Evan Connell - Mr. Bridge

For a few nights he resisted the urge to get out of bed and find out if Douglas had done what he was supposed to do, but finally he could resist no longer; he lay awake until he thought Douglas would be asleep, then he got up, put on his slippers and robe, and walked through the house feeling the locks. And there came a night when he discovered an unlocked window in the breakfast room.

After snapping the lock shut and testing it he hurried into Douglas’ room and shook him awake. Attempting to control his anger he said: “I have told you at least one dozen times to make absolutely certain those breakfast room windows were locked. Somebody could get in there. You have not been paying attention. Somebody could have stolen your mother’s silver. How many times am I expected to tell you! I will not stand for this. I have worked many years to provide us with a comfortable home and I am not going to have you throw it away. Do you understand?” Douglas’ eyes were open but his face was asleep; he groaned and rolled over.

Mr. Bridge was too exasperated to go back to bed. He paced through the house examining the doors and windows again. He thought of how often he had told his son to make certain the house was locked. It had been a waste of time. He returned to the bedroom, reached under the mattress, and pulled out the pistol. He had planned to give it to Douglas on his twenty-first birthday, but now he decided not to. He shifted the gun from one hand to the other, weighing it in his palm and fondling the knurled grip and the icy barrel. Twice a year he cleaned and oiled the gun, and occasionally he lifted a corner of the mattress to see if it was where it belonged. There was always a chance Harriet would steal it. He did not like the fact that she knew about the gun. If she did take it and sell it or give it to some Negro in the North End there could be a great deal of trouble. It could very well be used in a holdup. She had been warned never to touch it, and each time he looked he found the gun in the same place; yet he could not forget that when Douglas was a child she had shown it to him.

The clock in the hall struck three times. He was surprised. An hour had passed since he went downstairs. He shoved the gun into the holster and slid it beneath the mattress. He hung his robe in the closet, stepped out of his carpet slippers, and lay down in bed carefully so as not to disturb his wife.

Carolyn was home for the weekend, and a few minutes before the beginning of “The Bell Telephone Hour” while Mr. Bridge was settling himself in his chair beside the radio she asked if he knew any gangsters. No, he replied, he was not on friendly terms with any gangsters; but then he remembered something that had occurred years before and he added that he had once met a man who ought to qualify. Carolyn wanted to know what he was like. There was some purpose to the questioning, but he could not guess what it was. However, there was no apparent reason not to answer, so he told her about the experience. He had gone to North Kansas City to visit a client, and afterward as he was about to return to the office he happened to meet a man he had not seen for a long time. This man had been a detective on the police force but was obliged to retire because of a scandal. They decided to have lunch together at a spaghetti parlor near the bus station, and while they were eating they were joined by a friend of the detective.

At this point in his story Mr. Bridge paused and smiled. “Carolyn, you may not believe me when I tell you what occurred next, but this is the truth: after I had been introduced to the fellow he slipped into the booth with us and slapped me on the knee. He said he had heard my name and — these are his exact words—‘a pal of Morrie is a pal of mine.’ Then he asked — and again I am quoting — if there was anybody I wanted him to ‘take care of.’ That was the expression he used. Was there anybody I wanted him to ‘take care of’? I said there was not, and let it go at that. However, after the fellow got up and left I inquired about him and was informed that this man was a member of a mob. He was a professional murderer who was known to have accounted for at least six people. Now, how do you like that for a gangster story?”

“Introduce me to him.”

Mr. Bridge laughed.

Carolyn said, “I mean it. I want you to introduce me. Daddy, I’ve got to talk to him. I really do.”

“I’m afraid that’s impossible. In the first place, as I’ve already told you, this was some years ago.”

“You could find him. You know you could.”

“If he is still alive, which I doubt.”

“I’ve got to meet him.”

“You might just as well get this idea out of your head, because you are not going to meet him. Assuming I could locate the fellow, I most certainly would never introduce you to him. Now, suppose you tell me just why you have suddenly acquired a taste for gangsters.”

Carolyn explained that her journalism teacher had instructed the class to write a feature article on somebody engaged in an unusual and provocative line of work. She was supposed to interview such a person. “Please,” she begged, “I’ve just got to meet him, Daddy. I really do. Nothing could conceivably happen to me. Besides, Kansas City is so corrupt, and if I could interview this man I could expose this terrible corruption, don’t you see?”

“What I do see is that it could result in more problems than either you or I are prepared to handle. You steer clear of men like that. You stick to your journalism class. Don’t you get any wild ideas about fooling around in the North End.”

“But that’s what journalism is. Can’t you see? No. No, naturally you can’t.”

“I have seen enough, believe you me! Those Italians and Jews on the north side of Kansas City are dangerous, and don’t you ever forget it.”

“Italians and Jews, you say?” She reached for a cigarette. “Why ‘Italians and Jews’?”

“Because that is what most of those hoodlums happen to be. I am not expressing prejudice. I am reporting a fact.”

“A fact, you say? Would you define ‘fact’?”

“We won’t go into that,” he said. She was behaving foolishly. She had picked up this absurd manner from somebody at the university.

“If that’s how you feel, I can but acquiesce,” she shrugged, and puffed on her cigarette with a look of superior understanding.

“You stick to the things you know about. Find somebody else for your journalism assignment. If you are looking for somebody in an unusual line of work I can introduce you to a bail bondsman. How would that be? I know a man with an office not far from City Hall. I expect he would be willing to discuss his business with you. That should be unusual.”

“Oh, God,” she murmured, and she sounded like Ruth.

“I am not forcing this on you. I am trying to be helpful.”

“It’s sweet of you. It really is. But I mean, honestly, you don’t begin to have the faintest conception of what journalism is all about. Not really.”

“So be it,” he replied. “But let me warn you. You are not to go poking your nose into affairs that do not concern you, and what goes on in the north end of Kansas City has nothing to do with you.”

He turned to the radio. He adjusted the volume and the tuning to his satisfaction. The Telephone Hour was beginning. He leaned back in the chair and crossed his legs.

“Now,” he said, “suppose we enjoy the music.”

Not long after this the body of a young girl was discovered beneath a clump of bushes on the mud flats bordering the river. The coroner’s report stated that she had been criminally assaulted and murdered. Mr. Bridge, reading the account of this in the Star, decided to save the paper and show it to Carolyn the next time she came home. And because his wife had not yet seen the paper he read the story aloud. Then he commented: “When they find this fellow — if they ever do — I can bet you my bottom dollar he will have a record. They pick some fellow up for perversion of one sort or another, and after a while these psychologists and social workers insist he’s all right, so the parole board turns him loose and he goes right on doing it and eventually kills somebody. It happens time and time again. I’m sick of it! I’m sick and tired of it, I tell you!”