NO Quarter

by Robert Asprin

  He didn’t know. I didn’t know. We were going to have to settle for revenge.

  I’d told Alex about our plan. We were sitting on the couch in my apartment, where we often watched movies together. She listened quietly. Afterwards she nodded solemnly and said, “Okay.”

  Then she leaned over and kissed me.

  And I let her. I kissed back. As for the question I was waiting to ask her untill after we’d gone wherever the trail of Sunshine’s killer took us ... well, I had my answer without ever having to ask for it.

  It was nice holding her in my arms. She was completely different from Sunshine, but her body fit against mine in a way that made it seem almost as if I had found my other self—the female version. It felt so right that I completely forgot about the photograph from Sunshine’s apartment. I had meant to show it to her to see if she knew anything about it.

  “That all your tables, Bone?”

  I blinked. I was sipping a stone cold cup of coffee and dragging languidly on a cigarette. Earlier, I had been rolling silver—that’s wrapping individual settings of silverware up in napkins for the busboys to deliver to fresh tables—so the graveyard shift wouldn’t have to bother. I looked now and saw the big wicker basket was full. I didn’t have any customers left out on the floor. In fact, the place was just about dead.

  “All done, Dallas.”

  Dallas cupped my shoulder briefly with a large strong hand. “Well, why don’t you total your tickets and cash out, huh? You don’t look so hot.”

  “I don’t ...” Then I was nodding. “I think—I’m going to need a few days off.”

  He eyed me. “I can’t really spare you on this shift, Bone.”

  And I couldn’t afford to miss work, not really. I didn’t live as close to disaster as some, but I brought in enough money to keep my apartment, pay bills, spend modestly, and not a whole lot more.

  “Bring Conrad up from the lunch shift,” I suggested. “He’s always whining about not making enough tips.”

  “Conrad whines about bad tips because he’s a lousy waiter. I put him in your slot, he’ll just be making bad money at night, and this shift will suffer. Oh, screw it. You really need time? Okay, Bone. Take your days. Just so long as this isn’t your way of quitting on me.”

  “Thanks, Dallas.”

  I tossed my coffee and my smoke and was picking at my apron strings, my fingers raw. I had been peripherally aware all night of the rest of the staff eyeing me, the nudging and nodding and murmuring. Yes, the gossip about Detective Zanders’ visit was still going. There was no point in trying to explain the truth. It would only be fanning the flames. Fortunately, I was already too tired and out of it tonight to really care.

  My hurt, sore fingers—sometimes they got banged and bumped hard enough to break the skin, and I wouldn’t notice until the end of the night—froze in untying my short black apron. I hurried across the floor, my eyes tracking along the front windows.

  I pulled open the restaurant’s door, leaned out of the air-conditioned cool into a sultry night alive with music knocking from passing cars, roaches scuttling the sidewalks. I called out, “Piper! Hey!”

  He was a little guy, as small as Alex, wearing a draping old raincoat that pretty much enveloped him. His steps were tiny, and he was that nebulous age of all gutter-punks—sixteen going on death. Sleeping bag in a dirty knapsack, unhealthy skin. “Dropped out,” they might have said when I was a boy. Piper had definitely been dropped, and I doubted anybody wanted him back. And even so, he was among the less scummy of the homeless youths that we all share the Quarter with.

  “Hi, Bone.”

  “Piper, we got a leftover sandwich. You want it?”

  He grinned rotting teeth at me, and I ushered him inside, steering him toward the end of the L-shaped bar.

  “One last customer, all right?” I told Dallas, who shrugged and went into the office, as I fetched Piper the sandwich. Employees at the restaurant were entitled to one free meal per shift. While I usually skip it, sometimes I’ll box mine up to take home on the off chance I’ll remember to eat it later.

  I slapped the cold Italian salami and cheddar onto a plate and brought it out to Piper. He was so named for the penny whistle he sometimes blew in the Square as he begged for spare change. Others of his rather sorry breed panhandled, prostituted themselves, and committed petty crimes. Very lucky ones might hook up with a lover who had a job and an apartment.

