As soon as the door closes behind them the outside world ceases to matter. The bar feels like its own dimly lit pocket universe. The world outside could be crumbling in a great earthquake, streets opening up, fires blazing — but here that would mean nothing. Grab a stool and get yourself a drink, friend.
Several patrons sit at tables nursing their cocktails, several more sit at the bar. Mostly they’re old men of retirement age or older in moth-eaten cardigan sweaters and clip-on ties, men with rheumy red eyes and sagging faces like overloaded trash bags, filled with regrets. There are also a couple younger men in rags present, men spending their unemployment insurance on drink. And a woman in her late thirties, a redhead with a flushed face that would be beautiful if not for the damage years of hard drinking and heavy smoking have done to it, sitting at a table with a man in a blue mechanic’s jumpsuit and a greased duck-butt hairstyle.
They all make a point of not looking at the two newcomers.
Carl puts his hands in his pockets, pushing open his jacket so the barkeep is sure to see the badge clipped to his belt, and walks to the bar. Friedman walks beside him.
The barkeep, a heavy-set fellow with a white shirt stretched over his substantial belly, nods at them while drying off a glass and setting it on a metal drainer.
‘You guys drinking?’
Friedman shakes his head. ‘I don’t drink.’
‘And I’m on the clock.’
‘Then what can I do for you?’
‘You can tell us about Eugene Dahl.’
‘Never heard of him.’
‘He’s a regular here.’
‘News to me.’
Friedman pulls a sketch from his pocket and unfolds it.
‘You know him.’
‘I might’ve seen him a time or two.’
‘According to his neighbors he’s a regular.’
‘Could be.’
‘Was he here yesterday?’
‘I don’t remember.’
‘What about today? Have you seen him today?’
‘No.’
‘When’s the last time you remember seeing him?’
‘Days all blend together. Why you looking for him, anyway?’
‘What do you care?’ Carl says. ‘You don’t even know the guy.’
‘Curiosity.’
‘Look how that turned out for the cat.’
‘What cat?’
‘He killed someone,’ Friedman says.
‘I don’t believe it.’
‘That’s the thing about reality,’ Carl says. ‘It’s there even if you shut your eyes.’
‘Who’d he kill?’
Carl lights a cigarette.
‘Maybe you answer our questions.’
‘When’s the last time you saw Dahl?’
The barkeep exhales through his nostrils, looks away. After a while he speaks: ‘Few days ago. Thursday I think.’
‘Notice anything unusual about him?’
‘Like horns growing out his head or something?’
‘Did he seem wound up?’ Carl says.
‘Wound up?’
‘Nervous.’
‘No, he seemed himself. Met a dolly. Been meaning to ask him how it went.’
‘This girl anyone you knew?’
The barkeep shakes his head. ‘She was from out of town.’
‘How far out of town?’
‘East Coast. Did Gene really murder someone?’
‘We aren’t here cause of his tickling habit,’ Carl says.
‘Does he meet a lot of women?’
‘Women like him,’ the barkeep says, ‘then they hate him.’
‘That’s how it goes.’
‘Do you have any idea where he might be?’
‘No.’
‘Friends? Relatives?’
‘Gene drank alone. Like I said, he sometimes left with a girl on his arm, but he always arrived by himself.’
‘And he never talked about anything?’
‘Never about anything personal.’
‘What did you talk about?’
‘Impersonal stuff.’
‘And he never mentioned any friends?’
‘No.’
Carl pulls out a card and slides it across the bar.
‘If you see him, call.’
The barkeep looks at the card but doesn’t reach for it. Simply lets it lie there.
‘If he’s on the run I don’t think he’ll be stopping in for a drink.’
‘Nobody asked for your thoughts.’
‘If you see him, pick up the phone.’
Carl butts out his smoke on the bar and turns toward the door.
3
They step from the bar and make their way through the rain to the car. Carl lights another smoke, already beginning to feel the itch. He thinks about the syringe in his pocket, but knows it’s too early to use it, knows he needs to wait. Except that an itch needs to be scratched before it’ll stop. The more you try to ignore it, the less you can focus on anything else, and he needs to be able to focus on work. He thinks about heading to the toilet, but tells himself no. It’s only been a few hours and the day stretches before him long and gray; if he uses now he’ll have nothing for later. He only brought enough for one shot.
A knocking sound pulls him from his thoughts. He looks up to see the redheaded woman from the bar standing just outside the car.
Friedman rolls down his window. ‘Get in back.’
She steps into the backseat and pulls the door closed behind her.
‘Either of you got a cigarette?’
Carl taps a cigarette out of his packet, lights it using the cherry from his own, and hands it back to her.
‘Thanks.’
‘Is that all?’
‘It’s a cigarette. You want me to give you head?’
‘That’s not what I meant.’
‘Do you have something to tell us about Eugene?’
‘I might. You got five dollars?’
‘What’s your name?’
‘Trish. You got five dollars or not?’
‘I might. Trish what?’
The redhead takes a drag from her cigarette. She looks out the window.
‘Forget it,’ she says.
