“I found out that Jester sometimes had secret films made of his more affluent and powerful customers.”

“What kind of customers?” he asked, knowing full well what I meant.

“Them that buys their pussy.”

Anatole pulled his head back like a dog that just got a whiff of wolf.

“One of them was Laks,” I added.

“How do you know?”

“I saw it. And it was what they call graphic.”

“I don’t believe it.”

I chuckled and said, “I work for a living, Captain. No pension, no paid vacation, no office that somebody else pay the rent on. I’m my own man and I do what I know to be right. Mel haven’t done one goddamned thing wrong and Laks wants to destroy him. Are you good with that? ’Cause if you are, you can go back over to Clifton’s and drink your scotch. I’ll be out here on the street helpin’ my friends.”

He stood there looking in my direction but seeing something altogether different.

Back then, men like McCourt lived lives of unquestioning trust. People like that had faith in the companies they worked for and the bosses who represented those companies; they trusted the newspapers they bought on street corners and the government that sent them and their children off to war. Anatole was like that. He trusted his betters to do what was right, just like he expected me to be dishonest, deceitful, double-dealing, and treacherous. Now all that was turned on its head.

Right then, on that Mission Beach sidewalk, Anatole McCourt realized that the people he trusted were no better than those he despised. I could see that in the rare uncertainty of his eyes.

Then those eyes hardened.

“I hear what you’re saying, Easy, I do, but I can’t give you that information.” He raised his hand as if swearing a half-hearted oath.

“You doin’ a whole buncha shit you cain’t do, man. Like comin’ down here and gettin’ me outta jail.”

“I have to think about this.”

By the time I was back on the road to LA, my plans had been laid.

The first stop was John’s bar.

It was late afternoon and so there were maybe seventy-five revelers drinking and laughing, hugging and dancing. “It’s Your Thing” was playing on the jukebox.

“Hey, Ease,” John greeted from behind the crowded bar.

“John.”

“You here to see your boy?”

“Oh yeah.”

“I got him out back in the blue room. He got pretty good manners for a man in his profession.”

“Takes all kinds.”

Tossing me a key he said, “Go on. I’ll talk to you later.”

At the far end of the bar was a metal door painted red. I used the copper key on the lock and entered a long hallway that had four doors on either side. At the far end was a fire exit.

The blue room, so named for its blue door, was the third on the left.

I knocked.

“Who is it?” came a gruff voice.

“Easy.”

The door opened, revealing Melvin. He wore black trousers and a teal-green T-shirt, no shoes or socks. He was still clean-shaven and appeared to be sober.

“You gonna let me in?” I asked.

He took a full step backward, allowing me to pass through.

It was a large room, maybe as much as seven hundred square feet. The bare floor was dark wood and there was a queen-size bed against a far wall. A very long pine table under a large window looked down on an alley behind the warehouse. On the table was a double hot plate and a mini refrigerator along with various dishes, cups, and canned goods.

“Not bad,” I said.

“Place is okay but I’m about to crawl outta my skin.”

I strolled over to the table and pulled out a chair made of bamboo woven around a metal frame. Melvin just leaned against the table.

“How’s it goin’?” I asked, hoping to prime a conversation.

“That man Mirth was sent to murder me.”

“Sit down, Mel. Let’s talk.”

With a harrumph he hopped up on the table.

“I don’t know what to do,” he said. “I can’t go out and kill Laks. I want to. I do. But that wouldn’t get Mary out of Dutch.”

“No,” I agreed. “It’s us gonna save your bride.”

“How we gonna do that?” he asked.

“She’ll tell us something and we’ll use that to figure out what’s what.”

“Sounds like fun, but I don’t see how it gets us anywhere.”

“Not until you call Anatole and get him to give you the information on the man told him you were about to get nicked.”

“Why? What could we do with that?”

“When Laks got this demolition rollin’, he got somebody to tell Anatole about the blackmailers and that he was about to bring you in. I’m bettin’ that whoever that was is involved in this thing. Did he tell you?”

“No.” Mel propelled himself off the tabletop, pulled out a bamboo chair, and sat down hard. “I got the feeling that whoever talked to him about Laks was sticking their neck out and wanted to stay, you know, anonymous.”

“We need whoever that was to lead us to the guy they say can produce the gun Mary used. That’s all they got, and we know the evidence hasn’t been presented to the chief or the prosecutor because then they’d have both you and Mary arrested. They wouldn’t have warned you neither.”

“And you want me to ask some upper-level cop about that?”

“Ask him hard,” I agreed.

“But he’s, he’s probably...”

“Not some niggah you grab up off the street?” I suggested.

My question had an answer, but not one that Mel could say aloud.

“I don’t know, Easy.”

“It’s either that or we go after Laks.”

Suggs made a face that said there was a bad smell somewhere. He shook his head.

“I ever tell you why I’m not a big team sports fan?” I asked.

“What’s that got to do with anything?”

“You see, if you on a team then you have to trust e’rybody, all your teammates. But you and me both know that’s not how it works. We know that in life it is human nature that tells us we need to look out for ourselves, that you can trust but you have to question too. And that question, that’s what makes us honest, that’s what tells us the truth.”

For a moment there I thought the commander was going to vomit. But then he broke out into a broad grin. Then he laughed.

“You’re a good man, Rawlins,” he said. He looked down at his bare feet, looked up, and asked, “I ever tell you where I come from?”

“No, sir.”

“I was born in Sacramento. My father died before I was two and my mother, Mariette Suggs, left me off with her parents when I was five. I felt bad about her leavin’ back then, but later I realized that it was probably for the best.

“My grandparents were Baptists and they dragged me to church every goddamned Sunday. I hated it. But Gram and Daddums didn’t care what I wanted. They just sat me between ’em and pinched my arm whenever I closed my eyes.

“One day I asked my daddums why I had to go to church every week. I mean, they said the same shit in every sermon. You know what he told me?”

“No,” I answered brightly, glad that he was being open.

“He said, ‘Every man, woman, and child has to come before the Lord once a week. Not to be forgiven. Not so that he could hear their prayers. Not even for them to learn from the sermon’s claptrap. No. We got to get down on our knees before the Lord so he can judge us and we can be judged.’”

Sitting there in John’s blue room, Mel was considering his entire life: from being an orphan, to getting bored in church, to accepting the sins of his lover.

He exhaled mightily, so that his cheeks puffed out and his lips flapped.

“Okay,” he said. “I’ll try and find out who spooked me. Either I’ll get that from Annie or somebody else.”

He stood and held out a hand.

I mirrored these motions.

“I know he’s on your team,” I said. “But don’t tell Anatole where you’re at.”

“Okay. When do I get to see Mary?”

“Let me give you a phone number.”