Ace Atkins - Dark End of the Street

Russell. Yeah, she knew him. Liberal senator out of Memphis who wanted to be governor. His father had been some kind of racist pig during segregation. Guy spent every minute trying to tell people that he wasn’t like his dead daddy.

“Nice to meet you,” Perfect said, fishing with a sly little grin.

Nothin’. No smile. No warm shake. He acted like she wasn’t even there.

About ten yards later, Russell was intercepted by another round of the khaki club. He gave more two-handed shakes and wide big-toothed grins. Ransom was watching. He cleaned his sunglasses with a show handkerchief, squinted one gray eye, and looked out through a clean lens.

“I hate that son of a bitch,” he said.

THE TUNICA JUSTICE COMPLEX WAS remarkable for nothing but its newness. Red brick and squat with the architectural detail of a Ritz cracker box, the building sat on the edge of an aging downtown cut in the center by railroad tracks. Outside there was an American flag that flapped stiff and bold from a high pole and a few immature trees – barely rooted in their soil – sitting brown and dead by the front doors.

As I parked in a visitor’s slot, Ulysses jumped out before my truck stopped, sliding his boots on the asphalt. He had on a pair of thin shades and had the collar of his black leather coat flipped up on his neck.

“Hey, Shaft,” I said. “You want to hold up?”

“Oh, yeah, man. Guess you ain’t in a hurry to go to jail.”

I stopped and put my hands in the pockets of my jeans. I looked over at the dead trees and the long shot of the old downtown dressed up with boutiques, antique stores, and a coffee shop.

“Remember that time you locked that weight coach… what was his name?”

“Shit,” I said. “I don’t remember.”

“At camp? C’mon. Remember you locked him in that old laundry bin where we used to throw old jockstraps and socks.”

“What made you think of that?”

“Last time I seen you worried about anything. They were talkin’ about cuttin’ you.”

“Shit.”

“This ain’t nothin’. Self-defense. It’ll work out.”

I nodded.

“And the girl gonna be fine, too.”

We’d left Abby in Memphis with an associate of U’s named Bubba Cotton. Bubba was bigger than me and U combined and, according to U, had once killed a man using a shrimp fork at a Red Lobster by the airport. I felt pretty confident that Abby was safe.

A curtain of deep black clouds headed east on the horizon and a stop sign at the crossroads beat in the strong wind. The sun was hard and white but swallowed whole in seconds by the clouds. A whistle could be heard through narrow cracks in the shotgun cottages across the road.

U headed on in the complex, like a man strolling into an A &P to buy a loaf of bread, and motioned for me to follow. I kind of wished I was back at the Peabody now. I’d kick off my boots, watch the clouds drift over the river, and order a club sandwich and a Dr Pepper from room service.

U motioned again.

The building’s stale air hit us as soon as we walked inside to a Plexiglas window protecting a receptionist. She was white and fortyish and as gaudily made up as a corpse on viewing day. She wasn’t chewing gum or smoking a cigarette or seemed to be doing anything active at all. She had her hands flat on a stack of papers across her desk. Her eyes cast downward refusing to admit that she heard us walk through the door.

For some reason, I wasn’t sure why, her attitude was pissing me off. I wanted to reach through that little cut-out circle, where you were supposed to speak, and flick her in the head.

“Miss?” U asked.

She continued her daze.

Maybe it was a religious thing. Maybe she was meditating or slowly saying a special Russian prayer to herself over and over like the one in Franny and Zooey.

“Miss?”

Her eyes shifted upward.

“We need to speak to the sheriff.”

“Sheriff Beckum?”

“Is there another one?” U asked.

She looked annoyed. A reaction. A movement of facial muscles. Amazing.

“He’s in a conference right now.”

Above her hung a picture of the man himself. Sheriff Beckum. Looked to be in his early thirties, businessman haircut, porn star mustache. Not that I watched a lot of porn or anything. It was just that few people could really pull off the mustache thing and look cool.

“You think we could wait?” U asked.

“Can a deputy help you, sir?”

U crossed his arms across his chest and looked away, annoyed.

I took a huge breath of air and said simply and slowly: “Ma’am, we have a murder to report.”

Sheriff Robert Beckum entered the hallway in a way I didn’t expect. No creased khakis or frowns or mirrored Smokey and the Bandit sunglasses. Beckum was clean-shaven – I made a mental note to compliment the change later – and wearing corduroy pants and a faded-blue flannel shirt. Mud was scattered across one sleeve and he wore a big grin of a man completely and honestly content with his day.

He offered his hand to U and then turned to me.

“Y’all serious about a murder?”

He seemed thinner than the picture, and younger. Maybe even late twenties. Beckum had an intense face with a pointed nose and brown hair slicked back against his skull. He kept your attention like an eager shoe salesman and held your hand longer than was expected.

But I had learned long ago, handshakes truly told you little about a person.

I relied more on eye contact. And Beckum never broke away from my glance.

“There was some trouble last night at the Magnolia Grand,” I said. “A young woman was being held against her will. I helped her and in the process of getting away I shot a man.”

Beckum shook his head. “Well, goddamn. Nobody tells me nothing ’round here anymore. You’d think a sheriff would know when a man’s been shot.”

U stole a glance at me.

“Last night, about midnight,” I said.

“Y’all been gambling? Drinkin’ a little?”

I shook my head.

“I was there to talk to the man who runs their security.”

Beckum still never wavered from my glance. Kind of annoying. Had this look on his face like he could read minds and expected you to kind of quake with fear as he gave the ole squinty glance.

“Why?” he asked.

“I was looking for a friend.”

“He work there?”

“No.”

“The girl’s a friend, too?”

“No.”

“How’d you know she was being held against her will?”

“She was tied up.”

“In the casino?” Beckum asked, a sarcastic smile on his lips.

“In a storage room in the casino. I saw her on a video monitor. When we were running away from the casino a man started shooting at me. I shot back. And I hit him in the chest.”

“Why’d you bring a gun to a casino?”

“I didn’t,” I said. “I took it off one of the guards who tried to stop me from leaving.”

Beckum nodded and looked over at U.

“What’s your deal in all this, hoss?”

“I’m a registered bondsman,” he said. “I’m here to make sure he’s treated properly… hoss.”

Beckum snickered. Out of the corner of his eye, I saw U flex his jaw muscles.

Beckum saw it, too, but glanced away like it didn’t register. It did. His face flushed as he spoke.

“Guess it’s time we all take a ride to the Grand and see what the hell this is all about.”

“Indeed,” U said.

EVEN IN THE MIDDLE OF THE DAY, the scene was the same as the night before. The perfectly dimmed blue and green neon light. The pinging electronic music. The hundreds of slots, card tables, and roulette wheels buzzing with the energy of a never-ending party. The scent was the same, too. A musky odor of nervousness and beer breath mixed with cheap cigars and endless cigarettes.