So you want to know about Orson Welles and me.

It started one early February morning. I was still sleeping when my grandfather bellowed all of six inches away from my ear. "Phone, gundamnit."

My eyes shot up, tugged window blinds. Sixty-five years old and he has the lungs of a baby. "Who is it?" My voice cracked as I tried to crank up my brain.

"Don’t know. Think they’re callin’ from Canada. They try to reverse the charges, ya’ tell ‘em to go screw themselves. Hear me?"

"Right." I fumbled out of bed and shuffled towards the wall phone in the cracker box kitchen. "Go screw yourself."

"Not me, gundamnit! Them! Them! Tell them to go screw themselves, gundamnit!"

I was steering on automatic pilot when I put the receiver to my ear and spoke in to the mouthpiece, "Hello. Go screw yourself."

"Canada Lee is not amused."

"Canada!" was one of my oldest friends. As kids we ran loose in the same gang of scalawags, Canada my first Negro friend. As adolescents we worked together as stable hands. For me it was just an afternoon job to raise money for ball games and egg creams, but Canada, who never grew taller than five feet five, took advantage of the opportunity to learn how to ride. As adults I wormed my way to Chicago while Canada toured America’s jockey circuit. Later he lighted on New York City to study boxing, eventually winning an amateur lightweight title. "Is that you?"

"Who else would be using Canada Lee’s name except for us?"

"And who else talks as screwy as you do? How are you, buddy?

"Canada is fine. Why did you tell us to go screw ourself?"

"Oh, that was Governor’s fault."

"He has a peculiar way of demonstrating his affections we think."

"Tell me about it. I’ve got to live with him. Why are you calling? You in town? Fighting, maybe?"

"Canada no longer fights nor rides the ponies. Sometimes he screws, but not himself."

"Don’t beat a dead horse."

"We wouldn’t have been much of a jockey if we couldn’t. Canada is in New York City. Harlem, to be precise. We have heard you retired from the sissy game of baseball to become a private investigator."

"How did you hear about that all the way out on the east coast?"

"Canada Lee keeps tabs on all of his old friends. You would not believe some of the things we know about Abe Borodkin, Max Pilzer, Chauncey Morehouse…"

"All right, I get the point. So what are you doing if you’re not riding or fighting?"

As it turned out chance had turned Canada Lee into an actor. The Federal Theatre Project was WPA chairman’s Harry Hopkins latest strategy to help get unemployed Americans off the dole by offering government-sponsored jobs. A unit was established in Harlem, a district whose show business enthusiasm was legendary, but where opportunities to perform professionally were few. Hallie Flannagan, the Project’s chairwoman, announced that only ten percent of any unit’s ranks could consist of professionals who had been receiving relief. The remaining ninety percent had to be made up of amateurs. The Harlem Unit of the Federal Theatre Project allowed hundreds of starry-eyed Negroes a chance to pay the rent and fulfill life-long dreams, all at government expense!

After nearly fifteen years of battering his body, Canada decided to try out for Macbeth. He was good enough to convince its first-time director, a twenty-year-old protégée named Orson Welles, to give him the part of Banquo. Canada was ecstatic, grateful for the job, but his director now found himself in trouble. Canada was calling me to ask if I would hire on with the Harlem Unit as Welles’ bodyguard.

"There is a chapter of the Communist Worker’s Party here in Harlem," Canada explained. "They are convinced Orson wants to insult Negroes with a Williams and Walker version of Macbeth. The Communists are trying to turn the borough against Orson."

"Are you doing blackface?"

"Of course not."

"Then tell the Communists that."

"We have. They will not listen."

"Let ‘em watch you rehearse."

"Our producer presented the Communists with an invitation, but they declined. Sassafras, things are growing ugly."

We had seen some ugly things growing up, so I knew, contrary to the way he expressed himself, Canada was not given to hyperbole. "How so?

