Ricky returns to his folding chair and the senior Peal turns his attention to me. Along with his hue, he and his son share the same dishwater-blond hair, except his is speckled with gray strands. I suspect the senior Peal is in his early sixties.
“And Mr. Price, the only minority-owned bodyguard service in the state, not to mention the beautiful rehabilitation you have been doing in Englewood. Your work has brought other investors back to the area.” We shake hands as Martin stands there looking totally uninformed. I guess he thought a brother like me was broke.
“Gentlemen, I do believe we will be more comfortable in my son's office. Martin, will you kindly see to the coffee and sandwiches? Thank you. Mr. Brown and Mr. Price, please follow me.”
I'm flattered that he is conscious of who I am, but he has also put me on guard. This is a silky-smooth man. Realizing that within the type of law he practices a degree of marketing is required, common sense tells me I shouldn't be threatened by his acquaintance with me. If one is doing estate planning, one must be informed on who has money. Nonetheless, him being better informed of me than I am of him has my senses on alert.
We have to walk past the receptionist and she shares the same flabbergasted expression as Martin. When we enter the private office, the older Peal sits behind the desk, and Ricky and I take the leather couch.
“And how may I be of service to you gentleman?”
It is a simple question and he seems sincere in asking it, but the peace-making tone of his voice left me uneasy. Even though he is asking to be of service, I'm feeling like the target.
“Well actually, Mr. Peal, we came to speak with Martin. I am looking into the death of Daphne Nelson and her son. Some facts have been discovered, and I'm hoping Martin can verify them.”
“Which are?” Peal's eyes are ash-gray, only a shade or two away from being white. I see he likes to stare at people with them.
I return his gaze and answer, “The facts are in regards to an accident case your son handled some years ago. It involved the death of over sixteen people.”
“Yes, the church bus case. It was a sad day in our community. That case helped me to understand Randolph's determination to become a personal-injury attorney; seeing the vigor he drew on to pursue adequate settlements for all those families. I was proud of the boy.”
His eyes cast to the left when he says he was “proud of the boy.” I read somewhere that eye movement such as that meant lying. And hearing this European-looking African American man say “our community” for the second time adds to my uneasiness.
This uneasiness bothers me because I realize my edginess with this brother is based on how he looks. I am prejudging him by appearance. A brother like me is being prejudiced, and not only that; I have yet to offer him my condolences. He has lost a son.
A pain I am all too familiar with, and I have allowed my own prejudice to stop me from being a compassionate person. Because he is a black man who looks white, I have held back my concern.
“Mr. Peal, please accept our sympathies for the loss of your son.” I included Ricky, who nods his head in agreement.
“Thank you, Mr. Price. Randolph and I . . . our relationship was strained, to say the least. You see, his mother and I never married. We were college lovers. She and her parents raised Randolph. He was an adult before he came into my life and the life of my other sons. My wife Helen opened our family to him, but he had issues. He never felt a part of my family, and I understood. Even though I gave him my name at birth, his mother's parents insisted on raising him without assistance from me, and at that time any assistance from me wouldn't have amounted to much.
“An African American man of my complexion is not always accepted by our community. I could have practiced as a white man, but I chose to be part of the community I was born in. I advised Randolph to do the same. He took my advice for ostracism. It wasn't.
“I believed it would have been easier for him to practice as a white attorney in mainstream society. When one looked at Randolph, no traces of his African American heritage were seen. He was not born in or raised in our community. Randolph Peal by anyone's standard was a white man.
“When he finished law school he wanted to join my firm. My partner and my sons were against it. You see, Mr. Brown, Mr. Price, we have worked for our reputation within the community and my sons have worked hard to make sure that we are thought of as an African American firm; our practice targets mid- to upper-income African Americans.
“You see I was stuck between one son wanting to be involved in his father's career and three sons who thought his involvement would hurt us all. My solution was to become a silent partner with Randolph. He took my money, but not my advice. He targeted his practice at our community.”
Ricky says, “It seemed to have worked for him.”
“Yes, he proved me wrong. Randolph's firm was profitable after the first year. People in the community trusted him, especially after the church bus tragedy. Randolph's clients viewed him as a white man and they accepted him as such. After the bus tragedy, the sky was the limit for this firm.
“Mr. Price, how is that terrible tragedy linked to the death of Ms. Nelson and her son?”
