So I gamely reached my hands into the air, not trying that hard to get my wallet back but enough to act the part and keep my manhood. I jumped and jumped for my wallet and finally caught it and then Ichabod pulled my pants down.
What a time we had.
So funny I forgot to laugh.
I pulled my pants up. Adora clapped.
“Aren’t they wonderful?” she said, putting her arm through mine and leading me away.
“Credits to the human race,” I said.
The show was a sell-out and by circus standards fairly entertaining. They played all the hits. The clown car. The jugglers. The contortionist. The tightrope walker. It lived up to its name, the Circus of Cacophony, and was very loud and hectic. A full band played zany tunes as a soundtrack. Two minutes in and my ears were ringing. It almost made me long for the uncomfortable calm of the sideshow tent, which I’d strolled through prior. Saw a wolf boy, the tattooed man, a snake charmer and conjoined twins floating in a jar of formaldehyde. Annie stood on a small stage doing a pretty decent Lady Macbeth, “out damned spot!” and all that while three brat kids stared and pointed. I admired her resolve. Didn’t seem to bother her one bit. She turned and winked when she saw me.
All in all, I may have enjoyed the circus a bit more if it wasn’t for the tiny distractions. The seat I’d shoehorned myself into on the crowded bleachers was in the very last row, amongst the clouds, and next to a backwater family of what had to be at least seventeen cross-eyed, towheaded children. It was hard to keep count, the way they kept racing back-and-forth in the aisle and jumping on the bleachers and climbing on me and over me and spilling hot buttered popcorn on my lap. I tried to get the attention of the parents but they were four places over and too busy making out like the quarterback and the cheerleader at the drive-in. No wonder they had seventeen kids.
Out of the nutty bunch there was one that seemed like a good egg. She was a little girl of about six and she was sitting right beside me, very quiet, hands in her lap. My kind of kid. Only problem was, every time the clowns came on she started wailing and crying and wouldn’t let up until they were gone. I could sympathize. I’d met them and I felt like crying when I saw them, same as her. I patted her on the head and gave her some of the licorice I’d bought at the concession stand with the last of the change in my pocket.
“Can you believe it,” I said. “Those damn clowns palmed the money out of my wallet.”
The little girl looked up at me. “Pa said all thieves should be shot.”
“Eye for an eye, kind of guy, huh? In this case, I can see the appeal.”
She put out her hand for another piece of licorice.
“Maybe you should ask your parents if it’s okay,” I said. “Wouldn’t want to spoil your dinner.”
The girl hitched a thumb in her folks’ direction. “They’re busy, as usual, so”—and here she went full gangster—“cough up the red candy pronto, see?”
I laughed and gave her another piece of licorice, which she happily accepted. And there were no more tears until the lions trotted out, after which she started crying even harder. Kid was scared of big cats, too.
8
After the circus ended, as I filed out of the big top, Adora beckoned me over from where she was sitting in the backseat of black Buick Continental with the “Circus of Cacophony” logo on the side. She’d changed since I’d seen her last and looked ready for a night on the town with high society. Even stranger was that it appeared she was waiting for me.
“Did you enjoy the show?” she asked when I was in earshot.
“What’s not to enjoy? A lot of bang for the buck.”
“We aim to please.” Adora scooted over so I had room to sit down. “Need a ride into town? I’m headed there myself.”
I leaned in through the open window. “How’d you know?”
She gave me innocent doe eyes. “Know what?”
“That your clowns stole all my money.”
“Practice makes perfect. They’re always doing that kind of stuff. Don’t take it personal.”
“Don’t take being mugged personal?”
“Well, not too personal.”
“The ride—you sure it’s no imposition?”
“Do I look like it would be?”
I looked. She did not. So I sat down and closed the door, sealing off the noise of the audience slowly filtering away from the circus grounds. The car started and I noticed it was Ichabod the clown behind the wheel, only I barely recognized him out of uniform. Plus, his head was so small, the chauffeur hat sat down around his ears. He leered at me. His teeth were very pointy.
