If I Should Die Read online

  She looked at me and laughed. “No, I wasn’t there, never attended and didn’t intend to attend. But his parties were never meant to be secret. Gary never hid anything. He simply did what he wanted because he made millions for his firm. Millions. He was, so to speak, the genuine, original golden boy. Weekend cruises for one hundred of his closest friends and chartered ski trips to Aspen with fifty or so people meant nothing to him.”

  “What happened?”

  “He had managed an investment account which made a lot of money for his company. Then he either got greedy or careless. He bet that certain stock prices would decline, but when the market moved against him, he didn’t cover his risks. Instead, he increased the size of his bet again and again. By the time he was found out, the losses amounted to nearly $145 million. A lot of money. And word had it that he owed someone uptown or somebody uptown owned him and he was trying to buy his way out. Who really knows … He’s gone now and we’ll never know …”

  The filet mignon dissolved on my tongue like butter and the mimosas were served in the largest champagne glasses I’d ever seen. By the second drink, I had resolved to dedicate my life to achieving one goal: becoming rich.

  “But that was a terrible thing to happen to the Chorus, Mali. We’re one of their corporate donors. In fact, it was Gary who approached us. What are their plans now? Do they intend to resume their program?”

  “Yes. Of course they do. It’ll take time to recover from the fallout but I was at a meeting the other day. The Christmas tour is coming up and they’re preparing for it. My nephew’s in the Chorus, that’s why I wanted to speak to you about the director of development. I had heard that he had an uptown connection, but I don’t have a name …”

  “Well, neither do I. The only thing I can tell you is that as wild as Gary was, he was also a nice guy, wouldn’t hurt a fly. Had a loft in SoHo filled with a spectacular collection of African American artwork. He was an early and avid collector. God knows what became of all that.

  “Folks felt sorry when they heard what had happened … but knowing human nature, I don’t know if they were sorry about the way he died or sorry that he went before he could make a comeback and earn them another hundred million.”

  She picked delicately at her food, then caught my gaze and shrugged. “I’m sorry to put it so baldly, but down here, pressure is so great, the dollar will make you holler.”

  Later, I thought about that on the elevator coming down and considered hollering myself. I had spent my monthly allowance to hear that Gary was just a nice guy whose only imperfection was that he had let a couple of hundred million dollars go to his head and much of it up his nose.

  If that was all there was to it, why did someone waste two bullets …

  In the lobby, I said good-bye to Melissa and walked a few blocks to Motor Vehicles to see Barbara, another friend I had grown up with. Although she had left the crowd and married young and now had two boys in high school, we remained telephone friends, playing catch-up in semiannual marathon calls.

  We were glad to see each other now and I got a chance to admire her St. Thomas tan.

  I looked at the vacation photos while she searched the computer for “HO,” and thirty minutes later I left with a small printout of several combinations and the names and addresses of the plates’ owners.

  Tad’s name was there but Johnnie Harding’s name did not come up at all. There was one uptown address for a HONEY vanity plate and I circled that in red.

  chapter fourteen

  For the rest of the week, I talked long and hard to persuade Alvin to return to rehearsals. What with Clarence and Morris out and Erskin no longer there, it was a tough sell.

  Also, I wondered how many other kids would show up. Lloyd’s attitude at the meeting hadn’t exactly endeared him to the parents. Afterward, someone had whispered that he seemed more concerned about the corporate funding than about the kids. But then, since times were hard and with the current city administration acting tight enough to put Scrooge to shame, everyone was scrambling for dollars. The Christmas tour would be Lloyd’s big gamble. Either it puts the group back on top or they’re out of the picture all together.

  Alvin made up his mind after I said I’d walk with him and Dad would be there to bring him home later. I also promised to speak to Mrs. Johnson about Morris, but when we arrived, I was surprised to see him already there.

  “Mr. Lloyd called my mama,” he said.

  “Wonderful. Glad to see you back,” I said, wondering how many others he’d called and what promises he’d made. I counted seventy kids in the auditorium, clustered in noisy knots, and Alvin went to join them.