“What I have, Mr. Peal, is a hypothesis, one that I am not at liberty to share.”
“I see. Is what you're doing related at all to my son's murder?”
“Yes, I believe it is.”
“Who has employed your services?”
“Ms. Nelson was a dear friend, and she died on my porch. I am doing this on my own.”
“Understandable.”
Martin enters pushing a cart with sandwiches and coffee. The senior Peal stands, takes a sandwich and walks to the door, “Martin, these gentlemen would like to speak to you in private. I am going down to Accounting. Buzz me when you're finished here. And again, Mr. Price and Mr. Brown, it was a pleasure. And please keep my firm in mind for any of your estate or tax needs.” He closes the door behind him.
Martin pours himself a cup of coffee, grabs a sandwich, and takes the seat behind the desk. Ricky doesn't hesitate to take two sandwiches and a bottle of water. He passes me a sandwich and bottle of water.
I want to get right into Martin, so without hesitating I ask, “Was Mr. Peal always involved in the day-to-day operations before Randolph's death?”
“No, this morning at six-thirty was the first time I've met the man. I usually don't work on Wednesdays,” he says with much attitude.
“This clown picked me up at my home and brought me to work. He introduced himself by telling me Randolph was dead and I should be at work.” Martin bites into the sandwich and gulps the coffee. “I feel like I am being bullied. He sat in my living room while I showered and got dressed for work. He drove me in and told me I could expect to be here late tonight.
“The man has made it quite clear whose firm this is. Daphne was right, we were not Randolph's partners. This firm belongs to that man.”
I have no sympathy for his employment situation. “When did you hear about Daphne?”
“I heard about it last night on the news. I didn't believe it. I called her house anyway and left a message . . .” He only eats half the ham sandwich, wraps up what's left in a napkin and tosses it in the wastebasket on the side of the desk. He does finish the coffee. “And the rumors around here are that he is black. Can you believe that?” He moved right past Daphne's death to his present situation.
“I believe Randolph killed Daphne.”
“I thought the same, until he came up dead. Shot on your wife's back porch. How about that, Mr. Price?”
“Yeah, how about it?”
“What did the police say to you?” Martin asks, standing and getting himself another sandwich and a bottle of water.
“Not much, why?”
He drops back down in the chair. “Because, man, you have to be the main suspect. No one else threatened Randolph's life and put a gun to his head. One can only hope that the police have at least spoken to you.” He splits the second sandwichâtunaâin half and bites into it just as hungrily.
“Does Peal's father know about the altercation between Randolph and me?”
“Oh yes, I told him as soon as the receptionist said you were in the lobby.”
Peal Senior is indeed a clever sort; there is no way I couldn't have held a conversation with the man who threatened my murdered son with a pistol, unless of course I didn't care about my son.
“Tell me, Martin, did you tell him about yourself?”
“What about me?” He twisted the water bottle open and swallowed.
“You know, man, about your father.”
“My father?” When he looks up, surprise is all over his clean-shaven narrow face.
“Yeah, you know about Daphne and Randolph setting up the accident that ruined his business and caused him to kill himself.”
He wags his finger at me, “Oh . . . that's why you wanted to see me. You're trying to piece together a motive for my involvement in Randolph's death. Mr. Price, save the effort for your own defense. You'll need it.” He starts chuckling and twists the cap back on the water.
“My father was a sick man before the accident, a weak man who suffered from major depression. I didn't blame Randolph or Daphne. I doubt if Randolph or Daphne even knew who my father was. They sued Aspire Trucking, not Matthew MacNard. My father was never named in the suit.
“Aspire Trucking was a franchise owned by the bank, not my father. Gentlemen, you are aware that Aspire Trucking is a national franchise; which was the reason Randolph was able to get such large settlements?”
I wasn't familiar with Aspire's business status, and neither was Ricky.
“Judging by the expressions on your faces, you two bros didn't know Aspire was national? Tsk, tsk. Do your homework, gentlemen.”
No one likes to be showed up; Ricky likes it less than most. He leans up to the edge of the couch cushion. “You tellin' us that y'all never spoke of ya daddy's death?”
“No. I didn't see a need.” Martin reminds me of a turtle with his head stretched out from the shell.
“You was wokin' fo' da man dat killed ya daddy?”
