Vineyard Blues (6 page)

Day-trippers to the Vineyard usually land in Oak Bluffs, so the docks and Circuit Avenue, its main street, are lined with snack-food joints and gift shops offering Taiwan-made Martha's Vineyard mementos to visitors who have circumnavigated the island in tour buses and are now heading back to the mainland prepared to give authoritative reports about the place.

Seeing them boarding the boat for their return trip to the mainland, I am reminded of the time when I was lying on the beach in the summer sun, and overheard two college-age girls talking about their plans for the next year. One of them said she was going to Europe. The other replied, “Oh, I've seen that place. I was there on spring break.”

Never having been to Europe, I was aware that I was in no position to criticize the girl who had apparently seen it all in a week. Similarly, since I've never taken the tour bus around the Vineyard, I try to withhold judgment of the knowledge of island day-trippers, too.

Oak Bluffs is also one of the two towns on the Vineyard that allow alcohol to be sold and served, and is the site of a couple of notorious bars, including the Fireside, where I have been known to lift a glass or two. All in all, OB is the funkiest town on the island, and OB people wouldn't live anywhere else.

The church where Corrie was performing was already overflowing when Zee and I got there, but the big guy at the door was expecting us and showed us to our reserved seats in the front row, leading us past slightly irked people who had gotten there before us but were obliged to stand if they were going to hear Corrie.

It was a mostly dark-complected crowd, but there were paler people, too. I recognized some of the folks seated in the pews: John and Mattie Skye; Stanley Crandel, the latest in a long line of Crandels who owned the big Crandel house on East Chop, and who liked to claim John Saunders, the slave turned Methodist preacher, as an ancestor; his wife, Betsy, who waved; their actress niece, Julie Crandel, who was visiting from Hollywood and also waved; and, seated across the hall away from the more respectable Crandels, the small, ageless figures of Cousin Henry Bayles and his wife. Cousin Henry, who reputedly had once run the black mobs in Philadelphia, but was now quietly retired in a cottage down by Lagoon Pond, did not wave.

Since it was a house of God, the minister led a rousing prayer of thanks for grace and music, and turned the evening over to Corrie, who led off with a number I remembered hearing him sing with my father long long ago.

The blues tell of hard times and down times, of lonesome times, of sin and sorrow, of prisons with and without bars; but they also speak of endurance, of outlasting adversity, of good times with good women and good liquor.

Corrie sang mourning songs of ropes, chain gangs, and cotton fields, but mixed them with soft songs of rocking chairs on Southern summer porches, of bedrooms and barrooms that were warm and friendly, at least for a time. Sometimes we clapped hands as he sang, sometimes we sat and just listened to that voice of his, which he never raised, but that carried to the farthest corners of the hall. It delivered despair and hope without sentimentality or self-pity, and when Corrie put aside his guitar for the last time, the audience was left with emotions of both joy and sorrow, right where the blues usually leave you. As Corrie shook hands with the Crandels and others who surrounded him, the rest of us slowly exited into the night, feeling sad and good and somehow wiser than we had just a couple of hours earlier.

As we went out the door, we looked back and I saw Corrie embrace Cousin Henry Bayles and kiss Henry's wife.

“Well,” said Zee, holding my hand as we walked to the truck. “That was mighty fine. I thought I heard some Brownie McGhee and maybe some Gary Davis in there, along with the other stuff.”

“Could be. Reverend Gary worked with a lot of guys. I wouldn't be surprised if Corrie was one of them.”

“I see that Corrie and Cousin Henry are close.”

“Maybe Corrie spent some time in Philly when Cousin Henry was down there. As I understand it, Cousin Henry owned some clubs or at least took some money out of them before he left town for good. Maybe Corrie worked in some of them. He's mixed with some tough birds in some tough places, from what he says.”

“I'm glad to learn that Cousin Henry likes the blues. It makes him seem more human.”

My mouth said, “He's as human as most of us, I think.”

But in my mind I wasn't so sure. The cop's jungle telegraph, to which I had been hooked while on the Boston PD, had it that Cousin Henry had done some very, very bad things to people while in Philadelphia. Admittedly, the victims were pretty bad themselves, for the most part, and would have done to Henry what he had done to them, had they gotten the chance. Still, if the rumors were even somewhat true, at least part of Cousin Henry was arguably more beast than human.

But then there are monsters inside of most of us, just waiting to get out.

