Benny Muscles In

by Peter Rabe

  “Tober, listen to me. Don’t tell her. It would foul-”

  “Benjamin!” Tober stopped, balancing the tray like a mad juggler. “Dear Benjamin, what do you take me for? A hophead?” and then he started to laugh again.

  Back in the room Tober made two highballs on the piano and handed them to Pat and Benny. “To the lovers!” he yelled, and watched them hold their glasses. Then he stepped close to Pat. “Meet anybody else yet?”

  “Do I have to?” When she caught Benny’s eye she gave him a short smile.

  He turned away.

  “Pattypat,” said Tober, “you’re not heisting your highball.”

  “And you?”

  “Tober doesn’t drink,” Tober said.

  “You don’t?” She sounded as if she hadn’t heard right.

  “I am beyond drink.” He sounded confidential. “I don’t heist highballs, just heist balls.”

  “You what?”

  “Heist balls, baby. It’s higher than high ball. It’s the highest ball!” He giggled.

  Pat laughed too.

  “And I don’t often do this,” Tober was saying, “but for a high-built baby like you I’ll fix one.” He started to drag her out of the room.

  “Benny,” she called. “What’s a heist ball, Benny? Tober, let go. Benny, he wants to-”

  “Go and find out,” he said.

  Pat stood still for a moment and her tongue made a nervous movement along her teeth, but she didn’t say anything. Then she turned abruptly. “Show me the thing you can make, Tober,” and she walked out of the room.

  Benny watched them leave and sipped at the drink he’d been holding. Let Tober carry the ball if he wanted to. As long as Pat stayed around-two days at the most; as long as he could finish the deal and deliver the goods in the end, let Tober think he was taking over.

  He walked out into the hall and found a phone. It took a while to get New York. He lit a fresh cigarette from his stub and sucked on it as if it were his first one in days. Then he said, “Hello, Wally? Tapkow. Well?”

  “Hi, Benny. He sent a cable.” A group of maniacs came charging into the hall. They were all chasing a short, squealy blonde who was wrapped in a wet sheet; apparently the idea was to get the sheet off her. The way they were all yodeling and yelling, she really must have been something under that sheet, but Benny wasn’t thinking of that. He watched the chase, hoping she’d lead them down the hall to hell or someplace. The blonde made it.

  “Yes-Wally? I’m sorry, I wasn’t listening.”

  “He sent a cable, Benny. Two of them.”

  “So let’s hear.”

  “Well, I didn’t know where you was when the first one came, so I answered it. The first one he asks is everything O.K. so I wire back sure, you got her and everything’s under control. I figured you’d want it that way, and besides, it is, ain’t it?”

  “Come on, come on, what else?”

  “Nothing else, Benny. And then he sends the second one.”

  “Well?”

  “He really thinks you’re the nuts, Benny, really proud of you.”

  “Christ, get to the point, Wally. When’s he coming back?”

  “He says he’s proud of you and have yourself a ball while he’s gone, seeing that you deserve it and he’s doing likewise. You know, he’s got this other dame on board, the one who got switched, and she really musta-”

  “When’s he coming back, goddamnit?”

  “I can hear ya, I can hear ya. He says a week or so. Keep her under wraps a week or so and that’ll really stew her old man. After a week or so Pendleton’s going to be ripe for anything.”

  Benny burned his mouth on the stub he was holding and cursed. He cursed with a hard cramped throat while his hand clenched the phone as if it were the straw that might keep him from drowning.

  “What’s his cable address, Wally?”

  “He didn’t leave one. He’s cruising around the Caribbean or something.”

  A week or so, another week of stalling for time, watching every move she made for fear she’d do the unpredictable. Thousands of minutes while that crazy female turned into a leech boring at him. And Alverato. Big fat Alverato getting soft in the head over a spinster with a home permanent. The dumb bastard was losing his grip. If he didn’t have his reputation to coast on and his army of hoods-But the anger didn’t get Benny anywhere.

  He stomped at the butt that was still smoking on the floor and walked back to the room with the piano. The bottle and ice were still sitting there but the room was empty. He wasn’t after a drink. He had to find Pat, stay close by, to watch his property.

