The Conjure-Man Dies: A Harlem Mystery

For a time the shadow made no sound or movement, and Jinx squirmed about impatiently in his seat, trying to obey directions and restrain the impulse to say something. At one moment the figure seemed to fade away altogether and blend with the enveloping blackness beyond. This was the very limit of Jinx’s endurance—but at this moment Frimbo spoke.

‘Please do not shield your eyes. I must study your face.’

The voice changed the atmosphere from one of discomfiture to one of assurance. It was a deep, rich, calm voice, so matter of fact and real, even in that atmosphere, as to dispel doubt and inspire confidence.

‘You see, I must analyse your mind by observing your countenance. Only thus can I learn how to help you.’

Here was a man that knew something. Didn’t talk like an African native certainly. Didn’t talk like any black man Jinx had ever heard. Not a trace of Negro accent, not a suggestion of dialect. He spoke like a white-haired judge on the bench, easily, smoothly, quietly.

‘There are those who claim the power to read men’s lives in crystal spheres. That is utter nonsense. I claim the power to read men’s lives in their faces. That is completely reasonable. Every experience, every thought, leaves its mark. Past and present are written there clearly. He who knows completely the past and the present can deduce the inevitable future, which past and present determine. My crystal sphere, therefore, is your face. By reading correctly what is there I know what is scheduled to follow, and so can predict and guard you against your future.’

‘Yes, suh,’ said Jinx.

‘I notice that you are at present out of work. It is this you wish to consult me about.’

Jinx’s eyes dilated. ‘Yes, suh, that’s right.’

‘You have been without a job several weeks.’

‘Month come Tuesday.’

‘Yes. And now you have reached the point where you must seek the financial aid of your friends. Being of a proud and independent nature, you find this difficult. Yet even the fee which you will pay for the advice I give you is borrowed money.’

There was no tone of question, no implied request for confirmation. The words were a simple statement of fact, presented as a comprehensive résumé of a situation, expressed merely as a basis for more important deductions to follow.

‘So far, you see, my friend, I have done nothing at all mysterious. All this is the process of reason, based on observation. And now, though you may think it a strange power, let me add that there is nothing mysterious either in my being able to tell you that your name is Jenkins, that your friends call you Jinx, that you are twenty-seven years old, and that you are unmarried. All these matters have passed through your mind as you sat there listening to me. This is merely an acuteness of mental receptivity which anyone can learn; it is usually called telepathy. At this point, Mr Jenkins, others whom you might have consulted stop. But at this point—Frimbo begins.’

There was a moment’s silence. The voice resumed with added depth and solemnity:

‘For, in addition to the things that can be learned by anyone, Frimbo inherits the bequest of a hundred centuries, handed from son to son through four hundred unbroken generations of Buwongo kings. It is a profound and dangerous secret, my friend, a secret my fathers knew when the kings of the Nile still thought human flesh a delicacy.’

The voice sank to a lower pitch still, inescapably impressive.

‘Frimbo can change the future.’ He paused, then continued, ‘In the midst of a world of determined, inevitable events, of results rigidly fashioned by the past, Frimbo alone is free. Frimbo not only sees. Frimbo and Frimbo alone can step in at will and change the course of a life. Listen!’

The voice now became intimate, confidential, shading off from low vibrant tones into softly sibilant whispers:

‘Your immediate needs will be taken care of but you will not be content. It is a strange thing that I see. For though food and shelter in abundance are to be your lot sooner than you think, still you will be more unhappy than you are now; and you will rejoice only when this physical security has been withdrawn. You will be overjoyed to return to the uncertain fortunes over which you now despair. I do not see the circumstances, at the moment, that will bring on these situations, because they are outside the present content of your mind which I am contemplating. But these things even now impatiently await you—adequate physical necessaries, but great mental distress.

‘Now then, when you have passed through that paradoxical period, what will you do? Let me see. It is but a short way—a few days ahead—but—’ Into that until now completely self-assured tone crept a quality of puzzlement. It was so unexpected and incongruous a change that Jinx, up to this point completely fascinated, was startled like one rudely awakened from deep sleep. ‘It is very dark—’ There was a long pause. The same voice resumed, ‘What is this, Frimbo?’ Again a pause; then: ‘Strange how suddenly it grows dark. Frimbo—’ Bewilderment dilated into dismay. ‘Frimbo! Frimbo! Why do you not see?’

The voice of a man struck suddenly blind could not have been imbued with greater horror. So swift and definite was the transition that the alarmed Jinx could only grip the arms of his chair and stare hard. And despite the glaring beam, he saw a change in the figure beyond the table. That part of the shadow that had corresponded to the head seemed now to be but half its original size.

In a sudden frenzy of terror, Jinx jumped up and reached for the hanging light. Quickly he swung it around and tilted it so that the luminous shaft fell on the seated figure. What he saw was a bare black head, inclined limply sidewise, the mouth open, the eyes fixed, staring from under drooping lids.

He released the light, wheeled, and fled back to summon Bubber.

All this Jinx rehearsed in detail, making clear by implication or paraphrase those ideas whose original wording he was otherwise unable to describe or pronounce. The doctor emitted a low whistle of amazement; the detective, incredulous, said:

‘Wait a minute. Let me get this straight. You mean to say that Frimbo actually talked to you, as you have related?’

‘’Deed he did.’

‘You’re sure that it was Frimbo talking to you?’

‘Jest as sure as I am that you’re talkin’ to me now. He was right where you is.’

‘And when he tried to prophesy what would happen to you a few days hence, he couldn’t?’

‘Look like sump’m come over him all of a sudden—claim he couldn’t see. And when he seen he couldn’t see, he got scared-like and hollered out jes’ like I said: “Frimbo—why don’t you see?”’

‘Then you say you tried to see him, and it looked as though his head had shrunken?’

‘Yes, suh.’

‘Evidently his head-piece had fallen off.’

‘His which?’

‘Did you hear any sound just before this—like a blow?’

‘Nope. Didn’t hear nothin’ but his voice. And it didn’t stop like it would if he’d been hit. It jes’ stopped like it would if he’d been tellin’ ’bout sump’m he’d been lookin’ at and then couldn’t see no more. Only it scared him sump’m terrible not to be able to see it. Maybe he scared himself to death.’

‘Hm. Yea, maybe he even scared up that wound on his head.’

‘Well, maybe me and Bubber did that.’

‘How?’

‘Carryin’ him downstairs. We was in an awful hurry. His head might ’a’ hit sump’m on the way down.’

‘But,’ said Dart, and Jinx couldn’t know this was baiting, ‘if he was dead, that wound wouldn’t have bled, even as little as it did.’

‘Maybe,’ Jinx insisted, ‘it stopped because he died jes’ about that time—on the way down.’

‘You seem very anxious to account for his death, Jenkins.’

‘Humph,’ Jinx grunted. ‘You act kind o’ anxious yourself, seems like to me.’

‘Yes. But there is this difference. By your own word, you were present and the only person present when Frimbo died. I was half a mile away.’

‘So what?’

‘So that, while I’m as anxious as you are to account for this man’s death, I am anxious for perhaps quite a different reason. For instance, I could not possibly be trying to prove my own innocence by insisting he died a natural death.’

Jinx’s memory was better than Bubber’s.

‘I ain’t heard nobody say for sho’ he was killed yet,’ said he.