The Last Days of Louisiana Red (12 page)

“Ed Yellings spent three months down there, taping the followers of Doc John. Marie's Business by that time was in the hands of people who didn't have her gifts; had degenerated into a mail-order front for selling dope, jukeboxes. They had abandoned Marie's old business and were collaborating with criminal elements, and so these people got wind of Ed's visit to New Orleans and they sent three spies to Berkeley to find out what he was up to. One got into Ed's inner circle some kind of way. They got to Minnie.”

“Minnie?”

“Minnie can't help herself. They tried to get Sister and Wolf too, but the children took after their dad. They were psychically self-reliant and resistant to Louisiana Red. They had dismissed Street as a dummy until they found they could use him too.

“Ed used a formula Doc John was working on before his death, and based upon that formula Ed found a cure for cancer. Ed wasn't that original, but he certainly could put it together. They found out from one of their spies who had access to his papers that his next project was to find a cure for heroin addiction by isolating the spirit of the poppy seed.”

“That's very interesting. So when Ed set out to find a cure for heroin addiction they got rid of him.”

“Right. If Ed could successfully convince his clients that he was legitimate and the other mail-order house was merely a front, then all of their customers would go to Ed. He would have pulled the wraps off of their junk; the indictments would fly hot and fast.

“Ed was going even beyond the Gumbo pill and into aural healing. He was experimenting with ways of healing people by manipulating their psychic fields. He wanted to put all of the accouterments of the Business into museums under the skillful hands of Businesswomen like Betye Saar. He wanted to close down the operation altogether so that there wouldn't even be any trace of the Business, that way baffling the industrial spies. He knew that they were about to get some of their contacts in Washington to investigate his Gumbo, having found out that there was more than okra rice and chicken to his plant. His wife, Ruby, who had gone back east to enter politics, was rising fast in the Food and Drug Administration and was eager to cause a scandal. She wanted to get the Food and Drug Administration to investigate Gumbo Works for signs of violations of the law, and so Ed was working rapidly to end Solid Gumbo Works. That's when they had their spies kill him.”

“Who are the spies?”

“I'm not at liberty to give you their names; besides, knowing you, you wouldn't be satisfied unless you could solve the case yourself. You rascal, I see you going around with those women half your age. Cutting up.”

“That's my Business. Anyway, thanks for the leads.”

“There's more. This Minnie, the one that the New Orleans Louisiana Red Circle got to—leave her alone.”

“She's become a pest, she needs to be scorched a bit, I'm thinking about touching her. She's never been touched. That's what's wrong with the child.”

“You don't have to. She's going to meet up with someone who's nursing an old grudge against her. A stranger in the sky. You don't have to do anything but solve the case; leave Minnie to the Chairman of the Board.”

“If you say so.” He paused. “You know, you have to hand it to Marie Laveau.”

“What's that, LaBas?”

“Well, she had fifteen children, seven of whom died of yellow fever, and so she had to feed all those kids with no man, her husband Jacques having disappeared.”

“I'll bet I know what happened to him.”

“O, that's only gossip. She had to hustle, and no matter how crude she was I shall maintain a place for her on my staff. I plan to feed her a bonus from time to time, too. She has brought me some good luck, but instead of calling her the founder, Doctor John shall be the founder of the American Business and she will be second vice-president in charge of wit and hustle.”

“Why not name her first vice-president?”

“I'm keeping that open; you never know what new information we may uncover. Well, I have to get back to the case. I'm glad that Minnie won't be in the way any more. Are you sure you have the right information about her?”

“LaBas, you know how ultrasonic I am. Have I ever given you a bad lead?”

“No.”

“Well, I have to get back to the halls.”

“LaBas called the waitress and asked for the check. He excused himself and went to the men's room to wash his hands. When he returned, she had gone; spirited away. She had a habit of disappearing like that. She left a note on the table: “LaBas, you don't owe me anything for this. Just remember me.” LaBas paid the check and left the restaurant.

He didn't see T Feeler, who was hiding in a booth next to them. As soon as he saw them come into Harry's, where he was having a drink, he slid into the booth next to them to eavesdrop.

He would rush to Minnie to tell her everything he had heard.

