If I Should Die Read online

  “I can’t, Deborah. Too many things have happened already.”

  “Too many things like what?”

  “I don’t know for sure, that’s why I can’t say …”

  I glanced at her face and saw the same inquisitive look she’d worn since we were teenagers. I wished I could tell her more but there was no point in involving anyone else.

  “You know,” she smiled, dipping back into the bag of fries, “when you left the force, I listened to your howling for weeks, but let me tell you now. I was damn glad. You were meant for better things, Mali. We went all through school together. Sweated the exams, trudged up this hill in all kinds of weather, gave up the discos to sit through summer school. And who liked to shake their booty more than you and you gave it all up to hit the books. What was the point of it? What was the point of earning a degree in sociology just to become a damn cop? A GED would’ve gotten you the same job.”

  “You know as well as I do why I joined the force,” I said, trying to keep my voice even. “You remember that night we were walking down that very hill from school, and less than a block from here, we saw the cops, three of them, beating that brother, pressing his face into that chain-link fence with the heels of their shoes, using their flashlights on his head. You remember how he looked? His hands cuffed and his face a crisscross of swollen welts?

  “And you remember how we screamed? Two women with nothing but our books in our arms and our loud mouths … and screaming all the louder when the cops moved toward us, calling us bitches, asking what the fuck we were looking at? Remember?”

  Memory churned up an anger in me that I thought had grown cold, but as I spoke now, it spread to my throat, so hot and thick I couldn’t swallow. I put the sandwich down and turned to stare directly at Deborah, but she was looking across the avenue at the classroom on the third floor facing the park. Our old seventh-grade room where we had not yet learned the meaning of the limitations of blackness.

  “That wasn’t fair, Mali. I had nightmares for years after. I tried hard to forget that night.”

  “Well, I tried hard not to forget. I’ll never forget it. They were coming for us because we saw what they did and we backed away and they surrounded us, remember? And the only reason we’re alive today, I believe, is because other students heard our screams and had run down the hill. And the people came out of that building across the avenue. Came out in bathrobes and house slippers and curlers. Dog walkers showed up. And the cops knew they couldn’t do away with fifty witnesses. So they called for backup and yelled riot.

  “I joined the force because I thought I could work to make sure nothing like that happened again—at least not on my watch.”

  “But look,” she said, turning to me. “What you really joined was a force dedicated to one thing: keeping the natives in check. The tighter, the better. How long would you have lasted if you hadn’t hit that cop? Now you’re off the force. You were fired and you still want to play Dick Tracy. Like I told you earlier, sometimes you have to change the world before you can change the neighborhood.”

  “Well, maybe I should join the Peace Corps?”

  She saw my changing expression and held up her hand. “I didn’t say that. But you’re back in school and I’m glad. I really am. Social work is your life. Ever since I can remember, you’ve wanted to change things. An advanced degree will make it easier.”

  I wasn’t so sure how much easier it’d be, but I bit my tongue and remained silent as she continued. “And this cops-and-robbers thing, I think it goes a little beyond your concern for Alvin.”

  I looked away. It was too simple to say that Erskin had been very special to me or that he didn’t deserve to die the way he did. I wondered if I should try to explain what I had felt, kneeling that day in the rain, my feelings floating somewhere between sister love and something deeper, and brushing my fingers over his face to close his eyes. How could I tell her that when I hold my hands together, I still feel the feathery lightness of his lashes against my palm?

  “Whatever I’m doing,” I said, “I’ll clue you when the game’s over, okay?”

  Friends, close friends especially, seem to have a knack for stepping on my last damn nerve.

  Deborah saw this and made a big show of looking at her watch.

  “For heaven’s sakes, where does the hour go? Have to get back, girl. I’ll call as soon as I’ve dug up something. Remember what I said … be careful.”

  I watched her walk away and I sat a few minutes longer trying to collect my thoughts.

