A Red Death: Featuring an Original Easy Rawlins Short Story "Si (Easy Rawlins Mysteries)

C
RITICAL
A
CCLAIM FOR
W
ALTER
M
OSLEY’S
E
ASY
R
AWLINS
N
OVELS

A R
ED
D
EATH

B
OOKS BY
W
ALTER
M
OSLEY
PUBLISHED BY
POCKET BOOKS

Devil in a Blue Dress

A Red Death

White Butterfly

Black Betty

A Little Yellow Dog

Gone Fishin’

WALTER MOSLEY

A
N
E
ASY
R
AWLINS
M
YSTERY

WASHINGTON SQUARE PRESS
NEW YORK   LONDON   TORONTO   SYDNEY   SINGAPORE

The sale of this book without its cover is unauthorized. If you purchased this book without a cover, you should be aware that it was reported to the publisher as “unsold and destroyed.” Neither the author nor the publisher has received payment for the sale of this “stripped book.”

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and
incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used
fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons,
living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

A Washington Square Press Publication of
POCKET BOOKS, a division of Simon & Schuster, Inc.
1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020
www.SimonandSchuster.com

Copyright © 1991 by Walter Mosley

“Silver Lining” copyright © 2002 by Walter Mosley

Published by arrangement with W. W. Norton & Company, Inc.

All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce
this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever.

For information address W. W. Norton & Company, Inc.,
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ISBN: 0-7434-5176-7
eISBN: 978-1-4516-1250-9

First Washington Square Press trade paperback printing October 2002

10  9  8  7  6  5  4  3  2  1

WASHINGTON SQUARE PRESS and colophon are
registered trademarks of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

Cover art by Don Kilpatrick III

Printed in the U.S.A.

For information regarding special discounts for bulk purchases,
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D
EDICATED TO THE MEMORY OF
A
LBERTA
J
ACKSON AND
L
ILLIAN
K
ELLER
WITH SPECIAL THANKS TO
D
ANIEL AND
E
LIZABETH
R
USSELL

M
RS. MASTERS,
I’d like you to meet Mr. Ezekiel Rawlins,” Kathy Langer said. “He’s our senior head custodian.”

I had just entered the secretary’s office. Masters was standing there next to Kathy’s desk.

“Nice to meet you,” I said to the new principal of Sojourner Truth Junior High School. “I hope you’re going to like it here at Truth.”

“Oh, yes,” Ada Masters replied. “I already love it. It’s a beautiful school. And it’s so good to meet you at last, Mr. Rawlins. Are you feeling better?”

I had missed a few days of work looking for the photograph of a man I might have known. It turned out to be the picture of a stranger. I had squandered my sick days and made a bad impression on the new boss. The worst thing about it was, I didn’t give a damn.

“Okay now,” I said. “One’a those seventy-two hour viruses. Woke up this morning and it was gone.”

Mrs. Masters’s pale blue eyes concentrated on me. She was at the midway point between fifty and sixty, petite and well dressed. The gray suit she wore was elegant, made from cashmere. The light gray blouse showing at the V of her jacket had the high sheen of silk. Her sapphire ring was real and her
glasses were lined with nacre cut from a single shell. For all that expense her clothes weren’t showy; a careless eye might miss the finer touches and think that Masters was dressed according to a city employee’s salary.

The secretary, Kathy Langer, was an interesting contrast to her new boss. She was young, pert, and ready to make babies. Her coarse, nut-brown hair was almost shiny, her clothes came from the May Company bargain table or maybe JCPenny’s. A vegetarian could have eaten her blunt-toed brown shoes with a clear conscience. Her face wasn’t pretty but it was hungry, a thing most working-class men like. And she had a habit of lifting her chin to bare her throat, at least when I was in the room with her.

There I was, a big black man, in the room with two white women who would never meet traveling in their own social circles. It seemed odd to me and I wanted to say something about it. But I didn’t think that either one of them would understand or appreciate my views.

“Will you take a walk with me, Mr. Rawlins?” Mrs. Masters asked.

“Easy,” I said. “That’s the name I go by.”

I saw Kathy mouth the name. When she saw me regarding her she smiled and moved her shoulder like a lounging cat getting comfortable in a new corner.

“I’d like you to walk me around the lower campus,” Principal Masters said.

W
E VISITED SEVERAL CLASSROOMS.
The teachers looked wary until they saw Mrs. Masters smile at them and wave. She wasn’t like the previous principal, Hiram Newgate, who only dropped in to see what infractions he might find.

We also spent a while in the garden: the biology and agrarian
science department of the school. Out there the students grew radishes and studied elementary anatomy.

Finally we came to the custodians’ bungalow. The rest of my crew was out working by then so we had the room to ourselves. It was a big rectangular space with a large table down the center of it. Along the walls were shelves crowded with cartons of paper towels, toilet tissue, and boxes filled with bottles of ammonia, window cleaner, and bleach. There were five-gallon cans of wax piled in one corner and an entire wall of pegboard hung with dozens of sets of keys next to the door. The table was strewn with newspapers, overflowing ashtrays, empty paper coffee cups, and plates with half-eaten cakes on them.

“Nice place,” Mrs. Masters said. “The kind of place where the job gets done.”

“Sorry about the mess. But, you know, if I want ’em to keep the school clean I can’t complain about this room until Friday after lunch.”

“I understand,” she said. “May I have a seat?”

“Please do.” I was thinking that Newgate never asked permission for anything. He’d stand up if you didn’t offer a seat and nurse a grudge against you from then on.

“Can I get you a cup of coffee?” I asked.