Джеймс Кейн - The Moth

“Just waiting, sir.”

“Where?”

“Up the street, generally.”

“Not looking?”

“Of course I could see what was going on. But I never helped on no jobs, no, sir. I was up the street.”

“Anybody bother them?”

“I don’t just recollect. Some time, maybe.”

“And what did you do, then?”

“Well, sir, what could I do?”

“You could holler, couldn’t you?”

“Well, I guess I could, yes, I could holler.”

“Did you?”

“... I don’t just recollect.”

“Then you were lookout man?”

“No, sir, not me.”

“And where was it you pulled these jobs?”

“He pulled them. Him and Buck.”

“Where was this?”

“That was Phoenix, Yuma, Indio, Banning, I don’t know where-all. The last place, where Buck got killed, was Las Vegas.”

“You see that?”

“I was up the street waiting.”

“And hollering?”

“I tell you I never done nothing.”

“What happened on this hold-up?”

“Well, I was up the street, waiting, and Buck and Jack, they were to steal a car, first. Then here they come, in a little green coupe, and blowed the horn at me, and turned around and went up the street near this here filling station where they hoped to get the money. Then here they come back to the filling station in the car and went in to get gas. Then Buck and Jack got out and went in the men’s room. Then they come out. Then Jack got in. Then Buck reached for the gun. Then a fellow stepped out from behind a car that was parked on the other side of the grease jack, leveled a gun, and then there was a shot. And Buck dropped. And then Jack come by in the car hell to split. I run out and yelled at him, but he drove off.”

“That car — was it a Chevvie, 1933 coupe?”

“I don’t know. It was green.”

“You didn’t see it later?”

“Not after that.”

“You’re sure you’re not the one that ripped the seat cushions where it was abandoned out there by the grade crossing?”

“Not me, no, sir.”

“When was all this?”

“Couple of years ago.”

“Two years ago, in Las Vegas?”

“Could a been two, three years ago.”

“Well listen, make up your mind.”

“Maybe four year.”

“Which is it?”

“Two, three, four year.”

The Chief thought while the clerk wound up some notes on what was said, then motioned to the turnkey, who went out. Two or three guys came in that were cops, by their brick color, but they were in plain clothes. They sat down near me. The turnkey came back with two or three guys that, by their looks, were from the cells, then went out again. One had no coat on, the others had shabby clothes, and none had a shave. And then it came to me what this was: It was an identification. Through that door in a minute somebody would come to pick me out of the line. I don’t know if ever in my life my head worked faster than it did then. I went over it in a flash, what I had looked like in Las Vegas four years ago, when I was hard, weatherbeaten, and thin, and what I looked like now, with soft, hundred-fifty-dollar tweeds on, a dark coat of tan, thirty pounds more weight, and a little Hollywood mustache I had sprouted. And I caught it with my eye, what a bum looked like, from the set of these faces the turnkey had brought in, that hadn’t smiled in a month of Sundays, that had a dull heavy film on their eyes, and were covered with fuzz and grease and dirt. I knew I still had a chance, but something kept telling me — smile, smile, smile! Don’t look like these bums! Don’t be part of the line-up at all! Keep your head up, give out with it so anybody can see you, don’t turn away like these guys are going to do, and SMILE! Smile so it COULDN’T BE YOU!

The door was still open, where the turnkey had gone out again, and through it came the station-house cat, a big black thing with yellow eyes and a red ribbon around his neck. I didn’t overplay it. I didn’t make a corny dive for him and grab him up in a hurry. I made motions at him with my fingers, and grinned at him, and whispered at him, and picked him up. Then I rolled him out on my knee and began scratching his chin.

“I couldn’t be sure. It’s been some time ago. But I’d say it was him. This one here, with no coat on.”

I looked up, kind of like I didn’t know what was going on, then went back to the cat. The turnkey had come back again, and with him was a little guy, around fifty maybe, that I’d never even known by name, but that had taken care of night calls at the motel where Hosey and Buck and I had stayed before pulling our job, and robbed the fellow of his gun. I didn’t pay the least attention. I kept my head up while I was whispering to the cat. My heart skipped a beat when they brought in the guy in the filling station, the one that had sold us gas. But he didn’t point to anybody at all. The Chief said O.K., the detectives went, all but the one in the blue suit, and the turnkey motioned Hosey and the prisoners and the two guys from Las Vegas, and took them out and closed the door. The Chief turned to me. “Mr. Dillon, what do you know about this?”

“Nothing.”

“Just nothing at all?”

“Just nothing, period, new paragraph.”

“You never been to Las Vegas?”

“No.”

“O.K.”

The guy in the blue suit got up, and it turned out he was a Las Vegas detective. He said: “Well, Chief, it looked to me like a phony, but you got to do something about it, even if you think it’s a bum trying to promote a free ride. He saw the job, I’m sure of that, and probably traveled with a pair of yeggs a week or two, though not regular. One or two of those jobs, like the one he talked about in Yuma, were never pulled. But he never once mentioned that the one who got away in Las Vegas was a dark gimpy guy, and he never had the right name of the man that was killed. Of course, he could have called himself Buck, and maybe he used the name Mitchell. But the papers we took off him said Horace Burns, and if he doesn’t know that, then we’re chasing our tail to listen to him. Release this gentleman, I’d say.”

“I’m going to. Sorry, Mr. Dillon.”

“It’s O.K. Cute cat.”

“I found that gentleman in an alley when he was two days old and didn’t have his eyes open yet. I raised him with an eye dropper and milk warmed on that electric heater beside your chair, and he’s never known any home but this one. To him a cell is a front parlor.”

“Pretty eyes.”

“And fight his weight in wild ones.”

“Nice seeing you again.”

Outside, Mulligan went off to scare up a cab and I stood there waiting for him to come back. Then back of me I heard something, and turned. Hosey came running, and ducked across the street, to the park. After him came the guy from the motel and the guy from the filling station. When they caught up with him, the guy from the motel hit him and he staggered and then the guy from the filling station hit him and he went down. I turned my back, and when a cab came with Mulligan alongside, I got in quick and closed my eyes. “What’s the matter, Mr. Dillon?”

“Not a thing.”

“You sick?”

“Just tired.”

He gave my apartment address and we started up. Ahead of us, walking along, were the two guys from Las Vegas, the one from the filling station and the one from the motel. In the park was something lying on the grass. I felt big and cruel and cold, a thick, heavy-shouldered bunch of whatever it takes to be a success. As we turned into the ocean front it flashed through my mind I was going to do the one last thing, or try to, that I would have to do to hold what I had, so I could never be pried loose. Branch, at last, had decided to give her a divorce, and I meant, as soon as she was free, at the end of this interlocutory year they’ve got in California, to marry her and stay married to her. At least, even if I was a little shy on love, I could breathe easy, and if any more Hoseys came along, they might dent me but they couldn’t break me.