"A growing population of protestors pickets the Lafayette, our theatre, around the clock. They average two hundred a day, working in shifts. And we have begun receiving death threats against Orson’s life. Most are primal screams, nothing more. Very few, but still a few, are serious and coherent."

"How are you receiving the threats?"

"Most are mailed. Some are slipped under the exit doors. We receive an average of ten a day."

Yep. That sounded ugly all right. "Have you notified the police?"

"We have. Patrols have been stepped up, but that is all."

"About all they can do, really."

"No one worried about our Macbeth before the Harlem Communists stirred them up. Canada believes if people see Orson is under watch, no one will strike at him. Once the reviews come out and people read our efforts are sincere, this discontent will disappear."

"I hope you’re right, but it sounds like wishful thinking," I said.

"Perhaps. But Orson is determined to see it through, and so is our Unit."

"I appreciate the offer, but why do you need me? You’re better with your fists than me. You’re quicker. You’re colored so you won’t stand out in the crowd. Hell, Canada, you’ve got a lot more riding on this than I ever could."

"What you say is true, but there are places you can go with Orson that Canada is not allowed. Besides, serving as Orson’s bodyguard would take Canada away from his rehearsing. So he recommended you to Miss Flannagan, as Canada owes you for favors past due and has heard you need the money."

Strange way of paying me back, pal. I thought it, but I kept my trap shut. I knew what Canada was trying to say as I rubbed the thin scar along the back of my neck. "How much?" I asked.

"Thirty dollars a day, plus expenses incurred on the job, room and board."

"When’s opening night?"

"In two months on April 14."

Oh, good. A guy can get a lot of contusions in ten weeks. I thought it, but I didn’t say it. Poverty tends to make a body keep a tight rein on his sarcasm. "Okay. I’ll give it a go. For the rent. I owe Governor about a year’s worth."

Arrangements to bring me to New York had already been made and a suite was reserved for me at the Cosmopolitan Hotel, two blocks north of Orson’s apartment. Before I could honestly appreciate the responsibility I was assuming, I was on the job.

# # #

Six weeks later I was sitting slumped in an overstuffed and under-upholstered chair in an apartment on 123^rd Street in Harlem. It was three thirty in the morning, and all around me a Saturday night rent party was coasting along at full steam. All I wanted to do was go back to my hotel and catch some shut-eye. But I couldn’t do that. I had to watch over Orson Welles, and he insisted on being the guy who turned out the lights at any party he graced.

The tenement consisted of four rooms linked by a narrow hallway, one of which, the main bedroom, had been locked to bar uninvited guests. The other bedroom was reserved for folks playing poker or rolling dice. I was in the living room, converted into a dance floor by removing most of the furniture and storing it in a neighbor’s flat. I could have maybe grabbed a stool in the kitchen, but since that room was little more than an extension of the living room I opted to stay where I was.

Every lamp around the dance floor had had its white lights replaced with red bulbs, and at least seventy-five people were jitterbugging to the Lindy Hop. Keeping an eye on a hyperactive young man like Orson under these conditions was nearly impossible, but the party did provide me two allowances.

First, although Orson and I weren’t the only whites in the place, there weren’t many others and most of them were beat cops, who had come up to tell us to pipe down then stuck around for the party. Better yet, Orson was probably the only other person at the party besides me who couldn’t hoof, try as he might on the dinky dance floor.

The poor boy was too pathetic to look at for too long, so I started watching the vigorous musicians holding court in the living room. There was a stride piano player, a drummer, a guitarist, and some clown on a trumpet. These last three were playing free of charge, and, in a sense, so was the cat on the keyboard. The original pianist, hired through an agent, Libby Boyette, had moved on hours ago to another parlor social. He had been displaced by Abba Labba, a popular nightclub musician since the 1920s, who had outperformed him in a feral cutting that had sent everyone screaming "Break it down!" or "Get in the gully and give us the ever-lovin’ stomp!" The loser was the only musician walking away from this party a sawbuck or two richer than when he arrived, but it was the man who captured the piano stool who came out ahead in what mattered most. In Harlem you weren’t a jazz musician if you couldn’t cut at a rent party on a Saturday night. Abba Labba held on to his professional reputation by performing here for free, as he would at some other function next Saturday, and the next, and so on until the day he or Harlem died.

