Part 3: Zebra:The True Account of the 179 Days of Terror in San Francisco...Day 37

Zebra:The True Account 
of the 179 Days of Terror 
in San Francisco
By Clark Howard


Day37 

Anthony Harris left his new wife, Carolyn, after seventeen days. He would later say that it was because he could not stand the way she smelled: that she had an offensive body odor and did not bathe regularly. Carolyn would probably give a different reason for the early termination of their marriage; but whatever the cause, it did end, after less than three weeks, and Anthony moved out. 

He moved to the YMCA, then to the Empress Hotel, a neighborhood hotel, off the beaten track. It is not listed in any of the guidebooks. A guest does not have to show a credit card to check in. Most people would call the Empress a flophouse. 

On Sunday morning, November 25, 1973, Anthony sat up on the side of his lumpy bed at the Empress and reached for his trousers. He pulled them partway on while sitting, as he had become accustomed to doing in the narrow confines of a prison cell, then stood up and pulled them the rest of the way on and fastened them. There was no window in his room; he had to walk down the hall to look out and see what kind of day it was. On this particular morning, looking out the window at the end of the hall, he saw that it was drizzling rain. Eddy Street, two stories below, was gray and gloomy-looking. "Shit," Anthony muttered. That kind of weather depressed him.

He shuffled back to his room, wondering what time it was. As he passed the hall bathroom, he saw that it was occupied, the door closed. He went into his room and urinated in the sink in the corner. Then ran cold water until the smell went away, and washed his face. Putting on his shirt and shoes, he went down to the lobby and looked at a plug-in Westclox behind the desk. It was quarter of ten. Anthony crossed to a pay phone on the far wall. He called Black Self Help Moving, where he worked, to see if Larry Green was around. 

"Black Self Help," a cool, even voice answered. 

"Who speaking?" Anthony asked. 

"Man, you called here. Who you want?" 

"Larry. Is Larry around?" 

"No, he's not here. Who's this.?" 

"This Anthony." 

"Anthony, my man," the voice replied cheerfully, "what's shaking? This is J.C." 

J.C. was J. C. Simon, a handsome, swaggering black with his hair cut bowl-shape on his head, no sideburns. 

"What's happening down there, man?" Anthony asked. 

"The place is dead, brother," J.C. replied. "I'm the onliest one around. What you doing?" 

"Nothing. I ain't doing nothing." 

J.C. lowered his voice. "How'd you like to go out with me for a while?" he asked conspiratorially. 

"Out where?" 

"Oh, just out," J.C. said vaguely. 

"I don't know, man." Anthony was immediately uncomfortable with his answer. He was rapidly running out of excuses not to go out with the men from Black Self Help when he was invited. Too much time had passed for him to continue saying that he was fresh out of prison and adjusting. And to continue to play being a nervous newlywed wouldn't wash anymore, either; it was common knowledge that he and Carolyn had split. 

"How about it, brother?" J.C. pressed. 

"Sure, man," said Anthony. 

"All right!" 

"Can you come get me? It's raining out."

"Right on. You still at the Empress?" 

"Yeah, right." 

"Be down in the lobby in a half hour. I'll be driving the van." 

Anthony hung up and went back upstairs to his room. He had no watch so he would have to estimate when half an hour was up. He flopped down on the bed and closed his eyes. It was three days past Thanksgiving, a month until Christmas. He did not know yet what he was going to do at Christmas. He supposed he could go down to Southern California and visit his mother in Santa Ana. Or even his white wife in Monrovia. His most recent wife, Carolyn, might even give him a Christmas dinner if he asked real nice—but she would have to take a bath that morning for him to be able to stand her. He sighed quietly. Christmas was going to be a problem, all right. He did not want to spend it alone. 

Shit, he thought moodily. He had thought he would be all settled by now. Have a nice Muslim wife, be working, making a decent life for himself, practicing the Islamic faith. Instead, he was living in a seedy little hotel room all alone, and getting nowhere fast. How the fuck did things get so turned around on him? 

Anthony opened his eyes and stared at the ceiling. He thought about the day he was released from San Quentin 

🈦🈦🈦

It was a thirty-minute drive from the prison into San Francisco. He was taken to a Halfway House and given a room. He was to re- main there until he found approved employment and a suitable place to live. Less than an hour after his parole supervisor left, he had a visitor: a slim, light-skinned Negro, freckle-faced, handsome in a shy, almost boyish way. 

