Gods Go Begging (29 page)

Mrs. Thibault daubed her eyes with a tissue. “Death threat,” she whispered indignantly. “My boy can’t even write.”

At that Eddy walked to the refrigerator, removed a small magnet from the door, and used it to hang up the piece of paper that Jesse had given him in the courtroom. It was Biscuit Boy’s assignment, his paragraph about “A Gathering of Old Men.”

“How did Calvin get his nickname? How did he come to be called the Biscuit Boy?” asked Jesse.

Mrs. Thibault’s face lit up with one of the few smiles that she allotted herself on any given day.

“It was that poor Vietnamese girl over to the luncheonette that went and name him. God rest her soul. Calvin be sweet on her. He be real sweet on her. Here she be my age and all, and he be sweet on her. I must admit, she pretty.” She pulled her hair back with the finger of one hand. “Me … I look twenty years older than that woman, maybe more. Calvin ain’t never killed nobody, much less someone he be sweet on. That boy use to stay up on that street just to get one look at that woman. If he did, he come home all smilin’ and singin‘.”

Just then there was a loud knock on the door. Mrs. Thibault rose to answer it, but two men stepped inside before she could take a step. It was Inspector Normandie and a uniformed officer.

“Good day, ma‘am,” he said with a perfunctory nod. His red face was sweaty and his facial expression was caught somewhere between social awkwardness and a barely subdued look of glee.

“I saw your son’s lawyer walking up here, ma‘am, so I took the liberty of letting myself in. I hope I’m not intruding. This is Sergeant Thompson.” The uniformed officer nodded without smiling. “If you don’t mind, ma’am, I’d like to speak with Mr. Pasadoble for a moment.” The inspector then looked in the direction of the lawyer and said, “We can step outside.”

The inspector and the lawyer stepped onto the front porch and shut the door behind them. Jesse noticed that the sergeant had remained behind. Inside, Eddy and the sergeant were eyeing each other at a discreet distance. Mrs. Thibault had turned on the television.

“You’re a Potrero Hill virgin, ain’t you, a cherry?” grinned the inspector. Jesse’s expression made it clear that he did not understand the comment.

“This is your first time on this anonymous little hill, isn’t it? I saw you cussing up a storm and shaking like a leaf on the way up here. It takes a long time to get used to this place. Took me a couple of years. I’ve got something to show you, counselor. I don’t think the prosecutor will mind if I let you get an early peek at this.”

He reached inside his overcoat and pulled out a zip-top plastic bag that contained a small, folded piece of paper. With the tip of a wooden pencil, the inspector reached inside the bag and carefully unfolded the small sheet. He then handed the bag to the lawyer. He smiled as Jesse lifted the note to his eyes. The inspector was enjoying himself.

“Reggie, you is gonna die jest like the rest of them,” read Jesse aloud. “I swear you be a dead man. Calvin.”

“We haven’t told Mrs. Thibault yet, but we’re pretty sure we’re going to find Angelo the Pickle out there, too.” He nodded toward the hillside and the four open graves.

“We know he’s been missing for a few days now. I must say, counselor, your boy is the worst case I’ve seen in this town since the Night Stalker. As soon as we find that nine-millimeter gun with Calvin’s fingerprints all over it, we’ll have our ballistics tests and we’ll have our special circumstances. The Biscuit Boy is going to fry. Oh, excuse me. I misspoke. We’re doing lethal injections in California now, aren’t we? I hate them goddamn federal courts.”

“You’re crazy if you think Calvin killed these boys,” said a dazed, angered Jesse. “You’re even crazier if you think he would kill his own brother. You and I both know that Little Reggie Harp is the killer.”

“Then who did Reggie?” smiled the Inspector. “Who touched up my man Reggie? Do you think it was a strangulation suicide? As a matter of fact we’re beginning to think that Calvin is the brains behind the killings at the Amazon Luncheonette. It’s true, we haven’t found the gun yet, but that won’t hurt our case and you know it. Shit, the less hard evidence we have, the better off we are. The jury’s just gonna love the cold-blooded execution of two pretty women. All of that bra and panty and bullet testimony … you get my drift.

“Even if he hasn’t got any criminal history, five or six murders will get him the leather restraints and the hypodermic needle. Remember, counselor, the eyewitnesses may not be able to point to a killer, but they do say that two black boys did it and one of those boys is named Calvin.”

