Blanche on the Lam: A Blanche White Mystery Page 14

  She woke to the memory of a noise in the night. Loud. High-pitched. A train whistle? Car brakes? A scream? She flung back the sheet and the thin blue blanket and planted her feet firmly on the chilly linoleum.

  Something had changed. She could feel it the moment she stepped outside her bedroom door. At first, she thought the house had been broken into and its privacy shattered. But she saw nothing out of place as she tiptoed down the second-floor hall. She listened at all the bedroom doors and heard nothing, and nothing looked amiss. Yet, something had happened. When she'd first arrived, the house had had a timid kind of feeling, like a dog who'd been kicked too many times. When she'd looked at the house from out back last night, it had seemed worried. Now the house seemed to have somehow divorced itself from the household as surely as if a lawyer had served papers.

  “What is it, Blanche?” Mumsfield was waiting in the kitchen, sitting very still, his hands folded on the edge of the table.

  “I don't know, Mumsfield, honey.” She wasn't at all surprised that he should feel it, too.

  She crossed the room and turned on the green plastic radio on the windowsill. She drummed her fingers on the counter and shifted from foot to foot while some good ole boy invited everybody to come on down and be rooked at his used-car lot, and a woman with a husky voice tried to sell seaside condos by implying they came with a year's supply of pussy. Blanche reached for a knife and began halving oranges for juice. The station segued into national news. It was after the national news that a young man trying to suppress his Southern accent told her that the noise she'd heard in the night was a fire engine on its way to “the fatal fire at the cabin of Nate Taylor, near Oman's Bluff—the site of another tragic death recently.”

  Mumsfield began softly sobbing into his cupped hands. His body rocked slowly from side to side. Blanche remained dry-eyed, although her body was momentarily doused in pain, as Nate's must have been until the flames ate him.

  She turned off the radio when the reporter moved on to talk about the mayor's meeting with representatives of the Beautify Our City Committee. For a second, she let herself pretend that it was some other Nate, near some other Oman's Bluff. It was just too damned much! It wasn't enough that the man had been treated like a machine, robbed of respect, and kept poor all of his life. It wasn't enough that his time had been owned by other people who also decided how high he could raise his eyes and his voice, and where he could live and how. He also had to be murdered over some white people's shit that didn't have a damned thing to do with him.

  A thick, hot rage began to roil in her stomach at the thought of the deaths of all the poor black Nates and, yes, Blanches at the hands of the privileged white Everetts of the world. Nowadays, people wanted to tell you class didn't exist and color didn't matter anymore. Look at Miss America and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. But Miss America and the chairman were no more black people than Mother Teresa was white people. Men like Nate and women like her were the people, the folks, the mud from which the rest were made. It was their hands and blood and sweat that had built everything, from the North Carolina governor's mansion to the first stoplight. They ought to have been appreciated for being the wattle that held the walls together. Instead, they were expendable, interchangeable, rarely missed, hardly regarded, easily forgotten. Not this time! There was no question in her mind that Everett had killed Nate, no matter what they said on the radio.

  Why hadn't she expected this to happen? Or had she? If she'd acted on last night's concern for Nate's whereabouts, instead of hanging around the back stoop hoping he'd show up, maybe he'd still be alive. I could’ve tried to find his place last night, or looked for him earlier, she told herself. If she'd found him and added what she suspected to what he already knew, she was sure he'd have understood the danger and gone away for a while, as black people in the South have always been forced to do when they come to the attention of the wrong white person. Tears gathered as she pictured Nate off somewhere safe, making himself a new garden that was all his own. Her tears made dark blotches on the front of her gray uniform.

  “Don't cry, Blanche. Don't cry.” Mumsfield's voice was choked by his own tears. He knelt in front of her, reached out, hesitated, then awkwardly patted her hand.

  “Everyone has to die, Blanche.”

  Blanche smiled a wry smile. He was a good pupil. But the fact that we've all got to die sure as hell don't give nobody the right to kill you, she thought. She patted Mumsfield's hand, each of them now trying to comfort the other.