"Hey, brother, I'm Larry Green from the mosque. How's it feel to be out?" 

"Feels fine. What you want?" 

"Came over to welcome you back to the black man's world. And to invite you to join the mosque." 

"Why?" Larry shrugged. 

"We heard about you from the inside, man. How you a righteous thinker. And how you know judo and all that stuff. We'd like you to teach self-defense to some of our junior and teen members. Maybe a couple afternoons a week."

"Man, I got to work," Anthony protested. "I got to get out and find a fucking approved job.'' 

"We can fix that," said Larry with all the confidence of a much older person. "We can put you to work at either the Shabazz Bakery or the Black Self Help Moving and Storage Company. Both places are approved for ex-cons coming back into society, because they're connected with religious organizations, see, and the pigs have to be very careful how they fuck with religious freedom. So we can put you to work, and a couple afternoons a week you can take time off to teach at the mosque. What do you say?" 

Anthony shrugged. Why not? he thought. 

It was on the second floor of the mosque, in a large, heavily matted room, that Anthony began teaching judo and karate to teen and junior Fruit of Islam members. The Fruit of Islam was the Nation of Islam's younger rank: the youth who were being trained for leadership. Anthony worked with another instructor, whom he knew only as Wally 4X. Wally taught general health and bodybuilding. They alternated the classes, one teaching the juniors, ages eight to twelve, the other the teens, thirteen to eighteen. They had a good working relationship from the first day, and found that they liked each other in spite of the obvious differences between them. 

"Say, I haven't seen you down at Black Self Help, man," Anthony said early on. "Where you work at, the bakery?" 

"No, I have an outside job," said Wally. "I work for the city. I'm a civil servant." 

"You a spy for us?" Anthony wanted to know. 

Wally 4X smiled in tolerant amusement. "No, nothing so exciting. I'm just an ordinary P.E. instructor for the schools. The faith has nothing to do with my job. See, man, I'm not a Separatist like those guys down at Black Self Help. They're Nationalist Muslims; they want a separate state for the Nation of Islam. Me, I'm a religious Muslim. Islamism is my faith, not my politics." 

"You believe in the Word, don't you, man? The Word that comes to us from New Mecca?" 

"I believe in anything that makes sense," Wally replied, "whether it's the Word or whatever. But one thing I don't believe is that Chicago is New Mecca."

"Man, those cats down at Black Self Help would skin your ass if they heard you say that." 

"Precisely why I never go down there," Wally said. "I'm a liberal Muslim. Like the Nation of Islam ministers that teach the faith in this mosque, I don't advocate death to the white man. At this point I am firmly convinced that without the white man, the black man would perish. Twenty-five years from now, I may change my mind." 

"If you live that long." 

"Oh, I'll live that long," Wally said confidently. "If I can keep away from you badass Death Angels, that is." 

Anthony laughed. "You crazy, man." 

They never discussed politics or religion after that, and they got on very well together. 

🈵🈵🈵

The person Anthony spent the most time with in his early days of freedom was Larry Green. The young man's friendship was a refreshing change after a long association with convicts and street people. He considered Larry to be a basically good kid. He came from a decent home and family, grew up not in a city slum but in Berkeley, and was a high-school basketball star. His extremely light skin—a cafe au lait complexion—caused him frequent consternation, particularly when he was around dark brown or pure black Negroes; and the fact that he was very skinny—over six feet and usually under 150 pounds—was also a source of self-conscious embarrassment to him. Only when he was in action on the basketball court did he feel that what he was doing compensated for his skinny body. And that, unfortunately, only lasted through high school. 

From the first day that Larry visited him at the Halfway House, Anthony let the young man hang around with him. It was flattering in a way; none of Anthony's own younger brothers—Kenny, Pinky, Stanley, Jarvis—had ever looked up to him. It was nice to be admired, to be thought of as someone. 

"Say," Larry asked him early in their relationship, "could you teach me some of that judo so I can take care of myself better?" 

"Yeah, I guess so," Anthony said. "You want to join the class at the mosque?" 

Larry shrugged. "That's kind of chickenshit stuff that you teach to those kids. I want to learn some of the badass stuff like you taught Jesse Lee in the joint." 

"Jesse Lee Cooks? You know him?" 

"Sure. We got him a job at the Shabazz Bakery when he got out of Q. Anyway, that's the kind of stuff I want to learn. That badass stuff." 

