“Yeah? A hot tamale, this Miriam?” Terrance asked with an impish grin.
“More like a burrito, but yeah, hot, real hot.”
We all laughed, then I took my shot and banked the nine ball straight in.
“Nice shot,” Terrance said. You’re doing a real good job so far, partner.
Paslett nodded, then asked, “How about this Silva gal? She a looker?” Should we check her out?
“Oh, yeah, a sweet piece’a tail, tall brunette with sharp looks, but she likes ta play hard ta get.” Absolutely, but she won’t be easy to shadow.
I checked my watch and racked my cue. “Well, I gotta run, boys. Don’t wanna run late on my first day.”
“See you around, Ted,” my partner said. Don’t worry, I’ll be watching you the rest of the day.
“We oughta do this again,” Paslett said. We’ll need to meet, soon.
“I dunno, I’m awful busy for a while.” Don’t push it, let me set the pace.
“Well, whenever you can make it.”
I hid my smile. Not having to sir a C.O., getting him to agree with me—a lieutenant j.g. could get used to that, real fast.
FINISHING MY ROUTE THAT AFTERNOON, I FELT PRETTY GOOD. TERRANCE was watching my back and he’d have Barston’s discharge certificate at our pre-arranged dead drop by that evening. He was pleased with my work, so was Paslett. Sure, he was prodding me, but he’d eased off when I’d reminded him how much I’d accomplished so far. I’d become Barston, I’d gotten a job at H & H, I’d bagged Miriam as a source. If that wasn’t enough, it looked like I’d soon be working as Himmel’s personal courier. If I could just figure out a way to divert those packages to the O.N.I. labs. . . .
If, if. I should have known better than to weave my laurels yet. Ifs are Sirens, steer clear. So an officer had told us at the Funhouse. We had heard so many bromides like that during our training, they had stopped registering. As I soon had reason to regret.
CHAPTER 15
I DIDN’T SPOT TERRANCE AS I DELIVERED THE REMAINING PACKAGES, but I never doubted he was close by. None of the remaining clients had packages for me, and I couldn’t help but think I’d lost my nerve by asking my partner to shadow me. Himmel probably wanted to make sure I was reliable before he trusted me to bring him something.
I pushed that worry aside as I sped around Northwest D.C., double-parking or pulling in front of fire hydrants (what did I care if Philip Greene racked up tickets?). I needed to plot my next moves. Miriam needed to be more than an easy lay if she was going to be a good source, I realized. What she had wanted, what she’d told me to do to her the night she took me home—well, it had been pretty obvious I wasn’t her first quick roll in the hay. But the way she’d clung to me after she fell asleep, her arms wrapped tight around me, hinted that she wanted more than a man—or men—to haul her ashes. She wanted a steady, a sweetheart, a joe who’d treat her right. I must be that guy, I decided, the one who treats her right, who brings her flowers and whispers sweet nothings into her ear.
It wouldn’t be easy—Ted Barston wasn’t the courting kind—but I saw how I could play it. Ted would tell Miriam about his troubled boyhood, about a pop who neglected his son because he was so busy organizing strikes and leading the union. Ted would tell her about youthful scrapes with the law, about how his pop thought he could beat his boy straight. Miriam’s folks had taken in foster kids, it was a story she could understand. Ted would confess his dope habit, tell her all about how it had landed him in the brig. Then he’d drop hints he wanted to pull his life together. He couldn’t talk about settling down, but the lovey-dovey act should open Miriam up like a tin of sardines.
But how to get her to talk about what went on at H & H? How to find out how often Logan Skerrill had visited the office? My gut told me Miriam was no Red, she was just a receptionist. Himmel, Silva, and Greene were the core of the cell, and other members who came to the office must pose as clients or potential clients. So the trick was to get Miriam to talk about things she’d seen that looked ordinary, but weren’t. My angle in was Silva. She rode Miriam hard, she didn’t like me. If I could coax Miriam to join me in carping about Silva when we weren’t at work, I could get Miriam to tell stories about H & H. Hopefully, Logan Skerrill would come up, I might learn who had a reason to kill him.
