Росс Томас - The Fools in Town Are on Our Side

“He didn’t miss much,” I said. “The drunks and the addicts will spill anything for a bottle or a fix and the old folks will reminisce and ramble as long as somebody’ll listen. God knows what the psychotics would babble. No doubt Dr. Colfax has access to all records.”

“No doubt,” Orcutt said. “The newspaperman deserves a more fitting appellation, however He’s actually the editor and publisher of The Swankerton Advocate and its evening sister, The Swankerton News-Calliope. Odd name for a paper, don’t you think?”

“Very,” I said. “What’s his name?”

“Channing d’Arcy Phetwick, the third. Phetwick is spelled with a p-h, not an f. There’s a Channing d’Arcy Phetwick the fourth around, too, but he’s turned out to be something of a wastrel. The senior Phetwick also owns a television station which is the local NBC affiliate; a fifty-thousand-watt radio station, also NBC affiliated; a tremendous amount of timberland on the Coosa River in Alabama (pulp for newsprint, of course), a statewide trucking service in which he ships his papers, thus boosting his circulation considerably; numerous valuable downtown and suburban real-estate properties, plus a couple of profitable plantations, I suppose one should call them.”

“I assume that Phetwick and Colfax are paying your fee?” I said.

“You assume correctly.”

“That list of thumbnail biographies is divided into two parts, the advocates and the adversaries.”

“Isn’t that precious?” Carol Thackerty said.

“Merely convenient, Carol,” Orcutt said.

“Maybe you’d better tell me some more about the town,” I said.

“Swankerton has changed tremendously in the past ten years,” Orcutt said. “A number of manufacturing concerns, formerly located in the North, have moved here for the usual reasons — tax concessions, cheap, unorganized labor, adequate housing, what have you. About six years ago the Defense Department built an Air Force supply depot there which is, I think, the second or third largest in the country and employs about fifteen thousand persons. Swankerton was formerly a nice quiet town of around one hundred thousand. There was an established order, and one would be hard put to cite the sociological difference between the Swankerton of 1915 and the Swankerton of 1960. It grew a little, of course, during those forty-five years, but there was that established order. Certain people ran certain things. This one had the gambling and that one had the Chamber of Commerce. Another one had the prostitution franchise, if you will, and yet another one might have the city council in his hip pocket. It was really quite cozy. Homer has made a thorough study of it and I think we may consider him to be our authority.”

Orcutt nodded at Necessary benignly, like a piano teacher encouraging a good but bashful pupil at the annual parents’ day recital.

“Like Victor says,” Necessary said, “it was all very, very sweet. Everybody had everything staked out — from Coca-Cola to moonshine. One guy had the ABC — you know, the bar and liquor licensing office. It cost you anywhere from two to five thousand to get a bar license. Liquor stores came cheaper — about fifteen hundred. The gambling was mostly wide-open blackjack and the county sheriff and the Swankerton police chief split that. They got a ten percent rakeoff and they had guys spotted around who could tell what the nightly take was down to the last nickel. They had a sweet little burglary ring going with the buttons working the lookout for the thieves. That was a sixty-forty split. The cops got the sixty naturally. The whores were all local talent, mostly broads from the sticks. Nothing fancy.”

He paused and looked at Orcutt. “If you want me to tell him the rest, I need something to gargle with.”

Orcutt looked at Carol Thackerty. “There’s a rather good bottle of Scotch in my bedroom, Carol — would you mind?”

She rose, got halfway across the room, and then turned to me. “You, too?” she said.

“No, thanks,” I said.

“Do go on, Homer,” Orcutt said.

“Well, these new plants and factories start moving in about 1964 and 1965 and they bring a hell of a lot of their top-and-middle-echelon people with them. They all had families and they were used to the kind of schools and stuff that they’d had in Jersey and Connecticut and New York and Pennsylvania. A lot of them were real bright kikes, if you know what I mean.”

“Could you possibly avoid the anti-Semitic slurs, Homer?” Orcutt said it as if he didn’t really think there was much hope.

“I haven’t got anything against Jews,” Necessary said. “I just call them kikes. I always have and I probably always will.”

“Go on,” Orcutt said and sighed.

“Well, they start agitating and about that time the niggers start getting riled up and they start agitating. You know, all that desegregation stuff. There’s a reform movement and about 1965 the reformers put up a slate. Well, hell, they win a few offices — they get the school board for instance. Maybe the county coroner, but not much else. But it scares the shit out of the old guard.

“In the meantime, some of the boys over in New Orleans hear about the action in Swankerton, so they start scouting around. And when the government announced that they’re going to build an air depot in Swankerton, the New Orleans bunch moves in fast.”

“How?” I said.

“Look at it this way,” Necessary said. “The town’s going to have a floating population for a while — about five thousand skilled construction workers, all spenders. After that there’ll be the soldier boys plus the civilian employees. That creates a market — a demand. The New Orleans outfit decides to be the sole supplier.”

Carol Thackerty came back in the room with a glass of Scotch and water and handed it to Necessary. “There’s no ice,” she said.

“That’s okay,” Necessary said and took a gulp of the drink, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.

“Do continue, Homer,” Orcutt said, “and try to be as concise as possible.”

“What the hell you think I been doing?” Necessary said. “You told me to tell him so I’m telling him and if you think I’m too long-winded, then tell him yourself.”

“You’re doing fine,” I said.

“Okay,” he said. “Okay. I’ll just tell it the way it happened. Well, the New Orleans crowd comes in and they land hard. First, they move in on the numbers in Niggertown and take that over. Then they run all the white whores out of town and bring in their own and jack up the prices from fifteen and twenty bucks a lay to thirty-five and forty. They don’t bother the nigger whores any. Then they knock over a few blackjack games and the next day drop around selling protection. They spread a lot of juice around — the city council, the mayor, the chief of police, and a few of his buddies all get well, if you know what I mean.”

I said that I did and went on listening to Homer Necessary’s tale, which for him would now and forever remain in the present tense.

“Finally, they move in on the nightclubs and bars. They bust up a few and then work the protection slam. If the guy hasn’t got enough money, they loan it to him at twenty percent a week — or ten percent, if they like him real well. If he can’t pay, they buy him out for maybe forty cents on the dollar. I mean they really make it legal and everything. Next they get the city council to pass a new ordinance allowing the bars to stay open twenty-four hours a day. They do this because they got three shifts working to build that new air depot and when it’s finished the civilians are going to be working three shifts, too.”