What It Was Read online

  Milton Wallace eyed the Fury as it traveled south on 13th. Wallace recorded the image of the car, and the license plate, in his head.

  SHE WAS stepping out of a Warwick-blue Firebird convertible, sitting on redline tires, when Strange first saw her. She had parked the Pontiac on 9th, near the Upshur Street cross. She was young, had prominent cheekbones and clean beige skin, wore her hair in a big natural, and was unrestrained in a print halter dress. The girl was fine. Purse in hand, her hips moving with a feline sway.

  Looked to Strange that she was headed toward his spot. He could see her clearly through the wide plate glass window fronting his business. One of the reasons he liked this place: the open view.

  He got up out of the swivel chair behind his metal desk. A hard desk-style chair, like the kind he’d had in high school, sat before it. He looked around with an eye to straightening up, but there wasn’t much to put in place. He had one of those new machines, recorded the phone calls when they came in, but he had not yet figured out how to use it. He’d been here for just four months or so, and he had only acquired the bare bones that a person needed to replicate the look of an office. Everything seemed temporary. Even the sign out front was a bullshit sign, done by a dude around the corner who called himself an artist but claimed he was a lot of things when he was high.

  A radial GE clock radio sat on his desk, plugged into a floor socket. Its AM dial was set on WOL. The sound was all treble, no bass. Amid the static, “Family Affair” was playing low, Sly and his drugged-out drawl.

  A little bell mounted over the door chimed as the woman entered the shop. Strange, tall and broad shouldered, wearing low-rise bells, a wide black belt, brass-eye stacks, a rayon shirt stretched out across his chest, and a thick Roundtree mustache, stepped up to greet her.

  “Are you Mr. Strange?”

  “I am. But call me Derek, or Strange. Either way’s fine with me. No need to call me mister.”

  “My name is Maybelline Walker.”

  “Pleasure.”

  “Can I take some of your time? I’ll be brief.”

  Strange shook her hand and took in her smell, the faint sweetness of strawberries. “Let’s sit.”

  They crossed the cool linoleum floor. Strange allowed her to go ahead so he could check out her behind, as a man will tend to do. He made a maître d’s hand motion, pointing her to the client chair. She fitted herself into it, glanced at its attached desktop with puzzlement, and rested her forearm atop its face as she crossed one bare leg over the other. Strange noticed the ripple of muscle in her thigh as he took a seat behind his desk.

  “What can I do for you today?”

  “I’ve been seeing your sign out front for months now.”

  “I’m fixin to get a new one.”

  “Strange Investigations. Do you have many?”

  “A few.”

  Background checks, mainly, thought Strange. Case-builds for divorce lawyers. Infidelity tails. Nothing of any weight.

  “Are you busy with one now?”

  “I’m in a slow period.”

  “Hmm.”

  Strange looked her over. Straight backed and poised. Had some nice titties on her, too. High and tight, big old erasers about to bust through the fabric of her dress. A redbone with light-brown eyes. One of those brown-paper-bag gals, the kind he’d rarely gone after, as dark-skinned women were more to his liking. Not that he wouldn’t straighten out Miss Maybelline Walker if she’d give him a go-sign. God, he would hit the hell out of it if he had the chance.

  “Is there something?”

  “What?” said Strange.

  “You’re looking at me… well.” Maybelline blushed, a little.

  “I’m just waitin on you to tell me what this is about, Miss Walker.”

  “Make it Maybelline.”

  “Go ahead.”

  Maybelline took a deep, theatrical breath. “I lost a piece of jewelry. A ring. I’d like you to find it and bring it back to me. I’ll pay you for your time, of course, and a bonus if you succeed.”

  “How do you mean lost, exactly?”

  “I loaned the ring to an acquaintance of mine. He said that he had an associate who could appraise it. You know, to see if it had any real value.”

  Strange knew the meaning of the word appraise, but he did not make an issue of her condescension. If she was one of these uppity, educated girls, if she thought she was better than him because of geography, high school, skin color, or whatever, it made no difference to him. A job was sitting across the desk from him, and that meant cash money, something for which he had need.

