Authors: Day Keene
“I can’t help the kid lying low.”
Her finger nails bit into my muscles. “Then luck to you, soldier. All the luck in the world. And if there is anything more that I can do or anything I can tell you, you come back.”
I said, “I’ll do that. Thanks. Thanks a lot for the information.”
My footsteps sounded hollow on the deserted sidewalk. I walked on up the steet away from her. When I reached the corner I looked back. Olga had turned on the overhead light in the doorway. When she saw me look back, she raised her arm like she was wishing me luck.
Along with what she’d told me, it gave me a lift, a big one. So there are a few bastards in the world. There are also a lot of swell people.
I tipped my hat to her and turned the corner and walked south to the Loop.
T
HE LIGHTS
on the theatre marquees had been turned off, but the bars and restaurants along Randolph Street were still going strong. The walk was crowded with people walking, window shopping, or just standing on the corners enjoying the warm night. There were couples out for a good time, single girls out for no good and assorted two-legged wolves eager to oblige them.
I walked into the lobby of the Sherman as if I owned the hotel. If the house detective or some city cop recognized me all he could do was shoot. I’d been shot at before. I’d been shot at a lot of times.
The telephone room was off the lobby, a good-sized room lined with booths and two girls at a switchboard behind a counter. I told one of the girls I wanted to make a long-distance call to Pierre, South Dakota.
She said, “Yes, sir. To whom do you wish to speak?”
I said, “I don’t know.”
She was puzzled. “You don’t know to whom you want to speak?”
I tried to explain. “Look. It’s like this, miss. I’m looking for some information about a party who used to live in Pierre and I don’t know who would know. Could I talk to the operator in Pierre?”
She said, “Certainly,” and assigned me to a booth. At that time of night it was like phoning across the street. When the operator in Pierre came on the wire, I explained the situation to her. “It’s like this, miss,” I said. “I’m trying to get some information about a girl who left there some years ago. I don’t know how many. All I know is her name is Mary and the family name is Jones.”
She laughed. “That’s quite an order. After all, Jones is a fairly common name.”
I said, “I realize that.”
“And it’s half past two in the morning.”
I said I also realized that but the information was very important to me. I made it as strong as I could. “In fact, and I’m not being corny, it could be a matter of life and death. How about the editor of the local paper? Do you think he’d mind being awakened if there was a big story in it for him?”
“N-no,” she said. “I don’t. Just a moment, please.”
I heard her ring a number, then a sleepy male voice came on the wire. The Pierre operator explained the situation to him and turned him over to me.
He thought at first it was a gag. Bue he came awake with a bang, when I told him a girl who had been born and raised in Pierre was in the death house of the Illinois State Penitentiary under the name of Mona Ambler.
He knew the case. He said, “We’ve had press service on it but I had no idea she was a local girl. What is her right name?”
“Mary Jones.”
I could almost hear him thinking. “I’m sorry,” he said, finally, “that doesn’t ring any bell. But I’ll tell you what I’ll do. I’ll check with every Jones in the local exchange and see if they had a girl who went to Chicago. Where can I reach you?”
I said I couldn’t be reached by phone but I would be glad to call him back.
“You do that,” he said. “Suppose you call back in two hours. No. Better make it tomorrow morning at the paper. I’ll be there at seven sharp.”
Five hours was a long time to wait. A lot could happen in five hours. But if it was the best I could do, I’d have to be satisfied. I wrote the number he gave me on the back of an envelope and went out and settled my bill.
The girl behind the counter smiled. “Did you find out what you wanted to know?”
“No, but I think I’m on the track,” I told her.
I stood weighing my change in my hand. Making Gloria tell the truth was out of the question, but there was still the elevator kid. If I could get him and make him admit that he’d lied about me never having been in LaFanti’s apartment, his statement would give me something to turn around on. I could stop playing clay pigeon and let Captain Corson take over. The kid’s admission that he had lied would automatically clear up the business about war neuroses. It would also reinstate all the charges I’d made against LaFanti and give the captain a take-off point. Plus what I now knew about Mona, it also should take care of Gloria’s charge that I had first raped, then shot her.