A burst of light, like a Photoflash lamp, flickered outside the kitchen window. A sedentary brownstone across the alley blocked my view of the night, but it was clear there was lightning in the sky. I assumed customary grumbles of thunder followed the fireworks, since there was no way I could hear anything outside over the din of the rent party. For twenty-four hours a southern storm had perched along the New England seaboard, repeatedly dousing a cold rain on New York City. More than a few of the showers turned into downpours, two or three even threatening to become deluges, but despite the lightning the storm was acting sluggish, as if it had finally played itself out. There wasn’t a drop in sight. Like my grandfather was fond of saying, "Looks like ol’ God’s gonna have to knock down a couple o’ more barley pops ‘fore this mother can kick in again."

His memory made me smile. It also made me sad, which startled me. This was hardly my first sojourn away from my hometown or Governor, but for some reason all of a sudden I felt homesick.

"What’cha thinking about, shamus?"

I looked up to see Ben Kanter, a member of Orson’s WPA cast, talking to me. Cream-skinned with a nose better tailored to a Hibernian than a Negro, Kanter could likely have passed for white if he had ever felt the urge.

"Nothing of practical use," I said. "How are you doing?"

"Can’t complain. I’ve wanted to ask you something though. Some of the guys in the crew swear you’re that Sassafras Winters who pitched with the Chicago Cubs a couple years back. How about it?

Oh, great, I thought. Just what I needed.

"Guilty as charged," I confessed.

Kanter smiled, nice white even teeth. "Cool deal, McNeil!"

"Thank you. Go away."

"Hey, I’m not going to razz you! Tell me, were you a real Dillenger, a Dracula, or what?"

Kanter might as well have been speaking Greek until I realized he was tonguing jive. "You want to run that by me again? I can’t lay your racket." I was hoping I told him I didn’t jive.

"Oops. Sorry. Been waxing native all night."

"It’s cool. I used to be able to hold up my end of the conversation, but it’s been awhile since I was here last. I’ve gotten old. Forgot too much."

"Yeah. I can see what you mean." Kanter slipped me a good-natured wink. "Well, what I was asking was, were you hot? Were you good? Did you make the grade? Could you play, damn it?"

"I can play. I shored up Malone and Root when I had to."

"Pat Malone! Charlie Root? You were on the ’29 club?"

"I said I could play. You saw us that year?

"Oh, gosh, yes! I was in Chicago with my papa that July on a Sunday when your team played the St. Louis Cardinals. I remember that old man the Red Birds have got managing them, Hornsby, knocked one right out of left field onto Addison Avenue for your guys. Or was it Clark Street. I forget what those roads are called."

"Old man?" Hornsby? In 1929 that old man Hornsby pelted 40 dingers over a variety of fences throughout the National League. He also batted .380, drove in 149 runs, hit 229 times, and scored 156 runs. He was the quill of a damned fine litter that included Kiki Cuyler, Lewis Robert "Hack" Wilson, and Riggs Stephenson. During the July Kanter’s dad brought him to Wrigley Field, the Cubs won 24 out of 33 games. By season’s end we captured the NL pennant by 10 ½ lengths. 1929 was a great year. But it could have been better.

Having pitched middle relief in the Cubs’ final regular season game, I went out with some of my teammates and got plastered for the last time in my life. One of two reasons for my going on the wagon can be blamed on us losing the World Series that year to the Philadelphia Athletics when we should have clobbered them. It hurts to think maybe we celebrated too soon for our own good. As for the other reason, it has nothing to do with my baseball career so it doesn’t matter right now.

