That's where Tower Town was; what it was was streets whose "quaintly" run-down buildings housed tearooms (Ye Black Cat Club), art shops (The Neo Arlimusc), restaurants (The Dill Pickle Club), and bookstalls (The Radical Book Shop). Above the shops were garrets and "studios," as demonstrated by the flower boxes hanging from sills above, and the Studio for Rent signs in some of the shop windows. Like most big-city "bohemias," there was an effort, conscious or not, to attract tourists, and shimmers; but on a cold Thursday at dusk, the wind blowing the snow around like a minor dust storm, its streets were empty of anybody but the young artists and students who lived here, and they tended to have hands burrowed in the pockets of their corduroy coats, moving forward without looking, which was what they were good at, after all.
I'd been to the Dill Pickle Club before; it was a landmark like the water tower. But I never expected to be back a second time. I hadn't been impressed by the garish nude paintings on the walls, or the dark, smoky dance floor, or the little theater that seated fewer people in the audience than onstage, or by the stale, paper-thin chicken sandwiches that passed for food.
Now here I was back at the Dill Pickle, sitting at a table, just me and a candle and no tablecloth, waiting for Mary Ann Beame, trying not to listen as at a nearby table three long-haired boys in denim and dark sweaters talked with two short-haired girls in long black skirts and dark sweaters. They were all smoking, all drinking coffee or tea. Each of them seemed to be carrying on his or her own conversation. One of them was discussing the superiority of his poetry to that of a friend's (not present) and went on at length to point out that if he were an editor he would have none of that shit in his poetry magazine; oh, Harriet Monroe might, but it wasn't good enough for his (nonexistent) magazine. One of the girls was discussing a recent showing of "primitive art" at the Neo Arlimusc by a sixty-two-year-old clothing peddler from Maxwell Street who painted Jewish sweatshop scenes on cardboard: "The artist's expression will out! Poverty-stricken, he seizes upon the only medium within his grasp!" A pale frail-looking male was denouncing Kipling and Shakespeare (to name two) but later spoke admiringly of Kreymborg, while another, better-fed male was telling of his landlady throwing him out because she couldn't understand anyone not having beds and chairs in an apartment, and also because he had long hair. The final girl, a zoftig brunette with a nice full mouth, pretended to be upset that she was prostituting herself by posing nude as an artist's model (outside Tower Town) for a dollar an hour; actually, she was proud of herself. I was about ready to check my wallet for a spare dollar when Mary Ann Beame floated in.
She was wearing the black coat with the black fur collar again. I rose and helped her out of it. and she slung it over an extra chair at the table I'd been eavesdropping on; nobody seemed to mind, or for that matter notice. She wore a beret, white this time, and a navy-blue sweater with a diagonal white zigzag pattern throughout, like lightning, with a navy skirt. She put her little purse on the table and sat down. her wide. Claudette Colbert eyes looking at me expectantly, a little smile hesitantly forming on the red Claudette Colbert lips.
I hadn't spoken to her on the phone: I had got a male voice at the number she gave me. and left a message for her to meet me here, or to call me if she couldn't. So she probably thought I had news about her brother Jimmy. I didn't.
I told her so.
"I spent five days looking," I said, "and didn't find a trace of him. Nothing to indicate he's been in Chicago at all."
She nodded patiently, the eyes narrowing a bit. but still wide enough to get lost in; the lips pursed a bit. like a kiss.
"I tried the papers, most of the Hoovervilles. combed the near North Side…"
"You mean you thought he might've been that close to where / live?"
"Sure. Over on North Clark Street."
"That's full of derelicts."
"Right. And I asked around Bughouse Square. I did find one guy who seemed to know you, but that's as close to a lead as I got."
"What do we do now?"
"I'd suggest give up. My guess is he changed his mind at the last minute and took that freight to California or New York or someplace- someplace other than Chicago."
"No," she said firmly, shaking her head. "His ambition was to be a reporter for the Trib; that's what he would've tried first."
"And he well may have. Tried, got nowhere, and hopped a freight elsewhere."
"I want you to keep looking."
"I think it would be pointless. You'd be wasting your money."
"It's my money."
"It's my time. And I don't want to spend it looking for your brother."
For a minute I thought she was going to cry; but she didn't. She thought about it, but she didn't.
"Look," I said. "He'll turn up. The country's fall of kids riding the rails, looking for excitement." And work. I thought.
A big bushy-haired guy in a black sweater and denims came up to the table and took our order. I asked him how the chicken sandwiches were; he said good as ever. I ordered ham. Mary Ann waved off my suggestion that she order a sandwich and asked only for a cup of tea. I asked for some of that. too.
"Did you just come from the Merchandise Mart?" I asked.
She nodded.
"What, another soap opera?"
She nodded.
"It sounds like interesting work."
She looked away from me, toward a painting of a fat redheaded nude woman.
"Take this," I said, holding my hand out toward her.
She looked at the hand, then at me. "What's that?"
"Fifty bucks change. I worked five days. You gave me a hundred."
"Keep it" she said.
"Quit pouting and take the money, goddamnit."