"Well, before you learn any badass stuff so you can be a badass like badass Jesse Cooks," Anthony mimicked, "you going to have to learn some of the basics, what you call the chickenshit stuff. You got to learn to walk before you can learn to run, understand?" 

"Sure, Anthony," the younger man answered agreeably. "Whatever you say." 

"If you don't want to join a mosque class, where do you want me to teach you?" 

"How about your room at the Halfway House?" 

"Yeah, I guess we can use that for some of the simple stuff, long as I don't have to throw you. We'll give it a try." 

Anthony gave him regular lessons, once or twice a day, in the room at Halfway House. He taught him hip throws first, then side kicks, finally open-hand attacks to the eyes, throat, body. Larry was an enthusiastic student; he did not mind repeating a move over and over again until he perfected it; and when Anthony told him to practice a certain technique fifty times, more often than not he would do it a hundred. The young man took to  jujitsu as if he had been born for it. Before long, he had progressed past the basics and was into mastering the deadly heart-burst punch, the terrible straight-finger larynx thrust, and the brutal neck breaks. Larry Green was learning to compensate for his skinny body somewhere else besides the basketball court. 

The one thing about Larry that sometimes irritated Anthony was the younger man's morbid curiosity about life in prison. He wanted to know even the most minute details. 

"Say, brother, tell me about the queers in prison," he asked. "What do you do when they cop a feel? Bust their asses?" 

Anthony shrugged. "Queers don't usually bother you unless it looks like you want it. Or if you're young and they think you're prime. Then they fight over you or try to buy you. But if you got a rep, a good, solid rep for whipping ass, you get left pretty much alone."

"How 'bout the Muslims? They stick pretty much together?" 

"Oh, yeah. Out at Q, everybody sticks together. See, you got a lot of different gangs that runs together. You got the honkies, you got the spiks, you got them crazy, motherfucking Indians, you got the regular niggers, and then you got the Black Muslims. They the cream, see? Just like the Islamic lessons say. Don't nobody fuck with the Muslims in Q." 

"Far out, man," said Larry. "Shit, I wouldn't be scared to go to the joint if I could hang with the Muslims. I wouldn't even mind going in." 

Anthony grunted quietly. "Like shit you wouldn't mind. It ain't no tea party in there." 

"I could cut it, man," Larry said confidently. 

Anthony nodded. At the rate the kid was going, he'd probably find out someday. He wanted to learn about all the wrong things. 

☪   ☪   ☪

At his first meeting in the loft, Judo was questioned by the man with the Vandyke and by other Death Angel members who were attending. 

"We are always pleased to welcome a new recruit from the San Quentin Mosque," said Vandyke. "It has been our experience that those Muslims who have served in the white man's prison are unusually strong because they have been repressed, and they are usually filled with hostility because they have suffered. For the most part, they become good and reliable Death Angels. But before they do, we have to find out where their hearts are. Now tell me, brother, do you think it would be easier for you personally to kill a white child or a white woman?" 

"I don't know," Judo replied. 

"A white woman or a white man?" 

"I don't know," he said again. He felt distinctly uncomfortable. 

"Well, I shall tell you, brother," said Vandyke. "It takes a far better man to kill a child than a woman, and a better man to kill a woman than a man. That is why our quota for heads is lower for children than for women and men. Do you understand?" 

"Yes," Judo said. But he did not. It sounded suspiciously like a cop-out to him. Like maybe killing kids was easier than killing men. 

"Do you think you would be capable of an act of decapitation?" Vandyke asked.

"Capable of what?" 

"Decapitation. Cutting off a white person's head." 

"I'm not sure," Judo said. 

"We, of course, accept any method of eliminating our white enemies," Vandyke said, "but decapitation is preferred because it is a very vicious way of killing and shows that a man is not afraid of blood. Are you afraid of blood, brother?" 

"I don't know," Judo replied. "I don't think so, but I don't know." 

"If you ever feel you might be afraid of blood," Vandyke said, "just think back to the days when the white man cut open our mothers' bellies and fed the unborn black fetus to his livestock." 

Judo felt ill. 

"Does anyone in the audience have a question for our new brother?" Vandyke asked. 

A burly black man stood up. "I want to ask the new brother if he would have enough nerve to cut up the dead body of a white devil."

Judo held back the feeling of nausea and forced a half-smile. "You kidding me, man?" 

"No, man, I ain't." 

Another stood up. "Could you do it or couldn't you?" 

