by James Ellroy
"Yeah. Still, sometimes I think I'm turkey."
"Sure, sure," Tigo said. "It ain't only that, though. Like sometimes ... well, don't you wonder what you're doing stomping some guy in the street? Like ... you know what I mean? Like ... who's the guy to you? What you got to beat him up for? 'Cause he messed with somebody else's girl?" Tigo shook his head. "It gets complicated sometimes."
"Yeah, but..." Danny frowned again. "You got to stick with the club. Don't you?"
"Sure, sure ... hell yes." Again their eyes locked.
"Well, here goes," Danny said. He lifted the gun. "It's just..." He shook his head, and then twirled the cylinder. The cylinder spun, and then stopped. He studied the gun, wondering if one of the cartridges would roar from the barrel when he squeezed the trigger.
Then he fired.
Click.
"I didn't think you was going through with it," Tigo said.
"I didn't neither."
"You got heart, Danny," Tigo said. He looked at the gun. He picked it up and broke it open.
"What you doing?" Danny asked.
"Another cartridge," Tigo said. "Six chambers, three cartridges. That makes it even money. You game?"
"You?"
"The boys said ..." Tigo stopped talking. "Yeah, I'm game," he added, his voice curiously low.
"It's your turn, you know."
"I know."
Danny watched as Tigo picked up the gun.
"You ever been rowboating on the lake?"
Tigo looked across the table at Danny, his eyes wide. "Once," he said. "I went with Juana."
"Is it ... is it any kicks?"
"Yeah. Yeah, it's grand kicks. You mean you never been?"
"No," Danny said.
"Hey, you got to try it, man," Tigo said excitedly. "You'll like it. Hey, you try it."
"Yeah, I was thinking maybe this Sunday I'd ..." He did not complete the sentence.
"My spin," Tigo said wearily. He twirled the cylinder. "Here goes a good man," he said, and he put the revolver to his head and squeezed the trigger.
Click.
Danny smiled nervously. "No rest for the weary," he said. "But Jesus you've got heart. I don't know if I can go through with it."
"Sure, you can," Tigo assured him. "Listen, what's there to be afraid of?" He slid the gun across the table.
"We keep this up all night?" Danny asked.
"They said ...you know ..."
"Well, it ain't so bad. I mean, hell, we didn't have this operation, we wouldn'ta got a chance to talk, huh?" He grinned feebly.
"Yeah," Tigo said, his face splitting in a wide grin. "It ain't been so bad, huh?"
"No, it's been ... well, you know, these guys on the club, who can talk to them?"
He picked up the gun.
"We could ..." Tigo started.
"What?"
"We could say ... well ... like we kept shootin' an' nothing happened, so ..." Tigo shrugged. "What the hell! We can't do this all night, can we?"
"I don't know."
"Let's make this the last spin. Listen, they don't like it, they can take a flying leap, you know?"
"I don't think they'll like it. We're supposed to settle this for the clubs."
"Screw the clubs!" Tigo said. "Can't we pick our own ..." The word was hard coming. When it came, his eyes did not leave Danny's face. " ...friends?"
"Sure we can," Danny said vehemently. "Sure we can! Why not?"
"The last spin," Tigo said. "Come on, the last spin."
"Gone," Danny said. "Hey, you know, I'm glad they got this idea. You know that? I'm actually glad!" He twirled the cylinder. "Look, you want to go on the lake this Sunday? I mean with your girl and mine? We could get two boats. Or even one if you want."
"Yeah, one boat," Tigo said. "Hey, your girl'll like Juana, I mean it. She's a swell chick."
The cylinder stopped. Danny put the gun to his head quickly.
"Here's to Sunday," he said. He grinned at Tigo, and Tigo grinned back, and then Danny fired.
The explosion rocked the small basement room, ripping away half of Danny's head, shattering his face. A small cry escaped Tigo's throat, and a look of incredulous shock knifed his eyes.
Then he put his head on the table and began weeping.
