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  She reflected. “And yeah, maybe I thought that I’d be the one, you know? The woman he finally decided to stay with.” She ground out her cigarette. “Boy, was I wrong.”

  She offered me a glass of water. I declined and she poured herself one. “He was really nice at the beginning. I didn’t even mind doing those crazy things he wanted me to.”

  “What things?”

  She was embarrassed. “Look, it’s the kind of stuff you don’t mind doing at the time, but you can’t believe you did later, okay? I didn’t enjoy it. But I went along ‘cause it turned him on and I really liked that, you know, the idea that I could turn on such an important man.”

  “Look, Mabel. I know what a woman will do to please a man—and I know how he can make you feel afterward. So you won’t be getting any criticism from me. Now tell me, what did he ask for?”

  She chewed on her lower lip. “It could make a difference with you looking for this girl you told me about?”

  “Maybe.”

  She thought about it. “Let’s just say that he … he liked doing things that hurt.”

  “Hurt bad?”

  She nodded.

  “And you never talked to anyone else about this?”

  Her jaw hardened. “Suppose I had? Then what? It would’ve been my word against his. He would’ve said he didn’t have nothing to do with me, and everybody would’ve believed him.”

  I nodded. “You’re probably right.”

  “You damn tootin’, I am.” She took a sip of water. “You sure you don’t want nothing? If you don’t like water, I got something stronger.”

  “Okay, thanks. But water will be fine.”

  Mabel had put up a brave effort to resist the despair of her environment. At first I thought she was succeeding, but the longer I sat with her and the more I listened, the more I worried. As young as she was, Mabel looked about ready to give up.

  “I been looking for work,” she said.

  “For how long?”

  “Too long.” She looked out her window, at the hookers on the corner, and spoke in a rush of bitterness. “My friends say I was stupid to be giving it away. ‘Specially to a big muckety-muck like Sexton. If I got to be beat and suck his sausage, then I should’ve gotten paid for it.” She looked at me. “You think I’m a nasty girl for saying that?”

  “No. But it doesn’t matter what I think.”

  She looked away, but not in time to hide her tears. “He broke something inside me. Every time he …” She bit down her lip. “Every time he took his fists and …” Silent tears slipped from her eyes.

  I handed her a handkerchief. She wiped her eyes and sniffed.

  “How long did it go on?” I asked.

  “He was nice for ‘bout two weeks. I was stone cold in love with him. The things I let him do—and that I did.” She swallowed. “Two weeks, and then …” A little shake of the head. “And then I don’t know. He wasn’t never the same man no more.”

  “You decided to stop seeing him?”

  “I went with him for about two months in all. Two sickening months.” She hugged herself, cleared her throat. “One day he asked me to do something. It was so scary, I wouldn’t do it.”

  “Do what?”

  “He wanted me to … to string him up, you know? With a rope. Hang him—I mean, really hang him. Can you imagine? And he was gonna put on my underwear and make me …” She shuddered, waved her words away, and didn’t finish.

  “It’s okay. It’s all right.”

  Some kids went by outside, chasing a ball and yelling happily at one another.

  “Was that when you said—”

  “Yeah, I—I couldn’t go on like that. And man, oh, man was he angry. The funny thing is, I don’t think it was ‘cause he was hurt ‘bout me wanting to leave ‘im. It was more like, how dare I? That day, the day I tried to leave him, he beat me, beat me bad. There’d been other times, but never like that.”

  “Was it him—or this Mr. Echo?”

  “So Hilda told you about him, too?”

  “Warned me.”

  “He and Sexton belong together, two evil peas in a pod. But Sexton never let Echo touch me. He said he wanted to save that for himself. Beating the shit out of me was his own special pleasure.” She gave a little grunt. “He actually said that. And I was dumb enough to think it was a compliment.”

  “And you told no one.”

  “Hell, no. I was so ashamed. And scared. He made me promise, at the very beginning, not to tell nobody. If I wanted to be with him, then that’s what I had to do. But I didn’t mind. That kinda made it more fun. I thought.” She gave a weak little grin. “Wasn’t I the fool?”