This is a joke, Judo thought. "Sure, man, I could do it," he answered. 

Later that evening, Judo was shown snapshots of what appeared to be actual executions of white people. There were so many of them, and they were spread out in such a haphazard manner on one of the tables, that their detail all flowed together in a grisly montage of death. One photo did stand out, however: that of a white man tied to a straight chair, with a black man standing in front of him, firing a pistol almost point-blank at his face. Judo could not be sure, because he did not examine the snapshot that closely, but he thought the man firing the gun was a tall, handsome black with a bowl haircut, whom he had seen among the men in the loft. 

The one called Skullcap. 

On that Sunday morning in November when it was drizzling rain, Judo walked out of his hotel and waited in a doorway until Skullcap drove up in the van. It was the white Dodge van, the one in which he had ridden with Yellow and Head the night Yellow hacked the white woman to death. 

"What's happening, brother?" asked Skullcap as Judo got into the van. 

"Nothing, man. Nothing." Judo was on edge. He wished he could think of some way to get out of going with Skullcap and still save face. But there did not appear to be a way; none that didn't sound chickenshit anyway. 

"You got your piece, man?" Skullcap asked. 

"Yeah." 

"Good. I need to borrow it." 

Judo frowned. "What the fuck for, man? Where's yours?" 

"I loaned it to a brother in Oakland. He's still got it." 

"Well, shit, man, can't you borrow one from somebody?" 

Skullcap turned a flat stare on him. "I am borrowing one, brother. From you." 

There was something about Skullcap's voice and eyes that warned Judo not to argue further. Skullcap was by far the most dangerous man he had yet met in the loft meetings. His tall, handsome appearance aside, his brilliant smile and loose strut, his aura of being totally cool, totally hip—all that aside: there was something in the man, something very close to the surface, that was unspeakably terrible, unequivocally deadly. It was something that Judo, with all his kung fu prowess, did not care to challenge. 

"You can borrow the gun, man," he said. 

Skullcap smiled. "Thanks, brother. Put it in that case there behind the seat, will you?" 

Judo picked up an attache case from the floor of the van and put his gun inside it. He noted that the case was black and matched the black raincoat and black pigskin gloves that Skullcap wore. Skullcap also had on dark glasses despite the absence of sunlight, and a dark gray fedora cocked to one side of his head. He belonged, Judo thought, in a white Caddy convertible instead of an old Dodge van. In spite of the underlying threat of danger about him, Skullcap was one very sharp motherfucker. 

"Say, man, where we going?" Judo asked. 

"You'll see in a couple of minutes, brother," Skullcap answered. "I got us a devil all picked out." 

As he drove along the almost deserted Sunday morning streets,Skullcap hummed an old Bible hymn he had learned as a child. 

☠   ☠   ☠

When J.C. Simon was three years old, he had pinworms wiggling out of his anus, nostrils, and mouth. They were caused by his touching fecal matter and putting his fingers on his lips and nose. The condition caused the child severe itching and restlessness. At night the female pinworms would constantly be exiting his body and depositing new eggs to grow new worms. The boy was unable to sleep. He became uncontrollably irritable and difficult to handle. The condition became so bad that he was debilitated and unable to walk. 

Hazel, his mother, took him to the doctor time after time. "Enterobiasis," the doctor always said, and gave her a prescription for piperazine. "This will clear it up, Mrs. Simon, but it's going to keep coming back until the boy quits touching his anus." 

J.C. finally quit the disgusting habit when he was five. But for two years prior to that, he remained in almost constantly horrible physical and mental condition. 

J.C.'s father was Samuel Oscar Simon. He worked as a milk deliveryman. After J.C. was born, he moved his family from Opelousas, Louisiana, to Beaumont, Texas. There were three other children, all older than J.C, and eventually there would be born four younger than he. Samuel was thirteen years older than his wife. When J.C. was ten, his parents separated and Samuel moved to Houston. 

For a period after his father left the household, J.C. had trouble in school. His teacher summoned Hazel for a conference. 

"Something is the matter with the boy's hand," the teacher said. "He can't hold a pencil anymore. I think you'd better take him to a therapist of some kind. " 

Hazel had J.C. try to hold a pencil. The boy's hand seemed to go limp; the pencil fell to the desk. "I don't know what I'm going to do," she told the teacher. "I can't afford no doctor bills right now." 

"Well, you might as well take him home," the teacher said. "He can't attend school if he can't hold a pencil." 