She glared at me and grabbed the money out of my hand; stuffed it in her little black purse. Apparently she was a free spirit who didn't like getting sweared at.
The ham sandwich came and it was thin and stale and as bad as I remembered the chicken. The tea was okay; it tasted vaguely of oranges. I liked it. She drank hers, too, but whether she liked it or not, I can't tell you.
When we finished, I helped her into her coat and I paid and we went out onto the chilly street; it wasn't snowing, but the wind was still blowing around the snow we already had.
"You want a lift?" I asked her.
"I can walk; it isn't far."
"It's cold. My car's just down the block there. See? Come on."
She shrugged, hugging her black fur collar up around her face, falling into step with me.
I helped her up onto the running board and inside, and got around on the driver's side and got in and started it up.
"I got a heater in this thing." I said, getting that going.
"That's nice." she said noncommittally.
"Where to?"
"East Chestnut." She gave me a street address.
I drove.
"Who was that guy who answered the phone when I called today?"
"That's Alonzo."
"Oh? Who's Alonzo?"
"He's a painter."
"What's he paint?"
As if to a child, she said, "Pictures."
"What kind?"
"Experiments in dynamic symmetry, if you must know."
"Oh. Where's he live?"
"With me."
"Oh."
It was dark now, though my headlights caught the swirling snow; over on the right, two men walked hand in hand. That didn't surprise me, not in Tower Town. Just like Mary Ann living with some guy called Alonzo didn't surprise me; it disappointed me. but it didn't surprise me: it wasn't uncommon to see two names on a mailbox in this neighborhood- one a man's, the other a woman's. Unmarried couples were part and parcel of Tower Town like the talk of free love and individualism. Women in Tower Town liked to hold on to their individuality, and their independence- and their names.
After a while, I pulled over and she started to get out.
Tllwalkyou,"Isaid.
She looked at me; thought that over.
Then shrugged.
I turned the car off and followed her down the boardwalk sidewalk to a dilapidated four-story frame building. The entrance was in the alley, up an outdoor staircase that was painted red, perhaps as a political symbol, perhaps symbolizing that one took one's life in hand as well as the flimsy banister when going up those creaky' stairs.
We entered a small kitchen furnished with a table, a one-burner oil stove, and a chair; there was a sink with some dirty dishes in it, and a cupboard- no icebox. The walls were bare yellow plaster, cracking; pieces had fallen off. She lay her coat and beret on the table, and said. "Would you like some tea?"
"Sure," I said.
"Take off your coat and stay awhile." she said flatly, filling an oddly shaped copper teapot at the sink.
I lay my coat on top of hers.
"Go on in and meet Alonzo," she suggested.
What the hell. I thought; I went in and met Alonzo.
He was sitting in the middle of the floor. The room was dimly lit, and so was something he was smoking: from the smell of burning incense in the room. I figured it was a muggle, a marijuana cigarette. He was a little blond boy of about twenty in a vermilion sweater and corduroys; he didn't seem to notice me come in.
It was a big room, with a high ceiling and a skylight; but there wasn't much furniture in it- just a mattress covered by messed-up blankets, and a chest of drawers against one wall, looking lonely and out of place, like it had wandered in accidentally, off the street. The walls were hung with startling modernistic paintings: loud colors, distorted shapes, sound and fury signifying guess what. They hurt the eyes; they hurt mine, anyway.
"You paint this stuff," I asked him.
"I painted them."
"Does that one have a name?" I asked, pointing to a canvas where red, green, and blue weren't getting along.
"Certainly. That's Man's Inhumanity to Man."
"How'd you arrive at that?"
He looked at me with a smirk and eyes the color of soot. "The way I arrive at all my titles."
"Which is?"
He shrugged. "When I finish a work, I hold it one way, then another, and just keep tilting it till it suggests something. Then I title it."
"Tilt and title, huh?"
"You could put it that way."
"I just did. I take it you're Alonzo."
He stood, smiling. "You've heard of me?"
"Mary Ann mentioned you."
"Oh," he said, a little disappointed. "I talked to you on the phone today, didn't I?"
"I believe so."
He sucked on his muggle, held the smoke in; then he spoke, and it was like somebody speaking while taking a crap. "I suppose I'm expected to get the hell out of here."
"I wouldn't know why," I said.
"I don't do menage," he said, waving both hands, including the one with the muggle. which had served its purpose by now. He dropped it to the wooden floor and ground it out, walked to one corner of the room, where an old corduroy jacket was tossed, and put it on and left me alone with the paintings.
Pretty soon Mary Ann came in with two cups and saucers. She handed them both to me and went across the room and through a doorless doorway into darkness. I stood there like a cigar store Indian, balancing the two cups of tea, with no furniture to set them on, and finally walked over and used the top of the dresser for hers, and stood sipping mine.
She came out in a trailing black kimono with red and white flowers on it; it was belted at the waist with a black sash, and the white of her legs flashed as she walked toward me and then stood with hands on her hips.
"How'd you like Alonzo?" she asked, arching an eyebrow.
"About as much as his paintings." I said.
She tried not to smile, then said. "I think they're good."
