South Street (44 page)

“Guess what?” Brown said gently.

“I guess maybe he was just tryin’ to get along, too. Anyways, they told him. They told him she was gonna bust his balls, said she was gonna run soon as she saw a crack a daylight. Sure. They was right.” He swung his eyes to Leo. Leo lowered his head. “I knowed they was right. I didn’t need nobody tellin’ me that shit. It was like tellin’ me the sun comes up in the mornin’ or white folks hates niggers. I
knew
all that. I didn’t care.” He turned back to Brown. “See, didn’t none of ’em understand me. They all thought I didn’t know what she was doin’. Course I knew. Man’d have to be damn near dead not to know if other men, lots of ’em, was havin’ his woman. But you see, I had her sometimes. She always come back to me. Havin’ her that way was bettern not havin’ her at all. She was the prettiest thing I ever saw, an’ sometimes I had her. It was worth it, right?”

“I don’t know.” Brown said.

“No,” Rayburn said, “you don’t. You ain’t never touched her. If you had, you’d know.” He shrugged. “Or maybe it’d be different. Anyways, it don’t matter, ’cause she did run. An’ the funny part was, she didn’t run on account a one a them others, she run on account a somethin’ I done. She run ’cause I messed on
her
!” Rayburn chuckled drunkenly. Brown opened his mouth, glanced at Leo. Leo shook his head. Rayburn stopped laughing abruptly, the chuckle vanishing like a wire stretched almost to breaking, then suddenly cut. “You know what I done?” Rayburn demanded. He looked back and forth from Brown to Leo and back to Brown. “I laid me a white woman. You ever had a white woman?” Brown slowly opened his mouth. “Now, I don’t mean no whore, now,” Rayburn said quickly. “I mean a real white woman, kind wears expensive clothes an’ twenty-dollar perfume. I had me one a them. You ever had one a them? Kind that drinks martinis an’ drives a big car? I never had me one before. She was wearin’ a diamond ring an’ a pearl necklace, an’ she was married to some fuckin’ lawyer or somethin’. An’
she
came to
me
.
She
bought
me
drinks.
She
asted
me
to go home with her. An’ you know, the only reason I done it was ’cause she made me mad. Both of ’em made me mad. Les made me mad, an’ I was thinkin’, All right, bitch, now it’s ma turn. An’ this white woman, she made me mad, too. They all make me mad. You see them white women walkin’ down the street, oldern piss an’ ugliern shit, an’ they all so damn sure there ain’t a nigger in the world would just
love
to fuck ’em, old an’ ugly as they are, just ’cause they white. That’s what kills me—they so damn
certain
. You watch ’em. Old woman in an elevator, a brother gets on an’ right away she’s uptight. Sit down next to her in the only empty seat in a goddamn bus an’ she’s gonna stand right up, if she don’t get clean off. But all the time they be walkin’ around wavin’ it at you. All the goddamn time. An’ you walk around lookin’ at ’em wavin’ it, an’ soon as they catch you lookin’ they start actin’ like it was gold an’ you was tryin’ to steal it. They go walkin’ past you, an’ they’re so damn
certain
you’re just dyin’ for a piece, an’ maybe you was thinkin’ about somethin’ else all the time, but that don’t make no difference. They’re sure. You couldn’t convince ’em you wasn’t interested, an’ if you could they’d just wiggle it a little to get your attention. So sooner or later time comes when you reach out an’ take it. They offer it to you, you take it. ’cause you got to know, you know? They shakin’ it like it was made outa gold, an’ you get to thinkin’. Maybe it
is
made outa gold. Maybe their pussies smell like perfume, an’ maybe their tits are cherries, an’ maybe their damn assholes drip butterscotch. I mean who the hell knows? Maybe there
is
somethin’ special about it. Only there ain’t. It’s just another piece a tail that stinks in the mornin’.” Rayburn sighed, raised his glass, drained it. Leo shifted uneasily. “It didn’t mean nothin’,” Rayburn said. “Not a damn thing. Not to me. Only when I come home in the mornin’ Les was gone. Just on account a one piece a fat white pussy. Ain’t that funny? Leo? Ain’t it?”

“Yeah,” Leo said thickly.

“Yeah,” Rayburn said. He stood up, stood swaying. “I’ma leave this fuckin’ city. Tomorrow. No. Banks is closed. I’ma leave Monday. Leo, if that bitch comes lookin’ for ma ass, you tell her I done gone.”

“Sure,” Leo said.

“Tell her I done gone.”

Leo nodded.

Rayburn nodded drunkenly, slapped Brown on the back. “S’long.”