Friedman pulls a leather wallet from his inside coat pocket, removes a five-dollar bill. He holds it out to her but when she reaches for it pulls it back.
‘Now you know I have the five dollars,’ he says. ‘Let me know you have something worth it.’
‘I used to date him.’
‘Did you? Candlelight, all that?’
‘Fine, I used to fuck him.’
‘And?’
‘And he took me to this nigger bar down on 57th Street where his friend was playing in a bebop band.’
‘And?’
‘And give me five dollars or I go back to drink my drink.’
Friedman hands her the five-dollar bill.
TWENTY-EIGHT
1
Evelyn, wearing only her silk nightgown and a cotton robe, her hair mussed, her eyes red from lack of sleep, knocks on the door in front of her. After what feels like a long time Lou pulls it open from the inside. He wears black slacks and an undershirt, his pale feet bare, and small for a man of his height. Greasy strands of pomaded hair hang over his Neanderthal brow.
‘Have you seen this?’
She thrusts today’s paper forward, holding it out for him to examine.
‘I’ve seen lots like it.’
‘They didn’t catch him.’
‘What?’
‘Eugene. The police didn’t arrest him.’
Lou takes the paper from her and silently reads the news story. When he’s done reading it, he hands the paper back to her and shrugs.
‘So what? They know who he is and they have evidence against him. That’s all that matters.’
‘What do you mean, that’s all that matters? He’s still out in the city and knows he’s been framed for murder.’
‘They’ll catc
h him today or tomorrow. He’s a goddamn milkman, Evelyn, in way over his head. It don’t matter if he knows he’s been framed, he’s been framed. The evidence points to him and he ran, as a guilty person would. When they catch him he can say whatever he wants. Denial won’t mean nothin.’
‘And if they don’t bring him in in the next day or two?’
Lou shrugs again. ‘I don’t care. I got nothing against the guy. Point was to make it look like he was responsible for Teddy Stuart’s murder. That’s been done. What happens to him now, whether the police catch him or he gets away, that’s got nothing to do with me, and it’s got nothing to do with you.’
‘He knows I framed him.’
‘He knows he was framed. He might not know you’re behind it. But say he does, you really think he’ll come after you?’
‘I think he might.’
‘He’s wanted for murder. He’s on the run. He’s not coming after anybody.’
‘What if he does?’
‘What if he. . I don’t know, Evelyn. What do you want to do?’
‘Get a room in a different hotel.’
‘If everything goes well we’ll be out of here day after tomorrow anyway.’
‘You’re not the one at risk here.’
‘You’re not either, and if I thought you were you’d know it, because if you’re at risk, I’m at risk. Your dad would kill me dead if I let anything happen to you.’
Evelyn is silent. What Lou says has the ring of truth to it.
And yet part of her also knows that Lou wouldn’t mind at all if she took two to the back of the head. Until she started working in the business it looked like Lou might take over once Daddy retired. Now it looks like Lou will be working for her, and a man like Lou doesn’t want to take orders from a woman. She doubts Lou would want to take orders from anybody. He planned on inheriting the business. He spent years working for Daddy, getting close to him, becoming his most trusted friend, and in she wanders, all of twenty-one, and puts everything he’s worked for into question. Evelyn thinks he’d be just fine if her blood went still. He might look sad at the funeral, hug Daddy and tell him it’s a great loss for everyone, but in the privacy of his home he’d celebrate her death with a shot of something strong and a thank you, Jesus.
She’s sure of it.
And yet: what he says has the ring of truth to it.
If he let anything happen to her Daddy would kill him.
And he’s probably right. Her initial fear at hearing Eugene avoided apprehension was the fear of a woman used to dealing with criminals. He isn’t thinking about her, he’s thinking about how to avoid arrest. Hell, he’s probably at the border by now, about to cross into Tijuana. And that’s a good thing, isn’t it? She felt crummy about what she had to do to him, about helping to frame him. He deserves to get away.
‘You’re right,’ she says.
‘The police probably have him in custody already.’
‘Maybe.’
But she hopes not. She likes the idea of him living in Mexico, wearing colorful tropical shirts and white canvas shoes, drinking beer by the ocean.
‘Are we done? I have to talk to someone about a job.’
‘Okay,’ Evelyn says.
‘Okay.’ Lou closes the door.
She turns toward her room, and blinks at what she sees.
Eugene stands in the corridor, soaking wet, his hair hanging down around his face in clumps. In his right hand he holds a Baby Browning, a lady’s gun, but lady’s gun or not it shoots bullets, not flower petals, and it’s aimed at her face.
‘Evelyn.’
‘Eugene.’
‘We need to talk.’
2
Lou unlocks his room safe and pulls from within it a small bundle wrapped in brown paper. It’s the shape of a brick though thinner and considerably less weighty. He tucks it into his inside coat pocket, grabs an umbrella, and steps from his hotel room.
Once in the corridor he gives Evelyn’s door three quick taps with his knuckles.
‘I’m stepping out,’ he says, a smile on his lips, ‘you might want to make sure your door is chained. Don’t want the milkman to get you.’
Then he heads down the corridor, toward the elevator.