  The man on the radio had said the fire department suspected Nate of falling asleep while smoking. Blanche was very sensitive to smoke. When she'd been with Nate, she'd never picked up even a whiff of the telltale odor all smokers carry in their clothes and hair.

  Only a crazy person keeps killing people and killing people, she thought, and realized she had no reason to think Everett wasn't crazy. He was a rich white male. Being in possession of that particular set of characteristics meant a person could do pretty much anything he wanted to do, to pretty much anybody he chose—like an untrained dog chewing and shitting all over the place. Blanche was sure having all that power made many men crazy. And, according to Ardell, Everett had already exercised his privilege in the most lethal of ways once before. She thought about yesterday, when Everett had questioned her about her conversation with Nate. Everett had sniffed around her answers like a hunting dog with the scent of possum in its nose.

  “I need to get away from here!”

  “No, Blanche! No! Please don't leave, Blanche, please.” Mumsfield gripped her hand.

  Blanche gave him a sad smile. It was too bad he was related to these people, too bad he wasn't black or at least on her side of the household. Too bad she couldn't tell him that despite her outburst, he needn't worry about her leaving—not until she saw to it that something awful happened to his cousin Everett.

  “I better start breakfast.”

  “You won't leave Mumsfield, will you, Blanche?”

  “Not without telling you, Mumsfield, honey.” She hoped she was telling the truth. She took her hand back and rose from the chair.

  While she cooked, Mumsfield sat watching her move from refrigerator to sink to stove and back again. Ordinarily, having someone hanging around the kitchen watching her cook would have irritated her. Today, there was comfort in their shared grief. It was likely to be the last time she would talk with him and be with him just drylongso. He was a member of Everett's family. She would have to treat him as someone with more interest in saving Everett than in avenging Nate's murder. She felt very alone but not saddened by it. The fiery rage in her belly and the ice encasing her heart made her unfit for human companionship. Only Everett's long and miserable imprisonment or his death could return her to normal. “He will not get away with this,” she mouthed soundlessly while swirling butter in a sauté pan. “He will not!”

  Mumsfield helped her set the table. While she finished the eggs, he carried the tray of grapefruit halves and orange juice into the dining room, then went to fetch Everett and Grace.

  Everett entered the dining room first. His back was so stiff it might have been in a brace. Grace followed him. Her eyes were riveted on the back of his head. The two of them seemed to move in tandem, caught at opposite ends of a taut rubber band that twanged with tension.

  Blanche arranged the food on the sideboard. She pushed away the fantasy of dashing the food, and everything else she could lay her hands on, into Everett's smug face—scalding coffee, thick, stick-to-the-skin grits. She took a deep breath, relaxed her shoulders, and listened for what would be said once Mumsfield blurted out what he'd just heard on the kitchen radio. But Mumsfield was silent. Blanche looked over her shoulder. He had launched into his grapefruit with the same single-mindedness he brought to all other tasks. A time to mourn and a time to eat breakfast, she thought, and recognized the naturalness of Mumsfield's world, in which mourning had nothing to do with eating. The body didn't stop needing nourishment because the hear
t was broken; the living had to live. It was a philosophy she was sure Nate would have appreciated. She readied herself for closer contact with Everett.

  She removed the fruit plates from the table, then served the eggs, bacon, hash browns, and grits.

  Grace waved away the food without shifting her gaze from Everett. Her face was pale, her eyes were red and wide. She's like a TV set that can only get one channel, Blanche thought. She wondered what would happen to Grace if that station went silent or, like now, simply refused to broadcast on her frequency.

  Everett continued to act as though nothing and no one existed beyond his newspaper, just as he'd done the morning after the sheriff was murdered. Blanche was on full alert as she moved closer to him, but she wasn't prepared for the sudden wave of revulsion that made her skin turn cold when their hands accidentally touched. Everett took a teaspoonful of eggs and a slice of bacon, which he promptly ignored. Mumsfield had his usual sizable helping of each dish.

