“Well, that won’t last.”
“But you’re so right it won’t last. I didn’t say it would last. I was only telling you how I feel now, tonight.”
“Well, you want to go home with me or don’t you? Either way.”
“Put me in a cab and I’ll see you tomorrow night. Here,” she said, and handed him the fifty-dollar bill.
“Forget it, forget it. It’s only human nature. I’m kind of beat too, myself. Let me stash this bottle and I’ll get you a cab.”
They went out together and he hailed a cruising cab. “That’s all I am, Ernie. I’m kind of beat, too. I’ll see you tomorrow night, yeah?”
“Sure. Goodnight, kid.”
“Kid. Thirty-six years old. Goodnight, Ernie.”
Wigman hailed another cab, got in, had the driver stop for the morning papers, and proceeded to his hotel. During the night, his night, he had a heart attack and died. His body was found by the waiter who had a standing order to bring his breakfast at one o’clock in the afternoon. Ernie Wigman’s lawyer, Sanford Conn, was out of town and could not be reached, and the place ran itself that night, as it always did when Ernie did not show up. But a policeman had been around, asking questions, and the news of Ernie’s death was known to the bartenders and waiters and kitchen help, and to the regular customers. Rich Hickman took charge. “I’ll close up,” he told the others. They were agreeable; they did not want to have to account for the money in the till.
Rich got the last customer out a few minutes after four in the morning. In the back room was a cop named Edwards, the man on post whom Rich had asked to be there. “I just want you here when I tot up what’s in the till,” said Rich.
“I’m not suppose to do that,” said Edwards.
“Well, do it anyway as a favor.”
“Who to?”
“To Ernie. I think he has a kid somewhere, and Ernie was always all right with you guys. That I happen to know. I just want you to witness that I’m not stealing off a dead man.”
“I won’t sign anything.”
“Who asked you to sign, Edwards? I’ll count it up in front of you, and lock it up in the register and give you the key. Is there anything in the book against that?”
“Nothing in the book against it, but—well, what the hell? All right. But I don’t take any responsibility.”
“You don’t take any responsibility, but this way no son of a bitch is going to say I robbed a dead man.”
“You could of been robbing him all night long, that’s the way I gotta look at it, Hickman.”
“I couldn’t of been robbing him much. All you gotta do is compare tonight with last Tuesday or any Tuesday. If I was robbing him all night long I didn’t get rich on it.”
“I guess that makes sense,” said Edwards. “Go ahead and count it up.”
The cop sat bored on a bar stool while Rich made his count. “Cash on hand, five hundred and twenty-eight dollars and eighty-seven cents. Okay?”
“That’s what it looks like to me,” said Edwards.
“You wouldn’t do me a favor and initial this slip before I lock it up?”
“I guess I can do that,” said Edwards. “There’s somebody at the back door.”
“Let him in, will you? No, you keep your eye on the money. I’ll let him in. I hope it’s his lawyer, a fellow named Conn.”
“Conn is a good name for a lawyer,” said Edwards.
Rich went to the back door, opened it, and admitted June. “Ernie here?” she said.
“No. Come on in,” said Rich.
“What’s with the cop?” said June.
“I’ll tell you later.”
“Trouble? I don’t go for cops.”
“Then wait here.”
“I don’t like this. Where’s Ernie?”
“Ernie is dead.”
“A stick-up?”
“Nothing like that. He had a heart attack. If you’ll sit down I’ll take care of the cop and then I’ll tell you all about it.”
Rich returned to Edwards, put the money in the cash register, and gave Edwards the key. “All right, Edwards?”
“I guess so.”
“Thanks a lot.”
“All right. See you.” Edwards left, and Rich mixed a Rob Roy, put it on a tray and took it to the back room. In his other hand he carried a bottle of bourbon with a shot glass inverted and resting on the cap.
“Ernie had a heart attack at the hotel. They found him around one o’clock yesterday.”
“That’s when he usually had breakfast,” she said. “Are they having a service for him?”
“I don’t have any idea. He had a kid, didn’t he?”
“He had two kids around eighteen and twenty years of age, but I don’t know where they are or any of that. I guess they’ll show up. He was divorced, that I know.”