  He found Tober on the terrace.

  “Where’s Pat?” Benny stopped in front of the thin man.

  “Asleep, Tapioca. And don’t shout. Things are jangling enough without you stirring the air.”

  It was that time of day and Tober was running down.

  “Where, Tober?”

  “In bed, where else?” Tober sounded edgy.

  “Come on. Up, Tober. I want to see where she is.”

  “Jesus, Benny!” Tober jumped out of his chair, pulling back. “Don’t touch me, whatever you do,” and he stood making nervous gestures with his hands.

  “You need a pop, don’t you?” Benny stood watching the man.

  “Gad, yes!” Tober turned to go but Benny blocked his way.

  “First I want to see Pat.”

  They went upstairs together but Tober was distracted and couldn’t find the right room. They walked from one to the other, finding several things, but no Pat.

  “Tober, think!” Benny held the thin man by one wrist. “What did you do with her?”

  Tober winced, but then he remembered. “I made her a heist ball. That’s all, Benny. I fixed her a little drink and she said, ‘Aah, how nice and bitter,’ and then-”

  “Bitter? What do you mean, bitter?” Benny’s voice got hard. “You lousy junkhead, did you give that kid a jolt? Answer me, or I’ll break your wrist!”

  Tober almost fainted with confusion, but then he got himself straightened out. “Just a wee pinch, Benny. Such a wee pinch in a big glass of something. Grapefruit juice, I think. No, Martini! Such a Martini, Benny boy!”

  “You crazy sonofabitch-” But he didn’t finish the sentence because his breath came in a grunt when his fist swung hard against the side of Tober’s jaw.

  Tober collapsed in tears. There was no point in doing any more, so Benny stood and waited. He was breathing hard and his hands were working. She wasn’t crazy enough without being doped up in this nut house.

  “Tober, on your feet Where is she?”

  They found her in the next room and Tober had been right. She was sleeping. She was lying on Tober’s rumpled bed with her clothes on and her sleep was like a thick unconsciousness.

  Benny looked at the still figure and his mouth was mean. “Tober, how much did you give her? If that kid-”

  “Jesus, Benny, I swear. Just a pinch.”

  Benny grabbed Tober’s arm again. “Bring her around, you bastard.”

  “God in heaven, let go my arm. Can’t you see she’s sailing and having the time of her life? Benny, let go. I got to have my jolt. These crazy neckties-” He was tearing at his open collar.

  Benny let him go. Tober wasn’t any good this way, without his dose, and Benny watched him rush to the bathroom, where he tore open the door to the medicine chest.

  When Tuber came out again he was a different man. His black eyes were glittering and he carried his thin frame like a man of strength.

  “All right, Tober, let’s try again.” Benny got up from the bed and stopped in front of the man. “Bring her around.”

  Tober glanced at the bed, then smiled at Benny. “No need of that. It wasn’t enough to do any harm. You never know how it hits the first time, but often they go to sleep. She’s all right. She’ll sleep it off like a drunk. Except no hangover, Benny. The beauty of-”

  “Yeah, I know. I just saw you in one of those no-hangover stat
es. Does she know she took heroin?”

  “Of course not. I was very discreet Please, Benny, I don’t know what came over me.”

  “Forget it. Show me an empty room.”

  He picked her up carefully and followed Tober across the corridor. He moved his arms once so her head wouldn’t hang. He thought for a moment that he hadn’t known how limp she could be.

  Chapter Thirteen

  He sat by the bed until he fell asleep himself, and when he woke, feeling stiff and sticky, he saw Pat through the dark of the room, on her side now, breathing regularly. It was nighttime and from the drug she had passed into sleep. He took her shoes off and covered her with a blanket.

  There was none of the hardness in her face now, just the distance of a sleeping face, small and helpless.

  He looked at her and it got to him. At that moment he couldn’t have thought of his deal, of his hates and his determination, even though they were a part of him, up through his whole anxious life. They had helped. They had helped him forget the father he had never known, and his mother, who had done nothing for him except to bear him. The easiest thing had been to run with the gang, the petty, raucous hoodlums whose mean little lives had only one solution, to be big now and to let everyone know it.

