Wild Town

by Jim Thompson

  “Now, looky”—the man made a baffled gesture. “I mean, what the hell?”

  “Come on! Come off of it! I suppose you just followed me in here to get a drink, huh?”

  The man started to nod. Then, his squinted gray eyes turned frosty, and his voice dropped to a chilling purr. “Lookin’ for trouble, eh?” he said, the words cold-edged but soft. “Just ain’t happy without it. Well, I always like to oblige.”

  The gun whipped up from his hip. Bugs hesitated; nervous, oddly ashamed, wondering why it was that he always had to be in such a hell of a hurry with the mouth.

  “Look,” he mumbled. “I-I’ve been catching it pretty rough. I didn’t mean to—”

  “You look.” The hammer of the gun clicked. “Look real good. Now, you want to move or do you want me to move you?”

  Bugs moved.

  The jail was in the basement of the ancient brick courthouse. The ventilation and the light were bad, but the bunks were clean, and the chow—brought in from one of the town’s restaurants—was really first class. Each prisoner got three good meals a day, as opposed to the twice-a-day slop in most jails. He was also given a sack of makings or, if he preferred, a plug of chewing.

  Bugs supposed there was a gimmick somewhere in the deal. Probably you’d have pay off with a road gang at twelve hours a day. But such, according to the other prisoners—no local talent, all floaters like himself—was not the case.

  “These folks are different out here,” an oilfield worker explained. “They throw you in jail, they figure they got to look after you. They might shoot a guy, but they won’t starve him to death.”

  “What about the rough stuff? Working you over until you clean the slate for them?”

  “Uh-uh. You ain’t done nothin’, they won’t try to pin it on you. You won’t get roughed unless you cut up rough yourself…At least,” the man added carefully, “they’ve always played fair with me. This is my fifth time in for drunk and disorderly, and the boys have treated me real nice every time.”

  “But? There’s more to the story?”

  “We-el, no, not exactly. Not as far as the treatment of the prisoners is concerned. But the way this town is run”—he shook his head—“I got an idea that there’s at least one of these laws, the chief deputy, Lou Ford, that’d just about as soon kill you as look at you. The place is wide open, see? Gambling houses, bootleg joints, honky-tonks. And some very bad babies runnin’ ’em. But they don’t give any backtalk to Ford. He rides herd on ’em, as easy as I can ride a walking beam.”

  “He’s the chief deputy, you say. What about the sheriff?”

  “Sick and old. Hardly ever see him except at election time. So Ford’s the man, and I do mean the man. He’s got the town and the county right in his pocket, and it don’t do nothing without his say-so. The funny part about it is, he don’t look tough at all. Young, good-looking, always smiling—”

  “But a good gunhand, huh?”

  “Uh-uh. The only law here that doesn’t wear a gun. But, well,” the man spread his hands helplessly, “I don’t know how he does it; I mean, I couldn’t explain. You’d have to see him in action yourself.”

  Bugs had been jailed early in the morning. The following afternoon, the turnkey took him out of the bullpen and up the stairs to the street floor. He assumed he was being taken into court. Instead, the turnkey handed him a ten-dollar bill and gestured him toward the door.

  “That’s from Lou Ford,” he explained. “Wants to see you, and he figured you might want to spruce up first.”

  “But—well, what about the charges against me?”

  “Ain’t any. Lou had ’em dropped. He’ll be out to his house when you’re ready. Anyone can tell you where it is.”

  “Now, wait a minute!” Bugs bristled. “What does he want to see me about? What if I don’t want to see him?”

  “Easy to find out for yourself, mister. If you do see him or if you don’t.”

  Bugs got a shave and a haircut. He bought a white shirt and a tie, and had his worn suit sponged and pressed. Boomtown prices being what they are, that took practically all of the ten. He used the remainder for a shoe shine and a package of cigarettes, and headed for Lou Ford’s house.

  There were two “old” residential sections. One was the traditional wrong-side-of-the-tracks settlement of the Mexicans and “white trash.” The other was up the hill from, and overlooking the town: a few blocks of tree-lined streets, and roomy two-storied houses. Except for color difference—they were usually light blue, white or brown—the houses were almost identical, a comfortable combination of Colonial and Spanish-Moorish architecture. Each had a long porch (“gallery”) extending across the front. Despite the area’s always uncertain water supply, each had a deep shrub- and tree-shaded lawn.

