Out of the Blues Read online

  Leeksha recognized her as soon as she had the photo in her hand. “Oh, I know her. She’s over in Underground now.”

  Jackson said, “She used to be around Little Five.”

  “Yep, that’s her,” Salt said. “I’m looking for her because she might be able to help me on an old case.”

  “We’ll be doing a detail on Friday with the outreach people from Grady and the railroad police. One of our target locations is the area around Underground, so we very well may run into Pearl. You wanna come along, meet us here at four-thirty a.m.”

  —

  THE MOBILE MEDICAL BUS from Grady Memorial Hospital, the public hospital known as “The Gradys” from the days of segregation when it was two hospitals, was arriving as Salt pulled up behind the HOPE Team office very, very early on Friday morning. Inside, the team had already distributed maps and water supplies, and the cedar spray was being applied liberally as folks entered, the scent heavy in the room where twelve people were greeting one another and drinking box coffee from paper cups.

  “God, Salt, I haven’t seen you in too long.” Terrance Stewart put his cup down and wrapped his arms around her. Even at the early hour, his dark, pockmarked face was already shimmering with oil and sweat. He was the hospital’s coordinator for both mental and physical health outreach services to the city’s homeless. He’d started out in a faith-based organization without formal medical or psychological training and had become invaluable to all of the service agencies because of his tenure with and knowledge of the homeless community; he was a crucial instructor for those who had the formal training but lacked experience in the street. Salt knew him from his work on her old beat. He smelled strongly of cedar.

  “I see you-all have taken advantage of the spray I brought the team.” She sniffed loudly at his shirt, pulled back, and then hugged him again. “I can never thank you enough, Terry, for all you and your group did for my people.”

  “‘My people,’ that’s just like you. You’re the only cop I know who called homeless folks on their beat ‘my people.’ Worried me some but no doubt about it you knew that beat. What will they do without you?”

  “Like they say, ‘The beat goes on.’”

  “People, listen up.” Leeksha was at the front of the room with a clipboard. “Most of you guys know the drill, but for a couple of you new to these details, I’ll go over the plan and give you your team and area assignments.”

  Salt was going with Terrance’s team, Jackson Thornton from HOPE, and a sergeant from the railroad police. Everyone in the room began to gather in their assigned groups, coordinating transportation and logistics according to the area they would be searching. A commonality among all the participants was that while they were different shapes, sizes, colors, and ethnicities and from various agencies, they were all fit, some obviously more so than others, and able to stride the awkward crossties, trample through kudzu, and climb up and down the hard terrain of the hilly city. In the high humidity and in all kinds of weather they did their work; especially when it was very hot or very cold, their services were needed more than ever.

  The team rode in the medical bus to the heart of downtown and into one of the city university’s parking lots that abutted the rails. The attendant waved them through, and they parked under a viaduct where various medical personnel would meet up and man the bus in four-hour shifts. Salt tucked her jeans into the tops of an old pair of uniform boots and retied the laces. Their team of four started down the tracks, heading toward Underground, a mile or so from where they were now.

  The Underground area had become a tourist attraction and entertainment district that had come and gone in popularity, and come and gone again. But Underground wasn’t underground, it was more like a basement, where you could see the foundations of the city if you cared enough to look past the cheap trappings that were meant to sanitize the past and attract tourists. Attempts had been made to revitalize it, the last effort for the Olympics, but according to some, the place seemed to be snakebit and couldn’t maintain.

  There were many agencies nearby that served the homeless—Grady’s satellite health centers, shelters, churches—and the population to be served camped near the tracks and under the viaducts.

  Bessie Smith sang about that part of Atlanta.

  Underneath the viaduct ev’ry day

  Drinking corn and hollerin’ hoo-ray

  Pianos playin’ till the break of day.