  “Tell me about that last day.”

  She drew a deep breath. “I went to work. I knew he’d been following me home, but I thought he’d stop. So I went out with some friends after work. Afterward, we split up. I was about a block away from the house when I looked down and there he was, in the car, telling me to get in. I told him I didn’t want to. He said he was sorry he’d hurt me, that he wouldn’t ask me to do stuff like that no more. I said I didn’t believe him. Then he said that if I didn’t get in, and give him what he wanted, he’d make sure I lost my job. So I got in.”

  She blinked back her tears. “The funny thing is, I let him fuck me and beat me and he took my job, anyway.”

  She wasn’t going to get any criticism from me.

  “Mabel, will you go on the record?”

  She thought about it and shook her head. “I don’t think so. I’m not ready to do that.”

  “Why not? What have you got left to lose?”

  “My life.” Her eyes were somber.

  “Do you really think …?”

  “Oh, yeah.” She nodded. “You don’t know. You just don’t know.” She reached out to me. “So please don’t let him know I been talking to you. Please don’t say a word.”

  I promised, thinking how lucky I’d been to have had Hamp, and how I couldn’t leave her like this, not without trying to do something to help. Then it came to me.

  “Mabel,” I said, “I have an idea.”

  Chapter 18

  “I’ll always love you.” Hamp’s voice. His warmth. My eyes snapped open. I blinked and looked to my right, where Hamp had always slept. His place was empty. Of course it was. His pillow was in disarray, but only because I had hugged it in my sleep.

  Still half asleep, I rose up on my elbows and looked around our bedroom with groggy eyes, half aware of the early morning street sounds outside. His presence had been so real—for a moment, more real than my surroundings.

  I flopped back down with a sigh and stared at the ceiling. Which was the dream? This empty house and empty bed, or the loving words and comforting closeness? Three and a half years since Hamp’s death and still his voice came to me. Three and a half long years …

  Turning on my side, I curled up and drew the blankets to my chin. Hamp’s photo gazed back at me from my bedside table. Childhood sweethearts, we’d known each other all our lives. The strong thread of Hamp’s life was interwoven with mine as far back as I could remember. When his thread snapped on that hot July night, I felt as though the entire fabric of my life would unravel.

  “I miss you, babe,” I whispered. “I miss you so much.” Briefly, I closed my eyes, and said a prayer, then forced myself to get up.

  It was a quiet Sunday. After washing and setting my hair, I wrote Christmas cards, mailed them off and settled in for several peaceful hours of reading The Amsterdam News and The New York Times. The Times was full of talk about the Allies ending arms control over Germany and Britain’s plans for China. I skimmed those articles but read every word of a lengthy piece by Edward Smith on crime and chemistry. The report said that new laboratory techniques were an “often uncanny means” of furnishing detectives with evidence of guilt. I paused, wondering. If the techniques had been available when Esther disappeared, would they have made a difference? Hard to say, but I had a feeling that good old horse sens
e was the key to Esther’s case.

  It was an article about a war widow that finally made me put the paper aside. This woman’s husband had never returned from the war, but as long as she didn’t know what had happened to him, as long as he was still listed as ‘missing,’ she couldn’t give up hope. Hope, she said, had become a curse, one that caused her to live in an endless limbo. That reminded me of Mrs. Todd, lying in her bed of pain.

  “If only I knew,” she’d whispered. “Please, God, if I only knew.”

  * * *

  On Monday, back in the newsroom, I dialed COLumbus-8284, the Collector’s office. I expected Hilda Coleman to come on the line, but Whitfield himself picked up. I identified myself, reminded him that we’d met before and exchanged pleasantries.

  “I’m calling about Esther,” I said. “Esther Todd.”

  “Esther …” he repeated with surprise.

  “You do you remember her?”

  “Well, actually, no.” He gave an uneasy chuckle. “But of course, I meet so many people. Who was she?”

  Not who is she? But who was she?