FOREVER AFTER
1960: Jim Thompson
JIM (JAMES MEYERS) THOMPSON (1906–1977) was born in Anadarko, Oklahoma Territory, and worked numerous hard, physical jobs, including as an oil-well and pipeline laborer (his father was a wildcatter), while trying to write. He received commissions from the Works Projects Administration Writers' Project during the Depression, producing guidebooks of Oklahoma, among other works, and worked as a journalist, mainly covering crime stories.
His first novel, Now and on Earth (1942), is a tale of sex, sin, violence, and revenge. The book most readers regard as his masterpiece, The Killer Inside Me (1952), was the first of sixteen paperback originals he produced during the 1950s, his only prolific era. His other critically successful novels during the '50s include Savage Night (1953), A Swell-Looking Babe (1954), and The Getaway (1959). After The Grifters (1963) and Pop. 1280 (1964), the quality of his work, already extremely erratic, declined rapidly. When he died in 1977, not a single book of his was in print in the United States until Quill included The Killer Inside Me in a series of classic hard-boiled novels in 1983; the following year, Black Lizard reprinted most of his other titles. While his bleak novels of psychopaths, losers, alcoholics, and unreliable narrators never achieved sales beyond a vocal cult following in his own country, he enjoyed substantial commercial and critical success in France, where he has often been regarded as America's greatest hard-boiled writer. Several films were made from his work, with varying aesthetic success, including The Killer Inside Me, a dud filmed in 1976 with Stacy Keach as Sheriff Lou Ford; The Getaway, filmed twice (both with endings absurdly changed from very noir to happy), first in 1972 with Steve McQueen and Ali MacGraw, then in 1994 with Alec Baldwin and Kim Basinger; and the superb The Grifters (1990), for which Donald E. Westlake's screenplay received one of the film's four Academy Award nominations. Directed by Stephen Frears, it starred John Cusack, Anjelica Huston, Annette Bening, and Pat Hingle. Thompson also wrote several screenplays, including the caper film The Killing (1956) and the antiwar film Paths of Glory (1957), both directed by Stanley Kubrick, but was cheated out of a screenwriting credit both times.
"Forever After" was published in the May 1960 issue of Shock magazine.
***
IT WAS A FEW minutes before five o'clock when Ardis Clinton unlocked the rear door of her apartment and admitted her lover. He was a cow-eyed young man with a wild mass of curly black hair. He worked as a dishwasher at Joe's Diner, which was directly across the alley.
They embraced passionately. Her body pressed against the meat cleaver concealed inside his shirt, and Ardis shivered with delicious anticipation. Very soon now, it would all be over. That stupid ox, her husband, would be dead. He and his stupid cracks—all the dullness and boredom —would be gone forever. And with the twenty thousand insurance money, ten thousand dollars double-indemnity...
"We're going to be so happy, Tony," she whispered. "You'll have your own place, a real swank little restaurant with what they call one of those intimate bars. And you'll just manage it, just kind of saunter around in a dress suit, and—"
"And we'll live happily ever after," Tony said. "Just me and you, baby, walking down life's highway together."
Ardis let out a gasp. She shoved him away from her, glaring up into his handsome empty face. "Don't!" she snapped. "Don't say things like that! I've told you and told you not to do it, and if I have to tell you again, I'll—!"
"But what'd I say?" he protested. "I didn't say nothin'."
"Well..." She got control of herself, forcing a smile. "Never mind, darling. You haven't had any opportunities and we've never really had a chance to know each other, so—so never mind. Things will be different after we're married." She patte
d his cheek, kissed him again. "You got away from the diner all right? No one saw you leave?"
"Huh-uh. I already took the stuff up to the steam-table for Joe, and the waitress was up front too, y'know, filling the sugar bowls and the salt and pepper shakers like she always does just before dinner. And—"
"Good. Now, suppose someone comes back to the kitchen and finds out you're not there. What's your story going to be?"
"Well... I was out in the alley dumping some garbage. I mean—" He corrected himself hastily, "maybe I was. Or maybe I was down in the basement, getting some supplies. Or maybe I was in the john—the lavatory, I mean—or—"
"Fine," Ardis said approvingly. "You don't say where you were, so they can't prove you weren't there. You just don't remember where you were, understand, darling? You might have been any number of places."