  Salt alternated between walking on the rough gravel beside the ties and walking on the ties in an awkward stretch step. The air under the viaducts was damp and still cool from the night. Stained, dripping walls alternated with graffiti, layers of plaster, or brick—a century or more of building, rebuilding, tearing down, reconfiguring, covering up, and uncovering. They were headed in the direction of the government building where the old concrete Zero Milepost, which once designated the end of the Western & Atlantic railroad line, was on display. Atlanta’s first name had been “Terminus.”

  “Hear that?” Salt asked Jackson. She stopped to listen more carefully. Silence, then what sounded like a distant sledgehammer striking the rails with the same rhythm that a man might make driving a spike.

  After Sherman burned the original depot during the Civil War, the Union Railroad Depot had been rebuilt during Reconstruction. Other businesses were built in proximity to the depot, through which a hundred trains or more ran: Kenny’s Saloon, Gate City Harness Company, Planters Hotel, banks, law offices.

  “Hear what?” Jackson answered.

  Bridges had been built over the tracks and then joined by a concrete mall. First floors became basements, storage and service entrances, and then speakeasies and juke joints during Prohibition.

  There were stretches under the shorter tunnels where light from the streets made its way down the tracks. In other places they had to switch on their heavy flashlights, shining the beams up and down the tracks and walls. In one dark spot they came up to a bundle, and as they approached it they announced themselves in order not to startle anyone who might be easily stressed by contact with people. It was why so many of the homeless with mental illness couldn’t stay in the shelters—people.

  Jackson stood next to the muddy sleeping bag. “Hey, friend,” he said, holding the light at his side pointed down for a less intrusive ambient beam. There was a stirring inside the bag. “Hey, it’s the poleese. We’re checking to be sure you’re okay. Okay?”

  A scaly hand reached from the opening and a crusty-faced white man stuck his head out, blinking, then focused on Jackson as he untangled himself from his cocoon. “Samuels? Is it you, Samuels? Man, I thought you were a goner at Ia Drang.”

  Terrance stepped up. “Seventh Cav. Right? You’re due for your medical. They got your transport waiting.”

  “Sir, yes, sir.”

  “We’ll be your escort, soldier.” Terrance and the railroad police sergeant waited while the man gathered his belongings. They would escort the veteran back to the medical bus and from there would deliver him to the VA.

  Jackson and Salt continued down the tracks. “We’ve always dealt with the Vietnam vets, but now we’re beginning to get guys back from Iraq and Afghanistan,” he told her. Another set of tracks, its spikes red-brown with rust, merged with the tracks they’d been walking. Horizontal lines on the adjacent brick wall indicated some former use of the structure. “Blest be the tie that binds,” Jackson said.

  “What?”

  “Blest be the tie that binds. You’ve been humming that hymn ‘Blest Be the Tie That Binds.’”

  Salt replayed what had unconsciously been going through her head. “You’re right. I didn’t realize I was doing it.”

  Down the tracks in front of them was a ledged tunnel, trash-strewn, gang-signed, broken furniture here and there, and people, ten or more, swaddled in blankets and lying on the long, flat concrete shelves. A small drift of smoke wafted from a nearby
fire barrel, beside which lay a brown dog of an indeterminate breed. The dog stood and trotted over to one of the blankets.

  “Georgia Brown Dog,” Jackson said.

  “I heard that,” Salt said.

  “Poleese.” Jackson waved his flashlight. “Poleese.” They stopped well shy of the mouth of the tunnel while he radioed their location. “5582 to radio, hold myself and 4133 out at the tracks under Marietta and Central.”

  The shapes began to undulate, then heads and hands emerged. The dog trotted away. The sounds of bottles clanking against concrete echoed through the tunnel.

  “HOPE Team checking,” Jackson said, moving in. “HOPE Team.”

  “Fuck you, Jackson” came from one of the sleeping bags, its occupant shifting but not turning out.

  “That you, Makepeace? Come on, man.” Jackson took Salt’s arm and led her to the side of the tunnel. “Makepeace is lots of time really agitated before he gets his coffee. Let’s give him a minute.”

  The rest of the campers were silent as they gradually began to stir, throwing off layers, retrieving toiletries, cans, water, bags, and packets from stashes, packs, and crevices.