  … Shake my booty. What did she expect? I came by it naturally enough. Not too many people can brag that their mother had been a dancer with Katherine Dunham’s company. And Mom only quit when she married Dad.

  I opened my book again but the print on the page kept sliding away. I glanced at the cracked sidewalk and at the pigeons picking among the small patches of new grass poking through. No one strolled by and I wondered where all the people were, even though most honest folks were downtown, working at jobs they probably hated.

  I felt a slight twinge of depression. “Depression,” Mama once said, “is a condition that makes rich white women spend their days going from one store to another, accumulating things they’ll never use.”

  Well, I wasn’t rich or white but my AmEx card couldn’t tell the difference.

  Why not go shopping? a part of me said. You’ve got the rest of the afternoon free. Lord & Taylor is just an A train away. And while you’re strolling the neighborhood, there’s Saks.

  Another part of me, the practical and sensible part which I rarely acknowledged, brought me back to earth and my current status. I was a graduate student with no job, living at home with a musician father. His income was good but it wasn’t my income. Without my own funds to back up this plastic, having it in my pocket meant nothing. The practical side won out and I closed my book, which I wasn’t reading anyway, and headed for home.

  On the way, my thoughts drifted back to Gary Mark. Development directors are only as effective as their connection to money sources. Did he himself have money? How did he come to connect with the Chorus? Had he been very friendly with Erskin? Friendly with the director of the Chorus? And if he was as well off as he appeared to be, why hadn’t he had his damaged septum repaired? Most of the movie stars, models, and other rich cokeheads did.

  That evening, Tad was waiting in the Pepper Pot, a small, pleasantly lit Caribbean restaurant on Adam Clayton Powell Boulevard where the patrons could talk above a whisper without competing with those seated nearby.

  Our table near the window commanded a wide view of the avenue, and thanks to the break in the weather, street traffic was brisk. Teenagers, plugged into Walkmans, bobbed by to a private hip-hop beat. Vendors and hawkers were out, flashing by with mobile inventories of watches, socks, neckties, and scarves fluttering from their outstretched arms. “All items guaranteed,” they called. “Check it out. Money back if not satisfied.”

  I made my way to the table and Tad rose to pull my chair out. He was drinking Jamaican beer and ordered one for me.

  “Anything new?” he asked.

  If soft lighting did wonders for a woman, it did twice as much for this man who didn’t even need it. His eyes seemed deeper than ever and I wanted to touch the corners of his mouth to make certain the smile was real. My knees started feeling a little funny so I sat down quickly.

  “Nothing’s new,” I said. “Spoke to a librarian friend earlier today. She might have something for me in a few days. I’m trying to get a handle on the fund-raiser. He seemed like real money, but there was something else about him. Something hidden. And frightened.”

  “You saw him for two minutes and you figured all that out already?”

  I looked at him sharply. It was not his question so much as the tone that surprised and suddenly annoyed me. I was the one who had looked in Gary Mark’s eyes. And what I had seen was unmistakable.

  I also wanted to let Tad know that when he had walked into the precinct that
first time with that prisoner, I had figured something out immediately. In fact, what I had felt was as close to an epiphany as I was likely to get. In the time it took to blink, I had concluded that of all the men I had known and loved and hated and fought and lost and loved again, this one was going to be the very next and the very last. It had happened that quickly.

  “Sometimes two minutes is enough,” I said, “if you know what you’re looking for.”

  The waitress recommended the broiled snapper and baked plantains and we ordered more beer. The soft reggae echoes of Bob Marley drifted from the CD near the kitchen and should have been enough to calm my nerves, but I was thinking of Deborah’s warning: Don’t let me read about you in the papers. Pull Alvin out and forget it …

  But I couldn’t forget. If she came up blank, I made a mental note to call another friend. But I couldn’t sit in St. Nicholas Park and share down-home fried chicken and banana pudding with Melissa Stewart. She was one of the few black female partners in a top firm on the Street. I’d have to push my plastic and take her to Windows on the World and then probably dip her in mimosas to get her to talk. But at least she’d know of Gary Mark if he worked anywhere near Wall Street.

