by P. N. Elrod
“You gotta expect change. It’s the way things are. Lot of the guys thought it was the end of the world when we had Repeal—Bristow was one of ’em—but it was just temporary. There’s still plenty of tax-free booze being delivered. We’re keeping an eye open all the time for new stuff to do. As soon as they make a vice illegal, we find a way to get rich by supplying it.”
“Yeah, but those government guys are getting smarter at stopping up the chinks.”
“It won’t last. There’s always a way to get around the rules. Like right now. Couple guys I know practically got the FBI in their pocket, or J. Edgar Hoover, anyway. They think they own the world, but it won’t last.”
“Why, is he onto ’em?”
“Nothing like that. He can’t sneeze without they give him the say-so, and they think it’s great, but they’re going to have problems soon. The guy’s forty-two, has ulcers, and is crazy-obsessed about commies. If the Russians don’t bump him, he’ll do himself in chasing his own tail and trying to nab headlines about it. I don’t give him more than another year at the job before he drops stone dead. Then I’ll start to worry. That damn FDR will put in some stand-up guy who knows what he’s doing and can keep his nose clean. When that happens we’ll have to start running for cover.”
“How do they have Hoover in their pocket?”
Kroun shook his head, amused. “You don’t wanna know. The key to owning anyone is knowing what a man wants most and knowing what he most wants to keep hidden. A man with small wants who doesn’t give a damn what people think of him is usually free. Of course, that guy is not generally in a position where we need to own him, but there’s a few out there. They’re the ones to look out for.”
And what secrets do you want most hidden? I thought. God knows I didn’t want people hearing about mine, especially the current ones that were eating holes in my brain like acid.
“That canary out front in the pictures,” said Mitchell, whose mind was clearly on other things, “when does she sing?”
“You mean Miss Smythe?” I asked.
“That’s the one. Bobbi.”
I didn’t like the way he said her name. “Later. The second show.”
“We’re old friends. I’d like to go back and say hello to her.”
He got a long look from me, and I didn’t blink.
“What?” he asked, coming up with a puzzled front like he wasn’t getting my message. “She don’t take visitors?”
“That’s right.”
“C’mon, she won’t mind a friend.”
I didn’t like the way he said that, either. Oily and unpleasant, yet with the smile. I wanted to knock it from his mug along with his front teeth. On this, I knew I could absolutely trust my instincts. “She’ll mind.”
“You go ask her, give her my name. She’ll tell you different.” He waited.
I still wasn’t blinking. And had gone corpse-quiet.
He chose to ignore it. “What’s your problem?”
“Mitch,” said Kroun, who watched the exchange. “Lay off. She’s just a skirt. There’s plenty more back on Broadway you can say hello to instead.”
Mitchell seemed to verge on a reply, thought better of it, and subsided. There was a “We’ll see about this later” glint in his eye for me, though. I wasn’t worried. They’d be on their way back to New York soon, end of problem. Maybe I wouldn’t have to burden Bobbi with this ghost from her past.
Strome, who’d been silent all this time, let out a soft sigh that only I heard. I interpreted it as relief. I got the impression he was worried I’d do something stupid. It had been close. My second choice after punching Mitchell’s face to pulp would have been hypnosis, but that would have risked another skull-splitter for me. After talking with Escott I’d gotten the firm idea that this suddenly excessive head pain was also connected to Bristow’s torture, and it seemed pretty sound. I could hope the symptoms would go away after a while, but for now was stuck without one of my edges.
On the other hand, this was my club with my rules running. I had a right to refuse service to anyone, which included allowing undesirable types to bother my girlfriend.
When I started paying attention again, I noticed Kroun studying me, his own face unreadable. “Another drink, Mr. Kroun?”
He made no reply, just looked around again at the people, the band, even the lights above. “Quite a place.” he echoed his comment yet again. “I like the chairs.”
“Chairs?” I hoped he wasn’t trying to drive a point home, because I was missing it.
