Paper son, p.10
Paper Son, page 10
Reba came back balancing plates along her arm and set one down in front of each of us. “Y’all enjoy,” she recommended and left.
“Leland certainly seems to have been well-liked,” I said.
Pete nodded. “That’s why I thought what happened, it had to be punks, not something somebody meant to do. I mean, you can see. Who’d want to kill Leland?”
I heard a wobble in Pete’s voice and changed the subject. “Pete, tell me something. I look around, this whole crowd seems to be white, except you and me. Black people don’t come here?”
Pete took a breath and collected himself. “They got places they like better. Shack-Up Inn’s kind of touristy.” Lifting a deep-fried onion ring, he added, “And plus, I imagine they don’t get much of a kick out of the sharecroppers’ shacks.”
The tacos turned out to be delicious: salty, well stuffed, fishy tasting. Bill doctored his with a flood of hot sauce. I’d gotten a side of coleslaw, but that didn’t stop me from reaching to sample a sweet potato fry from Bill’s plate. “You can have some coleslaw,” I offered, which got the response I expected: sarcastic silence.
A gust of cold air accompanied a thin, red-haired white woman and a large, chubby black man through the open door.
“The talent’s here,” Pete announced. “That’s Angel Sewell. She’s Big Bone’s drummer. And there’s the man himself. Hey, Big Bone!”
Angel Sewell picked up a bottle of beer at the bar and climbed onto the stage, to do whatever drummers do to their drums before a show. Big Bone Stafford, greeting people as he lumbered through the room, turned at Pete’s shout. He lifted his beer and made his way toward us.
“Set yourself down,” Pete invited, and the big man did, descending into the empty chair at our table.
“Pete, glad to see you. Real sorry about Leland, you know that. Fine man, he was. And Jefferson, him being arrested, that don’t make no sense.”
“Amen,” said Pete. “Big Bone, this here’s my cousin Lydia and her partner Bill, down from New York.”
“Welcome to Mississippi, y’all. Come to be with Pete? This family thing all y’all Chinese got going, lots of others could take a lesson.” Stafford shook his head.
“We got no patent on it, Big Bone. Nice, though.” Pete beamed at me. “But much as I appreciate the company, they’ve got another reason for being here, too. Lydia and Bill, they’re private eyes, come to see if there’s anything they can do for Jefferson.”
“Private eyes?” Pulling on his beer, Big Bone Stafford looked at me and then at Bill. “Can’t recall as I ever met a private eye before. But I can see the boy might need help, especially in view of how he went and let himself out of jail.”
“You heard?” Pete said.
“News travels, son. Law’s been looking high and low.”
“Well, I’m hoping Lydia and Bill can maybe find him before the law does. Big Bone, they got a couple of questions for you. If you got time?”
Big Bone Stafford shrugged. “Show don’t start till I’m onstage. Barely know Jefferson, though. Don’t see what help I can give.”
“Thanks,” I said. “It’s this: Jefferson was in Burcell a few days ago.”
“That so?” Big Bone lowered his beer and looked at Pete.
“Seems to be.”
I said, “We don’t know why. We’re told Burcell’s a meth-cooking town, but Bill and I haven’t been there yet. Pete says you live out that way, in Oldman’s Brake. Can you tell us about Burcell? Is there another reason Jefferson could have had for going there?”
“First off,” said Big Bone, “I don’t like that ‘yet.’ Y’all ain’t been there, don’t go there. Yeah, they’s a few folks in Burcell not in the meth trade. They’d be three or four old families and they know enough to steer clear of Fisheye Ferguson—including they wouldn’t be inviting outsiders in. Some one of them had business with Jefferson, they’d come out, meet him in Clarksdale, or either at the mall. Sad to say, outsider like him, can’t think of no other reason he’d go down there, no.”
“Fisheye Ferguson?” Bill asked.
Big Bone drank some beer. “Runs the place, with a couple sons and cousins. Knows what goes on in his town, who’s there and who’s elsewhere. Folks there, they’re in the business. Folks from there don’t want to be in the business, best be elsewhere. It’s my understanding his boy Johnny and a couple others in that generation are studying on diversifying some, but to Fisheye’s mind, they got a good thing going, why mess with it?”