  When she leaned over Everett to fill his coffee cup, a slight tremor ruffled the newspaper. Everett quickly laid it down and glanced up at her as if to see if she'd noticed. He's like a hostage, or a drowning man, she thought, in the moment that their eyes met. He smoothed back his already unruffled hair in a gesture that Blanche understood to be his brand of hand-wringing. She smiled at his discomfort. It eased the pain of serving him. Still, her face flushed with shame. She told herself she had no other choice than to act as she was. She accepted the truth of this, but somehow it wasn't enough to stop her from feeling as though she'd betrayed herself and Nate in some way. I'll bring him down, she told Nate, on her way back to the kitchen. Somehow or another, I'll make him pay. I promise.

  She expected Mumsfield to come back to the kitchen when he finished his breakfast, but it was Grace who slipped by the swinging door. She stood by the table slowly wringing her hands.

  “My husband and I will be out for lunch.” She spoke quickly, as if she expected to be interrupted or told to shut up. “My aunt has had a restless night, and she's in a fierce mood. So if you'll prepare a thermos of soup and perhaps some sandwiches for her lunch, I'll take them up when I take up her breakfast tray. That way you needn't disturb her while we're out.”

  “Yes, ma'am.” Blanche waited for Grace to leave. Grace blinked at her a few times.

  “You've heard about it on the radio, haven't you?” Grace asked.

  “Ma'am?”

  “About Nate, about the fire....I wanted to come tell you before breakfast, as soon as I heard, but my husband said...”

  Blanche didn't understand why she wanted to lie to Grace but decided to follow her first mind.

  “What about Nate, ma'am?”

  “He's dead.”

  “Oh, Lord!” Blanche lifted her apron to her face as she'd seen Butterfly McQueen do in Gone With the Wind. If the subject had been anything other than Nate's death, she'd have had a hard time keeping a straight face. It was the kind of put-on that gave her particular pleasure. But now she only wanted to appear convincingly simple. She rubbed her eyes to moisten and redden them, and raised her head to regard her enemy's helpmate.

  “What happened, ma'am?” she asked. Her face felt hard and sharp, as though she'd used her apron to wipe away all of her softness.

  “There was a fire. Last night. At his place. He must have been asleep.” Grace's hands continued to wrestle with each other.

  Blanche folded her arms across her chest. “It sure is a shame.” She shook her head from side. “He seemed like a nice old man.... Was his wife...”

  “Oh, no,” Grace told her quickly. “He didn't have a wife, or other family. He was alone when he...when the house burned down.”

  Yes, of course, Blanche thought, the house burned down. Nobody burned it down. Nobody knocked Nate out or threw a lighted cigarette on his old newspapers and roasted him alive. The house burned down.

  Grace continued talking. “Perhaps he was a very sound sleeper. Perhaps the roof collapsed before he could get to the door.”

  Blanche ducked her head and tugged at her apron until the tightness had drained out of her face and she'd blinked the scalding tears from her eyes.

  “Too bad,” Grace went on. “But, of course, you didn't really know him, did you?”

  Blanche didn't bother to tell Grace that she had known Nate better and more truly in twenty-four hours than any rich white bitch could have known him in a lifetime. “Did he work for ya'll a long time?” she asked instead.

  Grace's eyes widened. “Why, he's been here since I was a child.” There was a wistful note in her voice.

  “You used to come here as a little girl?” Blanche asked the question as though there were something deeply fascinating about this particular piece of Grace's history. It was really her need to change the subject that prompted the question. She didn't know how much of this woman's nonchalance about Nate's death she could take. Better to get her off on everybody's favorite subject.

  Grace slipped into a chair and folded her arms on the table in front of her. “I was just five that first summer. I remember I wore a...” Grace's eyes filled with recollections. A bittersweet smile curled her thin lips as she talked of polka-dot sundresses and homemade ice cream. There was no mention of Nate in Grace's description of how the house and its inhabitants had looked to her little girl eyes. He was also forgotten in her tale of childhood summers spent romping through the wondrous woods around the house. The KKK story Nate had told was obviously not a landmark in the life of his savior.