“Yes. These are really nice chairs. Some places never get that right, but when it comes down to it, you have to offer people a place to park themselves. Really nice chairs. Nice. Chairs.”
Maybe he was drunk. Mine might not be the first whiskey he’d had tonight. “Thanks. Took a lot of hard work to haul together.”
Mitchell flashed an interesting expression. Made me think he thought his boss was being an idiot. It only lasted an instant.
“But all these chairs and no gaming tables,” Kroun continued, unaware. “Seems like too much effort for no real payoff.”
“It’s plenty for me. I keep my vices simple.”
“Like not drinking yourself?”
For social cover I had a glass of ice water in front of me, my usual, and all the waiters knew it. I’d not sipped any. “Well, you know how it is, the boss has gotta stay awake. You guys enjoy yourselves, though.”
Mitchell smirked. “He wants to get us drunk like Gordy did with Bristow. Thinks we’ll talk.” His tone was meant to bait. Kroun would know what he was up to and be watching my reaction.
Strome shifted in place, anticipating trouble.
I pretended amusement and confided to Kroun, “That’s a cute kid you got there. Lemme know when he’s outta short pants, and I’ll find him a job.”
Mitchell didn’t take it well. If his boss hadn’t laughed, he might have tried a swing at me. He’d get just the one shot.
“Relax, Mitch, we’re off the clock,” said Kroun. “Let the man run his bar. We’ll be going now.”
“But we ain’t seen the show,” said Mitchell.
“So?”
Under Kroun’s dark stare, he subsided again, dropping into silence like it was a foxhole.
Doing a good impersonation of civilized gentlemen, we rose and strolled to the lobby. Kroun thanked me for my hospitality, and I walked them outside. We stood under the canopy while Strome went to get the Caddy. The sleet had stopped, but the streets were still wet, the wind bitter. For a moment it was eerily similar to the night of Gordy’s shooting, and I couldn’t help but look around, anticipating another hidden gunman.
“What is it?” Kroun asked, picking up on my nerves. His eyes were sharp. No sign of whiskey in them at all.
“Just feeling the cold.”
He nodded, removing his hat to brush a hand through his hair. It seemed to be an unconscious gesture, always on the left side where that streak was. “Yeah, you’d think those bandages would keep you warmer.”
He got a look from me. Was he playing games or just showing a weird sense of humor?
“Ease off on yourself, kid,” he said sotto voce so Mitchell couldn’t hear.
“What d’you mean?”
“I mean I know what kind of hell Bristow put you through.”
“Oh, he skinned you alive, too?” I was jumpy enough to give him lip. Not smart. He just stared. Nothing hostile in it, but I wasn’t about to ascribe anything like sympathy to the man. Guys like him were born without or had it burned from them early by life in general.
He leaned slightly, talking close to my ear. “I know what he was and what he could do.”
“And you sent him.”
“Yeah. I did that. It was supposed to be between him and Gordy alone, and somehow you got in the middle. But you survived. That makes you the stronger. Then you put Bristow exactly where he belongs.”
“Yeah,” I echoed. “I did that.”
“So…ease off on yourself.” He stra
ightened and settled his hat firmly against the wind. “He was a bastard, but you beat him.”
A pep talk from a killer? Some of it skated close to being almost apologetic. And how did he know about what was in my head?
On the other hand, he thought we were friends. Maybe this was how he was with them. He couldn’t have had many the way he put my back hairs on high. I didn’t get a chance to find out; Strome drove up, Kroun and Mitchell got in, doors slammed, and off they went.
LADY Crymsyn was officially closed for the night. Except for my Buick, the adjoining parking lot was empty, everyone gone home or off to unwind themselves at places that kept even later hours. The neon sign above the red street canopy was dark, but lights showed within. Of course, that didn’t mean anything with Myrna in residence. Sometimes she’d have them blazing, including the neon; other nights she would only leave a small one on behind the lobby bar. She was the most consistent with it, wanting it lit nearly all the time.