We drove home and relieved the twin of her baby-sitting duties.

“How was the concert? Were Mom and Daddy there?”

“Great and yes. A good time was had by all.”

“How long is Mr. Appleyard going to be on the island? I hear that there's going to be a big party at a house tomorrow night, and that everybody's going to take something for the kids who got burned out, and that they wanted Mr. Appleyard to sing a couple of songs for the cause, but he's leaving the island before the party, so he can't do it.”

“How did you hear about all that?”

Only the faintest of blushes touched the twin's cheeks. “I used your phone a little. I hope you don't mind.”

We didn't mind, so the twin accepted her money, assured us that our offspring had been angels, got into her mother's car, and left.

“It would be encouraging to think that these summer kids would actually want to hear the blues,” said Zee. “Maybe I've misjudged them. Too bad Corrie can't be there.”

“I'd like to think some of them have good taste in music,” I said, “but I don't have any reason to.”

“We're becoming old fuddy-duddies, just like my parents,” sighed Zee. “They didn't like the music I liked, and now I don't like the music the next generation likes.”

As one who was born disliking most of whatever music was currently popular—preferring country-and-western and classical, and having a selective taste for traditional English, Scottish, Irish, and Russian ballads, some jazz and some blues—I did not instantly admit to fuddy-duddyism.

“Maybe it's the sweaty-bed blues they like,” I said, easing up to her and starting to unbutton her shirt.

Her blue-black hair smelled sweet and musky, and her dark eyes were deep as the sea. “Maybe that's it,” she said, unbuttoning my shirt in return. “Makes sense to me.”

I slid her shirt off her shoulders and kissed her right there on that spot at the base of her throat. She put her arms around my neck. I picked her up and carried her into the bedroom.

Marriage is good for you.

The next day, Joshua and I worked on the addition, with Diana supervising from her corral. It was pretty clear that I'd probably get more done without assistance, but so what? I wanted my kids to know how to swing hammers, fish, and do the other stuff that I did. As we worked, the
pop-pop-pop
of gunfire came through the trees from the Rod and Gun Club. One of the poppers was Zee, using her custom .45.

Zee was practicing at the club range with Manny Fonseca, who was her tutor in the competitive pistol-shooting game they played. In spite of her belief that the world would be a better place without firearms, Zee was a whiz with a pistol and had begun to make a name for herself shooting competitively.

She also had a lot of fun, which was something she had expected even less than her discovery that she was what Manny called a natural with a handgun. Her moral convictions about weapons were thus at odds with her talent and the pleasure shooting gave her, but the conflict didn't prevent her from being a better pistol shot than I had ever been, even when I'd packed iron professionally, first as a soldier and then as a cop. Like Scarlett O'Hara, I could shoot pretty well as long as I didn't have to shoot too far. Zee was a veritable Joanna Wayne.

In time, she and I would teach our children about pistols, rifles, and shotguns, for ignorance of weapons is, like ignorance of most things, more dangerous than knowledge. But that would come later, when they were older and bigger. For now, as the sounds of Manny's and Zee's practice rounds came snapping at us through the trees, Joshua and Diana were apprentice carpenters.

That afternoon, after cleaning her pistol and making note of an upcoming competition over in America, Zee went off to work on the four-to-midnight shift.

No doubt there would be plenty of work waiting for her. The emergency ward at the hospital in OB took in a pretty steady stream of customers during the summer, including moped casualties; sufferers of sprains, contusions, broken bones, heart problems, alcohol and drug overdoses; and other routine patients. I don't think I could ever do the work of medics without becoming hard as granite, but Zee, like most nurses and doctors I've met, somehow managed to stay quite human. It's almost enough to make you believe that there is a God.

Not long after she left, Corrie Appleyard, looking none too well, came putt-putting down the driveway on the same moped he'd been working on earlier.

“Easy rider,” he said with a forced smile. “Just came by to say good-bye, and thanks. I'm catching the seven-thirty boat back to the mainland.” He put out his long brown hand and shook mine.

“Zee's gone to work,” I said. “She'll be sorry to have missed you. We'll have a room ready for you in the fall, so come back anytime.”

“Sorry to have missed your wife,” said Corrie, “but I'll take you up on that offer to visit.” He lifted a hand. “It's been nice meeting your family. See you next time.”

He drove back up the driveway and out of sight.

