James Cain - The Cocktail Waitress

There came a pause, while I stood there before him, holding my tray balanced on one hand, the half-filled bowl upon it. We neither of us said anything.

“Is the situation really so dire?” he asked. “With your son and your sister-in-law, I mean.”

“Yes,” I said simply. But then, not wanting to walk away on a sour note, I smiled and said: “But things are looking up. Thanks to you especially. Each night brings me one small step closer to my goal.”

“But only a small step, Joan. I’d like to do more.”

“Well, then, we’re even, because I’d like to do more for you as well.”

I was surprised to see a look of pain cross his features. But I couldn’t ask him about it because Bianca appeared then with another man on her heels, and I recognized him at once, even out of uniform.

Bianca seated him at a table in my station, the small one at the far end of the room.

“Mrs. Medford.”

“Sergeant Young-can I thank you again, for suggesting I come here, for recommending me to Bianca, or vice versa, whichever is the right way to say it?” I handed over the wine and cocktail list, though obviously he knew the Garden better than I did and probably already knew what he liked to have.

“I’m glad she had an opening for you, and that you took it.” He handed back the card. “You can ask Jake to make me up a smash.”

Jake mixed a whiskey sour and poured it into a highball glass with some muddled mint leaves at the bottom. Sergeant Young took a long sip and set it down, then looked me over from head to toe. This time I didn’t stiffen. A week can make a difference.

“Mrs. Medford, I came partly to see how you are doing, and partly to sample Jake’s handiwork-but also because there’s something I want to let you know. It regards your case, and the matter of your husband’s death.”

“I thought that was all behind us,” I said.

“It ought to be, and I wish it was. If it was up to me it would be. But Church-you remember Private Church-he’s young and eager and stubborn, and out to make a name, and for some reason he’s not satisfied with the verdict of accidental death.”

“Why?”

“They train you at the academy to find crimes, Mrs. Medford. When you’re new in the job, you never want the answer to be that there wasn’t one. Let a few years pass and you know better-you’re thankful when a case can be closed without fuss. But he hasn’t had those years yet and is still burning to solve murders.”

“And he thinks Ron was-”

“He thinks we should keep the investigation open. He didn’t even want to come tell you about your sister-in-law’s call last Tuesday, but I convinced him it was the fair and proper thing to do, seeing as how the accusation against you was so clearly false.”

“For that I thank you. But-what can I do about the rest?”

“It’s not a question of your doing anything, just be aware that as far as the police are concerned, the matter’s not closed.”

It shook me, even though I knew I’d done nothing wrong, that no amount of investigation could show I had. You hear stories of people being railroaded, of innocent men and women sent to the chair. I asked: “What’s he got to be unsatisfied about?”

“Nothing, if you ask me. But he doesn’t like how some of the facts line up. Your husband was a heavy drinker-we got that from all the interviews we did-and he’d been drinking quite a lot that night, yet he was sober enough afterward to manage a drive home of more than forty minutes, in the dead of night, on some fairly twisty roads, without any mishap. Why, then, after you put him out of the house, does he crack up the car just ten minutes from home-presumably no more tired, no more drunk, the road no darker?”

“It was raining by then,” I said. “And we’d been arguing-he might have been distracted.”

“You see, now, that’s exactly what I told him.” Sergeant Young spread his hands. “But-all the same. Church insisted that the car be checked for signs of tampering, he asked the medical examiner who performed the autopsy about any signs of violence to the body that might not have been caused by the accident …”

“And?”

“And nothing. None of these inquiries turned up anything. But he still insists we not close the file.”

“Aren’t you his boss?”

“His partner, Mrs. Medford. It’s not the same thing.”

“So: what does this mean for me?”

“You might have to answer some more questions, at some point. You might be asked to sign paperwork permitting your husband’s body to be exhumed.”

“Exhumed!”

“I’m sorry, Mrs. Medford.” He genuinely seemed to be.

“It’s a horrible thing to suggest,” I told him. “But if it has to be- O.K. I’ve got nothing to hide. He can ask all he wants.” The tremor in my voice gave the lie to the confidence I was trying to portray.

Sergeant Young leaned across the table toward me and dropped his voice. “I wish you could be spared all of this, Mrs. Medford. Really I do. You don’t deserve it after what you’ve been through. Your husband drank, and he ran off the road, and he was alone in the car when he did it. Even if you did have a hand in it somehow-”

“Sergeant Young!”

“-I say even if you did-”

“I didn’t!”

“-but even if you had, I wouldn’t like to see you hounded for it, much less punished.”

“Please don’t say anymore. You make me very uncomfortable.”

“I regret that very much, Mrs. Medford. My intent was the opposite.” His eyes held mine, and I could see kindness in them. Or what I thought was kindness-you can never be certain. “As I say, they don’t teach it at the academy, but you learn it on the job: not every man’s death is a crime.”

I was relieved to see I had other customers to serve now. Making apologies, I headed for a table of three men in business suits, and felt enormous relief when they placed an order for club sandwiches to go with their drinks, since it gave me an excuse to retreat to the kitchen, to call it to Mr. Bergie.

I stayed in the kitchen as long as I could. When I got back to the bar, the sergeant was gone, having left behind just the mint leaves in his glass and a dollar tip.

I come now to Tom Barclay, but before I tell about him, what he did to me and what I did to him, I have to tell about our pants, the hot pants Liz went out and bought, for her and me to put on, without telling Bianca we would, thereby causing a situation. It might sound frivolous, coming on the heels of such serious matters as potentially being accused of murder-but everything else stemmed from it, however trivial it might have seemed at the start.

It was the first week of July, and murderously hot in the Garden, even with air-conditioning. That was unusual in Hyattsville, because Prince George’s County doesn’t have it hot like in Washington, or in Montgomery County in Maryland, alongside Prince George’s but north of it; and vice versa, not such cold weather in winter. But we had it hot this time, and not being used to it, our clientele was feeling it more than some other clientele might. And of course all the girls were feeling it, especially Liz. During a lull one night she said to me: “Joanie, not to get personal, but are you getting damp, like? In a certain intimate place? That we don’t mention in mixed company, but between girls could be called the crotch?”

“Liz, it’s these velveteen trunks-”

“They’re nothing other than murder -”

“And, Liz, the pantyhose make it still worse.”

“Joanie, we’re doing something about it, but don’t ask Bianca’s permission, because she could say no for some reason, and I’m not sure what I’d do about it. I could blow my top, but don’t want to. You know what I mean, Joanie? I like it here.”