  Piper looked at the food with moon-eyed hunger.

  “How about a beer?” I offered and didn’t wait, pulled the tap and set the amber pint by the plate.

  “I, um, well, y’know ... I don’t got anything to spend.”

  “No worries, Piper.”

  “I can’t think of anything I done to deserve this,” he said, appearing genuinely confused.

  “I’ll give you the chance to deserve it.”

  His black fingernails drummed either edge of the plate a few seconds. Then, he said, “Okay.”

  I described Dunk to him in the same detail I’d given to Maestro, highlighting those same points he had told me to look for in any suspects I came across during this hunt.

  “You know who I’m talking about?” There was nothing to see on Piper’s pimply, dirty face, but I was quite sure on a gut level that he knew Dunk, the waste-case boyfriend I’d found living in Sunshine’s apartment.

  “See,” I said, quietly, with a shade of sorrow, “I heard Dunk was going with Sunshine. The girl who was stabbed on the Moonwalk a few days back? She was my friend. Old friend, from back in the day. I just want to talk to someone else who knew her—really knew her. I ... I can’t get her death straight in my head, y’know? I’d like to find Dunk. Any idea where he hangs, what he does?”

  It wasn’t a bad performance, I thought. But what I thought didn’t matter much here. I waited on Piper. Piper was a gutter-punk. Dunk had certainly looked the part of that same subculture. It was reasonable they might know each other, considering the intimacy of that low circle. Also equally likely Piper would go mute rather than answer an outsider’s questions. We “normal” Quarterites must seem like aliens to these kids, who would find running water and electricity awesome luxuries.

  Outside the windows, on Decatur, some drunk nitwit was stumbling around in the intersection with Governor Nicholls Street, shouting some girl’s name and, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry!” over and over. Car horns blared, and someone came out of one of the bars to pull him from the street.

  Piper traced the brim of his beer glass with a grimy fingertip. He hadn’t yet taken a sip.

  “Yeah. I can tell you a thing or two about Dunk.” He looked down at the plate, moon-eyed again. “Mind if I eat this first? I’m starvin’.”

  Probably not much of an exaggeration. I hung back and waited while Piper dug in.

  * * *

  Excerpt from Bone’s Movie Diary:

  Roger Corman is a genius. Undisputed master of the low-budget schlock picture. Launched careers of a ridiculous number of now big-name directors, actors, and actresses. I greatly admire his work as producer/director, mostly because watching a Corman flick is to experience & appreciate how a worthwhile film can be wrung from next to nothing. Super-cheapie sets, slapdash scripts, one-take performances & still the vast percentage of his movies are enjoyable today. Watching a micro-budgeted film is to be in on the fun. Yes, that’s a blatant cardboard wall, not the side of a castle; yes, the sound’s noticeably off; yes, the story plays like it was knocked out by a screenwriter over a weekend binge of diet pills & Wild Turkey. So what? It’s like seeing a play your friends are putting on in a warehouse basement. You’re rooting for the film to succeed despite its handicaps, & you forgive a lot if it’s making a sincere effort. I always root for Corman. Besides, the world would be a poorer place without Death Race 2000, Rock ‘n’ Roll High School, Battle Beyond t
he Stars and 1962’s The Intruder, with William Shatner (yes, Shatner) giving a terrific performance. Another Corman-produced fave of mine is Suburbia. Not the ode-to-slackerdom pic. from ‘96, but the cult film about a tribe of street punks that band together for survival & companionship in the decaying suburbs. Fine movie. With no perceivable budget & a cast of virtual non-actors, it conveys the punk/squatter scene absolutely convincingly. Not glamorizing, not even angling for much sympathy, you nonetheless do sympathize with these kids who, in real life, you would probably dismiss as “scumbags.” Appraisal: Suburbia * * *

  Night was definitely going to be the better time for the fact-finding mission I had in mind. I habitually roll out of bed late, but today I was still left with a lot of daylight. Normally these are the hours for the mundane chores of living, like doing one’s laundry, shopping for groceries (actually, the bizarre local expression is “making” groceries, don’t ask me why), occasional banking, etc., etc.