Hazel took her son home. "J.C, what do you think is the matter with your hand?" she asked him.

"I don't know, Mamma," he said, eyes downcast. 

"Does it hurt?" 

"No, Mamma." 

"Does it feel numb?" 

"No, Mamma." 

She laid the boy down on his bed and sat beside him. She started massaging his little hand and fingers. J.C. seemed to relax. "Does that feel good, sugar?" his mother asked. 

"Yes, Mamma." 

Hazel began to massage the boy's hand as a matter of regular routine. Before long he was back in school again, holding a pencil with no difficulty. It had not been physical therapy that J.C. needed; it had been attention in a home that his father had left. 

As J.C. grew up, he was very close to his family. His mother was his best friend, his sisters and brothers next. He rarely made any close outside friends; the people he liked best were the ones who lived in his house. J.C. had respect for his family: he was a good boy and stayed out of trouble. Not mischief, but trouble. 

When he was old enough, he went to work as a busboy at the Beaumont Country Club. He was an easygoing, likable adolescent who got on well with everyone. At Lincoln High School he made the football team. He would have been a star player but he injured his knee. It never did heal correctly and J.C. grew to manhood with a kneecap that frequently slipped out of place. 

His grades in high school were good enough to get accepted at Texas College in Tyler, two hundred miles north of his home. Texas College was an all-black school subsidized by the Baptist Church. With normally some five hundred-plus students in attendance, the college had been in existence since 1894, highly regarded by educators. It was highly regarded by J.C. also, but that did not preclude his having problems there. He was away from home for the first time, away from the "friends" he valued most—his family. He had difficulty adjusting to his new environment, difficulty concentrating on his classes. He dropped out and went home. Hazel, his mother, made him go back. 

Over a period of three years, J.C. dropped out several times, and each time his mother made him return. During the periods that he was in attendance, he was at least a fair student, sometimes better than fair. Over three calendar years, he accumulated enough credits to equal four semesters' work—putting him at the halfway mark toward a degree. His studies were in general academic foundation; he was going in the direction of the social sciences. 

Then he met Patricia. 

They left school and moved down to Houston. J.C. got a job as a food selector in a grocery supply warehouse. They lived modestly but not uncomfortably. In 1970 their daughter was born; they named her Jacqueline Christine, but from the beginning she was called Crissy. She was an ordinary little girl born to ordinary black parents under ordinary circumstances. By all odds, everything about this young family should have remained ordinary. Then J.C. Simon met some men who were members of the Nation of Islam. Black Muslims. 

J.C. was impressed by the Muslims. They appeared cool, confident, with it. They dressed sharply, like young businessmen. They were clean-shaven, neatly groomed. They walked with shoulders back, a slight strut, a swagger. Most impressive to J.C, they seemed to know who they were. 

J.C. fell in with the Nation of Islam members. He visited the temple there in Houston. He began to feel a part of it. Their doctrines, the policies they preached, all seemed to make sense to him. He himself and his family had never felt particularly oppressed, so he was not attracted to it to escape any hardship; but he could see around him some of the inequities that the Islamic faith was trying to abolish. Before long, J.C. had joined the Houston mosque. 

Things began to go badly between J.C. and Patricia. Since he had become a Muslim, the two of them looked at things from entirely different perspectives. Their values began to be at odds, and with them their individual priorities. Soon J.C. left Patricia and went back to Hazel's home in Beaumont. 

Beaumont to Houston was only a ninety-minute drive, and J.C. still attended meetings at the Houston mosque. It was in the summer of 1970, after one of those meetings, that he and several friends found themselves in a small group being addressed informally by a dignified black man in a well-tailored business suit who spoke in a quiet but knowledgeable tone. 

"Yes, Houston is a marvelous city, a very friendly city, and I have thoroughly enjoyed my short visit here," he told them. "I wish I were able to stay longer, but my schedule simply will not permit it." He looked around at his young audience with a paternal smile. "Ah, how I wish we had young men like you in San Francisco. You know, San Francisco is going to be the very first Muslim run city in the country. We already have a master plan for the gradual acquisition of various business enterprises. And I don't mean to imply any illegal take-over; I mean a strictly legitimate attrition wherein white business owners will sell out to Muslim buyers. Everything strictly aboveboard." A subtle smile came to his lips. "Of course, we may have to—well, encourage some of the white folks to move on, but there are plenty ways to do that. My point is: San Francisco is going to be the city for all of us Black Muslims. Chicago will still be New Mecca, but San Francisco will be where the opportunity's at—especially for Young Turks like you fellows. Ah, if I could only be your age again. I tell you, wild horses couldn't keep me away from San Francisco." 

