South Central Noir

We chatted a bit — the murdered girls, the heat — then she said, “Say, Theus, I heard the Dunbar is hosting concerts Christmas week to New Year’s. Bessie Smith, Chick Webb — top stars. The Will Mastin Trio is headlining Christmas Eve. If you ain’t busy, I was wonderin’... you think we could go out on a real date? Mix in with that glamorous crowd? I’ll pay.”

I couldn’t say yes’um quick enough. She told me I couldn’t pick her up at Pink House no more ’cause Madam Sweet put her out. She’d hired a room somewheres west of Figueroa. On the night of our date she’d just walk to 9th, down the street from Pink House. We could take a taxi to the Dunbar from there.

She got halfway down the walk before I ran to stop her. “Excuse me. Miss?”

She turnt. Smiled. “Something I can do for you, prettyman?”

“I don’t know your name.”

“My name? It’s embarrassing to say out loud, but... my name is... Angel. Angel LaBrie.”

20

Officer Kimbrow’s evidence must have arrived on Chief Hopalong’s desk early Monday morning. On Mayor Stankey’s desk too. Like Kimbrow figured, they thought the photos and all was from somebody white. In the chief’s afternoon press conference, he mentioned, for the first time, the murders of Negro girls taking place along the Central Avenue corridor. Dogged police work, he said, had brought the monsters who did the killings to light.

A dragnet was set to snare the wrongdoers — two brothers, Cleotis and Theotis Palsey. One a corrupt county official, the other, a bloodthirsty homicidal fugitive. No Angelino was safe. Updates on the investigation would be forthcoming. Neither the mayor nor the chief mentioned their involvement in the crimes.

21

Next morning at daybreak, LA Vice tracked the Palsey brothers to an abandoned horse farm in Compton. Surrounded it. The brothers was ready. Started shooting, battled more than an hour. Two officers kilt. The LAPD set the farm afire. Cleotis got burnt to a crisp but his murdering brother got away. There was a citywide alert: Theotis is crazy, armed, and deadly. Vowing vengeance. Womens and girls in extreme jeopardy.

22

Them relaxed, rich hotel guests went buck wild. Poured out the doors like cattle. Hunting for taxis: to Union Station, the Valley. Anywheres but here. Uncle Balthazar gathered the staff in the break room, tolt us to keep calm, stay professional. Assure the guests they was safe long as they stays inside the Dunbar.

Didn’t work.

The customers that was left hurried over to the House of Style. Crowded ’round the radio. The mayor was making an announcement. The fugitive, Theotis Palsey, sent a warning to all the radio stations and newspapers in town. Promised murder and destruction to a long list of folks: the mayor, the chief, everybody in the phone book. The radio guy read the outlaw’s message:

“To Mayor Stankey and my former friends at City Hall:

I have been thy steadfast ally and defender.

Have done labors for thee lesser men could not stomach.

I counted thee as my brothers,

Brothers in the fight against the encroachments

of a repugnant race.

But ye hath betrayed me

And killed my dear brother.

Ye hath sown the wind

And ye shall reap the whirlwind.

Mark me: the shadow of death

Is upon thee.

Ye shall not escape.

Yours in Eternity

The Living God the Redeemer of Zion.”

23

Streets was deserted from the river to the ocean. Cop cars, bumper to bumper. Beat cops prowling alleys. Dragnets laid acrost the city. The thin blue line swelling everywheres.

Theotis was a ghost. Seeping through the holes in the net. By the start of my morning shift Tuesday, two more murders was alleged in his tally. White folks. A old white lady, home alone, raped, beat, and stabbed to death on Miracle Mile. A few hours later, a banker, shot to death, ten blocks south of there. Changing a tire.

The Redeemer of Zion wasn’t just killing colored folks no more.

24

Uncle Balthazar canceled the Will Mastin show around noon. The Memo, the Last Word, Club Congo, Murrays, and the Basket Room canceled they Christmas shows too.

Soon as my shift ended, I flew down to Pink House. I had to find Angel. I banged on the door, begged Madam Sweet to let me know where my Angel was staying.

“You tell that thieving bitch if she step her ugly feets ’round here, I got a .22 slug with her name writ all over it!” Madam Sweet yelled through the door.

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