As I parked the Ford, I decided to ask Miriam out to eat that night, after work. Then I’d pick up my discharge certificate at the dead drop. Time enough to squeeze in a date with Liv, too? I wondered. I could leave a message at her rooming house, inviting her to meet me at the Little Palace that evening. After the dead drop, I could drop by my flat, change clothes, and swing by the diner. We couldn’t spend the night together—I had to wake up on my cot at the Jefferson Club as Ted Barston—but even a few hours with Liv, as myself, as Ellis Voigt, sounded awful good after my day so far.
Greene made a show of checking his watch when I came in. “How’d it go, Barston?”
“Dandy. Only got lost eight times.”
He gaped, started to sputter.
“Aw, I’m kiddin’ you,” I said, clapping him on the shoulder. “What I’m s’posed ta do with dis?” I fluttered the manifest with the recipients’ signatures.
“I’ll take that!” He snatched the sheet from my hand and ostentatiously walked over to the front counter. “Please file this, Miriam.”
“Yes, Mister Greene.”
Standing behind Greene, I rolled my eyes at Miriam, who kept a straight face. But Silva saw me and strode over.
“Ted, fill out your time sheet, then you’re done for the day. We’ll see you at nine sharp tomorrow.”
“Yes, ma’am!”
She shot me a dirty look but said nothing. She headed toward her office, Greene on her heels, calling, “Nadine, Nadine, I wanted to ask you about . . .”
I said, “Miss Miriam, could I have my time sheet, please?”
“Of course, Mister Barston.”
She pulled my card from the box on the counter. I marked the time—3:45—and signed my initials and handed it back.
“Did you have a good first day, Mister Barston?”
“I did, Miss Miriam. Gonna celebrate, too.”
“Are you?”
“With a special friend, I hope.”
“Oh?” She arched an eyebrow. “You hope?”
“Well, I gotta ask her ta join me, don’t I?”
“You better call her soon, to make sure she doesn’t already have plans.”
“Yeah, be a real shame if she couldn’t join me at Ferrara’s, on Twelfth Street, at six, huh?” I smiled.
“It would be.” A smile back.
And with that I left, thinking that Miriam might be a sharper tack than she looked.
I TOOK A ROUNDABOUT WAY BACK TO THE JEFFERSON CLUB, MAKING unpredictable stops on corners and in front of shop windows, to check to see if I was being followed. When I was certain I was in the clear, I popped into a People’s Drugstore to call Liv’s rooming house. She was still at work, which was good, because I needed to leave a cryptic message, just in case I was wrong about not being shadowed.
“Yeah, I wanna leave a message for Liv,” I said to the girl who answered the telephone.
“What is it?” A racking cough followed her terse question. Probably a G-girl too sick to work, couldn’t get any rest because the telephone rang all day with calls for her housemates.
“Tell her Buck Mulligan will be at the Martello tower tonight at eight-thirty if she’s free.”
“Who? Where?!” Another painful-sounding cough.
When she was done clearing her throat, I slowly repeated my message and hung up before she could ask me where the Martello tower was.
The permanent odor of the Jefferson Club reminded me I needed a hot bath and a shave. I fetched the razor and a change of clothes from my rucksack and headed to the Turkish Bath House on Eighth. For a quarter, you could take a long, hot steam; for a nickel, the washroom attendant gave you a handful of mentholated shaving cream. Reclin
ing on the smooth stone bench, I closed my eyes and let the wet heat soak into my pores. Two men next to me were having a hushed conversation about tract housing and the current price for an acre of land in Annandale. Their murmurs and the warmth made me drowsy. I dozed, if only briefly. After toweling off, I shaved and dressed, ran a comb through my wet hair. I found myself whistling as I left the bath house. No dreams of Delphine last night, I realized. Maybe being Barston for a while was good for me.
FERRARA’S, WHERE I WAS MEETING MIRIAM, WAS AN ITALIAN RESTAURANT crammed into a narrow storefront. No sign, just a chalkboard. Dirt-streaked windows, festooned with drooping nets of yellowing garlic heads, probably deterred many would-be diners, but I’d heard the prices were cheap, the servings plentiful—just the sort of place Barston would take a date.
