by Kane, Henry
“Meet Paul,” said Sally.
“Hi, Paul,” said everybody.
And we were a gay group minus one—Kiki—who would join us. Sally grew animated with Paul, Roy grew animated with Marilyn, and I sat back, biding my time with Marilyn and studying Roy Paxton anew. Even sitting, he was tall. He had a ramrod back and an excellent carriage. He had curly, close-cut, dark-brown hair; dark-brown eyes; and dimples in the cheeks of a handsome oval face. He was about thirty-five, intense, tense, dynamic, nervous; the circles of dissipation beneath his eyes were like badges of merit.
“Roy,” Sally was suddenly. “What do you think about that Mrs. Lund thing?”
“Bad. Awful. Just awful.” His voice had the round, somewhat nasal, permanent tones of the Harvard man.
“Any theory?” said Sally.
My hand moved to Marilyn’s lap, where her hand was, and the hands clasped and clung.
“No theory,” said Paxton. “It’s just too damned ridiculous.”
“No theory at all?” said Sally. “You must have thought about it.”
“Oh, I’ve thought. Damned right I thought. But thinking just makes it more ridiculous. The best I can come up with is that perhaps some of those race track weasels had a grudge or something. I mean, that manner of execution … I mean, the only area, the only part of her that could possibly touch upon killers, murders, shooters … I mean, in that world, the race track world, only in that world could that fine lady touch upon that kind of riffraff … gosh, Christ, I don’t know what I mean.” He looked to me. “What about it, Pete? This sort of thing is more in your line than in mine.”
“Is it?” I said.
“Any theory?” he said. “More properly, any vague idea, any hypothesis?”
“I have some ideas,” I said.
“I’m eager to hear,” he said.
“I’d prefer we discussed my ideas alone,” I said. “Just you and I.”
“Alone? But why …?”
And then Kiki Kalmar joined the party, Kiki Kalmar in a kelly-green gown that matched her kelly-green eyes, an off-the-shoulder number with more cleavage than a butcher’s meat axe. “Well,” she said in her slow sultry drawl. “A most distinguished group, I must say, most distinguished indeed. Sally, Paul, Petie, Roy, and the little doll from Texas. Honey, you’re sure wearing a wild gown, baby. Honey, you’re sure catching on fast….”
Roxy Paxton, standing, was holding the back of a chair for her.
She slid into it, said, Mae-Westishly, “Thank you, dearie,” and to the hovering waiter she said, “Champagne cocktail. Three champagne cocktails, a cube of ice in each.”
“For whom are the other two?” I said.
“For me,” she said. “Service in this crib stinks, and I’m parched.”
“Oh,” I said.
Paxton resumed his seat.
Kiki, nonchalantly arrogant, regarded Marilyn from hair-do to make-up to bare shoulders to spangled gown. “Who brung you, baby?” she said.
“Pardon?” said Marilyn.
“Who brought you? Who’s your escort? Sally, here?”
“Peter brought me,” said Marilyn, unconsciously mimicking Kiki’s slow and easy drawl.
“Peter? I don’t believe it. If Peter’s no pansy, nobody is. What say, old Sal?”
“I wish he were,” said Sally.
“Ah, now, don’t kid a kidder. I’ve been making a play for this Petie-punk for years. Haven’t I, baby, Petie-boy? A stone wall. Nothing. No reaction. But nothing at all.”
“Maybe you’re not his type,” said Paxton, Harvard tone suddenly vixenish.
“I’m everybody’s type, baby-boy. You ought to know.”
“Yes, maybe I ought to know,” said Paxton.
The waiter brought three champagne cocktails and Kiki drained one of them instantly. “Cigarette, please,” she said. Paxton produced a cigarette and lit it for her.
Marilyn squeezed my hand, I squeezed hers, and then our hands came unclasped.
“How’s my dad, pansy-boy?” said Kiki.
“He’s great. Fine. Wonderful,” I said.
“You making it with him?” she said.
“Making it with your father?” said Paul.
“If you ever saw my father, little boy, you’d pop your cork. My father’s one of the most beautiful men alive. Right, Pete?”
