The Last Tomorrow

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The Last Tomorrow Page 12

by Ryan David Jahn


  6

  Sandy lies asleep in bed, a small boy in a big world.

  7

  Teddy Stuart stands at a window and looks to the night street six floors down. He’s alone in a small hotel room. Below him the hotel’s sign hangs from the corner of the gray stone building, giving it a name:

  THE SHENEFIELD HOTEL

  He wonders, not for the first time, if he’s made the right decision.

  He’s afraid he hasn’t.

  Two days ago, on the eighth, the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department turned him over to the LAPD and the LAPD brought him here, to this downtown hotel where they keep a block of rooms. A series of uniformed police officers have been standing outside his door since, working in shifts. They don’t speak to him except to tell him it’s time for a shift change, or to tell him room service has arrived.

  Teddy doesn’t think they’ll be able to do anything to stop the Man if he decides he wants to silence him, but worrying about such things does no good.

  He pulls the curtains closed and walks toward the bed. He pulls off his coat and tosses it onto a chair in the corner. He slips out of his suspenders, unclips his cufflinks and sets them on a table, unbuttons his shirt and tosses it on top of his coat, sits on the bed and kicks off his shoes.

  He wonders if part of him doesn’t want the Man to come after him, if part of him, that small biblical corner of his mind, doesn’t view that as the necessary next step in the righting of the world. His sins absolved in blood. He thinks maybe part of him does want that. A very small part of him. Some pure ancient part uncorrupted by everything else that surrounds it, by everything else that he is.

  But he can’t worry about that either. He can only do what he’s agreed to do.

  Whatever else happens happens.

  8

  Outside, the stars shine. The moon, nearly full, moves across the sky. The drunks leave bars and head toward home, some of them losing control of their vehicles, running them into streetlamps, into the sides of buildings, into other people; some of them making it home and passing out; some of them furiously beating their wives or their children with clenched fists or open hands. The streets empty of people but for the homeless, covered in newspapers and rags. The city goes quiet. The world turns on its axis, grinding away the hours like a great stone. The dark night turns gray as morning approaches. A light touches the horizon. Tomorrow becomes today.

  FIFTEEN

  Eugene, showered and dressed but not yet fully awake, stumbles from his bathroom and walks down his narrow hallway. He has the day off, but finds it impossible to sleep past four o’clock even when he has nowhere to be, even when he’s a bit hung over, as he is today. His time as a milkman has ruined him for sleeping in.

  As he walks toward the kitchen his shower-fogged glasses clear in the cool morning air. Coffee should be done percolating and he needs a cup. He grabs a mug from the cupboard and pours thin brown liquid into it. He checks the fridge, but is out of fresh milk. An empty bottle sits in the door beside a jar of mustard. His mind’s working just well enough that he finds the empty milk bottle amusing. He shuts the fridge and starts looking through his cupboards for an alternative. After shoving several cans of peas and green beans and Spam aside he finds a can of condensed milk. He can’t find his can opener, so he punches a couple holes into the lid with a screwdriver and pours the thick syrup into his coffee.

  Then, with mug in hand, he walks to the dining table and sits. He intends to drink his coffee in silence and stare blank-eyed at the wall thinking nothing at all, but instead his eyes fall upon the envelope he found nailed to his front door last night.

  He’d forgotten about it until now. Drunken memories seem to remain drunk long after you yourself have sobered up. Pulling the note from the door, walking inside, trying to write: it’s all a blur.

  He picks up the envelope and looks at it. It’s blank, white. He holds it up to the sunlight but can’t see what’s inside. He tears open the top and finds within the envelope a newspaper clipping. At first he’s staring at an advertisement. Think of it! A new cylinder-type vacuum cleaner! Only $13.95 complete with attachments! He flips over the thin sheet of paper and reads this headline:

  D.A. SEYMOUR MARKLEY SAYS COMICS CAUSE MURDER!