“And what about people in your town? You don’t go there?”
“Us from Oldman’s Brake, we pass through because the road do, but we don’t stop there. Fisheye and his kin, they know us, don’t bother us none. Don’t none of us want to get tangled up with them. Last time someone done that, it was old Miz McAdoo’s son Trevor. Didn’t work out so good.”
“Someone mentioned Trevor today,” I said, turning to Pete, who nodded. “And we saw his brother, Tremaine.”
“Ain’t y’all lucky.”
“They work for the Fergusons?”
Stafford shook his head. “No, ma’am. Trevor was fixing to, couple of years back. Wanted to deal retail. Word was, there was disagreements. Some of the younger Fergusons was against it.”
“But you said they’re thinking about diversifying.”
“The business, not who work in it. They looking to see what else they can be doing besides from what they are. Mighta been okay with shifting weight from production to retail if it wasn’t for Trevor being black. On the other side, Fisheye, he don’t care for diversifying product. His thinking, they understand the meth business, why go into anything else? But it seem he don’t mind who he got working for him if he’s gonna make money off it. Especially when he’s looking at a whole crop of black customers nobody ain’t reached yet. See, y’all, meth’s a white drug ’round here. Black people got other sins, but so far, not that one. You bring a black man into the meth trade, could be there’s money to be made.”
“But it didn’t work out?”
“Law got wind of what Trevor was doing, come after him. Some say it was a young Ferguson dropped the dime.”
“Even though it could lead back to them?”
“Could’ve, if anyone’d thought to ask.” The curl of Big Bone Stafford’s lip made clear that he meant “thought to ask” in the same way Pete meant “bless their hearts.” “So Trevor, ’cause the boy was born stupid and never did see no reason to change, he tried to shoot his way out. Plugged a deputy in the chest. Man survived, but a black drug dealer shooting a white lawman in Coahoma County—well, Devil’ll be ice-skating the day Trevor gets out of Parchman.”
“What about Tremaine?”
“Tremaine, he didn’t like Trevor messing with the Fergusons to begin with. He have a better idea. Tremaine the type always have a better idea, long as it don’t involve him doing no actual work. Tremaine went and set hisself up in what you might call a related business. Now he deal any kind of poison, long as it ain’t meth. See if he can’t steal some of Fisheye’s customers. Fergusons ain’t happy, even though Tremaine, he too parboiled lazy to be any kind of real threat. The law ain’t happy neither, ’cause now in addition to meth, we got a local selling horse, coke, crack, and all. Used to be, you had to go to Greenville, or either Memphis, to score any of that.”
“So what you’re saying is Trevor McAdoo was working for the Fergusons once, and his brother Tremaine’s working against them now.”
“What I’m saying is,” Big Bone Stafford said, “don’t go down to Burcell. Fisheye Ferguson’ll eat y’all alive.” He finished his beer. “Besides, y’all got no call to go. If Jefferson Tam was there, what else is it gonna be about? And whatever it was, not a soul in Burcell gonna tell y’all a word of truth about it anyhow.”
Bill looked thoughtful. “Okay,” he said. “What about this, though—you said Fergusons who don’t want to be in the business better be elsewhere. Are there some?”
Big Bone nodded. “Some folks, even Fergusons, got no stomach for the meth trade. Fisheye’s daughter, Anna Rae, left last year, went on over to Oxford, to Ole Miss. Fisheye don’t see no need for college—ain’t no one else in the family ever been near one—but she’s a smart little thing, Anna Rae, and he never could say no to that girl. He have a nephew, Ricky, in Atlanta, I believe, and a cousin, don’t recall his name nor where he went to. All of ’em was back for Thanksgiving, likely they coming home for Christmas. Fisheye likes his family around on holidays, calls a truce on the deserters. But that’s his rule. Anyone not in deep, they can get out, but that means out. Too deep, of course they can’t.”
Big Bone stood. “Look, good luck, y’all. Hope you can do something for Jefferson, though I got to say, this Burcell business, it don’t look good. I’m not blowing smoke about Burcell, about Fisheye Ferguson neither. Pete, you gonna make sure they understand that?”
“Yeah, Big Bone, I will. Thanks.”
