Jerry Tracy, hardboiled wise-cracker, pulls two grand out of the snow
DESERTED SEVENTH AVENUE WAS a blurry wilderness of flying white. It was unexpectedly quiet and lovely. The snow was falling steadily, eddying downward in thick gusts. Jerry Tracy took a deep breath and the cold wind burned in his lungs like wine. It whipped away the memory of the late poker game and the stale dregs of cigarette smoke; made him tingle from head to foot.
A belated taxi went scudding past with a faint slap, slap of its skid chains. The drowsy hotel doorman fingered his whistle and glanced at the Planet’s columnist. It was late—or perhaps early; about 3 a.m.
Tracy said: “The hell with a cab. I haven’t seen snow like this since I first hit this lousy burg. I’ll walk.”
He turned up the velvet collar of his Chesterfield, tilted the expensive derby low on his forehead and shoved his gloved hands deep in his pockets.
He started southward along the deserted avenue. His patent-leather shoes kicked up the feathery snow in little puffs like frozen smoke.
He skidded around a windy corner and plodded east. He was halfway towards Sixth Avenue when he saw a figure ahead of him.
Unconsciously, he quickened his pace. A girl—no kiddin’. All alone in a blizzard at this grim hour of the morning! Having a hard job to navigate, judging from her bent back and her uneven trail in the snow. She was going in the same direction he was—head down to the sharp claw of the wind—and moving unsteadily. Looked like a liquor stagger. He grinned faintly and fished professionally for a flip headline: Just a broad abroad. Not a bad pun; hey, Jerry? The hell you say; it’s lousy!
He had no trouble overtaking her. As he came abreast he gave her a quick once-over and the grin went out of his eyes. Again his brain buzzed. No booze there, Jerry! Sez you. Sez me. All right—so what?
He slowed down and kept in step with her.
“You look all in, baby. None of my damn’ business, of course.” He hesitated. “Got far to go?”
She made no sign whatever to indicate that she had heard him. Her head didn’t turn; it continued to push obstinately against the wind as though dragging the rest of her numb body along like a trailer.
He eyed the pinched profile curiously. Her chin was jerking with the cold like a paralytic’s; he couldn’t tell whether she was a hot-house beauty or a hag. Plenty young, though—and plenty weak on her pins. She wasn’t taking a short stroll, either. The front of her skimpy cloth coat was crusted white from collar to hem; her shoes were sodden.
He said: “Listen, kid!” and that didn’t get him anything.
He stepped around in front of her and stood there. She ran right into him like an automaton. Her hands came up and clawed mechanically at his chest trying to push him away. He had to bend his head to catch the words.
“Not for —— sale —— damn you!”
“Don’t be that way. Listen, kid! You broke?”
She raised her head dumbly. The lips writhed away from her chattering teeth. She looked wolfish, wild.
“Not—for sale—Mister.”
“Cripes sake!” he snarled. “Stop talking movie. … You haven’t got a thin dime—and you’re not used to it. How about a beef stew with a flock of potatoes?”
Her hands made a weak clutch at his lapel and missed. She fell forward. Her weight threw him off balance and he went awkwardly to one knee in the snow with his arm about her. She hadn’t fainted; she was conscious, with bleak, wide-open eyes.
He got her to her feet and held her braced close so that her head lolled on his shoulder. —— damn the snow! He winked his eyes and stared desperately up and down the deserted street. Try and find a cop!
His mind worked swiftly. A flock of unpleasant thoughts: What a sucker I am to bother my head! Nerts; you wouldn’t leave a dog out on a night like this. The poor little rat’s all in! Damn right; she might croak on me right here—wouldn’t that be swell! What the hell, Jerry; be decent; flag a cab. Try and find a hack in this lousy blizzard. … Maybe I could walk her down to a drug-store. That’s a laugh, too. …
His eyes veered down the street with sudden hope. Headlights were boring through the snow under the Elevated structure at Sixth Avenue. He saw the beams bounce up and down as the car crossed the tracks.
Tracy waved his free arm and yelped. “Taxi! Hey, Taxi!”
It pulled towards the side drifts. A yellow cab all splotched over with snow. A wop with a fat face and a sheepskin coat. Tight little eyes like hard black show-buttons.
“Pile out here, fella, and gimme a hand!”