Didn’t take much to nudge Miriam into talking about H & H. As soon as our first glass of Chianti was poured, she was off to the races, marveling at how Himmel lived in a suite at the Wardman Park Hotel, complaining about what a “louse” Greene was and how he thought he was “so important,” even though Silva ordered him around “like a nigger.”
“ . . . every goddamned chance he gets, he takes it out on me,” she finished. “‘Miriam, that’s not the way we file invoices,’ ‘Miriam, surely you know better than to use capital letters in an address.’”
“Yeah, he’s a real pud,” I said. “How come he ain’t in uniform?”
She smirked and said, “Says he’s flat-footed.”
Our food came. I’d wanted the osso bucco, but Barston struck me as a spaghetti and meatball kind of guy, so that’s what I’d ordered for both of us, with garlic bread.
“Well, if dat bitch Silva starts ordering me around like dat, I’m outta dare,” I said.
“Wish I could quit,” Miriam said glumly, looking at me with expectation.
My cue to ask her why she didn’t quit. Then she’d tell me all about her big dream, the one she was saving her money for. Every G-girl and steno I’d dated in D.C. had one, a plan that was going to lift them out of their dreary routines of filing and taking dictation. My guess, Miriam was going to beauty school as soon as she had the dough, then was going to open her own salon.
“How come you let her push you around?” I asked instead.
“Who, Nadine? Well, see, I need to work a little—”
“You gotta stand up ta bullies like her,” I interrupted, my mouth full of meatball. “Like I was saying yesterday, you gotta push right back when dey start shoving.”
She nodded politely, but I could tell I was making her uncomfortable. Miriam had spunk, but not enough to stand up to Silva. I’d seen that moments after walking into H & H, when Silva had tongue-lashed her in front of me and the staff. So I changed the topic—and struck gold.
“How come she’s such a bitch, Silva?”
“She’s always been mean. But ever since her boyfriend bit the dust, she’s been on a tear.”
“Was he overseas, her fella?” Hiding my excitement.
“No, he lived right here. Guess how he died?” Miriam’s eyes grew wide.
I shrugged, as if I didn’t give a damn, and shoveled noodles into my mouth.
“He got murdered, can you believe it?” she said excitedly.
“No kiddin’? How’d dat happen?”
“He got shot with a gun, that’s what happened.” Miriam giggled at her lame joke, so did I.
“For real, yer not yanking my chain?” I asked.
“Honest injun. And it just happened like a few days ago.”
“Was he bent, this guy?”
“Nobody knows. See, the thing is, Ted, we’re not even s’posed to know he got kilt!”
“How come?” Still packing the spaghetti away, like it was my last meal.
“I don’t know. He used to come in to see Nadine at the office, but then all’a sudden, he stopped, like two, three weeks ago.”
“So how do you know he bought it?”
Miriam wiped her mouth primly, looking like the cat who’s just got the mouse, and laid her napkin down. Her plate was still half-full. Would Ted finish her food? I decided he would.
“You done with dat?” I asked.
“Oh yeah, go ahead, Teddy. So anyways, Norman—he’s one of the clippers, he’s the one who always wears braces instead’a belts, older guy—he goes to see Philip after everyone’s left. The door’s closed so he knocks, and Philip, he yanks the door open and tells Norman, ‘whatta you want, can’t it wait till tomorrow?’ and Norman can see right in, and guess who’s in there, all red-eyed from crying?”
“Silva.”
“Right! Boy, I didn’t think she had a teardrop in her body. Anyways, she drops this newspaper she’s holding and comes rushing out and Philip goes chasing after her—see, I happen to know that Philip’s got a huge crush on Nadine, so he wants to comfort her and all that—and Norman’s just standing there, see, he can’t help himself, he wants to know what it’s all about, so he peeks at the paper Nadine dropped on Philip’s desk and it’s folded to this article about a murder near the Navy Yard.” She smiled triumphantly at me as I mopped up the sauce on her plate with the last piece of garlic bread.
“So how’d dis Norman know it was Silva’s fella? Coulda been anyone.”
“There was a photo of the guy who got kilt. Norman recognized him.”
“What’s his name, Silva’s squeeze?”
