Canvas Coffin

by Gault, William Campbell

  I looked at her suspiciously, but her face was innocent enough. “You’re driving,” I said. “Let’s go.”

  She took the Coast Highway to Olympic, and Olympic to Lincoln. Lincoln is as ugly a boulevard as you’ll see in any town, a truck-infested, traffic-busy thoroughfare lined with secondhand car lots, junk yards, clip joints, and all the small-shop rackets Los Angeles is loaded with, from pottery to prune juice.

  Just this side of Venice, she pulled the convertible into a five-car parking-lot, next to a grimy brick building. The neon sign on top of the dump read: Harry’s Hoot Owl Club.

  “Is this the best you can do?” I asked her.

  “This,” she said, “is where Mary Kostanic first gained prominence in Los Angeles — sporting circles. Don’t you read the Mirror?”

  “Not if I can help it. What’s on your mind?”

  “A hot-fudge sundae. They’re famous for them.”

  “It’s no place for a decent girl.”

  “If it’s good enough for Mary Kostanic, it’s good enough for me. Are you frightened, Champ?”

  “For you. Not for me. Some guy gets wise, and I’ll be obliged to pop him, and — ” I shrugged.

  She climbed out of the car. “Well, then, I’ll go in alone.”

  We went in together.

  Coming from the brightness of the street, it was like a dungeon. Four booths and a bar, a mangy-looking stuffed owl returning my stare from a pedestal atop the back bar mirror. Two workingmen drank beer in the rear booth; a girl sat at the far end of the bar, reading a Racing Form.

  Her eyes studied me appraisingly a moment, shifted to Sally, and returned to the Form.

  The man behind the bar wasn’t much bigger than Carnera. He wore a nearly white shirt and a black bow tie and a few ring scars.

  Both his hamlike hands were on top of the bar, and his gaze was steady on mine. “Well, Champ! Slumming?”

  Somewhere, I’d seen him before. But whether as friend or foe or neither, I couldn’t recall.

  “Dropped in for a drink,” I said. “Haven’t we met before?”

  “At Stillman’s,” he said, “in ’46. Before my fight with Burke.”

  “Harry Bevilaqua,” I said, and held out my hand. A smile distorted his huge face as he gripped me up to the elbow.

  “This is Sally Forester, Harry,” I said. “My girl.” Sally nodded and smiled. “You were a heavyweight, I’ll bet.”

  He threw back his head and laughed. The bar shook, the windows rattled and the truck traffic right outside the door was blanketed by the blast of his mirth.

  He could laugh. After what Burke had done to him. Burke had battered him into a lumpy, bloody mountain of smashed flesh, though he hadn’t put him down. Burke had done everything but subdivide him.

  Sally started to laugh, too, after a second, and I managed a smile. Remembering the Burke fight, the smile was a chore.

  I said, “What ever happened to Burke?”

  “Selling roofing, in Milwaukee. Burke would have gone some place, if he had a punch, you know that? Clever kid, but no punch.”

  “I never watched him much,” I said. “You sound happy though, Harry.”

  “Punchy,” he explained. “These days, that’s a big help.” And he laughed again, though not as loud. “Beer, Champ? A small beer? Or champagne, on the house? And the little lady, maybe a Martini? You looked good, those last couple rounds against Charley. You were kind of rough on him, though. You usually aren’t so rough with Charley, are you? Friend of yours, isn’t he?”

  “A small beer for me will be all right,” I said. “I don’t know about Sally.”

  “Who knows about women, huh, Champ? How about Giani?”

  “How about Burke?” I answered.

  He laughed. “Yeh. Feather puncher, though. I’m an easy bleeder, Champ. What’ll it be, Miss Sally?” He was drawing a short beer.

  “Oh — champagne,” Sally said. “Did you know Mary Kostanic very well, Harry?”

  The girl at the far curve of the bar looked up quickly, saw my eyes on her, and dropped her gaze to the Form. Harry studied the collar on my beer, still under the tap. The sound of the trucks was suddenly louder in the quiet room.

  Harry continued to look at the beer. “Who?”

  “Mary Kostanic. Brenda Vane.”