  Beside the article is a picture of a rather prim-looking man in his late forties or early fifties. He wears wire-framed glasses. His thin-lipped mouth is open in angry speech. He’s holding up a copy of Down City, which Eugene recognizes immediately. It’s one of the dozen or so issues for which he drew the cover. Below the headline, the story:

  LOS ANGELES — District Attorney Seymour Markley announced yesterday that he would be launching a grand-jury investigation into whether it might be possible to charge those involved with the creation and production of a comic book with criminally negligent homicide. The grand-jury investigation comes on the heels of a Bunker Hill killing in which a thirteen-year-old boy allegedly used a so-called ‘zip gun’ to shoot his stepfather before, in imitation of a crime comic book called Down City, carving a star into the dead man’s forehead with a straight razor.

  Markley said that the boy’s testimony to LAPD detectives indicated to him that he was not fully culpable for his actions. ‘Anybody familiar with the work of psychologist Frederic Wertham,’ Markley said, ‘can tell you that comic books are a terrible influence on the youth of today. There’s a reason church groups across America are calling for this trash to be burned, to be incinerated. These small boys are susceptible to the morally corrosive influence of entertainments filled with sex and violence, and the inevitable result is tragic deaths like the one we saw a few days ago, a death which has not only ended the life of a man, but which could destroy the life of a small boy before it is even fairly begun. When the boy testifies before the grand jury, I believe the influence, the guilt, of this gruesome comic book and its creators will be clear. And I hope this investigation causes other comics publishers to think twice about what they’re printing — what they’re filling the minds of impressionable youths with.’

  According to Markley, his office has evidence that E.M. Comics, a subsidiary of E.M. Publications, which also publishes adult magazines such as Nude Sunbathing and Hygiene, is run behind-the-scenes by James Douglas Manning — also known as New Jersey Jim and the Man — and used as a means of laundering ill-gotten money through overpayment for printing services.

  A source within the D.A.’s office has also said, on condition of anonymity, that Mr Manning’s accountant, Theodore Stuart, has agreed to testify against his employer during the grand-jury investigation, though he did not know the extent of the information Mr Stuart might be willing to divulge.

  If the investigation goes the way the D.A.’s office intends, and the grand jury returns a ‘true bill,’ James Manning and others involved in the production of Down City could be the first individuals in American history charged with homicide for the creation of an entertainment.

  For a long time Eugene only sits and stares unthinking at the gray newsprint, coffee on the table beside him forgotten. He sets down the news item and gets to his feet. He walks to his porch and lights a cigarette. He takes a drag and exhales in a sigh. He looks out at the dark, empty street. The air is cool. He tries to consider what this might mean for him.

  Worst case: he’s convicted of a crime he had nothing to do with and he spends years in San Quentin. Best case: nobody ever finds out he was involved in any way. He never signed his work with more than an offhand E., and usually he didn’t sign it at all. There are people who could easily point to him, of course, but not one of them, so far as he knows, lives in Los Angeles. Yet someone nailed this news item to his front door. Somebody knows who he is and where he is. And the implication is clear. A threat is implied.

  He can’t imagine that a grand jury would agree that he should be charged with homicide, even criminally negligent homicide, for the creation of a comic book. . except for one thing: it would be a way to nail James Manning, who has been
a known criminal for thirty years. Authorities have never managed to put him in jail, despite what everyone knows he is, and this could be a way to do it. A jury could be convinced. And if Eugene ends up a casualty of a witch-hunt, so what, that’s nobody’s problem but his own. He has no friends in high places. He has few friends in low places.

  And nobody will defend comics.

  Everybody agrees they’re wretched. Everybody agrees they’re trash. Everybody agrees they corrupt children. Books have been banned, and bookstore owners arrested for carrying them. Aren’t criminal charges such as these the next step? If books can be too dangerous to read, they can certainly be dangerous enough to rot the minds of impressionable children.

  He takes a drag from his cigarette. He needs to remain calm.