  Ford’s house was on the corner. A new Cadillac convertible stood in the driveway. McKenna stepped up on the porch and knocked on the door. There was no answer. He punched the doorbell, discovering that it was out of order. He knocked again. Stooping, he studied the age-dulled brass plate affixed to the door:

  Dr. Amos Ford

  Enter

  The doctor was Lou’s father, Bugs had learned. An improvident, kindly man, he had died several years before, leaving nothing to his son but this house, heavily mortgaged at that. Obviously, the sign no longer meant what it said; for visitors to enter, that is. It had been left on the door out of sentiment or shiftlessness. On the other hand…

  Well, there it was, wasn’t it? And why shouldn’t a stranger in town take it at its face value? What was he supposed to do—stand out here and beat the skin off his knuckles? He’d been told—ordered—to see Ford. Now this sign told him to enter.

  Bugs did so.

  He was standing in a narrow foyer, quite dark since the doors to the rooms on either side were closed. The only light streamed down from the stairway; from an open door, apparently, right at the head of the stairs. Muted sounds also drifted down the stairs. Scuffling. The creak of bed springs. A man’s sardonically soothing drawl, and a woman’s quiet, quickly furious voice:

  “Aw, now, Amy. You know I—”

  “I know you, that’s what I know, Lou Ford!”

  “But she don’t mean a thing to me, Amy! Honest. It’s just business.”

  “You’re a liar! What kind of business? Well? Go on, I’m listening!”

  “But I done told you, honey! It’s pretty confidential; somethin’ I can’t talk about. Now, why’n’t you just leave it at that, and—”

  There was an outraged sob. The sharp cra-ack of a hard-swung palm meeting flesh. Then, the girl came rushing out of the room; weeping in blind anger, clutching a handful of undergarments.

  Highlighted by the glare from the door, she began putting on her panties. She got them on, hopping from foot to foot. Then she slumped her shoulders, dropping her breasts into the cups of her brassiere.

  That was all that Bugs saw, all that he allowed himself to see. He got quietly back out to the porch, blushing deeply, shamed and embarrassed by what he had seen.

  He was like that, oddly. Modest. Excruciatingly old-fashioned, one might say, although he could not regard such things as a matter of fashion. He had killed. He had worked in shabby, disillusioning jobs. He had been penned up with degenerates for years. That had been his environment; violence, foulness and filth. And yet in all his life, he had looked on no more than three naked women. And of the three, one had been his wife.

  He wished the third had not been this girl. He wished, with a kind of gnawing hunger, that he had not seen her in her nakedness.

  And he wished, longed to see her again: to cherish her, treat her with love and respect. Because, yes, by God, she deserved it! No matter what she’d done, regardless of how things looked.

  He’d noticed more than her nakedness—and off-hand he would have said she was not much different than hundreds he’d seen: just a small, well-rounded young woman with a good-featured face and sandy brown hair pulled back in a bun. But then he had gone
on looking. And suddenly he had almost gasped at what he saw.

  You know how it is. A three-hundred-dollar suit doesn’t knock your eye out. A Ming vase doesn’t shriek for attention. But the ultimate beauty, the perfection, is there; and you’ll always see it if you look long enough, see it and recognize it, regardless of whether you’ve ever seen it before.

  Even if you’ve caught so much crap in your eyes that you’re half-blind in one and can’t see out of the other…

  Bugs must have been standing on the porch for ten minutes, kind of dazed and dopey, lost in his own sad thoughts, when he heard the back door close. That snapped him out of it, recalled him to the gray facts of what he was and why he was here. And he knocked again, hastily and loudly.

  Ford responded almost immediately with a hail of, “Right with you.” A moment later there was the click-tap of boots in the hallway, and he opened the door.

  “McKenna? I’m Lou Ford. Come on in an’ set.”