“Nice sled,” I said, choosing to ignore the off-duty clown with the scary dental work.
We hit evening traffic on Hastings heading west towards downtown. Stop and go along the neon highway. Adora lit a cigarette with a series of economical, yet languid, movements. She offered me one. I turned it down.
“Most men I know smoke,” she said.
I flashed her a grin. “Maybe you rub them the wrong way.”
Adora shook her head in mock distain. “That old line?”
“I’d say ‘if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it’ but you’d probably call me on that one, too.”
Adora nodded, smiling. “I might let you get away with it if…”
“If…?”
“You let me buy you a drink. To make up for my nimble-fingered employees.”
An elegant fog of smoke surrounded her and I’d never been so jealous of smoke before. Little Red Riding Hood and she wanted me to be the big bad wolf. Wanted me to want her. And I did, despite the warning signs. Never have been very smart.
“Okay, I accept. I’ll also say that was nice what you did for Jim.”
Adora played it coy. “Excuse me?”
“The funeral and all.”
She nodded, barely. “How’d you know it was me?”
I winked. “That’s what I do.”
“Oh, is it? I’ve been trying to figure that out for days now. Considering there’s pastrami sandwich on your floor, a telephone with no cord on your desk, and the sign on the door is for Brenkleman’s Tax Service.”
From the front seat, Ichabod let out a little laugh from the little mouth in his little head. Or maybe there was a mouse in the passenger seat. I eyed him in the rearview, but his eyes never left the road. “But it’s not all I do.”
“No?”
“Nah, I also like shopping and moonlit walks on the beach.”
“That’s funny,” said Adora. “I like drinking beer and fighting.”
Ichabod laughed again or maybe it was the squeak of the windshield wipers. The clouds, playing coy and undecided all day, had finally made up their mind to lay a blanket of cool mist over the sweltering city. We didn’t say anything for awhile after that. Adora stared out the window. I raced water drops across the passenger seat window, but kept backing the losing horse.
Still gazing out at the roadside scenery, Adora said, “So, Mr. Fitch. You know quite a bit about me, but what’s your story? Tell me about yourself. Oh, and no bullshit or snappy one-liners.”
“No bullshit or snappy one-liners? Why not make it easier and tie my legs together and then ask me to tango?”
“Seriously, Mr. Fitch.”
“Seriously, you don’t have to call me ‘Mr.’”
“But we’re basically strangers. Best to maintain a certain degree of distance.” She said that as she scooted a little closer to me. Trying to read this one was like trying to read a comic book in Japanese. The pictures were nice but it still made no sense. Because she knew who I was—I was like her. Dig beneath either of our surfaces and what you got was a thick, rigid crust of wiseass comments, double-talk and innuendo. It had to be, to protect the small bit of something soft and real that was left.
The next hours were a blur of drinking and eating but mostly drinking. Adora introduced me to a new friend—Champagne—and right away we had
a lot in common and there were no awkward pauses in our conversations. Really, it was love at first sight and we chatted all night. We chatted in a supper club. We chatted in a bar. We chatted at a dark, sweaty after-hours where everyone stashed their booze under the table in case of a raid and the giant doorman had a fist-squashed nose to the ground for the cop scent. Champagne and I, we even chatted beside a Frank Sinatra impersonator and his crowd of groupies and hangers on.
“That guy is pretty good,” I yelled to Adora over the loud music. It was Saturday night. The place was jumping. “Looks just like him.”
“That is him,” she said, doing her best Cheshire cat act.
I nearly spit out a mouthful of bubbly. Ring a ding ding. Sinatra. The Chairman of the Board. Ol’ Blue Eyes himself. I scooted a little closer and caught myself a bit of a tan from the fame glow.
