"Striking sanitation workers demonstrated in the streets of Memphis during Dr. King's last visit," the anchorman said, "following his statement that he supported the rights of the negro workers to strike. In spite of promises that the demonstration would remain peaceful, violence erupted. There was one death and over fifty injured." The newsreader reappeared on screen shuffling papers, momentarily unaware he was on camera. Smoothly, he launched into the rest of his story. "Dr. King issued a statement abhorring the March 28 violence and promised to return from Atlanta to address the strikers and plead their case with Mayor Loeb's office. Meanwhile, AFSCME officials said..."
He flicked the television off and looked at the plate of eggs and sausage that cooled on the bed. A cockroach peered over the edge of the plate and experimentally waved an antenna at the food. He watched it crawl into the plate and explore.
There were a thousand things that might go wrong. He had never been good at planning things, had spent more than a little time in prison because of that weakness. He went to the mirror in the common bath and looked at his face. It was nondescript, the face of any white man on the streets of Memphis. A little thin, perhaps, but that's what prison does to you. Doubt nibbled at his confidence as he looked at that wan visage in the mirror.
"What's wrong, James? Cold feet?" Raoul's voice whispered to him. "Don't worry, everything's fine. You haven't done anything yet. What are they going to do, throw you in jail for staying in the building beside the Lorraine?"
"I'm an ex-con with a weapon."
"So what?" Raoul countered. "Lots of people own rifles in Memphis. So what if you have a criminal record? Lots of people in Memphis are ex-cons." Raoul's voice was a balm on his nerves. "There's nothing to distinguish you from anyone else on the street, so what's the big deal?"
He looked again at the face in the mirror. So plain, so nondescript. Invisible.
"Maybe now," Raoul answered his thoughts, "but soon you'll get the attention you deserve. You will do the world a favor by getting rid of a troublemaker. People will finally understand how valuable you are. You'll be a hero."
Sometimes he thought he could almost see Raoul in the mirror, just over his shoulder. Raoul was always there when he needed him, with an encouraging word or a good suggestion. He shook off his doubts.
He stepped into the tub and looked out the window. It would be a difficult shot, but not impossible.
Back in the room were several brochures touting the attractions of Memphis; Beale Street, the Orpheum, Graceland. He picked up the Lorraine's brochure and opened it again to examine the floor plan. Raoul had told him that King was already booked on Eastern Airlines Flight 381 from Atlanta, and would arrive the next morning about 10:30. He didn't know how he knew that, nor did he think it odd that he did. He simply studied the floor plan until he found what he wanted.
The desk clerk at the Lorraine Motel looked up to see a dark man standing at the counter. It didn't seem odd to him that he hadn't heard the man come in. It just irritated him that the man had interrupted his reading.
"I'm from Dr. King's advance security. I've come to make a change in the Reverend's reservations," the man said. His smile was sincere and broad, but the desk clerk was dragging out the register. "Dr. King always likes to have a room on the second floor overlooking the swimming pool. You have him on the first floor."
The clerk shrugged, scanning the register. "Well, we have 301 available, near the stairs and the pool."
"Perfect. Would you put him there, please?"
The clerk made the notation and spun the book around, offering the pen to the man as he looked up. "If you'll just put your signature here for the change."
All that was left was a shadow of the man as the door shut. The clerk shook his head, closed the book and went back to reading his newspaper.
He lay on the bed with his head propped up on a pillow. King had arrived as expected, checked in just where Raoul had said he would. The television news was covering King's speech at Mason Temple. There was a swarm of people around the man. Not that that meant much to him. There had been a swarm around Kennedy in Dallas, and still it had happened.
For a moment, he felt the immediacy of that November day five years earlier. He closed his eyes and felt the Texas heat, saw the open black limo swing down the street below him, felt the kick of the rifle, saw the rebound of the target's head before the crack of the shot had even died.
His eyes snapped open and he felt disoriented. The vision had been so real, as if he had been the shooter. Only someone who had stood in the assassin's shoes could have felt and known that. The terror began to grip him.
"Easy, James," Raoul cooed soothingly. "You just dropped off and had a bad dream. Everything's under control."
Raoul was way ahead of everyone on this. He knew that, as long as Raoul was with him, nothing could stop him.
King got back late. People wandered from room to room all night long. In the dark bathroom, he watched the comings and goings of King's troop like a predator sizing its prey. Once, about 5:00 AM, he saw King come out of one room and hesitate on the balcony. There was no one around, and he cursed himself for leaving the rifle behind. Still, there was Raoul's voice, calming him, assuring him the right time would come. King disappeared from the balcony and he went back to his own room.
