In the middle of the steepest lunge back down the hill, with the cable still humming beneath the streets like some living thing, I hear a woman’s voice screaming out in fury. Even worse, I recognize the voice: “Get your goddamn hand out of my purse, you smelly son of a bitch!”
The crowd, the gripman, the conductor, and I all freeze. She screams again: “Are you deaf, you worthless bastard? I told you to get your goddamn hand out of my purse and drop my goddamn wallet. Quit pretending you don’t know who I’m talking to, bozo. Let me be more specific: get your goddamn black hand out of my purse. That narrow it down enough, asshole?”
Sheba Poe’s voice is as unmistakable as any in movie history—breathy, sultry, iconic, and, at this disturbing moment, unstrung. When the cable car reaches the next intersection, almost every rider leaps off, sprinting in all directions in helter-skelter flight from the drama Sheba has unleashed. The passengers who remain onboard have known one another since high school, except for the largest black man I’ve ever seen: wild-haired, frantic, six feet five inches tall, three hundred pounds.
“Little woman,” he says to Sheba, his voice gently controlled, considering the circumstances, “you gonna get yourself hurt if you don’t hush your mouth and lower your voice. I can’t get my hand out of your purse because you got it so tight around my wrist.”
“Let go of my goddamned wallet and I’ll loosen the purse, you smelly black son of a bitch.”
“I’d lose the references to smell and color,” Molly suggests in a soft Charleston accent.
“Uh-oh,” the big man says, emboldened. “I believe I found me some cracker-girls a long way from home. You cracker-girls could get hurt when I pull a knife out of my pocket, which is what I’m about to do to improve Miss Goldilocks’s manners.”
“You got worse than cracker-girls to worry about, tiger,” Betty answers smoothly, pulling out a thirty-eight and laying it against his head. “You got the law.”
With no assistance from anyone, she goes into professional posture, flipping out handcuffs and passing them to Ike in a move as showy as a behind-the-back pass. Ike snaps them, then steps him off the cable car and into an alleyway as our group follows. The gripman and the conductor appear from where they’d ducked down in front, as do six or seven curious passengers who materialized out of nowhere. Soon the cable car continues its interrupted journey down toward Fisherman’s Wharf as the seven of us face the wrath of a man whose eyes are murderous. “I didn’t know you were cops,” he says, taking us all in with his wild-eyed gaze, but addressing only Ike and Betty.
“We’re part of an exchange program,” Betty says. I recognize that she and Ike have no idea what to do with their prisoner now that he is cuffed and in their illicit custody. By the looks on their faces, I can tell that what they did was every bit as illegal as the theft of Sheba’s wallet.
“You heard that woman call me a nigger,” the man shouts. “It was a racial incident, plain and simple. I’m the victim of a hate crime.”
“Shut up, mister,” Betty orders. “Give us time to think.”
Sheba possesses a gift for making a bad situation worse. “You’re absolutely right, loser: it is a hate crime. I’ve always hated bastards like you. Look at the size of your ass. Why don’t you get a job sawing down redwoods in the national forest or something?” For reasons unclear to us Sheba delivers these words in a drop-dead perfect Charleston accent that only exacerbates the racial tension. I also notice that Sheba has ventured out in her disguise of everywoman, with sunglasses, scarf, and loose-fitting clothes, rendering both her fame and her beauty invisible to the naked eye.
“Officers, listen to these white folks,” the man says. “These is cracker rednecks. Hell, they’re Klansmen for all we know. I know what I’m talking about; I grew up in Carolina. I know a racist bastard when I see one, and I sure as hell know it when I hear one.”
“Which Carolina?” Ike asks. “South? Where ’bout?” By now, all of us have calmed down enough to hear the familiar rhythms of this stranger’s voice.
“You ain’t never heard of it,” the man says.
“Try me,” Ike replies.
“Gaffney.”
“Gaffney?” several of us scream.
It suddenly hits me when he turns to me that I have seen those eyes before. “We know this guy,” I say in wonder. To Niles and Ike, I say: “Get rid of the greasy hair, erase the beard. Make him twenty years younger and fifty pounds lighter. Pure muscle. The state semifinal in Columbia.”