  “I have a newspaper story here, describing a dinner party at Katherine Goodfellowe’s house in September of ‘23. Esther Todd entertained the guests by playing the piano. The story says you were there. There weren’t that many people. You must’ve met her.”

  “Maybe I did, but I don’t remember her. Why are you asking?”

  It was hard to believe him. Even if he didn’t remember Esther from the party, he should’ve remembered her name because of the heist and its notoriety. I reminded him of the case and explained my interest in it.

  “There’s a new theory,” I said, “that her disappearance was the related to a secret admirer.”

  “How interesting. But what has this got to do with me?”

  When I explained, he reverted to a flat denial. “I told you. I never met her—and whoever told you anything different is lying.”

  “I should tell you that I will keep digging. I will find out if—”

  “Look, I’m sorry to hear what happened to Miss Todd, but I can’t help you. My sympathies go to her family. I wish them God’s blessings. Did you get all that down?”

  “Every blessed word.”

  “Good.”

  He sounded relieved. But I wasn’t about to let him off so easily.

  “There’s another matter you should know about. I’ve spoken to someone who says she was your paramour. She’s told me that …”

  I filled him in. He was apoplectic.

  “Lies! All damnable lies! I know who you’re talking about. Yes, she was fired. She couldn’t do her job. She was crazy. Told everyone that she was my mistress. I had to let her go. I couldn’t afford to have someone like her around me, around this office.”

  I made notes. “So you deny hitting her?”

  “I’ve never hit anyone.”

  “You deny forcing her to perform intimate acts with you?”

  “My God! I don’t believe this. Mrs. Price, I thought you were better than this—that we were friends. I—”

  “I’m nobody’s friend, not when they stand between me and the truth.”

  There was an icy pause. Then came a question, thick with rage: “Are you threatening me?”

  “I’m giving you a chance to clarify matters.”

  Whitfield drew a deep breath. “I’ve never committed violence against her or anyone else. Anyone who says anything to the contrary is a liar. I won’t have my reputation sullied by some stupid, silly woman. I won’t have my name associated with crime or dirtied by innuendo. You print a word of what she says and I’ll sue you and your paper so fast you won’t know what hit you. Got that?”

  Before I could answer, I heard a click. He was gone. His reaction was more or less what I’d expected. I put the receiver on its cradle and the phone jangled. It was Bellamy.

  “Oh, hello,” I said, surprised.

  “I was wondering how your investigation is going.”

  “I’m not investigating anything, just trying to find new material.”

  “Fine. I won’t argue. So, did you find out anything?”

  “Maybe.” Cradling the phone between head and shoulder, I reached for a blank sheet of paper and slid it into the Underwood.

  “Come on, tell me.”

  “I’m afraid you’re going to have to wait, just like everybody else.”

  “I’m not everybody.”

  I didn’t answer. Just started typing. Loudly. He muttered an oath.

  “Wow! You sound like a Tommy gun.”

  “Really? I’m sorry,” I said, and pounded the keys harder.

  “Just tell me one thing.”

  “What?”

  “Did you get anywhere with the boyfriend angle? I mean, I know it’s not likely but …”

  I stopped typing and took the phone in my hand. “Look, I’ve got to pull my notes together and I can’t do that if I’m on the phone with you.”

  “So answer my question and I’ll get lost.”

  I thought about it. “Okay, I’ll tell you this: I’ve got a line on a man who might’ve been Esther’s friend. I won’t give you his name—”

  “Why not? Maybe I know him.”

  That was something to consider. It went against gut instinct to share information before it went to print, but what was I worried about? He wasn’t likely to tip off another reporter—and suppose he had another piece of the puzzle?

  “Sexton Whitfield. The name mean anything to you?”

  A pause, then the answer, a bit mystified. “Can’t say it does. Who is he?”

  I told him Whitfield's title.

  “You mean she was dating a white guy?”

  “Not at all.” I could feel his surprise at the thought that a colored man held such a high position.