  He’d done well in that game. He hadn’t been the biggest, but he’d been the sharpest. He hadn’t been the strongest, but he’d been the quickest. And then there was one difference between the rest of them and Benny. He didn’t care to stop at showing big. He had to be big.

  Benny got up from his chair and walked past the bed. The girl was still sleeping quietly and not knowing a thing. He turned away and hunted for a cigarette.

  She didn’t wake until morning. He had waited for her to wake, wondering how she would be. When she sat up and saw him, the change was sudden. The face he had seen in sleep froze into lines. She was Pendleton’s daughter now.

  “Beat it, Peeping Tom.”

  He stared at her.

  “I want to take a shower.”

  He left the room without a word. Perhaps he was imagining things. He hadn’t had much sleep. But then it came back to him why he was here, the real reason, the million-dollar deal that hung by one thin girl with brassy manners and a crazy temper. He went back to the room.

  She had found a big white bathrobe and it made her head and hands look small and frail. It made him say it before she changed her face again. “You’ll be all right, Pat. Last night-”

  “What do you want?” Her eyes looked flat.

  His voice was changed too now and he walked up to her, hands in his pockets. “How do you feel?”

  “Fine, Tapkow. Why?”

  “You got drunk.”

  “Act your age, Tapkow.”

  “I just want to warn you about Tober. Stay clear of that guy.”

  “Why, Tapkow?” She sat down in a chair by the bed and crossed her legs. “Because he’s a hop-head?”

  All he did was bite his lip, but she caught it. “Because of the heist ball concoction?” She smiled, watching him.

  He took out a cigarette, started to fumble for a match, forgot about it. “Look, Pat. Let me set something straight. You and me came here together. So I’m watching out that-that nothing should harm you. I’m trying to say-”

  “If you’re not going to smoke that cigarette, give it to me.”

  He looked at that face with the smile on it and almost lost his temper. Then his voice came very low. “For one minute I want you to shut up and listen.”

  “Look, Benny,” she said, and got up to put one hand on his arm. “If you’re worried about that concoction he gave me, just ease your conscience.” The honey in her voice was something new. “It was nothing, Benny. Hardly enough of a pinch to flutter a hair.”

  He stepped back and his eyes narrowed. “What are you talking about?”

  “Heroin, darling.” Before he recovered she went on. “You shouldn’t be all up in the air about it, Benny. Poor old Tober never breathed a word. He was your trusty old friend through and through.”

  “A pinch,” he said finally. “Just a pinch!” His voice got sharper. “Do you know how long you’ve been out?”

  “I can guess,” she said. She was still smiling, and she stepped close again. With a slow motion like a caress she pushed back the thick sleeve of the bathrobe. “But don’t blame Tober, darling. I fixed that dream myself.”

  And inside the frail-skinned crook of her arm he saw a red dot.

  She watched his face, enjoying it.

  “You what?” It was hoarse at first, then a roar. “You what? You fixed that jolt yourself? You crazy bitch, you went ahead and shot that filthy junk-”

  “I didn’t mean to go to sleep on it, really. But how was I to know how little it was cut.” It was a grin now, not a smile any more.

  “Christ in heaven, you stupid dame, don’t you know what this can do? Don’t you see what happened to that blithering Tober, what made him the jackass he is now? A wreck! A cheat! A lying, stupid jackass who-”

  “A cheat, a liar, a stupid lying jackass?” Her voice was a sudden scream. “You sanctimonious crook, you call him a liar?” She was crouching now, talking with an angry speed that hit him like a gust of hail. “You ugly runt, you can stand there in the daylight, talking like a judge, talking like a holy saint who’s shocked when somebody goes to pieces, breaks, goes under!” There were tears in her eyes, bright tears she didn’t try to hide. “You stinking swine, you can stand there telling me to be a lady and not mind the filth you brought along? What filth? The filth last night, Saint Benny, the filth the day before, that lying act you worked up in that cabin, that noble deal to make me think Saint Benny is a saint. He doesn’t take advantage of a crazy dame who’s throwing it around because she’s crazy. He wants to make her pure and clean instead, and later maybe have an unspoiled act of love-so pure, so rare, so-” She couldn’t go any further. Her raw voice cracked and she sobbed.

