Echoes of a Distant Summer
Echoes of a Distant Summer is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
2005 One World Books Trade Paperback Edition
Copyright © 2002 by Guy Johnson
All rights reserved.
Published in the United States by One World Books, an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.
ONE WORLD is a registered trademark and the One World colophon is a trademark of Random House, Inc.
Originally published in hardcover in the United States by Random House, an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., in 2002.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Johnson, Guy.
Echoes of a distant summer: a novel / Guy Johnson.
p. cm.
Sequel to: Standing at the scratch line.
eISBN: 978-1-58836-199-8
1. African American criminals—Fiction. 2. African American families—Fiction. 3. African American men—Fiction. 4. Oakland (Calif.)—Fiction. 5. Assassination—Fiction. 6. Grandfathers—Fiction. 7. Aged men—Fiction. 8. Mexico—Fiction. I. Title.
PS3560.O3778 E28 2002 813’.54—dc21 2001048978
www.oneworldbooks.net
v3.1
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Prologue
Book I: The Awakening of: Jackson St. Clair Tremain Tuesday, June 8, 1982
Wednesday, June 9, 1982
Friday, June 11, 1982
April 3, 1954
Tuesday, June 15, 1982
Saturday, June 19, 1982
July 1954
Monday, June 21, 1982
Tuesday, June 22, 1982
Tuesday, June 22, 1982
July 1954
Tuesday, June 22, 1982
Tuesday, June 22, 1982
Wednesday, June 23, 1982
Wednesday, June 23, 1982
Wednesday, June 23, 1982
Thursday, June 24, 1982
Thursday, June 24, 1982
Friday, June 25, 1982
July 1956
Friday, June 25, 1982
Friday, June 25, 1982
Friday, June 25, 1982
Saturday, June 26, 1982
Book II: The Immersion Saturday, June 26, 1982
Friday, August 18, 1951
Saturday, June 26, 1982
Saturday, June 26, 1982
Saturday, June 26, 1982
Sunday, June 27, 1982
Thursday, April 2, 1954
Sunday, June 27, 1982
Sunday, June 27, 1982
Sunday, June 27, 1982
July 1958
Monday, June 28, 1982
Tuesday, June 29, 1982
Tuesday, June 29, 1982
Wednesday, June 30, 1982
Wednesday, June 30, 1982
Wednesday, June 30, 1982
Friday, July 2, 1982
Friday, July 2, 1982
Saturday, July 3, 1982
Book III: The Resurrection Sunday, July 4, 1982
Sunday, July 4, 1982
Monday, July 5, 1982
Tuesday, July 6, 1982
Tuesday, July 6, 1982
Thursday, July 8, 1982
Thursday, July 8, 1982
Thursday, July 8, 1982
July 1961
Thursday, July 8, 1982
Friday, July 9, 1982
Monday, July 12, 1982
Wednesday, July 14, 1982
Saturday, June 22, 1964
Wednesday, July 14, 1982
Wednesday, July 14, 1982
Thursday, July 15, 1982
Friday, July 16, 1982
Friday, July 16, 1982
Sunday, July 18, 1982
Book IV: The Resolution Sunday, July 18, 1982
Sunday, June 23, 1964
Wednesday, July 21, 1982
Friday, July 23, 1982
Monday, June 26, 1964
Saturday, July 24, 1982
Saturday, July 24, 1982
Saturday, July 24, 1982
Wednesday, June 26, 1964
Sunday, July 25, 1982
Sunday, July 25, 1982
Sunday, July 25, 1982
Wednesday, August 25, 1982
Dedication
Acknowledgements
Other Books by This Author
About the Author
PROLOGUE
Sunday, June 6, 1982
Sampson Davis was thinking about death when the hired black Cadillac stopped on the corner of Eddy and Fillmore streets in what had once been the heart of the black community in San Francisco. He was eighty-five years old and dying of lung cancer, yet he was not thinking of his own death. He was pondering why such a vital neighborhood as the Fillmore was in its death throes; it was a pale relic of what once had been. He remembered how it was in the forties and fifties: the streets filled with shiny new cars; storefront barbershops with gambling and numbers rooms behind them; bakeries; Russian delicatessens; five-and-dimes; restaurants; diners and chop suey houses; movie theaters; hole-in-the-wall blues and jazz joints; and always the streets filled with people in their many shades of black and brown. It was the death of vibrancy that haunted his thoughts.
Sampson looked at his watch. It was seven-thirty in the evening and despite the new high-rise apartment buildings and the modern facades on the Fillmore corridor businesses, the streets were relatively quiet. There were still some black people on the street, but they did not look affluent. They were not the ones living in the new apartments. They probably came from the towering, ugly, pink Section Eight apartments over on Buchanan Street, the last remnants of Fillmore’s heyday. Sampson saw whites and a sprinkling of Asians going in and out of the new apartment buildings and grimaced. Asians he could understand. The northern part of the Fillmore had once been the heart of the Japanese neighborhood, until World War II policies had taken their properties and placed them all in prison camps. It broke Sampson’s heart to see so many whites nonchalantly walking down streets that they had feared to tread in the fifties unless they were the police.