The Cubbies and I lost one more World Series in ’31, this time to the New York Yankees and Babe Ruth, and by 1936 most of my teammates were out of baseball and on their own. These days a new roster was sitting in Wrigley’s home dugout, led by Phil Cavarretta, a Chicago boy born and raised. His team had already played in their own October Classic in ’35, but didn’t finish any better than my class. Suddenly it dawned on me that I hadn’t seen any of my fellow veterans since retiring in ’34, and I was damned close to turning thirty-five years old. So was Hornsby, "The Rajah." We were all getting long in the tooth. Getting old fast with nothing to show for it but two bungled World Series.

"Yeah…Addison. Listen, Ben, I’m beat. Can we jaw tomorrow at rehearsals?"

"Sure. Hey, I understand. Orson’s been running us all ragged. We’ll slide your jib later."

I watched as Kanter weaved his way back into the mainstream of the postage-stamp sized dance floor. Just like I figured, he wasted no time seeking out Rose Ramsey, the gal throwing this shing-ding at a buck-a-head admittance.

Rose was the Lady-in-waiting in Macbeth, but on 123^rd Street, a hop, skip, and jump from the A-train stop-off, she was a singer who had been watershedding and throwing social matinees to pay her rent since the stock market crash. She was tall but stout, with caramel-colored skin and a teddy bear face. More than once I had noticed Rose and Kanter talking to each other during rehearsals or spotted them together around the borough, and you didn’t have to be Sherlock Holmes to deduce each thought the other was swell.

The young couple struck up what seemed a familiar conversation. Nothing exciting was going to happen there so I glanced away to scan the crowd, something I figured bodyguards did from time to time.

Just under half of the hundred and more folks jostling inside the tenement were quailed from Macbeth’s cast and crew, the majority consisting of truck drivers, tradesmen, housemaids, laundry workers, seamstresses, porters, elevator operators, and shoeshine boys. Standing out in the crowd, dancing like a madman with a beauty a head taller than himself, was Canada.

He somehow sensed me staring at him, turned his rugged cherub’s face at me and waved. I waved back, then glanced at Abba Labba’s impromptu quartet again as a vocalist joined them. It was Rose. I searched for Kanter to see if he was watching her, but didn’t spot him anywhere as Rose began belting out an old Ethel Water’s tune.

I closed my eyes for a moment to yawn, stretched my arms and legs until the sinew threatened to pop, then did something unforgivable. I fell asleep.

When I felt the rap on the side of my head it was nearly dawn. Dusky orange sunlight permeated the air outside the kitchen window. Anyone awake was either content with doing the monkey hunch on the dance floor, talking, or eating what remained of the fish and pig’s feet. Dozens of bodies lay helter-skelter about the living room, sleeping where they had fallen. The place looked as if somebody had gassed the Savoy. I had to blink a couple of times before I could figure out Canada was standing next to me.

"We have an uninvited guest," he said.

I followed Canada’s gaze across the room towards a bullish middle-aged white man hastily cutting a wary path through the unconcerned congregation. The stranger’s coat and conservative seersucker suit were ruffled and his cheeks unshaven. His round hound dog face, drooping mustache, and round spectacles reminded me of Teddy Roosevelt. He didn’t look like a leftist radical, but I riveted my gaze on him while I asked Canada about, "Orson."

"He is fine."

"What do you think? Is this cat after him?"

"Canada doesn’t know. The Philistine flashed a dime store police detective’s badge and pushed past Rose to gain entrance."

"The guy looks like an aardvark left out in the rain. He’s no cop. My guess is he’s a private dick."

"Canada will defer to the expert. Shall we escort the gentleman outside for questioning?"

"No. Let’s give him some rope and see where he goes."

Canada pointed at Orson, passed out in a corner, an arm draped over the shoulders of a statuesque Negress, an enviable smile on the young man’s face. I thought about Welles’ wife, Virginia, back at their apartment, probably waking up around now to get breakfast ready for her husband and faithful companion. Twenty is too young to get married.