Smiling and as condescending as hell, Martin continues with, “Sir, you share the same mistaken belief that my mother had. No law firm killed my father. My father killed himself. I am a thirty-three-year old partner in the city's top-billing personal injury firm, and for the record, Mr. Brown, if this firm had been responsible for the death of my father, I'd still be here.”
I believe him, and Ricky must too because he sits back.
“What about Daphne?” I ask.
“What about her, Mr. Price? She's dead. She had a great rack, a tight little ass and wonderful feet . . . I'll tell you something . . . she was the first black woman I ever dated. Usually all they can do for me is point me in the direction of a white one. But Daphne had ambition. Her ambition almost rivaled mine. We had our good moments, but my world will not be slowed by her demise.”
The young man is sick, and sick people should be helped. I want to tell him something that will help him, but I hear Ricky saying, “Nigga, you fucked in da head.”
And that pretty much ends our visit. Martin springs up from his chair and shows us the door. I pull a card from my wallet and hand it to him. He doesn't tear it up. Leaving I ask, “Hey, do you know anyone who drives a white Bentley?” My card slips from his hand.
“No,” he answers and bends down for my card.
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Now I understand why Eleanor asked me if I had met Randolph's father. That was her way of telling me that Randolph had some African American heritage, as slight as it was. I follow Ricky out of the offices of Zonderman, Peal and MacNard. Daphne's plastic letters had been taken down.
I cannot align my thoughts. I now know that Peal's daddy is an African American, Martin is a total sell-out, Eleanor wants to meet again, Regina wants me locked up and the cops think I'm a murderer. All these thoughts add up to . . . nothing. I don't have a clue as to who killed Daphne, Stanley or Peal or who the hell was in that white Bentley.
Back in his truck, Ricky reminds me that I need to go see Daphne's parents.
Chapter Fourteen
When we get out to Harvey, Mr. Nelson is standing in his front yard in the shade of his huge oak tree. He stops nailing the
HOUSE FOR SALE
sign in the ground and greets me. He's solemn upon approach but accepts my hug. Dressed in a pair of green work pants and thick black suspenders over a V-neck T-shirt, he directs me inside the house.
In the kitchen I greet old neighbors and walk up on Regina, toting her customary tuna casserole. We nod to each other and turn away. I walk into the dining room to get a seat and notice a picture of Daphne and Eleanor on the mantle.
They look like happy sisters hugged up cheek to cheek. It's a very recent photo. In the background of the photograph, I notice a black DTS Caddy across the street. At first glance I think it's mine, but Daphne's parents live behind Regina's house. They share an alley. Most of the time my car is parked in front of Regina's house. The DTS in the picture can't be mine.
As Mr. Nelson walks in through the front door, I ask him about the owner of the car in the photo. He tells me Martin, Daphne's boyfriend. I'm about to ask him a couple of questions, but his eyes tear up. He grabs a hold of my arm and pulls me into a bedroom. I guess it belongs to him and his wife.
He stands right up on me and says, “She was a good girl, Mr. Price. Her and Stanley didn't deserve to get shot down like dogs in the street. Everything she did wasn't right, but people make mistakes. What her and that white lawyer was doing wasn't a secret to me. She called me yesterday and told me she was going to tell you. She trusted you, Mr. Price, always did.
“When that white lawyer got her that first big check, my little girl was hooked. There was nothing me or her mama could say to turn her around. The money talked to her louder than we did. But something was happening with her here lately. I think she was starting to see that some things are better than money.
“Last month she started talking different. She was regretting things she had done. She told her mama and me about the bus accident. We prayed for her and told her to pray. Our God is a forgiving God. I told her all she had to do was ask and He would forgive her. But it wasn't God she was afraid of; it was that white lawyer. She thought he would hurt her if she told people what happened.”
Mr. Nelson is standing right in my face and it's getting uncomfortable. I take a step back, and for clarification I ask, “Are you talking about Randolph Peal?”
“Yeah, he was the devil who worried her. You see, Mr. Price, Daphne didn't want Stanley involved in that crooked business. But she didn't know how to stop it from happening. She started bringing him around here, hoping I could tell him something. But young men looking for riches don't listen to their poor granddaddies.
“But I thank the Lord she brought him around here those last couple of months, at least I got to know him and her again. She would even bring her friend Eleanor by from time to time. That picture on the mantle is from a little birthday thing she had over here for Eleanor. Boy, we played some dominos that day! I even got that uppity boyfriend of hers to play a game.
