was crazy too.
“He tole me that if the FBI got hold of his files on you they would know what we were up to. That’s why he had me go to Jackie and Melvin. He went t’Towne hisself.”
“An’ killed him?”
“I don’t know. All I know is that he went there and that Towne is dead.”
I went on, “But you didn’t say nuthin’ when people started gettin’ killed, did you, Mofass?” The muscles in my arm twitched, and I shifted the pistol so as not to shoot him before I knew it all.
“At first I didn’t know. I mean, why would I think that he gonna kill Poinsettia? An’ by the time Towne got it I was scared about me.”
“Why’d Poinsettia get killed? What she have to do with this?”
“He offered her money, money so that she would call the police an’ blame you for beatin’ her.”
Mofass lifted his hands in a gesture of helplessness. The side of his face was swelling around the deep red welt on his cheek.
“You know how that girl was. She said sumpin’ to’im. Like how she gonna go to you if he don’t pay her some more. She blamed him fo’ her bein’ sick an’ she wanted to be taken care of.”
“Man, that don’t make no sense. Why he want her to blame me fo’ hittin’ her in the first place?”
“If you was in jail the FBI would have to find somebody else and then he could still get your money and save his ass.”
Mofass began to weep.
“And you were going to let me give it to ’im, huh?”
“What was you gonna do fo’ that FBI, man? Ain’t that what he had you doin’? He said he’d save yo’ money if you do somebody else dirt, ain’t that right? How come you any different than me?”
Mofass hurt me with that.
“Let’s get it over, Ease,” Mouse said. He waved his pistol in the general direction of Mofass. I wouldn’t have believed such a fat man could cower in his chair.
“No, man.”
“I thought you wanted this boy’s blood?” Mouse sounded indignant. “He fucked wit’ you, right?”
“Yeah, he did do that.”
“Then le’s kill the mothahfuckah.”
“That’s all right. I got a better idea.”
Mofass let another fart go.
“Like what?” Mouse asked.
“I want you to give me Lawrence’s address, Mofass.”
“You got it.”
“And I want his home phone number too.”
“Yes, sir, Mr. Rawlins, I got it right here,” he said, tapping his temple.
“Don’t mistake me, Mofass,” I warned. “This ain’t no merry-go-round here. You go fast right to the grave if you make a bad step. My man Raymond here is death, yo’ death if you do sumpin’ wrong.”
“You don’t have to warn me on that account,” Mofass said in his business voice. “But can I ask you what it is you plan to do?”
“Same as you’d get if you play this wrong.”
After he’d written the information I told him, “Go home, Mofass. Go somewhere. It will all be over by this time tomorrow.” After Mofass fled, Mouse said, “We shoulda killed’im.”
“No reason,” I answered.
“He tried to cheat you, man. Tried to steal yo’ money.”
“Yeah, he did. But you know we wasn’t never friends. Uh-uh, Mofass an’ me was in business. Businessmen steal just to keep in practice fo’they legal work.”
I was glad the big man had left. He was so gaseous that he’d smelled up the whole office.
“Thank you, Raymond,” I said. We shook hands.
“You my friend, Easy, you ain’t gotta thank me. Shit! You the one set my head straight about LaMarque. You my best friend, man.”
As I drove for home I thought about how I intended to take Mouse’s wife and son and disappear in the Mexican hills. I couldn’t kill Mofass, because I was no better than he was. Once I got home I dialed the number Mofass had given me.
“Hello?” a timid woman’s voice said.
“May I speak to Reggie Lawrence, please?” I asked.
“Who is this?” she asked. There was fear in her voice; fear so great that it shook me.
But still I told her who I was and she went to fetch my nemesis.
“Rawlins?”
“I want twenty-five hundred dollars,” I said. “Don’t gimme no shit, ’cause I know you got it. I want it in tens and twenties and I want it tomorrow evening.”
“What the hell…” he started.
But I cut him off. “Listen, man, I ain’t got no time fo’ yo’ shit. I know what you been doin’ an’ I could prove it too. Mofass spilled his guts, an’ I know you cain’t afford no close look. So drop this shit an’ bring me the money or they gonna turn yo’ office into a jail cell.”
“If this is some trick to get out of your taxes…” he said. He was trying to sound like he was still the boss, but I could hear the sweat on his tongue.
“Griffith Park, Reggie. Down below the observatory just inside the woods. Eight P.M. An army man will know how to be on time.”
I told him how to get there, and before he could say another word, I hung up on him.
And you know that felt sweet.
37
At about seven A.M. I was parked down the street from 1135 1/2 Stanley Street. It was a block or so north of Olympic Boulevard, and a solidly white neighborhood, but I took the chance that the police wouldn’t see me. I had most of the plans wrapped up in an envelope, his name lightly taped in the center, next to me in the front seat. I wore black gloves, a porter’s cap, and a uniform from a hotel Dupree once worked for in Houston.
At eight-fifteen Lawrence walked out his front door. I scooted down, squinted, and jammed my tongue into the socket Primo and Flower had created in my jaw. He went to his car and drove off, leaving his wife and child at home.
I waited another half an hour so she wouldn’t be suspicious, and then I knocked at the door. There was crying in the background. It got louder when the door opened.
Mrs. Lawrence was small and redheaded, though there was lots of gray in the red. She seemed to be young, but her head hung forward as though it were weighed down. She had to lift her head and screw up her eyes to look at me. The stitched scar coming down the left side of her mouth was jagged, the flesh around her right eye puffy and discolored. There was bright red blood in the white of her eye.
“Can I help you?” she asked.
“Delivery, ma’am,” I said in the crisp tone I used to address officers in WWII.
“Delivery for whom?”
“I got it here for a Reginald A. Lawrence,” I said. “It’s from a law firm in Washington.”
She tried to smile, but the child started hollering. She turned away and then back to me, quickly. She put her hand out and said, “I’m his wife, I’ll take it.”
“I don’t know…” I stalled.
“Hurry, please, my baby’s sick.”
“Well… okay, but I still need one ninety-five for the COD.”
“Hold on,” she sighed on an exasperated note. She went back into the house, running in the direction of the