  Harry set the beer carefully on the bar, his eyes never wavering from it. “I knew her well, very well. Mary liked fighters. And marines and thugs and even some cops. Tough guys, Mary liked.” He looked up, and straight at Sally. “I liked Mary. I liked her a lot. She was kind of a strange girl, but we’re all queer enough.”

  “How was she strange, Harry?” Sally’s voice was gentle.

  “Why? Why do you want to know?”

  “Not because I’m nosy or catty,” Sally said. “Not for any nasty reasons, Harry.”

  He looked at her for seconds. “Yuh.” He took a breath, and glanced down toward the girl at the far end. “What’ll you have to drink? Oh, you wanted champagne, I remember.”

  He reached into a refrigerated cabinet, took out a bottle, and started to peel the foil. His eyes were on the wall behind us.

  “The law was here. The nosy newspaper knuckle-heads were here. Even a stinking sob sister. I told ‘em Mary was a clean kid with lots of talent looking for a break in a rough town. That’s what the papers like, anyway.” He reached for a corkscrew and began to turn it into the cork.

  “Well, maybe none of it was true. The way she was strange, I got the idea she liked being kicked around. You know, there’s people like that. Remember, Champ, that Arty Retard?”

  “I remember,” I said. “There’s a name for the type.”

  “Masochist,” Sally said. “They live to suffer.”

  Harry shrugged. He had removed the corkscrew and was working the cork out with a thumb the size of a fifty-cent cigar.

  There was a pop and the cork went over our shoulders to bounce on the floor.

  “Real good vintage,” Harry said. “1952. Hah!” He winked at me. “How about Giani?”

  “Is he one of your relatives? Why worry about him?”

  “I don’t, Champ.” His big frame shook in a chuckle. “I won’t be fighting him. Good boy, right?”

  “That’s what I hear. That’s his claim, anyway.”

  Harry nodded. “Sure. Cocky. All the real brawlers are cocky. Bad boys, too, all of ‘em.”

  He poured the champagne into a glass, and brought out another for himself. Then he lifted his in a toast.

  “To better days,” he said.

  “And honest refs,” I said.

  “And real friends,” Sally said.

  Behind us, the door opened, and I glanced that way. I made out the peaked cap of a cab driver and then he was fully into the room and he saw me.

  He stopped short and stared. He looked pale, suddenly, and then his eyes slid off me and went questioningly to Harry.

  Harry’s voice was too calm. “Nobody called for a cab, that I know of.” He looked toward the two men in the booth. “Either of you gents call for a cab?”

  To my knowledge, I’d never seen the man before. But the atmosphere was too charged for me to let this go by. I said, “Hello. Haven’t seen you for two days. Come on over and have a drink.”

  Chapter V

  HE WAS A SMALL MAN, no more than a bantam. He looked at me without recognition, and then said, “Never turn down a drink, Mac. But what’s this about two days?” He came slowly over to the bar.

  I said, “Didn’t you carry me the other night?”

  The man looked at Harry. “Whisky.” And then at me. “I get a lot of fares, mister.”

  “From the Palisades, late, night before last?”

  He shook his head. He looked at me blankly and said, “You could check the trip tickets. Haven’t been out there for a week.”

  Harry, pouring the whisky, said, “Leave it lay, Champ. I think I know what you’re talking about.”

  “Well, I sure as hell don’t,” the small ma
n said. There was a touch of belligerence in his tone.

  “Simmer down, Noodles,” Harry said. “Have a drink.” Then he smiled at me. “I know a couple of the boys was at the party, Champ. I get a word here and there. Relax. Have another beer.”

  Sally said, “Then you did have him in your cab, but didn’t make an official record of it. Why?”

  Harry stared at her blankly. “Miss Sally, you’ve got everything mixed up. I don’t follow you at all.”

  Sally’s chin was out again. “Exactly how stupid do you think we are?”

  Harry spread both hands palm upward, like a praying oak tree. “Ma’am, what’s going on? What’re you getting all riled up about?”

  Noodles said, “Well, I’ve got to be moving. Can’t make any money in here. Thanks for the drink, Major.”

  He’d taken one step when I grabbed him by the shoulder. “Just a minute. We hadn’t finished talking, Noodles.”