  I decided to stroll uptown to the Pink Fingernail Beauty Salon hoping that, for a Friday afternoon, it would be crowded enough for me to pick up some gossip. Deborah’s visiting hours were limited to Sundays now that she had been transferred to the rehab institute and I planned to see her then.

  The warm spring air flowed across the wide expanse of Adam Clayton Powell Boulevard, and cars, cabs, trucks, and buses competed for road space as they chased the next light.

  The numbers runners were also out in force. Every few blocks they darted in and out of the three Bs of commerce: the bars, barbershops, and beauty parlors. The runners were mostly the old-timers, well dressed, quiet, and still very efficient.

  I spotted TooHot, a runner from back in the sixties and still going strong. Dad said that at one time folks called this man WeeWillie, but all that changed one day when he popped into the Rock Tavern on 8th Avenue to announce to Sugar, the barmaid, that her ship had come in. Loaded. So get set to party.

  But WeeWillie must have missed a few payments to the precinct and so the law had been waiting in the back booth to slap the bracelets on the minute he opened his mouth to yawn.

  Sugar had blinked toward the rear and yelled, “Shit! It’s too hot!” WeeWillie blinked also, and was gone before the cops had a chance to look his way. The next day, reincarnated as TooHot, he paid off Sugar, took a pass on the party, and a week later resumed business as usual.

  The Rock Tavern was on 8th Avenue around the corner from Minton’s Playhouse. Both are long gone but TooHot, sixty-nine years old, is still taking the single action, partly because a lot of folks still prefer to play the traditional (nontaxable) way.

  I detoured at 145th and walked up the hill past the Bradhurst pool. Its wide white tiles accentuated its emptiness, but in less than a month, the wrought-iron gates would be open and the water would be shimmering under the broad-leafed trees. After many false starts, Benin and I had finally learned to swim here. Alvin had learned much faster because he hadn’t been distracted by the lifeguards the way we had been.

  The hill seemed steeper than I remembered and I strolled, slower, past the crowd emerging from the subway at St. Nicholas Avenue, most of them joining the take-out line of the chicken and chips place next door to the old Brown Bomber bar.

  I passed Convent Avenue Baptist Church and paused to admire a wedding party pulling up in block-long, silver limos.

  On Amsterdam Avenue, the doorway of the Pink Fingernail could be seen a mile away. At the entrance, I lingered long enough to decide what alterations I needed and how long it would take. A shoulder-length hair weave would earn me several hours of gossip but the idea of piling someone else’s hair on my head did not appeal to me.

  I scanned the list in the window again and settled for a “natural mud baked facial mask,” which, according to the large print, was guaranteed to erase laugh lines, frown lines, and signs of stress and aging. Plus, it was cheap.

  Once that miracle was accomplished, and depending on how deep the gossip got, maybe I could stay for a manicure.

  The owner of the HONEY license plate was listed as Maizie Nicholas and her address was the same as the Pink Fingernail, but when I opened the door, I thought I had stumbled by mistake into a Mary Kay Emporium. The salon had a bit more pink than Bertha had described.

  A ballroom-size chandelier with tiny pi
nk shades hung from a gloss-red ceiling, and the floor was carpeted with an abstract swirl of pink tile. The walls were pale pink with dressing-room-style mirrors. Chairs, shampoo bowls, and display cases were varying shades of the color, as were the soda dispenser in the rear and the air-conditioning unit above the door.

  The shop was twice as large as Bertha’s but seemed just as crowded with seven workstations, a dozen hair dryers against the wall, a manicurist’s table, and a chaise lounge near the rear done up in a pale rose pattern.

  Four pink-clad operators were busy when I stepped in and all looked at my hair and flashed me a professional you-need-a-weave-be-with-you-in-a-minute smile.

  I smiled back, letting them know that when I walked out, my hair would not be flowing or glowing. All I was interested in was a facial.

  The thinnest one waved and I hoped she was Viv’s replacement.

  “May I help you?”

