Thomas Cook - Streets of Fire

He felt his fingers tighten around the slender wooden post as his mind flew back to the dark ground off Collins Avenue, the deep Negro voice of the man who spoke to Daniels, promising to deliver on his half of the bargain: GM, before morning, Thirty. He felt a slender rod of steel go through him, hard and cold.

GM.

Gaston Motel.

He rushed back into the house and dialed the Gaston Motel.

The desk clerk answered sleepily.

‘What room is King in?’ Ben demanded.

‘What?’

‘What room is King in?’ Ben repeated.

The man did not answer.

‘Tell me, goddammit!’ Ben yelled.

Silence.

Ben realized that his own voice was a white voice, a wild white voice. He softened it immediately. ‘Please,’ he began. ‘It’s important. I got to know.’

The clerk hung up.

Ben hit the button on the cradle, raised another dial tone, then called headquarters. It was on the second ring that he realized there was no one there he could trust, no one he could rely upon. He slammed the phone down and rushed from the house, leaving his front door wide open behind him.

At the car, he hit the ignition, then drove his foot down hard against the accelerator. The rear tires spun wildly, and the car lunged forward, peeling loudly on the smooth black pavement. He continued to press down on the accelerator. The dark lines of houses whisked by him in a blur. He could feel the wind ripping through the car, blowing back his hair, flapping loudly in his shirtsleeves.

The pale neon sign of the Gaston Motel shone dully ahead as he raced toward it, then pulled over to the curb. Sammy McCorkindale was snoozing in a patrol car only a few yards from the driveway. A lone young man stood in the driveway itself, his hands toying with a two-way radio.

It was Leroy Coggins, and he stared quizzically as Ben’s car thundered toward him, then screeched to a halt.

‘What room is King in?’ Ben yelled as he got out of the car.

Coggins stared at him, astonished. ‘What are you doing here?’

Ben grabbed him by the shirt collar. ‘Is he in Room 30?’

Coggins’ eyes narrowed angrily. ‘You think I’d tell you?’

Ben shook him hard, jerking his head violently. ‘Is King in Room 30?’ he screamed.

The anger drained from Coggins’ eyes. ‘Look, man, I can’t just …’

Ben ripped the radio from Coggins’ hand and pressed the transmitter button. ‘Get King out!’ he cried. ‘Get everybody out of Room 30!’

He handed the radio back to Coggins. ‘Go make sure they’re getting out of there, Leroy,’ he demanded frantically.

Coggins backed away, his hand grappling with the radio, bringing it to his mouth. ‘Get everybody out!’ he yelled as he ran toward the motel.

Ben backed into the street, staring at the plain, cement-block façade of the motel. He could see figures moving on the second landing, and even from the distance, he could hear their fists knocking on doors, their voices crying desperately.

He glanced toward the patrol car. McCorkindale was still snoozing obliviously.

When he looked back toward the motel, the second landing was clear, and he could see several people making their way quickly down the stairs and out into the parking lot.

The explosion came in a sudden flash of white light. The men in the parking lot dove onto the pavement, some of them scrambling under cars to escape the falling glass and cement that showered down upon them from the blast on the second floor. The door of Room 30 had been blown from its hinges and now tumbled over the metal railing and smashed through the windshield of the car parked beneath it.

The parking lot filled with people almost instantly. They stood, staring thunderstruck, as the first white light of the explosion spread out in a wave of orange flames. For a moment, an odd, unworldly silence descended upon everything, and there was nothing but the sound of the crackling flames. Then, suddenly, the cries of the people began to break the air, and along with them, the distant wail of scores of sirens. Within minutes police cars began screeching up the streets, and behind them, the fire engines.

Ben stepped back across the street and watched as the people around the motel began to mass themselves, shouting angrily and tossing rocks and bottles at the police and firemen. It was as if this small motel, burning in the night, had become their final redoubt, the place where they intended to make their ultimate stand. The police moved forward under a hail of debris, their nightsticks drawn. Behind them, waves of state troopers stood in tight ranks, waiting for their signal.

It came almost immediately, and Ben stood, staring in disbelief, as the troopers drove fiercely into the crowd, firing tear gas before them. But the crowd continued to resist, retreating slowly, but fighting as it retreated, pausing to scream curses and hurl bricks, bottles and pieces of shattered wood at the charging troopers. Steadily, the troopers themselves picked up their pace, driving the crowd toward the flaming wall of the motel. They fell upon the stragglers with a terrible vengeance, beating them to the ground, then dragging them unconscious to the waiting police vans. Wave after wave of troopers charged across the littered parking lot, seizing people already dazed by the gas or stunned by nightsticks and finishing them off with a final blow to the head or kick to the belly.

Ben stood silently, half-hidden behind a tree, his face flickering in the light from the fire, his mind desperately returning to where it had all begun, his ears tuned to the voice of the man who had met Daniels in the darkness, listening to every word, the deal, one for one, King for Langley. King was an obvious target. But Langley?

Coggins came up a moment later, his clothes torn and dirty, his whole body limp with exhaustion.

‘Look at that,’ he said as he nodded toward the smoldering ruin of the motel.

‘They’ll rebuild it,’ Ben said.

‘The whole city’s going under,’ Coggins said. ‘Everybody’s hurting. Negro business. White business. Everybody.’ He shook his head. ‘Even the shothouses are empty.’

Ben felt something in his mind open up suddenly like a small, long-buried chest. ‘Yes,’ he whispered.

Coggins looked at him. ‘Yes, what?’ he asked.

But Ben was already gone.

FORTY-FIVE

The early morning darkness had only begun to lift as Ben drew his car over to the curb not far from the house. He got out quietly and tucked the envelope he’d picked up at an all-night drugstore into his trouser pocket. Then he walked to the back of the car and opened the trunk. The short black tire iron was nestled in a bed of oily rags, so he wiped it carefully before tucking it securely into the back of his trousers. Then he took off his jacket, tossed it into the trunk and closed the door.

The man on the porch got to his feet quickly as Ben made his way up the cement sidewalk. He stood, his legs spread, and peered down at him, waiting.

‘I was expecting Gaylord,’ Ben said lightly.

The man did not speak.

‘Doesn’t Gaylord usually keep guard around here?’

‘Gaylord d-don’t keep nothing,’ the man said in a voice that was deep, faintly musical, and which Ben recognized instantly even without the stammer.

‘Who are you?’ Ben asked.

‘Name’s D-douglas.’

‘Mine’s Wellman,’ Ben told him. ‘I came to see Mr Jolly.’

‘’B-bout what?’

‘Business.’

‘Well, he don’t usually see n-nobody this time of night.’

Ben smiled coolly. ‘He might want to see me,’ he said.

The man laughed. ‘Why’s that?’

‘Because I’m replacing Teddy Langley here in Bearmatch,’ Ben said in a lean, vaguely threatening voice. ‘And I figured it would be a good idea if I met the man that everybody says runs this part of Birmingham.’