“So long,” Brown said. Rayburn turned and staggered out. Brown looked at Leo, climbed off his stool, shook his head. “I don’t know,” he said.

“I do,” Leo said bitterly. “I know all about it. I gotta know all about it ’cause I’m a goddamn bartender an’ bartenders is supposed to know all about it.”

“She gonna come lookin’ for him?”

“Shit,” Leo said. Brown shook his head, turned toward the door. “Leroy Briggs been kickin’ ass,” Leo said. “You be careful.”

“Sure,” Brown said shortly. He caught the note in Leo’s voice, turned and smiled. “Don’t worry.”

“I ain’t gonna be worryin’. I ain’t got time to sweat over every damn fool buys a beer in here,” Leo said. He sniffed, shifted his weight. Brown turned back to the door. “You need any help …” Leo’s voice trailed off. Brown smiled over his shoulder, nodded, waved, and stepped out into the night.

The rain ran down over the windshield, distorting his view of South Street’s lights, which glimmered dimly against the dark and troubled sky. Inside the car the lights glowed undistorted: the red lights for
OIL
and
TEMP,
the single green bulb on the tape player that blinked conspiratorially each time the channel switched. Loud music rocked through the padded interior, was soaked up by the deep pile carpet, the heavy leather seats. The Isley Brothers. Leroy tapped time on the leather-sheathed steering wheel with the silencer on the end of his Colt .45.

The rain banged and rattled on the roof, making him feel cold. He considered starting the engine to warm the car but discarded the notion—the sight of a big pink Caddy standing across the street with the engine running might excite the interest of someone in Lightnin’ Ed’s. It might tip Brown off. Leroy pushed the button to recline the seat, turned up the music, and resigned himself to the hardships of a stakeout. Absorbed in the music, he almost missed the opening of the door across the street. Almost, but not quite. He reacted swiftly, stabbing at the button that brought the seat to its fully erect position and at the same time punching the button that opened the window on the passenger’s side. The unmistakable form of Big Betsy the whore squeezed through the door of Lightnin’ Ed’s and out onto the sidewalk. Leroy relaxed. Big Betsy extracted a wad of newspaper from beneath the folds of her raincoat, opened it out, and held it over her head. She peered across the street. “Y’all quit that hosin’ over there,” Big Betsy bellowed. “Haw, haw, haw.” Leroy shoved the button, and the seat lowered him out of sight. “I can’t see you, but I know what you’re doin’,” yelled Big Betsy. “You drinkin’ an’ listenin’ to that there music an’
hosin’
, that’s what.” The seat reached its lowest position. Leroy tried to push himself further. “You best close that window, or your goddamn prick’ll freeze solid, an’ her cunt’s gonna be drippin’ icicles.” Leroy pushed a button and closed the window, cutting off Big Betsy’s cackle. She turned and waddled away down the street, splashing through the puddles like a raincoated duck. Leroy switched tracks on the tape player and tried to forget it. He watched the few cars that moved past him, noting the license numbers of the ones that splashed water on his car. He wrote the numbers down in a small red book. There were a lot of names in Leroy’s little red book, and he had crossed off quite a few of them. The next one on the list, in bold letters, was
BROWN
. Leroy said the name softly, caressing the single complex syllable with his thick lips. He regretted not being a better shot, not being able to shoot Brown in the kneecap or in the testicles to make him suffer a while before he bled to death. Still, Leroy’s plan, though lacking in artistic perfection, had a certain amount of elegance. It was, Leroy thought, worthy of him. He would follow Brown to his apartment, shoot him from the car window, leave him lying in the hallway, where Vanessa would have to step over him. Leroy considered the minor details of his plan, regretted the restrictions of time and space. But it would be enough—shooting the heavy gun in complete silence, then rolling away into the darkness, not speeding, moving slowly and steadily, the window powering quietly closed, the tape deck playing, while Brown lay twitching in a whirlpool of red. Leroy smiled.

The rain had subsided to mist and drizzle, and looking out at it, Leroy shivered. It was better cold, for if by some mistake Brown had time to cry out, he would shout into sound-deadening mist, to doors barred against the wetness, windows locked against the chill. The street would be empty; Brown would die alone. Across the street a rectangle of dim light showed and Leroy brought the seat up, switched off the tape player. A man’s figure emerged from Lightnin’ Ed’s. Leroy lowered the window for a better view, waited tensely. The figure staggered heavily against a wall, and Leroy cursed. He did not want Brown to be so drunk he would not know what was happening, just mildly high so that it might take him a minute to realize he was dying. Just high enough that, for a second, he might get off on the sight of his own blood. Leroy sighed, but then he saw that the drunken man across the street was not Brown, but Rayburn Wallace. Leroy grinned, changed the tape to The Temptations doing “Love Is a Hurtin’ Thing” while he watched Rayburn stagger down South Street, bouncing off the walls like a piece of driftwood in a flooded river.

