Nobody Said Amen (22 page)

“You can tell from over there?” He put his cigar on the edge of the table and opened his arms wide. “I think you ought to be a lot closer ’fore you rush to judgment.” His smile was fixed, but his voice was commanding. “I mean now, Nefertiti.”

She remained standing, but began to dry her hair with the towel, then slowly moved the towel, caressing the drops of water from her breasts, her stomach, her thighs. When she was done she moved past him and stretched out on the bed, her eyes locked on his. “You just walk in the door? That’s it?”

“That’s it, Nefertiti. I just walk in the door. And you welcome me. Simple.”

“Funny,” she said. “I took you for the sheriff, not my handy man.” Her mocking voice crooned:

“Why, he shakes my ashes, greases my griddle,

chimes my butter and he strokes my fiddle,

my man is such a handy man. . . .”

His voice was angry now. “I think you should remember that. The sheriff. The honky who lets you operate on this lily pad, case you forgot. Your handy man is now very dead, Nefertiti. Too dumb to live. No hard-on at all. So you may just have to settle for a fine white stallion who appreciates what you’ve got, you black bitch.”

“Someone like the sheriff.”

“Spitting image.” Without another word he unfastened his holster, placed it next to the cigar on the table, and began to undress.

“You gonna tell me what happened to Stanley?” The gaze from the bed was steady.

“Lesson for you, Nefertiti. He didn’t have the sense to do what I told him. And it got him killed.” He dropped his clothes on the floor and poured two glasses of whisky as he watched her in the mirror. “Your handy man thought he was a black Polack Wyatt Earp, riding into town and confronting the bad guys, all against my orders. Pulled his gun on Jimmy Mack, who was making a speech at the mass meeting.”

Her eyes were wide. “Bronko was going to shoot him?”

“The
Newsweek
reporter thought so and came running to have me stop it. I sent my best cop, Lonergan, inside to get the dumb bastard out, and the next thing I knew Bronko was dead and the FBI was all over my back. You know what I’m going to have to deal with now? Christ!” He approached the bed carrying the drinks. “Your handy man was hired to cover my ass, Nefertiti, not to lay my woman. And now I’ve got to find a new messenger who won’t mess with what’s mine.”

She emptied her glass. “Like me.”

He raised his glass in an elaborate toast. “Like my sepia Queen of the Nile.” She was silent as he sat heavily on the edge of the bed. His deep voice throbbed in the stuffy room. “So this is how the drill is going to go from now on. I’m gonna have Harold Butler start handling the door here at Fatback’s and then bringing me the rent.”

“You’re crazy. Everybody knows he’s Klan, Dennis. You think he’s not going to have trouble at our door?”

“Butler can take care of himself.” He knelt on the bed, staring down at her as he opened his arms wide. “And he’ll take care of me, too. Unlike your handy man, he won’t even try to get in this bed, Nefertiti. Unlike your sheriff, he can’t stand niggers.”

Billy’s broom was sweeping the dregs of the night before across the curb when the cruiser pulled up and stopped. Billy leaned comfortably on the handle and benevolently waved the two officers toward the open door of Billy’s Chili. “My goodness, two of Mississippi’s finest, coming for breakfast at my modest establishment. How in the world can I show my appreciation, gentlemen?”

“You learn to talk like that when you were in Italy, boy?” Butler asked. “Don’t sound like wop talk. Sound like wop talk to you, Lonergan?”

Lonergan grinned. “Sounds more like uppity-nigger talk, Butler. Course we never been in Italy, fighting to get laid with white Eyetalian women, like Billy here. So could be. Is it true her old man shot off your fingers on the way out the door, Billy?”

Billy laughed and held open the door. “Certainly good to see you relaxed and happy, officers.” Smiling, he led them to a booth facing the grill. “I understand you had a heroic confrontation last night. Saved Deputy Bronko from being killed by an unarmed black man named Jimmy Mack by killing Bronko yourself.” The two police sat down in silence. “Must have taken some moxie to do that. You fellas call that a ‘fire fight’? When we weren’t laying white Eyetalian women at Anzio, we used to call those uncomfortable shoot-outs ‘fire fights.’”

He moved behind the stove, flipping hotcakes and turning sausages in the pan. “At any rate, Billy’s Chili is happy to offer a free breakfast to the brave man who gunned down Deputy Bronko, a colored man who was not a patron of these premises. My clientele just didn’t like having the place get a bad reputation by letting in just anybody. You might say we discriminated against that black officer. Hope that wasn’t breaking any law. Could that be why you’re here this morning?”