"Really?"
The smile won out. "No. Not really. Come on."
I followed her through the doorless doorway, which as she pulled an overhead string lit up and turned out to be a small connecting hall, with a bathroom to the right, and another room straight ahead, which she led me to.
It was a smaller room, but big enough for the four-poster bed within; the walls were draped with blue batiks and so was the ceiling. It reminded me of a booth on a midway. Against the dark blue-batiked walls were a couple of pieces of furniture, for a change, including a small dresser and a makeup table with round mirror; on the makeup table was a small cylindrical art-deco lamp that provided the only light in the room. The only window was painted out, black.
"You and Alonzo don't share…" I searched for a polite way to put it.
"A bedroom?" she smiled. "No. Why should we?"
I shrugged. "You live together."
"We're roommates." she nodded. "But mat's the extent of it."
I sat on the edge of the four-poster, then quickly got up; but she tugged my arm until I sat again and sat next to me. with a wry little smile.
"Poor baby." she said. "You're confused."
"I just don't understand Tower Town. I guess."
"Alonzo likes boys."
"You mean he's a fairy?"
"That's it."
"Oh. And you're sharing rent, then."
"That's right. It's a nice big studio apartment, but it took the two of us to throw in together to be able to afford it."
"Why Alonzo?"
"We're friends. He's an actor as well as a painter. We did a play together, with the Impertinent Players. You know… a little theater group."
"Oh."
"Would you like some more tea?"
"No. No, thanks.
She took the cup from me and went trailing out, flashing some more white skin.
I glanced around the room. Over the head of the four-poster was a pale electric quarter-moon, with a man-in-the-moon face, turned off.
She came back in the room, sat next to me.
"Do you smoke that stuff?" I said, gesturing to the other room.
"Muggles? No. I don't even drink. I was raised in a proper home; we never had that sort of thing around, and I never acquired an interest in it, let alone a taste."
"But you don't mind him doing it?"
"Alonzo doesn't drink."
"I meant smoke marijuana."
"No, I don't mind. Alonzo's no dopey, no viper, mind you; he just does that once in a while, to relax. When he paints, or before he goes out to… well, to look for a date."
"Does he… bring his dates here?"
"Sometimes. But he tells me first, if he's planning to. And I can stay in my room and study lines, if I'm in a play; or just read or sleep."
"It doesn't bother you, what's going on out there?"
"Why should it?"
I didn't have an answer for that.
"The motto around here," she explained, "is live your own life. Live, don't just exist."
"Most people these days find just existing tough enough."
She didn't have an answer for that.
"I'm glad to be in your bedroom." I said. "You're a lovely girl, and that's a lovely kimono, and you make a swell cup of tea. But I'm still not going to look for your brother anymore."
I thought that would make her mad; it didn't.
She said, "I know," a bit distantly.
"Then why did you bring me up here?"
Now she did get just a little bit mad; just a little. "Not to bribe you, if that's what you think. There's plenty of other detectives in town."
"That's right, and some of the larger agencies could track your brother nationwide, if you got the dough for it."
"I'm psychologically connected to my brother."
"What?"
"My psychiatrist says that most of my problems are connected to my being a twin. I feel incomplete because my brother is missing."
"You have a psychiatrist?"
"Yes."
"And he says you feel incomplete because your brother is missing?"
"No. I say that. He says most of my problems are connected to my being a twin."
"What problems?"<
br />
She shrugged. "He didn't say."
"Why do you go to him?"
"Alonzo suggested it."
"Why?"
"He thinks I'll improve as an actress if I get in touch with my primitive unconscious."
"This is Alonzo's theory, not the psychiatrist's?"
"That's right."
"How much does the psychiatrist cost?"
"Quite a bit."
"How much, if you don't mind my asking?"
"Five dollars an hour."
I sat there and burned. Five dollars an hour. I cut my twenty-buck-a-day rate to ten for her. because I feel sorry for the struggling young actress trying to make it in the big city, and end up shlepping around Hoovervilles and fucking North Clark Street flophouses for five days, and she's paying five dollars an hour to some Michigan Avenue witch doctor.
She said. "Why does that make you mad?"
"What?"
"That I go to a psychiatrist. Why does that make you mad?"
"I've just been looking into too many unshaven faces, lately, that's all."
"I don't understand."
"Men are selling apples on street comers and praying to pull in a buck a day. and you're pissing five bucks away for nonsense."
"That's cruel."
"I suppose. And it's your five bucks. You can do what you want with it."
She didn't say anything; she was looking at her hands, which were folded in her lap.
"You must make good money doing radio," I said.
"Not bad," she admitted. "And I can get money from home, if I need to."
We sat in silence for a while.
I said. "It really isn't my business what you do with your money. Guys selling apples on street comers isn't your fault… and your five bucks isn't going to solve the problem, so forget I said anything. Like I said, I seen too many unshaven faces while I was wandering around Hoovervilles, looking for your brother."
"You think my life's a bunch of hooey, don't you."
"I don't know. I don't go for Tower Town, that's all. All this free love you people talk about, it doesn't seem right somehow."
True Detective Page 18