The hackman didn’t move. Just sat still and peered at the two of them.
“What’s the matter with the dame, Mac?”
“She just keeled over in the snow. She’s starved—half frozen. Some poor little two-bit dame on her uppers.”
The hard eyes blinked and got smaller.
“Are yuh sure she ain’t dead, Mac?”
He crawled out and looked at the girl closely. He shrugged. “Okey, Mac, so long as you come along wit’ her. I ain’t takin’ no rap for nobody.” He studied Jerry’s face, his silk muffler, the wing collar, the black bat-wing tie. “An’ it’s gonna cost yuh a buck over the meter, Bigboy. Tonight’s no night for hackin’, what I mean—I’m on me way to the garage right now.”
“Am I arguing?” Jerry grated. “Gimme a hand!”
Together they got her into the cab. Tracy dropped down next to her and slammed the door shut. The shoe-button eyes looked back from the driver’s seat.
“Where yuh wanna dump her? Polyclinic Hospital’s the nearest.”
There was a “Heated Cab” sticker on the door of the taxi but the cab’s interior was as cold as Greenland. The newspaper columnist shivered as he peeled off his coat and tucked it around the girl.
“You’re a swell advertiser,” he growled. “Heated cab, nerts!”
“Where yuh wanna dump her?” repeated the sullen voice. “Polyclinic?”
“No; I don’t!” He gave the wop the address of the towering hive on whose dizzy pinnacle rested “Libel’s End,” the Tracy penthouse.
The cab lurched ahead through the snow.
Jerry braced the dazed girl with one arm, reached with the other for his silver flask, uncapped it, tilted it carefully to the girl’s slack mouth. A lot of the liquor ran down her chin on to his prize English overcoat; but she swallowed some of it. He sat back, satisfied. “Old Doc Tracy. No diploma but lots of brains!” A moment later he swore softly as she quivered, gagged feebly and vomited the liquor.
Cripes, he thought, she’s empty as a drum. … Can’t hold two swallows of smooth, honest to God rye on her stomach. … Jeeze, she must be starved! He kept patting her shoulder with a kind of futile, monotonous gesture. He kept telling her: “Okey, kid. That don’t mean a thing. We got ’em licked; hey, kid?”
The cab stopped presently. A uniformed doorman hurried down a shoveled path under a long sidewalk canopy. He carried an opened umbrella in his hand. He threw open the door and beamed at the columnist. “Good evening, Mr. Tracy. Be careful getting out, sir; it’s slippery at the curb.”
The cab’s dome light glowed and he saw suddenly the extra huddled passenger. He stood there smiling woodenly, holding the umbrella over his head like a black toadstool.
“What the hell are you standing there for? Hotfoot it inside and put a call upstairs to McNulty. Tell him to start some hot coffee. Tell him I want it ready by the time I get up there. And send the elevator man out here to give me a hand.”
“Yes, Mr. Tracy.” He closed the umbrella with a snap and departed on a trot, his plum-colored coat-tails whipping in the wind.
Jerry leaned forward and peered at the dimly lit meter. He counted out the fare, added a dollar to it and thrust the money in the hackman’s grimy paw.
The doorman and the elevator man loomed outside in the snowflakes. Together they lifted the dazed girl out of the cab, caught hold of her on either side and walked her into the warm lobby.
McNu
lty was waiting upstairs in the penthouse foyer, his yellow Oriental face wooden and impassive. He led the procession into the beamed living-room and Tracy smelled coffee and the acrid odor of wood-smoke. Crackling flames were licking at the fresh logs in the fireplace—good old Chink, McNulty!
The columnist became a swift demon of energy. He yanked a deep leather chair over to the fire, plopped down a footstool, slipped a bill to the waiting housemen and gave them the office to scram. Then he propped up the girl and pulled off her snow-covered coat.
“Okey, McNulty. Gimme the Java!”
The Chinaman shook his head without excitement.
“She plenty cold, eh, Boss? Velly much no eat. You go way. Me take care.”
He fed her a teaspoonful of coffee, watched her narrowly, gave her a couple more. She kept the stuff down; and bit by bit he fed her the whole cup and filled another. Tracy yanked off her thin shoes, ungartered her stockings and peeled them off.
He began to chafe the bluish feet and ankles with brisk palms.
