snatched the bull whip from the bar and slashed Big Smiley across one cheek after another before Big Smiley could get his good hand moving. Big Smiley stopped smiling. Talk stopped suddenly along the length of the bar, petered out in the booths. In the vacuum that followed, Lil Green's voice whined from the jukebox:
'Why don't you do right
Like other mens do…'
Grave Digger sat back on the stool, breathing hard, struggling to control his rage. Veins stood out in his temples, growing out of his short-cropped kinky hair like strange roots climbing toward the brim of his misshapen hat. His brown eyes laced with red veins generated a steady white heat. The white manager, who'd been working the front end of the bar, hastened down toward them with a face full of outrage. 'Get back,' Grave Digger said thickly. The manager got back. Grave Digger stabbed at Big Smiley with his left forefinger and said in a voice so thick it was hard to understand, 'Smiley, all I want from you is the truth. And I ain't got long to get it.' Big Smiley didn't look at Ready any more. He didn't smile. He didn't whine. He said, 'Just ask the questions, Chief, and I'll answer 'em the best of my knowledge.' Grave Digger looked around at the teenagers in the booth. They were listening with open mouths, staring at him with popping eyes. His breath burned from his flaring nostrils. He turned back to Big Smiley. But he sat quietly for a moment to give the blood time to recede from his head. 'Who killed him?' he finally asked. 'I don't know, Chief.' 'He was killed on your street.' 'Yas suh, but I don't know who done it.' 'Do Sissie and Sugartit come in here?' 'Yas suh, sometimes.' Out of the corners of his eyes Grave Digger noticed Ready's shoulders begin to sag as though his spine were melting. 'Sit up straight, God damn it,' he said. 'You'll have plenty of time to lie down if I find out you've been lying.' Ready sat up straight. Grave Digger addressed Big Smiley. 'Galen met them in here?' 'Naw suh, he met Sissie in here once but I never seen him with Sugartit.' 'What was she doing in here then?' 'She come in here twice with Sissie.' 'How'd you know her name?' 'I heard Sissie call her that.' 'Was Sheik with her when Galen met her?' 'You mean with Sissie, when she met the big man? Yas suh.' 'He paid Sheik the money?' 'I couldn't be sure, Chief, but I seen money being passed. I don't know who got it.' 'He got it. Did they both leave with him?' 'You mean both Sheik and Sissie?' 'That's what I mean.' Big Smiley took out a blue bandana handkerchief and mopped his sweating black face. The four school girls in the booth began going through the motions of leaving. Grave Digger wheeled toward them. 'Sit down! I want to talk to you later,' he ordered. They began a shrill protest: 'We got to get home… Got to be at school tomorrow at nine o'clock… Haven't finished homework… Can't stay out this late… Get into trouble…' He got up and went over to show them his gold badge. 'You're already in trouble. Now I want you to sit down and keep quiet.' He took hold of the two girls who were standing and forced them back into their seats. 'He can't hold you 'less he's got a warrant,' the boy in the aisle seat said. Grave Digger slapped him out of his seat, reached down and lifted him from the floor by his coat lapels and slammed him back into his seat. 'Now say that again,' he suggested. The boy didn't speak. Grave Digger waited for a moment until they had settled down and were quiet, then he returned to his bar stool. Neither Big Smiley nor Ready had moved; neither had looked at the other. 'You didn't answer my question,' Grave Digger said. 'When he took Sissie off Sheik stayed in his seat,' Big Smiley said. 'What kind of a goddamned answer is that?' 'That's the way it was, Chief.' 'Where did he take her?' Rivers of sweat poured from Big Smiley's face. He sighed. 'Downstairs,' he said. 'Downstairs! In here?' 'Yas suh. They's stairs in the back room.' 'What's downstairs?' 'Just a cellar like any other bar's got. It's full of bottles an' old bar fixtures and beer barrels. The compression unit for the draught beer is down there and the refrigeration unit for the ice boxes. That's all. Some rats and we keeps a cat.' 'No bed or bedroom?' 'Naw suh.' 'He whipped them down there in that kind of place?' 'I don't know what he done.' 'Couldn't you hear them?' 'Naw suh. You can't hear nothin' through this floor. You could shoot off your pistol down there and you couldn't hear it up here.' Grave Digger looked at Ready. 'Did you know that?' Ready began to wilt again. 'Naw suh, I swear 'fore — ' 'Sit up straight, God damn it! I don't want to have to tell you again.' He turned back to Big Smiley. 'Did he know it?' 'Not so far as I know, unless he told him.' 'Is Sissie or Sugartit among those girls over there?' 'Naw suh,' Big Smiley said without looking. Grave Digger showed him the pornographic photos. 'Know any of them?' Big Smiley leafed through them slowly without a change of expression. He pulled out three photos. 'I've seen them,' he said. 'What're their names?' 'I don't know only two of 'em.' He separated them gingerly with his fingertips as though they were coated with external poison. 'Them two. This here one is called Good Booty, t'other one is called Honey Bee. This one here, I never heard her name called.' 'What are their family names?' 'I don't know none of 'em's square monicker's.' 'He took these downstairs?' 'Just them two.' 'Who came here with them?' 