“Right, in more ways than one,” I said. “When did you see him last?”
“God knows,” she said. “He bores me to tears, the righteous old prig.”
“Not so old,” said Paxton.
“You bet not so old.” And she sipped on the second champagne cocktail.
Kiki Kalmar was twenty-six years of age and she had lived every minute of every year. Kiki Kalmar gave no hoot in hell for anyone, at any time; whatever her hoots, they were reserved for one person: Kiki Kalmar. Kiki Kalmar was beautiful in a bold and arrogant manner, and that was the death of her as a woman: the boldness, the forwardness, the aggressiveness, the arrogance. She was red-haired, green-eyed, dark-skinned, beautiful-visaged, and she veritably smelled of sex, but she scared off the real men, because a real man desires a female woman, and Kiki was a female tainted with male drive. Kiki attacked. Kiki took over. Kiki made the plans. Kiki was the brain behind the scheme. Kiki was the aggressor. Kiki was wayward, ruthless, conscienceless, hard; Kiki was castration; Kiki was diametrically opposite, as in this instance, woman to woman, to such as Marilyn Windsor. Kiki Kalmar could spend her weekly salary in half an hour, and almost always she did, and always she had the need of money, and always she had the aid and support of many men, but she never had enough, because she attracted the wrong men. Kiki could have made it big, she had all the external equipment, but, unfortunately for her, all the money men of the world, the real money men, are themselves the bold and the ruthless and the arrogant, and they seek the soft woman, the gentle cocoon-spinning woman, the soft, sleek, silky, pretending-all-dependent beautifully-cuddling woman (who in the end becomes the imperious sniff-nosed lover-selecting widow). The Kiki Kalmars, in youth, attract the masochists, the half-men, the likes of the Roy Paxtons, who, themselves, need support, rather than yield support. Kiki Kalmar might make it one day, but on her own, using, possibly, a man as frontrunner; but she would never be taken over by a man, because she took over; because, all female, she was the man.
“Tell them about my dad,” she said.
“Tell them yourself,” I said.
“You see him more often than I do, sweetie.”
“That’s your loss,” I said.
“Critical tonight, aren’t we?”
“You brought the subject up.”
“Then let’s drop it.”
“Fine,” I said, “it’s dropped.”
“But like a ton of bricks,” said Sally.
“Oh, do you want to get in the act?” said Kiki. “You and your pithy remarks?”
“I once wrote a poem,” said Paul. “It was called I Like The Pith In Your Helmet. People misunderstood. They thought it was a dirty poem. They thought I lisped.”
“Don’t you?” said Paxton.
“Sometimes,” said Paul.
“Petie-baby,” said Kiki, ruffles smooth again, “do you know that Paul here is one of the top newfangled-type poets here in the Village? Recites like crazy, with the jazz for background. How’s about a recital, Paul-boy?”
“Any time.” Paul was no reluctant dragon.
Kiki sipped champagne, smiled. “Want me to do the intro?”
“I’d adore it, dearest.”
Kiki delivered her startling architecture to the bandstand, whispered with the leader, and the music converged to a drum roll and then silence. “Ladies and gentlemen,” declaimed Kiki. “A poetry reading by one of our foremost youg poets, Paul Roberts Christie himself, now of New York, formerly of San Francisco. Ladies and gentlemen—Paul Roberts Christie!”
Scattered applause, lengthy drum roll, subdued background of jazz progressive type, and Paul beamishly swished to the d
ais. “Ladies and gentlemen, this is a brand-new poem, a rather long one, and this is the first time it is being heard.” Smatter of applause and a few catcalls. “The Title—My Brother Is A Naked Fox Running Scared In The White Clouds Of The Dark Asphalt.”
The music throbbed, Paul recited, and I bent to Roy Paxton.
“Let’s go to the men’s room,” I said.
He looked at me suspiciously. Greenwich Village is no place for one man to invite another man to the men’s room.
“Don’t tell me it’s catching,” he said.
“I think you’re a naked fox,” I said, “and I’d like to belt you with a little dark asphalt.”
“You’re drunk,” he said.
“I’m sober,” I said.
