Strivers Row (68 page)

“No!”

“—grow in knowledge, in wisdom. In the words of W. D. Fard, an' Elijah Muhammad, which is me—which is my last, an' final, name. So you shall be
my
prophet, and
my
herald!”

“No!” Malcolm shouted, stumbling backward. The prison walls looming up gigantically now, yet wobbling, threatening to come crashing down and entomb him just as the ghosty men's house had done to Langley Collyer. Elijah had risen up off his prison cot and stood above him now, his hands still lifted high in the air, as if he were commanding the walls to stay up, trapping him.

“You will, son,
you will
! You will become the greatest prophet of all, even greater than W. D. Fard—even greater than me! An' when you do, son—
when
you do—all I ask is that you remember the man I am here, and now, even after you find out all the other men who are inside me. All I ask is that you remember me as I am in prison, and have mercy on me,
even as I crush your bones!
”

But Malcolm had already stopped listening. Trying to push his way past the little man, feeling for the sidewalk.

“No! No, I don't want to go to no prison like she did! I want Miranda!” he cried out.

“Miranda!” the risen Elijah cried, and threw back his head and laughed long and loud. “Miranda! Oh, son! That's the biggest joke of all!”

“I love her!”

He could see the streetlights of Fifth Avenue flaring up dimly again, the outlines of the prison beginning to shrink and fade—Elijah fading with it, as if he were walking off down a long tunnel.

“I love her!” he cried out one more time, and Elijah turned and smiled his radiant smile at him one more time.

“Oh, son!” he called back faintly. “And you
say
you don't love the devil!”

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

MALCOLM

He heard the motorcycle engines coming from a long way away, as they throttled down Fifth Avenue. Their sound rising from a low growl to an unbearable, high-pitched screech. He cried out—and saw that he was lying facedown on the slabs of moldy newspapers that lined the tunnel down into the ghosty house. He scrambled to his feet at once, brushing desperately at himself and his suit with his hands, trying to sweep off all of the vermin he knew were crawling all around him.

It was daylight out now, the sun high in the sky, and running his hands over himself again he shivered to think how long he had been lying in the entrance to the old house. He waited under the shadow of the old stairs until the motorcycle patrol had passed, peering out at the police riders who looked like so many gigantic, arrogant beetles in their dark glasses, and high, peaked caps. When they had passed he skipped quickly on up to the street, putting distance between himself and the ghosty house as quickly as he could manage without running. When he was a block away he slowed to a somewhat more deliberate pace, inspecting more of the damage to his suit, and face—checking to make sure that he still had both guns in his pockets.

He knew what he was after now, even if he didn't know just where he was headed yet. The visitation from Elijah Muhammad still lingered in his brain, more vivid than any dream, but even so he felt clearer in his own head than he had in a long time. Sure, now, that there was just one more thing for him to do—find West Indian Archie before Archie found
him
.

He went methodically from one bar and club to another, doing everything he could to put it on The Wire. Making his way down to the Braddock, then back up to Chick's, and the New Thrill, and the Fat Man's Bar. Letting himself be seen, calling out in a loud, clear voice everywhere he went to ask if Archie had been in. He made sure to stop and talk to everyone he knew on the street, including the worst squealers in Harlem, telling them straight out that he was looking for Archie. He had even walked into Small's Paradise, where he stood just inside the door for a few minutes, his arms crossed over his chest, saying nothing but taking care that everyone got a good look at him. Jumpsteady, and Dollarbill, and a few of the other regulars at the bar staring at him as if they had seen a ghost—and not even Charlie Small, standing behind the bar, had dared to say anything to him before he went out again.

The day had started out hot and wet, and it got steadily hotter and more humid as it went along. The waves of heat wafting visibly off the sidewalks before him, wilting the collars of his shirt and coat. He didn't bother to stop for a meal, but kept drinking dime beers as he went along, to relieve his thirst, and to try to get the ringing in his head to stop. Popping bennies to stoke himself back up afterward, scoring a snort in the men's room at the Braddock, another at Bowman's, and one in the Rhythm Café.

