Walter Mosley - Devil in a Blue Dress

“Mr. Rawlins,” the first secretary said as she walked up to me. “You know Mr. Baxter is a very busy man. He doesn’t have a lot of time…”

“Well, then maybe he better see me quick so he can get back to work.”

She didn’t like that.

“May I ask what is the nature of your request?”

“Sure you can, but I don’t think your boss wants me to talk to the help about his business.”

“I assure you, sir,” she said, barely holding in her anger, “that whatever you have to say to Mr. Baxter is safe with me. Also, he cannot see you and I am the only person with whom you may speak.”

“Naw.”

“I’m afraid so. Now if you have some sort of message please tell me so I can get back to my work.” She produced a small pad and a yellow, wooden pencil.

“Well, Miss—?” For some reason I thought that it would be nice if we traded names.

“What is your message, sir?”

“I see,” I said. “Well, my message is this: I have news for a Mr. Todd Carter, the president of your company, I believe. I was given Mr. Baxter’s card to forward a message to Mr. Carter about a job I was employed to do by a Mr. DeWitt Albright.” I stopped there.

“Yes? What job is that?”

“Are you sure you want to know?” I asked.

“What job, sir?” If she was nervous at all I couldn’t see it.

“Mr. Albright hired me to find Mr. Carter’s girlfriend after she ditched him.”

She stopped writing and peered at me over the rim of her bifocals. “Is this some sort of joke?”

“Not that I know of, ma’am. As a matter of fact, I haven’t had a good laugh since I went to work for your boss. Not one laugh at all.”

“Excuse me,” she said.

She slammed the pad down hard enough to startle her helper and disappeared through the back door again.

She wasn’t gone for more than five minutes when a tall man in a dark gray suit came out to see me. He was thin with bushy black hair and thick black eyebrows. His eyes seemed to pull back into shadows under those hefty brows.

“Mr. Rawlins.” His smile was so white that it would have looked at home on DeWitt Albright.

“Mr. Baxter?” I rose and grabbed his extended hand.

“Why don’t you come with me, sir?”

We went past the two scowling women. I was sure that they’d put their heads together and start gabbing as soon as Mr. Baxter and I had gone through the door.

The hallway we entered was narrow but well carpeted and the walls were papered with a plush blue fabric. At the end of the hall was a fine oak door with “Maxim T. Baxter, Vice-President,” carved into it.

His office was modest and small. The ash desk was good but not big or fancy. The floor was pine and the window behind his desk looked out onto a parking lot.

“Not very smart talking about Mr. Carter’s business to the front desk,” Baxter said the moment we were both seated.

“I don’t wanna hear it, man.”

“What?” It was a question but there was a kind of superiority in his tone.

“I said I don’t wanna hear it, Mr. Baxter. It’s just too much goin’ on fo’ me t’be worried ’bout what you think ain’t right. Ya see, if you’d let that woman out there know that she should let me talk to you, then—”

“I asked her to get a message from you, Mr. Rawlins. It is my understanding that you’re looking for employment. I could set up an appointment for you through the mails…”

“I’m here to talk to Mr. Carter.”

“That’s impossible,” he said. Then he stood up as if that would scare me.

I looked up at him and said, “Man, why don’t you sit down and get your boss on the line.”

“I don’t know who you think you are, Rawlins. Important men don’t even barge in on Mr. Carter. You’re lucky that I took the time to see you.”

“You mean the poor nigger lucky the foreman take out the time t’curse’im, huh?”

Mr. Baxter looked at his watch instead of answering me. “I have an appointment, Mr. Rawlins. If you just tell me what you want to say to Mr. Carter he’ll call you if it seems appropriate.”

“That’s what the lady out there said, and you go blamin’ me for shootin’ off my mouth.”

“I’m aware of Mr. Carter’s situation; the ladies outside are not.”

“You might be aware of what he told you but you ain’t got no idea of what I gotta say.”

“And what might that be?” he asked, sitting back down.

“All I’m’a tell ya is that he might be runnin’ Lion from a jail cell if he don’t speak to me, and real quick too.” I didn’t exactly know what I meant but it shook up Baxter enough for him to pick up his phone.

“Mr. Carter,” he said. “Mr. Albright’s operative is here and he wants to see you… Albright, the man we have on the Monet thing… He sounds as though it’s urgent, sir. Maybe you should see him…”

They talked a little more but that was the gist of it.

Baxter led me back down the hall but made a left turn before we went through the door that led to the secretaries. We came to a darkwood door that was locked. Baxter had a key for it and when he pulled it open I saw that it was the door to a tiny, padded elevator.

“Get in, it will take you to his office,” Baxter said.

There was no feeling of motion, only the soft hum of a motor somewhere below the floor. The elevator had a bench and an ashtray. The walls and ceiling were covered in velvety red fabric that was cut into squares. Each square had a pair of dancing figures in it. The waltzing men and women were dressed like courtiers of the French court. The wealth made my heart beat fast.

The door came open on a small, red-headed man who wore a tan suit that he might have bought at Sears Roebuck and a simple white shirt that was open at the collar. At first I thought he was Mr. Carter’s servant but then I realized that we were the only ones in the room.

“Mr. Rawlins?” He fingered his receding hairline and shook my hand. His grip felt like paper. He was so small and quiet that he seemed more like a child than a man.

“Mr. Carter. I came to tell you—”

He put up a hand and shook his head before I could go on. Then he led me across the wide room to the pair of pink couches that stood in front of his desk. The desk was the size of a grand piano. The great brocade curtains behind the desk were open to a view of the mountains behind Sunset Boulevard.

I remember thinking that it was a long way from vice-president to the top.

We sat at either end of one of the couches.

“Drink?” He pointed at a crystal decanter that held a brown liquid on an end table near me.

“What is it?” My voice sounded strange in the large room.

“Brandy.”

That was the first time I ever had really good liquor. I liked it just fine.

“Mr. Baxter said that you had news from that man Albright.”

“Well, not exactly, sir.”

He frowned when I said that. It was a little boy’s frown; it made me feel sorry for him.

“You see, I’m a little unhappy about how things are going with Mr. Albright. As a matter of fact, I’m unhappy about almost everything that’s happened to me since I met the man.”

“And what’s that?”

“A woman, a friend of mine, was killed when she started asking questions about Miss Monet, and the police think I had something to do with it. I’ve been mixed up with hijackers and wild people all over town and all because I asked a couple’a questions about your friend.”

“Has anything happened to Daphne?”

He looked so worried that I was happy to say, “The last time I saw her she looked just fine.”

“You saw her?”

“Yeah. Night before last.”

Tears welled up in his pale, child’s eyes.