by Tom Epperson
“That’s all I know for certain, Danny. Beyond that is just rumors, speculation. It’s believed that Bud brought you here from New York. I’ve heard that you’re the son of an old pal of his who once saved his life and now he’s taking you under his wing to pay off the debt. I’ve also heard you’re the son of his sister.”
“Bud Seitz’s nephew?”
“I wouldn’t put much stock in that particular story. I don’t see much of a family resemblance myself,” then he looked at my face more closely. “I don’t know. Perhaps the nose. And around the mouth.”
I sat there in silence, trying to get my head around all this.
“Danny? Are you all right?”
I nodded. I noticed numbly that Gene Autry was drinking a glass of milk—evidently as wholesome off-screen as on.
“Since I’m already speaking out of school here,” said Nuffer, who all the while had been speedily working his way through his steak, and now was on the home stretch, “there’s something else I think you should know.”
“What?”
“Have you heard of the Combination?”
I shook my head.
“It’s simply the people that wield the real power in the Angel City. Some are elected officials, some are businessmen, some are people like your boss. Some might even consider me to be a modest part of the Combination. So here’s the word.
“Imagine rats. Imagine they’re on a ship. Imagine the ship is sinking. Now I’m not suggesting you’re a rat, Danny, but I am suggesting that the future of Bud Seitz in this town is limited, and the more distance you put between yourself and him, the better for you.”
“What are you saying? The Combination’s gonna have Bud killed?”
Nuffer shrugged. “They’re in the midst of a reorganization, let’s put it that way.” He eyed my plate. “You’re not hungry?”
“No. Want my steak?”
“Well, it would be a shame to let something so delicious go to waste.”
He stuck in his fork and plopped the steak on his plate. Juice splashed up on the starchy front of his white shirt.
“Damn it!” He started rubbing at the spots with his napkin. “It’s always something, isn’t it? Now I’ll have to go back to work looking like a slovenly pig. Oh, to hell with virtue. Latona? Latona? Two more martinis please!”
As I drove home from Jack’s, a bit of song came into my head, I didn’t know how I knew it—
Mother of Christ,
Star of the sea,
Pray for the wanderer,
Pray for me.
Chapter 11
BUD KILLED TOMMY at about three-thirty on a Thursday afternoon.
It was two days after my lunch with Nuffer. I was sitting around the Peacock with Bud and Dick and Nello and Willie the Coon. The club didn’t open up till six, so we had it to ourselves. Everybody was drinking coffee and smoking and making the usual numbskulled conversation about nothing.
I looked across the table at Bud and thought: Could he really be my uncle? He’d told me he didn’t have any brothers and sisters but he could have lied about that. I wanted to ask him directly who I was but I’d also promised to protect Nuffer. What if I just told him I’d heard a rumor that such and such was the case? Could he figure out somehow Nuffer was the rat?
Bud was telling us about some suits he’d just bought at a new men’s store in Beverly Hills, then Nello said: “’Member Wingy? And them fucking shirts?”
“Oh yeah,” Bud grinned, then he looked at me. “Before your time, Danny. Wingy Nussbaum. They called him Wingy ’cause he had polio or some kinda shit when he was a kid and he had this funny little arm, it was like a little kid’s arm stuck on this growed-up guy. So he had to have all his coats and shirts made special. One time he ordered fifty silk shirts at thirty bucks a pop. So he goes in to pick up the shirts, and the tailor’s fucked up. He’s made the wrong sleeve short. Well, the tailor’s scared to death Wingy’s gonna kill him or something, but I guess Wingy’s in a good mood ’cause he just says: ‘Don’t worry about it. Just make me some new shirts.’ ‘But what am I gonna do with all these shirts?’ says the tailor. Well Wingy scratches his chin a minute, then says: ‘Bring me some scissors.’ So the tailor comes back with some scissors, and asks Wingy what’s he gonna do. ‘I’m gonna make you some short-sleeve shirts,’ says Wingy, and he cuts the sleeves off all fifty of them fucking thirty-dollar shirts.”