  Bugs followed him down the foyer, and into what apparently had been the doctor’s one-time office. Ford looked as out of place among the rows of glass-doored bookcases as a man could look.

  He was about thirty, the chief deputy. He wore a pinkish-tan shirt, with a black clip-on bowtie, and blue serge pants. The cuffs of the trousers were tucked carelessly into the tops of his boots. In Bugs’ book, he stacked up about the same—in appearance—as any county clown.

  His black, glossy hair was combed in a straight-back pompadour. His high-arched brows gave his face a droll, impish look. A long thin cigar was clamped between his white even teeth.

  He waved Bugs to one of the comfortable leather chairs, then sat himself down behind the desk. He said politely, “Like a drink? Well, how about a cigar, then?” And, then, when Bugs shook his head, “Now, that’s right. You’re a cigarette smoker, aren’t you?”

  He said it very carelessly, a man seemingly making conversation. But Bugs was sure that he wasn’t. He was saying that he had seen the two cigarette butts which Bugs had flipped onto the sidewalk.

  “Just got here, did you?” he went on, subdued amusement in his voice. “Sure hope I didn’t keep you waitin’. Nothing I hate worse than a fella that keeps another fella waitin’ on him.”

  “How about crooked cops?” said McKenna. “How do you feel about them?”

  “Well…which kind you mean? The jailbird kind? The kind that ain’t smart enough to stay out of the pen?” Ford grinned at him, narrow-eyed. “Made a little check-back on you, McKenna. You got quite a record.”

  “There’s nothing about grafting in it!”

  “Well, now, don’t you feel bad about it,” Ford said soothingly. “A man can’t do everything, and you damned sure done just about everything else.”

  “Look,” Bugs snarled. “What do you—”

  “How do you like our fair city, McKenna? Reg’lar little jool of the prairie, ain’t it? A city of homes, churches and people. How’d you like to be one with our upstandin’, God-fearing citizenry, them homely souls that ain’t no more interested in a dollar than I am in my right leg?”

  Bugs laughed in spite of himself. He remembered reluctantly that, however he might feel about Ford, he was indebted to him.

  The deputy joined in his laughter. “Now, that’s better,” he said. “You got no use for me, maybe. I got none for you, maybe. And maybe we’d both feel different if we could see the other fellow’s side. But I reckon that would kind of put us out of step with the world, and it ain’t really necessary. We can still do business together.”

  “What kind of business?”

  “There’s a big hotel here in town—you saw it, I guess. They need a house dick. Pretty good payin’ job, and you get your meals and room along with it. I think I can land it for you.”

  “Me? I could land a house dick’s job in a place like that?”

  “You ain’t listening.” Ford said reprovingly. “I said I could land it for you. Owner’s wife is a good friend of mine. Sorry I can’t say the same for him.”

  Bugs hesitated, chewing his lip. His head jerked in a curt negative. “I guess not. I guess I’d better not. I can’t get into any more trouble—I can’t, know what I mean? And if I was sneaked over on some guy, pushed down his throat—”

  “You won’t be. Won’t be no deception, a-tall. Fact is, if I got him figured right, he’ll hire you because you have got a sorry record. He ain’t been exactly no angel himself, see? And he’ll think a guy that comes clean with him must be on the level.”

  “But I wouldn’t be, is that it? That’s where you come in.”

  “Do I?” Ford examined the tip of his cigar. “You know what Confucius say, McKenna? Man with bare ass always have big mouth.”

  “There’s another one I like better,” Bugs said. “Many men drown in their own dung, but few die shouting for a doctor.”

  “Hey, now!” Ford seemed honestly delighted. “That’s all right! But about this hotel job, I ain’t askin’ you to be anything but on the level. Ain’t askin’ you to be, don’t want you to be. The most way you can help me is just to do what you should do.”

  “Yes?”

  “I said so. This is a rough town and it’s a big place, and it gets a lot of people that ain’t exactly panty waists. A good tough house dick—and I know you ain’t no coward, whatever else you been—can save trouble for me.”

  “Well,” Bugs hesitated troubledly. “It sounds all right. And Ford, by God, it has to be! If I got into just one more jam—”

  “Sure,” Ford cut in soothingly, “you just can’t do it. A fella in your spot has to do everything he can to keep out of trouble, because he ain’t got too many chances left.”

