The Dada Caper
Page 6
Betsy said it isn’t better but it pays a hundred dollars more.
I said I guess that’s better.
Betsy said I guess.
She went into the kitchen and I could hear her bustling around.
She whistled “Get Me to the Church on Time.”
I was watching the six o’clock news when she called me in.
There was steak and mushrooms and sliced tomatoes and chocolate pudding topped with whipped cream and a maraschino cherry.
Betsy is a good cook.
That night we played cribbage.
It is hard to find a woman who can play cribbage.
Betsy is very good at cribbage.
Betsy beat my brains out.
Six straight.
She skunked me three times.
She apologized.
She said sweetie there really isn’t much skill in cribbage.
She said I just kept drawing those double runs.
I said I noticed that.
Betsy said you’ll win next time.
I said that’s the same old crock they kept handing Napoleon.
Betsy made coffee and we drank it at the kitchen table by candlelight.
Betsy makes excellent coffee.
After a long silence Betsy said you seem a bit down in the mouth tonight.
I said it must have been that afternoon nap.
Betsy said good Lord Chance are you jealous of what I do?
I shrugged.
I said I don’t know.
I said well maybe.
I said but just a little bit.
Betsy said you don’t know how happy that makes me.
She said but you shouldn’t be jealous.
She said you’ve known for more than three years.
I said sure but I’ve only lived with you for a few days.
Betsy said aw Chance.
She reached across the table and squeezed my chin.
She was smiling but there were tears on her cheeks.
In the candlelight they looked like gold.
I brushed them away.
Betsy said honey do you remember the first time?
She said you got my number and you called me.
She said I came for an hour and I spent the night and I wouldn’t take your money.
She said boy were you ever something special.
She said I’ve loved you ever since.
She said I just can’t help it.
I said so what the hell are you crying about?
Betsy gave me a sniffling little grin.
She said you would never understand.
She said for God’s sake come to bed.
I said who says there ain’t no mental telepathy?
The goddam phone rang.
I said that miserable no good Alexander Graham Bell.
I said that meddling old bastard.
Betsy giggled.
Then she sat down and doubled up laughing.
Sometimes whores are hard to figure out.
They got that much in common with call girls.
38
…going to bed with a good woman can relax a man…going to bed with a bad woman can relax a man twicet…iffen he is a good man…
Monroe D. Underwood
Betsy blew in at three twenty-two.
I just happened to notice.
I pretended I was asleep.
Betsy slipped into bed.
She was very warm and very soft and very smooth.
She started biting on my shoulder and blowing on my neck.
It was probably the blowing on my neck that did it.
About four o’clock Betsy said Chance you’re just a big pushover.
I shrugged.
I said I ought to be.
I said I work very hard at it.
Betsy said tell me something.
She said are you getting over Candi Yakozi?
I shrugged.
I said Candi who?
Betsy said I see that you don’t even know her.
I said that’s right.
Betsy said believe me you really don’t.
She said Candi does weird things.
I said like go to bed with private detectives.
Betsy said oh worse than that.
Betsy said once she took the garbage out while wearing nothing but her panties.
She said at noon.
I said well it beats going out stark naked.
Betsy said not by much.
Betsy said you know what kind of panties Candi wears.
I shrugged.
I said as a matter of fact I didn’t even know she wore panties.
Betsy winced.
She said I guess I asked for that.
I said it’s a wonder she didn’t get raped or arrested.
Betsy said she did.
I said which?
Betsy said she got raped by the cops who arrested her.
I said speaking of rape there is some old woman who is raping bartenders.
Betsy said that’s utterly impossible.
I shrugged.
I said okay.
I said let’s get some sleep.
Betsy said why don’t we have a good-night cigarette first?
We had a whole bunch of good-night cigarettes.
Dawn was breaking when Winston chirped us to sleep from the window ledge.
Betsy is sort of wonderful to be with.
39
…just ain’t hardly nothing I enjoy like real high-class conversation…I would liked to of sat in with them there Greeks…Soccertoe and Platypus…man them sure would of been some kind of discussions…
Monroe D. Underwood
Betsy went out on a call that Saturday.
I bought a carton of Camels at Mama Rosa’s grocery store.
Mama Rosa didn’t know anybody named Nivlek Ysteb.
I got a haircut at Kelvin and Armitage.
The barber didn’t know anybody named Nivlek Ysteb.
I got five dollars’ worth of gas.
The station attendant didn’t know anybody named Nivlek Ysteb.
There wasn’t much doing at Wallace’s.