McNulty said calmly: “Be back bime-by. You wait see,” and disappeared without haste.
What a guy, Tracy thought admiringly. That Chink would look just as wooden if I brought in a giraffe and asked him to cut its head off. He’d say, “Can do,” and bring in a stepladder and a meat saw!
He kept rubbing the bare feet briskly, watching the girl’s thin face. She looked ruddy in the firelight, less witchlike. Her chin had ceased its ugly quivering.
After a while McNulty was back with a steaming bowl containing a clear straw-colored soup. She smiled wanly and drank it down with eager little gulps. She started to rise.
“Sit still a minute,” Tracy ordered. He raced into his bedroom and came back with a brown fuzzy bathrobe and a pair of slippers. “Get out, McNulty, and stay out!” He put the slippers on her bare feet. “Can you stand up all right, kid? That’s swell! Now just hold those arms up for a second. … ”
He pulled the dark dress over her head and tossed it aside.
She stood there, swaying a little, looking at him with troubled eyes. He was holding the brown bathrobe wide to the fireplace, toasting it in the dancing heat. His head turned briefly.
“Not afraid, are you, kid?”
She shook her head weakly.
“You shouldn’t be. Got to get to bed quick or you’ll have a swell case of pneumonia … Almost ready with the robe! Just turn your back to me. Kick off the rest of those things.”
He spoke casually. She hesitated. Then her back turned. There was a swift, candid glimpse of white skin; then he whipped the warm robe around her, picked her up bodily and carried her into the bedroom. He slipped her under the covers, bathrobe and all; piled more covers on top.
He stepped outside for a moment and reappeared with his flask. “Try and keep some of this down, baby; it’ll start you sweating.”
She smiled glassily at him. “You’re a prince, Mister. … ”
“Shut up and go to sleep!”
Her eyelids looked heavy. They drooped. She began to breathe rhythmically. After a while he put both her arms under the covers, doused the light and tiptoed out. He found another quilt, slipped off his clothes and stretched out on the couch in the living-room.
He lay awake for a while watching the flickering shadows from the fireplace. The girl had called him a prince. A prince, eh? He might turn out to be a prince of saps. … He hadn’t the faintest idea what the kid was. She might run any one of a dozen games on him in the morning. … Then he thought of her bare, bluish feet. … Swirling snow. … Nothing phoney about that! You might be a sap, Jerry; but for once in your life you did the right thing! The thought made him feel oddly light-hearted, happy. He grinned in the darkness, turned over and went to sleep.
It was almost noon when Tracy awoke. He took a stealthy peek in the bedroom. The girl was still dead to the world. She looked good for hours. “Let her sleep it out,” he told McNulty. “If you wake her up, you’re fired!”
He downed a quick feed, grabbed a cab for his Broadway office and spent a painful couple of hours banging out a long glittering column, full of wise winks, hot-cha and snappy gags. When he got back to the penthouse it was mid-afternoon.
The girl was awake at last, staring up at the ceiling with drowsy opened eyes. The sleep had done her good, he thought with approval. The wolfish pinch was gone from her face—an unexpectedly pretty kid. Younger than he had thought; twenty-two or so, probably. Brown eyes. The eyes were shy, youthfully grave. She lay quite still under the covers.
“Who are you, anyway?” she asked softly.
“Kris Kringle’s favorite nephew. How do you feel?”
“Warm and sleepy—and kinda weak.” Her eyelids blinked rapidly. “I—I dunno what’s the matter with me. I’m—I’m gonna cry, I think.”
“Hey, nix! Nix!” He made a gesture of comic concern. “Let’s talk sense. Are you hungry?”
“I could eat,” she said drowsily, “a cow, a bull and a roasted soldier. … ”
He chuckled at the old nursery rhyme. His fingers made a cheerful snapping sound.
“Okey. Can do. Now listen. There’s some clothes over on the dresser. Dressing-gown and slippers on the chair. That door leads to a hell of a swell bathroom. I know because I paid for it. Are yuh listenin’?”
She nodded.
“Fine,” he said. “Hop in the tub, fill the place full of steam. You’ll find plenty of towels and four kinds of soap. No bath-salts; I’m not that kind of a guy. … When you get finished, climb into these brand-new silkies and join me in the dining-car. Can do?” He grinned ruefully. “I’m beginning to talk like a damned Chink! That’s the McNulty influence.”