Everybody laughed and started telling Wingy Nussbaum stories: how he bought an oil well on La Cienega and whenever he went to visit it he’d wear high leather boots and puffy pants and a pith helmet like he was going on a safari, and how he once beat a guy to death with the hand crank of an old Ford, and then I saw Tommy walk in.
When he saw us he got a look on his face like maybe he wasn’t expecting Bud to be here and he turned back around, but Bud saw him and called out: “Hey, Tommy! Where you going? Come here!”
Tommy looked panicky for about a half a second then put a smile on and walked toward us as carefully as a man walking on a tight-rope; of course, that very carefulness was a dead giveaway that he was drunk, then he was at the table grinning and chuckling and blowing out boozy breaths all over everybody.
“Hey, fellas. What’s the good word?”
Bud started wiping his hands off on a Kleenex. He was very slow about it. One finger at a time.
“Tell me something. Is the sun down yet?”
Tommy chuckled some more. “Nope. Not last time I looked.”
“It’s summertime, ain’t it? The days last fucking forever, don’t they? It ain’t even close to sundown, is it?”
Tommy was sweating, and swaying a little; he put out his hand and touched the table to stop himself.
“No, Bud. It ain’t close.”
“Then what are you doing walking in here drunk at”—he checked his watch—“three twenty-two in the afternoon? You know it’s against the rules. I don’t want a bunch of lushes working for me. And don’t try and tell me you ain’t plastered.”
Tommy hung his head, like a little kid in front of the school principal. “I’m sorry, Bud. It won’t happen again.”
“You’re goddamn right it won’t happen again.”
Tommy looked as though he was about to cry.
“It’s just that—nothing’s been the same since Goodlooking Tommy got it. Poor bastard. Just ’cause he was reaching for a piece of bread.”
“If he hadn’t’ve been reaching for the bread, I woulda been the one that got it.”
“Better him than you, Bud, that’s for fucking sure. But I miss the son of a bitch. I can’t help it.”
“Goodlooking Tommy was a prick,” Dick said.
“I thought you guys hated each other anyway,” said Nello. “You was always fighting.”
“Naw, Nello, we was like brothers. It was like brothers fighting.”
Bud finished his last finger, and dumped the Kleenex on the Kleenex pile.
“It ain’t easy losing somebody you care about. I know that. But that don’t mean you just gotta fall to pieces. Right?”
Bud was speaking in such a kindly fashion that I could see in Tommy’s eyes he was thinking he was going to get away with it.
“Right.”
“Now let’s go over to the bar.”
“What for?”
But Bud didn’t answer as we all piled out of the booth and followed Bud toward the bar. The little Chinaman that cleaned up around the club was pushing a broom over the dance floor, and he found himself in Bud’s path. His name was Ching-wei, but everybody called him Chink-wei. Bud said: “Outa the way, monkey!” and Ching-wei jumped aside. His mouth hung open as he watched us pass. He had nubby brown teeth and melancholy seen-it-all eyes.
Bud went behind the bar. “Whatcha drinking, Tommy?”
“Nothing.”
“I said what are you drinking.”
“Scotch. That’s what I was drinking.”
“What kinda Scotch?”
“Glenfibbet.”
> Nello and Willie snickered as Bud grabbed a bottle of Glenlivet and set it down on the bar in front of Tommy.
“Drink it.”
Tommy eyed the bottle. It was about three-quarters full.
“All of it?”
“Yeah.”
“I can’t drink that much.”
“You got a puppydog craps in the house, you rub its nose in it. That’s what I’m doing with you.” He unscrewed the cap. “So let’s go. Drink.”
Never taking his eyes off the bottle, like he was looking at a mountain he had to climb, Tommy wiped off his mouth with the back of his hand, then raised the bottle to his lips. He took a long drink then, coughing, set the bottle back down. Nello and Willie were looking on with amusement.
“You know what they say, Tommy,” said Willie. “Don’t buy booze if the baby needs shoes.”
“The baby don’t need shoes,” said Tommy hoarsely. “There ain’t no baby.”
