She let herself plop against the wall and slide to a sitting position, where she waited for whichever man got there first. The big palm cupped her face, tilting it up at his. “Baby?”
It takes a time for a fog to clear, certainly the better part of a seaside morning. It takes awhile to mark the separation between nightmare and death wishing, between topsy and turvy. A kiss on the cheek turns the lights back on. Safe at home. Spoons up, darling. Hi, there.
Luther looked down at her tiny bare feet. “Hey, nutsy, where’re your shoes?”
She tucked her head within the hollow of his shoulder, very glad to be there and how do you do. “They went away.”
“Yes. Shoes will do that from time to time. Come on, baby.” He led her out of the alley. “I had a pair of shoes once—they went away, too. Didn’t leave a note or anything. Just went away. I’ve never allowed myself to become attached to a pair of shoes again. Who needs that kind of heartache?”
They were well out of the alley, but Luther could still see how shaken his little barefoot girl was. So he just walked with his arm about her, heading her home, knowing that it was no time to press her with questions. He had rescued the kitty from the tree. It was unimportant how the kitty had gotten there.
Tiger gradually came out of it and wanted to talk. “Luther, I think—I mean, I think I imagined that…I was about to give a man a boot job.”
“Cash or credit?”
She looked into her small fist to see if she still had the three crumpled dollars. She hadn’t. “Credit.”
“We’ll put it in Accounts Receivable. Did you get his name?”
“No.”
“Shoe size?”
“No.”
“Could somebody at Forsheim’s identify him?”
“I don’t know.”
“Hmmmm. Looks like a case for Louie Nizer.”
“Luther?”
“Hmmmmm?”
“Do you think I’m getting…sick?”
He had his opening. “Actually—I think you’re gonna get sicker.”
She pulled up short. “Explain, please.”
“Well, you know how two times out of nine I don’t lie.”
“Yes.”
“Well, this is one of those two times. What I tell you now is gospel. Cross my heart and stick my nose in a buffalo turd.”
“Go on.”
He suddenly became honest and tender. “I do bad things to you, I’m sorry. I know I’m unpredictable and irresponsible and—I know I’m disrespectful and that I’m this way, then that, and that I have difficulty in telling the truth, and that I keep you always under pressure—” He stopped and then became his old flip self again. “Well, Tiger, my sweet, my heart and my dearest, there’s going to be a little more weight in the east wing.” Before she could say anything, he decided that it wasn’t quite the time to take her home. So he hooked her arm and walked her off into another direction. “Come on. Let’s get something to eat.”
She padded alongside him, barefoot and frightened, into the sangria place, where they soon sat opposite each other at a little table in the back that featured a candle stuck into an empty wine bottle. The wax had dripped over the lip of the bottle and deposited ten minutes’ worth of paraffin on the wooden table before Luther wiped the remains of his sausage sandwich from his mouth and cleared his throat for attention. “Now then, where was I?”
“You were zigging. You had just zagged, so you were zigging.”
“Ah, yes. Now—” He was big and attractive and at his best. She knew it and he knew it. “Though I admit that inviting Fat to live with us was an unconscious expression of my insecurity at being alone with you—”
“When did you admit that?”
“Just now.”
“True.” She had tried, feebly, to offer some resistance to his verbal juggernaut, but it had been such an obvious ploy that all it did was weaken her position. She knew it, and he knew it.
“Where was I?” he asked, confident and formidable.
“You were zagging.”
“Correct. Yes. Though I own up to the fact that inviting Fat to live with us was an unconscious admission of my insecurity at being alone with you—”
“Prologue, all prologue.”
“The fact that Leon Darvac has just this night, while you were out, moved in—that is not of my doing.”
She repeated the name without expression. “Leon Darvac.”
“Yes. That’s his name. At least that’s who Fat introduced him as. I suppose he could have another name, except he looks like a Leon Darvac. He really does. And that pleases me because I never, in my whole life, met anyone who looked even remotely like a Leon Darvac.”
It was never said more sweetly. “You son of a bitch.”