“Son of a bitch—you’re right,” Ike says in disbelief.
Niles obviously doesn’t see it yet, and murmurs, “What?”
“Think, Niles, think,” Ike says. “We should’ve beaten Gaffney. Why didn’t we? We had the better team and were favored to win. Look at those eyes.”
“You know South Carolina?” the man asks with hope.
“Macklin Tijuana Jones!” Niles exclaims at last, astonished by the recognition.
“We were on their five,” I remind the women, who are staring at us as if we’ve lost our minds, “down by six. Fifty-eight seconds left to play. Those eyes. We drove our fullback into the line three straight times, and this was the guy who stopped us each time. The last play, Ike, Niles, and I had the same assignment. To knock this guy out of the play. Our job was to give Wormy a shoulder to get into the end zone. After our last time out, Macklin Tijuana Jones shoved all three of us back and tackled Wormy for a three-yard loss. The last play of the game.”
“My daddy still thinks you’re one of the best five football players ever to come out of the state,” Ike says. “Take off the cuffs, Betty. We got us a homeboy on our hands.”
“Not till he promises to behave himself,” she grumbles.
“You guys played for Peninsula?” Macklin asks. “I kicked the shit out of you.”
“You sure did,” I agree. “Then you played for Georgia.”
“You played pro,” Niles says. “But you got hurt—your knees, right?”
“Both knees by the time I was finished. The Saints traded me to Oakland. That’s how I ended up out here. I was already finished.”
Ike says, “Man, did you go from sugar to shit in a hurry.”
“I had back luck,” Macklin says. “Anyone can have bad luck.”
“What are we developing here? Skills in the art of conversation? Shoot him in the kneecap and let’s go to lunch,” Sheba says.
“Tell me I didn’t rob the wrong broad,” Macklin says, which gets a laugh from a few of us.
“You’ve got no clue, my friend,” Niles says.
“Where do you live now, Macklin?” Betty asks, though she doesn’t let down her guard.
“In the Tenderloin,” he says. “In a deserted car owned by a friend. It’s parked in the backyard of a building he owns. He was a Raiders fan. Helped me out.”
“You a crack addict?” Ike asks.
“That’s what they tell me,” Macklin admits.
“You were a magnificent athlete.” Ike shakes his head, then studies Macklin for a long moment. “You know the Tenderloin well?”
“I am the Tenderloin,” Macklin brags. “It’s my base of operations.”
“You want a job?” Ike asks.
“Have you lost your ever-loving mind, Ike?” Sheba cries.
“No, but I just had me a bright idea,” Ike says. “Macklin Tijuana Jones is going to help us find Trevor Poe.”
“That’s the dumbest idea I ever heard,” Sheba says.
“C’mon, Ike,” Niles says in protest.
“This is going to be hard enough,” Molly says. “Let’s try not to make it harder.”
“What’s a soul brother and sister from South Carolina doing hanging around pig, honky motherfuckers like these?” Macklin snarls.
“That’s it, Macklin: screw up just when things are going your way,” I say.
“I don’t get the Tijuana,” Fraser interrupts to ask, speaking for the first time. “Is that a family name?”
“Je
sus,” I groan. “If Charleston were a snake you couldn’t kill it with a stick.”
“My mother’s old man was Mexican,” Macklin answers her calmly, as if it were the most natural question in the world. “My daddy’s people were the Joneses.”
Ike lets out a bark of laughter at the exchange and says, “Take off the cuffs, Betty. This is a South Carolina Jones.”
“He still hasn’t promised to be a good little soldier,” Betty says. “He’s got to give me a sign.”
“I’d still like to coldcock that bitch.” He looks directly at Sheba.
“He must like the handcuffs, Ike,” Betty says.
“Threaten my friend again, Macklin,” Ike says, “and I’ll take my pistol and break one of your kneecaps. Because I’m a fair man, I’ll let you decide which one.”
“I ain’t gonna do nothing,” Macklin says. “Just talking. Always just talking.”