It was not long after the man's visit that a carload of the "Young Turks"—five of them—left Houston for the two-thousand-mile drive to San Francisco. J. C. Simon was one of the five. 

☪ ☪ ☪

Skullcap was still humming as he drove the van down Eddy Street and turned into Larkin. Judo saw that they were heading into the Civic Center, where all the city, state, and federal buildings were located. 

"Man, where the fuck you going?" he said, more an accusation than a question. "This neighborhood is crawling with pigs." 

Skullcap glanced disdainfully at him. "Not on Sunday, man," he said, like a patient teacher reminding a slow student of the obvious. 

Skullcap drove down Larkin to the 400 block. He passed the federal building on one side, a bank of stores on the other. On the corner was a bar, Harrington's Irish Club. One door back was Erakat's Grocery. 

Skullcap turned at the next corner and drove along a practically deserted street between the federal building on one side and the state building on the other. He completely circled the block and parked on the north side of the federal building. Around the corner and down the block were the grocery and the bar. Skullcap glanced at his watch. It was quarter of eleven. 

They waited, watching the street. 

Particularly watching the grocery. 

At ten minutes to eleven, twenty-one-year-old Randy Clough, a slight man with long sideburns, walked past the Erakat Grocery on his way to Harrington's Irish Club. Clough's father-in-law owned Harrington's; Clough was on his way to work. As he passed the grocery, he glanced inside. Saleem Erakat, the owner, was just getting ready to open. 

In the van, Skullcap watched Clough pass the grocery and enter the bar. "Okay," he said, "now that that sucker's out of the way, we're ready." He reached for the attache case behind the seat. "Here's how we'll work it: you go down this side of the street and stand by that big building right across from the store. I'll go down the side of the street that the store is on and go inside. You keep watch, hear? If anybody comes in, you cross the street and come in after them." 

"What the fuck good that gonna do, man?" Judo argued. "I ain't got no piece, you got my piece." 

"Won't nobody know that, man," Skullcap said patiently. "Anyway, I been watching this place for a long time; been going in and buying apples from the old fool who owns the place; hardly anybody ever comes in the first hour on Sunday morning. Believe me, I know what I'm doing, brother. Now come on, let's go." 

The two men alighted from the van and went their separate ways. Judo watched Skullcap as he walked along the opposite side of the street, strutting, black raincoat, black pigskin gloves, fedora cocked slightly to one side, attache case swinging in a short arc, long legs carrying him with just a hint of arrogance. The man looked good, Judo thought. No fucking question about it. 

He moved into place in front of the federal building as Skullcap entered the grocery. 

Saleem Hassan Erakat was fifty-three years old. A Jordanian Arab, he had operated Erakat's Grocery at 452 Larkin Street for thirteen years. He had a wife, Somiha, and four children ranging in age from a young teenage girl to a twenty-year-old son. Every member of the family worked in the store, which was open seven days a week. On weekends, most of the grocery's business came from neighborhood apartment residents, but during the week there was a steady flow of civil servants from the nearby government buildings. They came over on their coffee breaks and lunch hours to buy sandwiches, fresh fruit, Hamm's beer. Erakat's Grocery was a popular place in the Civic Center, and Erakat himself was a popular man. 

On this rainy Sunday morning, the stocky, thick-haired grocer had just taken the empty cash-register tray into the back room. It was a tiny room, used for quick meals during the long business day. There was a four-burner gas range in one corner, an aluminum sink on legs in another, a round breakfast table, a pair of mismatched chairs, and a variety of pots, pans, dishes, bowls, cups — most of them in a constant state of drying on the wing counter of the aluminum sink. 

Erakat put the cash-register tray on the table and started to open the cloth money bag to count out the day's starting change. Just then he heard someone enter the store. He stopped what he was doing and went into the front. A tall black man in a raincoat, carrying an attache case, had just come in. Erakat recognized him. 

"As-salaam-alaikum," the black man said, speaking the Muslim greeting. 

"Walaikem as-salaam" Erakat replied, which translated roughly to, "Peace be with you also." "Did you come in for your apple today?" the grocer asked. 

"Not exactly," said the black man. 

