“Just a party. How ’bout two-seventy-five?”
He brought up his right hand, rubbing the fingers. “I’d be giving it to you for that, my friend. But I tell you what,” he said. “Two cases at three dollars is fifty-four. I let you have them for fifty.”
I should have haggled for more but I was impatient to get out of there. I could tell Albright that Frank would be there Friday and on Thursday Frank and I would make a deal.
“Deal,” I said. “Can I pick it up tomorrow?”
“Why can’t we do business now?” he asked suspiciously.
“I ain’t got no fifty dollars on me, man. I could get it by tomorrow.”
“I can’t do it until Friday. I have another delivery Friday.”
“Why not tomorrow?” I asked just to throw him off.
“I can’t sell all my whiskey to one man, Easy. Tomorrow I will get two cases but what if a customer comes in and wants Jim Beam? If I don’t have it he goes to another store. Not good for business.”
We settled the deal with a ten-dollar deposit. I bought Zeppo a half-pint of Harpers and I gave Jackson a five.
“Whas happenin’, Easy?” Jackson said to me after Zeppo had gone off.
“Nuthin’. What you talkin’ ’bout?”
“I mean you ain’t givin’ no party. An’ you ain’t usually gettin’ no haircut on’a Wednesday neither. Sumpin’s up.”
“You dreamin’, man. Party gonna be Saturday night an’ you welcome t’come.”
“Uh-huh.” He eyed me warily. “Whas all this got to do with Frank?”
My stomach filled with ice water but I didn’t let it show. “This ain’t got nuthin’ to’do with Frank Green, man. I just want some liquor.”
“Alright. Sounds good. You know I be around if they’s a party t’be had.”
“See ya then,” I said. I was hoping that I’d still be alive.
All I had to do was live for twenty-four hours, until Frank made his weekly rounds.
Chapter 21
I stopped by Joppy’s on the way back from the liquor store.
It felt like home to see him buffing that marble top. But I was uncomfortable. I had always respected Joppy as a friend. I was also a little wary of him because you had to be careful around a fighter.
When I got to the bar I dug both hands into the pockets of my cotton jacket. I had so much to say that, for a moment, I couldn’t say anything.
“What you starin’ at, Ease?”
“I don’t know, Jop.”
Joppy laughed and ran his hand over his bald head. What you mean?”
“That girl called me the other night.”
“What girl is that?”
“The one your friend’s lookin’ for.”
“Uh-huh.” Joppy put down his rag and placed his hands on the bar. “That’s pretty lucky, I guess.”
“I guess so.”
The bar was empty. Joppy and I were studying each other’s eyes.
“But I don’t think it was luck, really,” I said.
“No?”
“No, Joppy, it was you.”
The muscles in Joppy’s forearms writhed when he clenched his fists. “How you figure?”
“It’s the only answer, Jop. You and Coretta were the only ones who knew I was lookin’ for her. I mean DeWitt Albright knew but he’d’a just gone after the girl if he knew where she was. And Coretta was still lookin’ to get money from me, so she wouldn’t want me knowin’ she talked to Daphne. It was you, man.”
“She could’a looked you up in the phone book.”
“I ain’t in the book, Joppy.”
I didn’t know for sure if I was right. Daphne could have found me some other way, but I didn’t think so.
“Why, man?” I asked.
Joppy’s hard face never let you know what he was thinking. But I don’t think he suspected the lead pipes I had clenched in my pockets either.
After a long minute he gave me a friendly smile and said, “Don’t get all hot, man. It ain’t so bad.”
“What you mean, ain’t so bad?” I yelled. “Coretta’s dead, your friend Albright is on my ass, the cops already brought me down once—”
“I din’t mean for none’a that t’happen, Easy, you gotta believe it.”
“Now Albright got me chasin’ Frank Green,” I blurted out.
“Frank Green?” Joppy’s eyes tightened to birds’ eyes.
“Yeah. Frank Green.”
“Okay, Easy. Lemme tell ya how it is. Albright come here lookin’ for that girl. He showed me the picture and right away I knew who it was…”
“How’d you know that?” I asked.
“Sometimes Frank bring her along when he deliverin’ liquor. I figured she was his girl or sumpin’.”
“But you didn’t say nuthin’ to Albright?”
“Naw. Frank’s my supply, I ain’t gonna get in bad with him. I just waited until he come back with her and I let her know, on the sly, that I got some information that she want to know. She called me and I give it to her.”
“Why? Why you want to help her?”
Joppy flashed a smile at me that was as close to shy as he was likely to get. “She’s a pretty girl, Easy. Very pretty. I wouldn’t mind her bein’ my friend.”
“Why not just tell Frank?”
“And have him come in here swingin’ that knife? Shit. Frank is crazy.”
Joppy relaxed a little when he saw that I was listening. He picked up his rag again. “Yeah, Ease, I thought I could get you some money and send Albright on a wrong trail. It would’a all been fine if you had listened t’me and laid off lookin’.”
“Why you had her call me?”
Joppy clamped his jaw so that the bones stood out under his ears. “She called me and wanted me to help her go somewhere, to some friend, she said. But I didn’t want none of it. You know I could help as long as all I had to do was from behind the bar, but I wasn’t goin’ nowhere.”
“But why me?”
“I told her t’call ya. She wanna know what DeWitt want, and you the one workin’ fo’ him.” Joppy hunched his shoulders. “I give her your number. I couldn’t see where it hurt.”
“So you just playin’ me for the fool and then, when you finished, you gimme t’her.”
“Nobody made you take that man’s money. Nobody made you see that girl.”
He was right about that. He talked me into it, but I was hungry for that money too.
“Her friend was dead,” I said.
“White guy?”
“Uh-huh. And Coretta James is dead, and whoever killed her also got to Howard Green.”
“That’s what I heard.” Joppy threw the rag under the counter and brought out a short glass. While pouring my whiskey he said, “I din’t mean fo’ all this, Easy. Just tryin’ t’help you and that girl.”
“That girl is the devil, man,” I said. “She got evil in every pocket.”
“Maybe you should get out of it, Ease. Take a trip back east or down south or sumpin’.”
“That’s what Odell told me. But I ain’t gonna run, man.”
I knew what I had to do. I had to find Frank and tell him about the money that Carter offered. Frank was a businessman at heart. And if Dewitt Albright stood in the way of Frank’s business I’d just stand to the side and let them fight it out.
Joppy filled my glass again. It was a kind of peace offering. He really hadn’t tried to hurt me. It was just the lie that stuck in my craw.
“Whyn’t you tell me ’bout the girl?” I asked him.
“I don’t know, Easy. She wanted me t’keep it quiet-like and” — Joppy’s face softened — “I wanted to keep her… secret. To myself, ya know?”
I took my drink and offered Joppy a cigarette. We smoked our peace and sat in friendship. We didn’t speak again for a long time.
Later on Joppy asked, “Who you think been killin’ all them folks?”
“I don’t know, man. Odell told me that the cops think it might be a maniac. And maybe it was with Coretta and Howard but I know who killed that Richard McGee.”