We both took drinks then and appreciated the quiet and calmness of our surroundings.
“You see the way them cops bowed down to him?” Fearless asked after some time had passed.
“Yeah,” I said. “White people.”
“Uh-uh, Paris,” Fearless said. “No, man. It ain’t just that. It’s the way he thinks too. Mr. Friar know he in charge. He know it. He know it so well that them cops know it too. An’ he so sure about who he is that here he bring us up in here an’ he ain’t even scared or nuthin’.”
“Why he wanna be scared of two Negro men, anyway?” I asked.
“You see that, man?” Fearless said. “You see? You think them cops stopped us ’cause they can, ’cause they don’t like colored people.”
“Well, didn’t they?”
“Naw, man. They stopped us ’cause they scared. An’ if they ain’t scared, the people pay ’em is. That’s the on’y reason they wanna keep you from readin’ yo’ book. That’s the on’y reason they asked that white man were we botherin’ him. They wanna keep on our ass ’cause if they don’t, they worried we might start fightin’ back.”
Fearless did that every once in a while. He’d open his mind to let me see his deft perceptions of the human heart. It’s no wonder that women and children loved him so much. He was a natural man in a synthetic world. He had to be as tough as he was to survive the danger that truth brought.
While I was having these thoughts, Martin Friar came through the bedroom door. His eyes were once again glazed over with doubts.
“He was fired four months ago,” the vice president said. “His home phone has been disconnected.”
“Why was he fired?” I asked.
“They didn’t say why. Only that he’d been let go and they didn’t know where he’d gone.”
“Did you look up his name in the phone book?”
“Yes. I called information too, just in case he’d gotten a new number recently.”
“What about any friends?” I asked. “Or family.”
“I don’t know any of his girlfriends’ numbers, and he was divorced two years ago.”
“Maybe his ex-wife knows how to get in touch with him,” I suggested.
“I don’t know her maiden name.”
“Does she have kids?”
“Three.”
“Then maybe she’s using their last name.”
Friar went back into the bedroom, closing the door behind him.
“You plenty smart, Paris,” Fearless said, pouring himself another shot of cognac. “It’s like you look at everything like one’a them books you read.”
“Yeah,” I said. “I know enough to jump in the Pacific but I don’t know how to swim.”
Fearless brightened at that.
“That’s where I come in,” he said. “You know I can swim like a dolphin. Yes, I can.”
When Friar returned, he told us that Mrs. Irene Motley was indeed listed. She’d known Friar from a happier time and so was willing to tell him where her ex-husband had moved. He had no phone, but that was okay because I had no intention of calling the man.
“Let’s go over there,” I said to Friar and Fearless.
“I should go alone,” Friar said flatly. “Brian doesn’t know you guys, and I’m the one in trouble.”
“Hector LaTiara,” I said, “the man you know as Paul Dempsey, is dead.”
“Dead?”
“Murdered. Angel, who you know as Monique, has disappeared and so have Maurice and his mother. They blackmailed you and done worse. It is in your best interest to have somebody backin’ you up when you go to see this guy.”
“Brian’s harmless. He wouldn’t have anything to do with people like that,” Friar said, dismissing my worries.
“Did he introduce you to Monique?” I asked.
“Yes.”
“He’s been involved with black people and gambling, and once you were in the same situation you got blackmailed. He’s the connection between you and the trouble you’re in.”
Martin was quiet then, contemplative.
“He’s been fired and he can’t even afford a phone. You know there’s something wrong there.”
Friar maintained his silence.
“Look, man,” I said. “They got you on embezzlement. You can’t go to the cops and you’d be a fool to go it alone. Let us go wit’ you. That way we go in strength.”
“Why should I trust you?” Friar asked. “I don’t even know your name.”
“Robert,” I said, holding out my hand for him to shake. “Robert Butler, and this is Mr. Tiding. Frank.”
“Why should I trust you, Mr. Butler?”
“Because I came to you,” I said. “Because I didn’t ask you for any money. Because I know the trouble you’re in and you haven’t told me a thing about it.”
Friar’s eyes were alive with thoughts and ideas but they hadn’t, as yet, settled on a verdict.
“Because you’re in trouble and Monique might be too. And maybe, if we’re lucky, we might pull your fat out of the fire along with hers.”
Finally the self-important white man nodded.
I let out a big sigh and Fearless rose to his feet.
Chapter 34
Brian Motley lived in a residence hotel called Leontine Court on the other side of downtown. The building was made from bricks that hadn’t been cleaned since the day they were laid and edged in once-white marble. The sidewalk leading to the door was so soiled and marked that it was almost as dark as the asphalt of the street. There were eighteen stairs rising to the front door. The climb told me that this hotel had been a fancy place that had come down with the neighborhood. Years ago you could have ordered sirloin steak with red wine from room service. Now the men hanging out around the entrance carried their day-old wine in back pockets. The only steak they ate had gone through the grinder.
There was a solitary figure at the front desk sitting under a sign that read ROOMS $2. The gatekeeper was a small white man with large square-framed glasses. The thick lenses threw reflections around the dingy room.
“May I help you?” he asked Mr. Friar.
“Brian Motley, please.”
“He’s in four-A,” the man, who was somewhere between thirty and fifty, said. “Across the courtyard and up the stairs to your left.
“And what about you?” the down-at-the-heels concierge asked Fearless.
“We wit’ the white man, boss,” Fearless said with a grin.
The Leontine courtyard must have been beautiful at one time. The marble walkways ran through great planters walled in by granite bricks. But the palm trees and elephant’s ears had all died away. The huge gardens were now used for cigarette butts and broken bottles. The men and women who perched out there on stone benches were young and old, beaten down and broken.
The sun glared pitilessly on the wide square, but the people still looked to be in shadow.
The only light on the stairway leading to the fourth floor came through paneless windows open to the yard. Dirt was caked in the corners and long-legged spiders scrambled out of our path. There were big roaches too, and flies, and one pigeon that couldn’t seem to find its way out of that hell.
Friar knocked on the crayon blue door. The man who answered wore shapeless maroon pants and a strap-shouldered undershirt. The shirt, once white, was now equal parts yellow and gray.
Brian Motley was unshaven but prebeard, five six exactly, and worn down to fit perfectly among the other residents of that slum.
His rheumy eyes registered Martin and then took us in. He made a slight shrug of resignation and said, “Killing me won’t help you, Marty.”
With that he backed away from the door and shambled down a very long, very narrow hall to a small room that wasn’t worth the buildup.
Motley’s floor hadn’t been finished or sealed in many years. The wood was pale and fibrous. His wooden bench and chairs had been built for outside use. There was nothing on the walls — hardly even paint. The only good thing about that room was a small window that looked upon downtown with its high-rises and blue skies.