  Whoever left the article nailed to his front door was making an obvious threat. I know who you are. I know where you are. I know what you did. I will tell. But the only reason to say all that rather than simply to do it is if there’s an unless. I will tell unless.

  Unless what?

  Eugene doesn’t know. And the only way to find out is to wait.

  SIXTEEN

  1

  Seymour Markley sits alone in a booth. He looks out the grease-spotted window to the street but doesn’t see them. He looks around the diner for the second time, scanning the faces of the other patrons, but none of them are familiar. They didn’t inadvertently cross paths. They aren’t waiting for him at some other table. They simply haven’t yet arrived.

  He takes a sip of orange juice, straightens his tie. Though he doesn’t plan to eat, couldn’t eat if he tried, he wipes the water-spotted flatware off with a napkin and sets each piece down parallel to the others, fork, knife, spoon.

  He can’t stand that these people have turned this around on him. Despite the fact that he might be able to advance his career because of it, it bothers him. He’s an important man. He’s an important man and he’s being made to wait by unimportant people: by scum: by a whore and her cuckold husband. It’s almost too much to take.

  The door swings open and he looks toward it.

  A fellow in a cowboy hat walks into the diner wearing dark pants, a checkered shirt with pearl buttons, and a bolo tie. On the pinky finger of his right hand he wears a blue topaz ring. His mustache is thick and long, hiding his mouth, and the ends are waxed to ice-pick points. Seymour feels like he knows him from somewhere, but can’t imagine where, unless he’s put him in prison before.

  But he doesn’t think that’s it.

  Behind the cowboy walks Vivian in heels and a brief dress.

  The cowboy scans the room. Then, tipping two fingers toward Seymour, he says in an oddly cheery voice, ‘That him, darlin?’

  ‘That’s him.’

  The cowboy walks over and drops his hand like an axe in front of Seymour’s face. Seymour blinks at it.

  ‘Leland Jones. Wasn’t sure I recognized you with your clothes on.’ He smiles.

  Seymour lets the hand hang for a long time, then says, ‘You can put that away. I’m not going to shake.’

  ‘Well, shit, that’s all right, sugar. I wasn’t dying to wring out your sweaty dishrag paw anyways.’

  He slides into the booth. Vivian sits down beside him.

  ‘Hi, Seymour.’

  ‘We’re not friends, whore. Do you two have the pictures?’

  Leland Jones leans in, smile gone. ‘You best watch the way you talk to my wife.’

  ‘Is your wife not a whore?’

  ‘My wife is a beautiful woman, and you’ll respect her. What she does for work don’t have nothin to do with who she is.’

  Seymour knows suddenly where he’s seen this man before. He remembers him from Fort Apache, and is almost certain he’s seen him in other Western movies as well. He didn’t have any lines that Seymour can recall, he was just human background, but yes, that’s why he seemed familiar.

  ‘Do you have them?’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘The pictures.’

  Leland Jones reaches into his back pocket and removes an envelope that’s been folded in half. He tosses it onto the table. It lands between the salt shaker and a bottle of hot sauce. Seymour blinks. Then reaches out and picks up the envelope, pulls it open, looks inside. Three Polaroid pictures. He flips through them twice, frowns.

  Looks up at Vivian and says, ‘The first picture you showed me isn’t here.’

  Vivian looks confused. ‘It’s. . what?’

  ‘Yeah,’ Leland Jones says, looking at him with blue eyes, his relaxed way of speaking stretching the word like verbal taffy, ‘I wanted to talk to you about that.’

  ‘Leland, what are you doing?’

  ‘Yes, Leland,’ Seymour says, ‘what are you doing? We had an agreement.’

  ‘You and the ladies had an agreement. But these pitchers don’t really belong to the ladies. They belong to me.’

  ‘We talked about this, Leland.’

  ‘All right, darlin, I get you’re mad, but let Leland take care of business.’

  ‘I held up my end of this agreement,’ Seymour says.