“I closed up tonight and I had the cop come in to see that I didn’t steal anything out of the till. Do you know Ernie’s lawyer?”
“Sanford Conn, his name is. He had a piece of the joint. I know him from him going out with Ernie and I a couple times.”
“This joint could do a lot better, a lot better. Ernie was a nice guy, but I could of told him ways to save a little here and make a little there. You know Conn, eh?”
“That well. Been out with him and his wife, with Ernie. A young fellow about thirty-five. He’s the lawyer for four or five joints like this, and I think he’s in for a piece of all of them.”
“Then he’s a guy I could go to with a proposition?”
“If there was a buck in it, he’d listen . . . So Ernie cooled. You know I was almost with him last night.”
“How do you mean, almost?”
“Almost is what I said, almost is what I mean. I didn’t go home with him. He put me in a cab outside here. I wouldn’t of liked that, waking up with a dead man.”
“What stopped you from going home with him?”
“Didn’t feel like it. I guess I got so burned up with you that I was sick and tired of men. Now I think of it, Ernie said he was tired, too. I wonder if he knew anything beforehand. He said he was tired.”
“He often said he was tired. I used to say to him, not come right out with it, but he’d sit and put away a quart of bourbon and eat a steak and a whole meal and sometimes he was here for ten-twelve hours, eating and drinking and never get up and walk around. I said to him about a month ago, I said—well, I didn’t say anything, if you want the straight of it. But I thought, this guy he never moves out of his chair, and all that booze and rich food. Ten-twelve hours he’d sit here. They get that way, some of them. I worked for guys that did the very same thing. And they kid themselves that they’re working, just because they’re sitting in their own joint. Work? What work? Why, one of the day men was stealing from him right in front of his very eyes, that’s how much work he was doing.”
“Stealing how?”
“Oh, there’s ways of working with a waiter. There’s plenty of ways you can steal. You steal a little, don’t you? The concession don’t get it all.”
“Most of it. You know, I’d like to have the concession here.”
“Yeah, but would Conn give it to you?”
“Maybe not Conn, but maybe a new owner would. Or a new partner.”
“You mean like if I got to be partners with Conn?”
“You must of attended a mind-reading school,” said June.
“Graduated,” said Rich. “You wouldn’t mind working for me? I got the impression last night you wouldn’t spit in my eye.”
“I wouldn’t be working for you, exactly. I’d have the concession, so I’d be working for myself.”
Rich thought a moment. “Usually the syndicate owns the concession, and they pay so much for it. You know that.”
“I ought to know it after—I been in this busine
ss. But here they never had a checkroom. Ernie didn’t want one.”
“I know. But you were softening him up.”
“It’s a lot of money going to waste,” said June. “I could do a hundred and fifty a week here.”
“You could do two hundred, two and a quarter.”
“So?”
“Well, that’s what I think it’s worth, not a hundred and fifty. So if you got it it wouldn’t be on a basis of a hundred and fifty. Don’t play games with me, June.”
“I want to make a little for myself. It’s not all clear profit. All right, so you’re big-hearted and you give me a concession worth maybe two hundred a week. But first you gotta convince Sanford Conn, and who knows Sanford Conn? I do.”
“Yeah, we were coming to that,” said Rich.
“One word from me, either way.”
“Honey, I’m with you. How much money you got, and how much can you raise?”
“Ha ha ha. Would I tell you? How much do you have, and how much can you raise?”
“This is serious. If you could get your hands on fi-thousand dollars, I think I could raise twenty-five. With thirty gees I could talk to Conn. Conn don’t have to know you got the checkroom till him and I make a deal.”
“You want me to put up five thousand dollars for the concession?”
“The way you say that I know you got it.”
“Where is your end coming from?”
“What do you care, or what does Conn care, as long as I get it? I don’t have that kind of money myself, but I can come pretty close to raising it.”
“That dame that you almost killed me with in her car.”
“Good for a little, but not much. She don’t have any cash, only some jewelry.”
“No heist. I don’t want any part of a heist. Don’t even talk about it. I got no record downtown and I want to keep it that way.”