  “You’ve talked to him?” he asked. “Learned a lot?”

  “A number of things. But nothing concrete.”

  “You going to write about him?”

  “Maybe. There’re some angles I want to check out.”

  “Like what?”

  I glanced at the clock. It was getting late and I had work to do. “Sorry, but I gotta go. Tell you what? Why don’t read the column when it comes out?”

  “I sure will,” he said and hung up.

  Chapter 19

  It took another hour to write a first draft of the column. It led with a section on Esther, followed by a second section on the film festival, with Evelyn’s quotes, and a few lines on the party at the Walter Whites. I wrote the second half in under ten minutes. It was the first part, the paragraphs on Esther where I took my time.

  How far should I go in identifying Whitfield and describing his role in Esther’s life? I could present a convincing case for Esther having been kidnapped by a jealous admirer. Did I dare hint at Whitfield as “an admirer?” I knew I dared not label him as her intimate associate or imply that he was behind her disappearance. I had innuendo and gossip, but nothing concrete.

  Maybe, I would talk to Sam about it over dinner.

  * * *

  I got to the Bamboo Inn at six o’clock on the dot and waved at the large tuxedo-dressed bouncer at the door.

  “Hi Henry.”

  “How you doin’, Miss Lanie?”

  Big Henry had a soft voice and gentle Southern accent, beefy arms and broad shoulders. He had a sweet nature, but he’d deck you in a second if you got smart with him.

  “Mr. Delaney here yet?”

  “He’s upstairs. Got a nice table, too.” Henry gave me an amused smile, revealing a large gap between his two front teeth. He was such a romantic. “You have a good night, now.”

  “Thank you, Henry.” I slipped past him with a nod. “Merry Christmas.”

  “You, too, Miss Lanie.”

  The Bamboo Inn was lovely and popular, with balcony booths overlooking a spacious dance floor, but it was more than just a pretty face. It offered some of the best Chinese food in Harlem, at decent prices, too. And live music wit
h no cover charge. Henri Saporo’s Orchestra played nightly and the club was a great place to hear jazz improv.

  If you wanted to see “high Harlem,” or aspired to be a part of it, then this was one of the places to go. The guests weren’t necessarily highbrow, but definitely a cut above the rest. Debutantes booked the place for cotillions. College kids took their girls on a spin around the dance floor. The diners were well-dressed men with high-tone women. There were lots of models from Vanity Fair, lots of beautiful people from different races, some as black as jet, others as pale as alabaster and lots of sepia and mahogany in between: lawyers, architects, doctors, councilmen, the Astors and their darlings, Asian men who brought their porcelain dolls to mingle with Harlem’s “better set.” The crowd included a few gangsters, but they too were well-mannered, well-dressed, well-shod. A few were carrying, but the guns and hip flasks were tucked away. The laughter was well-bred, genuine but muted.

  I’d been to the Bamboo many times, but mostly on business, to do the kind of one-on-one I couldn’t do at parties. The thought that I was there to have dinner with my boss took getting used to. I wasn’t sure what he expected or wanted. He wasn’t like our old boss. That was clear. But in a way, that made matters worse. Because if Sam was interested, then he was really interested. Only I didn’t know what to do with a man’s interest. It had been so very long …

  I decided to be neutral and businesslike. And see what happened.

  A waiter showed me to Sam. Just as Henry said, Sam had managed to get one the prized booths in a balcony. He was studying the other diners. His grooming was perfect. From the close cut salt and pepper hair to the buffed fingernails and tailored suit and tie, Sam was clean. He always made a good presentation in his business clothes, but for tonight’s appearance he’d taken extra care to fix himself up nice. The result was … well, I had to admit it: Sam Delaney was one fine-looking sheik. There was strength in his shoulders and honesty in his eyes. He was kind and, beneath his caution, compassionate: a solid combination. Any woman in her right mind couldn’t help but be aware of it. And most women would respond to it. But I wasn’t “most women.” I didn’t want to respond to it. I didn’t remember how, and I wasn’t sure I wanted to.