“Shut up and listen for once. In Charleston, Betty and I know the streets. All of them. We know people who can tell us everything: the rumors, the dealers, drug shipments arriving on freighters. But we don’t have dog shit in San Francisco. Until now. Now we’ve got Mr. Macklin Tijuana Jones. Everybody see what I’m talking about?” Ike speaks directly to each of us.
“One thing I know,” Macklin says in the quiet that follows Ike’s explanation. “None of you ain’t never seeing my black ass again. Nice meeting this interracial pep club, but I’ll be on my way if it’s okay with you nice folks.”
“If that’s your final decision, we’ll be on our way,” Ike tells him.
“What about these handcuffs?” Macklin asks.
“They’re yours now,” Betty says. “They belong to you. Enjoy them.”
As a group we begin walking away from Macklin. He screams, “You can’t leave me here handcuffed. We’re from the Palmetto State.”
Our laughter infuriates him, and he begins cursing us with creativity and panache, which tickles rather than frightens us. The sheer outrageousness of the encounter is taking a giddy toll on all of us.
Then Ike spins around and grabs Macklin by the throat. “We need your help, Macklin. Do we get it or not? Be quick, make a fast decision. And try to make a smart one.”
Macklin takes it all in, then calms himself. “What can I do for you fine ladies and gentlemen?”
Betty turns him around and removes his handcuffs, and Ike says, “Sheba—give me your wallet.”
With reluctance, Sheba passes her wallet over to Ike’s outstretched palm. He does not take his eyes off Macklin Jones as he removes three hundred dollars and presents it to Macklin with a small flourish. “There’s more where that came from. We’re out here looking for a man named Trevor Poe. He played piano in the city for a lot of important people. Here’s a flyer, Macklin. He’s got AIDS. You find him for us and we’ll give you five thousand bucks, no questions asked. On the flyer, I wrote down everything you need to find us while we’re here. If you want to start your shitty life over again, we can help. Thanks for robbing us today, Macklin. I think God brought us together.”
“I think it was Satan,” he mumbles.
“I’ll second that,” Sheba says, taking off her sunglasses and glowering.
Macklin stares at Sheba. They are evenly matched in their capacity to attach hatred to their glaring. “I’ve seen this twat before,” he says at last, looking away from Sheba to the rest of us. “She was in a Nike commercial or something.”
“Or something,” Sheba says, and we rush to catch the cable car returning down Powell.
Every city has its Tenderloin. It’s the part of town where you can feel the air change as you break through some invisible epidermis of squalor, a down-at-the-heels, joyless place where a city has gone wrong and can’t figure out a way to right itself. Though the Tenderloin is in the heart of the city, it seems like a bad piece of fruit, left too long in the sun and attracting the attention of flies and hornets. Although the Tenderloin was once lovely, and much of its architecture is still a pleasure to behold, it has spent itself with all the intrigues required by dissipation. In San Francisco you know that you are entering a rough neighborhood because no room has a view. In the Tenderloin, all vistas are worthless and disheartening; all alleyways smell of urine, strewn garbage, and cheap wine. On Monday, we are to deliver meals to seven hotels, more than a hundred meals. Our plan is to stick together and work with the utmost speed as we enter the Hotel Cortes. Sheba pacifies the deskman as the rest of us spread out through a hotel that does justice to the word fleabag. It smells of the kind of mold that grows on expensive cheeses, but also of a darker variety that has metastasized in dampness and air shafts and crawl spaces, untouched by disinfectants.
With six boxes of lunches, I sprint up a flight of steps that seems in danger of collapsing beneath my weight. Molly brings up the rear, with Niles and Fraser matching her step for step. I knock at the first door and hear a faint stirring, but the movements seem overcautious. A weakened voice finally asks, “Open Hand?”
I call: “Lunch is served.”
The man laughs as he unlocks the door. Thus I make my first acquaintance with a human skeleton so ravaged by AIDS I do not think he will see the next sunrise.
“Are you Jeff McNaughton?” I place his food on an unpainted desk. He looks translucent in his thinness and I watch blood flowing through the veins in his forehead. His flesh looks like it is made of onionskin.
“I ordered beluga caviar with blinis. Also a bottle of iced Finlandia to wash it down. I do hope there were no mix-ups,” he says.