  “I don’t have an appointment but I hope you can accommodate me. I’m interested in a facial.”

  “Sure. My name is Maizie. Have a seat and I’ll be with you in a minute.”

  She slid down off the high stool and motioned me to the chaise. I looked at her and at her extraordinary waistline and wondered if she had ever had an X ray or if her doctor simply had her stand near a strong lightbulb when he examined her.

  She was at least my height and must have weighed all of ninety pounds—truly Johnnie Harding material. I always felt fat when I was with Deborah, but looking at Maizie, I felt at least twenty pounds overweight. Bloated was a better word.

  Maizie was not exceptionally pretty, but rather ordinary-looking with shoulder-length hair, regular features, and makeup artfully applied to a medium brown face. Her smile was exceptional and she seemed outgoing.

  “Did anyone recommend you to my place?”

  “No. I saw an ad in the City Sun.”

  She smiled again, brighter. “That’s great. You’re entitled to a discount with the ad.”

  “Well, to be honest, I didn’t bring it with me.”

  “Not to worry. If you mention the ad, you’re still entitled.”

  “Well, thank you.”

  I felt terrible lying about something I never saw. I don’t know why I did it. I must have gotten carried away by all that pink. I made a mental note to read through all my old City Sun copies to make sure she hadn’t caught me out and was playing me along.

  I took a seat and picked up a magazine but was too nervous to read. Every time the door opened, I glanced up. Three more women had come in by appointment only to find their operators working on earlier customers. No one complained and the conversation flowed. The music was low enough for the talk to carry.

  “… and I told ’im, somebody went to the mat with him to knock them three caps off ’cause they was on tight,” the woman in Maizie’s chair said. “And gold too? With that big-ass diamond in it blindin’ you every time he open his mouth? Shit! Couldna been nobody else but his other woman. Anybody else, he’d a sliced ’im and I’d a heard about it by now.”

  “So you think it musta been his other stuff?” Maizie asked sympathetically.

  “Sure do,” the woman said, “and the only reason she survivin’ is because he don’t wanna take them two kids he got by her … He did the right thing ’cause if she die, I sure ain’t takin’ ’em. Got two a my own … you know what I’m sayin’.”

  Maizie nodded. “I hear you, Lexi. It’s tough all the way around.”

  I looked at Lexi as she rose from her seat, stretched, and walked over to get a soda from the machine. Then she settled back in, allowing her soft weight to spill over the sides of the chair. Her arms could not fold across her chest and the double chin and vanilla-pudding face were all the more exaggerated under the elaborate shoulder-length hair weave.

  “Diamonds is okay but you know all that damn gold don’t do nuthin’ but make your breath stink,” Lexi went on. “I’m glad they out even if somebody had to knock ’em out. Ain’t nuthin’ like dog breath when you tryin’ to git a little piece.”

  “Ain’t it the truth,” Maizie said.

  She put the last few waves into the mass of hair, then held a large hand mirror up to allow Lexi to see her handiwork from all angles.

  “Next week, when you come in, I’ll have that auburn piece for you. Right now, I’m fresh out of ’em.” She unfastened the pink towel from Lexi’s neck. “And you tell Nightlife that I said for him to behave—teeth or no teeth.”

  “Aw, his teeth is still in. It’s them caps he still beefin’ about and this happened over a month ago. You’d thought he’d a forgot about it by now. That’s why I think it’s his other woman and he can’t do nuthin’ but talk on it.”

  “Well, don’t let it go gettin’ your pressure up. He ain’t moved nuthin’ out so he’s still your man. Besides, you gotta take care a yourself and your kids first, you know what I mean.”

  “I hear you. See y’all next week.”

  She pressed several bills in Maizie’s hand, waved, and stepped out. I wanted to step out behind her, see where she would lead me, but Maizie beckoned and I moved to the chair.

  “Now, you wanted the stress-erasing facial?” Maizie asked, preferring not to call it a mud pack.

  “Yes.” I looked at my watch. “About how long will it take?”