Jesse pushed open the door of the apartment and waved Eddy outside. He then reached into the pocket of his coat and removed a tiny recorder. As Eddy said goodbye to Mrs. Thibault, Jesse switched the recorder on, then stated the exact time, date, and location of this conversation as well as the identities of those present.

“Eddy Oasa is present, as well as Inspector Saxon Normandie of San Francisco homicide detail. Inspector Normandie, do you object to my recording this conversation?”

“Hell yes, I do!” shouted the inspector.

“Good!” laughed Jesse, “because you have just verified your presence with that answer. Inspector, I hereby forbid you as well as any member of the homicide detail to have any contact with Calvin Thibault. I forbid anyone to speak to him at your behest. Any handwriting exemplars or physical evidence from his person must be obtained by court order and with notice to me.”

He turned off the recorder, then, after signaling for Eddy to follow, began walking away from the inspector and toward the Amazon Luncheonette. They had gone only about thirty feet when the figure of a woman appeared in a distant doorway. Without knowing why, Jesse walked toward her. As Jesse got closer to the woman in the doorway, the reddish and alabaster blur of her image resolved into the incredible form of a woman wearing a pink strapless evening gown and matching shoes.

Her long, straight hair was done in a combination bubble and flip. From a distance she looked like a middle-aged Josephine Baker or Lena Horne. Up close she looked even better. One leg was straight while the other was just bent at the knee. Her feet were at a perfect ninety-degree angle to one another.

“For your information, counselor, that is Mrs. Harp, the mother of Little Reggie,” shouted the departing inspector, nodding toward the woman. “She’s quite a celebrity around here. Folks say she’s a real Jezebel. Now, I’m as close-minded as the next male chauvinist redneck”—the inspector smiied—“but I sure as hell wouldn’t mind dippin’ my pen in some of that black ink.”

“Jesus!” said Eddy, who shook his head with disgust at the police officer as he turned away. Jesse and his investigator walked toward the woman, stopping at the base of her front porch.

“May we speak with you, ma‘am?” said Eddy with uncommon deference. The inspector’s crude comments were still ringing in his ears.

Without a word, but lifting her slender arm to direct their attention, the woman backed gracefully away from the door to allow the men to enter. What Jesse and Eddy saw inside her apartment stunned them into five long minutes of rapt and complete silence. In every nook and on every wall were row upon row of professional photographs of a young Mrs. Harp. Here she is a prom queen; there she is Miss Montgomery 1976. In another photo she is kissing the winner of a stock car race at the Macon county fair. In another she is shaking hands with Ed Sullivan.

She is everywhere, lounging like a sleepy kitten on the hood of a shiny new Corvette; posing next to a brand new Kelvinator washing machine. Her professional name was once Tawny Mae Harp. Her true name—her maiden name—was Princess Sabine Johnson. In a corner of the kitchen where a stove should have been, there was a locked display case filled with ribbons, trophies, and long-winded testimonials.

“Harp is not my true name. I was never married to Mister Anvil Harp,” she said quietly, allowing her guests to thoroughly peruse every photo. “He was a mistake.” Her voice was breathy and her red lips enunciated every word perfectly. “He was an … Reggie’s father was an indiscretion.”

She moved easily out of one posture and into another, posing in front of photo after photo, gliding to each as if her stiletto heels were sliding on panes of oiled glass. At the same time her hand was uplifted demurely to indicate a particular photograph without actually pointing directly at it. Her raised elbow, slightly bent wrist, and relaxed fingers performed in concert to form a polite suggestion, a mere implication of an indication. Anything more would have been uncouth, unprofessional.

Jesse noticed that there were no photographs of her family or her children anywhere in the home. Except for a selection of emcees and judges in tuxedos and an autographed photo of Bert Parks, no photos of a child or of an adult male were anywhere present.

“I’m sorry about your son,” he heard himself saying.

“This is a photograph from a rodeo in Mobile.” It seemed as though Princess Sabine Johnson Harp had not heard Jesse’s condolences. “It was quite something for a black woman … for a woman of color to be the queen of a rodeo back in 1973. As far as I know, it hadn’t happened before and it hasn’t happened since.”