  ‘I appreciate that. Candice is a hell of a woman and she don’t deserve to have no pain in her life. That’s why I’m willing to give you that last pitcher for a mere hundred dollars. A bargain when you think about it.’

  Vivian stares at her husband, clearly furious, her face white but for hot pink blotches on her cheeks, but she says nothing.

  ‘How do I know,’ Seymour says, ‘that once I pay for this last photo, another one won’t turn up? And another after that?’

  ‘I don’t mean to insult you, Mr Markley, but I don’t think Vivian had your pants down more’n five minutes before you was putting em back on. There just wasn’t no time to take a lotta pitchers.’

  ‘That’s not good enough.’

  ‘Then you’ll have to trust me.’

  ‘Trust a man who makes an agreement and then changes his mind when the other party has fulfilled his end of said agreement? I don’t think so.’

  ‘“Fulfilled his end of said agreement.”’ Leland laughs. ‘You are a lawyer, aren’t you? But last I heard Candice’s boy was still locked up.’

  ‘These things take time. The point is this: that last photograph has been paid for and I’m not willing to pay for it twice.’

  ‘I don’t see that you got a choice. I ain’t givin it back till you do.’

  Seymour simply stares at him.

  ‘Tell you what, think it over. I’ll call your office at five o’clock and we’ll have us a little chat. Till then, I’ll bid you adieu.’

  Seymour watches them stand up from the booth and walk toward the exit.

  He doesn’t move for a long time.

  2

  Leland sits on the couch at home, staring at the television’s blank gray screen. Ever since they left their meeting with Seymour Markley Vivian’s been telling him what a goddamned idiot he is. You know the rule, Leland. You don’t put your fucking hand in the same till twice. Well, it isn’t his rule. He’ll grab as much as he can, and if that means two fistfuls instead of one, all the better.

  He looks at his watch.

  It’s time to call Markley. He knows what the man’s decision will be — he knew before he stepped through the diner’s front door and out into the sunlight — but he wanted to let him think it over. He wanted the man to realize on his own that he really doesn’t have a choice in the matter. He wanted to let it sink in.

  Better to simply pay and be done with it. Better to put the situation behind him.

  He knows what Markley’s decision will be, but he might as well hear it.

  He gets to his feet and walks to the kitchen. He pulls the phone from the wall and puts it to his ear. He dials Markley’s office.

  3

  Seymour knocks on the blue door in front of him. A moment later a Negro woman pulls it open. She’s about thirty-five, and pretty, with broad cheekbones and a heart-shaped face. Her skin is very dark and smooth. Her hair
’s been ironed straight and pulled into a tight ponytail. She’s wearing night clothes.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘I’m not sure I have the right address.’

  ‘Well, who you looking for?’

  ‘Barry Carlyle.’

  ‘Oh, you’re Seymour. Barry said you might be stopping by tonight. Come on in.’

  She steps aside and he walks into the apartment. The walls are covered in striped green wallpaper. The couch is green corduroy. An oak coffee table sits in front of it, glowing with candles. A large oak record player sits against the wall. Bebop music plays, a trumpet screeching wildly while brushes slide against a snare drum.

  ‘Thank you,’ Seymour says as the woman closes the door behind him.

  Barry, drying his hands off with a dish towel, walks into the room from the kitchen. ‘Seymour, I see you found the place. This is Maxine, in case you haven’t gotten to the introductions yet. She helps out around the place. I apologize for the delay but I was peeling shrimps. Maxine gets squeamish about that part of the process. Pulling the heads off, you know. All that orange head fat. Anyway, have a seat.’

  Seymour’s never seen Barry like this — no coat, no tie, shirtsleeves rolled up, top button undone, suspenders hanging loose around his hips. He almost seems a completely different person.

  ‘Have a. . yes, of course.’ He sits down on the corduroy couch.

  ‘Would you get Seymour a — what would you like to drink?’

 

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