Росс Томас - The Fools in Town Are on Our Side

“You’re good,” I said to Necessary, rising.

“Uh-huh,” he said. “I know.” Then he turned to the young man in the chair. “You got a name?”

“Frank. Frank Smith. That’s the God’s truth. It’s Smith.”

Necessary returned the blackjack to his hip pocket and slapped Frank Smith across the face. It was a hard, brisk slap. “That’s what you get for telling the truth, Frank. You can just let your imagination work on what you’re going to get when you start lying.”

Not if, I noticed, but when. I lit a cigarette and watched the exchief of police operate. I decided that he must have enjoyed his former line of work.

“How much?” Necessary said.

“For what?”

Necessary slapped him again. “Fifty bucks. Each.”

“Who? I mean who paid you?”

“I don’t know. Just a guy.”

That earned him another slap.

Frank Smith’s face was red now from both rage and the slaps. “He was just a guy, I tell you. We meet him in Emmett’s—”

“What’s Emmett’s?” Necessary said.

“We shoot pool there, hang around, you know.”

Necessary shook his head. “It always starts in a poolhall,” he said. “It always starts there with just a guy. What did just a guy look like, Frank?”

Frank Smith moved his shoulders up and down a little. “I don’t know. Christ, he was about average.”

Necessary reached into his hip pocket and took out the blackjack. He did it casually, as if fishing out a pack of cigarettes. Frank Smith tried to ignore it, but failed. It fascinated him.

“I don’t want to use this on your arm, Frank,” Necessary said. “Right below your shoulder. It’ll make it sore. Maybe for weeks. I don’t want you to have a sore arm. I don’t think you do either, do you?”

“No.” It was barely a whisper.

Necessary slapped the blackjack into his left palm again. He had a certain way of doing it so that it made a crackling sound as if he were breaking all the bones in his hand. I wondered what old-time cop he had learned that from.

“He was medium heighth—” Frank Smith pronounced height with a “th” at the end and I couldn’t see how he would profit from it if I were to correct him. “Around five foot nine or ten. Weighed maybe hundred and fifty, hundred and sixty. Black hair. He had on a suit, I remember. A tan suit.”

“What color were his eyes?”

“I don’t know,” Frank Smith said. “Shit, I don’t remember the color of his eyes.”

“You’d be in trouble if you did,” Necessary said. “What’d he call himself?”

“He didn’t.”

“No name at all?”

Frank Smith shook his head.

“You ever see him before?”

“No.”

“Okay. What’d he say? Everything you can remember.”

“Well, he says there’s this guy over in eight-nineteen in the Sycamore and this guy owed him some gambling money and won’t pay. So he says he’ll give us fifty apiece to mess the guy up a little. Then he gives us the key to the room and an envelope to leave with the guy when we get done.”

“What else, Frank?”

“Well, he says the guy’s out of the hotel right now and we can wait for him in his room. Then he gives us the fifty each and we come on over and start waiting.”

“Why you?”

“Huh?”

The “huh” won him another slap. “Why’d he pick you two, Frank?” Necessary said, and his voice was curiously gentle.

Frank Smith didn’t seem to find much comfort in the tone. “I don’t know — and don’t hit me! He seemed to know us. He walked right up to us and called us by name.”

“How many times’ve you been booked, Frank?”

“Three. Maybe four.”

“Car theft?”

“Once.”

“Assault?”

“Maybe twice.”

“D and D?”

“Once.”

“What else?”

“Nothing.”

“What else, Frank?”

“Nothing. I swear.”

“How much time in the joint?”

“Six months.” Frank Smith muttered it.

“Car theft?”

“Yeah.”

“State?”

“At Mandersfield.”

“How old are you?”

“Twenty-one.”

“What’s your buddy’s name?”

“Joe Carson.”

“Where’d you meet him, at Mandersfield?”

“Uh-huh.”

“What was he in for?”

“Breaking and entry. He done a year.”

“How long’ve you been out?”

“Couple of months.”

Joe Carson groaned and I turned around. Necessary didn’t bother. Carson moved a little, but it was really only a twitch.

“Either of you on parole?” Necessary said.

“No. We done it all.”

“You’re lucky.”

Joe Carson groaned again and this time Necessary turned to look at him. Then he looked at his watch and nodded in a satisfied way. “Just about right,” he said, more to himself than to anyone else. He turned back to Frank Smith. “You got the envelope?”

“Joe’s got it,” Frank Smith said.

“Well, then, I want you to go over to Joe and get the envelope and hand it to Mr. Dye who you were supposed to give it to in the first place. I also want you to give me the fifty bucks that ‘just a guy’ gave you and I also want the fifty he gave Joe over there. You got that?”

Frank Smith nodded and moved over to Carson. He took an envelope from Carson’s hip pocket, found the fifty dollars, and returned to where Necessary stood. “You want the money?” he said to Necessary.

“That’s right.”

“Here’s Joe’s fifty.” He handed it over. Then he dug into his own pocket and came up with another wad of bills. “Here’s mine.” Necessary stuffed them into his own pocket.

“He gets the envelope?” Frank Smith said. He seemed determined to do everything correctly.

“That’s right,” Necessary said.

“Here,” Frank Smith said and handed me the envelope.

“Now drag him out of here before he wakes up and vomits all over the place,” Necessary said.

“That’s all?”

“That’s all, Frank.”

“Yessir.”

Frank Smith bent over Carson, grasped him under the armpits, and started dragging him toward the door. Carson groaned again. “Can you get the door, mister?” Frank Smith said to me, I held it open while he dragged Carson into the corridor. “What do I do with him now?” he said.

“That’s your problem,” I said and closed the door.

“How was your meeting?” Necessary said.

I nodded my head as I opened the envelope. “They propositioned me.”

“What’s it say?”

I handed the single sheet to him. It was printed in penciled block letters. Necessary read it aloud, giving each word the same emphasis as those who aren’t accustomed to reading aloud usually do. “Just a sample,” he read. “Next time is for keeps.” He shook his head. “Amateurs,” he said.

“Maybe.”

“Pros don’t give away second chances.”

“I know.”

“They may try again and then it won’t be a couple of punks.”

“Probably not.”

“It bother you?”

“Sure it bothers me,” I said.

“That’s good. I’d be a little worried if it didn’t.” He sighed deeply. “I guess I’d better stick a little closer.”

“You did fine a while ago. Thanks.”

“Orcutt sent me down.”

“He want something?”

Necessary shook his head. “He just got a hunch. He gets them sometimes. So he got a hunch that I should come down to your room. He was right.” He paused a moment. “As usual.”

“I’ll thank him too.”

“We’d better go see him.”

“Has he got a drink up there?”

“Sure.”

“All right. Let’s go.”

Necessary started toward the door but paused. “You want I should split the hundred with you?”