  “What did you find out about the gold caps?” I asked.

  Tad shook his head in disgust. “Nothing. Dead end. One dentist told me those caps were the cheap ones, the kind that someone can put in and snap out when they needed to. And that so-called diamond in it wasn’t worth a dime. And there’re no reports of any recent visits for tooth repair, at least not around here, so I guess Morris didn’t do much damage to the guy who grabbed him.”

  “And Erskin Harding was killed simply because he tried to keep Morris from being snatched?”

  “Maybe. Maybe not. He may have been in the wrong place at the wrong time but we don’t know yet.”

  I remembered Alvin’s question: “Why’d they have to kill him? They didn’t have to kill him.”

  It was true. They didn’t have to. Erskin had not been in the wrong place. It was a deliberate hit …

  “What’s Danny doing?”

  “Danny seems to be up against a stone wall as well. Matter of fact, I was wondering about what you told me about that boy Clarence.”

  I looked up quickly, wishing I had kept my mouth shut until I found out more about Clarence.

  “Tad, let me handle Clarence.”

  “Let you handle—uh-oh. Do I hear social consciousness kicking in? The boy comes from a deprived home, et cetera, et cetera, and will respond to love and attention and confess all.”

  “That’s not it and you know it. I don’t think there’s anything for him to confess.”

  I was becoming more annoyed, imagining how Tad would handle the situation.

  “Let me speak to him, Tad.”

  “Why?”

  “Because somehow, I don’t feel right about the idea of a seventeen-year-old murdering—”

  Tad held up his hand. “Please. You haven’t been out of the department that long. Have you forgotten what Riker’s looks like? Place is a zoo, packed to the rafters with seventeen-year-olds. And they’re not there for playing hooky.”

  I folded my arms and gritted my teeth.

  “I don’t know about the ones at Riker’s. I don’t feel right about this seventeen-year-old.”

  “That’s what most of their mothers say: ‘This is happening to my boy and it’s not right,’ even though the angel was caught with the gun still smoking in his hand. They look you right in the eye and say ‘My child didn’t do it.’ ”

  The waitress brought our dinner but I had lost my appetite. A minute later Tad noticed that the red snapper on my plate was untouched, so he whispered, “Okay, okay. You work on the kid. I’ll see if anything else turns up about Harding.”

  I gazed at him across the small table. He was so damned handsome it was hard to stay angry, but I worked at it.

  He’s placating me. As long as he’s been on the job, he should know by now that there’s always more to a case, more to a clue, than meets the eye. Feelings, however vague and unscientific, do count for something, but I was not in the mood to work on changing his mind. I looked away from him.

  Handsome or not, I crumpled my napkin on the table, picked up my purse, and left before my temper and tongue got the better of me.

  Outside, I drew in enough breath to calm down, then headed home, which wasn’t very far. The good thing about living in the neighborhood was that if you’re on a date and it turned sour, you didn’t need two trains and a plane to get back home. You could walk if you were angry enough. One look at your face and potential muggers on the street, most of the time, gave you a wide berth and left you and your mad attitude alone.

  Once home, I intended to submerge myself in an herbal bath and listen to Dad’s record, the old 78 rpm, the original sound of “Profoundly Blue.” God only knows what Alvin had done with that tape. Probably stashed it as a keepsake in the bottom of his closet somewhere inside one of his smelly sneakers.

  “Profoundly Blue.” I don’t remember ever hearing the tune or hearing of the musicians who made it so special. Meade “Lux” Lewis, Charlie Christian, Edmond Hall. Who were they?

