The Damned Don't Die

by Jim Nisbet

  “Trimble. Herbert Trimble.”

  Bdeniowitz wiped a hand over his face. “Sweet Heysoos,” he breathed. “So it was Trimble.”

  “Yeah,” said Windrow, “it was Trimble. He was sitting right behind you, playing the cello.”

  “Fruitcakes, alla them,” Gleason said around his cigarette.

  “The cello,” Bdeniowitz repeated tonelessly. He looked behind him. The music stand was there, and the chair, but no cello. “What cello?”

  Gleason shook his head. “It’s not here, Max.”

  Bdeniowitz scowled. “You trying to tell me we got a guy here, a fugitive from murder one, who sneaks back to the scene of the crime, with a stakeout on it yet, to play the cello? And then he steals it?”

  Gleason shook his head sadly. “Fruitcakes.”

  “That’s what he was doing, Max. I didn’t know from anything, just came back here to get a look at things, see what I might turn up.”

  Bdeniowitz scowled even more. “And how the hell were you figuring to get back in one of these joints, Windrow?”

  “I thought, you know, just a chance, but I thought that you might be here, Max, to unlock them for me.” Windrow looked up innocently. Gleason rolled his eyes. Max turned a color.

  “It just so happens, you private dick,” he said the words in a tone of utter contempt, “that we had this joint set up, on the chance that this kink might come home for his galoshes.”

  A little light bulb blinked on over Windrow’s head. Everybody in the room could see it. “Oh, so that’s how come the chair was empty, you told the uniform to go out for coffee, like, whistling all the way, every hour or so … huh?”

  Bdeniowitz was trying to squeeze his cheeks and his nose and his eyes all into one point with one beefy hand.

  “Yeah,” said Gleason, suddenly animate. “And he goes, like, two and a half blocks to the drug store, cause they got the good coffee …”

  “And there’s a guy on the roof, across the way, who’s on the lookout for Trimble …”

  “… in case he tries to slip back into his pad,” Gleason finished the explanation with a flourish of his cigarette hand. “Bingo! We nab ’em.”

  “Say, that’s great Max,” said Windrow appreciatively. He put both his hands on the floor and pushed himself up. “I guess that means you got them on the way out, after they bashed me, and everything’s tidied up.” Everybody—Gleason, Bdeniowitz, and the two uniformed officers—looked at Windrow strangely. Windrow enumerated with his fingers: “I got the divorce notice delivered, and a headache for my troubles; you nabbed your prime murder-one suspect, and a nice bit in the papers. Smart police work.” He brushed his hands together and looked around for his hat. “Great. Well, guess I’ll be going.”

  Bdeniowitz said, “This what you’re looking for?” and held up Windrow’s hat.

  “Oh, yeah. Thanks.” But as he reached for it, Bdeniowitz dropped it on the floor.

  “You’re not going anywhere,” Bdeniowitz said quietly, his eyes cold.

  Windrow looked from Max to his men and back. One of their walkie-talkies squawked.

  “What’s the problem, Max?”

  “We ain’t got Trimble, we ain’t got no dame, and we ain’t got no suspects. All we got is you, apple.”

  “What? Me? What about you guys? What happened to your trap?”

  “Johnson,” said Bdeniowitz.

  “Yeah.”

  “Tell.”

  “I returned from the decoy run to the drugstore at about ten thirty A.M. Been gone about half an hour. Resumed my seat and sat there for about fifteen minutes. Then I heard a noise, like a groan. I investigated. It came from this apartment. I tried the door. It was locked. I called Harry, across the street, on the two-way; he had the key. We drew our weapons, unlocked the door, and entered the apartment.”

  “And found what?”

  Johnson indicated Windrow. “This,” he said.

  “Anyone else?”

  “Nobody.”

  “Anything disturbed?”

  “Hard to tell, sir.”

  “Thanks. Harry.”

  The other officer stepped forward.

  “Have you seen Herbert Trimble enter or leave these premises today?”

  “Nosir.”

  “Yesterday?”

  “Nosir.”

  “How about the night guys?”

  “Nobody’s seen him, sir.”

  “Thanks.” He looked at Windrow a moment, then said, “Well?”