I found the Kelly page in the phone book. There were one hundred and thirty-nine Kelly’s listed in the book but only fourteen had first names beginning with M. I saw a Manton Kelly, Sr.
Manton, Sr. looked good to me. I wrote the address and asked the girl back of the counter which side of the city it was on.
She said, “On the south side. That shouldn’t be very far from Thirty-fifth and Wentworth, in the general neighborhood of the stock yards.”
I thanked her and started back through the lobby to the street. A fish-eyed lad in a well-tailored suit was standing in front of the closed cigar counter. He smelled like a house dick to me. I didn’t look good to him either. I could almost see the wheels revolving in his mind, as he tried to decide if I was the mad rapist splashed all over the front pages of the papers. If I was, would it be smart to lay the arm on me and run the risk of giving the hotel a bad name?
I solved the problem for him by taking my cigarettes from my pocket, as I walked up to the cigar counter.
The counter’s closed, huh?” I asked.
“Yes,” he said, “it is.”
I stuck a cigarette in my mouth. “I wonder if you have a match? I seem to be fresh out.”
He gave me a packet of matches with the name of the hotel on the cover. “Keep them,” he said, coldly.
I lit my cigarette, then thanked him and walked on through the lobby, with him still undecided about me. As a general rule, lads who are wanted for rape and attempted murder don’t ask house detectives for matches.
There was a cab parked not far from the Clark Street marquee. The palm of my hand slimy with sweat, I opened the door and got in before looking back at the hotel.
The house man had come out on the walk and was standing, staring at me. I nodded pleasantly and waved my cigarette at him.
“Where to?” the cab driver asked.
“Thirty-fifth and Wentworth,” I told him.
It was an old neighborhood with shabby-looking side streets leading off of the business district. The number I wanted was on Wentworth over a hardware store. With the exception of the bars and restaurants, all of the store fronts were dark, but there was a light in the flat over the hardware store.
I stood a long time looking at the low-slung white Jaguar convertible parked at the curb in front of the stairs leading up to the flat. It wasn’t a Jaguar neighborhood. I walked from the car to the stairs and looked at the name over the bell. I’d come to the right place. Under Manton Kelly, Sr., someone had hand-painted the name Manny in pencil.
I climbed the stairs and rapped on the door. A big, red-faced Irishman in a sweat-soaked undershirt came to the door with a can of beer in his hand.
“Yeah —?” he asked.
I said, “I’d like to see Manny.”
He was worried. “You a cop?”
I shook my head. “Hell, no. Just a friend of Manny’s.”
He was relieved. “I see.” He blew beer fumes in my face. “For a minute I was worried. I thought maybe the punk had lied about how he got his new car.”
“How did he get it?” I asked.
Kelly, Senior chuckled. “At last a Kelly got lucky. He hit the big baseball pool for five grand. And what does the crazy kid do with the dough? He goes right out and lays down most of it for a Jaguar.” He was proud. “Quite a heap, huh?”
“Yeah,” I agreed. “Quite a heap.”
He remembered he didn’t know me. “What did you say your name was?”
“Cole. Jim Cole,” I lied.
He was friendly and lonely. “Come right in, Jim. A beer?” I thanked him. “No.”
He’d been watching his television set. He switched it off. “How was the late news?” I asked him.
He made a sound in his throat. “Ahh. I’ve quit listening to it. So who cares if some doll over in England is going to be queen? Naw. All I ever watch is the wrestling and oncet in a while Groucho Marx an’ maybe on Sunday, Jack Benny.” He now remembered I’d come to see his son. “Now, look, about Manny, fellow —”
“What about him?”
“It can be, he’ll be back. You’re welcome to sit down an’ wait if you wanna. I’ll open up some more beer. But the chances are, he’ll be stinko by the time he gets here. He’s out kinda celebrating like. You know, on account of hitting the pool.”
“You know where he is?”
He laughed again. “Somewhere in the block. Probably either at O’Hara’s or Stan’s.” He explained. “I took his car keys offen him until he sobers up.” He drew a dirty lace curtain aside and looked down the street. “It would be a shame to smash up a heap like that.”
“Yeah,” I agreed, “a shame.”
