Donald Westlake - Two Much!

“That’s a dive, man, that’s no place to hang out.”

“Good, you know the place. Feeney, two of the regular patrons of O’Hanahee’s are old friends of mine from union-busting days. They’re called Brock Lujenko and Big Horse Tumwatt. You ever meet those fellas, Feeney?”

“They don’t sound like the crowd I hang out with, man.”

“Feeney, I was in the apartment last week. You were out.”

“Oh, yeah? I guess it was kinda messy.”

“It looked as though Laurel and Hardy had just left.”

“Hee hee.”

“The point is, Feeney, you’re going to clean it up.”

“Oh, yeah, sure.”

“Spotless. Immaculate. Exactly as delivered to you.”

“Certainly, man.”

“Because otherwise, sometime during the fall semester, you will meet my old friends Brock Lujenko and Big Horse Tumwatt.”

“Oh. Yeah?”

“Yeah. I’ll be moving in Tuesday.”

“It’ll be clean, man. Don’t you worry about a thing.”

“I’m not worried. Believe me, Feeney, in the ebb and flow of life you are the least of my worries.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

Buzz.

“Hah?”

“Miss Linda Ann Margolies.”

“In person?”

“On the phone.”

“Ah. Tell her... No, never mind, I’ll talk to her.”

“Mm hm.”

Click. “Miss Margolies?”

“How quickly they forget,”

“Eh?”

“If you recall, I believe we were naked on your office floor at the time, I said, ‘Call me Linda,’ and you said—”

“‘Call me irresponsible.’ It all comes back to me. How are you, Linda?”

“My shoulder blades are healing up just fine. And how are you , Irresponsible?”

“Exactly.”

“Who’s on first.”

“That’s right.”

“Well, what I’m calling about—”

“Sorry, miss, I gave at the office.”

“Yes, I remember. And you remember my thesis.”

“Is that what that was? You remember my pickle, don’t you?”

“It’s a dilly.”

“No, Linda. We don’t descend to material like that.”

“The hell we don’t. I want to send you my thesis.”

“I’m not sure it’ll fit on a card.”

“Listen, Eerie, things are—”

“Listen what ?”

“Eerie. That’s short for Irresponsible.”

“I’d rather you called me Sibyl.”

“Fine with me. Listen, Sibyl, what I want is—”

“I’m not sure I came out ahead on that one.”

“What I want , Jack, is for you to read my thesis and tell me what you think of it.”

“I think it’s the cuddliest, furriest little thesis I ever—”

“Sibyl.”

“Right. I’d love to read your thesis, I really would, but I can’t promise when. I’ve got a lot, uh, going on right now.”

“That’s okay, I have a month before it’s due.”

“Then send it along.”

“You may not like the title.”

“Oh? What is it?”

“Comedy: The Coward’s Response to Aggression.”

“Well, it’s hard to tell without the music.”

“It’s a tango.”

“So send me two copies.”

“Oh, God.”

“He’s a dilly.”

“Yours was worse.”

“No, it wasn’t. What did the cannibal give his sweetheart for Valentine’s Day?”

“A box of farmers’ fannies.”

“Did you hear about the guy who parted his hair from ear to ear?”

“He thought it was wonderful till somebody whispered in his nose.”

“Linda, is there no rotten joke you don’t know?”

“There are three of them, in fact.”

“Whi— Oh, no, you don’t. Good-bye, Linda.”

“Almost gotcha. Almost gotcha.”

“Gloria, I’ve—”

“Hold on a minute, till I finish typing.”

“Letter to your mother?”

“Company business. Tax form for the state.”

“Don’t show it to me!”

“I wasn’t going to show it to you.”

“Just sign my name and send it to them.”

“There’s a check should go with it.”

“So enclose a letter saying, ‘Please find check.’”

“Do I enclose a check?”

“Don’t waste time with silly questions. I have a car waiting. Type, type.”

Clackety clackety clackety clackety — zzzzip

“Okay, now what?”

“First of all, here’s your paycheck.”

“How come? It’s only Wednesday.”

“You’ll notice it’s postdated. So is this bonus check, in honor of Labor Day.”

“A hundred — You don’t think I’d try to cash this, do you?”

“Faith and patience, that’s what you need. Now, this is a check and deposit slip for the Wonderful Folks account, which I’d like you to deposit for me.”

“TEN THOU—”

“Hush! Hush!”

“Ten thousand dollars ?”

“Miss Kerner is investing in Those Wonderful Folks.”

“She’s off her tree.”

“Be that as it may, that check is as good as the girl atop the unicorn. Now, we’re gonna close up shop right now, you’ll deposit this check on your way home, by Friday the account will be full and green and beautiful, and you can cash these other two checks.

“Wait a minute. I don’t come back after lunch?”

“No. And we’re not opening tomorrow or Friday either. We’ll take a long Labor Day vacation. I’ll see you Tuesday.”

“Well, that’s fine with me.”

“Gloria.”

“What’s up? You’re up to something.”

“You don’t want to know about it.”

“Agreed.”

“But you do want to know what to say if anybody asks you where my twin brother Bart is.”

“Are you still playing that game?”

“I’m getting out from under right now. If it should happen that you are asked, if anybody wants to know where Bart Dodge is, it is your understanding that the brothers quarreled, and that Bart Dodge has severed his connection with this office and is unlikely to return.”

“Amen.”

“There’s light at the end of the tunnel, Gloria.”

“Pray it isn’t a flamethrower.”

“What a kidder.”

Less than three minutes after Gloria left, while I was still battening down the office hatches for an extended separation, the hall door opened and two guys walked in, strangers to me. They were wearing identical short-sleeved white shirts open at the neck, and they seemed larger than most people. “Sorry, gents,” I said, “I’m just closing up.”

“That’s okay,” one of them said, coming in the rest of the way, and shut the hall door behind himself.

“Listen,” I said, “I’m in something of a hurry. I’m going away and—”

“That’s right,” the other one agreed, and extended a white envelope toward me. “Here’s your ticket.”

“Ticket?” Frowning at them, trying to connect the idea of a ticket with Liz having told me earlier that she’d send a car for me, thinking confusedly that these people must be from Liz or how would they know I was going away, I now saw that they were really very large indeed, thicknecked and broad-shouldered and heavy-armed. They looked like football players arriving at the stadium.

I took the envelope. They watched me with their heavy faces, neither of them saying anything, so I opened the envelope and took out what was obviously an airline ticket. Opening that, I saw my own name, plus those ranks of letters and numbers by means of which airline employees manage to communicate with one another without being overheard by the customer. It took a few seconds to sort out: the “JFK” after “From” would be Kennedy airport, where Bart had soared off for California. And the destination? “To: St. Martin.”

“St. Martin?”

“That’s right,” one of them said. “It’s an island.”