Old Dad Underwood was sitting at the bar.
He was trying to stand a dime on edge.
Wallace watched him suspiciously.
Old Dad Underwood said oncet I knowed a feller what could stand a razor blade on edge.
Wallace said before or after he shaved with it?
Old Dad Underwood said I never asked him.
Wallace said well you should of.
He said that’s important.
I ordered a schooner of beer.
Wallace said my head aches so bad my goddam belt buckle hurts.
I said you ever hear of somebody named Nivlek Ysteb?
Wallace scratched his head.
He shrunk from the pain.
He said not that I know of.
He said last year I met three guys named Zunk.
I said it is probably very unusual to meet even one guy named Zunk.
Wallace said these was brothers.
He said they got a truck farm out on Bloomingdale Road.
He said they call it Zunk’s Bloomingdale Road Truck Farm.
Old Dad Underwood slipped his dime into his pocket.
He came over and sat beside me.
I bought him a beer.
He said names is funny things.
Wallace nodded.
He gritted his teeth in agony.
Old Dad Underwood said now you take the name of Smith.
He said I ain’t never knowed nobody named Smith.
He said I still don’t know nobody named Smith.
I said not knowing somebody named Smith is also probably very unusual.
I said why it may be even more unusual than meeting three guys named Zunk.
Old Dad Underwood said by Christ you are beyond doubt one hunnert goddam absolutely percent correct.
Wallace said oh I wouldn’t go quite t
hat far.
He said just look in the phone book.
He said for every goddam Smith which is in there I will show you forty-five goddam Zunks which ain’t in there.
Old Dad Underwood said how you going to show me forty-five goddam Zunks which ain’t in there if they ain’t even in there in the firstest place?
Wallace said I think perhaps you better get back to whatever it was you wasn’t making no goddam sense of in the second place.
Old Dad Underwood said all right I am undoubtedly the only man in the country what don’t know nobody named Smith.
He said I used to lay awake of nights just praying I would meet somebody named Smith.
He said this was all on account of I wanted to be like other people.
Old Dad Underwood shot a defiant forefinger into the air.
His voice swelled to a shout of triumph.
He said them days is gone forever.
He said my friends I am here to tell you that things has changed.
He said now I don’t never want to meet nobody named Smith.
He said all them goddam Smiths can just get in line to kiss my ass.
Old Dad Underwood smote the bar with the flat of his hand.
It made a sharp spanging sound.
Like a ninety-millimeter gun.
Wallace recoiled.
He glared at Old Dad Underwood.
He said you do that just one more time and I am going to throw your goddam ass out in the middle of the goddam street.
Old Dad Underwood ignored Wallace.
He said now I can dare to be different.
He said just wait till you are seventy.
He said you too will dare to be different.
Wallace said why do we just not change the goddam subject?
He said maybe we ought to talk about ESP or something.
Old Dad Underwood said that ESP just ain’t no good.
He said I knowed a feller what put a can in his car and now his radio don’t work no more.
Wallace looked at me with beseeching eyes.
He said there just ain’t no way I deserve this.
Old Dad Underwood said he poured it right in the radiator too.
Wallace said I ain’t never hurt nobody in my whole goddam life.
He picked up my glass and shuffled sadly away to the tap.
I said forget it Wallace.
I said I got to get back to the temple of love.
Old Dad Underwood said I heard all about them there kinds of places.
He said I knowed a feller what went in one called the Passion Spa.
He said they had to take him out on a stretcher.
Wallace’s saddle-brown eyes lit up.
He said hot damn what happened?
Old Dad Underwood said he fell down the stairs and busted his leg.
Wallace leaned on the beer spout.
He said I am going to sell this joint and get drunk forever.
Old Dad Underwood said if I was you I would try something I never done before.
I left.
On the way home I pulled up at Mama Rosa’s grocery store.
Mama Rosa still didn’t know anybody named Nivlek Ysteb.
I bought a package of bubble gum.
That way the day wasn’t completely wasted.
40
…firstest wives never lasts as long as secondest wives…until they becomes secondest wives…
Monroe D. Underwood
Betsy fixed pork chops and scalloped potatoes that evening.
After coffee I gave her a hand with the dishes.
Betsy said what should we do tonight?
I said how about a movie?
Betsy said I thought we might stay home and enjoy some stimulating conversation.
I said it just so happens that I was involved in some stimulating conversation a little earlier in the day.
I said it stimulated me to come home.
I said you want some bubble gum?
Betsy said I mean stimulating conversation about us getting married.