  “Well what?”

  “Well, what are you doing standing there telling me you talked to Herbert Trimble this A.M.?”

  “I did talk to him. He was sitting right there, playing the cello, when I came in.”

  “How did you get in?”

  “Walked.”

  “The door was open?”

  “Unlocked. I heard the cello, tried the door, found it unlocked, and walked in.”

  “And Trimble was here.”

  “And Trimble was here, Max.”

  “I think you ought to take a ride downtown.”

  “For what?”

  “Oh, you know. Breaking and entering, interfering with police officers in their line of duty, withholding evidence …”

  “Max, there were no cops here when I got here, and the door was open. Trimble was here, and he was playing the fucking cello.”

  “Why would—?”

  “How would I know? He just was, that’s all. I figured … I didn’t figure anything. I figured I could give him his lousy papers and go home. And I did. And I would have. But then he starts telling me about the night of the murder.”

  Gleason looked up from the floor. Bdeniowitz didn’t flinch. “Really,” he said softly.

  “Really. He said the girl spent the whole night over there moaning and groaning, like she was into heavy sex with someone, all night, he said.”

  Gleason looked at Bdeniowitz. Max continued to watch Windrow.

  “He said he couldn’t sleep all night, that he had an idea for a short story, hack work, you know, that’s how he makes his money, since he quit the museum.”

  Bdeniowitz continued to say nothing.

  “So he gets up to knock it out on the typewriter, about four o’clock, he said. And he’s just written the first line, the one that you found on the machine, when something happened next door.”

  “What, what?” said Bdeniowitz.

  “I’m not sure, exactly. He said all the moans and groans changed tone.”

  “Tone?”

  “Tone. They got—he said they began to sound more painful than pleasurable. So he stopped writing and tried to figure out what to do about it. Finally, he went next door.”

  All the policemen had slowly moved closer to Windrow, the better to hear his story. After a pause, Gleason made an impatient gesture. “Whad happened, whad happened?”

  Windrow shook his head and winced. “I don’t know. That’s when the lights went out.”

  Gleason stared at him in disbelief. Bdeniowitz allowed his right cheek a slight tic.

  “I think I believe him,” Windrow said. “I think he sat here, all right, trying to ignore whatever was going on on the other side of the wall, and that finally, for whatever reason, he forced himself to go over there and see what was up. And I think he saw something. I think he saw something that scared the hell out of him. But I don’t think he killed her.

  “In other words,” Windrow continued, “I think he was a material witness, and the only one you’ve got. I think he got scared and ran. I think he went to his wife for help and that she is trying to help him. When I went by there last night to get a recent picture of him, she gave me the picture of Harry Feyn that led me to call you, to tip you to arrest him, thinking he was Trimble.” Bdeniowitz raised his eyebrows and started to speak. “Well, how was I to know Max? I’d never seen the guy before. Whose picture did she give you?”

  She tore a page out of a museum catalogue,” Gleason volunteered, “and circled a face. His name was und
er it.”

  Well, I’ll bet it’s not him. She’s helping him, I’m sure of it, and I think that guy Feyn is in on it. Did you get anything out of him?”

  “He told us he hadn’t seen Trimble.”

  “How about Mrs. Trimble?”

  “They’re friends. Better friends, it seems, since her hubby left.”

  “Why would he lead me to believe he was Trimble? Why did he take the papers I had for Trimble?”

  “What papers?” said Bdeniowitz.

  “The ones describing the disposition of their divorce settlement. Didn’t he have them on him when you arrested him?”

  “We didn’t see them.”

  “Well, I don’t know how he fits in this, could just be a quick money angle, but Mrs T. is definitely trying to help Herbert out. I think he went to her with the story, and then they came back here. Maybe he came for his money, his dope, his galoshes, his cello lesson, I don’t know. He looks and acts wigged-out enough to do anything.”

  “How about murder?” said Gleason, blowing smoke to one side.

  “I don’t know,” said Windrow thoughtfully. “But I doubt it.”

  Bdeniowitz paced over to the window behind Trimble’s desk and stared out of it, his hands in his pockets. Presently, he said, speaking to Windrow, “How do you know Mrs. Trimble was here? Did you see her?”