  “And your acquaintance, he, what, took off with the ring?”

  “He was murdered.”

  Strange sat forward in his chair. He picked up a pencil that he had been using to draw the design of a logo he intended to implement on a new sign for out front, in the event that he ever had enough money to purchase one. He’d put the logo on his cards, too, when he got around to having some printed. He’d been playing with a magnifying glass laid partially over the name of his business, but as of yet he had not gotten it exactly right.

  “So now the ring’s missing,” said Strange.

  “Yes.”

  Strange opened a schoolboy notebook and looked at Maybelline.

  “The name of your acquaintance?”

  “Robert Odum. Went by Bobby.”

  “When was this? His murder, I mean.”

  “A week ago yesterday. He was shot to death in his residence.”

  “Gimme the address.”

  Maybelline told him where Odum stayed and Strange wrote it down. He vaguely remembered reading about the murder in the Post, buried in the section locals called “Violent Negro Deaths.”

  “Why was Odum killed?” said Strange. “Any idea?”

  “I don’t know why anyone would want to hurt Bobby. He was gentle.”

  “You knew him long?”

  “Not very. He was a friend of a friend.” She held her eyes on his. “I like to think I’m a good judge of character.”

  “How you know the ring’s gone?”

  “I’ve been by his apartment since his death. I looked everywhere for it.”

  “Police let you in?”

  “No. I spoke to a detective, but he told me I couldn’t pass through. I waited until they were done working the… what do you call that?”

  “The crime scene.”

  “It was several days after Bobby’s death that I went by.”

  “How’d you get into his place?”

  “I have a key.”

  “But you say you were only an acquaintance.”

  “We’d grown close in a short period of time. Bobby trusted me.”

  “If he was going to a fence with your ring—”

  “I didn’t say he was going to a fence.”

  “Okay. Where’d you get the ring, originally?”

  “I’m not sure I like your tone.”

  “No offense intended,” said Strange.

  Maybelline’s eyes flickered delicately with forgiveness. “The ring was in my family. It was my mother’s. Her mother’s before that. It’s costume jewelry, you want the truth. But it means something to me.”

  “I understand. Still, if it was only costume jewelry, why was Odum getting it appraised for you?”

  “He seemed to think that the body of it, the ring itself, I mean, was gold. Obviously the stones were cheap glass, but gold, of course, has value. I didn’t care about its worth. I wasn’t ever going to sell it. But for insurance purposes, I thought it was a good idea.”

  “All right.” Strange was tiring of her story, which was illogical and probably a lie. It had begun to confuse him, and maybe that was her intent. Still, he was curious. “Describe the ring, please.”

  “But I haven’t decided to hire you yet,” she said, rather petulantly.

  “I can provide references if you want.”

  “That won’t be necessary. Tell me something about your background.”

 
; “I’m D.C. born and bred. Grew up in Park View, on Princeton. Went to high school at Roosevelt, right across the street from where we sit. I was Four-F ’cause of a knee injury I got while playing football for the Rough Riders. My knee is good now, and as you can see I’m perfectly fit. I was an officer with the MPD until the riots, at which time I left the force. Kicked around some, doing a little bit of this and that, until I figured out that I dug detective work but not a uniform. So I copped a license and opened up my own place. I like soul and funk, the Redskins, good-looking women, Western movies, half-smokes, nice cars, puppy dogs, and long walks on the beach. Hot oils, too, if the situation calls for it.”

  This time Maybelline blushed full. She smiled and said, “I guess that almost covers it.”

  “Almost?”

  “Why have a storefront here when you could operate out of your car? What I mean is, what does paying rent get you when your business is done mostly on the street?”

  “It’s an odd question.”

  “I’d like to know if my money is going to your overhead or to shoe leather.”

  “Fair enough. Kids in this neighborhood watch me open that front door every morning. I think it’s important for them to see a young black man going to work each day, building his own thing. Don’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  “So there it is. Now tell me something about you.”

  “If you’re looking to know more about me, here’s not the time or place.”

  “Okay, then,” said Strange. “The ring?”