T Feeler, tensed up and high strung, his “good hair” waving under his beret, fled Harry's and ran to his bicycle parked in the parking lot. He began pedaling up University Avenue, turned left at Oxford, right at Hearst, and left at Euclid. He traveled up Euclid until he came to Keith, where he turned right to the Yellings' home. He jumped off the bicycle, ran up the path and through the door out of breath.

“What's wrong with you, you ol sissified nigger, come in here mess up my flo?” Nanny stood with a mop in her hand, a hand on her hip; she was doing the hall.

“I must see Minnie, quick.”

Minnie, hearing T Feeler's voice, rushed out from the rear apartment behind whose doors much commotion was going on.

“It's O.K., Nanny,” Minnie said.

“Well, he should knock next time. He trying so hard to be cute he don't even think about knocking. He ain't as cute as he think he is.” Pouting and flashing T a murderous grin, Nanny went upstairs.

“Minnie, they're after you.”

“Who's after me, T?” she said, showing him to one of the living room-sofas.

“LaBas and some woman. They were having a drink at Harry's. They didn't know I was in the next booth. Anyway, they were talking about you. She told him that a stranger in the sky and out of your past would take care of you, and that this stranger would want to even an old score in which you acted hoggish. I didn't get much of the conversation, but it seemed they were discussing your father.”

“You came all the way up here to tell me this?”

“But, Minnie …”

“I'm not worried about LaBas any more. Maxwell Kasavubu obtained a lawyer for me. Since Wolf died, they believe they have a good case for giving me the plant. Solid Gumbo Works will be mine, and I'll make it go public. I'll put those Workers out, and LaBas will be thrown out too. He's probably engaged in some last-ditch negotiations to keep me from getting the place.”

“But, Minnie, he has some powers. They say that LaBas and his Workers are nothing to fool with.”

“Quacks. They're quacks. We found out what they were making down there. Quack industry. Mumbo Jumbo. Now if you'll excuse me, T, I have to go back and help on the pamphlets we are putting out for the rally on behalf of Kingfish and Andy Brown—the brothers were unjustly busted in the home of one of LaBas' Workers. The corrupt bushwa is some kind of double agent because he called the police on his own brothers.”

“Do you need a hand, Minnie?” T volunteered.

“Sure, T, why don't you take care of Big Sally's thirteen children? Then the sister upstairs who're minding them can come help us with the work.”

“Yes, Minnie. Anything you say. You're the boss.” T Feeler walked behind Minnie like a frail sad puppy.

Morning. LaBas had reached an impasse in the case. Whenever this occurred, he would take up another project. Usually, when he took his attention off of a case, he'd divert it to something quite different. He had decided to give his temporary living quarters a thorough housecleaning in the old-fashioned way. Marie Laveau had written a book in which she talked about a Business housecleaning. This housecleaning not only got into the nooks and crannies of the living space but the spiritual space as well. He was looking up names under “Domestics” in the yellow pages.
Domestic
!! LaBas called Nanny. He wanted to ask her some questions.

He was a blonde. He lay in the bed, tossing and turning. His room. What was that odor? The pungent odor of middle-class perfume making the air misty. He didn't feel right. His hair. What on earth was the matter with his hair? It was long and was covering the pillow. The pillows? They had a flower print and were pink. Pink? He rose in his bed and his breasts jiggled. BREASTS? THE BREASTS?? He looked back into the mirror next to the bed and his mouth made a black hollow hole of horror. “O MY GOD. MY GOD.” He was a woman. You know what he said next, don't you, reader? He's from New York and so … you guessed it! “Kafka. Pure Kafka,” he said. A feeling crept over him. Tingly. What could he do? He felt like screaming, but he couldn't scream. Was that someone coming down the hall? He ran and jumped back into the bed, pulled the covers up to his neck and pretended to be asleep. Someone
was
coming down the hall. They stood for a moment outside in the hall. And then the knob slowly turned. Someone was now in the room; a dark foreboding shadow crept to the foot of the bed. A giant colored man—an Olmecheaded giant wearing a chauffeur's cap. Max started to really scream this time.

