Authors: Max Allan Collins
Balling some white chick, most likely, Nolan mused, allowing himself a small smile. He got out of the tan Ford and walked up onto the porch of this particular house, the one in which Tillis’s woman supposedly lived. The porch was screened in and had an old-fashioned swing on it and the paper was here but hadn’t been brought in yet. He noticed
he was standing on a rubber mat that said the Stillwell family. Before he knocked, he thought it over and backed down off the porch and took a look around. This was the right number, all right. Because the porch was roofed, the second floor seemed to sit way back, emphasizing the gothic shape of the house, its gingerbread trimming. Some of the windows up there were stained glass and it was an absurd obsolete old house that Nolan would have liked to live in, in another life, and only reaffirmed his thoughts about the neighborhood being wrong for Tillis—what’s a rotten guy like you doing in a nice place like this?
Inside a doorway in back, he went up a spastic stairway that required three right turns of him and finally deposited him on an over-size landing in front of a white door. On the door was a slot with a card in it saying Phyllis Watson. Nolan knocked. He had his .38 out, which he didn’t think he’d need, but caution never hurt anybody; he also stood to one side of the door, back to the wall.
A pretty white girl, with puffy brown eyes and long brown hair that was tousled and a little bit greasy, opened the door and stepped out on the landing, wearing a shortie terrycloth robe, belted at the waist, not too securely. Nolan thought Tillis ought to train his women a little better, she certainly had no hesitation about answering the door (which didn’t seem to have a night latch on it, as far as Nolan could tell) and coming out to say hello with most of her skin showing. She was a tall girl, which made sense with Tillis being so big, and she had great legs, and Nolan put his hand over her mouth and dragged her back inside the apartment, nudging the door shut with his foot.
The kitchen was ordinary, tidy. He showed her the gun and whispered into her ear, “Don’t scream,” and marched her into the next room, his one arm around her waist with the gun poking her side, the other arm reached up across melony breasts to cover her mouth. They walked in step together, clumsily, as though doing a dance they just learned together.
The room was high ceilinged, trimmed in carved woodworking that isn’t done these days, and had once been the house library, judging from the walls of bookcases on either side of the room. They moved quickly through the library, which with lounging pillows and shag carpet and couch and easy chairs and TV had been reconverted into a living room, and on to the bedroom, where an air conditioner stuck in a window was cooling Tillis, who was asleep on his stomach, on top of the covers, naked.
Carefully, like a contortionist, without moving the arm across melony breasts or the one around her waist, Nolan stretched out a foot and kicked the bed.
Tillis roused, rolled over, sat up in bed, said, “What the fuck,” rubbed sleep from his eyes.
Nolan said, “Surprise.”
Tillis said, “Nolan?”
“Tell this girl I’m a friend and not to scream when I let her go.”
“Phyllis, honey, he’s my friend, don’t go screaming, honey.”
“And tell her not to jab me in the balls or anything.”
“Don’t go jabbing him in the balls or nothing, honey.”
He let her go and she squirmed onto the bed and put her arms around Tillis. She was whiter than usual, being scared, and up against the big naked black man she made quite a contrast. Her eyes were full of confusion and hate, and she twisted up her face at Nolan.
“Racist motherfucker,” she said.
“You forgot ‘sexist,’ž” Nolan said.
“Cool it, Phyllis honey,” Tillis said laughing, patting her backside, “He really is a friend. Sorta. He just got reason to play things a little close to the vest. He’s a little more cautious than some people I know.”
Phyllis said, “You mean I should have been more careful about just opening the door for him like I did?”
“We talked about that before, honey. I ain’t no goddamn plumber, you know.”
“I’m sorry, Tillie.”
“It’s okay. You gonna put the gun down, Nolan?”
“Down,” Nolan said, lowering it. “Not away.”
Tillis grinned, his white smile flashing in the darkened room; he looked like a sinister Louis Armstrong. He turned to Phyllis, said, “Be a good girl and get me some pants.”
“Just pants,” Nolan told her as she crossed in front of him, going to a dresser.
“What makes you so goddamn paranoid, man?” Tillis wanted to know.
“Old age,” Nolan said, watching Tillis climb into his trousers.
“I thought you’d be in one of those homes by now,” Tillis said, “boppin’ round the grounds in a wheelchair with a shawl around your shoulders.”
“Last time you told me that, I just finished knocking you on your black ass.”
