indignantly. “Where were the police, I ask you?”
Grave Digger looked sheepish.
No one answered him.
“I’m going to write a complaint to the Commissioner,” he threatened.
The sound of a siren grew quickly in the night.
“Here comes the ambulance,” Anderson said with relief.
The red eye of the ambulance was coming up 125th Street fast, from the direction of Lenox Avenue.
Grave Digger addressed Mr. Zazuly directly. “And that’s all you saw?”
“What did you expect him to see?” Haggerty cracked. “Look at those specs.”
The ambulance double-parked beside a prowl car, and the cops stood by silently while the intern made a cursory examination.
“Can you give him something to bring him to?” Anderson asked him.
“Give him what?” the intern replied.
“Well, when will he be able to talk?”
“Can’t say, Inspector, he might have concussion.”
“I see you’re going to get ahead fast,” Anderson commented.
Nothing more was said while Casper Holmes was rolled onto the stretcher and moved.
Anderson glanced at his watch. “Homicide ought to be getting here,” he said anxiously.
“The stiffs won’t spoil in this weather,” Haggerty said, turning up the collar of his overcoat and putting his back to the ice-cold, dust-laden wind.
“I’m going to see how Ed’s making out,” Grave Digger said, and strolled toward the entrance to the Paris.
When Coffin Ed entered the Paris Bar, not one person looked in his direction.
It was a long, narrow room, with the bar running the length of the left side, taking up hall the space. Customers sat on bar stools or stood; there were no tables.
The usual Saturday night crowd was gathered, bitchy young men wearing peacock clothes with bright-colored caps, blue and silver and gold and purple, perched atop greasy curls straight from the barbershops at seven dollars a treatment. And the big, strong, rough-looking men who made life wonderful for them. But there was not a woman present.
Coffin Ed was not a moralist. But their cliquish quality of freezing up on an outsider grated on his nerves.
“Don’t everybody talk at once,” he shouted from the doorway.
No one said a word.
To a man, they were staring into their drinks as though competing in a contest of three wise monkeys: See nothing; hear nothing; say nothing. The contest was progressing toward a dead heat.
The three bartenders were rinsing glasses with an industriousness that would have gotten them all blacklisted by the bartenders’ union.
Coffin Ed began swelling at the gills. His gaze flickered dangerously down the line, seeking a likely candidate to begin with. But they were all equally engrossed in silence.
“Don’t try to give me that silent treatment,” he warned. “We’re all colored folks together.”
Someone in back giggled softly.
The uniformed white cop guarding the rear door stared at him with a dead-pan expression.
Coffin Ed’s temper flared, and the grafted patches on his face began to twitch.
He spoke to the back of the joker on the first stool. “All right, buddy boy, let’s start with you. Which way did they go?”
The girlish young man continued to stare into his drink as though he were stone-deaf. The indirect lighting from the bar gave his smooth brown face a bemused look. His luminescent silver cap gleamed faintly like swamp-fire.
He was drinking a tall frappé highball of dark rum with a streak of grenadine running down the center, called a “Josephine Baker.” If La Baker herself had been reclining stark nude in the bottom of his glass, he could not have given her any more attention.
Coffin Ed took him roughly by the shoulder and tamed him about. “Which way did they go?” he repeated in a rasping voice.
The young man looked at him from big, brown, bedroom eyes that seemed incapable of comprehending anything but love.
“Go, sir? Who go?” he lisped.
Face jumping in a sudden flash of rage, Coffin Ed slapped him left-handed from the bar stool.
Grave Digger looked sheepish.
No one answered him.
“I’m going to write a complaint to the Commissioner,” he threatened.
The sound of a siren grew quickly in the night.
“Here comes the ambulance,” Anderson said with relief.
The red eye of the ambulance was coming up 125th Street fast, from the direction of Lenox Avenue.
Grave Digger addressed Mr. Zazuly directly. “And that’s all you saw?”
“What did you expect him to see?” Haggerty cracked. “Look at those specs.”
The ambulance double-parked beside a prowl car, and the cops stood by silently while the intern made a cursory examination.
“Can you give him something to bring him to?” Anderson asked him.
“Give him what?” the intern replied.
“Well, when will he be able to talk?”
“Can’t say, Inspector, he might have concussion.”
“I see you’re going to get ahead fast,” Anderson commented.
Nothing more was said while Casper Holmes was rolled onto the stretcher and moved.
Anderson glanced at his watch. “Homicide ought to be getting here,” he said anxiously.
“The stiffs won’t spoil in this weather,” Haggerty said, turning up the collar of his overcoat and putting his back to the ice-cold, dust-laden wind.
“I’m going to see how Ed’s making out,” Grave Digger said, and strolled toward the entrance to the Paris.
When Coffin Ed entered the Paris Bar, not one person looked in his direction.
It was a long, narrow room, with the bar running the length of the left side, taking up hall the space. Customers sat on bar stools or stood; there were no tables.
The usual Saturday night crowd was gathered, bitchy young men wearing peacock clothes with bright-colored caps, blue and silver and gold and purple, perched atop greasy curls straight from the barbershops at seven dollars a treatment. And the big, strong, rough-looking men who made life wonderful for them. But there was not a woman present.
Coffin Ed was not a moralist. But their cliquish quality of freezing up on an outsider grated on his nerves.
“Don’t everybody talk at once,” he shouted from the doorway.
No one said a word.
To a man, they were staring into their drinks as though competing in a contest of three wise monkeys: See nothing; hear nothing; say nothing. The contest was progressing toward a dead heat.
The three bartenders were rinsing glasses with an industriousness that would have gotten them all blacklisted by the bartenders’ union.
Coffin Ed began swelling at the gills. His gaze flickered dangerously down the line, seeking a likely candidate to begin with. But they were all equally engrossed in silence.
“Don’t try to give me that silent treatment,” he warned. “We’re all colored folks together.”
Someone in back giggled softly.
The uniformed white cop guarding the rear door stared at him with a dead-pan expression.
Coffin Ed’s temper flared, and the grafted patches on his face began to twitch.
He spoke to the back of the joker on the first stool. “All right, buddy boy, let’s start with you. Which way did they go?”
The girlish young man continued to stare into his drink as though he were stone-deaf. The indirect lighting from the bar gave his smooth brown face a bemused look. His luminescent silver cap gleamed faintly like swamp-fire.
He was drinking a tall frappé highball of dark rum with a streak of grenadine running down the center, called a “Josephine Baker.” If La Baker herself had been reclining stark nude in the bottom of his glass, he could not have given her any more attention.
Coffin Ed took him roughly by the shoulder and tamed him about. “Which way did they go?” he repeated in a rasping voice.
The young man looked at him from big, brown, bedroom eyes that seemed incapable of comprehending anything but love.
“Go, sir? Who go?” he lisped.
Face jumping in a sudden flash of rage, Coffin Ed slapped him left-handed from the bar stool.
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