“Please, Ms. Dalton, you will wake the whole house,” the figure says.
Look at that white bitch laying there. Sloppy drunk. Probably wants some peter too. That's all they think about anyway. I'll fuck her into a cunt energy crisis she mess with me. That's probably what she wont. Been hittin on me all night. Probably pretending to be drunk. Wonts to see how far I go. I know Jan ain't gettin any. One simple dude. Tried to give me that old PROGRESSIVE LABOR line. Who don't know that? Who don't know that old simple ass mutherfuckin bullshit? Them mens was working at the Ford plant. Had some good jobs too. Then here come this Progressive Labor bullshit and them niggers lost they job after it was over. Ha! When is this bitch going to go to sleep? I wont to take that dark blue Buick with steel spoke wheels over to the South Side. Man, will them mo 'fugs be mad when they see. Think I'm a pimp. Then I'll go up to the counter and roll out my 75 dollars. Man, they think I'm one of them pimps. Then I go get me some rangs. Lots of them. Have them all shining on my fingers. Shining. Justa shining. Gee. Bet I could have me plenty ol stankin bitches. Commisstee. That shit ain't nothin but some bunk. Roosia. Shhhhhhit. Started to bust that mo 'fug Jan right in the mouf. Must be a sissy
. … The door opens and in comes a woman tapping a cane.
Ahhhhshitt. Here come that other old crazy white woman down the hall. Look like Ms. Mary trying to say something. I better do something quick
.

Max finally realized the situation. He made a futile effort to move his lips. “Bigggg. Bigggggg.” Meanwhile the cane tapping comes closer to the door. Bigger picks up the pillow and starts towards Mary Dalton when—

Max wakes up from the nightmare.

There was some bamming at the door real rough. Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam, Bam! Max leaped out of his dream and rushed to the door. Who could this be bamming at his door this time of night? The woman, trembling, rushed into the room.

“What do you want? I told you to never come here.”

She wriggled out of her raincoat, then nervously wrung out a match after lighting a cigarette. She plopped down in a chair and drew her breath. It was Lisa, stripped of her Nanny's rags; sharp, voluptuous.

“It's LaBas. He called. He wants to talk about Ed's killing. Suppose he starts to ask me a lot of questions? You know I can't stand up under a lot of questions.”

“You fool. You come here for that? I told you never to contact me here on this assignment.”

“Look, you've only been here for a few years. I've been here more than ten, ever since his wife Ruby left. I've worked on that household and put my conjure all over the place. Then they sent you in to begin this organization to add to Ed's problems. Just as I had worked hard to prepare Minnie to do that. We've done enough damage to that family. When will it end?”

“It will end when Solid Gumbo Works has folded.”

“I can't wait any longer. Since Wolf was killed, she's brought those Moochers into the household. I have to shuffle about like Hattie McDaniel to take care of their needs. They write slogans all over the walls and sleep on stained mattresses. They leave rings in the bathtub. They've been up all night with the mimeograph machine, trying to free Kingfish and Andy.”

“Yes, I know,” Max said. “I wrote the copy.”

“I have to fix breakfast and clean up their mess. You know how Moochers are, never clean up after themselves, always expect someone else to do their cleaning for them. I told you not to draw the girl into that organization. I was doing O.K. All I needed was some more time.”

“You were taking too long. Besides, the Moochers provided us with the numbers to wear down Solid Gumbo Works.”

“Well, I still maintain that if it had been left to me, I would have put her on Ed. I never did go along with his killing.”

“It was necessary. You know that. If we hadn't butchered him that night, he would have discovered the cure for heroin addiction. That was the industrial secret you passed on to me; the papers of his you Xeroxed. We had to do it. If he had found a legitimate cure, our quack operation would have shut down: the southern mailhouse empire we built would shut down. Heroin, jukeboxes, our black record company in the east, The House of Cocaine. Everybody would have been asking for Ed's Gumbo. Wasn't it enough that he found a cure for cancer?”

“You thought you'd gotten rid of that threat when you killed that Chinese acupuncturist, but Ed found different means.”

“You always respected him a bit, didn't you?”

“He was a man. Ed was a hard-working man. Sometimes I wanted to tell him who I was, where I was from, and what was wrong with me. That I had been sent into his house to train his child to drive him crazy.”

“You can't quit. I received orders from Louisiana Red that we have one more job. You think you have problems. Do you think I like posing as a visiting lecturer at the University of California at Berkeley? The way the women in the English Department office whisper about my lack of potency and sometimes refuse to file for my office post box.

