Ed Lacy - Room To Swing

“You see May much?”

“No. It isn't that we're unfriendly. We're just not friendly any longer. There's a difference.”

“Did she leave town a few days ago?”

“No. She's never been out of Bingston, except to go shopping in Cincinnati.”

“But since you don't see her, she could have left—?”

“I know she didn't. I thought you wanted to ask about Bob Thomas?”

“I am. Do you know anybody here who might have reason to hate him?”

“Not enough to kill him. After all, he hasn't been around in years. He was forgotten more than hated.”

“What was your reaction when you read about his being killed?”

“Me? I don't know. I suppose most of all I felt sorry. We used to live in a shack at the end of town, place called the Hills. Bob lived there with his mother—I never saw or knew his father—and some other poor families. It's a garbage dump now, was then too, but unofficially. The junk heap gives it the name Hills. There was about seven or eight families lived there, white and coloured.” He looked across me at Frances. “Fran, you talk to Mrs. Simpson recently?”

“Not for a week or so.”

He toyed with his hair again. “Damn health hazard for her. Mrs. Simpson still lives out there. We've been trying to have her move.... But you want to know about Bob. He is—was—two years older than May, five years older than me. But we three hung out together, hunting rats with slingshots, building shacks... all that kid stuff. Sometimes when his Ma didn't show up for a few days, he'd eat at our place. My mother died when I was a baby and my father was a drunk. I guess he tried to raise May and me the best he could, only it was too much for him, and he kept losing himself in a bottle. What I'm trying to say is—we were a wild bunch of kids, hungry and ragged all the time. When I was nine an uncle came to live with us. He worked as a mechanic, taught me most of what I know about cars. More important, we started eating regularly—until he left a few years later. He liked to move about and—I'm giving you this in detail only because Fran said you wanted a complete picture.”

“That's exactly what I need,” I said, wondering if lover boy Willie called her Fran.

Tim studied me for a second, as if about to ask why, but he didn't. He said, “Bob used to eat with us a lot. His Ma was staying away more and more. She was a waitress in a dive over in Cincy. It was the end of the depression then and she had a hard time keeping herself fed. May was growing up a real beauty. She was fifteen when our uncle took off and—Mr. Jones, this is damn hard for me to say; I have to make it short. Pop died of exposure that winter and we kids raided farmers' fields, lived like animals. When May began bringing home money I was too young to even suspicion how she got it. Bob was crazy about her and by then they were—well—going steady, I guess you'd call it. Guess you know he did time at reform school after his Ma disappeared and—”

“What happened to his mother?”

“Later we learned she'd been killed in a car wreck over in West Virginia. We stopped a lot of the wild kid stuff. I even started going to school more and when Bob came back from the reform school, he always had a few bucks on him, and told me he was working for a dairy farmer. Of course May was giving him the money. And I knew what she was doing by then, I had to know. I tried to stop her. I left school and got a job, but how much can a kid make? Bob, he wanted her to stop, too, but he never held down a job for long. And what could he make? You understand, May wasn't any silly oversexed kid out for thrills. Way she saw it she was—well—she was selling her body, but then what does a factory girl do but sell her arms and legs?”

He paused, perhaps waiting for an answer. I said, “Guess that's one way of looking at it.”

“I don't know,” Tim said, as if thinking it over. He shook himself slightly. “In '50, when she was nearly nineteen, May found herself pregnant. She wanted Bob to marry her. He was willing but insisted she give up—what she was doing. She couldn't see that. Whenever Bob worked, he only picked up dimes at odd jobs and May had enough of poverty. He refused to marry her. May was getting big and upset about the kid not having a 'name.' Other people were getting worried too. May's 'work' was still pretty much of a secret, even in a small town like Bingston; only a few men were supporting her. Things came to a head when Bob was due to be drafted. She had to do something about her pregnancy—she had him arrested for rape. It was a lousy thing to do but she only did it because she thought it would scare him into marrying her. Needless to say the so-called respectable citizens who were keeping her liked the idea. It was an out for them. You probably know the rest—Bob was released on low bail, to give him a chance to marry May. He beat her so badly she lost the kid, and nearly died. Nobody has seen him here since.”

I took out my pipe, lit it. “Did you ever see Thomas again, look for him?”

He shook his head. “If I'd found him that day I would have killed him. I was carrying a hunk of pipe in my pocket to beat his brains out. But I didn't have time to do much looking, I was busy taking care of May. A year later, when I was in the army, I'd try to find him—in whatever town I came to—but I never saw him.”

“What would you have done if you had found him?”

He patted his hair nervously. “I don't know. By then, even though I was sending her an allotment, May was working openly—at her—trade. I think by then I realized it wasn't his fault. He'd been as trapped by circumstances as May. Although he shouldn't have whipped her. I've never forgiven him that.”

“Maybe, in his own way, he loved May so much he lost his head,” Frances suddenly said.

“Maybe. But I hate violence—for any reason,” Tim said. He took out a pack of butts, asked Frances if she wanted one. She said no and he puffed deeply on his, almost savagely.

We were all silent for a moment, then Tim asked, “Have you got a picture of Bob Thomas now, Mr. Jones?”

“Yeah, a pretty good one.”

“Odd what you remember about people. Bob always realized his lack of education. When my uncle was living with us, all Bob could do was talk about learning a trade, being a somebody. But then, when he had a little money, I mean May would have put him through a trade school, he never bothered with it.”

“In a world of nobodies we all want to be a somebody,” I said, almost to myself, thinking Porky Thomas had the desire for a trade till he died.

“What did you say?” Frances asked.

“Just a would-be clever crack from a would-be clever character I know in—eh—Chicago.” I turned back to Tim. “Did Thomas have any other brothers or sisters?”

“Nope.”

“Was there ever an English teacher employed in the Bingston school named Barbara? Sort of a washed-out-looking woman, probably be between thirty-five and forty now?”

“I never heard of any teacher like that. Matter of fact, Mr. Kraus has been teaching English for as long as I can recall.”

“Thomas ran off about six years ago. In all those years hasn't anybody in Bingston seen or heard of him?”

“No. I think they would have told the police, if they had. Not only was there a lot of feeling about the beating he gave May, but most people still think he was the one that got her into trouble.”

“But these other admirers of May, suppose they'd come upon Thomas, perhaps tried to take him in and—”

“I don't know a one of them who has left town in years. They all have families here. I think this is about all I can tell you.”

“Okay. Would it do any good to see your sister?”

“She'd scream for the police. Her measure of respectability now is being anti-Negro.”