“And this time you caught me cold, with my black ass
really
hangin’ out. Yeah, you’re old all right, but you’re good.”
Nolan grinned back at him, said, “This time I thought we’d skip the preliminaries. My ribs hurt for a week last time we tangled.”
“Must be that arthritis gettin’ to you.”
“Must be. Let’s go talk in the other room. How about your friend getting us some coffee?”
“Good idea. Phyllis, honey, do what the man says.”
“Is there a phone in the kitchen?” Nolan asked.
“No,” Tillis said, pointing to the nightstand phone. “Only one in the apartment’s here.”
“Okay,” Nolan told the girl, “go make the coffee.”
“Get fucked,” she told him.
“Start without me,” he said.
She started to spit back a reply, but saw that Tillis was laughing at what Nolan said, and she shrugged helplessly and went off to the kitchen.
Nolan and Tillis took seats in the library-living room.
Tillis sat on the couch, Nolan on an easy chair across. He glanced at the books in the case behind him and recognized only one author; he hadn’t heard of James Baldwin, Leroi Jones, Germaine Greer or Joyce Carol Oates, but he knew Harold Robbins.
Tillis said, “You’re early, man.”
“I made good time on the tollway.”
“I wouldn’t’ve called Harry in on you, you know.”
“Thought crossed your mind, though, didn’t it?”
Tillis grinned, then got serious fast. “What’s this about, anyway?”
“You asked me that on the phone.”
“Want you to tell me, man. Want to hear you say it.”
“It’s Charlie, Tillis.”
“Charlie’s dead.”
“Yeah. And you helped crucify him. Only on the seventh day he rose.”
“What makes you think he’s alive?”
“Nothing much. Just that yesterday he murdered a friend of mine, stole around a million dollars from me, and kidnapped a kid I know. That’s all.”
“Shit. You jivin’ me? You’re a shifty motherfuck, I know that much. You shitin’ me?”
“No shit at all. He’s alive and I know it. If I wasn’t sitting on this, the boys from Chicago would be coming around and checking out all Charlie’s friends.”
Tillis leaned over, hands folded, and thought for several long moments. When he looked up, his dark eyes were big and solemn and brimming with honesty. “All right, man. I’m gonna tell it. Gonna tell it all to you. You got to help me save my ass is all I ask. Whew. Jesus. The shit hit the fan this time, right? Shit, man.”
“Tillis, you’re going to be in trouble. I’m your only hope.”
“The Great White Hope, that’s my old buddy Nolan. Jesus Christ. Let me catch my breath. My whole fuckin’ world’s crashing down in my head. This is bad news for the big shitter, Nolan. Christ all fuckin’ mighty.”
“You started to tell me.”
“Okay. Now you know about Charlie and me. I didn’t love the sucker, but he helped me out, stayed by me. I didn’t go to college first to play ball like most of the dudes, and I didn’t play ball long enough to have a name that was gonna make me a goddamn announcer with Howard Cosell on the tube or nothin’. My football career, shit, when that fuckin’ knee went, I mean maybe I coulda got a job selling tires or something . . . right here, folks, here’s our boy Tillis, he’ll show you the tires, he played ball with the pros, shook hands with Joe Namath, this boy did.”
“Tillis.”
“Yeah. Anyway, Charlie. He did right by me. Paid me good, treated me with respect, unless he got real mad or something. I didn’t love him, but who do you think I was gonna love in the goddamn Family? Wasn’t exactly a truck-load of soul brothers around me. I had to develop a goddamn taste for pasta, let me tell you. Charlie did me right, and then you come along and fucked him in the ear with those marked bills you passed him, and then this political thing started happening, only it was going on all the time, I guess, but this trouble you brought Charlie brought it to a head. The younger bunch was buckin’ the old regime, Charlie bein’ the main one, you know. It was a political deal, power play, like General Motors or the court of some fuckin’ king or the goddamn Democratic Party. So those of us lined up with Charlie were maybe gonna get chopped when he did. Wasn’t no
if
—just
when.
There was a bunch of us. Anyway, me and some other guys took a hand in helping the people against Charlie in the Family get rid of him. Only, as you guessed, I guess, we faked it. It was a couple of bums off skid row who got roasted in that fire when Charlie’s car accident’ly on purpose cracked up. We just used some stuff to make it look like Charlie. See, Charlie knew he didn’t have a chance, so him and his kid were going to like
pretend
to die in this crash and take off somewhere, South America, I don’t know where really . . . Charlie had plenty of money put in
other people’s accounts, people he trusted, so money was no hassle.”