He backed out, his hand on the knob. “If you’re afraid of burglars, sweetheart, there’s a key in this door.”
He buttonholed the passing Chinaman. “Tea for two, McNulty. The kid hasn’t eaten lately, so use your own judgment.”
McNulty smiled one of his rare grimaces. He patted the columnist on the arm approvingly, muttered something that sounded like “clazy sunny peach” and padded off to the kitchen.
The meal was ready long before the girl. She wore a flowered silk dressing-gown that covered the embarrassment of borrowed underthings. Pink satin mules on her feet. Level brown eyes, brown hair neatly brushed; slim little girl figure. Tracy gulped and revised his earlier judgment. Pretty—hell! She was beautiful—a soft-eyed little knockout.
She was speaking her piece again. “I—I don’t know how to thank you or—or I suppose your wife—”
“Why bring that up?” he grinned. “Oh, I getcha! You mean the borrowed garments—you mean the silken thisa and thata. … Wife, hell! I’m just a bold, bad man-about-town, equipped for all emergencies. … Draw up to the groaning board; I’m kinda hungry myself.”
There was plenty of thick soup and thick gravy, and mashed potatoes, with some kind of a savory Chinese mystery-meat that made the salivary juices gallop all over your tongue. … She cleaned up with a relish, slowing down on the attack whenever she caught Tracy’s worried glance.
The Chinaman watched her too. He clapped his hands presently, said “Feenish. No more. Get hell out,” and Tracy chuckled and the girl went with him to the beamed room with the huge snapping fireplace.
They sat down together on a couch and watched the play of the orange and purplish flames. The Planet’s scandalmonger lit a cigarette. After a few puffs he tossed it into the fire.
“I’m going to get nosey and inquisitive, if you don’t mind.”
“Mind? You’ve bought the right to ask—anything, I guess.” Her mouth was tremulous but the brown eyes were clear and clean.
“I’m asking questions, kid, and nothing else,” he said sharply. “Maybe I can help you. I don’t want any lies or heroics. If I get too nosey, just tell me. That fair enough?”
“Go ahead.”
“What’s your name?”
“Lily Carson.”
“Age?”
“Twenty-two.”
“Where you from, Lily?”
“Pennsylvania.”
“Parents? Relatives?”
“No.”
“What do you mean? All dead?”
“I don’t know,” she said in a low tone. “I grew up in a big red-brick building with four hundred other kids. We wore pig-tails and gingham uniforms. Little Orphan Annie from Pennsylvania—that’s me.”
“Nix on the cynical stuff, sister! It’s cheap and it gets you nowhere. Leave the hardboiled line to clever guys like me.”
“Are you a crook?” she asked him suddenly.
His eyes narrowed instantly. “Why ask me that?”
“I met a crook once. He was always telling me how hardboiled and clever he was.”
“Did you play the game with him?” Tracy countered.
“No. I didn’t have guts enough.”
“You had guts enough to play straight. Isn’t that what you mean?”
“I don’t know. Maybe.”
He shrugged irritably. “Listen, Lily. We’re getting nowhere. Suppose you start with the old red-brick asylum and bring yourself up to date. And incidentally—I’m not a crook.”
He sat back and closed his eyes. Listened to the low-pitched murmur at his side. Small-town stuff. … The job here, the job there. Factory, bakery, drygoods. The Pitman stenography class at night. The fat real-estate man who wouldn’t let her out of the inside office till she cut his bald head with a ruler. No job. The dough dwindling. Gulp, sniffle—chin up, finally—millions of steno jobs in the big town! Choo! Choo! and the West Shore Ferry. …
Tracy opened his eyes and grunted morosely. “Go ahead, Lily.”
Cheap hotel. Want ads. New job. Three bucks a week in the savings bank. Blooie—no job again. … Furnished room. Coffee and beans twice a day. A thousand gals fighting for one job—and not fighting clean, either. After a while, no furnished room, no suitcase. …
“And a blizzard for a fadeout,” Tracy muttered. He looked at her for a minute. “You left out the crook, Lily. I’m sorta interested in crooks. Where did he proposition you? In New York here?”
“Yes.”
“How long ago?”
“Not so long.”
Jerry Tracy, Celebrity Reporter Page 12