He was overcome by a bout of coughing, which caused his eyes to water. He was getting more things caught in his throat all the time and it was getting harder to catch his breath after each bout of coughing. If he could just last until this assignment was finished, death would come easily. He took a moment to take slow, measured breaths until it seemed that he was back to normal, whatever normal was for an eighty-five-year-old. The driver opened the door for him and he received unrequested assistance to his feet. A quarter of a block off Fillmore on Eddy Street was one of the few remaining black businesses. It was Ezekiel J. Tree’s Billiard Parlor. This was Sampson’s destination. He scribbled a quick note on the small pad that he carried and handed it along with a hundred-dollar bill to the driver.
The note read: I am going into that pool hall. If I do not come out within two hours, call the police.
The driver, who was Hispanic, nodded and said, “I’ll park somewhere close. If you look to your left when you come out, I’ll be parked down the street.”
Sampson shook his head. He wrote: I don’t want the car seen. You must wait until I have walked to the end of the block.
The driver read his note and frowned. He asked, “Are you sure you can make it that far?”
Sampson nodded and smiled. He tapped his chest, checking to see if he still had the envelope in his interior breast pocket. He heard the crinkle of paper and felt reas
sured. Taking his time, he crossed Fillmore and walked slowly toward the billiard parlor. He moved fairly easily for a man of his age. Other than his cancer, the only time he had ever been ill in his life was when he had been made mute by a blow on the head, and really it was the terrible beating that he had received after that which had jeopardized his life.
When he pushed open the door of the pool hall, he knew that there was a very good chance that he might not come out alive, but that didn’t cause him to hesitate one moment. In the thirty years that his wife, Wichita Kincaid, had been dead, living had become decidedly more unpleasant. Death was not nearly as frightening as the changes that he saw going on around him. This new, modern world was sickening. Therefore, when he had been informed that he had lung cancer and that a regimen of surgery and chemotherapy could prolong his life, he had refused it.
He stepped into the establishment and saw that it was an extremely large room with a video arcade in the front which was being used by boys of different races from about ten years of age to those in their late teens, and behind that were pool tables lined up three across and five rows deep. Along the right wall was a long wooden bar which served beer, wine, and soft drinks, and cheap packaged snacks. The bar also doubled as the place where the pool balls were rented.
Sampson walked over to the bar and pointed to the draft-beer sign. He sat down on a stool at the end of the bar as far away from the front door as possible and surveyed the hall. The place was doing good business for a Sunday evening. There was an unwritten rule in pool halls like Tree’s: The front tables were for walk-ins, people off the street, and casual players. The middle tables were reserved for the petty criminals and gang members, and the rear tables were for the real pool players and high rollers who bet their money under the table. True to this design the front tables were full with blacks, whites, and Asians, all recreational players. The middle tables, which were directly in front of him, were all occupied by young black street toughs and their girlfriends. They were all swaggering and talking loud, wearing lots of gold rings and chains, which they took special pains to show off. At the table closest to him, Sampson saw a young black man suddenly spin on his girlfriend and slap her hard across the face. “Listen, bitch!” the young man snarled. “You don’t tell me what to do! If you want to keep those teeth in your mouth, you better shut the fuck up!” The young man looked around challengingly, daring anyone to take notice of his act. The girl sat silently and made no effort to protest.
The young man saw Sampson looking at him and challenged, “What the fuck you lookin’ at? You got a problem?” Sampson merely shook his head and turned back to the bar. Behind him the young man continued, “That’s right, you old motherfucker! You better turn around! I’ll kick your ass too!”
Sampson took a deep breath and thought, This is what has happened to the black community. It has lost its respect for its women and elders. This young fool doesn’t know, less than thirty years ago, how hard black men struggled to have their women respected, how the black woman was at the very bottom next to the Indian in taking shit from everyone, how black women had held together families torn apart by racism and poverty, how black people died of the simplest things because the nearest hospitals wouldn’t give them medical attention. This fool doesn’t know his history, because if he did he wouldn’t dare treat his woman in such a profane manner.
Sampson began writing on his tablet and when he finished he tore the sheet off.
The bartender, a squat brown-skinned man with a broken nose and a missing front tooth, came over and asked, “You all right, old-timer?”
Sampson nodded and slid the written note across the bar. The bartender glanced at the note and a look of suspicion crossed his face as he asked, “Why do you want to see Mr. Tree?”
Sampson wrote another note and pushed it toward the bartender. The bartender asked, “Can’t you talk?” Sampson shook his head and with a gesture indicated that he couldn’t speak. The bartender read the second note and questioned, “You have some information about King Tremain? Who the hell is that? Why would Mr. Tree be interested in him?”
Sampson took the note back and wrote at the bottom: Just tell Zeke Tree. He knows who King Tremain is. He’ll remember the father of the man who gave him his scar.
The bartender shook his head after he read Sampson’s addendum. He leaned forward and whispered, “A word of advice, old-timer, Mr. Tree doesn’t like being called Zeke. His closest friends call him John, but everyone else calls him Mr. Tree. And nobody who likes their health talks about his scar. I’m going to do you a favor and tear up this note. You can write another asking to see Mr. Tree.” He tore the note in pieces and dropped it behind the bar.