  “Oh, a little over an hour if you really want it to penetrate the dermis. I see you have very fine pores, so this will take a while to get all the built-up dirt and impurities out.”

  She placed cotton pads over my eyes and turned on a blinding bright light. She examined me closely, and the more she talked, the angrier I felt. Dirt. Impurities. Pores. Crow’s-feet. Already. Lines around my mouth. I was beginning to wonder if I had left my real skin at home and stepped in here covered with crocodile hide.

  I grew depressed, wondering if plastic surgery might not be the answer to all the problems I didn’t know I had.

  When she finally started the process, the mask felt good. Warm, herbal-scented, and thick enough so that when it dried, she warned me to remain still to prevent it from cracking.

  It was hard to stay awake but I’m glad I did because the talk started as soon as the door closed on Lexi.

  “Girl, please. She comin’ back next week for auburn? Gimme a break …”

  “Well, it’s only gonna be a streak.” Maizie smiled, not exactly discouraging the talk.

  The woman who had just taken a seat in the next chair whirled it around to face everyone in the room. “Now, I don’t want you to think I’m raggin’ my girl. I mean we tight, and whatever I say here, I already told her to her face.”

  “I know you did, girlfriend. Y’all go back a long way, but what I can’t see is how she put up with what’s-his-name … Night Owl.”

  “Nightlife. Same thing. Real name is Richard Dillmard. Don’t matter what you call him, that no-good thief ain’t never home where he s’pose to be.”

  “I wouldn’t be home neither if I had to come home and fry that kinda fat.”

  “And where she get that name Lexi from anyway? Sound like somethin’ off a soup can label.”

  “Well, Lexi come from Lexington. Her mama had did time there back in the day. Big-time dope dealer and the judge didn’t give a shit that she was pregnant. Lexi born in federal prison in Lexington, Kentucky.”

  “Damn. That’s one name I’d a changed.”

  “Aw, ain’t nuthin’ wrong with Lexi. Least she didn’t turn out like her mama. She could stand to lose a few pounds but she works her two jobs and takes care a them kids the best she know how. And that man ain’t hardly much help.”

  “Well, what is he doin’ if he in the street? Gotta be into some kinda money.”

  “Well, he into a little a this and a little a that. You know how it is … that is, when he can git out. I heard that when Lexi go to sleep at night, she got that man’s neck in a hammerlock. Ain’t too often he be runnin’ ’round on her.”

  “So when does he see his other stuff?”
>
  “Daytime and early evening. When Lexi workin’.”

  Maizie had gotten quiet and allowed everyone else to talk. I watched her face when the talk centered on what Nightlife actually did for a living. She used the time to rearrange rows of nail polish on the shelf under the manicurist’s table but her eyes reminded me of a quiet cat.

  The subject of Lexi’s problems with Nightlife petered out and the talk turned to other things: getting tickets to Geraldo, and what they would wear to make themselves stand out when the camera swung their way.

  I was ready to leave. I had gotten a name that could be tracked. Nightlife, Richard Dillmard, who had the caps punched out more than a month ago and who had most likely been in that car when Erskin was killed.

  Maizie’s silence told me that she knew Nightlife very well, knew who he worked for, and probably knew the particular work he did.

  I checked my watch. Fifteen more minutes and my face would be free of this steel casing. Right now, my neck and my eyeballs were the only muscles I was permitted to move.

  When the door opened, everyone felt the rush of cool air, and the casual conversation turned off as suddenly as if someone had tightened a water faucet.

  I inched forward slightly in my chair to watch the operators bend attentively to their work. The only spontaneous movement came from Maizie as she walked toward Johnnie Harding, looking as if he had just stepped out of GQ.

  “Hey, baby,” Maizie whispered.

  He said nothing but kissed her lightly on the cheek and beckoned her toward the rear of the shop.

  The aisle leading to the back was wide enough but he still had to pass each workstation. He moved slowly and gazed at each woman in the chairs as he passed. When he approached me, a hollow feeling, an unfamiliar, raw edge of fear, welled up in me.