  “It has a large center stone, looks like a diamond, with eight smaller stones circling around it. The arrangement is called a cluster. The ring it’s mounted on has the Grecian key design engraved on its shoulders on a background of black enamel.”

  As she spoke, Strange drew a version of the ring, based on her description. When he was done he turned the notebook around and let her look at it.

  “Close?”

  “Something like that,” she said. “What do you charge?”

  “I get eight dollars an hour. My hours are straight and I’ll account for all of them. I ask for a fifty-dollar retainer at the start.”

  “I can give that to you right now if you’d like.”

  “That would be good.”

  She reached into the small rectangular purse and counted out some bills. She handed Strange his fee across the desk.

  “What do you do, Maybelline, you don’t mind my askin?”

  “I’m a tutor,” she said. “Mathematics.”

  “Which school?”

  “In-home. I work by the hour, just like you.”

  “Let me get your contact information right quick.”

  She took the notebook and pencil, and wrote down her phone number and home address. As she did it, “Mr. Big Stuff” came from the clock radio on the desk. Strange saw her nod her head to the rhythm and the syncopated shake of one of her feet.

  “You like this one?”

  “Hard to get it out of my head. OL doesn’t help, either. They play it all the time.”

  “All groove, no melody,” said Strange. “But what a groove.”

  Jean Knight, he thought, from New Orleans. Stax single number double-0-88. Originally recorded for the Malaco/Chimneyville label out of Jackson, Mississippi. Strange still catalogued this arcane data in his mind.

  “The singer is a southern girl, right?”

  “Uh-huh. But this radio does her no justice. I need to get a real stereo in here.”

  “All in time.”

  Maybelline got up out of her seat. Strange did the same.

  “Have you reported the missing ring to the police?”

  “Please. I’m not even trying to waste my time.”

  Strange nodded. “I’ll be in touch. Thanks for your confidence.”

  “That ring is dear to me. My mother passed last year and it’s what I have left of her.”

  “I’ll do my best to find it.” As he walked her to the front door, he said, “Do you know if the MPD has a lead on Odum’s killer?”

  “The homicide policeman I spoke with barely told me anything.”

  “You recall his name?”

  “Frank Vaughn,” said Maybelline. “White man, on the old side. Do you know of him?”

  “Heard tell of him, yes.”

  In fact, Strange knew Vaughn well.

  HE WORE his hair a little bit longer now, just over his ears. What they called the dry look. No more flattop, no more Brylcreem. Even Sinatra’s hair was on the long side, though that Hail Caesar thing he’d tried for a while was all wrong for his face and age. That was around the time he’d married that skinny young actress. Vaughn reckoned that Sinatra was just scared. Scared of death, like all sane men and, worse, scared of being irrelevant. At least Frank Vaughn had not made those kinds of mistakes. An updated hairstyle, sure. But no leisure suits, no Roman Empire cuts, no May-December romances. Vaughn knew who he was.

  He studied himself in the mirror as he straightened his black tie and smoothed out the lapels of his gray Robert Hall suit. A bit more jowly in the face, some baggage under the eyes, but not too gone for fifty-two years old.

  Vaughn smiled, displaying his widely spaced, crooked teeth. The younger cops called him “Hound Dog,” on account of his look. He’d heard one of the uniforms say, “Vaughn looks like a animated canine,” trying to be fancy with it, when all he meant was, he looked like that big dog in the cartoons, the one with the scary choppers and the spiked collar. Vaughn preferred to think of himself as a less pretty Mitchum. Or Sinatra on the cover of that record No One Cares, seated at the bar in raincoat and fedora, staring into his shot glass. A night wolf, wounded and alone.

  “What’re you grinning at?” said Olga, who had entered their bedroom, her hands on her pedal-pushered hips, watching him appraising himself in the full-length. Olga’s hair, as black and dead as a stuffed raven, had been newly coiffed at the Vincent et Vincent in Wheaton Plaza. Et. Vaughn always wondered why they didn’t just say “and” on the sign.

  “Just admiring my good looks,” said Vaughn.

