Shabby Street

by Orrie Hitt

  About a mile further down I drifted over to Main and parked near the corner of Clarke Street. I sat there for quite a while, listening to the kids squeal as they played in the snow, wondering what I’d say to her. It was a waste of time.

  I got out and walked around the corner, looking down the street, moving slow. Some place down there in the darkness was the house where my folks lived and where I had lived. I speculated, vaguely, about what they might have done with the hundred I’d sent them at Christmas. Probably the old lady had bought herself another set of false teeth and the old man had gone on a howling drunk. Some day, when I had the time, I’d go down there and find out.

  I went up the steps and across the porch. The frost in the boards snarled with the cold. From inside came the muted sounds of a radio. I pushed on into the hall and found the door to her apartment. I knocked and waited. I knocked and waited some more. Then, suddenly, the radio came up real loud and the door jumped open a foot.

  “Hello, Julie.”

  She was wearing a red robe that wasn’t tied too securely and her hair was all mixed up around her face.

  “Hi ya, Johnny.”

  Her eyes were animal and shiny and I got the odor of liquor on her breath. I glanced down the break in her robe, past the white fullness on one partially exposed breast. The ragged ends of a nightgown hung below the robe and I could see her bare feet and I could smell the sweat all around her. I wanted to get sick right there in that hall.

  I kicked the door open. “I been down to the restaurant, looking all over — ”

  I stopped talking. I stopped walking. For a second or so I thought I’d stop living. I was conscious of the dim lights, of the door being closed — and of him.

  “Well, Sammy,” I said.

  “What’s new, Johnny.”

  He was stretched out on the old sofa and he didn’t have a damn thing on except a pair of shorts. A bottle of liquor sat on the floor and a couple of half filled glasses beside it.

  “Sammy Grick,” I said, my voice tight.

  It was as simple as drawing a straight line, but I’d had no way of knowing about it. She’d met him in the office, up there at the Connors Agency, and some of it hadn’t worn off.

  “What are you trying to celebrate?” I asked her. “Next Christmas?”

  She walked around the room, holding the robe tight, every bit of her moving in all directions at once.

  “You ought to know,” she said.

  “Maybe.”

  Sammy sat up and lit a cigarette. He held out the pack but I shook my head and he put it away again.

  “Connors get in touch with you?”

  “When?”

  “Today.”

  “No.”

  Sammy started to get up but changed his mind. His shorts didn’t fit him so good.

  “The old guy was calling my place early this morning. Wanted to know where he could reach you.”

  I’d spent the night in Waymart and it’d only taken me a few minutes to move out of the apartment.

  “To hell with him,” I said. “I got no time for that guy.”

  A grin twisted Sammy’s lips.

  “You got any time for your wife?”

  “Just what do you mean by that?”

  “She’s in the hospital.” He let me wait while he finished his drink. “They took her down there about five this morning. I guess she was pretty bad. The old man sounded all busted up. He thought you ought to know.”

  “Thanks.”

  “You don’t sound worked up about it.”

  “I don’t even know what’s bothering her,” I said. “Maybe she’s just tired.”

  But I didn’t feel that way about it at all. I was going around inside like a butter churn. She was my wife and I’d lived with her and now there was something wrong. She’d been all mixed up and unhappy for a long time and she hadn’t ought to have anything else happen.

  “So long, kids,” I said and walked to the door.

  “Johnny!”

  I gave her the same look as I’d give a Hudson County prostitute.

  “So long, baby.”

  “Johnny!”

  She jerked my hand away from the door and slammed it shut. Her eyes were all wet and the tears hung like big drops of rain on her cheeks. She crawled in close to me, putting her head on my chest, and I could feel the warmth of her.

  “Don’t go,” she pleaded. “It’s a trap. They want to arrest you.”

  “You should stop drinking so much.”

  “Please, Johnny!”

