Ed Lacy - Dead End

I was home by midnight, a little dizzy. In one day we had made five arrests and pocketed fifty bucks each.

Of course, we didn't do that every day, but we made plenty of arrests. Doc had a whole string of stoolies and often we were at the scene of a crime before it took place. Nor did we make extra money every day, but we did okay. Once we got a tip on a floating crap game, pocketed three hundred of the nine hundred dollars on the hotel rug. I thought it was risky but Doc said, “Stop slobbering. Sure, the desk lieutenant knows we held out some money—so does downtown—but they'd be surprised if we hadn't. It's expected. If you don't take what you can, it makes a lot of people uneasy. Just be careful you don't horn in on the big graft that goes up to the top, right to City Hall. This stuff is peanuts to them. They go for the organized shake, the big money that comes in as regularly as payday.”

Sometimes I thought Doc was being damn petty. Like once Doc spotted a parolee he remembered, coming out of a bar at night. He frisked the joker, took twenty dollars from his wallet, then let him go with a kick in the rear. I took my ten but Doc could tell I didn't like it. He told me, “Bucky, look at it this way: We're doing the guy a favor. And also doing our job. Don't forget, the biggest part of police work is preventing crime. Now, this fellow would have to finish three more years if we had turned him in.”

“Turned him in for what—taking a drink?”

“He was violating his parole by taking a shot at that hour of the night, not to mention the bar is a hangout for punks. But you're not following me, Bucky. The important thing is we reminded him to go straight. All parolees are tempted, so we merely acted as a brake on him. Isn't avoiding three years in the pen worth a couple of ten-dollar bills? We did him a favor.”

“As the saying goes, with pals like us he'll never need an enemy.”

Doc laughed and slapped me on the shoulder. “Don't worry, kid, he expected it. Why do you think he was only carrying twenty dollars? That was shake money, just for cops.”

As I said, in many ways Doc reminded me of Nate. Doc was lonely, which I suppose was one reason why he put in such long hours on the job. I didn't mind; police work wasn't work to me. But many a night after we finished he would ask me to have supper with him at some odd restaurant, listen to him philosophize and run his mouth. Sometimes we'd even take in a movie together. I took a small room in Doc's hotel. I was seeing less and less of Elma, but I was giving her thirty-five a week, plus rent, and she didn't seem to care that I was so busy.

And some nights Doc didn't want me around, would go to his room early and spend the night reading.

If I never quite understood Doc, I knew he liked me. Once I had a fever and chills during the night. I was shaking like a cement mixer. Elma had an HIP doc in the first thing in the morning and he said I had malaria, told her to give me quinine. Doc phoned at eight thirty to ask where I was. When Elma told him about the attack, he shouted over the phone, “Have you given him any quinine yet?”

“No. I'm getting dressed to go out now.”

“I'm coming right up. Don't do a thing.”

With me still flashing hot and cold, Doc got me dressed, drove me to a V.A. hospital. I'd had sand-fly fever a couple of times in Korea, and when I was released from the hospital three days later, I was set for a small pension, less than twenty dollars a month, for the rest of my life. See, that's what I mean by Doc being smart—if I had taken the quinine first the blood test at the hospital would have showed negative and I never would have got the pension. True, it wasn't much, but it took care of my taxes. In fact, I spent my first check buying Doc a fancy lighter.

One night as Doc and I were having supper in a French restaurant, we started talking about marriage. Doc told me he had once been married for a few years, a long time ago. For some reason I was surprised; I could never picture him as a homebody. “She was a good woman, Bucky—beautiful, talented, intelligent. She was an artist. I nearly had a breakdown when her heart gave out. She was only twenty-eight. I was fortunate in having those few years of happiness. It's very difficult, under modem tensions, for two people to live together smoothly.”

Doc stared at me as he sipped his coffee, asked, “It's none of my business, but how did you ever get hooked by Elma?”

“She lived next door when I was a kid. Might say it was one of these quickie war marriages.”

“Are you happy with her?”

“Happy? If I had the money, I'd get a divorce.”

“No, it's cheaper and better to stay married—if you can stand it. Insurance against getting hooked again. But a strong stud like you should have something better in bed. What time is it?”

“Almost eight.” Along with his always asking for “fire” for his cigarettes, Doc never looked at his own watch.

“Pay the check while I make a call. I'll fix you up with a real woman.” Doc stood up.

“Nobody has to fix me up. I can get my own women.”

“I might even fix you up with a real watch, too.”

“Doc, mind your own damn business!”

He smiled down at me. “This one is a trifle slimmer than your Elma.”

“I told you, you don't...”

Walking away from the table, he called out softly, “At least see the merchandise.”

A half-hour later we were in the lobby of a ritzy apartment house off the Avenue. This not only had a doorman, but even elevator operators. Her name was Judy Low, and she was the most beautiful girl I've ever seen. Fairly tall; a strong, lean body; a cute face with hot, heavy lips and bright eyes; and certainly the smoothest blond hair in all the world reaching her shoulders. There was something about her that got me—perhaps the wanton look on her face. Okay, that may sound corny, but there was something about her that shouted she was made for bed.

The apartment was lush, too; two neat, large rooms with modern furniture in a blaze of colors, lots of books, and a hi-fi that played odd but soothing music. Doc gave her a familiar squeeze as he said, “Judy, this is my partner and friend, Bucky Penn.”

She said in a silky voice she was glad to see me and did we want a drink? Judy was wearing a heavy robe with Arab writing, or something, woven into it. When she walked across the room it was simply amazing. No big hip-sway or anything cheap—this was a very expensive watch movement.

We had a few drinks, and the liquor was the best, too; and then, like a hammy actor, Doc said he had to be leaving. Two minutes later Judy was on my lap.

I began dropping in to see Judy three or four times a week. Doc wisecracked how we were made for each other: Punch and Judy. Like I said, I was never the lover-boy type, but Judy drove me nuts—for a time. Perhaps it was her slim, hard body, after the years of Elma's sogginess. Or it could have been that just as I was now having my clothes made by Doc's tailor, having a high-priced call girl was a new kind of living for me. It got so I couldn't wait until I saw her early in the evening.

Judy had a peculiar clientele. She was busy between three and seven in the late afternoons with top executives who stopped to see her before they commuted to their suburban homes. Doc said she got a hundred or more a trick and limited her business to about fifteen steady customers. Doc claimed that even with her pay-off, she was making twenty grand a year. When I asked him if the brass wouldn't be sore about us horning in on the graft, he said, “You're not horning in, merely on her free list. And they won't kick about that. Taking prostitution money would make any politician a dead duck—if it became known. Enjoy yourself and don't worry. She likes you.”