Peter Rabe - Murder Me for Nickels

I heard you the first time, Folsom, and if you’re following orders, boy, then boss Lippit is more than clean out of his head. He is clean out of every thing, including the more powerful instincts, such as the one about making money.

“Where? When?”

Ask again, Folsom. I didn’t get it either.

“Franklin,” he yelled, and Franklin said, “Yeah.”

“We gonna be done here before maybe an hour?”

“Yeah.”

A very intelligent beast, this Franklin. A four letter word, twice repeated, and making it sound the same way each time.

I could hear Folsom hang up and then I saw him come back.

“He hasn’t got any schedule,” Folsom told Franklin. “He’s just drifting around, here and there, like he does. Except for his two o’clock swim at that club.”

“That’ll be fine,” said Franklin. “Fine.”

“We gonna be done?”

“Why not be done? He’s yours, anyway.”

A lot of “he’s” in that conversation, except with the last “he” they were looking at me.

The other “he” was Lippit.

It closed out the inventory. Item: Break up my pressing plant, though that was nothing personal. Because, Item: Ruin the masters so that Lippit’s disc supply would again be cut off. Item: Get Lippit himself. That was business, and personal, because Franklin would be doing that job. Item: Very personal. Folsom to be done with me within the hour.

Now Folsom had me and then he would get Lippit. But first, me. He came at me, hoping I could take it for an hour.

I whipped the bottle at him so he stunk from liquor. I kicked out my foot and missed. I swung out with the glass club and missed. I stepped out of the way and missed.

When you’re drunk everything is sure and nothing works. Then I felt sober but still nothing would work and the main thing was still sure. It was their turn.

And there was no point in talking because everyone knew what would happen next.

Franklin held my arms from behind and breathed quietly into my ear. Folsom stood in front, also quiet, because he was feeling around in his pockets. The leather jacket had six outside pockets and he went through all of them. It made a slippery sound every time he put his hands in and out. He found his gloves. He put them on and smiled at his hands while he did this.

I felt I was the noisiest one, breathing. My breath rustled in and out, in and out, and I could do nothing about it. It went all by itself, the way everything else did. For a moment it seemed as if I might decide whether to be drunk or sober, but that wasn’t up to me, either. Everything felt swimmy one moment and very clear the next. I would see the ceiling and then I wouldn’t. I could see the lake, and then not. Only the light stayed the same, bright and painful, outside the window, on the rug, on the wall. Some of it shimmered around on the ceiling.

Folsom looked black in the light, like a very big menace. He had his gloves on and stepped closer, and there was nothing for me to do. When it seemed to Franklin as if I meant to move, my arms hurt. I meant to do nothing. I wished I were more drunk.

Folsom stroked the gloves down his fingers and looked at my face.

“I hear Benotti did that,” he said, and he touched the patch.

“Trouble with Benotti,” he kept talking, “he’s always too sure.”

He stroked the gloves and then, with one finger, he stroked the patch. It itched.

“Can’t be just luck, you getting him twice. Don’t you think so, St. Louis?”

I had a horrible feeling inside, as if everything was melting together.

“Of course, the third time, when he’s out of the hospital, that will be different.”

“Listen,” said Franklin. “I can’t hold him like this so easy very long. He’s taller than me.”

“What’s the matter, he’s too strong for you?”

“He ain’t too strong for me. He ain’t doing nothing. It’s the angle.”

“Try and hold out a little longer, huh, Franklin?”

Franklin said, “Go to hell,” into my ear, but I think he meant it for Folsom.

“Let’s see how that cut is healing, huh? Before we change all that again.” And he ripped off the patch.

I don’t know what he saw. I could only see his face. Close and pale, with hard lines.

The lines seemed to get soggy and his skin changed a queer yellow, and liquor had never affected me like this. But it wasn’t the liquor.

“Whassamatter?” said Franklin.

“Shut up-”

“You gonna be sick or something, Folsom?”

“Just shut up-”

He stepped away and looked somewhere else. He was breathing deeply to get himself back in hand.

“I mean, you don’t look right,” said Franklin.

“Goddammit, you never heard of nobody can’t stand the sight of blood? Some people just can’t stand the sight of blood and it’s got nothing to do with anything!” His voice wasn’t strong, but high and insistent. “Some’s born that way and it don’t mean nothing at all! You understand that, Franklin?”

“No.”

“Whadda ya mean, no!”

Franklin bent around to look at the side of my face and then he straightened up again.

“I don’t see no blood. Mostly healed there, anyways.”

“But it’s gonna bust open!”

This was almost a scream, as if about some great injustice. And then he screamed more, loud and obscene, and he started hitting my middle.

Wild, though. It must have been wild because he let it go almost anywhere. Cursing and screaming all the time, at the big man, too.

“Hold him, damn you, hold him! You made me hurt my wrist!”

“To hell with-” or something like that from Franklin, and I felt him let go of me.

For the rest of it, I seemed to fly all over the room. Drunks land easily. I wasn’t that drunk, but I played it up. It helped with his wild swings, with the sound when I hit the wall, with the business of spending his rage.

How it really happened, I don’t know.

There was much less light in the room, but more heat. The sun was lower. I couldn’t see if the patterns were still on the ceiling because I was lying down on the rug. There was chintz next to my face, from an easy chair, and I didn’t move my head because it felt fairly comfortable. I could see less that way, but he couldn’t see me too well from that angle, either.

The sky was reddish outside, over the lake, and Folsom, in a chair by the window, looked hunched and dark.

I lay still because it felt pretty good that way. It felt like after a sleep, nothing worse, and if I had fainted before it had not been for very long. I had come out of the faint and then had gone back to sleep. This hurt and that hurt, but the rest wasn’t bad.

And Folsom was so sure, he sat reading at the other side of the room. Or maybe I was too sure about being all in one piece.

When I moved I found out about our arrangement. For lack of a weightier word, it was ridiculous.

When I moved, my leg went just so far and then jerked. And Folsom jerked because his chair jerked. Which was because of this line. He had it tied to my ankle and to the leg of his chair.

“If you got any funny ideas because Frank isn’t here, then I’ll…” And blah, blah, blah, more of the same.

He gave an experimental yank to the line, he held on to his chair, he straightened up to get the gloves off the window sill.

I went gaw, or gawk, or something stagey like that, and it meant that I had passed out again. He thought that was best and believed it. He sat down again, and I was glad for the time. I had no idea when the big guy would come back, but before then I wanted to think this through in peace. Think, while the big one was down at the club. Beating Lippit? Killing him?

I hadn’t thought about Lippit at all. I had thought about getting drunk, passing out, rolling away from the punches, all that. Busy with details. No time for any grand concept of Lippit. About how much of a bastard he was, or a fool. Was this thing his idea, was it Folsom’s-