He opened the attache case and removed the gun. 

From across the street, Judo watched through the store window as Skullcap and Erakat talked. He saw them move toward the rear of the store until they were out of sight. 

Judo swallowed nervously; his throat was suddenly dry. He felt very vulnerable standing in front of the huge federal building, whether from the sheer size of it or the fact that it represented authority, he did not know. All he knew was that his bowels were churning. He could not stand still. Glancing apprehensively up and down the street, he started crossing to the opposite sidewalk. 

As he did, a retired waiter named Joaquin Calles came around the corner, walking toward the store. 

In the back room of the store, Saleem Erakat calmly pointed to the money bag on the table. "There is the money. That is all there is. Take it. I do not resist you." 

"I have to tie you up," said Skullcap, "so you won't follow me out or call the police." 

"I will not follow you out," the Jordanian said. "I am not so crazy as to follow a man with a gun. " 

"I said I have to tie you up, motherfucker!" Skullcap snapped. The hand holding the gun was shaking; all of Skullcap's movements were sudden, jerky. Erakat took note of the nervousness. 

"Tie me up then," he said calmly. "Do what you have to do." 

A necktie belonging to the grocer was draped over one of the mismatched chairs. Skullcap snatched it up. "Turn around," he ordered. "Put your hands behind your back." 

Erakat obeyed. Awkwardly holding the gun, Skullcap wound the necktie around Erakat's crossed wrists and managed to doubleknot it. He did not do a very good job of it; a strong man like Erakat could have freed himself very quickly had he the chance. 

But Saleem Erakat would not have a chance. 

"Now go in there," Skullcap said, waving the gun toward a closet-size bathroom. 

He followed Erakat into the bathroom, grabbing a quilted lap robe from one of the chairs and wrapping it around the gun. 

Judo got to the front door just steps ahead of Joaquin Calles. He stood in the doorway, blocking the entrance. When Calles walked up, Judo said, "Closed, man. The store's closed." 

Calles looked pointedly at the open sign hanging in the door. Judo followed his eyes. For an instant it seemed as if the older, re- tired waiter might challenge Judo. If he had, Judo might have killed him with one or two well-placed blows. As it turned out, Judo merely reached inside the door and flipped the sign around to closed. Joaquin Calles walked away. 

Judo remained in the doorway for another minute, fidgeting, shifting his weight from one foot to the other, trying to wet his lips with a dry tongue. Presently the drizzling rain stopped. Judo's eyes blinked rapidly. Shit, man, lots of peoples liable to come out soon's they see it's quit raining, he told himself. Better warn the brother. 

Anything to get out of that fucking doorway. 

Judo hurried into the store. 

And from around the corner came another Erakat customer, seventy-four-year-old Nellie White, her dyed red hair a touch of brightness in the gray, sunless day. 

In the rear bathroom, Skullcap made Saleem Erakat sit on the floor in a corner. The grocer tacitly obeyed; the sooner this thing was over, the better. 

"You remember me coming in here every day for an apple, huh?" asked Skullcap. 

Erakat nodded. "I remember most of my customers," he said truthfully. 

"You won't remember anymore," Skullcap told him. 

With the muzzle of the gun barely protruding from the lap robe he had wrapped around it, Skullcap nudged Erakat forward until the grocer was looking down at the floor on which he sat. 

Then Skullcap squeezed the trigger and shot him once behind the right ear. 

Judo heard the muffled crack of the shot as he was hurrying to the rear of the store. He went into the back room and in the small corner bathroom saw Skullcap bending over the grocer. There was blood on the wall behind the slumped victim, and more blood dripping from his head to a small pool between his spread legs. Judo's eyes widened in shock. "Man, what the fuck happened?" he blurted. 

"I finished a white devil," Skullcap said with a smirk. Then his expression hardened. "Get your ass back out to that door, man!" 

Judo hurried back through the store. His mind was a turmoil of fear; one apprehensive thought after another raced through his head, vying for recognition. He felt sweat literally pop out on his brow. 

Before he reached the front door, he saw Nellie White enter. He dropped to a crouch behind a row of shelves. Got to get that old woman, he thought. If I don't she'll see me, she'll identify me. Blame me for shooting that sucker. 

Judo crept down the length of shelves toward Nellie White. She looked pretty old, he thought. Got brittle bones. He could snap her neck easy. 

