Great Noir Fiction

by Ed Gorman (ed)

  “Yes. There wasn’t any—”

  “Let me get this,” said Jordan. He took his hands off the window sill and wiped his palms. “You mean this thing hasn’t been cased?”

  “Well, yes. I mean, it hasn’t been. I was trying to explain plain before, in the bar, you remember? I was going to tell how this came up sudden, about Kemp getting into it again, and ready to cause all kinds—”

  “When will I know?”

  “When what?” said Turner.

  They could hear the front door being opened and people laughing.

  “Jordan can’t work,” Sandy explained, “unless he’s got something to work on.”

  “Yes. Of course.” The sounds from the corridor distracted Turner. He now wanted to be done. He had seen this man now, Jordan, he had felt various strange sensations, and he now wanted to be done. Somebody in the hall said, “There’s no ice in the bucket.”

  “Kemp’s got to go within a week, at the outside,” said Turner. “And nobody’s done any casing.”

  Jordan took a new cigarette out and put it into his mouth.

  “So we thought,” said Turner, “you would do your own casing.”

  There was barely a pause and Jordan said, “You must be nuts.”

  On the other side of the door the hall was empty now, and there was no noise any more to cover the silence in the unused room. Turner smelled the dust. He thought he might sneeze. Then he said, “Well?” looking at Sandy. “Well, what is this?”

  The problem was, Sandy knew, that Jordan had just come back from a trip. He was not sure what Jordan did after coming back from a trip nor had he bothered to think about it because Jordan was worked in well and no point thinking about anything beside that—unless there were signs. But there were no signs about Jordan. But the thing now was, he was asked to go right back out which was not usual. Always watch it when it wasn’t usual.

  “Sam?” he said.

  “What?”

  Jordan had a match in his hand, playing with it. I think he does sometimes play with a match in his hand, thought Sandy, which means nothing. And he’s tired. The thing now, talk personal. We have known each other some time. Make it personal and I know how you feel.

  “Put it this way, Sam. Here’s a job, four-five days at the outside, in a place with no special angles—medium-size town, nobody knows you, nobody’s looking. And there’s Kemp with an everyday routine, same place for breakfast, same place where he takes a walk every day. There he is, not expecting, with no organization—and you go in there. I know you’re getting rushed out close to the last job, but when you come back you’ll get extra time, extra dough. I’ve mentioned that, Turner, and that’s all there’s to it. Okay, Sam?”

  Jordan struck the match. “The same man,” he said, “who goes out to do a job, doesn’t also go out there and do his own casing.”

  “Why?” said Turner.

  “When he noses around,” said Sandy, “talks to people, he gets seen. That is what he means. That’s what you mean, isn’t it, Sammy?”

  It was so plain, Jordan did not even bother to think about it. It kept him from thinking about something else: that he had never—very carefully never—been in any touch whatsoever with the man who was a job. Except for yesterday’s accident. And that, of course, he had thought about quite long enough.

  “How big is Penderburg?” Sandy asked.

  “You know San Bernadino?” said Turner.

  “Jordan,” said Sandy, “you know San Bernadino?”

  “No.”

  “Give another example.”

  “Well, I don’t know any other example. It’s small, what I mean is, not any too big. What I mean is, you wouldn’t stick out right away, just walking down the street. But the way I get it, small enough to get a line on a man who lives there and does the same thing every day. What I mean is, that’s how I got the picture. You see it?”

  “Talk to Jordan, not me,” Sandy told him.

  “You see what I mean, Mister Jordan?”

  Jordan nodded. He had lit the match and let it burn out, and he had put it down on the window sill. He nodded and played with the matchbook.

  Say no to all of it. First, an impossible job, after that, the long stretch of nothing. Say no to all of it. I can’t do it.

  “It stinks,” he said.

  Sandy looked down at his shoes and then he got up. He got up with a quick snap in his movement and then walked to the window and back to his chair. Naturally, he thought. Naturally when he does his trick he thinks about nothing except how to set his mark and then blow. He doesn’t know if the guy is important or anything. A hell of a lot of these worries don’t touch him and “it stinks” is all he knows. No time for a beer is all he knows.

