James Chase: The Dead Stay Dumb

There were three of them. The bigness of the room hid them from the sun, burning up the road outside. They sat round a table, close to the bar, drinking corn whisky.

George, behind the bar, held a swab in his thick fingers, and listened to them talk. Every now and then he nodded his square head and said, “You’re dead right, mister.” He just “yessed” them along—that was all.

Walcott uneasily fingered a coin in his vest pocket. It was all the money he had, and it was worrying him. Freedman and Wilson had stood him a round, and now it was coming to his turn. He couldn’t rise to it. His weak, freckled face began to glisten. He touched his scrubby moustache with a dirty thumb and moved restlessly.

Wilson said, “Cain’t go no place these days but there’s some lousy bum lookin’ for a free flop an’ a bite of somethin’ to eat. This town’s lousy with bums.”

Walcott said quickly, “Ain’t it gettin’ hot in here? Seems like it’s too hot to drink even.”

Freedman and Wilson looked at him suspiciously. Then Freedman drained his glass and set it on the table with a little bang. “Ain’t never too hot for me to drink,” he said.

George leant over the bar. “Shall I fill ’em up, mister?” he said to Walcott.

Walcott hesitated, looked at the two blank, coldly suspicious faces of the other two, and nodded. He put the coin on the counter. He did it reluctantly, as if the parting with it was a physical hurt. He said, “Not for me… jest two.”

There was a heavy silence, while George poured the liquor. The other two knew it was Walcott’s last coin, but they wouldn’t let him off. They were determined to have everything they could from him.

George picked up the coin, looked at it, spun it in his thick fingers, and flipped it into the till. Walcott followed every movement with painful intensity. He screwed round a little in his chair, so that he couldn’t see the others drinking. He put his hands over his eyes.

Freedman turned his red fat face and winked at Wilson. He said, “It’s only the Kikes that have the dough.”

George said ponderously, “Yeah, you’re right, mister.”

“Sure I’m right,” Freedman said, sipping his corn whisky. “Take a look at Abe Goldberg, ain’t he got most of the dough in the town?”

Walcott turned his head. His pale eyes lit up. “That guy’s stinking with it,” he said. “Hell of a lot of good it does him, too.”

Wilson shrugged. “His fat cow sews up his pockets,” he said. “He don’t drink, he don’t smoke, he don’t do nothin’.”

Freedman winked again. “You’re wrong there,” he said. “But what he does do don’t cost him anything.” They laughed.

The three-quarter swing doors of the saloon pushed open, and a girl came in. She stood hesitating in the patch of sunlight at the door, trying to see in the dimness of the room. Then she came over to the bar.

George said, “’Morning, Miss Hogan, how’s your Pa?”

The girl said, “Gimme a pint of Scotch.”

George reached under the counter and slapped down a bottle in front of her. She gave him a bill, and while he was getting change she looked round the room. She saw the three, sitting watching her. They sat like waxworks, suspended in everything but her. She looked slowly from one to the other, then she tossed her head and turned back to the bar.

“I ain’t got all day,” she said. “Stir your stumps, can’t you?”

George put the money on the counter. Aw, Miss Hogan—” he began.

She picked up the money and the bottle quickly. “Forget it,” she said, and walked out.

The three turned in their chairs as she went, their eyes fixed in a bright, unblinking stare. They watched her push the swing doors and disappear into the hot, sunlit road.

There was a lengthy silence.

Then Freedman said, “She ain’t got a thing under that dress, did you see?”

Walcott still stared at the door, as if hoping she’d return. He nervously wiped his hands on a cap he held on his knee.

Wilson said, “If I were Butch I’d take the hide off her back… the little whore.”

George said, “Ain’t she a looker? There ain’t another skirt in this dump like her, ain’t that right?”

Walcott dragged his eyes away from the door. “Yeah,” he said: “See the way she came in? Standin’ in the sunlight like that, showing all she got. That girl’s a tease. She’s going to get into trouble one of these days, you see.”

Freedman leered. “You don’t know nothin’,” he said. “You can’t teach that babe a thing. I’m tellin’ you, she’s hot. I’ve seen her at night with one of those engineer fellows in the fields.”

The other two jerked their chairs forward. They leant over the table. George looked at them. They had suddenly lowered their voices. He couldn’t hear what they were saying. He hesitated, then, feeling himself excluded, he moved further down the bar, and began to polish glasses. Anyway, he told himself, it wasn’t too healthy talking about old Butch Hogan’s daughter Old Butch was still dangerous.

A long, starved shadow of a man tell across the floor of the saloon, making George look up sharply.

The man stood in the doorway holding the swing doors apart with his hands. A battered, greasy hat pulled over his face hid his eyes. George looked at him, saw the frayed, stained coat, the threadbare trousers and the broken shoes. He automatically reached forward and put the cover on the free-lunch bowl.

“Another goddam bum,” he thought.

The man came in with a limping shuffle. He looked at the three at the table, but they didn’t see him. They were still wrangling about the girl. George leant forward a little over the bar and spat in the brass spittoon. Then having expressed his attitude, he straightened up and went on polishing a glass.

“The name’s Dillon,” the man said slowly.

George said, “Yeah? Ain’t nothin’ to me What’s yours?”

“Gimme a glass of water.” Dillon’s voice was deep and gritty.

George said, his face hostile, “We don’t serve water here.”

“But you’ll serve me an’ like it,” Dillon said. “D’you hear me, punk?—I said water.”

George reached under the counter for his club, but Dillon suddenly pushed up his hat and leant forward.

“You ain’t startin’ anythin’,” he said.

The cold black eyes that looked at George made the barman suddenly shiver. He took his hand away with a jerk. Dillon continued to stare at him.

There were no guts in George. He was big, and every now and then he had to smack someone down with his club. He did it without thinking. This bum was different. George knew he’d get nowhere being tough with a guy like this.

“Here, take the water, an’ get the hell outta here.” He pushed a bottle of water across the wood in Dillon’s direction.

The three at the table stopped talking about Hogan’s daughter and turned in their chairs. Freedman said, “Well, by God! Here’s another bum blown in.”

George began to sweat. He walked down the counter to Freedman, shaking his head warningly.

Dillon took a long pull from the water-bottle.

Sure of himself, because of his two companions, Freedman said, “This punk stinks. Get him outta here, George.”

Dillon put the bottle down on the counter and turned his head. His white, clay-like face startled Freedman. Dillon said, “You’re the kind of heel that gets slugged some dark night.”

Freedman lost some of his nerve. He turned his back and began talking to Walcott.

Just then Abe Goldberg came in. He was a little fat Jew, maybe about sixty, with a great hooked beak and two sharp little eyes. His mouth turned up at the corners, giving him a kindly look. He nodded at George and ordered a ginger ale. Dillon looked at him closely. Abe was shabby, but he wore a thick rope of gold across his chest. Dillon eyed that with interest. Abe met his eye. He said, “You a stranger around here?”