“Look in O’Hara’s,” the old man said. “If he isn’t there, look in Stan’s. The punk is probably sitting in one of the booths with a girl or maybe even gone upstairs.” He finished the beer in his can and wiped the foam from his lips with the back of his hand. “So help me. I can’t understand you young guys. I never paid for quail in my life.” He confided, “And any time I do, it’s going to have to be platinum-plated with a cuckoo bird that comes out and sings Yankee Doodle. Ya sure ya don’t wanna beer?”
I said I was sure and walked back down the stairs.
I tried O’Hara’s first.
“Yeah. Manny was in,” one of the barmen told me. “But I haven’t seen him for some time. You might try up the street in Stan’s.”
I thanked him and ordered a rye and a short beer.
As he served me, he asked, “Ain’t I seen you somewhere, fellow?”
“Could be,” I said. “Could be.”
I left it there and so did he as one of his customers rapped on the wood with his glass. On my way out I played the cigarette machine for a deck of Camels and lit one, standing in the doorway of the bar. It was much hotter here than it had been in Evanston. There was no doubt I was near the stockyards. It was almost like being back on the farm where Johnny and I had lived as kids, only there were more cows.
I started down the street, then ducked into a dark areaway beside the hardware store as a prowl car cruised past. The uniformed driver stopped when he saw the Jaguar and he and his partner got out. I snuffed my cigarette and stood spread-eagled against the wall.
“Quite a boat,” one of them admired.
His partner looked at the clip board he was carrying. “It must belong to some big shot giving Stan’s a play. At least, we haven’t got it listed.”
The radio in the prowl car continued to squawk. Car so and so do this. Car so and so go there. I hoped it would tell me Emerson’s body had been discovered. It didn’t. Nor did it mention me at all.
One of the cops said, “If it’s still here the next time we come by we better check with Stan. You don’t see too many Jaguars standing around.” He wiped the sweat brim of his cap with his handkerchief. “Look, Pete. Tell me, confidential. If you had four or five grand to spend for a car, would you buy one of these foreign jobs or a nice big shiny Cadillac?”
His partner hooted. “Listen to the guy. So help me, I’d be satisfied if I could get out of hock to the finance company for the ‘46 Chevy I’m driving. Every time I get almost clear, one of the kids gets sick or something and I have to borrow more dough and go right on paying interest.”
The two cops got back into their car and drove on. I relit the butt I’d pinched and walked up the block to Stan’s.
It was a big barn of a building with the blinds drawn but the front door wide open. Somewhere in the smoke and beer fumes, a three- or four-piece combo was resurrecting South of the Border, but no one was paying any attention to it. Stan, obviously, was paying off to someone. There were as many teen-aged tarts in the bar as there were customers. All of them were available and the stairway in the rear of the joint was doing a thriving business in couples.
While I looked around me, I bought and drank a bottle of beer. The pimply-faced punk who ran the elevator to LaFanti’s apartment was sitting in a booth, playing big shot to two teen-aged girls. I walked over and stood in front of the booth. “Scram,” I told them.
It was the way I said it. They scrammed.
Manny was too drunk to recognize me at first. “You got a nerve,” he began. Then he realized who I was and his eyes bugged. “Hey,” he gasped. “The cops are looking for you on account of what you done to that girl. What are you doing here?”
I sat down across from him. “I want to talk to you.”
He poured some courage down his throat. “Yeah? What about?”
I told him. “A white Jaguar with red leather upholstery. A brand new 1953 model with dual stacks, fender mirrors and of course, the famous XK 120 power plant.”
He looked at me, then back at his glass and his face screwed up like he was going to cry.
“WHY DID
you lie, Manny?” I asked him.
He said, “Go away.”
I shook my head. “Uh uh. If you hadn’t lied to the cops I wouldn’t be in the spot I’m in. LaFanti’s done it to me, but good. And you helped him by swearing I hadn’t been in the apartment.”
He played the same record that Gloria had. “I had to lie. You do what LaFanti tells you to do. That is, if you’re smart.”
“He gave you five grand for lying?”
Manny shook his head. “I ain’t talking. I ain’t saying a thing.”
A waiter came over to the table. “Something wrong here, gents?”
I laid a fin on the wood. “Not a thing. Just a little friendly conversation. Bring us two ryes and two beers.”