  “All right, Jordan. What is it?”

  “What?”

  “I said what is it, is something bugging you?”

  “Maybe,” said Turner, “he means he can’t handle it.”

  Sandy gave the fat man a brief look and said, “That kind of talk don’t cut any ice with him,” and then he looked back at Jordan. “So answer me.”

  Jordan, of course, had nothing to answer. He did not like Sandy’s tone, which was enough reason for him to shut off the topic, and the topic—aside from that—was not a talking matter at any time.

  “So why did you say it stinks and you won’t take the job?” Sandy asked.

  “You know it stinks, that kind of setup.”

  “That’s why I picked you and not some fluttergut jerk.”

  “That kind of talk,” said Jordan, “doesn’t cut any ice with me either.”

  “Maybe there’s more cut to it, if I tell you this looks like you maybe got the shakes?”

  “You can stop talking crap,” said Jordan. “You hear me, Sandy?”

  I’ve got him, thought Sandy. Like everybody he’s got to be perfect and don’t-mention-the-shakes-to-me. Nice. I’ve got him. And then Sandy pushed his point.

  “If it isn’t the shakes, then why get prickly about it?”

  Jordan shrugged this time. What had made him sensitive was the word and everything it implied. The shakes themselves were not bothering him, though Sandy could think so, if he wanted.

  “Or is it something else?” Sandy said, and while he did not know it, he had Jordan again.

  “No. Nothing else.”

  “What then? I want to hear this.”

  “You can stop riding me, Sandy.”

  “I’m not riding you, I’m asking a question. I want to know why missing your in-between break shakes you up enough so you can’t take on the next job.”

  “Nothing like that shakes me up.”

  “Then what does?” Sandy kept at it.

  “Nothing does.”

  “So why is it no?”

  “Don’t take that tone with me,” said Jordan.

  It meant different things to everyone in the room. Turner thought the next thing might be a shot. Jordan thought, this will change the subject. It better change the subject, because some things are nobody’s business. And Sandy thought nothing. He carefully dropped every thought because Jordan talking this way was not usual.

  “You going on this job or not?” he said quietly, the way Jordan had talked.

  Before he asks again, thought Jordan. Before he stirs up what I just found out myself. About the change having crept in.

  “I’m going,” Jordan said.

  This means no change, Jordan thought. This means there was nothing important, and he struck another match and this time lit the cigarette he had in his mouth.

  After that it was cut-and-dry business and Sandy stayed out of it. He felt there was nothing else that he needed to do.

  “And bring two more glasses,” somebody said in the hall, and a door slammed. Jordan took the cigarette out of his mouth, knocked the coal out of it on the window sill, put the dead butt back in his mouth. “So whatever you’ve got,” he said to Turner, “let’s have it.”

  “And the beer,” somebody said in the h
all, and the door slammed.

  Turner made the bed squeak and smiled. “My,” he said. “A beer would be nice now, huh?” Then he pulled folded papers out of the inside of his jacket. “Well now,” he said, and put the sheets down on his knees.

  Jordan sniffed, smelling dust.

  “First of all,” said Turner, “the name. You got the name, right? Do you want a piece of paper and my ballpoint to write all this down?”

  “No.”

  “Yes. Now. Thomas Kemp. Same name he uses now. And the town is Penderburg. Address—” and he looked at his paper, “505 Third Avenue. He-he, they got avenues.”

  “What does he look like?”

  “What does he look like? Here you are. I brought this shot. This picture, I mean,” and he held it out.

  Jordan took the small photo and looked at the old man in it. The old man sat in a chair in the sun, garden hedge behind him, and smiled. He had all his hair, Jordan saw. Maybe kinky.

  “Is he gray?”

  “Gray? Just a minute . . . Yes. Sort of streaky.”