He takes the elevator down to the lobby and walks toward the front door. The doorman pulls it open and steps aside. He walks out into the rain, holding his umbrella overhead. As he makes his way across the lawn to the street a gust of wind catches the umbrella and nearly tears it from his hands, but he manages to keep his grip on it, and forces his way through the bad weather.
As he approaches Wilshire he sees a large truck, a barn-red Mack wrecker, parked on the street waiting for him. The right front fender is dented up, and there are great gouges running along the length of the door, and the right half of the split windshield is spider-webbed with cracks, but at least his man is on time. If he’d had to stand in the rain he might have gotten irritable.
He pulls open the passenger’s-side door and steps up into the truck, shaking off the umbrella and pulling it in behind him. The truck’s seat and floorboard are littered with food wrappers, greasy pieces of cloth, coffee mugs, washers, nuts, and bolts. The upholstery is gouged and torn. The stink is incredible, an old human stink whose fumes hit the back of your sinuses like horseradish.
The stink is coming off the man behind the wheel, a fat man in a greasy T-shirt and a pair of Levis. He has a dirt-tanned round face in need of soap and a razor. It glistens oily in the gray light. His hands rest on his thighs, grime under the fingernails, fingers wrapped in filthy band-aids. The right thumbnail is black, and a hole has been drilled into its center to release the pressure. There’s a bead of blood there like a jewel.
The rain on the metal roof is cacophonous.
‘Got a cigarette?’
‘I didn’t bring them out with me,’ Lou says.
‘Shit.’
The man reaches to the ashtray and picks through the butts till he finds one of decent length. He lights it with a match, inhales deeply, then casually blows a series of smoke rings.
He cracks the window.
‘You got the money?’
‘I’ve got it. Are we clear on the job?’
‘It ain’t exactly complicated.’
‘Even so.’
‘We’re clear.’
‘Good. Then you know that part of what you’re being paid for is silence. No matter how tough the police get, you keep your mouth shut.’
‘How would the police know it was anything but-’
‘Irrelevant. The point is, your silence has been purchased and paid for, yeah?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Good.’
Lou removes the package from his pocket and hands it to the man.
‘Tomorrow morning at eight o’clock.’
‘Consider it done.’
‘I’ll consider it done when it’s done,’ Lou says.
With that, he pushes his way back out into the rain.
After the stink of the truck, it’s a relief.
3
Eugene walks out of the rain and into the lobby of the Fairmont Hotel. He looks around. No one looks back. Last time he was here he was anticipating a date, an evening out with the beautiful-ugly woman he’d met the night before. Now he’s back to meet the same woman but has no idea what to expect. He has no plan at all except to point his gun and get answers. Will she provide them? He doesn’t know. He doesn’t think he could shoot her if she refused to talk. If she calls his bluff it’s over. He thinks it is. But then you don’t have to shoot someone to prove you mean business. He could hit her. Could he hit her? After what she did to him he thinks maybe he could. Punch her square in the nose and watch her bleed. Part of him is repulsed by the idea, one does not hit a lady, but another part knows that civilized behavior doesn’t apply to situations such as these. Besides, she’s no lady, and you don’t sip tea with a serpent.
The pistol feels cold against his stomach.
He walks
across the lobby to the elevator and takes the elevator up to the third floor. He isn’t sure how he’s going to get into her room.
He stands in the corridor feeling strange, disoriented, lost in a dream, as he felt when he was a child with high fever. He could simply walk to the door and knock, see what happens. And if she doesn’t answer? He doesn’t know. But he doesn’t know what else to do either.
He walks to her room, pulls the pistol from his waistband.
He raises his left hand to knock.
But before he can he hears the sound of the chain being pulled away from the door, then the sound of the deadbolt being snapped out of place. He takes several quick steps away from the door, backing around a corner.
Paranoid thoughts run through his mind. He’s suddenly convinced the lobby was being watched. When he entered the hotel a call was made. Now a gunman will emerge from Evelyn’s room and end his life.
The door swings open.
Evelyn pushes through. She walks to the hotel room next to her own and knocks, a newspaper gripped in her left hand. The knock is answered.
‘Have you seen this?’
4
‘Evelyn.’
‘Eugene.’
‘We need to talk.’
‘Okay.’
‘Let’s head into your room.’
‘I’m not going in there with you.’
‘Then you’ll die out here.’
‘I could scream.’
‘Then you’ll die screaming. I’m already wanted for murder, Evelyn. I have no problem becoming what the police already think I am.’
She licks her lips. After a long time she nods.
‘Okay.’
TWENTY-NINE
1
Carl stands in the rain. He looks at the door in front of him and waits for the slow bastard on the other side to pull the thing open so he can put a roof between himself and the pissing gray clouds overhead. Friedman stands beside him. Neither man says a word. After a while Carl raises his hand and knocks again. The crease at the top of his fedora catches rain while he stands and waits. The water pools there till the crease can no longer hold it, then it pours down the front of his head in a stream, splashing on the brim of his fedora and down to his scuffed shoes.
The Last Tomorrow Page 20