All of it was how the other half lived and I could see the appeal. Having Adora on my arm meant we entered through different doors. A nod of the head. A sly wink. These actions, however small, had meaning. A new language. Uptown’s words. A rolled-up bill passed in a handshake. Granville’s poetry. Trying to get through those doors myself, speaking like that, would’ve got me a knuckle sandwich for dinner and a taste of pavement for dessert. With Adora, side entrances and back rooms opened like gates to paradise.
Me, I did my best to not stand out. Mingle. Fit in. Toe the line. Mostly, I watched and listened. The buzz, the gossip, the talk of the town, was another accident involving yet another businessman/shady figure with criminal ties, Rolly Stevens. Apparently, the tow truck company magnate had slipped in the shower at his health club, the clumsy fool. Now, Rolly was at St. Paul’s hospital and not expected to wake from the coma.
“So,” I said, turning to the two lawyers talking beside me. They stopped their conversation. Probably worried I was going to ask for money or free legal advice. “Say a certain group of criminally minded no-goodniks like, I don’t know, a bunch of clowns, wanted to take over the rackets in this town, they might find that the herd of competition had been thinned?”
The lawyers nodded, in unison.
Tweedledee said, “You didn’t have a flat in this town without one of Rolly’s tow trucks coming to the rescue. Even the independents, who didn’t know they worked for Rolly, or want to, worked for him, eventually. That or they ended up drinking ocean water at the bottom of the Georgia Straight, a bag of rocks tied to their feet.”
Tweedledum grinned a school-of-fish-eating shark grin and said, “Brooks Brothers Fall collection?”
Yes, my cheap suit was a running joke all night. The gown-and-tux crowd loved it. They ate it up with their silver spoons and gold forks. Adora came off as so well-heeled I got a pass. I didn’t even have to open my mouth for them to think it was a gag, like a costume party. Dress up by dressing down. They were all going to do the same thing the next night, at the next party, for the next charity gala. I was starting something. I was now. I was so out I was in. I made a million new best friends and didn’t know if I loved them or hated them. But I knew for certain there was no in-between, no gray area. I decided to love them for now and hate them later, not really sure why that would be the natural order of things, but understanding the situation nonetheless. They were people like anybody else, just with fatter wallets and a size of entitlement to match.
Adora mixed even better, like a pearl onion dropped into a Gibson martini. Watching her mingle, dance, laugh, converse, I’d never have known she grew up in a circus, riding an elephant for kicks, with a bootlegging underworld figure for a father/role model.
Ichabod stayed close but not too close. Usually outside, leaning up against the Buick, eyes surveying everything as we walked joint to joint. I couldn’t figure his angle, his connection to Adora. Friend or foe? Clown confidant or clown spy?
I even broke in a new routine:
Champagne.
Champagne.
Champagne.
At some point, for some reason, somehow, I ended up in a coat check. It may have been the second time at the first after-hours joint, or maybe the first time at the third. Tough to say. I lost track. Wherever it was, the coat check was like a zoo, what with so many of nature’s little creatures hanging around. I was battling it out with two mean minxes when I heard the door open. I peeked out between the fur coats. Adora stood at the open door, holding a bottle of Champagne, looking as drunk as a skunk dipped in her father’s moonshine. Despite that, she carried herself quite well and barely even slurred her words.
“I saw you go in,” she said, “but when you didn’t come out I thought you could use some backup. Those furs giving you trouble?”
“They’re vicious,” I said, finally freeing myself.
“I can see that. But for a smart guy like you a few minxes shouldn’t be a problem.”
I looked around to see who she was talking to, playing it up. “Me, smart?”
“Don’t underestimate yourself,” she said, speaking out of one side of her mouth. The other side was guzzling bubbly straight from the bottle.
“I usually do. It’s easier that way,” I said, sliding down to the floor. Gravity had won. Adora sat down beside me and offered me a swig of Champagne. I accepted.
“You look tired, Mr. Fitch. Done already?”
