Chester Himes - For love of Imabelle

Lawrence looked at her briefly, then studied the notes in front of him. He took his time and reread all the reports.

“Jesus Christ, all this cutting and shooting,” he muttered. “This room is swimming in blood. No, no, don’t take that,” he added to the court stenographer.

He looked up at Imabelle again, slowly stroking his chin, wondering where to begin questioning her.

“Who was Slim?” he finally asked. “What was his real name? We have him down here as Goldsmith. In Mississippi he was known as Skinner.”

“Jimson.”

“Jimson! Is that a name? Christian name or family name?”

“Clefus Jimson. That was his real name.”

“And the other two. What were their real names?”

“I don’t know. They used a lot of names. I don’t know what their real names were.”

“This Jimson.” The name felt unpleasant in his mouth. “We’ll just call him Slim. Who was Slim? What was your connection with him?”

“He was my husband.”

“I thought as much. Where were you married?”

“We weren’t exactly married. He was my common-law husband.”

“Oh! Were you — did you keep in touch with him? That is, while you were living with Jackson?”

“No sir. I hadn’t seen him or heard anything about him for almost a year.”

“Then how did he get in touch with you — or you in touch with him, however it worked?”

“I ran into him at Billie’s by accident.”

“Billie’s?” Lawrence consulted his notes again. “Oh yes, that’s where the other two were killed.” My God, the blood, he was thinking. “What were you doing at Billie’s?”

“Just visiting. I’d go up there afternoons when Jackson was at work, just to sit around and visit. I didn’t like to hang around in bars where it might cast reflections on him.”

“Ah. I see. And when you met Slim you and he connived together to cheat Jackson on the confidence game—” He glanced at his notes. “The Blow.”

“I didn’t want to. They made me do it.”

“How could they force you to do it if you didn’t want to?”

“I was scared to death of him. All three of them. They had it in for me and I was scared they’d kill me.”

“You mean they had a grudge against you. Why?”

“I’d taken the trunk full of gold ore they used to work their lost-gold-mine racket with.”

“You mean the fool’s gold that was found in the coalbin where you and Slim lived?”

“Yes sir.”

“You took it when?”

“When I left him in Mississippi. He was playing around with another woman and when I left I just up and took it and brought it to New York. I knew they couldn’t work the racket without it.”

“I see. And when he found you at Billie’s he threatened you.”

“He didn’t have to. He just said, ‘I’m gonna take you back and we’re gonna rook that nigger you been living with.’ Hank and Jodie was there too. Hank was all hopped up and in that mean dreamy way he has when he’s hopped and Jodie was gaged on heroin and kept snapping that knife open and shut and looking at me as if he’d like to cut my throat. And Slim, he was half-drunk. And Hank said they were going to take the gold ore and start operating right here in New York. There wasn’t nothing for me to say. I had to do it.”

“All right. Then you contend that you participated under duress. That they forced you on threat of death to work with them in their racket?”

“Yes sir. It was either that or get my throat cut. There was no two ways about it.”

“Why didn’t you go to the police?”

“What could I say to the police? They hadn’t done nothing then. And I didn’t know they were wanted in Mississippi for murder. That happened after I’d gone.”

“Why didn’t you go to the police after they had cheated Jackson out of fifteen hundred dollars?”

“It was the same thing. I didn’t know then that Jackson had got hep that he’d been beat. If I’d gone to the police then and Jackson hadn’t preferred charges, the cops would have just let them go. And they’d have killed me then for sure. I didn’t know then about Jackson’s brother. I just knew that Jackson himself was a square and he couldn’t help me none.”

“All right. But why didn’t you go to the police after they’d thrown acid into Detective Johnson’s face?”

She glanced fleetingly in the direction of Grave Digger, and drew into herself. Grave Digger was staring at her with a fixed expression of hate.

“I didn’t have any chance,” she said in a pleading tone of voice. “I would have, but I couldn’t. Slim was with me all the time until we got home. Then after Hank and Jodie came down the river in that motorboat they rented, they got out underneath the railroad bridge and came straight to the place where Slim and me was at. Then there wasn’t any use of thinking about going.”

“What happened there?”

Sweat filmed her bruised face beneath their concentrated stares.

“Well, you see, Jodie thought I’d ratted to the police, until Slim showed him where I couldn’t have ratted. I hadn’t never had no chance. Jodie was gaged and evil and if it hadn’t been for Hank, Jodie and Slim would have got to fighting again. Hank was the only one carried a gun, and he put his gun on Jodie and stopped him. Then Jodie wanted him and Hank to take the gold ore and lam and leave me and Slim there. Slim said they couldn’t take the gold ore without taking him and me too. Then Hank said he agreed with Jodie. They couldn’t take Slim on account of the acid burns on his neck and face. The cops could identify him too easy. They’d put two and two together and know just who he was. Hank said for Slim to hole up somewhere until his face got healed and they’d send for him, but meantime they’d take the gold ore. Slim said nobody was taking his gold ore, he didn’t give a damn what they did. Then before Hank could stop him Jodie had stuck him in the heart and kept sticking him until Hank said, ‘Let up, God damn it, or I’ll kill you.’ But by then Slim was dead.”

“Where were you when all this was happening?”

“I was there, but I couldn’t do nothing. I was scared to death that Jodie was going to start sticking me too. He would have if Hank hadn’t stopped him. He was like a crazy man.”

“But why did they put the body in the trunk?”

“They wanted to get rid of it to keep from having another murder rap hanging on them in New York. Hank said he knew where they could get some more fool’s gold in California. So they just left enough in the trunk to weight it down and threw the rest in the coalbin. They were planning to drop the trunk into the Harlem River. Hank said he was going to get a truck to move it and Jodie was supposed to stand downstairs and keep on the lookout. I was supposed to scrub the blood off the floor. I was too scared to think about leaving with Jodie standing downstairs. I didn’t know he had gone with Hank until Jackson and his brother came to take the trunk.”

Lawrence rubbed his chin angrily, trying to get the picture into focus. His eyes seemed out of focus too.

“Just where did you fit into their plans?”

“They were going to take me with them. I was scared they were going to take me out and kill me on the road somewhere.”

“But you had already gotten away by the time they returned and killed Goldy?”

“Yes sir. I didn’t know anything about that.”

“Why didn’t you notify the police then?”

“I was planning to. I was going down to the police station and tell the first policeman I saw. But that man attacked me before I had even gotten there, and before I had a chance to say anything the police had rushed me off to jail for just trying to protect myself.”

Lawrence paused to study the report again.