  I intended to lie back in the water in absolute silence, close my eyes, and let the answers come to me in the dark. Close my eyes and imagine the smoky club where the recording took place in front of a large old microphone hooked up in center stage after the place had closed for the night; the men—with their porkpies and stingy brims pulled low and their rolled-up shirtsleeves, open collars, and loose suspenders—playing the tune over and over until a particular chord cut through the haze sounding just the way they wanted.

  Or maybe they got it right the first time. Dad said it occasionally happened that way, like the classic Miles Davis recording “Kind of Blue.”

  I hurried past the bricked-up windows of the old Smalls’ Paradise and crossed the intersection of 135th Street and Seventh Avenue. The avenue traffic was still heavy with strollers, bikes, and Rollerbladers but faded into quiet once I turned onto my block.

  The bathwater was fragrant and the cluster of scented candles near the tub threw soft shadows against the pink marble walls. The water enveloped my shoulders and I decided to ignore the noise of the phone. When the machine kicked in on the third ring, Tad’s voice filled the room and “Profoundly Blue” became a small background riff against the faulty rhythm in my chest.

  “Mali. If you’re there, pick up! Why the hell did you walk out like that? I got some news and it’s not good. I’ll see you in a few minutes.”

  In the minute it took to stumble out of the tub, grab a towel, and reach for the phone, the line had gone dead.

  I barely had time to towel off and slip into a T-shirt and sweats before the bell rang. I paused at the top of the stairs and listened to the voices, trying to decide if I had the strength to absorb any more bad news, whatever it was.

  “Is Mali home?”

  “Why, yes. Just a minute, she’s—”

  The dead tone of Tad’s voice propelled me downstairs.

  My father nodded and disappeared again into his basement study and Tad, moving like an old man, entered the living room.

  “Would you … like something—Walker and water?”

  “Yeah. That would be good. Whatever you have.”

  I gazed at his reflection in the mirrored bar, watched him sit on the edge of the sofa and rub his chin. He reached for the double Scotch and I was about to raise my own glass when he said, “You were right on the money about Gary Mark.”

  “What do you mean? What’s happened?”

  “Somebody took him out. Two bullets to the back of the head as he was getting into his car. Probably happened while we were in the Pepper Pot trying to decide what to do about Clarence.”

  “Could’ve been a robbery, a random thing,” I whispered, knowing it was not.

  I took a long sip from my glass, avoiding Tad’s look as he continued. “Wallet, keys, credit cards, all the
re. It was a quick hit and the guy jumped into a waiting car.”

  “Where did it happen?”

  “Right in front of the rehearsal hall.”

  “Anyone see the plates?”

  “If they did, no one’s talking.”

  A dizzy feeling came over me and I sat down. Perhaps I had swallowed my drink too quickly, perhaps it was too much alcohol on an empty stomach …

  “Mali. You all right?”

  “Yes. I think so …”

  Two murders and an attempted kidnapping. The toll was rising. I did not want to think about who might be next.

  This murder made all of the papers, the Daily Challenge and the City Sun carrying it and the major media—print and television—flooding the area with reporters pushing mikes under unsuspecting noses.

  “What do you think is the major cause of crime in the area?” one young reporter asked brightly on the six o’clock news, her question interspersed with stock footage of graffiti-scarred walls and burned-out tenements.

  “Let’s see …” came the bewildered answer of one of the locals, smiling wide because he was finally being recognized on national television as the probable authority on urban decay. He blinked and smiled into the bright lights and straightened his Mets baseball cap and smiled some more.

  “I’d say it was them drugs, that’s what I think.”

  The reporter shook her head sadly and waved the mike back and forth like a wand. “So you think drugs are the problem, the major cause of crime in the area?”

  “Well, yeah. Definitely. I think so.”

  I didn’t know whether to throw up or throw my shoe at the television screen. Never mind that eighty percent of the population who are drug dependent live outside these “urban areas” and never mind that the chemicals needed to convert the plant to cocaine are manufactured in the United States and then shipped to South America—basic facts the reporter must have known as she asked: