Ace Atkins - Devil’s garden

“Isn’t that the point?”

She smiled up at him and pinched his cheek. Hearst felt his face turn red as he looked out onto the empty seats, feeling the jitters of opening night coming into play. Everything was set. All there was to do was sit back and watch the thing play out.

“How ’bout dinner?”

“More champagne?” she asked.

“Always.”

“In p-pajamas?”

“Of course.”

“You screwy boy.”

“SO HE’s A LIAR?” the Old Man asked.

“He’s not so much a liar as he just left some things out,” Sam said.

“With his fat ass on the line, you’d think he could stand to be a little more truthful,” said Phil Haultain.

“He probably left out that the Fishback fella brought the booze to keep him out of trouble,” Sam said.

“What about lying about knowing the girl?” the Old Man asked.

“To keep himself out of trouble,” Sam said.

“He should’ve figured he’d get found out on that one,” the Old Man said. “I wonder who Brady has lined up to tell about Arbuckle’s passion for Miss Rappe.”

“Plenty,” Sam said. “I heard Tom Reagan was down, too.”

“You run into him?”

“No,” Sam said. “But I hear he was talking to the same people.”

“You think they know about Maude Delmont running that con on that fairy actor?”

“I’d bet on it,” Sam said.

Phil Haultain walked to the windows and looked down on Ellis Street. You could hear the sound of the cable cars zipping up and down Powell and the yelps of the little newsboys hawking the afternoon editions. The big lug was wearing his big brown Stetson and a double-breasted suit and nodded while the Old Man and Sam talked, as if making sure they knew he was all right with what they were saying.

“I wouldn’t screw that Delmont broad,” Haultain said. “She’s old as my mother and twice as ugly.”

“You’re a romantic, Phil,” Sam said.

“I likes what I likes.”

“Phil, stick with those two women.”

“I got to know Miss Blake and Miss Prevon on an intimate basis,” Haultain said.

“Where are they?” the Old Man asked.

“Living on the hospitality of Ma Murphy.”

“And who’s Ma Murphy?” the Old Man asked.

“Mother of George Murphy, young assistant district attorney in the employ of Brady,” Haultain said. “She runs a rooming house and they got guards round-the-clock.”

“Sam, go home, see your wife, take a shower, have a hot meal.”

“Will do.”

“And then I want you to shadow Maude Delmont. I want to know what the coppers know. You understand?”

“Yes, sir.”

“There’s something at that party we’ve missed,” the Old Man said.

“That’s why I followed Jack Lawrence,” Sam said. “But the more I know about that party, the less I know.”

“You don’t trust Arbuckle?” the Old Man asked.

“Not as far as I can throw him.”

Sam looked to young Phil Haultain and he smiled back.

“You got this guy running shadows now?” Sam asked.

The Old Man cracked a smile. A rare smile for the Old Man, who didn’t seem to know what a smile was all about.

“Stir the pot,” the Old Man said. “See what floats to the top.”

“Even if we don’t like it?” Sam said.

The Old Man placed his feet on his desk. He lit a cigar. The sounds of people and machines and cable cars came from outside. He smiled but said nothing.

“It’s good to know,” Sam said.

“You bet,” said the Old Man, the cigar a burning orange plug in the side of his mouth. “Even if we want it buried.”

Weeks later, the morning of November 11, Sam awoke to military bands warming up by the Civic Center and City Hall-the first few chords of “How ’Ya Gonna Keep ’Em Down on the Farm?”-and the metallic sounds of the testing of amplified voices from where President Harding would address the crowds later in the day. The apartment windows were open onto Eddy; a soft, cold breeze parted the torn curtains and brought in the early sounds of Armistice Day. But Sam soon closed the windows to shut out the racket and returned to watching his daughter sleep. Her name was Mary Jane, perfect and tiny and pink, with the sad soft eyes of her mother and the long delicate fingers of his mother’s family, the Dashiells.

After the baby had been born, Jose didn’t miss a beat, changing and washing diapers, soothing the late-night cries, and walking that creaking floor with the child just about the time Sam would come in from a shadow job. He’d sit with the child, after a long day on his feet, and rock her, careful not to breathe close, head turned and sometimes holding his breath, at the doctor’s request. Sam made camp on the Murphy bed, an alarm clock and bottle of balsamea kept nearby for company, while Jose and the baby slept in the bedroom.

Sam left the crib and Jose and the bedroom and set a match to the burner on the iron stove, making coffee. He was off today, as was most of San Francisco, but was already showered and dressed, his military papers tucked securely in the vest pocket of his tweeds. The Examiner had run a story the day before about veterans being given food and coal, and even toys for their children, and this was the first day since making his way west that he’d been proud he’d signed up for the goddamn circus. He’d been ignored by pencil pushers, told the sickness he’d caught back in camp wasn’t worth a damn, and was now forbidden by docs to be close to his daughter. He’d be damned if he wouldn’t get every scrap offered by his government.

The coffee boiled and he strained it over a mug. On a hook by the door sat his old Army-issue coat and cap. He heard Jose stir and she came tiptoeing into the room and leaned down to kiss Sam on the cheek.

“You think we’ll have room in the icebox?” Sam asked.

“We’ll make room.”

“The paper said to come to the Civic Center.”

“Do you hear all that?”

“It’s what woke me.”

“You think you’ll see the president?”

“I’ll give him your best.”

“I’d like to get the baby out.”

“It’s shoulder to shoulder,” he said. “Drunks and fat politicians. I won’t take long.”

Sam stood, finished the coffee, and walked with Jose to the door, sliding into his Army coat and cap.

“I don’t think I’ve seen this,” she said.

“From my steamer trunk,” Sam said. “The only thing worth a damn I got from the Army.”

She buttoned him up into his coat and pulled his hat down into his eyes.

“It’s cold.”

“Who turned out the lights?”

Eddy Street was choked that morning with flivvers and cabs and crowded buses in from the county. Men in overalls and women in catalog dresses looked lost on city streets. Newsboys shouted out special editions from every corner and every other old woman wore a paper gold star on her breast. There was a legless man in ribbons and medals propped atop a wooden crate and holding a tin cup. A blind man walked in the opposite direction of Sam, being led by a nurse in white wearing a flowing black cape. Sam turned onto Van Ness, passing over Turk, and was almost over Golden Gate when he saw the thick heads of folks clear and heard a police whistle, an arc forming around the open door to a hotel.

The Mariah was parked out front, doors wide-open and waiting for a gaggle of red-faced cops who emerged from a flophouse, pushing out three men-two in their undershorts and shirts and a third with no shirt but pants and shoes-out into the street. One man was yelling at the cops. Another man’s face was spiderwebbed with blood from his nose. The yelling man got a beefy fist to his stomach and was told to shut the hell up. Sam stood there in his heavy coat, collar popped high and hands deep in his pockets, and watched the cops toss all three men into the back of the paddy wagon.