Sampson nodded his thanks and wrote another note, which he handed to the bartender. The man took the note and went to a phone by the cash register. Sampson watched him as he talked. The bartender’s demeanor was one of deference. Whoever was on the phone was of some importance. When he hung up the phone, the bartender returned the note and said, “Somebody’ll be out soon. I hope you know what you’re doing, old-timer. These are serious people you’re messing with.” He turned and went down the bar to serve some other customers.
Sampson did not have long to wait. Two black men came out of the back and made their way to the bar. One was a large, hulking man with a flattened nose and short, kinky hair, while the other was of medium build and was sporting a Jheri Curl hairstyle. They both appeared to be somewhere in their twenties. The hulking man was chewing on a cheap, pungent meat stick as he followed his smaller companion.
The smaller man stepped up to the bar and asked the bartender as he pointed to Sampson, “Conway, is this the guy who wanted to see Mr. Tree?” Conway nodded and hurried to occupy himself at the far end of the bar.
The man stalked over to Sampson, his Jheri Curls swaying sickeningly back and forth, and demanded, “What’s your business with Mr. Tree?”
Sampson started to write a note in response when the larger of the two men stepped forward and slapped the side of his head. “My brother Frank asked you a question! Answer him, goddamn it, or I’ll really give you something to worry about!” The big man had the face of a boxer who had, without proper preparation, stepped up in class too many times. He continued to bite off big chunks of his meat stick as he watched Sampson.
Sampson looked back at the man who had hit him. He was not afraid; if he was to die, so be it. It would be better than dying alone in a hospital. His only regret was that he had not met this particular fool even twenty years earlier. He would’ve enjoyed killing him. Sampson simply gestured to his mouth to indicate that he couldn’t speak.
“What the fuck does that mean?” the big man demanded, pulling back his arm to slap Sampson again. “I told you to answer my brother!”
Conway, the bartender, came over and volunteered, “The guy’s a mute, Jesse. He can’t talk. That’s why he’s trying to write an answer.”
Jesse nodded his head as this information sank in. “He can’t talk, huh? Why the fuck didn’t he say that?”
Frank turned to his brother. “Don’t show what a dumb-ass you are, Jesse. The old coot can’t talk! That’s why he didn’t say nothing!”
Jesse didn’t like the fact that he had once again publicly displayed his dullness, and he held Sampson responsible. He grabbed Sampson’s jaw in a tight grip and squeezed. “How we know he ain’t jivin’ us? He could be tryin’ to run a game on us!”
Sampson made no move to struggle or get away, even though he was getting short of breath. If he lived he hoped that this man would be among those who would come after him. These men without history, rootless men, moving like tumbleweeds across the landscape. The earth would not miss them.
An older man in his fifties wearing rimless glasses appeared and he ordered, “Get your hands off of him! Can’t you see there are people watching you? Are you two absolute fools? I told you, check the man out till I get off the phone with the boss. I didn’t tell you to rough him up. Especially
out here in front of witnesses.”
Frank began to explain, “He ain’t hurt, Mr. Gilmore. Jesse was just trying to make sure he knew we meant business. That’s all.”
“Yeah, that’s right,” Jesse confirmed. “I was gettin’ him ready for you.”
“Get the hell out of my sight and let me talk to the man!” Frank and Jesse backed away respectfully and walked down to the end of the bar. Gilmore turned to Sampson. “Who are you?”
Sampson wrote: Sampson Davis. I used to work for King Tremain back in Oklahoma. I managed his general store after he left.
“What do you want with Mr. Tree?”
I have information that he may find very valuable. Maybe even willing to pay for.
“What information?”
It’s information for Mr. Tree’s eyes only. If he thinks it’s worth anything, he can reach me tonight at the Golden Gateway Hotel at Sixth and Howard streets.
After Sampson finished writing his note, he took the envelope out of his pocket and placed it on the bar.
Gilmore read the note quickly and picked up the envelope. He felt the envelope between his fingers, trying to determine if there was only paper in it. After he satisfied himself he said, “Okay, you delivered your message and we know how to contact you. Anything else?” Sampson shook his head. Gilmore gestured toward the door with his hand and said, “All right, you can go. If we need to contact you, we’ll reach you at the Golden Gateway Hotel.”
Sampson got up from the stool and walked slowly toward the door. He wasn’t sure he could move his jaw. There was considerable pain when he attempted to open his mouth. It didn’t really matter, he wasn’t planning on eating again anyway. He stopped concentrating on his mouth and focused on his breathing. He didn’t want a coughing fit in here. He had to get away before someone read what was enclosed in the envelope. He walked through the arcade, pushed open the door, and stepped out into the darkness of the street. He turned to his left and it did look like a long walk to the corner. He couldn’t even see the corner; his night vision wasn’t what it used to be. He kept moving, step after step, toward Fillmore. Once he reached the corner, the black Cadillac pulled out of a parking space and drove up alongside him. The driver jumped out and ran to open the door for him.