Big Bone nodded. “Enjoy the show.” He signaled the bartender for another beer and climbed the stage steps.
17
We sat through the first set in silence. Big Bone Stafford’s deep voice boomed, whispered, howled, and purred. Angel Sewell’s drums gave us a soft swishing like rain in the cottonwoods, sometimes a steady beat, all the way up to a thundering pound. The music didn’t mean much to me—classical, jazz, and blues are Bill’s department; I’m more of a pop, punk, and Chinese opera girl, myself—but I enjoyed the look on Bill’s face. I could tell he was following subtleties I didn’t hear, making connections I couldn’t find.
When the musicians took a break, Bill turned his chair back around to the table.
“You like our music, I see,” Pete said.
“I sure do.” Bill clinked his beer bottle on Pete’s.
“And you, Cousin Lydia?”
“I don’t know anything about it, but I’m enjoying it.”
“Big Bone, he’s the best. They got a couple of young guys coming up, they’re pretty good, but I don’t know that they’ll ever be what this generation is. But listen, y’all . . .” Pete trailed off.
“Yes,” I said.
“Me, too,” Bill agreed.
“Yes, what? You, too, what?”
“You were going to ask if we think Jefferson might be hiding in Burcell,” I said. “We do.”
“But—”
“Yes to that, too. If someone in Burcell spent all that time and money helping him put this escape together, it must mean he’s worth a lot to them. Which doesn’t sound good.”
“Not good at all,” Pete agreed. He looked at Bill. “This the ‘guilty of something else’ you mentioned back at the house?”
“I don’t know,” Bill said. “It’s just that, in my experience, things are usually a lot more complicated than they look.”
Pete didn’t answer, and neither did I. After another minute, Bill spoke again. “As I see it, we have three options. One, we drive over to Burcell first thing in the morning and ask Fisheye Ferguson where the hell Jefferson Tam is.” He looked at Pete. “Why do they call him Fisheye?”
“Got one of those walleyes, so he can be staring you down over here when he’s looking over there. And you don’t mind me saying so, that idea’s a stinker.”
“I think so, too. Two, we could tell the sheriff why we think Jefferson’s in Burcell and let him go do the dirty work.”
“That,” Pete put down his beer, “stinks worse, because it’s got more reasons for stinking. Sheriff finds out the Fergusons broke Jefferson out and stashed him in Burcell, he’ll go in there guns blazing. And plus, that friend of Jefferson’s, Tolson Reeves, what he told you about the law, everyone knows that. Sheriff’s department, or maybe it’s the Clarksdale PD, someone’s got a leaky pipeline. Law goes into Burcell to flush out Jefferson, could be they’ll shoot up the place and never even see his tail disappearing through the cotton.”
“And of course,” said Bill, “there’s the possibility he’s not there.”
“There is,” I said. “Still, it’s our best lead. Even if he’s not, I’d like to know why he was two weeks ago.”
“I would, too. So I’d say—”
“—we need to find a deserter. And since Oxford’s closer than Atlanta, and daughter’s closer than nephew—”
“—first thing in the morning, we go up to Oxford and talk to Anna Rae Ferguson.”
Pete stared at us. “This how you big-city detectives work? List all kinds of dumb things you’re not going to do, and then come up with the one that’s so obvious, if it was a snake it would’ve bit you?”
“Generally.”
“All the time.”
“Well, hell. Where do I get my license?”
We stayed for the second set, and then exhaustion hit. At least, it hit me; Bill would’ve stayed all night. As we left, he thanked Big Bone and dropped a twenty in the mason jar at the front of the stage.
We were crossing the lot when Pete’s phone rang. “You got Pete Tam. Yeah, Pelton, hi. What?” He stopped walking. “Son of a— Well, that’s great, they did that. Thanks, Pelton. Yeah, I’ll be right by, I got the key. Thanks, thanks, tell the guys I appreciate it.”
“What’s up?” I asked when he clicked off.
“Those siren locks? They work. One of them went off just now. That was Pelton Dawes. Alarm started shrieking, bunch of the guys from the Down Home Club piled out, saw a car peeling down the street. They walked around the store, and everything seemed okay. Pelton wants to know can I come turn the damn thing off now. Says it’s loud as hell.”