Tony nodded. Looking over her shoulder into the bedroom, he frowned worriedly. "Why'd you do that now, honey? I know this has got to look like a robbery. But tearin' up the room now, before he gets here—"
"There won't be time afterwards. Don't worry, Tony. I'll keep the door closed"
"But he might open it and look in. And if he sees all them dresser drawers dumped around, and—"
"He won't. He won't look into the bedroom. I know exactly what he'll do, exactly what he'll say, the same things that he's always done and said ever since we've been married. All the stupid, maddening, dull, tiresome—!" She broke off abruptly, conscious that her voice was rising. "Well, forget it," she said, forcing another smile. "He won't give us any trouble."
"Whatever you say." Tony nodded docilely. "If you say so, that's the way it is, Ardis."
"But there'll be trouble—from the cops. I know I've already warned you about it, darling. But it'll be pretty bad, worse than anything you've ever gone through. They won't have any proof, but they're bound to be suspicious, and if you ever start talking, admitting anything—"
"I won't. They won't get anything out of me."
"You're sure? They'll try to trick you. They'll probably tell you that I've confessed. They may even slap you around. So if you're not absolutely sure ..."
"They won't get anything out of me," he repeated stolidly. "I won't talk."
And studying him, Ardis knew that he wouldn't.
She led the way down the hall to the bathroom. He parted the shower curtains and stepped into the tub. Drawing a pair of gloves from his pocket, he pulled them onto his hands. Awkwardly, he fumbled the meat cleaver from beneath his shirt.
"Ar dis. Uh—look, honey."
"Yes?"
"Do I have to hit you? Couldn't I just maybe give you a little shove, or—"
"No, darling"' she said gently. "You have to hit me. This is supposed to be a robbery. If you killed my husband without doing anything to me, well, you know how it would look."
"But I never hit no woman—any woman—before. I might hit you too hard, and—"
"Tony!"
"Well, all right," he said sullenly. "I don't like it, but all right."
Ardis murmured soothing endearments. Then, brushing his lips quickly with her own, she returned to the living room. It was a quarter after five, exactly five minutes—but exactly —until her husband, Bill, would come home. Closing the bedroom door, she lay down on the lounge. Her negligee fell open, and she left it that way, grinning meanly as she studied the curving length of her thighs.
Give the dope a treat for a change, she thought. Let him get one last good look before he gets his.
Her expression changed. Wearily, resentfully, she pulled the material of the negligee over her legs. Because, of course, Bill would never notice. She could wear a ring in her nose, paint a bull's-eye around her navel, and he'd never notice.
If he had ever noticed, just once paid her a pretty compliment...
If he had ever done anything different, ever said or done anything different at all—even the teensiest little bit...
But he hadn't. Maybe he couldn't. So what else could she do but what she was doing? She could get a divorce, sure, but that was all she'd get. No money; nothing with which to build a new life. Nothing to make up for those fifteen years of slowly being driven mad.
It's his own fault, she thought bitterly. I can't take any more. If I had to put up with him for just one more night, even one more hour...!
She heard heavy footsteps in the hallway. Then a key turned in the door latch, and Bill came in. He was a master machinist, a solidly built man of about forty-five. The old-fashioned gold-rimmed glasses on his pudgy nose gave him a look of owlish solemnity.
"Well," he said, setting down his lunch bucket. "Another day, another dollar."
Ardis grimaced. He plodded across to the lounge, stooped, and gave her a halfhearted peck on the cheek.
"Long time no see," he said. "What we havin' for supper?"
Ardis gritted her teeth. It shouldn't matter now; in a few minutes it would all be over. Yet somehow it did matter. He was as maddening to her as he had ever been.
"Bill..." She managed a seductive smile, slowly drawing the negligee apart. "How do I look, Bill?"
"OK," he yawned. "Got a little hole in your drawers, though. What'd you say we was havin' for supper?"
"Slop," she said. "Garbage. Trash salad with dirt dressing."
"Sounds good. We got any hot water?"
Ardis sucked in her breath. She let it out again in a kind of infuriated moan. "Of course we've got hot water! Don't we always have? Well, don't we? Why do you have to ask every night?"