Butler said, “Deputy Lonergan, here, is the hero, boy. He gets the free breakfast. And I get the free breakfast because I’m hungry. That sound like a good plan?”

Billy laughed. “Certainly does. Put up your feet and stay a while. I got these hotcakes and pork sausage on the grill.” He paused. “No offense, you gentlemen enjoy pig sausages? Not everybody likes pigs.”

Butler turned to Lonergan. “You take offense, Lonergan?”

Lonergan’s smile faded. “We’ll have the sausages, Billy.”

Billy and the two settled in the small booth toward the rear. Butler poured coffee into the saucer, waiting for it to cool as Lonergan’s eyes settled on the gun, hanging in plain sight, over the hood of the stove. He pushed his hot cakes away and walked over to examine the weapon.

“A carbine! Damn, that’s a fine little gun. Don’t see many carbines down here.” He returned to the table. “Know you gotta have a license for that carbine, Billy.”

“Yes sir, Deputy Lonergan. Certainly do. Got it in ’46 when I returned to Indianola after my extreme exertions caused by layin’ white Eyetalian women on the Anzio beachhead. On certain other occasions I used that little carbine in the hills behind the beachhead and got attached to it. I have the license with my discharge papers in the back room. You like to see it?”

“I certainly would. Right now.”

Billy turned in his seat and called to the closed door. “Z, baby, would you bring in my gun license please? We have a guest here who’s eager to see it.” A slender, blue-eyed, olive skinned woman with luxuriant black hair framing her oval face brought the small certificate to the table and paused behind Billy’s chair. When she smiled, she revealed small, bright teeth behind her full, pink lips. Billy hid a smile behind his coffee cup as he watched the two police stare at his wife. He’d seen this reaction before. “Z, say hello to Deputy Lonergan and Deputy Butler. I don’t think they’ve met you yet.”

“
Buon giorno
, Signori,” Z smiled. “I mean good morning, gentleman.” She turned to Billy. “Gentleman?”

Billy chuckled. “Gentlemen.” He pushed back his chair and put his arms around Z. “My Italian wife is just getting comfortable with English. But she’s learning faster than I learned Italian at Anzio.”

Butler was the first to speak. His voice was shrill. “This white woman with the nigger hair is your wife?”

Billy regarded him with a humorous detachment. “According to Chaplain Amos Grenville, Commander, U.S. Navy, who married us at the Anzio City Hall on August 22, 1944, this white woman with the nigger hair is my legal and beloved wife. Would you care to see the papers?”

Butler scraped back his chair and headed for the door. “Screw you both! I’ve seen enough filth for one morning.” The door slammed behind him.

Lonergan remained seated, his eyes fixed on Billy’s wife. “You called her Z, Billy. What does Z stand for?”

“It was her name in the Partisan group we worked with behind the beachhead. I’d heard about this sharpshooter in the hills that was picking off Germans, only name I heard was Z. Didn’t find out it was a woman for ten days. Didn’t find out it was a beautiful woman named Natalia till I met her when we secured the beach. Got married a week before our outfit shipped out for Normandy. It’s taken a long time to get her here.” He squeezed her shoulder. “But she’s a keeper.”

Lonergan said “A sharpshooter. You like the carbine, Z?”

She smiled. “Yes. A nice light gun. But I like a longer rifle for the sharpshooting. Yes?”

Lonergan said sharply “Tell me where you were last Wednesday night, Z.”

Her eyes wide, she turned to Billy. “Where?”

Billy smiled. “Wednesday night Z worked with me till we closed up about two. We must have had thirty, thirty-five people here saw us working. Why do you ask?”

Lonergan gathered his hat and stood to go. “There’s been some sharpshooting out near the Communist house, Billy. Shot the shit out of my truck. You hear anything about that?”

“No, Deputy Lonergan. All I heard about was poor Bronko. A lot of action for Indianola. Natives must have been restless.”

“And you’d let me know if you hear anything? ”
“What a question. I’m sure you know the answer. Say goodbye to Deputy Lonergan, Z.”

With her arm entwined in Billy’s, she followed the officer to the door. “
Arrividerci, signor
. Goodbye.”

