Корнелл Вулрич - A Treasury of Stories (Collection of novelettes and short stories)

He was well-dressed, Skip was; maybe that had something to do with it. The taxi-driver had already had his eye on him from as far away as the corner. He had noted him as a possibility. A man as well-dressed as that wouldn’t be very likely to walk when he wanted to go some place — and this man seemed to want to go some place, to want to go some place badly, without knowing just where. Which was just the way the driver liked them to be. In Skip’s case it was more than a mere matter of clothes. He had an air about him; he knew how to carry them. On someone else the dark blue chesterfield, the white piqué scarf, the slanted derby would have been just so many articles of wearing apparel; on him they were badges of distinction, insignia of swank. That clothes make the man has been said often enough, but that the man sometimes makes his clothes seem what they are is equally true. It was in Skip’s case. The driver considered himself a good judge of character. Here was someone for whom the best was none too good; here was someone who wanted a party, money no object, but didn’t quite know how to connect with one. In other words, here was someone who was just what the driver was looking for, made to order.

The taxi-driver turned around in his seat, willingness to oblige written all over his weasel-like face, and said: “Yessir, boss! Where to?” Skip hadn’t given him any address yet. If he had, of course, it would have been a different story.

Skip wrinkled his brow in perplexity.

“Suppose you help me out?” he said. “I used to know someone who lived in that house you saw me standing in front of, but — no soap. Guess Annie doesn’t live there any more. Now I’m all dressed up and no place to go. Eleven o’clock’s too early to go home. Maybe you know of some place where I can get a drink — in the right company?” Then he added quickly: “Now don’t get me wrong. I don’t mean what you think. I mean just what I say: a couple of drinks, a lot of laughs, and somebody not too hard on the eyes sitting across the table from me. Oh, I know there’s plenty of places like that in town, but just when you want to remember the addresses, you can’t.”

The driver had a hard time keeping a straight face. Was this a pushover? Asking for it, mind you! Coming right out and asking for it! Didn’t even have to waste time building it up to him. Who said there wasn’t a Santa Claus? However, he decided it wouldn’t pay to seem too eager, liable to frighten a good thing off that way and spoil everything. He would go about this carefully.

For a minute he pretended to be at a loss himself. He scratched the back of his head in cleverly simulated cogitation as if he were racking his brains. Then finally he drawled, as his machine moved slowly along and his meter moved quickly upwards, “Let’s see, I ought to know of a place like that—” He was, he told himself meanwhile, getting real good at this sort of thing; maybe he should have been an actor. Still, he didn’t want to overdo it; keep the guy waiting too long, the sucker might cool off, change his mind. So he took one hand from the wheel and snapped his fingers triumphantly as if it had just then occurred to him. “I got it now!” he said. “I know a real nice place up on Seventy-second. Come to think of it, I took a fellow there only last night.”

“What’s it like?” the man in back of him wanted to know.

“It’s sort of private, know what I mean? But that’s all right; I can take you up and introduce you. It’s not a loose joint or anything like that — it’s just a sort of little club. They don’t like too many people to go there at one time because there ain’t room enough for them, but outside of that everything’s on the up and up. If you don’t like to sit by yourself, why they’ll introduce you to one of their little hostesses — everything perfectly proper and the way it should be.” He paused. Then, just to show how immaterial the whole thing was to him one way or the other, he added: “At least so they tell me. I’m a working man myself, don’t get much time to relax.” With a superb negligence he questioned: “What d’ye say? Want to go up there?”

“Sure, why not?” his passenger acquiesced. But there was a happy ring to his voice that showed how eager he had become to visit this paradise the driver had described to him.

“I’ve sold him,” thought the man at the wheel. “Sold him out!”

When they had arrived, by means of a roundabout route that gave the meter a thorough work-out, the driver hopped out and held the door open just as if he were a private chauffeur.

“Sorry I took you out of your way like that,” he apologized insincerely, “but I wasn’t sure of the number myself until we got here just now.” Skip however paid him without demur and even threw in a tip for good measure. He was, the driver told himself, getting to be a good picker, a very good picker. “It’s on the second floor,” he said. “I’ll go up with you. I’ll tell ’em you’re a friend of mine.”

It was a rather run-down looking apartment house they had stopped in front of, of pre-war vintage. It boasted an elevator, however, and orange electric lights in the lobby. It had undoubtedly seen better days. The driver ushered Skip in, and the latter missed seeing the knowing look that was exchanged between his guide and the sleepy colored youth who ran the elevator. It was a look that plainly said, “You know and I know but he doesn’t know.”

They got off at the second floor and went toward the back along a cheap musty corridor paved with white mosaics, most of which had become loosened and rattled as one stepped on them. The taxi-driver stopped in front of a door numbered 2– and rang the bell. He gave two short rings and one long one, then whistled a little.

A chain rattled on the other side of the door, a bolt was thrown back, and the door was opened just an inch, no more. “It’s Marty,” said the taxi-driver in a low voice, whereupon the door opened the rest of the way and revealed a pasty-faced individual in what is known to hoi polloi as a tuxedo. He had a look that would have turned milk sour, but the minute he saw that Marty was not alone, he put on a great show of cordiality and good- fellowship and aplomb.

“Hello, Marty, old boy,” he said, “glad to see you! Where y’been keeping yourself? Come on in and have a drink!” But his eyes were on Skip Rogers the whole time he spoke.

“No thanks,” said Marty. “I gotta get back to my cab and earn an honest living. But this is a friend of mine, I want you to treat him right. See that he has a good time.”

The orang-outang in the dinner jacket beamed. “Any friend of Marty’s is a friend of mine,” he proclaimed. “Step right in,” and motioned Skip in with a sweep of his arm. Then he attempted to close the door after him, but the taxi-driver’s foot had somehow become wedged in front of it and held it open.

“Not so fast,” the latter snarled under his breath. “How about my commission? What do you think I’m doing this for — my health?” And he held out his paw palm upward. A five-dollar bill came out of the trouser pocket of the tuxedo and found its way to the outstretched hand. The foot, however, stayed where it was. “What’re y’trying to do, hold out on me?” Marty wanted to know. “This is a real live one I brought you this time.” A murderous look passed between them, but two single dollars joined the five. After which Marty removed his foot, the door closed, and the chain and bolt went back in place with a venomous clash.

He stood still for a moment, folding and refolding his ill-gotten gains until the seven dollars had become a wedge not much bigger than a postage-stamp. He then held it to his lips for a second in what looked suspiciously like a kiss and carefully tucked it away in his clothing. “And now back to the warpath!” he grinned cheerfully, and turned away from the ominous-looking door.