All Shot Up_ The Classic Crime Thriller - Chester Himes [42]
As an afterthought, he extended the box toward the detectives. Both declined.
“I will tell you what I know, which isn’t much,” he said. “Then we will see what we can make out of it. You boys must have been working on it all night yourselves.”
“Still at it,” Grave Digger lisped.
“First we’ll tell you what we got,” Coffin Ed said. “A colored sailor, a country boy from Alabama, left his ship at about six o’clock last evening. He had been working for one entire year to save money to buy a car; when he got his final pay, he had six thousand, five hundred dollars in one-hundred-dollar bills in a money belt. The ship docks in Brooklyn. It was eight o’clock before he got uptown. He met his girl friend, Sassafras Jenkins. They had some drinks and then took a taxi over to an office on lower Convent Avenue, where he had an appointment to meet one Mister Baron, who was selling him the car.”
Casper smoked his cigar softly, his black face impassive.
“The appointment was for ten o’clock,” Coffin Ed went on. “Baron was a half hour late. He rode up in the car with a white man. Roman and his girl were waiting on the sidewalk in front of the dermatological clinic near One-twenty-sixth Street. The white man got out and went upstairs to an office in the rear. Roman and his girl stayed downstairs for another half hour with Baron, inspecting the car. A small crowd of people coming from the supermarket up the street collected.
“It was a brand new Cadillac convertible with some kind of gold-like finish. Baron was selling it to Roman for six thousand, five hundred dollars.”
Casper blinked but said nothing.
“You got a Cadillac convertible. What did yours cost?” Grave Digger asked.
“With accessories over eight thousand,” Casper said.
“Roman paid six thousand, five hundred for his,” Coffin Ed said. “The three of them went upstairs to the office where the white man was waiting, and executed the bill of sale. Sassafras witnessed it, and the white man signed as a notary public, using the name Bernard Kaufman. The white man left.
“Then the three of them took the car for a tryout at Baron’s suggestion. He had Roman turn into the street south of the Convent, where there would be little if any traffic, so he could test its pickup. Roman had no sooner started accelerating than he hit an old woman crossing the street. He wanted to stop, but Baron urged him to drive on. He didn’t have any insurance; the car still had dealer’s plates; he couldn’t apply for registration until Monday morning; and he didn’t have a driver’s license. His girl friend didn’t think the old woman was seriously hurt, but he ran anyway. He hadn’t got clear of the block when a Buick drove up and forced him to a stop. Three men in police uniforms got out and accused him of hit-and run manslaughter and forced the three of them out of the car.”
Casper sat up straight. His face turned slightly gray.
Coffin Ed waited for him to comment, but he still said nothing.
“The phony cops forced him and his girl into the Buick, sapped Baron, took the six thousand, five hundred dollars and went away in the Cadillac.
“We’ve been all night running down the Buick. We got it and Roman. We got a statement from Roman. He claims that Baron confessed that the old woman got up after he had hit her. So it must have been the bandits in the Buick who hit her the second time and killed her.”
Casper looked sick. “That’s horrible,” he said.
“More than you think,” Grave Digger lisped.
“But I don’t see what that has got to do with the robbery.”
“I’m coming to that,” Coffin Ed said.
Casper couldn’t see Coffin Ed’s face distinctly in the shadows, and it worried him. “Come over here and sit down where I can hear you,” he said.
“I’ll talk louder,” Coffin Ed said.
A flicker of anger passed over Casper’s face,