Fredrick Brown - Night of the Jabberwock

"And the smoke alone is worth a thousand pounds a puff."

"And that's the answer, Doc," he said, quietly.

I stared at him. A prickle went down my back.

Outside, in the night, a clock struck four times.

"What do you mean, Smitty?" I asked him, slowly.

The little man who wasn't there poured more whisky from an imaginary bottle into his imaginary glass. He said, "Doc, you've been letting the glass-topped table and the bottle and the key fool you. They're from Alice in Wonderland. Originally, of course, called Alice's Adventures Underground. Wonderful book. But you're in the second."

"The second square? You just said that."

"The second book. Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There. And, Doc, you know as well as I what Alice found there."

I poured myself another drink, a short one this time, to match his. I didn't bother with ice or seltzer.

He raised his glass. "You've got it now, Doc," he said. "Not all of it, but enough to start on. You might still see the dawn come up."

"Don't be so God damn dramatic," I said; "certainly I'm going to see the dawn come up."

"Even if Kates comes here again looking for you? Don't forget when he misses that rusty gun in your pocket, he'll know you were at the courthouse when he was looking for you here. He might recheck all his previous stops. And you're awfully damned careless in filling the place with cigar smoke, you know."

"You mean it's worth a thousand pounds a puff?"

He put back his head and laughed and then he quit laughing and he wasn't there any more, even in my imagination, because a sudden slight sound made me look toward the door that led upstairs, to Smiley's rooms. The door opened and Smiley was standing there.

In a nightshirt. I hadn't known anybody wore nightshirts any more, but Smiley wore one. His eyes looked sleepy and his hair — what was left of it — was tousled and he was barefoot. He had a gun in his hand, the little short-barreled thirty-eight Banker's Special I'd given him some hours ago. In his huge hand it looked tiny, a toy. It didn't look like something that had knocked a Buick off the road, killing one man and badly injuring another, that very evening.

There wasn't any expression on his face, none at all.

I wonder what mine looked like. But through a looking- glass or not, I didn't have one to look into.

Had I been talking to myself aloud? Or had my conversation with Yehudi Smith been imaginary, within my own mind? I honestly didn't know.

If I'd really been talking to myself, it was going to be a hell of a thing to have to explain. Especially if Kates had, on his stop here, awakened Smiley and told him that I was crazy.

In any case, what the hell could I possibly say right now but "Hello, Smiley?"

I opened my mouth to say "Hello, Smiley," but I didn't.

Someone was pounding on the glass of the front door. Someone who yelled, "Hey, open up here!" in the voice of Sheriff Rance Kates.

I did the only reasonable thing to do. I poured myself another drink.

Kates hammered again and tried the knob.

Smiley stared at me and I stared back at him. I couldn't say anything — even if I could have thought of anything to say — to him at that distance without the probability of Kates hearing my voice.

Kates hammered again. I heard him say something to Hank about breaking in the glass. Smiley bent down and placed the gun on the step behind him and then came out of the door into the tavern. Without looking at me he walked toward the front door and, at sight of him, Kates stopped the racket there.

Smiley didn't walk quite straight toward the door; he made a slight curve that took him past my table. As he passed, he reached out and jerked the cigar out of my hand. He stuck it in his mouth and then went to the door and opened it.

I couldn't see in that direction, of course, and I didn't stick my head around the corner of the el. I sat there and sweated.

"What you want? Why such a hell of a racket?" I heard Smiley demand.

Kates' voice: "Thought Stoeger was here. That smoke—"

"Left my cigar down here," Smiley said. "Remembered it when I got back up and came down to get it. Why all the racket?"

"It was damn near half an hour ago when I was here," Kates said belligerently. "Cigar doesn't burn that long."

Smiley said patiently, "I couldn't sleep after you were here. I came down and got myself a drink five minutes ago. I left my cigar down here." His voice got soft, very soft. "Now get the hell out of here. You've spoiled my night already. Didn't get to sleep till two and you wake me at half past three and come around again at four. What's the big idea, Kates?"

"You're sure Stoeger isn't—"

"I told you I'd call you if I saw him. Now, you bastard, get out of here."

I could imagine Kates turning purple. I could imagine him looking at Smiley and realizing that Smiley was half again as strong as he was.

The door slammed so hard it must have come very near to breaking the glass.

Smiley came back. Without looking back at me he said quietly, "Don't move, Doc. He might look back in a minute or two." He went on around behind the bar, got himself a glass and poured a drink. He sat down on the stool he keeps for himself back there, facing slightly to the back so his lip movement wouldn't show to anyone looking in the front window. He took a sip of the drink and a puff of my cigar.

I kept my voice as low as he'd kept his. I said, "Smiley, you ought to have your mouth washed out with soap. You told a lie."

He grinned. "Not that I know of, Doc. I told him I'd call him if I saw you. I did call him. Didn't you hear what I called him?"

"Smiley," I said, "this is the screwiest night I've ever been through but the screwiest thing about it is that you're developing a sense of humor. I didn't think you had it in you."

"How bad trouble are you in, Doc? What can I do?"

I said, "Nothing. Except what you just did do, and thanks to hell and back for that. It's something I've got to think out; and work out for myself, Smiley. Nobody can help me."

"Kates said, when he was here the first time, you were a ho — homi — what the hell was it?"

"Homicidal maniac," I said. "He thinks I killed two men tonight. Miles Harrison and Ralph Bonney."

"Yeah. Don't bother telling me you didn't."

I said, "Thanks, Smiley." And then it occurred to me that "Don't bother telling me you didn't" could be taken either one of two ways. And I wondered again if I had been talking to myself aloud or only in my imagination while Smiley had been walking down those stairs and opening the door. I asked him, "Smiley, do you think I'm crazy?"

"I've always thought you were crazy, Doc. But crazy in a nice way."

I thought how wonderful it is to have friends. Even if I was crazy, there were two people in Carmel City that I could count on to go to bat for, me. There was Smiley and there was Carl.

But, damn it, friendship should work both ways. This was my danger and my problem and I had no business dragging Smiley into it any farther than he'd already stuck his neck. If I told Smiley that Kates had tried to kill me and still intended to, then Smiley — who hates Kates' guts already — would go out looking for Kates and like as not kill him with his bare hands, or get shot trying it. I couldn't do that to Smiley.

I said, "Smiley, finish your drink and go up to bed again. I've got to think."

"Sure there's no way I can help you, Doc?"

"Positive."

He tossed off the rest of his drink and tamped out the cigar in an ash tray. He said, "Okay, Doc, I know you're smarter than I am, and if it's brains you need for help, I'm just in the way. Good luck to you."