  While Grace rambled through her childhood, Blanche worked at getting her temper under control. She thought it unlikely that Grace knew the particulars of Nate and the sheriff's deaths, mostly because she couldn't imagine Everett telling Grace about them.

  “...It was the third summer that I met Everett. He...”

  Blanche responded to Everett's name. “It's like ya'll was meant to be married from birth, ain't it, ma'am?” Blanche used her tone of voice and her facial expression to say how romantic she found this idea.

  “Oh, yes!” Grace leaped at the idea like a hungry cat at liver, just as Blanche knew she would. Blanche understood what a relief it was to find a soft, warm memory to distract the mind from the unpaid rent, the lost love, the sick child, the murdering husband. When Grace eventually stopped to take a breath, Blanche fine-tuned the course of the conversation. “It must be wonderful to be with the same man since childhood.”

  “Oh, yes!...I mean...We haven't been together all that time, exactly...He...”

  Blanche chuckled. “Oh, I know how it is with a man! He sees someone different, someone younger or prettier, or...” Blanche left room for Grace to add “richer,” in her mind, and then went on. “And off he goes, just like a puppy after a rabbit. Then here he comes back, tail between his legs, looking to be fed.”

  Grace didn't answer for so long, Blanche thought she'd made a mistake to use such a broad and obvious prompt.

  “If only he trusted me more, talked to me!” She gave Blanche an anguished look. There was more warmth and feeling in her voice than Blanche had heard before. Spots of red dotted her cheeks and neck. “Whatever it is, I know I could help him. I know I could!” She raised her hands and opened her arms and fingers as though grasping an invisible Everett and pulling him to her chest. “I could arrange things so that...This family has connections!” she added, with a little toss of her head. Then she caught her breath and stared into middle space, a look of loss and pain on her face, as though confronted with some awful vision. She was quite still for few moments, after which she seemed to collapse in on herself. Her shoulders rounded, her hands fell heavily to her sides. Tears pooled in her eyes and began a slow course down to her chin.

  “What's the use?” she mumbled. She shook her head slowly from side to side. “What's the use?” She rose, turned, stumbled to the swinging door, and pushed her way into the dining room.

  Blanche was pleased. Grace might not know anything, but she clearly suspected something. Blanche opened
a can of chicken rice soup and marveled at the sort of woman who thought she could make everything right for her man, even if she didn't know what “everything” was, just as she could change him from being a louse into a sweetheart. Despite her shortsightedness and romantic nonsense, Grace was not to be dismissed. She might turn out to be useful.

  While the soup heated, Blanche cut the crusts from four slices of bread. Grace would never turn Everett over to the police. But she must know something that could be used to convince other people of Everett's guilt. Whatever it was, Blanche was prepared to pump Grace hard to get it. She sliced the meat from the leftover Cornish hens and softened some cream cheese. She would have to find a way to start another conversation with Grace. She turned off the fire under the simmering soup, found a thermos in the pantry, and filled it.

  Blanche had a feeling the whole business with the soup and the sandwiches was for her benefit. She sliced a few olives and put them in the sandwiches, then covered the dish with a silver plate cover. She diced some ham for Emmeline's omelet, broke two eggs into a bowl, and seasoned them, while a pan heated. She thought it was terrible to waste so much food, but she had to play her part. She eased the omelet onto a warm plate.

  “Is it ready yet?” Blanche jumped an inch off the floor at the sound of Everett's voice. A faint creak on the other side of the door to the dining room had told her somebody was headed for the kitchen, but she'd expected Grace. Everett was standing just inside the door. “I've come for the tray. Is it ready?”

  “Almost.” Blanche poured water over the tea leaves and thought about flinging the water in his face.

  Everett smoothed his hair and frowned slightly as he looked out the window. Blanche set the tray on the table. She didn't trust herself to hand it to him.

  “She's not well, you know,” he said, without moving to take up the tray. “Not...not physically ill. Just...sometimes she imagines... She's under a good deal of strain. I hope she hasn't...Do you know what I mean?” he asked when Blanche made no reply.