The stranger paid no attention to Orson. All he cared about was making a beeline for Rose’s back rooms. Nothing else in the flat mattered to him.

I stood and my knees cracked, complaining, like two cars backfiring one second after the other. My back bitched that I was making it do too much too soon. I ignored the pansies. "You coming?"

"Canada Lee wouldn’t miss it."

We went after the peeper, arriving in the narrow hall leading from the kitchen in time to see him kick in the door to the bedroom facing the alley. I heard metal snap, saw part of a bolt fly out into the hall, then lost sight of the dick as he charged into the bedroom.

Canada and I ran after him, storming into the bedroom right behind our quarry. The place was a mess, as if the dick had managed to toss the room in the whole three seconds he had been alone in here. In that time he had found his way to the window overlooking the alley two stories below. It was open. The stranger held a standard .45 revolver in his hands, aiming it at something or someone down in the cul-de-sac.

"I got him. Call the cops, boys."

"Who the hell are you?" I asked.

"My name’s Andre De Shields. I’m a private investigator. Now call the cops!"

I still didn’t know what was going on and momentarily lost my train of thought, something I had a bad habit of doing when pitching in pressure situations, to the disgust of my managers. Canada brought me back when he touched my shoulder. "Sassafras, there is blood."

True enough, beads of moist crimson ran from the open window back to a vanity at the other end of the room. A broken bottle of cold cream marked the start of the trail.

"What the hell is going on here?" I asked. People from the party were beginning to mass in the hall outside the door, whispering among themselves.

"I said call the cops!"

I moved to the window. "Why?" I glanced out and down. Framed in the 45.’s sights was Ben Kanter. He was frightened, standing beside an uncovered manhole, hands dirty and smeared with rust, one assumed from having removed the sewer’s plate now lying at his feet. I could hear rainwater rushing through the nearly overflowing street pipe. The pavement of the alley was wet and slick from the storm.

"One last time, just what the hell is going on around here?" I asked.

"I’ve been looking for a fella named Norton Denbrough. I tracked him here, but I do believe this nightrunner killed him before I could get to him." De Shields was grinning, almost as if satisfied that he had been too late.

# # #

Clipping from The Brooklyn Chronicle, March 15, 1936:

Manhattan Banker Murdered at Harlem Party

White Financier Was In Love With Negro Actress,

Possible Victim of Lovers’ Triangle

A Harlem negro, Ben Kanter, was arrested today on suspicion of killing a white Manhattan man, Norton Denbrough, during a rent party on 123^rd Street.

Kanter, 32, is suspected of killing Denbrough during a lover’s quarrel over Rose Ramsey, the party’s hostess and a negro actress with the WPA’s Federal Theatre Project.

Denbrough, 30, lived in Gramercy Park West and was employed at Manhattan First National Bank in the investment branch. The bank fired Denbrough last December for dating Ramsey.

According to Andre De Shields, a private investigator, Denbrough had been living with Ramsey for several weeks.

"There’s no doubt Denbrough was romantically involved with Ramsey," De Shields said. "So was Kanter. I saw Ramsey and Kanter together around Harlem plenty of times."

The victim’s mother, Claudette Denbrough, hired De Shields after her son started spending long periods of time away from home.

"She wanted to know what her kid was up to," De Shields said.

Denbrough was last seen alive just after dawn this morning by De Shields. Apparently Kanter killed Denbrough during a fight in Ramsey’s bedroom, carried the body down a fire escape, and disposed of it in a sewer in an alley behind Ramsey’s apartment building.

Violent runoffs in New York sewers from Saturday night’s thunderstorms have made it impossible to begin a search to recover Denbrough’s body.

"We might never find it now," a police spokesman said. "We’ll try, but it’s unlikely. Not that it matters. We’ve got the killer. That’s what counts."