  “I’ve got some information, guys,” Jackson announced. “The Gateway has gotten more rooms, SROs,” he said, referring to the city’s center that coordinated services for the homeless.

  “Fuck the Gateway.” Makepeace stuck his head out, eyes bulging.

  “Naw, man. Not at the Gateway. Rooms, single-room occupancy, SROs, in apartments or houses, not shelters. Gateway just makes the arrangements.”

  Two women, both wearing Grady bracelets indicating their recent stay in the hospital, came over. “What we got to do to get them rooms?”

  “Just check in at the Gateway. They do the paperwork and you’re in,” Jackson told them.

  Salt unfolded some of the Pearl flyers. “I’m Detective . . .” She stopped and took out one of her new business cards. “They call me ‘Salt.’ I’m looking for this woman.” She handed them both a flyer and a card. Jackson passed Makepeace and went on into the cavernous tunnel, passing out his cards and the Pearl flyers.

  The women took their time looking at Pearl’s mug shot. “Uh-uh.” They shook their heads. “We ain’t been out here long. Ain’t seen her.”

  “Goddamn. Goddamn.” Makepeace ripped back his wrappings and slung his legs by picking them up at the knees, hurling himself upright. “Give me the goddamn picture.” He motioned Salt with his fingers, then snatched the flyer from her hand as soon as she was within his considerable reach. “Pearl. You satisfied now? Her name is Pearl. Used to be Pretty Pearl, a singer, now she Pitiful Pearl. Yeah, I know most every goddamn soul out on these tracks. You’d think they’d hire me for the fucking HOPE Team. HOPE Team. You better hope they leave you the fuck alone.”

  “Dude, is that any way to talk?” Jackson walked back to them.

  “Fuck you, Jackson Thornton. In case you hadn’t noticed, this is not the fucking Biltmore.”

  “Mr. Makepeace—” she began.

  Makepeace interrupted. “So Mr. Hope here told you who I am. What’s a nice white girl doing out here anyway? Don’t you have some doilies to make or some tea to sip?”

  “Do you know where Pearl is staying?” Jackson asked him. “Salt is a homicide detective. She’s hoping Pearl can help with an old case, Mike Anderson’s death.”

  “What’s it worth to you?” Makepeace reached behind him, grabbed aluminum crutches, adjusted the braces, and swung himself to standing. “You got any fucking cash?”

  Salt looked to Jackson, who said, “Come on, man. Don’t be like that.”

  Makepeace turned his face away and spit, then turned back. “I saw her ’bout a week ago out on the corner at Spring and Mitchell, in that parking lot where those churches come and let the do-gooders feel they selves all warm all over ’cause they put together some peanut butter sandwiches and went all the way to the jungle of downtown Atlanta to feed some actual black people.” He slapped a crutch against the tunnel’s concrete support.

  “Do you know where she’s sleeping?”

  “If she’s street-feeding could be anywhere, but I’d look for her around that parking lot on the sandwich days.” He jerked his head down, then turned his body toward the abutment. Over his shoulder he said, “Now I’ve got to go attend to my toilet,” giving the last word the French pronunciation “twa-let.”

  Jackson reminded the campers again about the newly available rooms, and he and Salt returned to the tracks. “I thought the Gateway was supposed to be coordinating with the churches so that they wouldn’t be doing street feeds anymore,” Salt said.

  “We met with those churches. Gateway gave them the tour, showed them the facilities where they could serve and prepare meals, the whole spiel. But for some of these churches and organizations it’s more about them, their charity, than helping people get off the street. Makepeace in his own way was telling the truth.”

  “What about Big Calling? Midas Prince seems to have a lot of clout. Can’t he get the message to the other churches?”

  “Shit, that place is the worst of all. They just warehouse people and collect the grant money. Last week I watched a van pull up in their parking lot and throw a garbage bag of sandwiches at some guys. Reverend Gray? You know him? He quit there.”

  “Really?”