I stood under the shadow of the canopy, not quite smoking a cigarette. My lungs refused to tolerate inhaling the stuff, so I puffed for something to do and watched the occasional car drive past. Chicago was too big to ever completely sleep. Someone was always up and around.
Humankind was roughly divided into daytime folk, night people, night owls, and the creeps of the deep night. Most of the latter, unless gainfully employed or with some other reasonable excuse for being out during the truly godforsaken hours, lived down to their name. If not for my job I could be counted as one of them—two jobs, to include the help I gave Escott when he needed it. Three, to include Gordy.
It was coming up on the beginning of the deep night. Lonely time for me since everyone was usually asleep. I was uncomfortable standing out here, not from the cold, but being by myself and out of range of some kind of distraction. No radio, no band playing loud, happy music, just the wind in my ears and the infrequent passing car. This was me testing the demons in my head; I was trying to get better at not thinking, not remembering.
By the time I finished my third smoke, Escott finally drove up, easing his big Nash right next to the front curb. It was a no-parking zone, but the doorman wasn’t here to chase him off.
“You’re in one piece,” I observed brightly as he got out. “Congrats.”
“Why should I not be?”
I shrugged. “This town.”
“Where’s Bobbi?”
“Upstairs counting receipts. You don’t wanna disturb her.”
“You’re curious as to what transpired concerning Evie Montana.”
“Well, yeah.”
“A gentleman doesn’t talk,” he said, mock-lofty.
“Come on, you know what I mean.”
“Inside, if you please. How can you not be cold?”
My overcoat was in the office. “Has to do with being dead, I guess. Sometimes I just don’t feel it.”
“I wonder why that is?”
“So we don’t feel the chill of the grave after escaping it?”
“Possibly, but there may be some other reason for the peculiarity. After all, not every society buried their dead. The Romans were fond of cremation, and the ancients of my countrymen practiced open-air—well, I suppose you couldn’t call it interment. Exterment? If there is such a word; I’ll have to look it up. They left corpses in the open air until only bones were left, which would certainly have prevented any of your sort from returning from the dead.” He drew breath to go on, but caught me looking at him. Just looking. “Ah. Well. Be that as it may…”
I opened the door for us, locked it behind, and felt better for it.
The deep-night world was shut outside and would require no more of my attention for a while. Escott unbuttoned his coat, dropping it and his Homburg hat on the marble-topped lobby bar, the whole time giving me one of his once-overs.
“What?” I asked.
“No holes in your clothing, no damage to the premises, and the lights are functioning. I take it your visit from Kroun ended amicably?”
“Yeah, but he gives me the creeps.”
“Must be a novel experience for you.”
I ignored that one. “Drink?”
“A very small brandy would be nice, thank you.”
The liquor was locked up, but not for long. I couldn’t find his favorite kind right away, though there was always a bottle on hand; it was a standing order. It finally turned up behind several similar-shaped bottles, the label facing the wall. Myrna must have been playing again, with him as the target.
The barstools were stacked to one side to be out of the way of the morning cleaners, so we went through to the main room. I forgot how dark it was to Escott until he bumped into a table that was slightly out of place. The insignificant amount of light coming from the small red windows above the third-tier booths was plenty for me. I turned on the little table lamp for him, reaching between a thicket of chair legs. The seats there had also been upended for the convenience of the morning’s cleaning crew. I didn’t care for the closed-up, dead look it gave to the club. Chairs were supposed to be sanely on the floor waiting for people to use them, not like this. I decisively moved two of them down for us, then the other two so I wouldn’t get annoyed if I knocked elbows.
The place was very silent, very empty. A dust cloth was thrown over the piano, turning it into a large blocky ghost shape in the dimness. The stage gaped like an open mouth, needing to be filled with bright lights and people and music.
Listening hard for a moment I did hear music. Thin and distant.