“Bottoms up, Tommy,” said Nello.
“This ain’t fair. I ain’t the only one around here ever took a drink during the day.”
“Maybe so, but you’re the one that got caught,” said Bud. “So keep drinking.”
Tommy continued working his way through the bottle. He coughed and gagged and mumbled and laughed and his eyes watered and got glassier and glassier. He nearly made it too—only had about a golden inch of booze to go when he suddenly threw up all over on the bar. Some of it splashed on Bud’s new suit.
Bud was enraged. “You filthy pig!” He took the bottle by the neck and swung it at Tommy’s head. Tommy lifted up his left arm to block the blow and the bottle shattered against his forearm as his right hand dove into his pants pocket for his gun. But Nello and Willie were all over him and easily wrested the gun away.
Now Bud was incredulous. “You fucking see that? Son of a bitch was gonna shoot me!” His face was turning about eight shades of red. He grabbed handfuls of Tommy’s coat at the shoulders and yanked him over the top of the bar.
Tommy’s body went out of sight and I heard it thumping down on the floor. From one of the shining rows of bottles behind the bar that many a long summer afternoon Tommy had gazed at so longingly, Bud snatched a quart of Wild Turkey and started swinging. I heard a couple of dull-sounding thuds then peered over the bar just in time to see the bottle break over the back of Tommy’s head.
He was on his hands and knees trying to crawl away like Wendell Nuffer. He was screaming and Bud was screaming. Bud was left with the jagged neck of the bottle in his fist and he drove it in Tommy’s neck. Blood spurted and he grabbed one bottle after another and pounded away on Tommy’s back and shoulders and neck and head. More puke came gushing out of Tommy’s mouth. There were jets of blood and explosions of glass and booze as Tommy crawled through the tunnel-like space over the broken glass and the slippery floor.
I looked at Nello and Willie; they were leaning over the bar watching, fascinated, smiling. When I looked for Dick, all I saw was his back as he walked away.
“Stop it, Bud! Jesus Christ! Stop it!” I yelled, but Bud just shot me a lunatic look and kept whaling away.
“Mother, help me! Mother, he’s hurting me!” screamed Tommy.
It was a bottle of dark rum that finally did the trick. It crunched into the back of Tommy’s skull without breaking and Tommy dropped on the floor. A croaky sound came out of his throat, and then he was quiet.
The air stank of liquor. Bud was panting; for someone so particular that even when he went in a fancy joint like Perino’s he’d spend two minutes wiping off the silverware with his napkin, it was interesting how often Bud wound up covered with awful stuff. Some slivers of glass were caught and sparkled in the blood on his face. He took out his handkerchief and began wiping at himself.
I saw the white hair and black-framed glasses of Stan Tinney. He was beholding with dismay the scene behind the bar; it looked like somebody had thrown a bomb back there.
“We open in two and a half hours. Two and a half hours.”
“More than enough time,” said Bud, and he nudged the corpse of Tommy with his toe. “We just need to get this sack of shit outa here,” and then he looked at me.
Chapter 12
FORTUNATELY I GOT Dick to help me out. We wrapped Tommy up in a tablecloth first then rolled him up in a rug from Stan’s office. The rug was so if anybody happened to see us in the Peacock parking lot cramming the body in the rumble seat of Dick’s car they wouldn’t think anything about it. Just two guys with a rug. We brought along a couple of shovels too. Just two guys with a rug and a couple of shovels.
Dick had a Ford coupe painted a hideous orange. We went west on Sunset till we got to Sepulveda where we turned north. Then we crossed over the Sepulveda Pass and went down into the San Fernando Valley. It was beautiful there. Kind of like the Garden of Eden. Orange and walnut and avocado orchards, and wide green well-watered fields, and white farm houses set back from the road surrounded by shade trees. Three pretty teenage girls on horseback gave us sunny smiles and waved at us as we passed. If only, I thought, they knew what was riding in the rumble seat.
“’Member Ginger Rogers?” said Dick wistfully. “When we seen her on that horse?”
“Yeah.”