“At first I didn't believe the boy was from Chicago. He was too white-acting to be from around here. Some of us may put on airs around white folks, but very few of us put on airs around each other. That boy kept putting on. It wasn't until I found that I knew his daddy did I believe he was from around here.”
“You knew Matthew MacNard.”
“We were lodge brothers. He was a good-natured man, always a kind word.”
“Really? I heard he was a melancholy type of man.”
“No! Not Matthew. He loved life. He was the chairman of the entertainment committee. A robust man, he was. He loved new Cadillacs and fat Cuban cigars. Martin driving that Caddy is the only thing about him that reminds me of his father. Matthew MacNard enjoyed life and he had a good one, until that tragic bus accident. It ruined him.
“He couldn't come back after it happened. He held himself responsible because the brakes on one of the trucks failed. He must have told me a hundred times how he fixed the truck's brakes that morning.
“People say Matthew killed himself because he lost his business. Hell, it was a two-truck business and he drove one of the trucks. No. He killed himself out of guilt. You see he lied and told the company he was getting them trucks fixed at a shop, but he wasn't. Matthew would keep all the repair money and work on the trucks himself. It was guilt that drove him to eat a bullet.
“But then I come to find out it wasn't the truck's fault, and the whole thing was a setup, a phony accident to make some money. And here this man now went and killed himself. If it was anybody's fault, it was the lawyer's. He set the crooked mess up, him and . . . my baby . . . But it was him, that white lawyer who led her down that sinful path.
“Ain't no justice in this world, Mr. Price. I learned that when I came back from Korea. A poor man ain't gonna never get his due, not from man, anyhow. It was wrong that Matthew and all them people on the bus had to die so that lawyer could make some money, and it was wrong that my daughter and her son got shot down to keep his secret safe. And that's what I think happened. She wanted out of that business, but he wouldn't let her go that easy. She probably threatened to go to the police, so he her killed.
“The quick and the dead, the good Lord judges them both, Mr. Price. We might get past man's law, but there is no getting by the Father. And I find my comfort in knowing that that moneychanger is being dealt with by my Father.
“Mr. Price. I know you remember when the drink had control of my life. It wasn't a secret that things weren't getting done for my family. There was no fatherly guidance in this house for my daughter or my grandson.
“Other people in the neighborhood spent time with them. Mrs. Coleson, bless her soul, took Daphne with her up to New York every summer, and you with Stanley. I remember him bursting out our back gate running over to your house. He couldn't wait to spend time with you. As soon as he got off the school bus he was headed to your yard.
“What I'm trying to do, Mr. Price, is thank you for the time you spent with my grandson. You was there for him when his grandfather wasn't, and for that I thank you.” He gives me a quick awkward hug.
“I'm moving come week's end. Me and the missus are headed back home to Alabama. We going to bury Daphne and the boy in our family plot. I'm through with up here. We were planning on going down next year, but there is no sense in putting it off any longer. It's time to take these old bones south.”
I nod my head but say nothing. We shake hands and walk back into the living room. I look for Mrs. Nelson to offer my condolences, but before I can find her, I notice a gathering of neighborhood ladies staring at me, and none of the looks are friendly. The group opens a little and I see Regina is in the middle of the crowd. Suddenly I feel closed in and decide it's time to leave.
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Climbing into Ricky's truck, I'm engulfed by a cloud of weed smoke. He must have smoked a heck of a lot to have a cloud this dense; especially since the air conditioner is on full blast. He passes me the joint. I decline because getting high redirects and slows my thoughts. Ricky claims smoking weed targets his thinking and allows him to concentrate. I doubt it.
“D, I was thinkin' we should put Eleanor, Martin and Peal's daddy together. I'm thinkin' Peal's daddy is a suspect too. I didn't trust him fo' a minute. He up in there taking over his son's business and the man ain't been dead a day.”
Waving the smoke from my face, I say, “He told us he was a silent partner. I kind of trust the man.” Who I didn't trust was Martin and Eleanor. Ricky's earlier thought about them being in cahoots was starting to make sense to me.
“What! If you trust dat guy you in over ya head.” Ricky takes a long, deep hit from the joint. The cloud he exhales is huge. “Didn't Martin say that they was da top-billin' personal-injury firm in da city?”
“Yep.”