  “Lord, you’re vain,” said Olga, smiling crookedly, her bright-red lipstick screaming out against her mime-white face.

  “When you got it,” said Vaughn.

  “Got what?”

  “This.” Vaughn turned, brought her into his arms, and pushed his manhood against her, to let her know he was still there. They kissed dryly.

  “What have you got today?” she said, as he broke away and walked over to the nightstand by his side of the bed.

  “Police work, Olga,” he said, his usual reply. He withdrew his holstered service revolver, a .38 Special, from the nightstand drawer, checked the load, and clipped the rig onto his belt line. “Ricky home?”

  Ricky, their college graduate, pacing himself as a bartender at a little live music venue in Bethesda. Vaughn had always feared Ricky would be a swish, with his long hair and mania for music, but the kid got more pussy than a hetero hairdresser. These days he was shacked up with a broad somewhere more often than he was in their house.

  “He didn’t make it back last night,” said Olga. “But he called so we wouldn’t worry.”

  “Loverboy,” said Vaughn, with sarcasm and pride.

  “Stop.”

  He kissed her again, this time on her cheek, wondering idly what she was going to do all day. He left their master bedroom and headed down the stairs, noticing a line of dirt along the baseboards of the living room as he grabbed his raincoat out of the foyer closet. Olga tried, but she wasn’t much for housekeeping. Their place hadn’t been spick-and-span since they’d lost their maid, Alethea Strange, just after the ’68 riots. He’d driven her to her row home in Park View, right through the thick of it as the city burned, and though it was unsaid, he knew she would never return to their house as a domestic. It had been so. Vaughn bringing her up in his mind, feeling a stir, thinking, That was some kind of woman.

  He left their house, a split level off Georgia Avenue bet
ween downtown Silver Spring and Wheaton, and drove toward D.C., his mood brightening considerably as he rolled over the District line, nearing the action, the final passion that moved his blood.

  VAUGHN HAD recently bought a new Monaco from the Dodge dealership in Laurel, Maryland. The Monaco was a middle-aged man’s car, gold with a brown vinyl roof, a four-door with power steering, power windows, and power brakes, but heavy, with too little power under the hood. He missed his white-over-red ’67 Polara with the 318 and cat-eye taillights, and he missed the decade it came from. Those had been violent years, volatile, sexy, fun.

  Vaughn drove down 16th Street, came to a stop at a red light, nodded to a couple of patrolmen in a squad car idling alongside him. That was something he wouldn’t have seen five years ago, two blacks in uniform, riding together in the same car.

  The MPD had integrated fully now, the ratio of black cops to white more accurately reflecting the population makeup of the city, which, post-riot white flight, had settled to near 80 percent colored. Vaughn had to watch that, you couldn’t call them colored anymore, or Negro for that matter. Olga told him time and time again, “They’re African American, you big ox.” Vaughn had no major problem with the designation, but he figured, if they’re going to call me white, and sometimes whitey, I’m just gonna go ahead and call them black. That is, if I can remember.

  Okay, Olga?

  Vaughn parked in a lot beside the Third District headquarters at 16th and V. No more precincts, but districts now. He checked in, sat at his desk and made a couple of calls, left the building, and headed back to his Monaco. Under its dash he had installed a two-way radio. He rarely kept it turned on.

  A young uniform saw Vaughn in the lot and said, “How’s it hangin, Hound Dog?”

  Vaughn said, “Long and strong.”

  He lit an L&M and pulled out of the lot.

  VAUGHN PARKED the Dodge on 13th Street, near the corner of R, and entered the apartment building with the extinguished gas lanterns where Bobby Odum had resided and been chilled. There was music bleeding out into the hallway, but it was not coming from the unit he was headed for. He went there straightaway and with his fist he cop-knocked on the front door.

  The door opened shortly thereafter. A young black woman with a big Afro stood in the frame. She had on high-waisted slacks and a macramé vest over a sky-blue shirt. She was compact, but her rope wedge shoes gave her altitude. Her eyes were deep set and intelligent, and he imagined that they could be welcoming if directed at the right individual. Directed at Vaughn, they were ice cool.