“I’m sorry about Little Reggie,” repeated Jesse in a forceful but respectful voice. It was something he wanted to express to this woman before asking her any questions. “I’m sorry about your son.”

Her posture slumped; the perfectly held spine and shoulders collapsed visibly. The politely curved elbow drooped; the bent wrist straightened and fell downward. The once arching breasts dipped below the brim of the bodice. The demure smile on Sabine’s perfect face evaporated completely, leaving behind the bare residue of a professional persona.

“I don’t want to talk about Little Reggie Harp,” she said harshly. “There has to be an end to mourning, doesn’t there? Now, gentlemen”—she sighed with exasperation—“pray, let’s continue our tour, shall we?”

Her studied, prize-winning composure returned to her almost immediately. Neither Jesse nor Eddy had seen an iota of grief in her eyes. Perhaps Little Reggie had savaged her along with everyone else on this hill.

“Here I am on the cover of
Ebony
magazine, and here on the cover of
Jet.
My, but I do look rather fatigued in that photo, don’t I? Probably a late dinner and soiree the night before. I was Miss Pike County in 1975 and Miss Coffee Brown in 1974. Why, I was no more than a child when I started winning swimsuit competitions. This is a brand-new shopping center in Tuscaloosa, where I got to cut the ribbon with the mayor, and I shoveled the very first spadeful of dirt. Lord help me, I think I buried His Honor’s left shoe.”

She laughed sweetly and tossed her head to sweep a face full of soft, straight hair to the side and out of her lovely eyes. For the first time she looked directly at the two men who were standing in her hallway. They did not seem to appreciate her awards, her honors. The brilliant smile faded, then disappeared as a look of firm resolve took its place.

She led the two men to a back bedroom that had been converted into a large walk-in closet. Jesse noticed that the unit had originally been designed to be a two-bedroom apartment, yet there was only one bed. He also noticed the bathroom. There was a thin strip of paper stretched across the toilet seat that read “Guaranteed Freshness.” The water glasses on the sink were wrapped in small plastic bags. The tiny soaps were in their wrappers, still unopened. The towels hanging on her racks were all from the Grand Montgomery Hotel.

Near the mirror was a small, two-cup coffeemaker. Jesse looked at Eddy, who had also seen the bathroom. Sabine slid open a door and turned on an overhead light fixture that lit the entire contents of the closet. There were hundreds of dresses, costumes, and bathing suits on rotating racks. One entire wall of the room was hidden behind stack after stack of shoe boxes. Every label was French or Italian. There were no coats or warm jackets. Her entire wardrobe was summer.

“Did Reggie live with you, Mrs. Harp?” asked Eddy. “There is nothing in this apartment that would belong to a man … or a boy. Nothing that I can see.”

Her jaw became tense and jutting. She quickly pulled a bathing suit from its rack and stared at it intently. Slowly, the concern on her face began to melt away.

“Of course he lived here,” she said in an absentminded whisper. “I’m his mother, aren’t I?”

She smiled at the bathing suit as she spoke. It was strictly regulation, one-piece with absolutely no padding in the breast area, not even a smidgen. Completely unmindful of the men in her dressing room, she imagined herself stripping naked and pulling the tight bathing suit onto her body. The image sent chills down her spine. All these years later and it would still fit.

“I can’t help it if he chooses to sleep here and there. I can’t control him anymore.” She smiled mechanically while glancing downward toward her ample breasts. From the time that those two hills had been mere bumps beneath her T-shirts she had wished and cajoled her mammary glands into being. It was clear to both Jesse and Eddy that this woman’s downcast glance at the geography of her chest was one of her favorite views. It was also clear that Sabine had just referred to her dead son in the present tense.

“Did you know any of the other boys who died?” asked Jesse, remembering the task at hand. “Were they friends of Little Reggie?”

“I don’t mix with the people up here,” Sabine answered with impatience and indignation. “This is only a temporary situation. I’ll be leaving here soon. I really don’t belong up here … never belonged up here. Please don’t judge me by this place. People up here are trash.”

The last sentence flew from her mouth like spittle. Seemingly embarrassed by her outburst, Princess Sabine smiled meekly then returned her attention to the bathing suit. She carefully inspected the leg holes, and a look of pride filled her face. Most of the other girls would put two-sided tape in the leg holes to keep the suit from riding up on the thighs. Not Princess Sabine—never.