“Cut it out,” he said.
“I want to talk to you.”
“You’re talking.”
“Personal.”
“Oh, now, drink up and forget it. We’ll talk when you’re sober.”
“I want to talk to you, personal, about a note from Astrid Lund for a hundred and fifty thousand dollars. Do you want to go to the men’s room?”
“Yes,” he said.
We went to the men’s room.
TWELVE
In the privacy of the acrid germicidal odors of a public men’s toilet, alongside the shamelessly exposed stalls of the urinals where, our custom has it, the boys assembled like beasts for micturition in concert, I came at once to the point (and where else would be more appropriate)? “Roy,” I said, “I’m a guy who believes in quick confrontation. Where the facts warrant, I don’t believe in diddling around with secret information. I have information that can grab at you where the hair is short. If you’re willing, we’ll discuss it. If not, say so.”
“Depends,” he said, “on the information.”
“Okay. Let’s give it a try. I’ll ask the questions, you answer them. If you think I’m too nosey, or you don’t want to answer, our discussion is at an end. Now let’s try to do it as quickly as possible, eh?”
“Go,” he said.
“You’re broke,” I said. “True?”
“In a manner of speaking—yes.”
“You recently took a note from Astrid Lund for a hundred and fifty thousand dollars? Yes? No?”
“Yes.”
“Would you tell me for what reason she gave you a note in that sum?”
He lit a cigarette. “Well,” he said, “that’s no great big confidential deal. I’ve done a great deal of work for her over the years—I’m still doing work for her—and I’ve not been paid except in promises. I finally insisted upon a note—an On Demand note—for services rendered. Astrid was the chief heiress of a very sick old woman who did not have long to live. I could negotiate that note for a small interim loan. That’s about it.”
“Is it?” I said.
His dark eyes narrowed. “Do I detect a tinge of disbelief?”
“Damn right you do.”
“Oh, now, come off it, Pete.”
“Sorry, but I’m staying right on it, pal.”
“On what?”
“Roy, I have definite information that you received that note for all that dough upon the basis of your promise that you would see to it that the old lady was liquidated within a short time, within a period of two months. The old lady … has been liquidated; cruelly, brutally, unimaginatively—murdered.”
The narrowed eyes opened in frank wonderment. The dark handsome face grew a blank look of perplexity. He flung his cigarette into a urinal where it hissed dolefully and expired. “Let’s get out of this goddamned outhouse. I’ll buy you a drink at the bar.”
It gave him time to collect himself and I did not mind. I wanted him as thoroughly collected as matutinal garbage in a suburban area. Whatever his story, I preferred that it was shoveled at me after due consideration; thereafter I would try to sift the wheat from the cheat. I wanted him fully prepared and loaded for bear. We had Scotch at the bar and I said, “What about it, Roy? Did you glom on to that hundred and fifty gees—which right now is practically cash—on the promise to have the old lady knocked off?”
“Yes,” he said.
My heart fell as though shoved. Unexpected confession of heinous guilt is more a blow to the recipient than to the confessor.
“Oh, hell,” I said, quietly, lugubriously.
“Now don’t get me wrong,” he said.
“I’m not getting you wrong, Mr. Skolsky,” I said. “I too love Hollywood.”
“Very funny,” he said. “Like a shroud.”
“Sorry,” I said. “I get embarrassed when people open their hearts to me.”
“Peter,” he said, “in a way, you’re a marvel.”
“Gee, thanks. How a marvel?”
“You come up with impossible information. Now how in all hell could anyone tell you without incriminating themselves …?”
“We are strangely simple, we humans, in deviously intricate fashion.”
“The hell with the philosophy, and I’m not going to ask you how you know.”
“It wouldn’t help if you asked. I wouldn’t tell you.”
“You do want my explanation?”
“There’s an explanation—for cold-blooded murder?”
“Oh, now, don’t be an ass!”
“Look who’s calling the kettle black.”
“Pete,” he said, “you don’t really think I had anything to do with her murder, do you?”
“Brother, you just said you did.”
“I said nothing of the kind. I said that I had received a note on the basis of a promise. I said nothing about having consummated that promise.”