He pushed on up through the throngs of Sunday promenaders on Seventh Avenue and Lenox, the churchgoers turning out in their sharpest new dresses and suits, and good shoes. Bumping hard into anyone who got in his way, stopping if they stopped and looking back at them, smiling to himself to watch the men swallow their curses and move on. He slid his hands down to both his guns, in his front jacket pockets. No longer worried about being picked up with them, telling himself that he would kill any cop who tried to run him in. Thinking of himself as Gary Cooper in
The Westerner
, stepping out into the street with his guns on.

At some point when he stepped out of yet another bar, he noticed that it was coming on dusk. The heat still not letting up, the night air promising to hang just as heavy as it had all day. He stopped down a little alley along Beale Street, snorting, over some trashcans, the last of the blow he had scored. The streets seeming to tilt and tremble as he walked back uptown, his shirt sticking to his jacket.

He was nearly back to the hotel, his clarity from earlier in the day all but melted away under the unremitting sun by now. Unsure of just what he would do if he still couldn't find West Indian Archie, leave town or spend another night there; go down to Miranda's or try to force his way into the ghosty men's house again, or just put the gun up against his own head—when he looked in the window of the La Mar-Cheri at 147th and St. Nicholas, and saw them there, together.

The La Mar-Cheri not much more than a storefront, a run-down little bar with barely a space for a combo to play in back, out on the very edge of Archie's territory. But there they were, all right, sitting up in one of the two window booths. Leaning over the table toward each other, their heads almost touching—Archie's huge, rough brown hands encasing one of hers. Malcolm thought that he could take him right there through the glass, less than three feet away. But she was there, too—laughing and smiling at him, her face glowing and carefree. Looking more beautiful than ever in a white, flowered sundress. Her hair pinned up with one of those flowers she loved so much—false jasmine—so that he could see the full, graceful curve of her neck and shoulders.

He yanked open the door, the blast of voices and jukebox music making his head vibrate. Slide-stepping immediately to their booth, pulling out his .32-20 as he did—only to see Archie's .45 already trained directly on his gut, even as his other hand still held on to hers.

“Hello, Red,” he said evenly. “You got my money?”

“I heard you been lookin' for me. Well, here I am!” Malcolm told him—trying to sound just as calm as Archie had, but aware that his voice was quavering wildly. Trying not to look down at Archie's .45, two feet away from his stomach, its barrel as big as a cannon's. The only noise in the bar now the sound of bar stools scraping the floor as the customers scrambled out of the line of fire, or to get a better view.

“Stop this right now. The both of you!” Miranda hissed at them. She had looked shocked when he first appeared, her mouth falling open, but she had recovered herself quickly, Malcolm saw.

“I ain't got yo' money!”

“I see. So you thinkin' you gonna kill me, then,” Archie said, his voice still level and patient—and Malcolm slowly nodded his head.

“Then lemme give you somet'in' to think about, Red,” Archie continued, his voice low, and weary, and a little bit sad. “One a two things is gonna happen here. You gonna kill me like you say, or I'm gonna kill you. Either way, I'm a old man. I'm sixty years old. I been to Sing Sing, I can do it again. My life is over anyway. But you kill me, you lost just the same. You gonna spend all the rest of your young years in prison.”

“She don't love you!” Malcolm blurted out then. “She loves
me!
”

“Red, stop this foolishness.
Right now!
”

“So that's what this is about,” Archie said, a look of pained understanding crossing his face, and making him look suddenly so much older that Malcolm almost felt a pang of pity for him.

“So that's it?” he asked, turning his eyes away from Malcolm completely, and looking at Miranda now. She avoided his gaze, looking down at the table, and he let her hand go. Uncocking his .45 then, and placing it quietly on the table between them. Still ignoring Malcolm, turned all the way toward Miranda now, who kept looking down at the table, her hands clutching her arms.

“How long has it been?” Archie asked, in a voice that sounded far away, like that of a man coming upon the scene of an accident. And when Miranda still said nothing, Malcolm could not help but answer for her, going on uncontrollably.