Luther fell all over himself with abject, introspective sincerity. “I swear to you, God strike me dead, if he can find the time, Fat says that Leon called and said his building had been condemned, primarily because it was falling over and—”
She placed her hands palm down down on the table in an expression of “let’s stop the shit.” And she said, “Question?”
Like a schoolteacher, he pointed to her as though she were a mile away in a large auditorium. “Yes. The young lady over there. Speak up, please.”
“We have no phone. When Leon called, how did Fat answer?”
“In a very loud voice.” She had him, so he smiled and allowed her the point. “Actually, that’s a very good question.”
“Yes, isn’t it?”
He leaned across and touched her hands, his long arms neatly straddling the candle, causing the light to play up at his face so that he appeared as a smiling spook. “Tiger, before you get all crazy—”
She slid her hands out from under his. “Keep your hands off me, Black Bart. I may be a simple schoolmarm, but I can shoot your eyes out with the derringer concealed within my ample bosom.”
He played it her way. Anything to avoid the head-on confrontation that was gathering steam. “You have a derringer in there?”
“Two of them.”
“Loaded?”
“Cocked.”
“Son of a bitch.”
“Bastard.”
He tried again, pulling back from the candle because his nose was just this side of catching fire. “It’s all true, darling. Leon’s building actually began to collapse. At first they thought it was the Mad Bomber of London.”
“Ah, the Mad Bomber. At it again, is he?”
“Well, he has been blowing up half of London. Why, just a fortnight ago—”
She swung her head away and looked elsewhere. “Waiter?”
Luther spoke hurriedly. “Anyway, Leon grabbed whatever clothes he could and came right over, lickety-split. But he won’t be staying long because Fat’s been working on this idea which Leon says can’t fail. I think it has to do with his dancing index cards and—well—that’s it.” He sat back and rested his case because he had no other choice. “That is definitely it.”
Rebuttal. “Well, it’s not quite it, is it?”
“Pardon?”
“I mean, somewhere along the line you gave it your okay, no?”
He twitched defensively. “Well, I gave it…tacit approval. Understanding the circumstances, I couldn’t quite bring myself to say no.”
“Did you nod? Did you give it a shrug and say you’d talk it over with me? Did you shake a little? Did your nostrils dilate?”
“I’d like to call my lawyer.”
“Did you flex the muscles in your manly jaw?”
“I furrowed my brow.”
“Oh, that’s good.”
“Yes. I thought so, too.” He demonstrated his furrowed brow. It looked like an aerial view of a recently plowed Kansas hayfield. “How do you like it?”
“And Fat interpreted that as approval?”
“Yes. A common mistake, don’t you think? After all, a furrowed brow means different things to different people.”
“Would you like to know wh
at it means to me?”
“No. Only to Fat. It was his furrow. To properly judge the furrow, you’d have had to have been there when the furrowing took place. I will not have my furrows analyzed out of context.”
“Listen. I approve, okay? I approve of everyone moving in.” She got to her feet, her toes flexing on the dirty floor. Then she blew out the candle in a move that was dramatic and total and final. And she looked down at his wondering eyes and delivered her decision. “I also approve of me moving out.”
She walked away barefoot, breaking stride only once to jig on a hot cigarette butt. Luther sat for a moment, the curling smoke of the expiring candle causing his eyes to tear, and he was genuinely moved because he thought he was crying and he hadn’t cried in so many years that, obviously, she was very, very important to him. He left a Monopoly card on the table instead of money. It read: “Take a Ride on the Reading.” Then he scooped up the tip that was left on a nearby table and caught up with her outside, following her huddled figure as she scurried for a bus that had pulled up from out of nowhere. He got on the bus right behind her, almost losing one foot in the closing door. Gallantly dropping his freshly pilfered tip into the coin box, he bowed to her and said, “Allow me.”
She looked at the bus driver, a disinterested sort because it was late at night and he was pooped. “Driver,” she said, “this man is bothering me.”
The driver never looked up, just tossed the words at Luther from over his shoulder. “Don’t bother her.” Then he stepped on the accelerator and Tiger went caroming down the aisle like a partially deflated medicine ball, plopping into a seat and leaving no room for Luther.