  I pushed her away. She tripped on a rug and almost fell. The robe flopped open and for a couple of seconds she was practically naked. Very deliberately she took the sash and tied it tight, staring at me all the time, her mouth pulled out of shape.

  “Go ahead,” she said. “Maybe you deserve it, lying to me the way you did.”

  Off and on I’d told so many lies that I couldn’t remember them all.

  “I didn’t lie to you, baby.”

  “You said you were going to get everything straightened out. That day down in the restaurant you told me to wait and that you’d do what’s right.

  You’re a damned liar, Johnny.”

  I shrugged and opened the door again.

  “They’ve got the auditors down there and Mr. Connors is going to get you at last. Twenty thousand dollars you’re short, Johnny!” Her voice rose up into a sob. “Oh, Johnny, why did you do it?”

  Very slowly, very carefully I closed the door. There was a key in the lock and I turned that and dropped it into my pocket.

  “You’d better get on your feet, Sammy,” I said.

  I could see it all, like it was a picture smeared on the wall. He’d been after her, chasing her, wanting her. And she’d tried to stick to me and believe. So he’d lied about the audit, making her hate me, driving her to him.

  “Tell me how short I am,” I said, moving toward him.

  “Johnny!”

  “Tell me!”

  He slid along the davenport, trying to get away. I jumped fast and grabbed. I caught the loose flesh on his chest in my left hand, locked the fingers shut and twisted. His face got red and he let out a moan. I jerked him upright and slammed my right into his jaw. Blood and saliva spurted from his mouth and I could see the corner of a broken tooth. I let go of him and fired another right. His head snapped back first, going all the way back, and then his body went with it, moving up over the davenport and pounding into the wall.

  “Now you’ve got something to play around with,” I told her. “Fix him up so he’ll run again.”

  “Johnny!”

  I unlocked the door.

  “Johnny!”

  She was still yelling my name when I reached the sidewalk, but by the time I got to the corner the wind whipped it away into the night.

  I got into the car, trying not to think about it, and started the motor.

  I drove down Main to Crawford and took the traffic circle up over the railroad. There were two hospitals in town but the big one, St. Francis, was the most popular.

  The Catholic Sister behind the desk at St. Francis told me Beverly’s room number. A nurse took me up to the second floor in a slow-moving, ether-scented elevator. I walked down the hall and quietly went into her private room without knocking.

  She was lying there, her face almost as colorless as the white sheet, staring vacantly at the ceiling. At my entrance she turned her head slightly, then quickly glanced away.

  “Hello, Beverly.”

  She was silent for a long, agonizing moment.

  “What do you want?” she whispered.

  I went and stood beside the bed.

  “Nothing. I just heard you were here.”

  “Is that all you heard?”

  “Yes.”

  Her shoulders rose and fell sharply.

  “He’s dead,” she said. “He was born dead. A month too early, the doctor said. Too much excitement.”

  I felt like getting down on my knees and tel
ling her what a no-good bastard I was. For a couple of seconds I felt empty and torn and broken inside. I knew then that I’d wanted the kid to live, no matter who his mother was, as long as he was part of me.

  “That’s lousy,” I said.

  “You didn’t want him.”

  “That isn’t the way I feel right now.”

  “It’s the way you felt before, Johnny.”

  “Maybe,” I admitted. “And maybe I didn’t know just how I felt.”

  There was a long, awkward silence. I started to light a cigarette, noticed the No Smoking sign and put the cigarette away again. I took a gum wrapper from my pocket, found it minus the gum and stood there holding it. I bent down and sniffed the flowers on the side table.

  “He wasn’t even old enough to have a funeral,” she said. “Isn’t that awful?”

  I nodded. She stirred in the bed and I could feel her looking at me.

  “Just a name,” she said. “You can give them a name if you want to. Any name. Just as long as you don’t want to use it again.”

  I straightened slowly. She was blinking her eyes, driving back the tears.

  “I called him Johnny,” she said. “Johnny Reagan, Jr.”