Lonergan pulled in opposite the Freedom House, and parked across from where his truck had stood on the night of the firing. “We were right there, Butler. Preacher’s truck was right behind us.” They stepped onto the baking road, shading their eyes from the noon sun. The lawn of the Freedom House was dotted with groups of black kids with their teachers. On the porch they could see the journalist, Mendelsohn, talking intently with Jimmy Mack. When Mack spotted their cruiser, he and Mendelsohn disappeared inside. Lonergan walked slowly around the cruiser.

“All the shots hit my truck on this side, away from the Commie house. None came from over there.”

Butler grunted as his eyes swept from the school to the road to the cotton fields. “So they came from the cotton. All we got to do is look through this haystack for a goddam needle with a name on it.”

“Or names. Preacher’s sure there was more than one.” Impatiently, Lonergan pushed the nearest cotton plants aside and began to search between the rows. “You move east a hundred yards. I’ll move west. ’Less the shooters were marksmen, they must have been in the first few rows.”

“You think they left us a note? Shit, man, it’s a hundred degrees out here.” He stopped short, bending down to pick up an empty five-shot stripper clip. “Well, lookee here. A souvenir, Lonergan!” He walked toward the deputy and stooped again. “And some 30-06 shell casings! You ever see this kind of stripper clip?”

Lonergan squinted and then nodded. “It looks like the stripper clip from an old Enfield rifle. My grandpa brought one of those back with him in ’18. Now who the hell still has an Enfield? Most of them got replaced by Springfields during the first war. Grampa said they were glad to unload the old Enfields, so he brought his home for hunting.” He continued his search and finally found more empty casings at a spot opposite the near end of the house. “Damn if the preacher wasn’t right. Two shooters, and they had us in a barrel.”

Sweating and hot, they returned to the cruiser. Lonergan cranked down the windows and headed for the station. He grinned. “The mayor’s gonna be really pleased about this.”

Frowning, Butler lit a cigarette. “Another merit badge for Mr. Wonderful. You know, Lonergan, the guy who found the clip and then found the casings was your partner. You might tell the mayor.”

“What do you take me for, partner? Course I’ll tell him. We talk a lot, me and the mayor.” He grinned at Butler’s sour face. “One thing I don’t get, though. Those shooters had us in their sights, close range. They shot out the tires, the windshields.” He turned to look at Butler. “How come they didn’t take us out?”

Butler watched the cotton rows cart-wheeling by. “Don’t know, but they’ll be damned sorry they didn’t.”

Old Oscar Kilbrew was dozing in his hammock when the cruiser pulled up at the curb. Lonergan led the way to the broad veranda, and when he spotted the old man he tapped gently at the screen door. “Mr. Kilbrew, sir, could we have a minute of your time?”

Kilbrew blinked and then raised his head, struggling to sit erect on the sagging hammock. “That you, Deputy Lonergan? Come on up. Who’s that behind you?”

“Deputy Butler, sir.”

“Always glad to see Shiloh’s finest. Can I get you gentlemen a cold drink?”

Lonergan looked at Butler then said, “No, sir. We’re only stayin’ a few minutes. We’re investigating a shooting incident that took place out at that Communist school the other night. Thought maybe you could help us.”

Butler said, “I remembered you were one of the old veterans of World War I still alive in Shiloh, you and Senator Tildon. But that don’t help us much. We’re tryin’ to figure out who else came back to this town from the war who might have brought back an old Enfield rifle with him. You any idea, Kilbrew?”

“It’s Mister Kilbrew, Deputy. Why d’you want to know that?” The reedy voice was coldly sarcastic. “How you so sure that two old veterans still alive in Shiloh didn’t do the shootin’? Think we’re too old to do that? You think Senator Tildon and I couldn’t have shot up the Communist school if we wanted to?”

Butler flushed, his eyes darting to his clearly embarrassed partner. “Like we said, just doin’ an investigation.”

Lonergan stepped forward. “I’m sure the deputy didn’t mean no disrespect, Mr. Kilbrew.”

The old man turned to face Lonergan. “Nobody seems to know their place anymore, Officer Lonergan. I know you’ve got a job to do. How can I help you?”

“Down at the end of the Green there’s a stone marker to ‘Our Heroes from the Great War.’ Your name is on it. Senator Tildon’s name is on it. Col. Jeffrey Tollin is on it, and I know he died in 1938 when his place burned. But there are two other names at the bottom of the marker: Thomas McCormack and Percy Williams. You knew these men?”

Kilbrew smiled. “Course I knew them. We were demobilized at the same time. We were all in the cavalry. Used to march with those boys every Armistice Day. What do you want to know about those two old colored gentlemen?”