  He looked at the hand on his shoulder and up to meet my gaze. If he was frightened, he hid it well. “Take your hand off me. Who the hell you think you are?”

  Harry said, “Leave him go, Champ.”

  “I’ll fight both of you, if I have to,” I said. “But my neck’s involved in this business, and I don’t want any brush-offs now.”

  Harry’s big face looked sadly patient. “Champ, leave loose of him. This ain’t no ring. I’m the boss and bouncer, here, and there’s no ref around. Leave him go.”

  I tightened my grip on the little man’s shoulder, and he bent in a half-crouch, a grimace of pain tightening his face.

  From the corner of my eye, I saw Harry walking along toward the front, open end of the bar. I heard him coming up behind me, moving easily, and I could guess his feet were flat.

  Now I could see him in the mirror at the end of the room, and I released the little man and pivoted. I brought my right hand around as I did and put every one of my hundred and sixty pounds into the button try.

  I couldn’t have hit him cleaner with a rifle.

  I felt the shock of it all the way to my molars, and felt the bone go in my hand.

  I saw the man-mountain take two backward steps and then the floor shook as he crashed a chair and toppled.

  I heard Sally scream, heard a thunk, and turned to see Noodles going down, his knees paper, a knife gleaming in his hand.

  There was a look of pure incredulity on Sally’s face and a leaking champagne bottle in her hand.

  My hand throbbed steadily. Noodles sat in one of the booths, his head cradled in his arms, on top of the table. Kayoed by a dame; poor Noodles would live a long time with that.

  The mountain of meat known as Harry Bevilaqua sat in a chair near the booth that held Noodles, rubbing his jaw with one ridiculous hand.

  “The first time, Champ,” Harry said sadly. “First time I ever took a full count. And from a lousy middle — ” He shook his big head.

  The girl reading the Racing Form was still at it, working with a pencil and a scratch pad now. The two men had left.

  My hand was swelling, turning blue along a streak between the middle knuckles. I said, “What do we know now?”

  Harry looked at Noodles, and at the girl. He said to her, “Your nose is shiny, Ruth. You go and powder your nose. Take a lot of time; get it right.”

  She went out through a door at the rear of the room.

  Harry glanced again at Noodles, and then looked down at his big hands. “Well, that night, Mary called about one, said a man had passed out in her place, and was there someone around that could help? Noodles was around; he went up there. Take it away, Noodles.”

  He shook his head, cradled in the thin arms. “To hell with them. Get the cops. To hell with them.”

  “Noodles,” Harry said softly, “the champ is all right. That ain’t only my word; you could ask any of ‘em from back where it’s civilized and they’ll tell you Luke Pilgrim is aces. We didn’t do right, playing cute with him. The lady’s sorry, Noodles, but you shouldn‘t have pulled no knife on the champ.”

  The little man shivered and lifted his head. He glared at me. “You were up there, outside, sitting on the curb. I picked you up and brought you back to the hotel. And now that I told you, it’ll be all right if I tell the cops, huh, Cheese Champ?”

  “Noodles,” Harry said, “Luke’s no cheese champ. You saw that right he hit me with. Or did you?”

  “I didn’t see nothing,” Noodles said. “But I will, and I want a ringside seat when Giani beats his brains out.”

  “That we’ll see,” Harry said. “But cops, Noodles, what kind of people call copper? Not our kind of people.”

  Sally said, “I’m sorry I hit you, Mr. Noodles, but I love Luke and you were going to kill him. Wouldn’t you want your girl to do as much for you?”

  “I ain’t got a girl,” he said. “Lay off me.”

  I said, “For Christ’s sake, if you want to scream for the law, there’s the phone. But quit whimpering. You boys may as well know I blanked out from the seventh round until breakfast the next morning. I learned later, from Max, about the party and about taking the redhead-Mary Kostanic home. Or rather, going home with her. I want to know what happened, too, damn you. I want to know if I’m a murderer.”

  Silence, while both of them stared at me.

  Sally said, “That wasn’t very bright, Luke. Only you and Max and I knew about the blackout, until now.”

  “They can take it to the law,” I told her, “and then try to explain why they’ve been so quiet about their part in it. They could take years to explain that away.”