“Do you think that I enjoy it when they refuse to mimeograph copies of lecture notes for my students? Why, this campus reminds me of the set of
I Was a Teenage Werewolf
. If Louisiana Red hadn't promised me this one-million-dollar retirement money, I never would have taken care of this assignment. I was doing all right with my New York industrial spy firm. But you, you have to stay until it's over. They have you where they want you.”

“I'm leaving.”

Max pulls out a sheet of paper from a desk drawer. “You know that Louisiana Red doesn't play. They will get to you through your police record. You are a fugitive from justice, you know, you bag woman. (Reads) ‘Real name: The Hammerhead Shark.' The title you picked up in that caper when you hit a man on the head with a hammer, put a hex on a congressman, double-crossed Jack Johnson, stabbed Martin Luther King, brought charges against Father Divine, brought down Sam Cooke in a blaze of gunfire and bad-mouthed Joe Louis. They know your penchant for Coon-Can and about your scar too. Not only are the law enforcement bureaus after you, but you know the consequences of crossing the Louisiana Red Corporation.”

“I'm not frightened any more. I've sent a message to the Red Rooster and told him that I want out, Max.”

“I've thought about leaving myself.”

“You have? Why, Max, we can leave together, go to Reno; why, I can get a job as a waitress, you can deal blackjack.”

“But they'll follow us.”

“Not if we move fast enough.”

“Maybe we ought to. You know how I missed you during those long days. When you couldn't be with me in my arms. How we had to limit ourselves to meeting every other Thursday, your day off. There must be thousands of us all over the country, meeting like this out of public view.

“Yes, my dearest, the American underground of Desire, the name of the first American slaver; we know each other on the street and recognize each other's signals. How we pay subscriptions to our propaganda organs which convince the public that it's only the Jim Brown and Racquel Welch bedroom scene that's the problem. We rule America, all of it, my Nanny and me. The ‘Every Other Thursday Society.' Yes, I want to leave, Lisa. My cover is getting to me.”

“I don't understand.”

“That book I'm doing—the one on Richard Wright's book.” He rushes to the bar, makes a drink and gulps it down. Then he slams the empty glass on the bar. “It's getting to me. I'm having these dreams. Just before you knocked on the door, I had one. I was the murder victim and this big brute was coming towards me with a pillow.”

“That dream will come true if you won't move over to the wall.”

The startled couple turned around to see the gunman standing in the doorway.

“Son of a bitch. So you were going to take it on the lam and leave me stranded now that the assignment has heated up.”

“T, take it easy, have a drink.”

“No thanks, I'm not thirsty. Here I have been playing the fool for these past years, helping you set up Ed Yellings, and now you are going to drop me. Years of swallowing my pride and acting like a kookie rookie when all along you two were carrying on. I'm finished with this assignment. I feel sick about what has happened to Minnie. She wants more power now than Marie Laveau, and you two did it to her. I'm going to call the Director of Louisiana Red Corporation, the Red Rooster, and tell him everything I know about you two. You see, it's all over. That's what I came up here to tell you about.”

“What's all over?” Lisa says. “You don't make sense.”

“About an hour ago Minnie busted George Kingfish Stevens and Andy Brown out of jail and then commandeered an airplane after miraculously evading San Francisco security, which was as tight as a drum. You don't have anything else to use against Solid Gumbo Works because Minnie has been shot.”

“Shot,” both Lisa and Max exclaim.

“Yes, she was shot by a passenger. The poor child was rushed to a New York hospital. It sickens me, my part in this whole thing.”

He walks over to the telephone and dials.

“Hello operator, give me Louisiana Red Corporation in New Orleans, person to person to the Red Rooster, the number is area code 504—” but before he could say anything Max lunged for him and with incredible strength wrestled him to the floor. The gun went off, killing T Feeler.

“Max, let's get out of here. We really must go now.”

Max slowly looked up from where he knelt over the corpse. “Who you callin Max, bitch? I'll whip you into bad health.”

“Max, what's the matter with you? Why are you talking that way?”

“I'm gone fix you good. Killing you won't count. Not even the best critics will notice it. I'm going to kill you.” He walks towards her. She screams.

“Max! Stop!”

“Max? Who Max? I'm Bigger,” Max growls.