“Lincoln Skerrill,” Miriam announced.
I didn’t correct her. I stacked her now-empty plate on top of mine, pushed both to the side, and lit up.
“Well, dat’s sometin’, all right,” I commented.
“Yeah, but you know what the real kicker is?”
I shook my head.
“She didn’t even go to his funeral, can you imagine! She must not’a loved him one bit. Just showed up to work like it was any other day.”
Because if she had shown up, Terrance would have taken down a detailed description of her as well as of any other out-of-place mourners. My partner had attended Skerrill’s military service, held while I was cramming to become Ted Barston, to take note of who came. That Silva knew to stay away meant that Griffin Crieve was right about her, Greene, and Himmel. She could mourn all she wanted, as long as she did it privately—the cell must be protected, at all costs. I found it awful hard to believe that Skerrill had been dating Silva without knowing that she was a Red, and that she and her cronies were up to no good. I had to check the urge to prod Miriam to tell me more, so that I didn’t look suspicious. But getting her to gossip from now on would be easy-breezy, as long as I kept her happy.
With that in mind, I asked her why she couldn’t quit her job just yet, and she launched into an exuberant recitation of her big plan. Sure enough, beauty school, her own salon. All so real to her, a story she’d obviously told countless times to whomever would listen, that all I had to do was nod and say sure or great now and then. Maybe that’s why a nice girl like Miriam had bee-lined to a bum like Barston. She hadn’t noticed he never really listened, that he was awful good at plastering a fake smile on his nodding head as he was actually thinking about himself. Her last guy had probably told her to shut her trap every time she tried to talk about beauty school—now here was Teddy Boy, enrapt as he listened. I thought about Liv and her desire to go to the South Pacific after the war. Liv and Miriam couldn’t be more different, as far apart as Ted Barston and Ellis Voigt were, yet both girls had the same glow in their eyes when they talked about their dreams, about their futures.
Barston and I sure didn’t get excited when we considered our futures. Maybe we had more in common than either of us thought. At least Barston was a man without a past. He had a history, sure, facts I’d memorized as if preparing for a high school exam. But he didn’t have a past, that ebb and flow of memory that laps over our thoughts every day. And my past was distracting me from listening to Miriam. First a memory of Liv, now one of Delphine: her telling me her big dream, so many years ago when we were kids. Nodding as Mir
iam went on, I was stuck on the thought that if I’d never met Delphine, I wouldn’t be sitting across from Miriam at that moment. Didn’t make sense, but who ever said the past does?
CHAPTER 16
I PAID THE BILL AND TALKED MY WAY OUT OF SEEING MIRIAM HOME. Gotta see a pal from my Navy days, kiddo. Yeah, all right, she answered, starting to pout, till I whispered in her ear. Then she brightened and didn’t even seem to care that I left her standing on the corner as I crossed the street. I turned once to wave, then hustled down Massachusetts, toward Mount Vernon Square. I had to get to the library before it closed to pick up Ted Barston’s discharge certificate.
Terrance didn’t much care for our dead-drop site. I hate libraries, he’d said during our lunch at Margie’s. How can you hate some place you’ve never been? I’d shot back. Funny, he’d growled through a plume of cigarette smoke, but he’d agreed to the set-up. On an earlier visit to the library, I’d determined that Dr. William Sherlock’s Practical Discourse Concerning Death had only been checked out once. In October 1921. Not a title likely to find another borrower, especially after I surreptitiously ripped the catalog card from its drawer and gave it to Terrance, so he could find the title. Sure enough, Barston’s dishonorable discharge was folded into the book, along with an unsigned note from my partner: I should read this book sometime—looks like a real gas! I chuckled, ripped the note into tiny pieces, pocketed the certificate.
Outside the library, I hopped on a bus to get to my flat, so I could change clothes before meeting Liv at the Little Palace. Breaking cover was pretty reckless, strictly verboten, and some kind of dumb, for sure. But as long as no one from H & H wandered into the diner—and what were the chances of that?—Ted Barston and the investigation were safe. Just an hour or two with Liv, I told myself, then I’d become Barston again and return to the Jefferson Club.
The Dead Don't Bleed: A Novel Page 13