Walter Mosley - A Red Death

“What if I do all this you say an’ I still don’t find nuthin’?”

“If I don’t get what I want, Mr. Rawlins, then my job isn’t worth a cent. If I can’t make this case you’ll be shit out of luck along with me.”

“And if you do find it?”

“Then I help you, Easy. Sink or swim.”

“I have your word, Mr. Craxton?”

Instead of answering me he asked, “Home?”

“Yeah.”

On the ride all he talked about was how he was going to buy some bonita, cut the fish in chunks, scald it, and then marinate it in a vinegar and soya sauce. It was a dish he’d learned to make while on duty in Japan.

“Nips know how to do fish,” he said.

What you thinkin’ ’bout, Easy?” Etta asked.

We were lying back in her bed. I had my hands together behind my head and she was running her fingers along my erection, under the covers. I felt strange. It was one of those feelings that doesn’t quite make sense. My body was excited but my mind was calm and wondering about the next move I should make. If Etta hadn’t kept her fingers going like that I would have been nervous, unable to think about anything.

I came to her house in the evening, after LaMarque had gone to bed. She bathed me and then I loved her, again and again until it was close to sunrise. I don’t think there was much pleasure in it for her, except maybe the pleasure of helping me dull the fear and pain I felt.

“ ’Bout them people. ’Bout how they dead but still I gotta worry ’bout ’em. That’s what makes us different from the animals.”

“How’s that?” she whispered and, at the same time, she gave me a little squeeze.

“If a dog see sumpin’ dead he just roll around on the corpse a few times an’ move on, huntin’. But I find a dead man an’ it’s like he’s alive, followin’ me around an’ pointin’ his finger at me.”

“What you gonna do, baby?”

“FBI man thinks Reverend Towne was mixed up in somethin’. He thinks that Towne was messed up wit’ communists.”

“What com’unists?”

“Uh, that feels good,” I said. “The Jew I been workin’ for, communist.”

“What they gotta do wit’ Towne?”

She sat up a little.

I said, “Put your hand back, Etta, put it back.”

She grinned at me and settled back against my chest.

“That’s why the government got me outta jail. They want the Jew,” I said, clearheaded again.

“So? Let them do it. You ain’t gotta go out an’ do they job.”

“Yeah,” I said. Then I sat back and smiled because so much pleasure could come after pain.

“Mofass is gone,” I said after a while.

“Gone where?”

“Nobody knows.”

“Outta his house?”

“Uh-huh. He left some kinda half-assed note at the office. Said his mother was sick down in New Orleans and he was going to care for her. He let his room go too. That’s some strange shit.”

“Ain’t nuthin’ wrong wit’ that.”

“I guess. But I cain’t see Mofass runnin’ out without a word.”

“People change when it comes t’ family.”

“But that’s just it, Mofass never even liked his momma.”

“You just cain’t tell, Easy, blood is strong.”

I knew she was right about that. I loved my father more than life even though he abandoned me when I was eight years old.

“But you know it is funny,” Etta said.

“What?”

“You know that boy tried to beat up on you after church?”

“Willie Sacks?”

“Uh-huh. His momma, Paulette, come by here today.”

“Why’s that?”

“I asked her ’cause I wanted her to know how Willie had come after you. I told her but she already knew it. She said Willie had gone bad after he met Poinsettia.”

“Bad how?”

“She had’im runnin’ after her an’ spendin’ all his money. Willie used t’take his money home. He ain’t got no father an’ Paulette relied on him t’pay the rent.”

“Boys grow up, Etta. LaMarque do the same thing when some girl get him to feelin’ like this.” I touched her hand.

“But you know Willie never made enough an’ Mofass was payin’ fo’ that girl too.”

“What?”

“Mofass been payin’ her rent the last year. Poinsettia told Willie ’bout it. She said how sometimes she had to go out with him but that they never did any more than kiss.”

“No lie?” I never thought Mofass chased the ladies.

“But she also said how Mofass had her go out with other men sometimes.”

“You mean like he was her pimp?”

“I don’t know, Easy. I just know what Paulette said. Now you know she heard it from her son an’ he got it from Poinsettia. Willie broke up with her when he found out. At least that’s what Paulette thought. But after her accident she started callin’ again. Maybe Mofass did somethin’ to that girl.”

“I don’t know,” I said. “But I can’t see it. What could she have on him to make him wanna do that?”

“You’ll find out.”

“What makes you think so?”

“I just know it, that’s all. You’re a smart man, and you care too.”

“Yeah?”

“Uh-huh.”

She tossed back the blankets so that I could see her handiwork. She watched it too.

“I want some more, baby.” She said it loudly and bold as if she were announcing to an audience.

I knew she didn’t but I asked, “You do?”

“Yeah.” It was almost a growl in my ear.

“Where?”

And she guided me. And I turned into a rutting pig again, trying to rut myself to safety.

I woke up with a start. There was a sound somewhere in the apartment. I worried that Mouse was in the other room with his revolver but at the same moment I looked at EttaMae. I looked at her feeling how spent I was and I realized that I wanted her more than just for sex. That was new to me. Usually sex was the first and last thing with me, but I wanted her with the same ardor when I was all used up.

I snaked out of bed and slithered into my pants. There was no light from outside or from the other room. I eased the door open and saw him sitting in the living room. He was swinging his head back and forth and kicking the heels of his feet against the couch.

“LaMarque!”

“Hi, Unca Easy,” he said, looking around me to the room I came from.

“What you doin’ up?”

“You sleep wit’ my momma?”

“Yeah.” I couldn’t think of anything else to say. I could only hope that he would never repeat it to Mouse. I would have liked to ask him to keep it quiet, but it was a sin, I thought, to make a child lie.

“Oh.”

“Why you up?” I asked again.

“Dreams.”

“What kinda dreams?”

“ ’Bout a big ole monster wit’ a hunert eyes.”

“Yeah? He chase you?”

“Uh-uh. He ax me if I wanna ride an’ then he take me flyin’ so high an’ then he start fallin’ like we gonna crash.”

LaMarque’s eyes opened wide with fear as he spoke.

“Then,” he went on, “he stop jus’ fo’ we crash an’ he laugh. An’ I ax ’im t’ let me go but he jus’ keep on flyin’ high an’ scarin’ me.”

I sat next to him and let him crawl into my lap. He was panting at first.

I waited until he’d calmed down and then I asked, “Do you like it when your daddy takes you to Zelda’s?”

“Uh-uh, it’s smelly there.”

“Smell like what?”

“Dookey an’ vomick.” He stuck out his tongue.

“You tell your momma ’bout what it smells like there?”

“Uh-uh, I never telled. I’s ascared ta.”

“How come?”

“I’ont know.”

“You think that they might fight if you told?”

“Uh-huh, yeah.”

He’d grabbed a fistful of the fabric of my pants and wrung it.