A. Fair: All Grass Isn't Green

“Do you write?”

“Once in a while.”

“You look prosperous. You look as if you didn’t have trouble selling.”

“Can you tell that by looking at me?”

“Yes, there’s an incisive something about you, atmosphere of assurance. You take us free-lance writers that get beaten down with rejections and after a while there’s a general aura of frustration and futility which clings to us. I’ve seen it happen to others and I think happening with me.”

“Tell you what I’ll do,” I told her. “You’ve been good sport. I’ll take a chance. Give me fifteen dollars and your typewriter, and I’ll come back in two weeks for twenty.”

“Will you do that?” she asked, her face lighting up.

I nodded.

“Oh, that’s wonderful! I’ve been thinking about appearance of my work lately. It does look sort of — well, amateurish.”

“A fresh ribbon wouldn’t hurt any on your typewriter,” I said.

“Fresh ribbons cost money,” she said, “and money doesn’t grow on bushes.”

She went into a closet, fumbled around for a while, then came out with two fives and five dollars in one-dollar bills.

I handed her my typewriter, put her typewriter in its case, and said, “Remember, I’ll be back in two weeks. I hope the new machine brings you luck.”

“It will. It will! I know it will!” she said. “I’m feeling better already. You said your name was Lam?”

“Donald Lam.”

“I’ll have the money for you, Donald. I just know I will. I’m assured of that sale. I feel it in my bones. I would have done a little bit better on this first installment, only I have to eat and I’m saving out enough for hamburger. You can’t do good work when you’re really hungry.”

“That’s right.”

She saw me to the door, then on impulse put her arms around me and kissed me on, the cheek, “I think you’re very wonderful,” she said.

I took her battered-up typewriter and went back to my car, thinking over the information I had obtained about Nanncie Beaver.

Two trips in a taxicab. Cardboard cartons, one trip, which lasted less than half an hour; and then suitcases on the second trip, and she didn’t come back after the second trip.

I went back to the directory and found the card that was marked MANAGER.

I went to the manager’s apartment. She was past middle age, heavy and cynical. “Do you have a vacancy?” I asked.

“I’m going to have one, Sixty-two B on the second floor. It’s a nice apartment.”

“Can I take a look at it?”

“Not right now. It isn’t cleaned up yet. The tenant just moved out yesterday and left things in something of a mess.”

“I’ll make allowances for that.”

“I can’t go up with you now. I’m expecting a long-distance call.”

“Let me have the key and I’ll take a look,” I said,

“What do you do?” she asked.

“I’m a writer.”

She shook her head. “Writers are pretty poor payers. They mean all right, but they can’t come up with the money when they don’t have it, and there’s lots of times when they don’t have it.”

“What do you want for the apartment?” I asked.

“Fifty-five dollars,” she said.

I said, “I’m a little different form the average writer. I would be able to give you the first month’s rent down and fifty-five dollars for the last month’s rent. Anytime I didn’t pay up you could take the rent out of that second fifty-five dollars.”

“Well, now, that’s something different,” she said. “You must be a very successful writer.”

“I’m getting by,” I told her.

She handed me a key. “Remember, the apartment is in an awful mess. I’m going to have it cleaned later today.”

“Sure,” I said. “I’ll make allowances.”

I went back up the stairs and into Apartment 62B.

It was in something of a mess. Papers were strewn around on the floor. Other papers had been hastily crumpled and thrown into the wastebasket. Some of the drawers were half open.

I smoothed out the crumpled papers. Most of them were the type of form letter that is sent out on direct mail advertising. One of the papers was typed and listed series of articles, three books, with the title and the author, and then the list went on: half a package of first-page typewriter paper, a full package of copy paper, pencils, pens, erasers, typewriter ribbons, envelopes, writers’ market data.

There was nothing to tell me why she’d pulled that piece of paper out of the typewriter, crumpled it up and thrown it in the wastebasket.

At the top was the name — NANNCIE ARMSTRONG, Box 5.

I took the paper, folded it up, left the apartment, gave the keys to the manager and said I was thinking it over and that I’d like to see the apartment after it was cleaned up.

I drove to my apartment, got the classified telephone book, and looked under STORAGE.

There was a storage company, the International, which had a branch within about five blocks of Billinger Street, where Nanncie Beaver had lived.

I went back out to the car and drove over to the Yellow Cab Company. The dispatching operator said. “I had a cab yesterday that picked up some cardboard cartons at eight-thirty Billinger Street and took them to the International Storage branch that is about five blocks away... Was there trouble?”

“Quite the contrary,” I said. “I found that cab driver very alert, very competent, very courteous. I have some other things I want done and I’d like to get him.”

“That cab might be rather hard to locate,” the operator said.

“Your cabs report in on what they’re doing.” I said. “This cab reported in that it was on Billinger Street and was taking a bunch of cartons to the International Storage Company; then the cab picked me up with my suitcases.”

Since I knew that the cab drivers reported by address and not by customer, I knew the dispatcher had no way of knowing whether the customer had been a man or a woman.

I pushed a five-dollar bill through the wicket. “It’s quite important to me,” I said. “If a box of chocolates would help refresh your recollection, this would give the needed stimulus.”

“That won’t be necessary,” she said.

“It might help.” I told her.

She almost absent-mindedly reached for the five-dollar bill. “It might take a little while to look this up,” she said.

“I’ll wait.”

“I... wait a minute, I’ve got it right here. It was cab two twenty-seven A. These drivers work in shifts, you know. The cabs keep busy all the time, theoretically twenty-four hours a day. One cab driver returns the cab to the garage, the next driver picks it up.”

“I know,” I said, “but this driver was on duty in the morning and...”

“Then he’d probably be on duty at this hour.” she said.

“Could you locate him,” I asked, “and have him go back to Eight-thirty Billinger Street? I’ll be waiting there for him.”

“You want to get this particular cab?”

“This particular driver ,” I said.

“All right,” she told me, making a note. “I’ll notify him. You’ll be waiting there?”

“I’ll be waiting there at the foot of the stairs.”

I drove my car back to 830 Billinger Street and wait twenty-five minutes before a Yellow cab drove up.

The driver got out and looked around.

“You did a job for me yesterday,” I said, “moving some cartons to the International Storage Company.”

He looked at me thoughtfully. “It wasn’t for you,” said. “It was...”

“I know,” I told him. “It was for my assistant, Nanncie Beaver, who was moving out of Apartment Sixty-two B. Now then, there’s been a mix-up on some of the stuff that she took with her and some of the cartons that were left at the storage company. I’m going to have to check and you can help me. First, we’ll go to the International.”