That night, sometime after Zee came home, climbed into bed beside me, and we both snuggled to sleep, I was awakened by the fire whistle in Edgartown calling to the volunteers. Then I heard sirens and more sirens, and I was disturbed by the direction they seemed to be headed. I listened, then eased out of bed and went into the living room and turned on the scanner. Voices and static crackled from the speaker. I heard the name of the street where Corrie had been staying, and had an almost irresistible urge to go there. But I knew that the last thing the firemen needed was another citizen getting in their way, so I remained where I was.

In time I heard someone say that the place seemed to be empty, and I felt a surge of relief. Apparently, everybody had gone to a party at another house, said the voice.

That would be the party the twin had mentioned, where the college kids would combine fun with charity as they tried to help those who'd gotten burned out earlier, and where Corrie had been asked to do some singing for the good cause.

Another bad fire, but at least no one had gotten hurt, in spite of the arsonist who I now believed was pretty clearly at work. The fire marshal could handle it. I turned off the scanner and went back to bed.

It wasn't until the next morning, as I made breakfast and listened to the radio news, that I learned I was wrong about no one being hurt. A body, as yet unidentified, had been found in the ruined remains of the house.

Is there a worse death than death by fire? According to what I'd read, most victims in fires died not from flames but of suffocation, often while they slept, so maybe it was quicker and less painful than other deaths. Maybe the real horror of fire was experienced by those who survived the flames. I, at least, could imagine no more dismaying fate. My acrophobia and claustrophobia shrank to nothing by comparison. Better by far to fall or even smother to death than to be maimed by fire. My father's life as a fireman in Somerville had never inspired me to follow in his professional footsteps; another career course, that of a policeman, had seemed a much safer one to me.

Of course, policemen run risks, too, and my five years on the Boston PD had ended abruptly in the shooting that had left me with a bullet that still snuggled against my spine. But somehow even now, years later, being shot didn't seem nearly as frightening as being burned to death.

Zee and I listened to the radio for details but got few: a fire, the body of a person whose identity was being withheld until relatives could be informed, the building a total loss.

I poured Zee's coffee and she looked up at me and said, “You say the sirens sounded like they were headed toward the house where Corrie was staying.”

I thought that's what the scanner had said. “I can't be sure,” I said. The morning wind was from the southwest and I wondered if I was imagining the smell of smoke floating down our long driveway.

“I think we should go and see,” said Zee. “If that boy Adam got burned out, we can put him up for a few days until he gets his feet back on the ground.”

“Maybe it wasn't even his house,” I said. “There are a lot of houses in that area.”

“We should go see,” said Zee. “Maybe we can help.” She put her cup aside and got to her feet.

“Maybe one of us should stay here with the kids.”

“They'll be fine. They'll stay in the car.”

She rose and we cleared the table and stacked the morning dishes in the sink. We put Joshua and Diana in the old Land Cruiser and drove to the house where Corrie had been staying.

It was a blackened ruin smoldering amid scorched trees and piles of water-soaked rubble. Firemen played hoses on the fallen walls while smoke drifted away downwind. There were several disheveled young people sitting or standing, looking at the remains of what had once been their summerhouse. I recognized a few faces I'd seen when I'd brought Corrie home. One of them was the boy who'd told us about Adam being missing. I also saw Ben Krane circling the ruin, his face dark and angry.

I parked and went over to the boy. “Have you seen Adam Washington?”

He gave me a vague look. “Adam? Yeah. He's around here somewhere. Maybe he went to work, come to think of it. I'm not sure.”

“How could he go to work when all his clothes are cinders?”

An ironic smile flitted over his face. “Adam works on a garbage truck. He doesn't need clean clothes. Most of the rest of us do.”

I felt a small flicker of approval for Adam Washington, a college kid who was willing to work on a garbage truck.

We looked at the smoking house for a moment, then I said, “Were you here when they found the body in there?”

He shrugged. “I guess so. We were all here watching our stuff go up in flames after the firemen came. Nobody told us when they found the body, but we saw them bring something out on a stretcher and put it in the ambulance. I guess that was it.”

“Did you see who it was?”

“Jesus, no! It was in a bag.”

From some recess of my mind a closed door opened and I saw once again the boxer pose of that long-ago charred victim who had burned himself to death in his own bed. I again smelled boiled hot dogs and nearly retched. Was it a real smell from this site or the memory of that one I'd smelled in Boston long ago?

Frank Costa, looking tired as death, was drinking a cup of coffee by a fire truck. I went over.