  “He went to the health department, the district attorney, told them the place was infested with body lice and that the drug dealers run the place,” Jackson said.

  “They hire enough off-duty guys at the church. I ran into Sandy Madison there the other day,” said Salt.

  “The church is one thing—Reverend Prince has plenty of money to keep things looking good there. But he runs the shelter on grants, very little of the shelter’s funding comes from the church. It makes him look like he’s the savior of Atlanta’s homeless, the go-to expert.”

  Salt stopped. “Listen.”

  “What?”

  She went over to the rail closest to the wall on their right, the southbound line, knelt, and put her hand to the rail. “Sounds like someone hammering on metal.”

  “Not on that line. It’s been out of use for a long time. The railroad isn’t working on them either, not until they decide what they’re going to do with the area. It leads to the Gulch,” Jackson said.

  “I’ve heard something about them rebuilding the area, a new terminal or something? We’ve been chasing perps into that place forever,” Salt said.

  “President Obama’s administration is backing the project. They want to turn it into something like what it was in the beginning, a terminal that serves local, state, and interstate lines. Maybe they’re excavating or surveying. Maybe that’s what you heard.” He knelt down and put his hand beside hers on the rail. “Or maybe it’s John Henry’s ghost.” He nudged her with his elbow. “Come on. Let’s finish up.”

  They continued on down the line, Jackson alternately humming and singing, “My daddy was a steel-driving man, Lord, Lord. My daddy was a steel-driving man.”

  WHISKEY AND WATERMELON

  I finally take a day to be with my girl and I find her cavorting with not one but three other guys.” Wills stood smiling in the entrance of the dojo. He bent down to untie his shoes, came in, and performed a mannerly bow to the sensei altar. Theo and Miles, gis flapping, belts askew, aimed their small bodies toward him as he slouched into an exaggerated protective squat against the wall.

  Salt and Pepper caught the boys before they pounced on the detective, forcing them to maintain discipline, a bow to each practitioner and the sensei. “Patience, Grasshoppers, patience,” Wills said to them. Then they fell on him, hugging and trying to get him down. Wills tumbled them to the mat, then he and Pepper bowed to one another in collusion against their small opponents. It was all too much for Wonder—even though he was trained not to enter the dojo, he barked in the doorway.r />
  Wills laughed as he pushed each of the boys into showing off the forward rolls they’d been taught. Pepper pushed them back toward Wills as the boys somersaulted into combat stances, back and forth.

  Salt bowed to Pepper, to each of the boys, to the sensei, and went over to Wills, bowed and kissed his eyelids. “I have a little patience, only a little,” she whispered. They left Pepper sitting seiza with his sons and went downstairs to the kitchen.

  “Water, lemonade, juice?” Salt opened the refrigerator.

  “Whiskey. My hours are all turned around,” Wills answered.

  Salt got lemonade from the fridge, opened the cabinet below the butcher-block counter, and took out a bottle of good bourbon. “You’re handsome even when you’re dragging.”

  Wills slid his loosened tie from his shirt and leaned on the edge of the kitchen table. “I’m beat. Went by the house just long enough for Pansy and Violet to tell me they hate me.”

  “Your dogs don’t hate you. All your girls go belly-up for you.” Salt widened her arms, exposing and wagging her middle, Pansy and Violet–like. “They miss you, just like I do.” She went to him and teasingly kissed each side of his lips lightly.

  He put his arms around her waist, his face in the V of her gi. “After this case is wrapped, let’s go away somewhere, for at least a week.”

  “Agreed.” She held his head for a moment, then was distracted by a whiff of cedar. “I’m sure I don’t smell very good. We’ve been practicing for over an hour. Let me fix you your whiskey.” She slipped from his arms. “You want to tell me about how the case is going?”

  “The case is all I’ve been talking about, thinking about, working on, for weeks. I need a break.”

  The boys, thumping and yelling their way down the stairs and hall, ran into the kitchen with Wonder on their heels. Theo screamed, “Get him, doggie.” Both boys jumped on Wills.