Doug didn’t hear the door open but the movement of the mattress when June slipped in under the covers woke him. He felt her arm slide around his waist and her body snuggle up against his back. He started to turn over but she gripped his forearm, then found his hand. Her voice stopped any further movement.
“Shh. Go back to sleep. I just couldn’t stand to be alone tonight.”
In a little while he heard her breathing slow as she drifted into sleep. It wasn’t that easy for him, with the softness of her breasts pressing against his back and her small hand clasped in his.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Mustafa Jones had once been a preacher. He still preached, but over the years his sermons had gradually evolved away from their roots in the Baptist ministry. Several years ago he had completely broken from the Baptists and founded his own sect. It had grown slowly at first, but once he began espousing the mantra of blacks as underdogs it had gone much better. Now he was being asked to merge his following with the much larger Church of Blacks, headed by Qualluf Taylor, his own personal hero. Taylor crusaded for black political power, laws that demanded equal sentencing for equal crimes, more representation in the legislatures from local to national level, low cost housing and every other hot button initiative even remotely pertaining to blacks. Now there was more politics than religion in the Church of Blacks; Qualluf Taylor paid only token respect to it in order to continue its tax- free status while he sought more and more money and power. Mustofa had already agreed to accept the invitation to merge his sect with the bigger organization.
The Harcourt Virus was almost made to order for Mustafa and other black religious and political leaders—had it not been so universally fatal. As soon as it appeared, and the fact that only blacks caught the disease, When Mustafa began railing for total war against whites everywhere on earth, but particularly in the United States, he was following the lead of Qualluf Taylor and the Church of Blacks.
Mustafa Jones was a big man, not running to fat yet, even though he was in his fifties. He was very dark, with hair and short beard beginning to gray. He stood behind the lectern on a raised platform which had been erected only that morning in the old Pines Park area of Shreveport, Louisiana. His permit to demonstrate had been granted, then revoked, then quickly approved again by the mayor and city council after a crowd began gathering downtown around the courthouse.
Mustafa was sermonizing now in his best fashion; waving his arms, shouting to the skies for justice and denigrating everything in the world with a hint of white to it, with the possible exception of vanilla ice cream. “…and I tell you, brothers and sisters, the
“The
“Harcourt virus!” He spat. “It’s not a Harcourt virus, it’s a black virus, dreamed up by the white power structure and designed to kill us all! They’re spreading it all over the world. The whites are attempting to wipe out the black race completely and finally, like they’ve been trying to do for the last five hundred years!”
Mustofa strode back and forth behind the lectern, wireless microphone to his lips. He paused to wipe sweat from his forehead and to shuck his jacket. “We have to stop this foul and odorous affliction the
A huge rolling chorus of “No! No!” erupted from the crowd. Mustofa led the chant while he wiped his face and loosened his collar. He rolled up one of the sleeves of his shirt. He went back to his haranguing of the white race, but his voice began to falter. Sweat poured off his body, dripping from his chin and soaking his shirt. He began rolling up his other sleeve, then stumbled against the lectern. The microphone bumped it with a loud knocking noise that was amplified almost to the level of thunder.
“Kill the whites! Kill them all,” he managed weakly, then had to grip the lectern with both hands to keep his balance. His face shone wetly under the lights. His lips trembled as he attempted to continue speaking.
“I… kill…” The microphone fell and bounced on the flooring, making a curious drumming noise. His grip on the lectern slipped and he slumped to the plank floor of the dais. The lectern tipped and fell as he rolled onto his back. Aides scampered to help him while the crowd noises changed from organized chanting to a cacophony of muttering. That changed too, after someone shouted over the low rumble of voices.
“He got it! Mustofa got the Black Virus!”
Shouts and cries rose into the air. Someone pulled a pistol and fired into the air with the shout of “Kill!
Kill the Whities!”
The carnage in Shreveport began with that first pistol shot. Frightened black women gathered their children while their men either pulled out concealed weapons or hurried back home to arm themselves, with guns if they had them, knives if they didn’t. Shots began to ring out at the edge of the enraged crowd. A white policeman fell with a bullet to the head. An enraged brother officer, seeing his partner lying dead with a bullet in his brain, pulled his pistol and fired wildly into the crowd. The bullets hit several women and children, but none of the armed men.
Of the police detail which had been assigned to monitor the demonstration and keep order, only a handful survived and they were all black. The ones who tried to stand with the white officers were lynched right along with them and that quickly put a stop to aid from that direction. Within fifteen minutes it was all over.
After the police in the area were disposed of, there was nothing to stop the violence. Before the night was over the city was split in half between armed and warring groups of blacks and whites. Neither of them showed any mercy.
The governor of Louisiana called up the National Guard, but by the time the fighting was quelled, the casualties were well over a thousand, with several times that number wounded and whole neighborhoods burnt to the ground. Even the venerable charity hospital that treated mostly black residents had been overrun and almost all of the white doctors, nurses and workers on duty slaughtered. One other hospital suffered the same fate. The police department itself was fractured and no longer effectual because of fighting between black and white officers. In the ensuing chaos, no one paid any attention to the fact that Mustofa Jones had died from a heart attack, not the Harcourt Virus.
June was gone from his bed by the time Doug woke up. He used the bathroom and brushed his teeth with the borrowed toothbrush, all the while thinking of the previous night and wondering where it would lead, if anywhere. He ran his comb through his hair and ventured out toward the enticing smell of frying bacon.
“Good morning,” June said. “I was just about to knock on the door.” She smiled prettily, though a faint blush appeared on her face.
“Good morning. I hope you’re cooking for two.”
“I am. Sit down and I’ll pour you some coffee. How do you take it?”
“I can get it.”
“’Sit down’, I said. I haven’t cooked for a man in a long time. Let me enjoy it.”
“Just black, then.” Doug pulled out a stool at the bar and watched as June poured the coffee and continued preparing breakfast. Before long he was seated next to her at the little dining table, digging into toast with eggs over easy, bacon and hash browns.
As they were finishing, June said “I’m sorry I woke you up last night. I had a bad dream and couldn’t go back to sleep. I kept seeing that boy trying to pull me out of the car.”
“It wasn’t a bother at all,” Doug responded.
June lowered her gaze, then raised it again. “That was the first time I’ve been in bed with a man since Charlie was killed. Even if it was just sleeping.”
“I know how it is. It was well over a year before I went out with a woman and almost another year before I thought I was ready for a relationship. I was wrong even then. Doris was… well, you’re probably not interested.