“I can’t lie to you, Jeff. Someone substituted sevruga at the last minute. It was an outrage. But I’m just a delivery boy. My name’s Leo King. You’ll be seeing me for the next couple of weeks.”
The man begins a spasm of coughing. “I won’t last a week, Leo. I’ve got the Pneumocystis pneumonia. It’s come back to me.”
“You need me to call anyone?” I ask. “Your parents? Your family?”
“All the calls have been made,” he says. “None of them answered.”
“I’m looking for a friend.” I pull out a circular. “His name is Trevor Poe. You know him?”
“The piano player.” Jeff studies the photograph. “I used to see him play in bars in the Castro, but we were never formally introduced.”
“If you hear where he is, will you call me?” I ask. “You can reach me at the number below his picture.”
“No phones at the Cortes,” Jeff tells me. I help him over to the desk and open his lunch for him. “I won’t be leaving this room, Leo. And you’re the only name on my dance card, sweetheart. Thanks for lunch.”
On the next door I knock loudly, and it is answered by an older man, who is in much better physical condition than his younger companion. Rex Langford is the older man and Barry Palumbo the younger. Barry’s eyes are open but offer no sign of greeting; he could have been a mannequin if I could not hear his raspy breathing.
“You’re early. Unprecedented,” Rex says.
“First day. At the rate I’m going, I’ll get lunch to some of these guys by midnight.”
“New on the block, huh?” he asks. “Somebody at Open Hand hates your guts. No one lasts long delivering meals to the Cortes.”
“My name’s Leo. Anything I can do for y’all?”
“Y’all. Music to my ears. A concerto at last. A country cousin come to town.”
“Where are you from?”
“Ozark, Alabama,” he tells me. “It’s not far from Enterprise, which boasts a sculpture of a boll weevil on its main drag.”
“You’re joking, right?”
“Sadly, I’m reporting the gospel truth. The Louvre has its Venus de Milo, but Enterprise, Alabama, has its boll weevil. Both represent something essential about the souls of each place.”
“It must be odd growing up in Ozark, Alabama,” I say.
“Growing up is odd, no matter where you do it. That’s my only piece of observed wisdom. It’s yours for free,” he says.
“I like it. I accept it as a gift.”
“Where are you from, cracker-boy? Do I detect the slight memory flaring of Mobile in that accent?”
“Charleston, South Carolina. There’s a Huguenot influence in both accents.” I place a circular in his hands. “I’m looking for a friend. Trevor Poe’s his name. You ever run across him?”
“Did he go to the Baths?” Rex asks.
“Trevor lived at the Baths.”
“Then our lives may have abutted,” Rex says. “If you get my drift.” “If you have any friends who visit, would you ask them about Trevor Poe?”
“Most of my friends are dead. Except Barry over there. Say hello to Leo, Barry. He brought us lunch; isn’t that nice?”
“Hello, Leo.” His voice sounds half-human.
“Barry’s blind,” Rex says. “I feed him. Then he throws up. Then I feed him again, and he throws that up too.” “I can’t help it, Rex,” Barry whispers.
“It’s nice of you to do for him, Rex,” I say.
“Not nice at all. It’s all I’ve got to do,” he says with a shrug. “He’ll go, then I’ll go. But there won’t be anyone to help me.”
“Do you have any money, Rex?” I ask.
“Of course not. Both Barry and I get welfare checks, but that goes poof into the wind. Medicine, rent for this penthouse, and so forth.”
From the bed, Barry calls out, “Will the guy who brought lunch call my sister Lonnie?”
“I’ll be glad to call Lonnie,” I tell him.
“We were so close when we were growing up. No sister ever loved a brother like Lonnie loved me.”
“I’ll call her tonight, Barry.”
“Her husband hates me, so hang up if he answers the phone. I’d love to have her visit me one last time. Give him her number, Rex.”
Rex writes on a piece of paper and hands it to me as I exit. I walk down the hall toward my next delivery and open the paper: “Don’t bother,” it reads in a barely legible scrawl. “She says it’s God’s will he’s dying—calls it a pervert’s death. But thanks anyway.”