But Judo never quite got to Nellie White. The unsuspecting elderly woman looked in a bin in the front window for some fresh garlic, saw that there was none, and quickly walked back out of the store. 

Judo blinked away the rivulets of sweat that were running into his eyes. He watched Nellie leave, then ran back to the rear of the store again. Bounding into the back room, he startled Skullcap, who was at the round table, examining the money bag. 

"Man, we got to get the fuck out of here! There's all kinds of people starting to come in here!" 

"We going," Skullcap said calmly. He opened the attache case and put the gun and money bag inside. He noticed Judo glance at the money bag. "Don't get no ideas, motherfucker. This money goes into the Death Angels' treasury." He snapped the case shut. "Come on." 

Skullcap started for the front of the store. Judo looked around desperately to see if there was anything in the room worth stealing. There was not. Mustering his courage, he stepped into the tiny bathroom and felt behind the slumped victim for a wallet. As he did, his fingers brushed Erakat's wristwatch. It was low on his wrist, below where Skullcap had tied him. Judo worked it off. Then he felt again for the wallet. He found it and worked it out of Erakat's pocket. 

Stuffing the watch and wallet into his own pocket, Judo started after Skullcap. The door leading back into the small rear room had moved almost to a closed position. Judo pulled it open and hurried toward the store.

"Come on, chump, hurry up," said Skullcap. "An' don't be touching nothing, sucker; you don't be wearing gloves." 

Judo hesitated. Had he touched the doorknob just before leaving the bathroom? He could not remember. Uncertain, he took a tentative step backward. 

"Okay, let's split," Skullcap ordered. He walked briskly toward the front door. Judo, not wanting to be left in the store alone, immediately forgot about the doorknob and hurried after him. 

On his way out, Skullcap picked up a Baby Ruth candy bar, unwrapped it, and proceeded to eat it as they walked back to the van. 

Five minutes later, Nellie White returned to the store, this time for milk. For the second time, she saw or heard no one on the premises. Yet the door was wide open. Looking around the quiet, still store, Nellie felt a chill in her spine. Involuntarily, she shuddered. Then she hurried out and went next door to Harrington's Irish Club. 

Jack Holder, a retired sausage-maker, was sitting at the bar in Harrington's, having his customary Sunday morning drink, when Nellie came up to him. "There's something wrong in Sammy's store," she said. Few people called Erakat by his proper name of Saleem; most called him Sammy. 

"What do you mean?" said Holder. "What's wrong?" 

"The store's open but nobody's around. Not Sammy or any of the kids or anybody. It's kind of—scary." 

"Let's have a look," said Holder. They went next door. 

In the back, Holder found Saleem Erakat where his killer had left him. 

👮   👮   👮

Officers Dennis McCaffrey and Andrew Citizen responded to the call. Upon arrival at the Erakat Grocery they secured the premises and summoned an emergency ambulance. After the ambulance arrived and the attendant determined that Saleem Erakat was officially and legally dead, the officers requested a watch lieutenant and additional help at the scene. They also notified the Crime Lab, the Photo Lab, and Homicide. 

While all this was going on, word began to spread swiftly through the neighborhood that the popular grocer had been slain. Telephone calls were made, friends were advised, known acquaintances of the dead man were told. Within an hour, a dozen relatives had arrived at the grocery. Men, women, and children, they were crying and wailing in the custom of Jordanian Arabs in mourning. One woman lay  face down on the floor and wailed for an hour; the policemen in the store had to step over and walk around her. Outside, in the steadily drizzling rain that had begun again, a crowd of passersby gathered and stood peering in the store windows, looking curiously at the distraught family. 

In the meantime, procedure continued to be followed. A Crime Lab specialist named McCarthy arrived, and a photo man named Clement. Three officers named Ward, Gisler, and Copeland began searching out and questioning possible witnesses. 

But most important of all—not only to the crimes already committed, but to the eighteen additional crimes which would be committed in the next 142 days—there arrived at the scene two Homicide inspectors to take charge of the Erakat investigation. 

Their names were Gus Coreris and John Fotinos. 

At the end of Day Thirty-seven, there were five victims. 

Quita Hague, hacked to death. 

Richard Hague, surviving, his butchered face still painfully healing. 

Ellen Linder, raped, ravaged, threatened with death. 

Frances Rose, her face blown apart by close-range gunshots. 

And Saleem Erakat, tied up and executed with a single shot behind the ear, after greeting his killer with the words, "Peace be with you also."

next
Day Fifty-three