  “It still wasn’t very bright,” Sally said.

  “Neither am I. Well, boys?”

  Harry looked thoughtfully at Noodles. Noodles still stared at me.

  Then Harry smiled. “We ain’t mad no more, huh, Noodles?”

  Noodles shrugged. A flicker of cunning crossed his thin face.

  Harry said, “Was it that high right hand, in the seventh, Champ? Was that what put you in the black?”

  “That was it.” I continued to look at the little cabbie. “Was Mary alive when you picked me up at the curb?”

  “I don’t know. That’s straight. There was a light on up there, but nothing moving, so I don’t know.”

  “That’s no help,” I said. “Do you remember a bakery sign on the supermarket at the top of the hill above that Conference Grounds. It’s a Mayfair Market.”

  “Bakery sign?” Noodles frowned. “You mean one of them windmills?”

  “That’s right. What happened there?”

  “You got me. Nothing.”

  “Did you come into the hotel with me?”

  He shook his head. “You gave me a ten and told me to keep the change, and I took off.”

  “I was drunk?”

  “No, I don’t think so. You didn’t weave any. You seemed kind of — oh, hell — punchy, I guess.”

  Sally said, “You probably walked right past the clerk at the desk. Luke, your hand — ”

  “Yup,” I said. “Bone broken, I’m sure.”

  “Geez,” Harry said. “Champ, you standing there and that hand — That’s your living, man — You’d better — ”

  “I’ll be going in a minute,” I said. “Noodles, whether you like me or not, I’d appreciate everything you can tell me. You won’t have to go to the law, if I killed her. I will.”

  “That’s all I know,” Noodles said. “So help me, that’s every word of it.”

  “Sally,” I said, “phone Max at the hotel. Tell him to have a doctor there. He’ll know a good one. I don’t want just any doctor on this hand. We’d better go; it’s getting bad.”

  Harry said, “You should have hit me with a bottle or a chair, Champ. Christ, that’s — ” He was chewing his full lower lip.

  “I’ll drop in again,” I said. “I’ve got to get some air.”

  The floor wavered a little, but I made the sunlight and felt better. I stood next to the doorway, sucking in the warm air, trying to concentrate on
not getting sick.

  Then Sally came out, the keys in her hand. “Max will have a doctor there. Let’s go. You’re all right, Luke?”

  “It feels worse than it is,” I said, “but don’t lose any time.”

  She made the flivver talk, and they talk very well for their size and weight. We got to the hotel a few minutes before the doctor.

  Max met us at the door, his face stormy. “What in the hell kind of mess is this, now?” He didn’t look at Sally.

  Neither of us answered him. I sat in the big chair near the window; Sally went to get me a drink of water.

  “Brawling,” Max said, “like some slap-happy bum. What came over you?”

  “Self-defense, Max,” I said. “Remember Harry Bevilaqua?”

  “I think. Freak — big freak? Nobody ever put him away, though.”

  “I just did. And I learned how I got back from the redhead’s.”

  “How?”

  “Cab. The girl phoned Harry for help, and he sent a cabbie up. Maybe he came in his car instead of a cab; I didn’t check that. Anyhow, she phoned.”

  “Then she was alive when you left her.”

  “The cabbie doesn’t know. I was waiting outside.”

  “That’s great. And why didn’t he go to the law?”

  I stared at Max. Sally brought my water and held it for me to sip, and I couldn’t get my mind from Max’s words. Why hadn’t Noodles gone to the law? Not because of any love for me; on that I’d give odds.

  The doctor came, and I got the hypo, right off. There was no broken bone but a strained muscle; nothing permanent. So far as he could tell now.

  He left, and Max said, “Well, if it’s not too much trouble, I’d like to hear the story that goes with the hand.”

  I told him about it and all the time I talked I was thinking of his remark about Noodles.

  The relief the hypo brought relaxed me, and I dozed off, the sound of tires soothing. Windmills came tilting at me and the big woman in white shorts danced a tango with Max. “Died, died, died” — someone said.

  It was Sally, and I opened my eyes.

  “Where the hell you been?” Max was saying. “It was on all the radio stations.”

  Sally was crying. “That nice man, that decent, sweet, dignified, courageous — ”