“Something wrong?” asked Escott.
“The radio in my office is on.”
“You can hear it?”
“Yeah.”
“Your extranormal senses are quite amazing.”
“Or I could just be crazy and hearing things.”
“What song is playing?”
“Wayne King doing ‘Mickey Mouse’s Birthday Party.’”
“Ah. Then you are hearing things, and you are crazy. No one listens to that one anymore. It’s all your imagination.”
“Good, I’d rather be crazy than have it real. So? Evie Montana?”
He swirled brandy, letting it get used to the air. “I took her to the Nightcrawler. Since she chose to fill the drive with detailed and enthusiastic praise of Alan Caine’s boundless talent, I was curious to see him and went in to catch the second show.”
“And what’d you think?”
“That you met a completely different fellow.”
“Huh?” I expected Escott to hate the guy on sight.
“He has an excellent voice, a commanding stage presence, and put across every song with an enlightened earnestness that was on a level with true genius.
“Huh?” I didn’t want to hear this. “The guy’s a jackass!”
“If so, then it’s not when he’s performing. He really should be singing opera, not wasting himself with popular songs in a club.”
“What’s with you? You gonna send him flowers next?”
He sipped the brandy, amused by my annoyance. “One can have an admiration for a performer’s talent, if not for the performer himself. He’s truly gifted.”
“And a jackass.”
“I’ll believe that when I see it.”
“Fine with me. Go by tomorrow before the show and watch him rehearsing.”
“One only has to know how to deal with artistic temperament.”
“Just don’t go recommending him to Bobbi for this place. I’d end up strangling him.”
“Or you could simply rearrange his mood for the duration.”
I’d been known to do that with troublesome talents. Escott was unaware of my going temporarily on the wagon from whammy-work. No need for him to know, either. He’d just give me one of those worried looks I was sick of seeing.
“Mr. Derner came by my table. He had a message for you,” he added.
“Oh, yeah?”
“A negative one. Some of the boys thought they’d found Dugan, but it turned out to be
a false alarm. Not all of them were convinced, though, and might be coming ’round to claim the remainder of the bounty. Mr. Derner assured me he would take measures to prevent your being bothered by them.”
I grunted and wished I could drink real booze again, even the cheap stuff, which was all I could afford back in my reporter days. “The guy they thought was Dugan—he okay?”
“So far as I know. He was dragged to the Nightcrawler, produced sufficient evidence to prove mistaken identity, was given a drink and an apology, and returned to wherever they found him.”
“God, I’m gonna have to call it off. Those mugs are too stupid to be let loose.”
“You don’t think they’ll find him, do you?”
“Dugan could be halfway to Hong Kong by now. I know I would be there if I had me after me.”
Escott blinked a few times. “It’s far too late for that to have made sense, and it did.”
I glanced at my watch. The evening was getting into the deep-night hours. “Bobbi should be done with the receipts by now. I oughta get her home.”
“Sounds to be an excellent idea for myself. That is, if you don’t require me further?”
Escott really did like to help out at the club. “You’ve done above and beyond. Thanks.”
He got up. “No problem.”
His time in the States had corrupted him. He sounded just like Gordy.
In the lobby he boomed a loud good night toward the upstairs. Bobbi answered back, asking if I was around.
“Yes, he’ll be up directly.”
“Okay. Drive careful.”
“Thank you, I will.”
Theirs was a call and response thing like you hear in some church services. They’d done it several times now at closing, a comfortable form of reassurance. I hadn’t been the only one left shaken by Bristow’s work on me.
Escott let himself out using his own key. It would be a dark and chill ride home until his Nash warmed up again.
“Drive careful,” I muttered, suddenly aware of the emptiness of the building. Were I here on my own, I’d have made like Myrna and turned on all the lights. Certainly I’d have gotten some music going to push back the silence. The stuff seeping thin through the walls from my office radio wasn’t enough.