  The sun was bright, and Jordan could not tell much about the man’s eyes because of the black shadows. Small eyes perhaps, but then Kemp was smiling. Lines in his face. From smiling? He looked fit, and built chunky.

  “When was this picture taken?”

  “When was this—let me think. Let me think what they said . . . This year. It happens he’s got a daughter in L.A., and the way we got this picture, knowing he was going to visit her, we went . . .”

  “I don’t need to know that.”

  “Oh. That’s right.”

  Jordan gave the picture back and then leaned on the window sill again. “Tell me more about where he is now. What he does.”

  “Yes. And I better mention this,” said Turner. “Kemp’s got a bodyguard.”

  Sandy exhaled with a sound which he covered by tweaking his nose, as if something itched him there. He sounded busy, very preoccupied.

  Jordan did nothing. He had a matchbook in his hand and was playing with that but he had been doing that anyway. The bodyguard thing was a technical matter. He had no reaction to it, except technical interest. “What kind of bodyguard is he?”

  “What kind? What do you mean what kind?”

  Jordan looked at Sandy and Sandy explained it. “Is he just a punk or has he got training, Turner?”

  “Well, he carries a gun. He hangs around all the time and, you know, watches.”

  “You didn’t answer,” said Jordan, and Turner, who very much wished all this were over because he had nothing else to say and what else was there anyway, having met Jordan and seen all there was to see, started to giggle again.

  “I mean, he carries a gun all the time. You know. That kind.”

  Sandy sighed a slow sigh. Then he said, “In Pennsylvania. Where they dig coal. And he’s got a gun all the time. That kind.” Suddenly he slapped his hands on his thighs and started yelling. “Are you making this up as you go along, Turner, like maybe working up some kind of a comedy routine, or is this supposed to be the report that’ll lay out this Kemp or whatever?”

  “I—what I mean . . .”

  “Shut up!” Then Sandy sighed again. He stretched back in his chair and said to the ceiling, “Of all the jinxed-up, screwed-up deals that I’ve ever seen.”

  Turner squeaked the bed.

  “Jordan,” said Sandy. “You getting anything out of this?”

  “Yes. A few things.”

  He had a name and a place, and there were two men. He was startled by Sandy’s anger, just as Turner was, though for other reasons. He was impressed that Sandy had spoken up like this, though he wished he had not used the word jinx. And now, maybe, they could break up this meeting and Turner would leave, and perhaps there would be some time to have a beer somewhere, but without Turner.

  Turner said that he was sorry there was nothing else, and why couldn’t Sandy take a reasonable attitude about this the way his friend there, Mister Jordan, was taking it, and the only thing about the bodyguard was, he did not seem to be there because of Kemp’s maybe getting active again, but had been there with him for some time. “You know how those older ones are,” said Turner, “those kingpins, always having somebody hanging around. You know what I mean?”

  “No,” said Sandy. “I don’t.”

  “He means habit,” said Jordan.

  There was a knock on the door and the young man stuck his head in. “Oh,” he said, and smiled at Sandy.

  “Yeah,” said Sandy. “We’re almost done.”

  “I didn’t mean . . .”

  “That’s all right, that’s all right,” and he got up, stretching.

  “Maybe a drink?” asked the young man.

  “Now that,” said Turner, “would be a fine idea,” and he bustled his papers around and stuffed them into his pocket. “As a matter of fact, there’s a drink I know, what you do is . . .”

  “Not right now,” said Sandy. “Later.” Then he looked at Jordan and said, “Finish up.”

  “I’m done,” said Jordan, “unless Turner here . . .”

  “No. I got nothing else.”

  The young man in the door raised his eyebrows at Sandy, and Sandy nodded at him. “Okay,” he said. “We’re done.”

  Then the young man opened the door enough to come in and leaned against the door frame. He smiled at everybody and waited.

  “You’re looking fine,” he said to Jordan. “How you been?”

  “Fine. Thank you.”

  “But tired, huh?”

  “Yes. Some.”

  They all stood around while Turner took his papers out again to refold them, and while Sandy put on his overcoat. Jordan was chewing his cigarette. The party sounds were much clearer now, and with music.