Luther was still up front. It was his turn to make a report to the driver. “Driver, that girl has no shoes on.”
“Put your shoes on.” The driver never spoke again, probably for the remainder of his life.
Luther navigated the aisle better than Tiger, choosing to hang onto a strap a few rows diagonally behind her, even though there were three dozen seats available. There were a handful of passengers, just a smattering of half-asleep people going God knows where. Luther spoke loudly, not caring who heard. “There is no way for you to move out, Clarissa. I’m locking you to the radiator. If you haven’t given your word by wintertime that you won’t try to escape, you’ll fry when the steam comes up.”
Tiger kept looking out the window, determined not to hear, rubbing her toes together to ward off frostbite. The random questions of her own mind popped like hot corn kernels. Who was she? What was she doing fleeing that madman? How far could the bus take her? Dubuque? Des Moines? What was her name? Janice. Yes. Whatever happened to Janice? Does anyone remember Janice? You there, going into the drugstore—remember Janice? And you, sir, peeing in the doorway, remember little Janice?
Luther was straphanging back there, but maybe if she blinked her eyes thrice, he’d disappear in a puff of green smoke. She heard his voice and knew that he was striving to be serious in spite of his delivery. “I happen to be mad, okay? I have no doubt about it. My brain is already pledged to Harvard and my pecker to Radcliffe. I also have no doubt, Loretta, that you are my only hope that my testes will not end up on somebody’s plate at the Racquet Club.” He finished up by prodding a drunk. “It’s a curse, I tell you. I’m cursed with being in love with a graduate of Jones College.”
Tiger wheeled angrily in her seat, frightening half to death the lady in the seat directly behind her. “You creep! Not a graduate! A dropout! And not Jones! Smith!” Then she turned forward again, conscious only that the woman behind her had gotten up and judiciously changed her seat.
Luther let go of the strap and made his way up the aisle, sliding into the warm and vacant seat behind Tiger, where she’d know he was sitting though she’d be unable to see him. He picked up a Daily News that had been read by eight people already. “Ah,” he said, contemplating the newspaper, “fifty-seven degrees in San Francisco today. What a goddamn accomplishment for the city by the Bay.” Then he leaned forward and whispered into her ear. “Tiger, I give you my oath. Fat and Leon can stay for only as long as it takes them to get their idiot idea off the ground. I swear. I oath. What the hell do I care about San Francisco? San Francisco means nothing to me.”
Tiger got up and changed her seat, depositing herself in one farther toward the front of the bus. Luther did likewise, once again ending up directly behind her. He soon leaned forward confidentially again. “Don’t turn around, don’t act startled. Pretend nothing unusual is happening, but your ass is on fire.”
Tiger moved to change her seat again, but Luther moved first and faster, sliding quickly alongside her, pinning her where she sat with the bulk of his big body. He grabbed her hand. “And if they can’t do it in a reasonable amount of time, out they go. Do you read me, babe? Tiger? I’m oathing. You cannot ignore a man who is oathing.”
She could. She could keep looking out the window, which she did. A seedy-looking man across the aisle, a decent sort, hardly heroic, felt obliged to intercede on Tiger’s behalf. He tapped Luther’s arm. “Maybe she don’t feel good.”
Luther barked at the man. “You a priest?”
“No.”
“Then don’t dispense religious dogma with such craven alacrity or you’ll find yourself excommunicated on a good Samaritan charge, you humbug and charlatan.”
“Oh.” The man sat back and wished he was a plainclothesman with the power to arrest and kill simultaneously.
Luther stood up in the aisle and became an Indian. He looked dourly down at Tiger. “Tall Chicken make his pledge. He take full-um responsibility. Our tepee will once again belong to just Tall Chicken and his squaw, Horny Hen. All others will be gone before too many moons have passed. This-um no bullshit.”