I said somehow I do not find this sort of conversation to be particularly stimulating.
Betsy folded the dish towel.
She draped it over the sink.
She gave me a nice level look.
She said we will be married someday.
I said the meek will inherit the earth someday.
I went into the living room.
I sat on the couch.
Betsy brought me a beer.
She sat beside me.
She put her arm around me.
She said Chance I believe you’re afraid to get married.
I said I got a right to be afraid.
I said I got a right to be rigid with terror.
Betsy said you never told me what happened during your first marriage.
I said I don’t like the way you emphasized first marriage.
I said you seemed to imply that there could be a second.
Betsy said so tell me.
I said maybe I better tell you what didn’t happen.
I said that way we might get to bed by midnight.
Betsy said did she drink a lot?
I said was Hitler a Nazi a lot?
Betsy said did she sleep around?
I said well let’s just say she had a split personality.
I said one-half nympho and one-half maniac.
Betsy said where is she now?
I said I don’t know and nobody better never ever tell me.
Betsy went to the closet and took out a jacket.
She said what movie do you have in mind?
I shrugged.
41
…lastest western movie I seen they let me in for free…cost me fourteen dollars to get out…
Monroe D. Underwood
We ended up at a western.
Showdown in Sundown City.
Or some goddam thing.
I fell asleep during the big shoot-out.
On the way home Betsy said the good guys won it.
I said that figures.
I said they got a big edge in the series.
I said God is always on their side that’s why.
42
…if all the Smiths was laid end-to-end there just ain’t no telling what might happen…
Monroe D. Underwood
Monday morning Betsy had a call in Arlington Heights.
When she left I had three cups of coffee and a brainstorm.
I looked in the telephone book for Ystebs.
I found one.
3442 West Belmont Avenue.
I dialed the number.
A woman answered.
I said is Nivlek there?
The woman said who this?
I had to think fast.
I said Boris.
She said Boris who?
I said Stranguloff.
She said I don’t know nobody named Stranguloff.
She said I don’t even know nobody named Boris.
I said what about Nivlek?
She said I don’t know nobody named Nivlek.
I said do you know anybody named Smith?
She said no.
I said neither does Old Dad Underwood.
She said I don’t know nobody named Underwood.
43
…oncet I knowed a feller what could imitate a butterfly on the telephone…fooled me every goddam time…never did explain how he done it…
Monroe D. Underwood
An hour or so later the phone rang.
I picked it up.
A deep voice said Betsy?
I said oh yes.
I said is that you Henrietta?
The line went dead.
44
…only Smiths I ever heard of was John and Al…some injun woman saved John…wasn’t nobody could of helped Al…
Monroe D. Underwood
I found a suburban telephone book in a drugstore.
No Ystebs.
I called th
e plumbers’ union.
No Ystebs.
I called the Brotherhood of Railroad Trainmen.
A grouchy bastard said we don’t got no Ystebs.
He told me they had almost two hundred Smiths.
45
…oncet I knowed a feller what understood women…never did get married for some reason…
Monroe D. Underwood
That night Betsy and I went to one of those old-fashioned pubs for a hamburger and a beer.
Betsy had the hamburger.
I had the beer.
I said do you know anybody named Nivlek Ysteb?
Betsy said should I?
I said how the hell would I know?
Betsy gave me a funny look.
She said by God I think I’ll have a beer.
46
…just don’t pay to be too skeptical…oncet I knowed a feller what claimed to be Jesus Christ…he took a quart of wine to the men’s room…came back with a quart of water…that kind of carrying on makes a feller stop and think…
Monroe D. Underwood
On Friday morning I drove to Elmwood Park.
There was nothing but my pay in the post office box.
I stuck the envelope in my pocket and headed for Wallace’s.
Wallace was slumped against the backbar.
He was shaking his head from side to side.
Like a bull when it sees a red flag.
He said I am going to peddle this joint and move to Alaska.
He said I am going to open a whole bunch of gold mines.
I said you already got a gold mine.
Wallace said yes but this particular gold mine is in Chicago.
He said I get these here awful headaches in Chicago you see.
I said just a minute Wallace.
I said could there be the slightest possibility that strong drink might be related to your problem?
Wallace said drinking ain’t got absolutely nothing to do with it.
He said it is the air pollution and them Sox.
Shorty Connors came in.
Shorty Connors stood about six feet six.
He was called Shorty because his brother stood about six feet nine.
Shorty Connors was carrying a battered old cornet.
Wallace approached Shorty Connors very cautiously.