“Someone tried to break in again?” I looked at Bill. “So maybe they didn’t find what they were looking for the first time?”
“And they came back because—?”
“Maybe they have new information.” I didn’t want to say it, but I did. “From Jefferson.”
“Now hold on a minute,” Pete said. “You don’t mind me saying so, you might be doing a bit too much detecting. Store’s empty three days now, whole thing’s been in the papers, number one in the gossip. That’s like putting up a neon ‘rob me’ sign. This is most likely just some of those punks.”
“Could be, Pete,” I said.
“Yeah, I can tell you don’t believe it for a minute. But anyhow, whoever it was, they’re gone and us standing here isn’t getting that alarm turned off.”
We drove over to H. Tam and Sons. From a few blocks away, we could hear an electronic screech slicing through the night. When we pulled up, the door to the Down Home Club was open. A shadow stepped out onto the sidewalk.
Pete waved as he got out of the car. “It’s okay, Duverne, it’s me.”
The shadow, now a man standing under the streetlight, waved back. “Damn good thing you here. That thing driving me to drink.” He lifted his beer, gave a gap-toothed grin, and headed back into the club.
Bill and I followed Pete around the back. He punched a combination into the screaming lock and peace flowed in like a river.
“I’m going in the store,” Pete said. “See if I can’t find some unsquashed bags of chips to carry over to the club, thank them for keeping an ear on the place.”
“Pete,” said Bill, eyeing the club door as we came back around. “They would’ve been open last night, right? Maybe someone saw something.”
Pete looked at Bill. “You mean, the break-in? Never even thought of that. Could be I’m not ready for that license. But you want to go in there, ask questions?”
“It’s the logical thing to do,” I said.
“Yankee logic. Down Home Club, like I say, they don’t take to outsiders.” He looked at Bill. “Particularly, they don’t take to white outsiders.”
I said, “They seem to like you, Pete.”
“Yeah, well, they could get over that fast, I bring ’em the wrong guests. Still, you’re right.” He paused. “I guess I could go in there myself and ask, but we just now found out I’m not much of a detective. And anyway, they saw you already. I go on in and leave you out here, they’ll wonder what we’re up to.” He rubbed his chin. “All right. But Bill, I notice your way of speaking, it gets more and less Southern, depending on . . . well, I’m not sure what. Can you bleach the South all out of it?”
Bill grinned. “Ya askin’ me ta give ya Brooklyn? Or eez thet you vant somevere in da Ukraine?”
Pete snorted. “You mean, a choice between Goodfellas or Dracula? Just talk like a normal Yankee.” He entered H. Tam and Sons and stopped. “You’re not neither of you carrying a gun, are you?”
“We’re not licensed down here,” I said.
“I notice how that doesn’t answer the question.”
I smiled. “No, it doesn’t. But no, I’m not.”
“Me, either,” said Bill.
“All righty, then.”
We did a quick check inside the store to make sure the would-be intruders had not, in fact, gotten in. Hard to tell, but the mess looked the same and the windows were locked and bolted. We managed to find three undamaged, family-sized bags of potato chips and one of pretzels, and a few cans of peanuts. Pete clutched them in his arms, we locked up, and we crossed the street to the Down Home Club.
18
The faces that turned to us when we creaked open the Down Home Club’s door did not look welcoming. Pete went first, bearing gifts, then me, then Bill. In the dim light, I took note of the scarred bar on my left, the card tables and mismatched chairs scattered around the room, the haze of smoke and the beery smell. I searched the shadows for Tremaine McAdoo, the only person I knew to expect in this place, but I didn’t see him.
A woman’s gravelly voice spilled out of speakers hung from the patched and painted ceiling, singing about her no-good man. No actual women were in evidence. The eyes of the bartender and the men at the tables, maybe a dozen altogether, narrowed when they saw Pete; and when they saw me and Bill, mouths hardened and shoulders tightened.
“Pete—” began the man behind the bar.
“Now, now, Pelton, hear me out before you throw me out.”
Since I recognized Pelton as the man who’d been hotly arguing with Tremaine McAdoo earlier, I had no doubt he would, in fact, throw us out if moved to do so.