That’s all either of us said for a long time. We listened to the car radio. Dick smoked. Every now and then he coughed. Finally he went in his pocket and pulled out a folded-up piece of paper, which he handed to me.
“What’s this?” I said.
“Something I found in my mailbox.”
I unfolded it, and read aloud: “‘My friend, you can have it all…more money than you’ve ever dreamed of, and the time and freedom to enjoy it! For a small initial fee, you can become a licensed dealer of J. R. Brinkley’s Goat Gland Extract. This amazing new scientific discovery is GUARANTEED to restore sexual vigor within 24 hours, or the purchase price is cheerfully refunded in full!’”
“See, the deal is,” said Dick, “you don’t do none of the selling yourself. You get a bunch of other guys to do the legwork, and you get a cut of everything they make. While them poor slobs are walking around in the hot sun lugging around suitcases full of this crap and getting doors slammed in their pusses, you’re drinking a beer in a bar someplace and sticking your hand up the skirt of some broad.” He gave a cackling, triumphant laugh, as if he were already living such a delightful life.
I looked over the handbill. “I dunno, Dick. You think anybody’s really gonna buy something like this?”
“You kidding me? Everybody ain’t young and horny like you are, Danny. There’s plenty of guys out there that can’t get it up no more, and they got old ladies driving ’em nuts ever night, just begging for it.”
“I have a friend named George. He says he can’t get it up.”
“See? What did I tell you?”
“He’s glad about it though. He says women are more trouble than they’re worth.”
“Well, most guys, you give ’em the choice, they’d rather be able to get it up. Just so’s they can jack off, if nothing else. So what do you say? You wanna go in partners with me in this?”
“Maybe. But how would Bud figure in?”
“I dunno. We could cut him in too, I guess.” Although at first I heard: We could cut him in two.
“Lookit,” said Dick, “I just want outa this racket. I don’t wanna end up wrapped in a fucking rug like Tommy.”
We got on a highway that led us out of the valley. The green fields and orchards gave way to brown, dried-up hills, and off to our left the sun seemed to get bigger and bigger as it drifted down. I didn’t ask Dick where we were going. I just slumped down in the seat and let the hot dry air gush in through the window and dry the sweat off my face as fast as it formed and I tried not to think about Tommy hollering for his ma. The road rose and then the land began to flatten out, and I saw a few cactuses and knew we were in the desert.
We saw only a few other cars, and one truck filled up with stoves; “STEVE’S STOVES” was paint
ed on the side, and it was traveling so fast you had to assume there was a desperate stove shortage somewhere. After about half an hour, Dick slowed down and turned off the highway onto a rutty dirt road.
We bumped and lurched along toward the setting sun. A wind had kicked up, and dust was blowing across the road, and then a swirl of white and brown feathers. Then I saw a dead chicken. Then I saw a live one, stumbling along the side of the road like it was drunk. It had blood on its feathers. Then we passed a chicken coop and a sagging tarpaper shack, with more chickens wandering around and pecking at the dust.
“Why would anybody,” said Dick, “wanna live way out here and raise fucking chickens?”
The road got increasingly rough, then suddenly ended, as if the roadbuilders had come to their senses and realized the road was a bad idea. We got out of the car. We looked around. You couldn’t see the highway from here. Off in the distance jumbles of bare mountains rose up. I felt like Dick and I didn’t belong here. Like the desert didn’t have the slightest use for us.
We took the shovels out of the car, then I followed Dick out into the desert. We cast long thin shadows as we walked past cactuses and scrubby bushes and strange little twisted trees.
“You been here before, I guess,” I said.
He shrugged.
“Who’s out here?”
“Well—Flumentino’s around someplace.”
“Emperatriz too?”
“I told you. She went back to Mexico, I think.”
“I heard different.”
He was silent; then he smiled a little.
“That Emperatriz was one cute dame. Did I tell you? She had a name for me. El Flaco. The Skinny One. ‘Why you ain’t got no girlfriend, el Flaco?’ she’d say. ‘You are such a handsome man!’”