“Oh, now we go with the shyster tactics, is that it?”
“No, damn you, it’s not it!”
“Then what the hell is it? You’re starting to go round and round in typical lawyer fashion.”
“Listen, will you? Listen, please.”
“I’m listening.”
He finished his drink, heaved a hearty sigh, lit up a new cigarette, inhaled, and let the smoke drift. “You seem to have stumbled upon certain information which can be quite embarrassing to me.”
“Embarrassing is putting it mildly.”
He sighed again. “I’ll try to give you the facts without breaching any confidences. Let’s start with Astrid. That one is far from a paragon of virtue. She’s gotten herself deep into money trouble with certain unsavory characters. I’d prefer not to go any further into that. Okay?”
“Okay.”
“Of course, she could get out of her money troubles with the old lady dead.”
“Okay, now let’s go on from there, huh?”
“In a state of desperation, she came to me. She knows that, through my profession, I’m acquainted with some pretty tough hoods. She … she felt me out about the liquidation of the old lady. She rationalized that the old lady was dying anyway; we would just be accelerating her demise a mite. I went along with it, or at least pretended to. I demanded her note for one hundred and fifty thousand dollars which most appropriately could be justified as payment for services rendered. There were no legal doubts in my mind about collection. That note is good, solid. I promised to fulfill my part of the bargain within two months.”
“And you did.”
“No, damn you, I did not!”
“The old lady is dead, isn’t she? Shot down. Murdered. And your note is now as good as cash.”
“All of which is what Astrid thinks, and I’ve let her think that.”
“And you’re blameless and innocent and pure. Pure as the driven mud.”
“Completely blameless. I had nothing to do with it. What happened is some kind of crazy coincidence. Crazy or not, I permitted it to redound to my benefit.”
I drank Scotch and water. I said, “Now hold it a minute.”
“Yes, Mr. Shamus?”
“You promised that the old lady would be knocked off within two months?”
“Right.”
“And you had no intentio
n of doing anything about that promise?”
“Right.”
“Then what about that note that she gave you?”
“Ah, that’s exactly the point. The note was the essence of my own little con game. Once I had that note, nothing would help dear Astrid. Follow?”
“Not quite.”
“I could legitimately justify that sum as accumulated fees due and owing to me. All right. Now I’ve got the note. Now what could happen? First, the old lady could just die of her illness. Fine. I still have a note which I can collect. Second, the old lady does not die, and I do not have her killed within the time period I promised. Then what happens? Nothing. Astrid bitches, I stall, time moves, and the old lady dies of natural causes. I still have that Demand Note, and Astrid has come into millions. I press claim on the note. She can’t defend, can she? She can’t say in court: ‘Oh, no, I’m not paying because this was a deal which I made to murder my mother-in-law and that lousy Roy Paxton didn’t hold up his end of the deal.’ She can’t say any of that, can she? What can she say? She can say nothing! I put in a claim on a legitimate note for legitimate payment for accumulated legitimate services, and I get my judgment faster than you can bat an eye. In other words, getting that note out of her was my primary object. She came to me with her horrible money troubles and I didn’t give a blast in Hades for her troubles; but I saw a way of getting evidence of obligation out of her, and I got it. Now that’s the story, so help me.”
“Thanks for the story,” I said.
He looked annoyed. “You sound skeptical.”
“That’s an occupational disease with me, pal.”
“You don’t think I’m lying, do you?”
“Maybe you are, maybe you’re not. You’ve told me your story and I thank you for telling me. Now let’s go join the ladies.”
Paul Roberts Christie exhaustedly returned from his fox hunt. The ebb and flow of drinks at our table was as the ebb and flow of an alcoholic tide. Everybody got plastered or semi-plastered except Marilyn. Paul and Sally slobbered upon one another, Roy slobbered upon the green-eyed Kiki, and I yearned for Marilyn. The first pair to fly off were Sally and Paul.
“Goodbye, all you dear goons,” said Sally. “And Marilyn, stay in your apartment tomorrow, remember. I’ll be over some time in the afternoon. We have shopping to do for clothes on a completely new enterprise.”
