The Innocents

by Richard Barre

  Had I gotten out of that tight spot with nothing but my life and my drawers, I’d have felt blessed. Not Urschel. His version: the Feds weren’t fast enough; the Feds weren’t smart enough; the Feds were chasing the money, catching the small fry who were passing off the dough—where the hell was Machine Gun Kelly?

  Wasn’t too hard. I found him in Memphis second rock I flipped over.

  The beer was cool; the air in the bar wasn’t. When I was done, I went out, sat on a wood bench in a park across the street. Some regular folks strolled by.

  Some irregular folks with pilots’ sunglasses, sideburns and pointed shoes went up a long stair beside a house two numbers north of the bar, disappeared through a screen door.

  A bit later, another irregular climbed the stair.

  Not long, all three irregulars plus Kelly and Kathryn came down the stair.

  She was stunning even on the lam. Hennaed hair, tall pumps on her feet, a dress so diaphanous it had to be a dark color or you could have seen her garters.

  The crew went in the bar behind Kathryn.

  I ate a few cigarettes, got up strolled over, bellied at the bar again.

  “I’ll do scotch this go. A dollar’s worth again.”

  “Sure, mister. I’ll be back.” The same hall. Maybe there was a decent bar back there somewhere.

  Kelly and company had hemmed in a table at the back end of the room.

  Me, them—that was the customer list in its sad entirety at the moment.

  I put my spine to the rail, tilted my hat off my forehead. I looked at them, smiled like I wasn’t a cop. They looked—the whole table looked. I read them.

  Kelly didn’t recall me. Kathryn knew me, maybe even knew why I was there.

  My dollar pop came back. Nice—a highball glass full, one dissipating ice cube bouncing around in there.

  I took it over to the table, sipped on the trip. Nice scotch. Another sip, I fronted across the table from Kelly, looked down.

  “‘Lo, George.”

  “I know you?” Kelly drank to it. Up close he didn’t look so good. Rough, tense, shadow line on his jaw. His eyes had been drunk for several days.

  Kathryn pointed. “Poker game, Kansas City, I believe.” A smile to make a moke wanna use a .45 caliber Thompson on another moke.

  “You got a good memory, ma’am. Seven stud, nothing wild.”

  “You were the big loser, weren’t you?” Razzing me for not taking Kelly up on the playmate swap in Kansas City those two years back.

  I caught her drift, played with her some. “I walked out with three grand and change I didn’t bring in.”

  “Yeah, I recall now, buddy. You cleaned up.” Kelly thumbed at me. “Guy’s holding four queens, I gotta solid flush, Kewpie Darrow’s got a damn boat, kings over sevens.”

  “Kings over sixes, baby.”

  Kelly grinned. “Man, what a hand. Stakes went to nearly six gees. You won. Why come you only took three home?”

  “I was down so far the bottom of the well was tapping my feet when I hit the homer. How you and the lady been?”

  “Been good.” He didn’t sound like he believed it.

  Kathryn said, “I still think you were the big loser that night.” Coming back to it, looking at me but making it about Kelly, how he was too dumb to get it.

  “Pull out a chair, buddy.” Kelly pointed with a spare finger.

  I pulled, sat.

  “What’s payin’ the bills? The queens?”

  I wagged my head. “Nah. Strictly a hobby. I got a piece of this, a piece of that. Know what I’m saying?”

  “I hear you. Why Memphis?” Being a cagey bastard for a simpleton.

  “A dinge I know off Beale picks up highbrow motor cars. I fly out from the coast, drive one back. I swing south of the border at Laredo. Time I’m back in LA, the car’s clean as new—foreign registration.”

  Kelly clued up, sniffed at the bait. He liked.

  Kathryn watched—I could feel it on the side of my face like sunshine. I don’t know what face she was wearing. If I looked at her, I’d give it away.

  “What you pickin’ up this trip, buddy? What was your name again? Tom?”

  Kathryn: “Joe.”

  I nodded, still wouldn’t look at her. “Got it already. A thirty-two Auburn. Super charged, a hundred-sixty horsepower. Not much’ll touch her on a flat road.”

  Kelly nodded. “Get somethin’ to drink, for God sake, how ’bout it, somebody?”

  The guys with the Kellys were southern slickers. Pompadours, pegged pants, two-tone sport shirts, two-toned shoes with the pointed toes. Big hayseed grins and unruly side-whiskers.

  Low-on-the-pole got up, went to the rail.

  “Whatchu get on somethin’ like that Auburn automobile it was in California?”

  I shrugged. “I can put it in the newspaper out there, get retail.”

  “Bullshit.”

  I shrugged some concession. “Close to retail.”

  “What’s retail?”

  I was getting ready to set the hook; I could feel it.

  Kathryn watched me pull him in.

  “Two, two and a half grand.” I lied. Legal it was worth maybe a grand. I’d paid four C’s for it.

  “I’ll give you a grand.” Kelly emphasized with a fist, one finger out, banging on the table, the one finger pointed at me.

  “I’ll drive it home for the other grand.”

  “Fifteen, buddy, and you ain’t got no troubles. Pick you up another high-ride in nigger town, make who knows what kinda dough.” Slinging his jowls around. “What’d you pay for it, a grand?”

  Yeah, sure, sweetheart. “Eighteen, it’s yours.”

  “Seventeen.”

  Sold to the stupid guy in the stained straw hat and the five o’clock shadow.

  I looked at the key in my hand, tossed it at Kelly.

  He said, “I gotta get the cash. It’s down the street.”

  “There a poker table down there?”

  Kelly grinned. “What, you giving me a chance to win back my sixteen hundred?”

  “Seventeen. Yeah, you’re lucky you can. Anybody else here gamble?”

  Kathryn said she did.

  I said I’d noticed.

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