'They came by theyself, most of 'em did.' 'Did he have appointments with them?' 'Naw suh, not with most of 'em, anyway. They just come in here and laid for him.' 'Did they come together?' 'Sometime, sometime not.' 'You just said they came by themselves.' 'I meant they didn't bring no boy friends.' 'Had he known them before?' 'I couldn't say. When he come in if he seed any of 'em he just made his choice.' 'He knew they hung around here looking for him?' 'Yas suh. When he started comin' here he was already known.' 'When was that?' 'Three or four months ago. I don't remember 'zactly.' 'When did he start taking them downstairs?' ''Bout two months ago.' 'Did you suggest it?' 'Naw suh, he propositioned me.' 'How much did he pay you?' 'Twenty-five bucks.' 'You're talking yourself into Sing-Sing.' 'Maybe.' Grave Digger examined the note addressed to GB and signed Bee that he'd taken from the dead man's effects, then passed it over to Big Smiley. 'That came from the pocket of the man you cut,' he said. Big Smiley read the note carefully, his lips spelling out each word. His breath came out in a sighing sound. 'Then he must be a relation of her,' he said. 'You didn't know that?' 'Naw suh, I swear 'fore God. If I knowed that I wouldn't 'ave chopped him with the axe.' 'What exactly did he say to Galen when he started toward him with the knife?' Big Smiley wrinkled his forehead. 'I don't 'member 'zactly. Something 'bout if he found a white mother-raper trying to diddle his little gals he'd cut his throat. But I just took that to mean colored women in general. You know how our folks talk. I didn't figure he meant his own kin.' 'Maybe some other girl's father had the same idea with a pistol,' Grave Digger suggested. 'Could be,' Big Smiley said cautiously. 'So evidently he's the father and he's got more girls than one.' 'Looks like it.' 'He's dead.' Big Smiley's expression didn't change. 'I'm sorry to hear it.' 'You look like it. Who went your bail?' 'My boss.' Grave Digger looked at him soberly. 'Who's covering for you?' he asked. 'Nobody.' 'I know that's a lie but I'm going to pass it. Who was covering for Galen?' 'I don't know.' 'I'm going to pass that lie too. What was he doing here tonight?' 'He was looking for Sugartit.' 'Did he have a date with her?' 'I don't know. He said she was coming by with Sissie.' 'Did they come by after he'd left?' 'Naw suh.' 'Okay, Smiley, this one is for keeps. Who is Sugartit's father?' 'I don't know none of 'em's kinfolks nor neither where they lives, Chief, like I told you before. It didn't make no difference.' 'You must have some idea.' 'Naw suh, it's just like I say, I never thought about it. You don't never think 'bout where a gal lives in Harlem, 'less you goin' home with her. What do anybody's address mean up here?' 'Don't let me catch you in a lie, Smiley.' 'I ain't lying, Chief. I went with a woman for a whole year once and never did know where she lived. Didn't care neither.' 'Who are the Real Cool Moslems?' 'Them punks! Just a kid gang around here.' 'Where do they hang out?' 'I don't know 'zactly. Somewhere down the street.' 'Do they come in here?' 'Only three of 'em sometime. Sheik — I think he's they leader — and a boy called Choo-Choo and the one they call Bones.' 'Where do they live?' 'Somewhere near here, but I don't know 'zactly. The boy what keeps the pigeons oughtta know. He lives a coupla blocks down the street on t'other side. I don't know his name but he got a pigeon coop on the roof.' 'Is he one of 'em?' 'I don't know for sure but you can see a gang of boys on the roof when he's flying his pigeons.' 'I'll find him. Do you know the ages of those girls in the booth?' 'Naw suh, when I ask 'em they say they're eighteen.' 'You know they're under age.' 'I s'pect so but all I can do is ast 'em.' 'Did behave any of them?' 'Only one I knows of.' Grave Digger turned and looked at the girls again. 'Which one?' he asked. 'The one in the green tam.' Big Smiley pushed forward one of the three photos. 'She's this one here, the one called Good Booty.' 'Okay, son, that's all for the moment,' Grave Digger said. He got down from the stool and walked forward to talk to the manager. As soon as he left, without saying a word or giving a warning Big Smiley leaned forward and hit Ready in the face with his big ham-sized fist. Ready sailed off the stool, crashed into the wall and crumpled to the floor. Grave Digger looked down in time to see his head disappearing beneath the edge of the bar, then turned his attention to the white manager across from him. 'Collect your tabs and shut the bar; I'm closing up this joint and you're under arrest,' he said. 'For what?' the manager challenged hotly. 'For contributing to the delinquency of minors.' The manager sputtered, 'I'll be open again by tomorrow night.' 'Don't say another God damned word,' Grave Digger said and kept looking at him until the manager closed his mouth and turned away. Then he beckoned to one of the white cops on the door and told him, 'I'm putting the manager and the bartender under arrest and closing the joint. I want you to hold the manager and some teenagers I'll turn over to you. I'm going to leave in a minute and I'll send back the wagon. I'll take the bartender with me.' 'Right, Jones,' the cop said, as happy as a kid with a new toy. Grave Digger walked back to the rear. Ready was down on the floor on his hands and knees, spitting out blood and teeth. Grave Digger looked at him and smiled grimly. Then he looked up at