“Already?” I looked at my watch but those hands pointing different directions could’ve meant anything. “Just need to rest for a little while. Today was the second busiest day I ever had in my whole life.”
“And the first?”
“Yesterday. I’m on a roll.”
“So did you find anything out about Jim’s last days?”
I dipped the net in to catch some information from the pool of bubbly it was swimming in. “Jim worked at the office building you visited me in, drank at the Cambie and lived I don’t know where. The address he gave Moyer was an empty lot in Strathcona. Oh, and you paid for the funeral, so I don’t know how the first time you heard about it could’ve been the obituaries, like you said.”
Adora shrugged, smirked. “Fine, you got me. Anything else?”
I shrugged as well, too far pickled to get out of the jar and figure out what being right meant. “Ever hear the story about the guy, the spider and the plastic sheep?”
Adora hiccupped. “I guess a hundred bucks doesn’t go as far as it used to. I take my ‘smart’ comment back.”
“What do you want from me, lady? You said it before yourself: there’s pastrami sandwich on the floor and the sign is for Brenkleman’s Tax Service. What you see is what you get.”
“Well, I see a man who doesn’t know what he wants, who he is or how to figure it out. One with no script of his own, so he tries desperately to live another one written by someone else. To be a private dick like the ones in the books and on the movie screen except he’s too lazy and broke to get a license. A living, breathing stereotype, drinking whisky in a Fedora and chasing waitresses like in a Dick Tracy comic book panel only the speech bubble’s empty because he has nothing to say.”
Wow, she’d let me have it with both barrels. Funny how drunk people often had the best aim. The sharpshooter scooted closer and put her head on my shoulder.
“No offense intended, Mr. Fitch, really,” she said, hiccupping again.
“None taken,” I said, lying.
9
I dreamed history. My mother was waking me up for school.
“Get up, ya bum,” she said, always one for tough love.
“Okay, ma,” I said, turning over.
“I said, ‘get up.’”
“Don’t worry, I won’t be late for class.”
“I ain’t your ma and if you’re on your way to school I think you got a bigger problem than me.”
“I don’t understand, ma.”
“Fella, I told ya…”
I opened my eyes and tipped up the brim of my Fedora to see what the hubbub was about. I was on a park bench with a newspaper as a blanket and standing ov
er me was a beat cop swinging his nightstick back-and-forth. Judging by the sly grin on his face and the mean glint in his eyes, he hadn’t hit anything in a while and was looking to break the unlucky streak.
Cop eyes sized me up like I was the last jelly donut on the tray. “Say, fella, we met before?”
“The other day at Lost Lagoon. An honest accountant out for a stroll. You told me about your sister.”
“Oh right. Brinkle-something.”
“Brenkleman.”
He squinted his eyes at me. “You don’t look much like a heeb to me.”
It was a toss off remark for him and there’d be others where that came from, no doubt. Hogan’s Alley and the coloured menace. Chinatown’s slant-eyed sinners. If my time riding the rails had taught me anything it was that human was human and skin colour was a surface thing that only idiots and assholes didn’t bother to scrape beneath. Something told me this cop was both and didn’t rate any better than farce. Fight stupid with stupid.
I winked conspiratorially. “My parents always wanted me to be a numbers man so they legally changed my name so I’d have a better shot. You know, with the organization.”
“Jeez, that on the level?”
“Sure, and my sister’s last name is Yodel, seeing how she loves making Swiss watches.”
His squint got even more squinty and the nightstick was practically shivering with the anticipation of it all. “You some kinda kook or what? Maybe two weeks at Woodlands on a straitjacket cure would fix ya.”
“On what grounds?”
“You think I need grounds to run in a hobo with a smart mouth who smells like two days’ worth of dog shit and looks twice as bad?”
I needed a vagrancy arrest about as much as another glass of Champagne. Time to make nice. “How about a poor soul who’s not a hobo at all but merely a working man with troubles.”
Dead Clown Blues Page 5