The chill was getting to him. He reached down beneath the seat and pulled out a bottle, took a swig. He hoped Brown would not die before he had had a taste of the cold. He replaced the bottle just as the door of Lightnin’ Ed’s opened for a third time.

The night was quiet, cold, lonely, wet. Brown stepped out onto the street, shocked and shivering from the sudden chill. Strange weather, Brown thought, Philadelphia weather—heat for Christmas, snow in July. He peered guiltily down the shining asphalt corridor, but there was no sign of Rayburn and his load of troubles. There was no sign of anyone. There was only the mist-shrouded shape of a long car, dark and dead, parked across the street, the hum and blink of changing traffic lights, and Brown. He shivered, buttoned his collar to the top, and started home, moving quickly, in short tight steps, peering into the shadows, listening to the dripping of water, the congested gurgle of clogged sewers. Behind him a powerful engine ground and caught, settling into a restrained hum. Brown walked on, crossing streets quickly, noticing the spaces between the streets not as distance but as time, time left in the swelling drizzle, time before he could sink into bed. He paused at the last corner while the light cycled, then a car rolled past him, stopped across the street from his door. Brown, head down, half-asleep, paid no attention. Yawning, he moved along the sidewalk, stepped down onto the cobblestones of the alley beside the deserted store. He stumbled on the slick surface, cursed, and stopped. From the dark depths of the alley came a low moan.

Brown came wide awake. He stopped, shivering. Leo’s warning echoed in his mind. He had a sudden vision of Rayburn’s razor slicing through the darkness, too quick to be seen. Brown turned away from the alley and stepped toward his own door. The moaning sounded again. Brown stopped, hesitated, cursed, and plunged into the darkness. Ten or fifteen feet into the alley he stumbled over a garbage can and sprawled on the cold cobblestones, fell against something warm, stinking, wet. Brown recoiled, gagging. The something moaned. Brown held his breath, brought his face close.

“Jake?”

Jake gurgled as if his throat had been cut, writhed, coughed, spewed phlegmy blood. Brown stared down in shocked disbelief at the sudden darkness against his white shirt. Jake gurgled again. Brown stepped back. “Don’t worry, Jake, I’ma get help. You stay right there.” Brown backed a few more paces, fighting for his footing. Then he whirled and charged out of the alley, slipping and sliding on the cobblestones. As he emerged he spotted the car parked across the street, silver exhaust streaming from the tail pipe. “Hey!” Brown shouted, charging across the street straight toward the car’s open window. “Help!” With a heavy clunk of engaging gears the car shot away from the curb, fishtailing on the wet pavement. Brown stood in the middle of South Street staring after it. “Paranoid bastard,” Brown muttered. He looked around. The street was empty. Brown went back into the alley. He bent over Jake, wrapped his arms around Jake’s body, lifted him, carried him out to the street. He looked around again, for a phone, a cop, a passing car. There were no phones. There were no cops. There were no cars. Brown felt his mind waver like the ghostly mist that surrounded him. In his arms the wino moaned. Brown turned east and started walking. For two blocks he hurried, but then his feet slipped into a slower rhythm in time with the dripping drizzle, the changing traffic lights, the rasp of Jake’s breathing.

Brown walked on toward the eastern river, his wet shoes squeaking a weird lament, holding Jake’s body tight against him, smelling Jake’s odor, breathing his breath. Cross streets passed in the shining mist and Brown’s teeth chattered with the cold, the effort, the stench of wine and soured blood. Brown, unthinking, ignored the phone booths that stood a block north on each cross street like shining sentinels. He reached Eighth Street, turned north, realizing, when he got to Pine Street, that he had gone too far. He struggled west again, past the manicured lawns sequestered behind iron fences, past the historical marker that said that the Pennsylvania Hospital had been founded in 1751 by Benjamin Franklin. He rounded a corner, saw a red sign that said
EMERGENCY
. He entered an alleyway, found a covered walk. Automatic doors opened inward, slamming back against his arm as he maneuvered Jake inside. Brown cursed. A nurse in a starched white uniform looked up, picked up a phone, and spoke into it before coming out from behind her desk. She pulled a long wheeled cart, draped in white, away from the wall. “Put him here.” Brown lowered Jake onto the cart. An annunciator whispered softly. White-coated attendants materialized and whisked Jake away into the hospital’s gleaming bowels. Brown stood, wet, bloody, confused. “Are you the next of kin?” asked the nurse.