"So what's to get excited about?" He shrugged. "Well, guess I'll go splash the chassis."
He plodded off down the hall. Ardis heard the bathroom door open and close. She got up, stood waiting by the telephone. The door banged open again, and Tony came racing up the hall.
He had washed off the cleaver. While he hastily tucked it back inside his shirt, Ardis dialed the operator. "Help," she cried weakly. "Help ... police... murder!"
She let the receiver drop to the floor, spoke to Tony in a whisper. "He's dead? You're sure of it?"
"Yeah, yeah, sure I'm sure. What do you think?"
"All right. Now, there's just one more thing ...."
"I can't, Ardis. I don't want to. I—"
"Hit me," she commanded, and thrust out her chin. "Tony, I said to hit me!"
He hit her. A thousand stars blazed through her brain and disappeared. And she crumpled silently to the floor.
...When she regained consciousness, she was lying on the lounge. A heavyset man, a detective obviously, was seated at her side, and a white-jacketed young man with a stethoscope draped around his neck hovered nearby.
She had never felt better in her life. Even the lower part of her face, where Tony had smashed her, was surprisingly free of pain. Still, because it was what she should do, she moaned softly; spoke in a weak, hazy voice.
"Where am I?" she said. "What happened?"
"Lieutenant Powers," the detective said. "Suppose you tell me what happened, Mrs. Clinton."
"I ... I don't remember. I mean, well, my husband had just come home, and gone back to the bathroom. And there was a knock on the door, and I supposed it was the paperboy or someone like that. So—"
"You opened the door and he rushed in and slugged you, right? Then what happened?"
"Well, then he rushed into the bedroom and started searching it. Yanking out the dresser drawers and—"
"What was he searching for, Mrs. Clinton? You don't have any considerable amount of money around, do you? Or any jewelry aside from what you're wearing? And it wasn't your husband's payday, was it?"
"Well, no. But—"
"Yes?"
"I don't know. Maybe he was crazy. All I know is what he did."
"I see. He must have made quite a racket, seems to me. How come your husband didn't hear it?"
"He couldn't have. He had the shower running, and—"
She caught herself, fear constricting her throat. Lieutenant Powers grinned grimly.
"Missed a bet, huh, Mrs. Clinton?"
"I—I don't know what you're—"
"Come off of it! The bathtub's dry as an oven. The shower was never turned on, and you know why it wasn't. Because there was a guy standing inside of it."
"B-but—but I don't know anything. I was unconscious, and—"
"Then, how do you know what happened? How do you know this guy went into the bedroom and started tearing it apart? And how did you make that telephone call?"
"Well, I ... I wasn't completely unconscious. I sort of knew what was going on without really—"
"Now, you listen to me," he said harshly. "You made that fake call of yours—yes, I said fake —to the operator at twenty-three minutes after five. There happened to be a prowl car right here in the neighborhood, so two minutes later, at five twenty-five, there were cops here in your apartment. You were unconscious then, more than an hour ago. You've been unconscious until just now."
Ardis's brain whirled. Then it cleared suddenly, and a great calm came over her.
"I don't see quite what you're hinting at, Lieutenant. If you're saying that I was confused, mixed up — that I must have dreamed or imagined some of the things I told you— I'll admit it."
"You know what I'm saying! I'm saying that no guy could have got in and out of this place, and done what this one did, in any two minutes!"
"Then the telephone operator must have been mistaken about the time," Ardis said brightly. "I don't know how else to explain it."
Powers grunted. He said he could give her a better explanation—and he gave it to her. The right one. Ardis listened to it placidly, murmuring polite objections.
"That's ridiculous, Lieutenant. Regardless of any gossip you may have heard, I don't know this, uh, Tony person. And I most certainly did not plot with him or anyone else to kill my husband. Why—"
"He says you did. We got a signed confession from him."
"Have you?" But of course they didn't have. They might have found out about Tony, but he would never have talked. "That hardly proves anything, does it?"
"Now, you listen to me, Mrs. Clinton! Maybe you think that—"
"How is my husband, anyway? I do hope he wasn't seriously hurt."