“Dat's got to be a lot of money. Now da daddy gets it all.” He hit the joint hard and exhaled another dense cloud.
Maybe I'm getting a contact high because Ricky's point seems valid. He tries to pass me the joint again. This time I take it and hit it. While I'm exhaling my own cloud, Regina starts tapping on Ricky's driver window. He flips the power button and the window rolls down, letting free a boulder of weed smoke.
Regina fans the smoke out of her face and says, “I know damn well you two are not sitting out here getting high in front of these people's house! They just lost their daughter and grandchild! You are not that insensitive, are you, Ricky?”
Ricky's sitting there looking at her with his mouth hanging open, saying nothing. She's coming at him too fast. I know his brain is overloading. He wants to say something but he can't. I can't help him, after hitting the joint . . . I'm stuck too.
“You are two ignorant-ass motherfuckers!” She turns and walks away with heels clicking on the sidewalk.
I was going to go see Chester, but not now . . . I hit the joint again. Ricky is looking at Regina walking back to the house. He starts the truck and I hit the joint again.
“Man, give me my damn joint!”
I want to pass it to him, but my arm won't move in his direction. Matter of fact, my arm is not moving at all.
Ricky turns his globe of a head to me, and he looks worried. “Damn, I forgot ya ass hardly smoke weed. Dat shit is too potent for you. Dat's dat hydro, baby!” His worried frown changes to a grin. “How you feelin'?”
Like I'm stuck is what I want to tell him, but talking is out of the question. I force my arm to pass Ricky the joint. Something is wrong with me. If it wasn't for seeing the passing houses I would not know the truck is moving. It feels like I'm stuck in a hole full of heavy mud. I don't like this here feeling at all. This situation calls for closed eyes, I didn't get any good sleep last night; maybe it's time to try again. Smoking weed has really never been my thing. I can remember the first time Ricky and I tried it.
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We were in my grandmother's backyard at the brick barbecue pit in the middle of her yard. Ricky had the matches and I had the “punks,” brown incense sticks that supposedly keep the mosquitoes away, but we used them to act like we were smoking joints. We held them between our thumb and index finger and made the hissing, inhaling noise of those who smoked weed.
This hot afternoon, however, we were using them to burn the spiders we found in the corners of my grandmother's brick pit. We thought it amazing that the spiders would wrap their legs around the incense sticks, while the hot tip was burning through them. We'd killed about five, and the game wasn't getting boring at all. This was better than dropping lit matches on ants.
My older brothers, Charles and Robert, were on the upstairs back porch looking down at us. They were drinking the remains of a case of Schlitz that my uncle had left after the Fourth of July celebration. And they were also getting high smoking green weed.
Commercial is what they called the weed, and they weren't happy about having to smoke it. Columbian or “Bo” had just arrived in our neighborhood, but it cost ten dollars. And Mama left them the same amount of money she left Ricky and me: five dollars. We were all supposed to go to Taurus Flavors and get ice cream and steak sandwiches.
They wanted “Bo,” me and Ricky wanted Taurus Flavors, and at eleven years of age, armed with screwdrivers and sticks, we were keeping our five dollars. We thought they were stupid; why smoke something on a hot day when you could sit inside the air-conditioned Taurus Flavors and eat a steak sandwich and ice cream? We wasn't going for it, so they had to get commercial instead of “Bo.”
Ricky and I were so engrossed in our hunt for another spider we didn't see them come down the stairs. “Man, what you lames doing?” Charles asked.
“Killing,” Ricky said.
“Killing what?”
“Spiders,” I told him.
Robert asked, “Why?”
“'Cause they hold on, even after they got a hole burned through them,” I told him.
“Man that's some lame little-kid stuff. When y'all gonna start actin' cool? Y'all gonna be in fifth grade next year, that's too old to be killing bugs. That ain't cool.”
We pulled our heads from the pit and stopped immediately. They pulled us in by using the dreaded phrase of any eleven-year-old kid, “It ain't cool.”
After all, they were the big brothers. They understood cool. They wore Chuck Taylor All Star gym shoes, pressed khaki pants and silk T-shirts. Their Afros were so big they used rakes, not picks. They rode five-speed polo bikes with steering wheel handlebars and sissy poles. They knew whole Richard Pryor albums and had done “it” to girls. If they said something “ain't cool,” it wasn't.
“Here, drink these and come on over here in the shade with us.”