  Necessary chores or not, these are also ways of killing time. What was odd was that today I felt antsy, maybe even a little guilty, about wasting the hours. Bone was working at his restaurant tonight, would be tied up till late. That meant if I didn’t do something, nothing was going to be happening with the hunt all day.

  I automatically set about clearing my mind. Discipline is as important as every kung fu master in every martial art film tells his apprentice it is. I hadn’t done this kind of work in a long time. I wasn’t about to trip myself up at the start making beginner’s mistakes.

  So I took care of a few quick ordinary errands, then ducked back to my pad. Stepping out of the shower, I noticed a message on my answering machine. Isn’t that always the way? Actually, I don’t regularly pick up my phone when it rings. Like a lot of people, I use the message machine to screen my calls, since I don’t have caller ID.

  This one was from the Bear. He identified himself, then said, “I heard from a buddy of mine who’s a bouncer on Rampart. He told me late last night a guy was in his joint nosin’ ‘round about you. Description matches, down to the silver crucifix. Same thing, him askin’ for you by name. Lookit, I’m gonna set up a red-alert perimeter. Whoever this dude is, he’s not goin’ away. He’s gonna pop up again an’ when he does I wanna know it right when it happens. That way me or one of my buddies can nail this guy’s feet to the floor ‘til you can come check him out. I’m figurin’ you’d like to ask him some questions. If you don’t want me doin’ anything, let me know. You might be handlin’ this your own way. Later!”

  My clean-cut early thirties guy again, and this time working Rampart Street trying to find me. Rampart bordered one of the long sides of the Quarter and was totally off my normal routes.

  I understood what the Bear meant by “red-alert perimeter.” Like all Quarter bartenders, the Bear knew other bartenders, especially those who worked the graveyard shift like he did. It’s a very active network. Often it’s used for silly purposes, like “phone shots,” where one bartender calls another and they share a shot of Jack Daniel’s or whatever over the line. Sometimes, though, the network is put to more serious use.

  The Bear was going to put out an APB on my friend with the crucifix. If he showed up asking questions about me in any of the network bars, the bartenders, probably enlisting the aid of some of their regular customers, would hold him on the premises. Then I would be contacted. Chances were at that hour I would be out at one of these bars anyway, so I could be tracked down with a few fast phone calls.

  It’s good to have a support system. As far as I know, the Quarter’s is unique.

  I pulled out my big drawer and started looking over my short blade collection. Then I reconsidered, shut the drawer and dressed to go out. My stomach was rumbling. I knew Bone ate rarely and catch-as-catch-can, but I liked a regular eating schedule. It was time for dinner.

  My dining choice was Poppy’s, one of two ’50s style greasy spoons in the Quarter that specialized in burgers and round-the-clock breakfasts. When you first visit New Orleans, it’s almost mandatory that you try the gumbos and jambalayas and blackened whatevers that are as much a part of the atmosphere as the bars and the Mardi Gras beads the shops sell year-round. When you live here, however, particularly if you weren’t born and raised here, you build a list of small, hole-in-the-wall restaurants and takeout places where you can get Chinese, pizza, gyros, or whatever else you were used to eating back in the World.

  I sat at the counter with a paperback I’d brought along and was working my way through a waffle with a side of sausage when I felt a presence closing in. I had developed the “sixth sense” early on. In my line of work, I’d sort of had to develop it. What it is, of course, is simply perpetual watchfulness, using all of one’s senses. Sometimes they deliver a warning from something you’re not consciously aware of going on. I hadn’t lost the ability after retiring and moving down here. It was probably because the Quarter, while not a war zone, explodes into random or aimed violence periodically and in isolated instances. My danger/warning instinct has saved my neck a couple of times, even if it was only by letting me get out of harm’s way before things blew.

  I was keenly alert for Mr. Silver Crucifix, ready for him to pop up anywhere, but I was not jumpy. My discipline stayed with me. Without raising my head, I shifted my eyes to the long mirror and scanned the diner. “ESP” forewarnings are nice, but sometimes it gives you an edge if you don’t telegraph that you’re alert and have the antennae out. In cases like that, it can buy you an extra couple of seconds beyond what your reflexes can provide, and in a serious fight, a couple of seconds is a long time.