  Windrow started to say yes, then thought about it.

  “No,” he said.

  Bdeniowitz continued to look at the window. “Didn’t see her, eh?”

  Windrow fumbled, feeling foolish. “There was a necklace …”

  “A necklace?”

  “I saw it, right here on the floor. And a pair of pants.”

  “Yeah?”

  “They were hers. She’d had them on when I saw her at her place, last night. I just assumed …” He stopped.

  Bdeniowitz rocked on his heels in front of the window.

  “Get out of here, apple,” he said softly.

  “But somebody hit me on the head while I was talking to Trimble …”

  “Get out of this building, get off this case, and don’t leave town.”

  Windrow picked his hat up off the floor, where Bdeniowitz had dropped it.

  “‘Don’t leave town,’ he says,” Windrow grumbled, putting on his hat as Johnson opened the door. “On twenty-five dollars a week.”

  Chapter Ten

  WINDROW HIT THE STREET AND WALKED. HE DIDN’T PAY attention to a particular direction at first, but after a while he noticed the tall eucalyptus of the Panhandle a couple of blocks south and headed for them. Once in the middle of it, he followed the block-wide green strip as it paralleled the Haight-Ashbury. The fog that had blanketed the city the night before had retreated to Stanyan Street, and he could see the tall head of boiling white mists beyond, where the Panhandle suddenly widened into Golden Gate Park. Where Windrow walked the sun shone, and its light played minor rainbows at his feet in the ratcheting sprays of the sprinkler heads as he approached them. Here and there a nursemaid or young mother pushed a stroller with a little bundle of clothes in it, in which, if he looked closely, he could make out the central features of a little pink face. A raft of pigeons lifted off a sandy playground, circled a few feet over his head, and settled down behind him as he walked through them. Old men sat on the wooden benches, singly and in pairs, sipping beer from sacks or resting both hands on their canes. He passed one arthritic old fellow who looked as if he were shuffling as fast as he could go, and enthusiastically so, though he covered only a few inches at a step.

  “Listen, sonny,” the old fellow said, raising a finger at Windrow as he passed, and not slackening his pace. Windrow slowed and walked with him. “You got to do it in the morning, boy, first thing in the morning. If you work like a man all day and come home tired at night, why, you ain’t in no kinda shape to make no kinda baby.” The old geezer wagged his finger. “You just tell her to hold her horses and you save it, don’t give in, turn over and you go right to sleep, son, and get a good night’s rest. When you wake up in the morning you’ll be fresh and new as a young boy. And that’s when you roll her over and, by God, you’ll make a baby then, every time. And that’s the truth.” The old man put a hand on Windrow’s arm and stopped, and Windrow did too. “Hang on a minute, son.” He pulled a pint out of his back pocket. “I’m doin’ pretty good, ain’t I, keepin’ up with you? For an old man?” He took a hit off his pint. “Care for a snort?” Windrow did, and had one. The whiskey going down added a new and familiar sensation to the two or so he’d already collected that day. He handed the bottle back and thanked the old man, who took another sip and capped it. He began shuffling again. Windrow took his leave. “Now, remember, sonny,” the old man called after him, “git her in the morning, first thing. You’ll always make a baby, that way.” Windrow jaywalked across busy Oak Street and headed up Clayton, toward Haight. “And stay on top!” the old man shouted after him, gesturing with the bottle, “I got eight grandchildren!”

  The clock read just after twelve, and it was dark and nearly empty and still a little stale from the night before, but the bar was open, and the woman behind the counter didn’t mind at all serving a man a drink. Windrow had intended to ask for breakfast, but thinking the old man in the park had gotten him on to something, he ordered a whiskey and two aspirin. On the second sip he knew he’d made a mistake. He ordered a dark beer with an egg broken into it and headed for the bathrooms. Both doors were marked WOMEN, but he’d known that and opened the first one he came to.

  He didn’t have much to be sick with. He hadn’t had a meal since breakfast in his office the night before. But the convulsions teased the broken rib and a few fresh, yellow sparks shot around in his vision. He tried not to make a mess of it, nor to make so much noise that he might embarrass himself. He’d always wanted to live a tidy, neat life, no trouble to anyone. But when the rib jabbed his stomach lining or the lung, he wanted to quit.

  The sickness passed. He flushed the john and straightened up. His glottis and the nubs of gone tonsils were thick and swollen. The blood rushed from his head and left a wave of dizziness. He steadied himself, both hands on the sink. When the darkness passed, he opened his eyes and looked at the cry in the mirror.

  He wet a paper towel under the sink spigot and swabbed gently at the blood dried in his eyebrow. It wasn’t much of a cut, but it had bled a bit. He wasn’t surprised Bdeniowitz hadn’t pointed it out. Bdeniowitz would point out Windrow’s obituary in the paper to him, in case he’d missed it, but in a small flesh wound he would take only passing pleasure. As he daubed at it, cleaning the hair, the little cut welled fresh blood, but soon clotted. He rinsed his mouth twice, pushed his hair back over the bump on his head, and went back to the bar.

  On the countertop, next to his hat, stood a large glass of orange juice, a mug of steaming coffee, with cream, and a candle, lit. The bartender was nowhere to be seen. From the back room, beyond the end of the bar counter, came the sound of frying. The bartender came through the double doors with a plate of sourdough bread, sliced and buttered, and placed it in front of Windrow, to the left of the coffee. In between she carefully laid a napkin, with a fork on it and, properly spaced toward the coffee, a knife and spoon. The blade of the knife faced the empty center of the setting, where one might expect a plate full of food to turn up. Windrow looked at the little woman behind the counter. Her name was Connie, and she lived with the woman who owned this place. She was short and young, about twenty-five. She had very straight, light brown hair, cut in bangs in front so that it covered her ears and just touched her collar, no more. She had bright, clear, big gray eyes. She always looked intelligent and rarely spoke.

  “Ah, Conrad,” Windrow said. “What’s this?”

  “Your first meal,” the little lady said, and she disappeared down the bar and into the galley.

  Windrow looked at the trappings of real eating. He wasn’t sure he knew what to do. He tested the orange juice. The glass had rivulets of coolness runni
ng down its outside, and ice cubes floated in the thick, pulpy juice. It was fresh-squeezed and delicious, he thought. He finished the drink in two draughts.

  Once he had lived with, and helped, a woman who was a friend of the woman who owned this bar, and the owner had never forgotten Windrow for it. Connie knew the story, and knew that Windrow was never to pay for what he drank in Orlando’s. Today Connie had something extra, maybe just because she thought Windrow needed it, but more likely because he’d walked in looking like he could use help crossing the street.

  Connie came back up the duck boards behind the bar with a large, steaming plate and placed it before Windrow. The plate contained two thick slices of ham, scrambled eggs, fried potatoes, a slice of orange, a little pile of preserves, and a sprig of parsley. The eggs and potatoes already had large grains of cracked pepper on them, and the ham had been sprinkled with salt. Windrow spread his arms and grinned.

  “What, no catsup?” he said. Connie flashed her shy smile. While she went for the catsup, Windrow dug in with both hands. He thought he might be able to finish the meal before she got back with the catsup.

  Over his third cup of coffee, Windrow asked Connie, “Heard from Elsa?”

  Connie looked up briefly from the glass she’d been polishing, then went back to it.

  “Dallas,” she said.

  Windrow looked at the front door, rubbed his stubble beard with a knuckle. Elsa.

  “This coffee could use a little brandy in it, Conrad.”

  She topped off the cup with brandy and cream. Windrow sipped it.

  Elsa was a whore. She was one of the expensive kind, which made her a prostitute. She was one of the really expensive kind, and that made her a call girl. Elsa was the lady who was the friend of the lady who lived with Connie and owned Orlando’s, the one Windrow had helped out of a jam. He had helped her so much that he’d decided to hinder her a little bit, so he’d fallen in love with her. She claimed it was likewise, and they tried it out for a while. They lasted a year. One night, at the beginning of that year, to set an example for the rest of it, they got a little drunk, and they smoked a little pot, and on the way home, all cuddly in the front seat, someone else jumped a red light and ran into them.