  “And you think I can handle the job, a guy that—that acts like I do? I don’t mean I don’t act all right, get me?” Bugs added hastily. “I give just as good as I get. But I won’t take any guff from anyone—and I don’t give a hoot in hell who they are either. And I won’t go around with a big possum grin on my face—”

  “Yeah, sure, I understand,” Ford nodded. “You ain’t going to do no getting along with no one. It’s up to them to get along with you.”

  “That’s not what I said! What I said was that—” Bugs scowled, then his face twisted into a sheepish grin. “I guess it did sound that way,” he said mildly. “I guess that’s probably the way it is.”

  “Or been,” Ford corrected. “You live like a man should for a while, get yourself some reason for livin’, and you’ll feel a lot different. Well”—he got up from the desk—“guess we’re all set, huh? Let me run up and get my hat and coat, and we’ll be on our way.”

  He left. Bugs got up and paced nervously around the room. As attractive as this set-up seemed, in some ways, he was worried about it. Suspicious of Ford. Ford’s clownish mannerisms were too exaggerated, no more than a mask for a coldly calculating and super-sharp mind. He wouldn’t go to these lengths simply to place an efficient house detective in the Hanlon Hotel.

  Still—Bugs thought—how could he be so sure? He didn’t think like an ordinary man anymore; he’d reached the point where he was suspicious of everyone. Ford was on the take, of course, but you found graft just about everywhere. And aside from that, and his treatment of the girl, Amy…

  Bugs frowned, remembering. Firmly, he removed her from his calculations about Ford. Maybe she was asking for that kind of treatment. But she wasn’t, she couldn’t be! At any rate, she was none of his business.

  Bugs paused in front of the old fieldstone fireplace, studying the several pictures which stood propped on the mantel. There was one of a young boy—Ford, obviously—standing beside a collie dog. There was one of a spade-bearded, bespectacled man, and another of an exotic-looking, proud-eyed brunette in a high-necked shirtwaist. There was—the remaining picture had toppled over. Bugs picked it up, and stared into the face of the girl, Amy.

  Her lips were parted slightly. Her eyes looked straight into his; smiling, dancing with happy expectancy. Pleased with herself and him, and deligh
ted that life had brought two such nice people together.

  And from right behind him, Ford coughed.

  Bugs jumped. He dropped the picture back to the mantel. “Hope you don’t mind,” he mumbled. “I was just, uh—”

  “Aw, now, sure not,” Ford drawled. “You don’t see a dawg like that very often. He was the first and last dawg I ever had. Just seemed like I couldn’t never find another one to measure up to him after he passed on.”

  “I see. Uh—those are your parents?”

  “Yep. Fine-looking woman, ain’t she? Traced her ancestry clear back to the Con-kee-stadors. Let’s see, now”—Ford waggled his cigar thoughtfully. “I guess it was right after that dawg picture was taken that she run off with a cattle buyer.”

  Bugs didn’t know what to say to that. Nor to the deputy’s next statement that his mother was one helluva smart woman. “Didn’t try to do what she wasn’t made to.” But he felt that Ford had said a great deal to him.

  “Now, that little gal there,” Ford went on. “That’s my fee-an-say, Amy Standish. Teaches school here in town. Probably do a lot better some place else, but she’s lived here all her life and her family before her for God knows how long. So it looks like I’m stuck with her.”

  “You’re stuck!” Bugs turned on him. “I’d say you were damned lucky!”

  “Well, now, I guess you would,” Ford nodded, “just seein’ her in that old picture. But she’s got fat as a hawg since it was taken.”

  “Fat? Why, you’re—” Reddening, Bugs choked off the sentence.

  Ford looked at him innocently. “Yeah? You was sayin’, McKenna?”

  “Nothing. Are we going to stand here talking all day, or are we going to see about that job?”

  “Just as soon as I make a phone call,” Ford said. “Want to do me a little favor while you’re waitin’? There’s a sign out there on the door—keep fogettin’ to take it down—an’ if you’ll get a screwdriver out of the—”