  “Yeah.”

  “I’ll never want to use that name again.”

  “No.”

  She pushed the sheet away. She raised one hand and found my arm. Her fingers were strong and warm.

  “I’ve done a lot of growing up in here, Johnny. My mother wondered why I didn’t cry a lot. I couldn’t cry for him, Johnny. I didn’t do it. You didn’t do it. It happened. God did it.”

  “Maybe.”

  “He hates us, Johnny.’

  “That’s a rough thing to say.”

  “I don’t mean as individuals.” Her voice was growing steadier, softer. “I mean as two people who did some awful things together and even worse things to each other.”

  “I see what you mean.”

  “And if he had lived — well, it would have gone on. I don’t mean we would have lived together, or stayed married, or even seen much of each other. But you’d have come to see him, sometimes, and he’d have been there, living, not letting it die for us.”

  “You hadn’t ought to think about it so much.”

  “I just wanted to tell you.”

  “All right.”

  Her lips trembled and her eyes brimmed full.

  “I think I loved you once, Johnny,” she said. “It’ll never be the same with anybody else, ever again.”

  I was pretty sure she’d outgrow me fast, but I didn’t say anything.

  “You’re so big,” she said. “So cruel. So absolutely ruthless. I — I feel so helpless around you.”

  She’d had me a little mixed up, too.

  “I’ll see you later,” I said. “Some day when you’re feeling better, when we can talk.”

  Gently I freed her hand and let it drop to the bed. I bent and kissed her briefly on the mouth.

  “Dad’s very upset,” she said. “He told me you weren’t short.”

  I nodded and walked to the door.

  “Forget it,” I said. “I’ll drop around in a week or so.” I thought about Florida and the hot sands and what I was going to do. “Or I’ll write,” I added. “I might write, anyway.”

  “Johnny?”

  “Yes, Beverly.”

  “I won’t be home, Johnny. And you won’t have to write, or see me. I’ll get the divorce.”

  I hesitated only a moment.

  “Okay,” I said.

  I went out into the hall and closed the door. The elevator was on its way down and almost as soon as I jammed the button the doors opened and I got on.

  The nurse had to remind me to get off when we reached the main floor.

  I even forgot to ask them if I was supposed to pay the bill.

  CHAPTER XXIII

  Sold

  ON MONDAY morning I had a short note from Cynthia Noxon telling me she’d be up later that day. The envelope had been originally addressed to me at the Connors Agency but somebody over there had been kind enough to forward it to Waymart. It wasn’t a challenge and it wasn’t an admission of defeat. She just said she was coming.

  “When this tomato shows up,” I told the dumpy girl in the outer office, “have her cool her buttons out here for a spell.”

  “Yes, Mr. Reagan.”

  I went back and gloated over the renewal file. It was thick and bulky and loaded with money. And she’d pay for every nickel of it. One way or another. Or both.

  At ten the phone rang and somebody yelled in that it was for me.

  It was Connors.

  “I have to see you, Johnny. Right away. Can you drive over?”

  He sounded pretty urgent but I didn’t let that annoy me.

  “Not today,” I said. “I’m wrapped up like a mummy.”

  “Well, listen to this, then. You’ll be interested in this, Johnny. I no more than got into the office this morning when a man showed up. He was looking for you.”

  There was a brief pause.

  “Yeah?” I could feel it coming, something wrong, sweeping in and over me. “What did this guy want?”

  “His name is Goldstein, Johnny. He wants to buy another annuity just like the one you sold him.” Connors’ voice dripped disgust. “Remember that one, Johnny?”

  Nuts, I thought, I should have given the old guy the works. He’d had fifteen thousand and I’d only tried for half because I hadn’t wanted to frighten him off. Now he was crossing me up. He thought he had a real bargain and he was going after the rest of it. What a laugh!