The dreams were often so unsettling they woke him in the middle of the night, but he could never remember them. He felt he should have been able to, since much of what happened to him during the day left him with feelings of deja vu he could only attribute to the dreams.
Although he knew he wouldn't remember it, in this dream he was at a train station. Around him were several people in turn of the century costume. He could feel the metal of a small revolver in his hand as he moved toward a stoutish man talking to several others on the platform. The man represented everything he despised: structure and order, enforced law. The voice inside him said it was time. He felt the pistol bark and saw the man drop.
Almost instantly, he was swept into a crowd of people speaking a language he didn't understand and didn't care to know. A beautifully outfitted carriage was gliding to a stop nearby. A man and a woman, obviously royalty, stepped down from it. The nationalism in him rose like a red anger. To serve his people that they might regain their rightful place, the revolver in his hand spoke and both fell.
Again, strangely, he was transported, this time to a quiet modern street. A long-haired, bespectacled man and an Asian woman were walking toward him. He smiled and started to say something to the man, the little pistol cupped in his hand, but Raoul's voice stopped him, saying, "Soon."
He woke, sweating, with the images already dying. Light was coming through the windows. He glanced at the clock. 6:30 AM. Time for a shower and breakfast.
Raoul said the time was close.
He watched for an opening all day, but nothing presented itself. The landlady was quiet enough, but she tended to look at him oddly sometimes, as if she didn't recognize him for a moment. Raoul said it was just their way. White folk all looked the same to them.
It was getting late when King walked out on to the balcony and started chatting with some people by the pool. Raoul told him it was time, so he hurried to the room and found the rifle. He found that Raoul had cleaned and loaded it. Raoul was in control. He felt the tension go out of him as he stepped into the tub.
The rifle barrel slid out the window and he found the target through some intervening bushes he knew would give him cover. As the sights centered on the target's head, he exhaled slowly, then gently squeezed the trigger.
The impact of the round lifted King off the balcony and slammed him into the wall. He allowed himself just long enough to be sure the first shot had done the job before pulling the barrel back into the room. As he did, he caught one of the men on the balcony looking directly at him. He ducked out of the window as the shouting began.
Quickly, he moved back to his room and dropped the rifle in the bedsheet. Grabbing the corners, he bundled everything he owned into its folds and twisted it shut. Raoul's voice was urgent, but not alarmed, a good sign. He found his way out of the building and followed Raoul's directions.
He slipped into a doorway as several people ran by toward the motel. The calm knowledge that Raoul had his escape arranged was all that stood between him and panic. With an effort, he kept his breathing even and started away from the doorway.
It was then he realized he and Raoul had become separated. The presence that had kept his spirits up for so long was gone. Frantically, he looked around, trying to locate his partner, but Raoul was nowhere to be found. He backed into the doorway. In horror, he looked down at his package. The police seemed to suddenly be everywhere. If they found him with this, he was done for. The shouting, the running people, the howl of sirens approaching.
Visions of the prison cell rushed back. In a panic, he dropped the sheet and bolted for his Mustang. The little white Ford sprang to life and, for a few moments, he had the wild idea he might escape.
Later, one of the witnesses would say she had seen an unidentified black man leave the area right after the shooting. She wouldn't be able to give a good description of the man because there was something about him that couldn't be expressed in words; a darkness around him which her mind immediately translated into his racial type, but her soul rejected. Raoul knew about this reaction to his appearance. After a few days, it would fade until she would remember only the black man, the preternatural chill forgotten.
Raoul watched the car speed away. The beauty of it was, he hadn't really done anything but encourage the man's fantasies. All he'd had to do was blunt that veneer of civilization that humans were so proud of, and the beast had risen eagerly to the surface. The beast in the human heart was so much more honest than The Enemy's illusion of civilization. And so much more entertaining. He'd killed two birds with one stone, if you'd pardon the expression. One of The Enemy's peacemakers was stilled, and his own army increased by one recruit. The millenium was only about a decade away, less than a heartbeat to him.
Now, there was much to be done and little time. There was an appointment to be met in Los Angeles in June. A certain Palestinian was contemplating murder.
So much to do, so little time.
David Blalock has been writing science fiction and fantasy for about twenty-five years now. In print since 1990 in various publications, his latest hard copy story is in the anthology "More Monsters from Memphis"(available from Barnes&Nobles website). He lives near Memphis, Tennessee,with his wife, daughter, and computer.
E-mail:jrlthran@memphisonline.com
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