  This time, however, it was easy to spot what I was picking up—Alex, making her way toward me, her face set and determined. I had a hunch I could almost write the script for what was coming, but since it was unlikely the situation would be physically dangerous, I dropped my eyes back to my reading and let the scene unfold at a normal pace.

  “Hey. Maestro.” She slid onto the stool beside me.

  “Alex!” I said, faking a surprised tone. “How you doing? Join me for a bite or a cup?”

  She was wearing snug black jeans and a yellow T-shirt. It wasn’t often I got to see her in anything but her Pat O.’s uniform. For an almost scrawny girl, she had a very nicely proportioned figure.

  “I want to talk to you for a few, if it’s all right. Actually, even if it’s not all right.”

  “No problem.” I smiled easily, slipping my bookmark into the paperback. “Still, did you want a cup of coffee at least?”

  “A coffee I’ll take.”

  “And is this anything we want to share with the hoi polloi?” I figured it wasn’t.

  Alex’s big eyes darted toward the counterman and the fry cook, both hovering in the near vicinity.

  “Didn’t think so. Scotty,” I said and signaled the waiter, “bring a coffee to the back booth, won’t you? Thanks a lot.” I always tipped Scotty well, so he didn’t give me any grief about relocating. I had always been a fairly conscientious tipper, but hanging out with Bone had driven home the “sacredness” of it. I understood he made good tips himself, but was a zealot when it came to tipping bartenders or other waiters.

  I tucked my book in my back pocket, picked up my plate and my own coffee, and led the way to the diner’s rearmost booth, safely insulated from eavesdroppers.

  “So. What can I do for you?” I said, settling in. As I positioned my food and cutlery, I studied her at leisure.

  She tossed a pack of cigarettes on the tabletop, dug one out, and pulled the ashtray to her. “Mind if I smoke while you nosh?”

  I did, but said, “Not at all.” Her short, dark hair formed a halo over her resolute face. Scotty came by with her coffee.

  “Bone told me yesterday what you two are up to.”

  “He said he was going to.” I shrugged. “He knows you better than I do, naturally, and if he thinks you can be tru
sted with the information, I’ve got no problem with that.”

  “Well, I do,” she said, her lips flattened into a thin line. “What are you getting him into, Maestro?”

  So much for eating. I sighed, leaned back and lit a smoke of my own before answering.

  “First off, Alex,” I said evenly, “I’m not getting him into anything. He was determined to do this thing before I even talked to him. My first and foremost concern in this is keeping him safe. Frankly, he’s a lot better off with me on his side. If he went it alone—”

  “For Chrissake, Maestro!” For a second she looked ready to launch into a real tirade, then leaned forward and pinned me with those large eyes. “I know Bone wants whoever killed Sunshine. I want her killer too. I want his fucking head on a stick. Understand? What I want to know is if what you told Bone about yourself—is any of that true? Do you have some actual experience in this stuff? You wouldn’t be the only guy walking around the Quarter talking pure bullshit about himself to impress people.”

  I took a slow drag on my smoke, exhaled it, and stared at her through it. “Impugning my honesty, Alex?”

  “Oh what, are you trying scare me?” she shot back immediately. She was obviously not one who could be easily intimidated. I’d never seen her in this mode. She was a firebrand. “I want my question answered, Maestro, and I’d goddamned well better like the answer. Are you who you said you are to Bone?”

  Looking into her fierce eyes was like looking up into the heat and glare of the sun, but I didn’t blink.

  “I didn’t lie to Bone,” I said.

  She slumped back at that, stirred some sugar into her coffee and took a sip.

  “Okay,” she finally said, dropping the challenging tone. “So you really are a pro at this?”

  “A retired pro.”

  “Bone said that too. Okay. He’ll be safer doing this thing with you. But ‘safer’ isn’t ‘safe,’ of course.”