Ed Lacy - The Men From the Boys

“What are you, the wise old bird tonight?”

“Sometimes I like you, like you a lot. Now hit the sack.”

I stretched out on the bed and Barbara waved from the door. I told her, “Fix the door so it will lock.”

She did that, waved again, closed the door. I loosened my belt, reached over and turned off the light. And waited, wondering if I was going to dream of Mrs. DeCosta again. I started thinking about Lawrence.

I could have talked to the boy about fishing. Once I took him surf casting with me, and he loved it but he caught a bad cold being up all night on the beach. I even let him take a slug of whiskey. What I remember most is the big bass I got, about sixteen pounds. Had a fight pulling him in and Lawrence was excited too. In the morning when we were getting ready to go, I took a fillet out of the fish, left the rest, and the kid said, “You shouldn't do that, he was such a beautiful fish.”

“I'm not going to lug any stinking sixteen-pound fish on a train.”

Lawrence was thin and sort of sissy looking and he wailed, “But to leave him on the beach like this, all open, it isn't fair to the fish!”

“Fair? The bass is dead. And what the hell does a fish know about fair or unfair?”

The little drip started crying and then sneezing, and when I got him home Dot bawled the devil out of me. Worrying over a fish, now over a nutty butcher who...

The next thing I knew I was jerking myself erect and there was sunlight in the room. The damn radio was still on and the three o'clock news was starting. It reminded me of the old days when I'd pound my ear for a dozen or more hours, sleeping off a drunk.

My mouth was cracking dry and there was a dull, uneasy feeling in my gut. I felt dopey instead of rested. And it was another hot day. A cold shower snapped me out of it a bit. Then I shaved, washed my teeth a couple of times—they seemed to be coated—found a clean shirt and dressed. I chewed a pack of gum for my breath.

Dewey was behind the desk already, looking red-eyed, the veins in his nose large. He asked, “Howya feeling, Marty?”

“Hungry as a church rat. What are you doing in so early?”

“Lawson wanted a couple hours off—going to some art exhibit. As if the heat isn't bad enough, one of the maids didn't show, called in sick.”

“Which one—Lilly?”

He nodded.

“Dewey, what was the number yesterday?”

“Let's see... I think a six was leading... I only play the single action... and... yes, I recall now, it was 605. You have anything down?”

“Think I did.” I went into the office and found Lilly's home address.

As I came out, Dewey said, “Marty, you and I get along because we both mind our own business, so if what I'm going to say is out of line, say so. The thing is, you're acting kind of funny.”

“You mean I'm for laughs?”

“Don't kid me, Marty. Mr. King is up in the air, wanted to talk to you and wore out his hand knocking on your door.”

“Tell Mr. King I may achieve a sudden ambition in life—busting his weasel face.”

Dewey blinked his watery eyes. “Got another job?”

“Nope.”

“Tell you, Marty, we run the hotel so smoothly I wouldn't like to see you lose this one—have to break in a new man. Lucky for you there wasn't any trouble last night. Another thing, a Dr. Dupre has been calling you, three times in the last hour. I would say he was kind of angry at you, too.”

“Long as I have a buddy-buddy like you, Dewey pal, what have I to worry about?” I said, walking out.

At the coffeepot I had a couple of pastrami sandwiches and some orange juice. My stomach was solid and I felt good. I was a dummy not to have thought of sleeping pills. Merely rent a room in one of the uptown hotels where I wasn't known, tell them not to disturb me. About fifteen straight hours would do the trick.

I felt so good I listened to the old waitress's dirty jokes— which she told me over and over again every week—and nearly gave her heart condition by leaving a half-a-buck tip.

I had close to three grand in a safe-deposit box and another grand in a savings account. I had to leave it to somebody. Leaving it to Lawrence would be a waste; he'd never learn how to enjoy a buck. Flo would get hysterical if I left her anything. Barbara really needed the dough, but it would only end up as a new car for pimp Harold. Still, best I draw up a will or some snotty cousins in Atlantic City would come into it—if they were still alive. The last time I saw them I was twenty-one and they gave me a crummy stickpin.

I walked around till I found a public typist—a pimply girl in a plumbing store. I dictated a short will giving Lawrence all my dough on the condition he buy Dewey a barrel of cheap wine. I asked the girl if she was a notary and she told me, “Wills do not need to be notarized, just two witnesses.”

“Okay, you want to be a witness?”

“I don't mind,” she said and called some guy out of the shop in the back of the store. He signed as a witness too, getting the paper all dirty with his greasy hands. The girl even made him put his address down. All this cost me only a buck and I took the will back to the Grover and left it in a sealed envelope in my desk.

Across from the Grover there's an old drugstore which I give all the hotel business. I dropped in there and Sam said, “Marty, don't tell me you need a new supply so soon.”

“I want to buy a small bottle of perfume. Something going for about three bucks. Wrap it up nice.”

“What kind?”

“How would I know? Anything that smells strong.”

Sam showed me a bottle that was all glass with about four drops of yellow liquid that looked like a doctor's sample. “This is the real stuff, from Paris and no lie.”

“All right. By the way, Sam, I get calls for sleeping pills now and then. Let me have a box of goof balls.”

Sam reached under the counter, then showed me a tiny box. “These are the newest thing on the market. Put you to sleep but no drugs, no chance of anything going wrong.”

“I want the old kind, the strong ones.”

“Marty, you don't understand, these are safe. You can take the whole box and your heart won't burst, or your lungs get paralyzed.”

“Sam, I want goof balls.”

He had heavy lids and when he got excited the lids seemed to droop, giving him an evil expression. “Marty, you need a doctor's prescription for those.”

“Stop horsing around. Sam, you know me. When a guy asks for a pill, pays for it, I have to give him what he wants. Don't worry, I won't give him more than two. Think I want to get into trouble?”

“But they're damn strict these days. I can lose my license, my store, maybe worse.”

“You put them in a plain box—I found them in one of the rooms when a guest checked out.”

“Marty, you have no idea how tight they are on sleeping pills and sedatives. I can't take the chance.” His fat face was troubled, his eyes nearly shut.

“All right, if you want me to start dealing with another ...”

“Marty, be reasonable!”

“I'm asking you for a simple favor and you're making a production out of it. What's wrong with you, Sam? You think I'd be nuts, giving some clown too many?”

The lids opened a little and after a moment he whispered, “Okay, but remember, if anything happens, I'll swear you never got them here.”

Sam went behind the clouded glass partition in the rear of his store, returned in a few minutes with a plain pillbox which he crudely palmed in my hand as we shook hands— although we were alone in the store. He said, “No charge. Just pay for the perfume. You can have that wholesale—a dollar seventy-three.”

“How many pills are in here?”

“A dozen. I'll cover it in my inventory—somehow.”