“Since the first night I seen her. Before you took up with her, so it's not really like we been steppin' out on you. But I'm gonna make it plain now—”

Unable to help himself, an adrenaline surge of relief swelling up from the deepest pit of his stomach. Stopping only when he noticed that the two older people in the booth were paying no attention to him whatsoever.

“Oh, Daddy,” Miranda said, in a small, wistful voice. Reaching out her hands to Archie, running one palm along the side of his rugged brown face. “Daddy, Daddy, Daddy.”

“That's right. An' I can give her what she wants,” Malcolm started up, still unable to control his mouth. “I'm gonna take her to Hollywood, so she can be a real star. Big man like you, Archie, always get yo'self some other white girl—”

“Shut up, Red!”

“A
white
girl?”

Archie looked back and forth between Malcolm and Miranda, his face now filled with an incredulous, bitter mirth.

“A white girl. So that's it. And you let him think so, didn't you, baby?”

He gripped Miranda's hand in his again, kissing it along the line of her knuckles, then carefully let it go. Retrieving his .45 from the table and placing it carefully in an inner pocket of his jacket before he hauled himself up out of the booth. Moving right at Malcolm, who retreated a couple of steps before him, still holding up his pistol.

“Don't make me shoot you!”

“Red, Red,” he said, shaking his head. “She as colored as you or me. I thought you knew that. Her brother even got a church up here in Harlem.”

“That's a lie!” Malcolm shouted then—thinking even as he did on all those skin creams and complexion whiteners in her bathroom cabinet.
Remembering, now, who it was her face had reminded him of the very first night he met her. That same, nearly white minister from the train—

“But that's what you wanted, wasn't it? Someone thinkin' you were a great white lady. Worshipin' you for it. Wasn't that it?” Archie said, looking back at her now.

“You were the last thing I'll ever love in my life,” he said, and Miranda turned her head abruptly down toward the table again, as if she were dodging a slap.

“You're just tryna trick me!”

“Go ahead an' ask her,” Archie said, shrugging. “She ain't a white girl. Her name ain't even Miranda.”

Archie came toward him—and Malcolm was shocked to see that there were tears flowing freely down his cheeks. He pushed Malcolm's gun casually out of the way, and pulled him into a bearhug, squeezing him until Malcolm thought his ribs might crack. Then he kissed him forcefully on the forehead, and pushed him away.

“I don't care about the money, Red,” he whispered to him. “I just wanted to make sure you was all right. That's the only reason I put it out on The Wire.”

He patted him once on the shoulder, then turned to pick up his hat and walked on out the door. Malcolm standing there with the gun still in his hand, the bar coming alive behind him again.

“Son, you wanna put that away—” the bartender called out— Malcolm ignoring him.

“That ain't true. Is it?” he asked Miranda instead, the words still bubbling out of him. “He just sayin' that to throw me, ain't he—”

But she only looked at him, letting him babble on some more. Her beautiful face nearly hidden in darkness now, silhouetted as it was in the setting sun through the window.

“Goddammit, Red,” she said at last, her voice more sorrowful than angry. “Goddammit, Red. How much of a child can you be?”

“But you said—”

“
You
said it didn't matter. You said you never met anybody like me, never loved anybody like me, black or white.”

“I know,” Malcolm said, his mouth dry as cotton against his tongue now. Barely able to look at her there in the booth—tears running down her cheeks now.
So everybody can cry but me.

“I know I said that. But you didn't love me, did you? Ain't that the whole story? You liked bein' the big white lady to me, didn't you?”

“Ah, Red,” she wept, and raged at him. “Ah, you were so god-damned young!”

“But you was just playin' with me, wasn't you? And with Archie, too, I suppose. Weren't you?”

She looked down at the table again, unable to say anything else through her tears, and he dropped the gun into his pocket, and followed Archie on out the door of the La Mar-Cheri. Walking slowly, without any real idea of where he was going. Barely noticing the men starting to run past him on the sidewalk, their excited shouts, or the wail of sirens in the distance.