  “Tell you what I’ll do,” said the young man. “How about a drink before you go, huh, Jordan?” and he ran off down the hall before Jordan could answer.

  The three men in the room stood around while the young man was gone, and Sandy wiped dust off his pants. Turner said how hot it was and wouldn’t a drink be the ticket now.

  The young man came back with one drink, which he gave to Jordan. “Happiness,” he said.

  The drink was straight bourbon with ice, and Jordan kept a mouthful of liquor and let it burn. It distracted him while there was nothing to listen to or to say. He heard the young man say, “How about it?” to Sandy, and Sandy answered, “Who’s here?” It was, Max is here, you know Max, and his brother, you know him and his bunch, you know, that crowd, nice. And Sandy said that would be nice and Turner started talking about his special drink again.

  Then Jordan thought about his own affairs, just briefly, there being time and need to think more about all of it later. Vague job, which was the kind needing thought ahead of time. Bad having to case Kemp himself, almost as bad as having to touch somebody afterwards. But that made sense. No superstition in that. No jinx. Not casing was caution and not touching was hygiene.

  Turner had already left the room. Jordan swallowed the liquor and wiped his face. Then he put the glass on the window sill.

  “You didn’t finish,” said the young man.

  “That’s all right.”

  “You want my car to drive home?” Sandy asked.

  “No. I’ll take a cab.” Or, no. Maybe I’ll stay, he thought. “Who’s here?” he asked, and walked to the door where Sandy and the young man were standing.

  “Nobody you know. Not well, I mean. There’s Max, I don’t know if you . . .”

  Just vaguely, thought Jordan. I probably know everybody there, just vaguely. Then he said, “That laugh just now. That sounded like Lois.”

  “Hey, yes,” said the young man. “That’s right. You know Lois.”

  “You want her?” said Sandy. He held a cigar in his hand and was licking the end with his tongue.

  And the young man was off down the corridor again. There was music and talk buzz when he opened a door down the hall and then just the mumble again when he closed it. />
  “When are you leaving town on this?” Sandy asked.

  “I’ll make it tomorrow. Middle of the day.”

  “Need money?”

  “No. We can work it out afterwards.”

  “You’re not dropping over tomorrow, before going out?”

  “No.”

  The buzz getting big and then the mumble and the young man came back.

  “Gee, man, I’m sorry. She’s with what’s-his-name, you know, Fido’s brother.”

  “I don’t know his name,” said Jordan.

  “Well, you know how it is, he brought her.” He smiled and went away.

  Sandy took Jordan’s arm and they walked down the corridor all the way to the end.

  “I’ll call that Ruth for you,” he said. “I’ll call her from here.”

  “That’s all right. You don’t have to do that.”

  “What’s a phone call?” Sandy opened the front door.

  Jordan said good-by and, “In a week or so . . .”

  “Yuh,” and when Sandy closed the door Jordan thought, who in hell is Fido’s brother . . .

  Chapter 4

  He took his suitcase out of Sandy’s car and walked back to the main drag. There he hailed a taxi and took it to a place three blocks from his building. He walked the three blocks and smoked a whole cigarette.

  He had a room for sleeping and for keeping his clothes. He shut the door, walked to the dresser, bending a little when he walked past where the light hung from the ceiling. He took a clean shirt out of the suitcase and some underwear, and put them into a drawer. He had dirty laundry in a little bag, and he dropped that on the floor. Then he closed the suitcase and put it into the closet. He carried a gun and put that away in the place where he always kept it. Then he sat down on the bed and closed his eyes. He sat like that for a while but could not decide whether he was tired.

  She came down the hall to his room, and he knew who it was by the steps. Then she knocked on the door the way she was supposed to and he let her in.

  “Hi, Sammy. How’s business?” and she laughed too loud.

  She went past him, to the night stand, bending a little when she passed where the light hung from the ceiling. She put her purse on the night stand and said, “You got the bottle, Sammy?”