Chester Himes - The crazy kill

"What you doing up so soon?" she asked into the phone. "Or has you gone to bed yet?"

"I'm in Chicago," Johnny said. "I flew here this morning."

Mamie's thin old body began trembling violently beneath the slack folds of the rusty old kimono, and the telephone shook in her hands as though she had the palsy.

"Trust her, son," she pleaded in a whining voice. "Trust her. She loves you."

"I trust her," Johnny said in his flat toneless voice. "How much trust am I supposed to have?"

"Then let it alone son," she begged. "You got her all for yourself. Ain't that enough?"

"I don't know whether I got her all for myself or not," he said. "That's what I want to find out."

"Ain't no good ever come from digging up the past," she warned.

"You tell me what it is and I'll stop digging," he said.

"Tell you what, son?"

"Whatever in the hell it is," he said. "If I knew I wouldn't be here."

"What is you want to know?"

"I just want to know what it is she thinks I'll pay ten grand for her to tell me," he said.

"You got it all wrong, Johnny," she argued in a moaning voice. "That's just Doll Baby lying to try to make herself look big. If Val was alive he'd tell you she was lying."

"Yeah. But he ain't alive," Johnny said. "And I got to find out for myself whether she's lying or not."

"But Val must have told you something," she said, sobbing deep in her thin old chest. "He must of told you something or else-" She broke off and began to swallow as though to swallow the words she'd already said.

"Or else what?" he asked in his toneless voice. She kept swallowing until she could say finally, "Well, it's got to be something that you went all the way to Chicago for, 'cause it can't just be what a lying little bitch like Doll Baby says."

"All right then, what about you?" he said. "You ain't been lying. What you keep pleading Dulcy's case for then, if there ain't nothing to plead for?"

"I just don't want to see no more trouble, son," she moaned. "I just don't want to see no more blood spilt. Whatever it might have been, it's over with and she's all yours now, you can believe that."

"You ain't doing nothing but just adding to the mystery," he said.

"There ain't never been any mystery," she argued. "Not on her part. Not unless you made it."

"Okay, I made it," he said. "Let's drop it. What I called to tell you was I got her locked up in the bedroom-"

"Good Lord above!" she exclaimed. "What good you think that's going to do?"

"Just listen to me," he said. "The door's padlocked from the outside with a Yale lock. The key is on the kitchen shelf. I want you to go and let her out long enough to get something to eat and then lock her up again."

"Lord have mercy, son," she said. "How long do you think you can keep her locked up like that?"

"Until I straighten out some of these mysteries," he said. "That ought to be before the day's over."

"Don't forget one thing, son," she pleaded. "She loves you."

"Yeah," he said, and hung up.

Mamie dressed quickly in her black satin Mother Hubbard and her own men's shoes, dipped her bottom lip full of snuff and took the snuff stick and box of snuff along with her.

The sky was black-dark like an eclipse of the sun, and the street lights were still burning. Not a grain of dust nor a scrap of paper moved in the still close air. People walked about silently, in slow motion, like a city full of ghosts, and cats and dogs tiptoed from garbage can to garbage can as though afraid their footsteps might be heard. Before she found an empty taxi she felt herself suffocating from the exhaust fumes that didn't rise ten feet above the pavement.

"It's going to rain tadpoles and bull frogs," the colored driver said.

"It'll be a blessing," she said.

She had her own set of keys to the apartment, but it took her a long time to get in because Grave Digger and Coffin Ed had left the locks unlocked and she locked them thinking she was opening them.

When finally she got inside she had to sit for a moment in the kitchen to steady her trembling. Then she took the key from the shelf and unlocked the bedroom door from the hall. She noticed that the bathroom door was standing open but her thoughts were so confused it held no meaning for her.

Dulcy was still asleep.

Maime covered her with a sheet and took the empty brandy bottle and glass back to the kitchen. She began cleaning the house to occupy her mind.

It was ten minutes to twelve and she was scrubbing the kitchen floor when the thunderstorm broke. She drew the shades, put away the scrub brush and pail and sat at the table with her head bowed low and began to pray,

"Lord, show them the way, show them the light, don't let him kill nobody else."

The sound of the thunder had awakened Dulcy, and she stumbled toward the kitchen, calling in a frightened voice, "Spookie. Here, Spookie."

Mamie looked up from the table. "Spookie ain't here," she said.

Dulcy gave a start at sight of her. "Oh, it's you!" she exclaimed. "Where's Johnny?"

"Didn't he tell you?" Mamie asked.

"Tell me what?"

"He flew to Chicago."

Dulcy's eyes widened with terror and her face blanched to a muddy yellow. She flopped into a chair, but got up the next instant, got a bottle of brandy and a glass from the cabinet and gulped a stiff drink to quiet her trembling. But she kept on trembling. She brought the bottle and glass back to the table and sat down again and poured herself half a glass and started to drink it. Then she caught Mamie's look and put it down on the table. Her hand was trembling so violently the glass rattled on the enameled table top.

"Put on some clothes, child," Mamie said compassionately. "You're shaking from cold."

"I ain't cold," Dulcy denied. "I'm just scared to death, Aunt Mamie."

"I am, too, child," Mamie said. "But put on some clothes anyway, you ain't decent."

Dulcy got up without replying and went into the bedroom and put on a yellow flannel robe and matching mules. When she returned she picked up the glass and gulped the brandy down. She choked and sat down, gasping for breath.

Mamie dipped another lipful of snuff.

They sat silently without looking at each other.

Then Dulcy poured another drink.

"Don't, child," Mamie begged her. "Drinking ain't going to help none."

"Well, you got your lip full of snuff," Dulcy charged.

"That ain't the same thing," Mamie said. "Snuff purifies the blood."

"Alamena must have took her with her," Dulcy said. "Spookie, I mean."

"Didn't Johnny say nothing at all to you?" Mamie asked. A sudden clap of thunder made her shudder and she moaned, "God above, the world's coming to an end."

"I don't know what he said," Dulcy confessed. "All I know is he came sneaking in the back door and that's the last thing I remember."

"Was you alone?" Mamie asked fearfully.

"Alamena was here," Dulcy said. "She must have taken Spookie home with her." Then suddenly she caught Mamie's meaning. "My God, Aunt Mamie, you must think I'm a whore!" she exclaimed.

"I'm just trying to find out why he flew to Chicago all of a sudden," Mamie said.

"To check up on me," Dulcy said, gulping her drink defiantly. "For what else? He's always trying to check up on me. That's all he ever does, just check up on me." A roll of thunder rattled the windowpanes. "My God, I can't stand all that thunder!" she cried, jumping to her feet. "I got to go to bed."

She grabbed the brandy bottle and glass and fled to the bedroom. Lifting the top of the combination radio and record player, she put on a record, got into the bed and pulled the covers up to her eyes.

Mamie followed after a moment and sat in the chair beside the bed.

The wailing voice of Bessie Smith began to pour into the room over the sound of the rain beating against the windowpanes: