Manhattan Noir 2

by Lawrence Block

  Across the foyer, a stout, uniformed woman sat at an incongruous green-metal desk under a sign that read: ALL VISITORS MUST SIGN IN AND OUT. She had been watching Simms since he had walked in and finally said, “Can I help you?” Simms went over to her. “I’m supposed to go to work for Charlie Hosey.”

  “You from the halfway house?”

  “Yes.”

  “Okay, you got to see Max Wallace first. He’s head of security on the premises. See the grand ballroom over there—those big doors that are chained shut? Go down the hall next to them—you’ll see his office.”

  Simms threaded his way through the playing children, past the women whose conversation ceased as he went by, past the big ballroom doors which did have a length of chain connected to their brass handles by a padlock, and down a hall to a door that had assistant manager lettered into its mahogany surface and a plastic sign reading Security thumbtacked above it.

  A black man dressed in starched, creased khaki, Max Wallace was thick but not fat, built like a fire hydrant, with eyes that riveted wherever they focused. As soon as Simms entered, they riveted on him. “Let’s see your assignment paper,” he said without preliminary.

  Simms hesitated. “The job counselor at the halfway house said I was supposed to give that to Charlie Hosey.”

  “I don’t care what the job counselor at the halfway house told you, bud. I’m in charge of these premises, not him. I want to see your assignment paper—now.” He held out a thick hand. Simms gave him the folded paper he wanted. Wallace’s laser eyes flicked over it. “General maintenance man,” he read, and grunted contemptuously. He tossed the paper back to Simms. “What’d you serve time for, Simms?” he asked, leaning forward, his words almost a challenge.

  “You’re not allowed to ask me that,” Simms told him.

  Wallace’s eyes flashed anger, but just for an instant. He sat back. “They tell you that at the halfway house?” he asked.

  “Yes.” Simms wished he had a drink of water.

  “Then I guess you also know that I can’t ask where you did your time, or even how much time you did—that right?”

  “Yes. Right.”

  “Well, since I’m not allowed to know anything about you, I’m going to tell you a few things about me. First of all, understand one thing: I’m in charge of everything and everybody inside these premises. The Algiers is a city welfare hotel. There are nearly three hundred indigent families living here, many of them just women with young children.” Wallace tilted his head with a coyness surprising for his size. “I guess you been away from women for quite a spell, haven’t you?”

  Simms didn’t say anything. Wallace’s eyes narrowed. “Couldn’t be that you were away for rape, could it, Simms? I mean, it would be just like those halfway-house fools to put a rapist in a building full of women to try to prove he’s been re-ha-bil-i-tated. Is that it, Simms? You a rapo?”

  “I told you, you’re not allowed to—”

  “I heard you the first time.” Wallace pointed a threatening finger. “Every woman in this building is under my protection, Simms. I catch you out of line with any of them, you even look down one of their blouses when they bend over, and I’ll have your ass back in the slammer so quick you’ll think you never got out. Understand me?”

  “I understand,” Simms said quietly. He was relieved when Wallace looked away long enough to pick up the phone and dial two digits.

  “Charlie, this is Max,” he said. “Come to my office and get your new helper.” When he hung up, he sat far back in his swivel chair, the springs squeaking with his weight, and carefully unwrapped a large black cigar that could have been designed with him in mind. Lighting it with an old-fashioned flip-top Zippo, he released several puffs of pungent smoke into the close little office. As he removed the cigar from his teeth, he actually smiled.

  “Maybe I misjudged you, Simms,” he said almost pleasantly. “Maybe you’re not a rapo, after all.” His smile, there for mere seconds, vanished and his voice turned harsh again. “Maybe you’re a child molester. A pervert. Is that what you are, Simms?”

  George Simms didn’t have to worry about answering that one, because at that moment Charlie Hosey walked in.

  “I can really use you,” Hosey said as he showed Simms around the hotel. He was an older, short, balding man with a vague whiskey smell about him. “It ain’t bad keeping up with the big stuff—the boiler, the hot-water heaters, the electrical system. It’s the little stuff that runs me ragged. The minor plumbing repairs, jammed locks, hotplates shorted out, lighting fixtures that don’t work. You can handle all that kinda stuff, can’t you?”

  “Sure,” Simms said. “Those are the same problems I used to take care of in the cellhouse. Except for jammed locks, that is—I wasn’t allowed to mess with locks.”

  “I guess not,” Hosey said.

  “Did you come here through the halfway house, too?” Simms asked.

  “Me? No. I used to work here when the Algiers was a real hotel. I was maintenance superintendent when the place closed down. After that, I went to St. Luke’s Hospital for a few years. Then when I seen in the paper where the city was gonna lease the Algiers as a welfare hotel, I went and seen about coming back. They was glad to get me. Keeping this place going is like working in a secondhand tire shop—it’s patch, patch, patch all the time.”

  They paused at the chained doors. “That’s the Moroccan Ballroom,” Hosey said. “The Duke and Duchess of Windsor used to throw parties in there. I seen ’em. It’s got picnic tables in it now—the Help for the Homeless people come in twice a day and serve free meals. Over here—” the little man led Simms across the lobby to a pair of locked leather-padded doors “—is the Casablanca Club. It used to be a real ritzy nightclub. All the big show people used to perform in there: Jolson, Helen Morgan, Blossom Seeley and Bennie Fields, Ruth Etting. I seen ’em.” He sighed wistfully. “Yeah, this place used to be something.”

  They rode a service elevator, which Hosey had to unlock, down to the boiler room in the basement. On the way down, Simms asked, “What’s with this guy Wallace, anyway? He comes on like a concentration-camp guard.”

  “Ex-cop,” Hosey said. “Takes his job real serious.” After a beat to think it over, he added, “I guess I ought to tell you—Max don’t much like the halfway house sending guys to work here. You’re the third one they sent. The other two didn’t last long. Max, he don’t give a guy much slack. He particularly don’t like nobody messing around with one of the young women that lives here.” Hosey shrugged. “I ain’t telling you what to do, understand—but you asked and I thought you should know.”

  “Thanks,” said Simms. “I appreciate it.”

  Off the big boiler room was the maintenance office: a badly scarred wooden desk littered with papers and miscellaneous junk in front of a padded chair that had a patch repaired with black electrical tape. A wooden straight chair stood in front of the desk, an old metal file-cabinet next to it. A pinup-girl calendar from a plumbing-supply company was thumbtacked to the wall. At the back of the office was a curtained doorway leading to a small storeroom. The curtain wasn’t closed all the way and Simms caught a glimpse of a cot in the room.

  “Here’s where I list all the minor repairs to be done,” Hosey said, showing Simms a clipboard hanging on a nail. “Every day you just go down the list and do as many of ’em as you can. I ain’t gonna dog you as long as you do a reasonable amount of work. I know alls you’re getting is minimum wage for now. But if you work out and want a permanent job when you’re released from the halfway house, we can talk about it.”

  “I’ll do a good job for you, Mr. Hosey,” Simms told him.

  “Just call me Charlie,” said the little man.

  A week later, Simms was sitting on the fire stairs at the end of the seventh-floor corridor having a smoke and drinking coffee from a small thermos he’d bought. His toolbelt and the clipboard of job orders lay on the step next to him. He had been sitting there for nearly an hour when the door to
Room 704 opened and a little Puerto Rican girl, five or six years old, came out into the corridor to play. Pretty, clay-colored, with raven hair, she had on jeans and a sweater and carried a doll that was missing a hand. Sitting on the worn carpet with her back to the wall, she propped up her knees, sat the doll on them, and began to braid the doll’s hair.

  Simms watched her for a couple of minutes, then leaned forward a little and spoke to her. “Hello.” He said it very quietly so as not to frighten her.

  She looked at him but didn’t speak back.

  “My name’s George,” he said. “I work here.” He showed her the toolbelt. “See?” The little girl looked, then turned her attention back to the doll. “That sure is a pretty doll,” Simms said. “But what happened to her hand?”

  “She was in a accident,” the child said, not looking at him.

  “That’s too bad,” Simms said consolingly. “But she’s a very lucky little doll to have you to take care of her.” From the pocket of his denim workshirt, he took a pack of chewing gum. Slowly unwrapping a stick, he put it in his mouth. The little girl was watching him. “Would you like some gum?” he asked. She looked back at her doll without answering. “It’s fruit-flavored,” he said. “Here—” he held out a stick “—have some.”

  The girl rose and walked over to him. She stood before the stairs he was sitting on and Simms gave her the gum and watched as she unwrapped it and put it in her mouth. As she began to chew, she smiled.

  “See, I told you it was good,” Simms said. A lock of hair had fallen over her forehead and Simms reached out and brushed it back. “Now, I told you my name, but if we’re going to be friends you’ve got to tell me yours.”

  Just then a woman came out of 704 and strode urgently over to them. “Debbie, what are you doing?” she said irritably.

  Simms frowned. Debbie? Debbie? What the hell kind of name was that for a Puerto Rican kid?

  The woman took the girl by one arm. “You know you’re supposed to stay right by the door. And not talk to strangers.”

  “It’s okay,” Simms said, smiling. “I work here.”

  “I don’t give a damn where you work!” the woman snapped. She was pretty—an older version of the child, except that her eyes had no innocence left in them. “What have you got in your mouth?” she demanded of Debbie. “Spit it out,” she ordered, holding her hand under the child’s mouth. “Now get back in the room!” As the little girl hurried away, the woman turned her anger on Simms. “What the hell do you think you’re doing, giving gum to my kid? Who the hell are you, anyway?”

  “My name’s George,” Simms said. “I work here.” He held up the toolbelt. “I fix things—”

  “Yeah. Well, if I ever catch you giving anything to my kid again I’m gonna fix you.” The woman stuck the wad of gum on the handle of his screwdriver. “Stay away from my kid!”

  She stalked away.

  A few days later, Simms went down to the maintenance office for some new work orders and Hosey was not at his desk. Simms pulled the curtain aside and looked into the storeroom for him. He wasn’t there, either. It was the first time Simms had seen the storeroom except for an occasional glimpse when the curtains were left open an inch or so. Now he looked around curiously. The cot he’d seen his first day was of the ordinary folding variety, with a blue-striped mattress and a couple of gray blankets that had ST. LUKE HOSPITAL printed on them. An upturned wooden crate served as a nightstand. On it was a cheap little lamp, an ashtray full of cigarette butts, and a glossy porno magazine with a nude woman in bondage on the cover. Standing on the floor next to the cot was an almost empty Jim Beam bottle. A few of Hosey’s extra clothes hung from nails in the wall.

  The phone on Hosey’s desk rang. Simms closed the curtain and answered it. “Maintenance.”

  “Where’s Charlie?”

  Simms recognized Max Wallace’s voice. “I don’t know, I just walked in.”

  “Find him,” Wallace ordered crisply. “Then the two of you get up to my office—fast.”

  Simms found Hosey over in a section of the basement that had been converted into a laundry room for the welfare tenants. He had the drum out of a clothes dryer and was resetting its axle. Simms told him about Wallace’s call and Hosey put aside his work. “Did he say what it was about?” he asked.

  “No,” said Simms. “He just sounded mad—as usual.”

  When they got to the security office, Max was with a little black girl of eight or nine and her mother. Wallace glanced at Hosey, glared at Simms, and knelt in front of the girl. “Sweetheart, I want you to look at these two men and tell me if it was either one of them that scared you.” The child hesitated and Wallace gently patted her head. “It’s all right. Come on now, take a look for me.”

  The little girl looked at Hosey and Simms, frowned, seemed to ponder, and finally said, “I’m not sure. It was so dark—” Her voice broke and she whimpered a little.

  Wallace gestured to her mother. “I’ll talk to her again later. Meantime, try to go on with her normal routine as much as you can. Don’t avoid the subject, but don’t talk about it like it was the end of the world, either. Understand?”

  “Yes, all right,” the mother replied in a strained voice. She took her daughter and left.

  Wallace sat behind his desk and studied Hosey and Simms with cold eyes. “That little girl,” he said evenly, “was on her way down the stairs to go to school this morning when a man accosted her on the landing between the lobby and two. She says the man tried to kiss her. The light on the landing was out, but she saw that he was a white man and she says he had a funny smell.”

  “Well, why pick on us?” Hosey said indignantly.

  “You’re white and you’re in the building,” Wallace said.

  “For Christ’s sake, there’s probably two or three dozen white guys living in the place,” Hosey argued. “And there’s boyfriends that sneak in and spend the night, there’s johns that some of these women go out and pick up for extra money. You got no right to single us out, Wallace.”

  “Nobody said I was singling you out. I always check the obvious first.” The security man reached for his phone. “You can go,” he told them.

  His eyes lingered on Simms until he was out the door.

  That afternoon, Simms was helping Hosey rehang one of the lobby doors that the kids had misaligned by swinging on it. “Maybe I shouldn’t have got so hot at Max,” the little man mused. “He’s just trying to do his job. It ain’t an easy one, either—there’s lots going on in this place that shouldn’t be going on. Prostitution, drug sales, stolen property being sold—”

  “I guess you never expected to see those kind of things in the Algiers,” Simms sympathized.

  “Not stuff like that, never,” Hosey declared. “’Course, in any big city hotel you’re gonna get your share of illegal goings-on. Hell, I used to see Meyer Lansky and Lucky Luciano come in here regular to have a drink in the Oasis Bar—there’s no telling what kind of crooked business they was talking about. And one time we found out there was a high-price callgirl ring operating out of what used to be the penthouse suite. It was supposed to be rented to this wealthy Texas dame and her four daughters—well, they wasn’t her daughters at all, if you know what I mean.”

  Hosey grinned. “Funniest thing that ever happened was the time some teller over at Chase Manhattan got conned by a blonde who was a dead ringer for Lana Turner. She was supposed to run away with him, see, after he embezzled a bundle of dough, but what she really did was run away from him—with the dough. The cops arrested him right here in the hotel, sitting on the bed, suitcase all packed, waiting for her to come back.” While Hosey was talking, Simms noticed Debbie’s mother go into the coffee shop across the street from the hotel. Debbie wasn’t with her. “She got caught later on,” Hosey said.

  “Who?”

  “The blonde that looked like Lana Turner. She got caught down in Florida somewheres. Only had about ten thousand dollars left. Claimed the bank teller only gave her
twenty. The bank said a hundred thousand was stole. If you ask me, the bankers probably took the difference.” Hosey used an electric drill on a long extension cord to screw in the last door-hinge. “Well, that about does it. I wish there was some way to keep the kids from swinging on it, but I guess there ain’t. We’ll be fixing it again in a month.”

  “Okay if I take a few minutes off, Charlie?” Simms said. He could see Debbie’s mother sitting by the coffee-shop window with a cup in front of her.

  “Sure, take a break,” Hosey said, winding up his extension cord.

  Simms trotted over to the coffee shop and went to the table where Debbie’s mother sat. “Can I talk to you a minute?” he asked.

  She looked up from a folded section of classified ads. “What about?”

  Simms sat across from her. “I just wanted to tell you I was sorry for what happened about the gum. I guess I wasn’t thinking. I mean, it was just a natural thing to offer the kid a stick of gum. It never occurred to me how it might look.”

  “Just stay away from her, okay?” the woman said firmly.

  “Yeah, sure I will,” Simms assured. “I just wanted you to know I didn’t mean nothing by it. I was only trying to be friendly.”