The announcer went on to explain that the weapon that might have been used in the robbery-murder was also found at the scene. There was also some speculation that Lannerman and Fitz might have had something to do with the murder of an associate of theirs, a man named Myermann.
I made a U-turn in the middle of Central Avenue headed for Santa Barbara.
I stopped to call EttaMae’s number. Luckily she answered.
“What you want, Easy?”
“I need Mama Jo’s number.”
“She ain’t got no phone.”
“Then I need her address.”
“Why?”
“I think somethin’ me and Raymond did might come back on her. I need to get there fast, Etta.”
“You want me to get Raymond up? He knows the way.”
“I got a map. I’ll find my own way.”
She hesitated and then gave me what I needed.
I drove along the Pacific Coast Highway part of the way, then followed the map to a dirt road that led up into a forest of pine.
Walking down toward the house I was brought back to an earlier time, a time in the swamplands of eastern Texas. The trees, the smell of soil, insects buzzing around my head, even the fever I’d felt in the primeval wood returned.
The two-story house was rustic. Made from wood and stone, brick and plaster. There were large patches of chicken wire and tarpaper where the more costly materials had crumbled and failed.
The front door was ajar.
I picked up a stone and pushed the door open.
The room I entered was just like the one I had seen twenty-five years before. Shelves along the walls were filled with bottles and jars containing powders, leaves, twigs, and crystals. There was the same rough-hewn table and chairs. There was even a fireplace with the same skulls—five or six armadillos and one human, Domaque Sr.
“Easy,” she whispered from behind a drawn curtain.
I jumped nearly across the room.
“What’s wrong?” the curtains opened and Jo walked out.
She didn’t look a day older, except maybe around the eyes. Black skin and dark hair with some silver showing here and there. She stood erect, an inch taller than I. She was wearing a coral-colored robe drawn tight around her shoulders.
“We gotta get outta here, Jo,” I said.
“Sit down, honey,” she said. “Let me make you some tea calm your nerves.”
“We got to go,” I said again.
“Why?” She smiled. Her teeth were the color of aged ivory. They were big and somehow frightening.
“The man who robbed that armored car and blamed it on Dom was found by the police,” I said. “But he got away. We framed him with the same bag he tried to frame Dom with. He might be comin’ here.”
“Oh?” she said. “Then go on and sit, baby. I done thrown the bones on that one and the girl. They ain’t gonna mess around me. Go on—sit.”
I did as she said.
She made a pot of tea from her leaves and twigs. She served mine in a wooden mug.
The table was clear except for a worn black velvet bag.
“That’s my chicken bones,” she said. “That’s how I divine the future.”
From the first sip I was a little light-headed.
“Really?” I said.
“Uh-huh. You want me to read your future?”
“No thanks.” I took a second sip and settled back into the chair. I was still thinking about Dean Lannerman but for some reason I wasn’t concerned.
“I know what you mean, honey,” Jo said. “Men like you is better off not knowin’. Otherwise you might second-guess what you doin’ and get all worried when they ain’t nuthin’ you could do.”
“Yeah,” I said. I grinned too.
“Old Domaque was like that,” she said waving her hand at the skull covered in dried skin on the mantel. “He died for love of me and my father. He refused to fight and died thinkin’ that if he killed my father he would have broke my heart.”
“He must have been a great man,” someone speculated. That someone was probably me.
“Drink up, baby,” Jo said.
I did so. The world around me got sparkly and soft. Jo’s deep voice droned on. Some kind of music was playing. It was music that I had listened to years before on scratchy phonographs down in Texas when I was a child. I don’t know if the music came out of my memories or if Jo was playing something on an old player.
“You never did nuthin’ wrong to Raymond, baby,” she was saying. “And you saved Dom for me. Don’t you ever worry about what you do, Easy. You are the kinda man who stands up for who he is. You come here because you know what’s right. You might not always make it in time but you always on the way. That’s all we can ask for, darling child.”
I fell asleep to the deep crooning tones of Mama Jo’s speech. I felt as if I were being lifted up by a hundred black hands, that I was being carried up the side of a mountain while a thousand women sang. There were drums and trumpets playing. And I was walking down the center of Central Avenue with ten thousand people behind me. We were all walking together toward some unknown destiny.
I came to a door that had my name on it. Then I took a deep breath and trundled off into a deep sleep.
WHEN I WOKE UP I knew it was night. I was in bed and dressed only in my pants. There were voices coming from beyond the curtains. I came out feeling deeply refreshed. Dom and Mouse were sitting with Jo at the country table, eating from tin plates.
“You sleep good, baby?” Jo asked me.
Just that little bit of concern made me want to cry.
“What happened to Dean?” I asked.
“Dead,” Mouse said.
“Dead,” echoed Dom.
“How?”
“They had a roadblock waitin’ for him down on the highway. They knew him around here and spotted him on the road.”
“He was comin’ for Jo,” I said.
“But he was ordained to die on the asphalt,” Jo said.
I wondered if her chicken bones had been so specific but I didn’t ask.
“Wanna go fishin’, Easy?” Dom asked.
“In the mornin’?”
“Now,” he cried. “The grunion’s runnin’.”
I STOPPED AT a phone booth and called Bonnie. She seemed to understand, which surprised me because I was still in the haze of Jo’s potion.
“I dreamed I had a door,” I said into the receiver.
“It was telling you something,” Bonnie said. “Something that you need to know.”
* * *
AFTER THAT RAYMOND AND DOM and I ran up and down the beach with our aluminum pails scooping up the spawning fish and laughing out loud. We were like children in the dark of the ocean. No one knew we were there. No one cared about us and that was just fine by me.
Amber Gate
THERE WAS A SMALL shoe repair shop at 86th Place and Central Avenue back in those days. But Mr. Steinman, the owner and only employee, also made shoes. And if Steinman made you a pair of shoes you’d have to work in a junk-yard in order to wear them down. It took him three months to finish just one pair. He charged two hundred dollars but that was cheap for the craftsmanship and style. And he didn’t make shoes for just anyone. No. He had to know his customer before agreeing to spend a quarter of a year on a pair of shoes for him. He had to work on your footwear and see how you cared for what you bought in the stores. You had to prove that you would maintain the shine and use a frame to keep up the shape. You couldn’t have scuff marks or uneven heel wear from poor posture if you wanted to wear a pair of handcrafted Steinman’s.
He was an odd little white man but I liked him quite a bit. And he must have liked me because he had left a message that he’d just finished my third pair of handmade shoes.