“I've had enough fires for a while,” he said. “They better catch this torcher quick.”

“You should go home and let some of the other guys manage this.”

He shrugged. “Everybody's in the same boat.”

“So you think it was arson.”

“Two fires in two of Ben Krane's houses in the same week? What do you think?”

“I think you're probably right.”

“I ain't a fire marshal or an arson investigator,” said Frank. “I'm only a gardener who volunteers for this work, so I could be wrong.”

“So could I, but I don't think so. Did you see the body they found?”

“Hell, I was the one who saw it first. First one I ever seen. Had them bent arms you read about. Like a boxer, you know. Fire contracts the muscles or something like that; I forget.” He drank his coffee, his sooty face lined with fatigue and his red eyes weary and vague.

“Was it a man or a woman?”

“Hell, don't ask me. I couldn't tell by looking at it.”

“Big or small? Tall or short?”

“I don't know. I didn't look too close.”

“I guess I wouldn't either.” Frank yawned. “I need about twenty-four hours of sleep, J.W., or I ain't gonna be worth a damn when I go back to work. Maybe I'm getting too old for this firefighting stuff.”

“Nah,” I said, “you're good for another twenty years.”

Frank had been with Edgartown's volunteer fire department as long as I could remember. When I'd been just a kid, he'd been a fireman, and he, a small-town, amateur fireman, and my dad, a big-city professional fireman, had enjoyed a summer friendship whenever my father and my sister and I had come to the island for a holiday. Right now, he was about as old as my father had been when that warehouse wall had fallen on him.

“There you are,” said a voice behind me. “I've been looking for you.”

I turned and saw Ben Krane. His falcon face was gray with soot and his suit trousers and shoes were black from the ashes he'd been walking through as he'd circled and studied the ruins of his house. His dark eyes were narrow and hot. Beyond him, I could see Zee looking at us from the Land Cruiser.

I said, “If this keeps up, you won't have any houses left, Ben.”

“You're damned right about that! This is the third building I've lost since spring. Somebody is trying to burn me out of business!” He glared at Frank. “And nobody is doing anything about it! Not a damned thing. They haven't got a clue about who's doing it or why!”

Frank was tired and irritable enough to tell the truth. “A lot of people wish you were out of business, Krane. You own half the slums on Martha's Vineyard!” He put down his coffee cup and straightened. He was twenty years older than Krane, five inches shorter, and about forty pounds lighter. Krane, eyes ablaze, stepped toward him. I slipped between them.

“What can I do for you, Ben?”

His eyes were level with mine, and he almost put a hand on me to push me aside. But then he caught himself and stepped back.

“I want you to find out who's doing this. The fire people and the cops are doing nothing! If I leave it to them, I may as well burn my places down myself!”

“Some people think you're doing that already,” said Frank, trying to get around my outstretched arm.

“Finish your coffee, Frank,” I said. “Let's step away from here, Ben. Come on.”

Ben hesitated, glaring at Frank, who, I imagined, was glaring back, then allowed me to walk him away from the fire truck.

“I know what people think of me,” he said, when we stopped a distance away, “and I don't give a damn. I pay my taxes and I give good service to the people who hire me. I play it straight as a realtor and as a lawyer and as a landlord. I don't care whether people like me or not. All I want is to be treated the same way as everybody else!” He glanced at Frank with angry eyes.

The speech sounded rehearsed to me, but maybe it wasn't. I thought that at least part of it was true: Ben really didn't give a damn about what people thought of him.

I hadn't eased him away from Frank so we could discuss his proposal to hire me, because I thought that idea was nonsense; I'd done it to get him and Frank apart.

“I know you must be frustrated,” I said, “but I don't think I'm the guy you should be hiring. I don't know a thing about arson or arsonists, and the cops and the arson investigators are professionals; you should leave it up to them to find this guy, whoever he is.”

“I lost an office last year and three houses this year, and they haven't found shit! I need somebody working for
me
!”

“If you think you have to hire somebody, you should hire a professional investigator. Try Thornberry Security up in Boston. They're about as good as you can get.”

Krane shook his head. “What does a Boston outfit know about Martha's Vineyard? No, I want somebody who knows his way around.”

“All right,” I said. “I'll work on it for a week. After that, you can find somebody else.” I named an outrageous fee, but instead of telling me to forget the whole thing, he surprised me by nodding.

“Fine,” he said, and I had a job I didn't want.