Tiger tried not to laugh. She tried hard, but a snicker escaped. It was all so absurd. She was sitting on a bus the destination of which she had not the slightest idea. She was sitting there barefoot while a Scarsdale Indian was propositioning her. She looked up at the tall redskin who stood frozen with his chin thrust out like an ad for Mussolini, and she said, “And how long is a moon, Tall Chicken?” And she knew full well that her question had signaled total capitulation to his lunacy.
“How the fuck should I know?” And he pulled her from the seat and yanked her up the aisle, screaming to the driver, “Getting off, please. Getting off. Please cease the fucking bus, sir.”
The bus rambled over to the nearest bus stop, and a moment later, the two dispossessed Indians were standing nowhere, on a corner they knew nothing about, with nothing going on around them other than a few lampposts. Luther pressed her hard against him and spoke down at her though she wouldn’t look up. “Dammit, Tiger, when have you known me to give so much ground ever? So you come on back and trust me. That’s what it’s all about, isn’t it?”
Her face came up, featuring a wan smile. “Oh, Christ…”
Luther checked his wristwatch and looked up the street for another bus like the one they had just gotten off and knew nothing about. “Where the hell is that bus? And they have the nerve to raise the fares. It’s a good thing I never pay. I’d be pretty damned pissed-off.” Tiger watched as he launched delightfully into a new and wonderful snit. “This city”—he was shouting—“the dirt! The filth! The garbage! The vermin running around! Where the hell is a cop? You can never find a cop when you need one in this goddamn city! Never!” He cupped his hands and hollered through them. “Cop! Cop! Hey, cop! My kingdom for a cop! Why can’t I find a cop? A fag! I can find a fag when I want one, but not a cop! How come not a cop?” He turned minty. “Yoo-hoo, oh, coppy? Arrest me, coppy, I’m a molester. Run me in with your big stick, you old wonderful cop! Oh, coppy!”
The night closed in around them, but somehow they got home. Tiger never quite remembered how. Perhaps Luther picked her up and flew her home. Yes, that seemed logical.
11
Because her little bare feet were so sore, Luther carried Tiger piggyback up the stairs. He opened the door to the
apartment, and she slid from his back. The first thing they saw, leaning against the wall like an evil cypress just oozing swamp, was Leon Darvac. Wickedness was all over him. It exuded from his enlarged pores and rippled in his pink and watery eyes. Even in his powder blue cardigan he was a singularly unattractive creature, and Tiger immediately spelled his name backwards to see if it carried any significance. “Noël Cavrad.” Nothing. Unless it was the Swedish diminutive of Noël Coward, but that wasn’t likely because there was no way in which Leon Darvac could have claimed to have been of Scandinavian extraction. He had a rodent-like head, with flat, pointy ears and no chin to speak of, and had he been standing there munching on cheese, she’d have climbed back aboard Luther’s back and, resorting to the whip if necessary, been well on her way to somewhere west of the Mississippi and east of Rangoon.
Introductions were made, and Leon, to his credit, withheld offering his leper’s paw. Whatever his malevolent malady, he somehow respected the fact that it was contagious and abhorrent and fatal, and he didn’t choose to pass it along to the masses. He also had about him, unfortunately, the smell of a spoiling corpse in a tight sauna. The poor man obviously suffered from athlete’s foot, for which there was no known cure and no known cologne to mask its presence.
Tiger found some old sandals for her scuffed feet and sat quietly beside Luther, for Fat was holding court and deference had to be paid. Fat had his papers and his little index cards spread in organized mounds all over the table, and he seemed solidly sure of the case he was about to present to the academy. The only truly discordant note about him was that he no longer seemed the plain and pleasant tubby fellow of old. Rather, he was displaying another shade of his personality. It was the sudden air of the con man, the elan of the practiced hustler, the liquid shiftiness of the accomplished conniver.
“Here’s the bit,” Fat said. “I’ve worked it all out very carefully, and Leon, who has the mind of a computer, concurs. The idea is simple, precise, feasible—yet bold. We, all of us, charge a monthly membership fee. And we have a central telephone number.” He turned officiously toward Luther. “We’ll need a phone. Make a note.”
A Glimpse of Tiger Page 7