“Hold it. Why’d he include his kid in the crash?”
“The kid was workin’ in the Family. Just an overblowed accountant, but Charlie was afraid the kid would get wasted along with him. Guess the kid always wanted to work with his father, wanted to be a part of the Family, saw it as . . . I don’t know, adventure, I guess. Or a family tradition or some goddamn thing. Charlie never went for it, really, that business about working your kids into the Family ain’t so true anymore. But this kid of his insisted, and when the boy got out of college Charlie gave him this token desk thing, away from the guns and that side of it. Charlie was like a lot of guys, wanted his kids to get an education, be respectable. I think his daughter was in the fuckin’ Peace Corps, can you get into that?”
“Why didn’t Charlie leave, like he was supposed to?”
“Nolan, I swear to God I thought that sucker was in Argentina or someplace, with his buddy the Boss of the Bosses. Swear to shit, I thought that’s where he was. But Nolan, I’m no fuckin’ wheel, remember . . . I’m a cog, man, and Charlie was pretty foxy about who he had help him, well, die . . . and just as foxy about how much each of us knew exactly. Like, I know
some
of the people involved, but not all.”
Nolan got out of the chair, walked over and sat on the couch next to Tillis. He handed Tillis the list Felix had made up. “How many of those people were in this with Charlie?”
Tillis studied the list. The girl in the terrycloth robe came in and gave them cups of coffee. Tillis told her to go back out to the kitchen and she did.
“I see Charlie’s daughter is on this list,” Tillis said.
“Yeah.”
“You gonna bother her?”
“No.”
“Good.”
“Well?”
“I’m not going to tell you any names.”
“What?”
“Listen. My ass is grass because of this. I gotta move slow on this, think it through. You’re in pretty good with the Family, now, right? I heard you made the peace with that tightass lawyer, Felix what’s-his-name.”
“Yeah, the Family’s behind me. I already admitted that. But they’re going to sit on this till I say go. You got my word. I can save your damn ass. You maybe aren’t going to get a pension out of the deal, and a penthouse overlooking Lake Michigan, but you’ll be alive.”
“Maybe I can get that job selling tires,” Tillis said, with a rueful grin. “God. I got about as much chance to get outa this as a turd in a toilet.”
“Mine’s the only hand can stop the guy from flushing it.”
“I know, man.”
“Listen to me, Tillis. Charlie’s fucking nuts. He’s out of his mind. He wants to hurt me and I got to stop him. He’s got my money, Tillis. Worse than that, he’s got this kid. I like this kid, Tillis.”
“You don’t like anybody.”
“Hell, I like
you.
I must be capable of liking any damn body.”
“What do you mean, a kid?”
“Well, he’s about twenty. He was in on that last job of mine.”
“That bank number?”
“Yeah.”
“Then you’re talking about a man, not a kid.”
“Compared to you and me, he’s a kid, Tillis. And compared to Charlie.” Nolan sipped his coffee; it was weak. “Maybe he’s dead.”
“Charlie?”
“The kid. Jon’s his name. If Charlie killed that kid, I’m nailing the bastard to the wall. That bastard is a cancer that’s got to be cut out of the human race.”
Tillis shook his head, said, “I can’t imagine him messing
around with a young kid, especially somebody you’re fond of, Nolan. Too much like his own son, you know? Charlie wouldn’t want anybody hurting
his
kid, and that’s what you might do to get back at him, so I can’t . . .”
“Charlie’s capable of anything, as long as it’s insane. As far as his own precious kid is concerned, Charlie’s got his pride’n’joy at his side, the kid’s been in it with him from word go.”
“What? Momma, that man
has
flipped out.”
The phone rang in the bedroom. Tillis said, “Phyllis, honey, go get that!”
Tillis said, “You’ll want to get to Harry, right? That’s the next step.”
“Right. I figure he knows what’s happening.”
“You probably figure right, man. Maybe I’m a cog, but ol’ Harry’s a wheel.”
Phyllis trudged through the room, all but pouting, plodding along toward the trilling phone.
Tillis said, “I think maybe I know the best way to handle it.”
“Let’s hear it.”
“Let me go pump him.”