  “Sure, I remember him,” I said, thinking fast. “I’ve been trying to broker that thing all over the place, only I haven’t had any luck.”

  “We sell annuities,” he reminded me quietly. “Maybe the income isn’t as high — or fantastic — but we sell them.”

  “Look, I just figured that thing wrong, that’s all. I was figuring ten when I should only have used seventy-five hundred. I didn’t want to disappoint him. I’ve been trying to work it out.”

  “I’ll bet.”

  “I’ll have it all squared away this week.”

  “You’d better, Johnny.” His voice became suddenly sore and vicious, ripping at me across the line. “You have that money in my office tomorrow morning or I’m turning the whole thing over to the insurance department. I told Mr. Goldstein that I’d be responsible — you used my name and you were in my employ at that time — and I will. Only you won’t get away with it, Johnny. You took that money from him and you either have it some place — or you don’t have it. And you’d better have it. I’m telling you, Johnny. Don’t play it out any longer.”

  The telephone whanged in my ear and I jumped about two feet. I sat there staring at it.

  A couple of hours later I was over being mad. I almost thought I might be getting a little bit scared. Old Connors had meant it about the insurance department. They could move in and throw me in jail or do almost anything else they felt like doing.

  Things, it seemed, were rolling up a short, dead-end street.

  I didn’t go out for lunch; I just sat on my nerves and waited. I wondered if Cynthia Noxon would show, if she’d have any money and, if she did, what I’d be able to work out with her.

  I got out those renewals and looked at them again. All told they were worth somewhere around forty thousand dollars but I could never hope to get that much for them. Maybe half. I was counting on half, which would give me enough to pay off Goldstein — I’d been going to do that, anyway — and I’d have plenty left over to make a big splash some place else.

  The hands of the clock moved around to three. I could feel the sweat running down my sides and legs. I kept going to the door and looking out front to see if she was there. All I got was more suspense.

  About quarter of four, when I glanced out, I hit the jackpot. She’d just come in with some elderly-appearing guy. I didn’t keep her waiting.

  “Hi, there!” I said. “Co
me on in.”

  She said something to the guy and he sat down in a chair like a trained dog. Then she came through to my office, wrapped in a three-quarter fur coat, her hard, cosmetic face in first class shape, her eyes bright and washing all over me.

  “Gee, it’s good to see you!” she said.

  She was lying but I grinned and closed the door. I waved her into a chair alongside the desk. She opened the coat and sat down. I got a flash of white flesh as she crossed one leg over the other.

  “How have you been, Johnny?”

  “Fine.”

  “Still going strong?”

  “Yeah. You know me, baby.”

  I dug out a bottle and offered her a drink. She said she didn’t want any, thanks, but I didn’t let that stop me. I had one for luck.

  “Who’s the money bags out front?”

  She flushed slightly.

  “Did anybody ever tell you that you’re very crude?”

  “Not lately.”

  “He’s — well, he’s an associate.”

  “I see.”

  “You make it sound so nasty.”

  I winked at her and lit a Camel. Now that she was in the office with me, where we could talk and I could see her, I wasn’t so nervous. I tried to stop thinking about Goldstein and his stinking money. I couldn’t let her know, not for a second, that I had to sell and had to sell fast.

  “Things have been a little rough on you, huh?”

  “You know that, Johnny.”

  “Well, you brought it on yourself, baby. You dropped the egg out of the basket and it hatched.”

  “We all make mistakes.”

  “Sure.”

  “One of mine was misjudging you.” She uncrossed her legs and I got an even better look.

  “I came up to talk terms,” she said, leaning forward. Her dress dipped low in front but I couldn’t see anything except a handful of pink silk. “I’m prepared to be reasonable, Johnny.”

  “You’re the one that’s buying.”

  “Or selling,” she said earnestly. “One of us has to move over. We can’t go on fighting each other. It doesn’t make sense.”

  “No.”

  “Name your choice, Johnny. Do you want me — or do I get you?”