  He saw it now. She’d gone to bed that night in the cabin, thinking of him with a kind of love. She’d…

  “Don’t bother, Tapkow.” He had started to reach out for her when her voice stopped him. “You’re forgetting yourself. This is Miss Pendleton, the piece of business you got on your hands. Your little Big Deal Pendleton dame all neat and cold and so important.” Her laugh had a nasty ring. “You didn’t tell me, Saint Benny. Tober didn’t mean to tell me, Saint Benny. But learn something, Saint Never trust a hophead.”

  After she had slammed out of the room he stood a while. He ran a hand over his tired face and just stood.

  A week, maybe, Alverato had said. A week maybe, or perhaps a little more, because Big Wheel Saint Benny had the right dame and everything under control.

  Then she came back. She had a pair of shorts in her hand and a halter. “Beat it, Tapkow. I want to dress.” She turned and saw him still standing there. “Don’t worry about me, Tapkow, I’ll be around.”

  He stayed there and lit a cigarette. “I just learned something,” he said. “Never trust a hophead.”

  She shrugged. Then she let the robe fall to the floor. He saw her pull the shorts over her hips and then fit the halter around her breasts. She patted herself, ran a hand through her hair, and went to the door. “You don’t believe me, Tapkow?” She opened the door. “Then just remember. I don’t like Daddy any better than you do. Less.” She banged the door.

  He went downstairs and stood in the hallway. When he saw the short girl from the day before, the one with the wet sheet, he followed her to the terrace, because she was pushing a cart with a coffeepot and other things on it. He had a cup of coffee and let it burn his tongue. It helped.

  And what had happened in the room upstairs, that had helped. He was back to the time before, thinking only of the things that mattered and the way he’d made them all come true. The big deal in the palm of his hand and nothing to stop him from keeping it there.

  Then he went back to the hall and sat down where he could see the stairs and the cars beyon
d the open front door. Never trust a hophead, she had said.

  When he saw Pat again the shock made him stare. It was the same girl with her long legs tanned and the sun suit and the rumpled hair. Only the hair was rumpled as if it were on fire, her eyes were deep glittering stones, and she was screeching as if the air around her were all spikes and nettles. She came jumping down the stairs and when she came closer Benny saw that she was laughing. She passed him with a wild jump, ran to the door, then back, and stopped before him. Her hand shot out and he felt a sharp pinch on his check while she crinkled her eyes in laughter. Then she was up the stairs and gone.

  Before Benny got halfway up she came back. Tober was with her. Somehow his wasted frame managed to look sodden and they both were giggling like maniacs. Benny gave no warning. One hand grabbed the front of the shirt, the other drew back like the kick of a wild horse.

  But it never came through. He let go of Tober and lunged for Pat, who was climbing over the railing ready to jump. How she got away he never knew. The next thing was her wail, then the smack of her bare feet on the tile below. Before Benny got down she was racing through the front door and into the yard.

  Benny came to a stop at the open door. He saw her in the car, behind the wheel, and she was looking his way. She sounded quiet and hostile. “I’m leaving,” she said. The motor was racing and her hand was on the shift.

  He didn’t know how she had got the keys, but that wasn’t important now. Tober had come up to the door and he looked at the car with interest. “I never drive when I’m high,” he was saying. “I’m an old bore and I have a number of cardinal rules.”

  “Tober.” Benny talked low, afraid to move. “Make her stop. She mustn’t get away, Tober.” A drop of sweat stung his eye but he didn’t even blink.

  “Oh, Patty!” It was a singsong, like the voice of a nurse calling a child. “Before you leave, Patty-”

  She was listening.

  “Before you leave, Patty-”

  Both men advanced slowly. She threw the car into gear with a crash.

  “I don’t want that Tapkow pig to come any closer!” She sounded fluttery and shrill. “I don’t want that Tapkow pig. You never give up, Tapkow, do you?”