“If I had a record I couldn’t work either. And I’m not talking about a heist. But her and a couple others I know, and a couple liquor salesmen. Plus your five, I could go to Conn with a proposition. This is a very good chance for the both of us, June. And me and you could save rent.”
“Yeah, that was coming, too. You move in with me or I move in with you. Which?”
“You got an apartment, I’d move in with you. I only got a room way the hell up on West Eighty-fourth Street.”
“Where do you think I live? In the Waldorf Towers? I got an apartment but it’s only one room.”
“By the month?”
“What else?”
“We could save money on a lease. Wuddia say?”
“I don’t know. I’d have to think it over. How would I get rid of you if I didn’t like you around?”
“How would you get rid of me? Start leaving your stuff on the floor, your hair curlers all over the can.”
“I’m tidy.”
“I noticed that, or I wouldn’t broach the proposition.”
“I take a bath twice a day, sometimes more,” she said. She snickered.
“What?”
“This way I’d know for sure if you dyed your hair.”
“You wanta know something, I touch it. It’s near all gray, but I touch it.”
“I like it.”
“Thanks.”
“Well, we didn’t talk much about Ernie,” she said.
“No, but we didn’t say anything against him,” said Rich.
“That’s true. We didn’t say anything against him. I guess he was that kind of a guy, Ernie. He checks out and you start forgetting him right away, but at least you don’t say anything against him.”
“Well, he done us a favor,” said Rich.
“You mean you and I getting together? Yeah, if that’s a favor. It’s too soon to tell.”
“I think we’ll work out all right, June.”
“Maybe we will. And if we don’t—”
“You can start leaving hair curlers around.”
She smiled. “Yes,” she said. “If they all would of been that easy to get rid of.”
“What are you, divorced?”
“Twice. What about you? Are you divorced?”
“No, I never got married. I came close a couple times, but something always happened, so I never had it legal. You know, I go south in the winter, and when the season’s over I come north or I been to the coast a couple times, working.”
“This’d be the first time you ever settled down? I mean with a place. I don’t know, Rich.”
“You worried about your five gees?”
“Wouldn’t you be?”
“Don’t worry about it. I like you. I knew that right away last night. I would of gone after you, Ernie or no Ernie.”
“Yeah, and I wouldn’t of run away from you. I didn’t have anything permanent with Ernie.”
There was a banging on the side door and Rich went to the door and peered out at two men. “I don’t know these guys,” he said. There was a roller shade on the door and similar shades on the windows of the back room. “We’re closed,” he shouted, and let the shade fall back in place. The banging was resumed.
“Maybe you better see what they want,” said June.
“I think I heard one of them say Hickman,” said Rich. “Will I take a chance?”
“Talk to them through the door,” said June.
Rich opened the door a few inches, and immediately it was pushed against him and he was driven out of the way. “What’s the idea?” said Rich.
“What’s the idea? What’s your idea?” said one of the men. Then he saw June at the table. “Hello, June.”
“Hello, Sandy. It’s all right, Rich. This is Sandy Conn.”
“You’re kinda rough, Mr. Conn,” said Rich.
“Maybe, and you’re kind of stupid. Close the door, Jack,” Conn commanded his companion. Jack was obviously a hoodlum, a muscle man.
“I heard you were out of town,” said Rich.
“You’re Hickman, the bartender?” said Conn.
“Yes. I heard you were out of town and I decided to take care of everything till you got back.”
“Yeah, yeah. All right, what’s in the till?”
“Five hundred and twenty-eight dollars and some cents,” said Rich. “In the register.”
“A good thing it isn’t in your pocket. Give me the key,” said Conn, extending his hand.
“I don’t have it. I gave it to Edwards, the cop on the beat.”
“You what?”
“I can vouch for that,” said June.
“You? I wouldn’t ask you to vouch. You’re in with this fellow now. Give me the key or do I get Jack here to take it away from you? Whichever one of you has the key, hand it over. I don’t care which one Jack has to take it away from. Do you, Jack? You have any objection to wrestling with a woman?”
Jack laughed.
“I guess not,” said Conn.
“Call the precinct, if you don’t believe me,” said Rich. “But if this goon gets any closer to me or her, I break this bottle over his head. Then I take care of you, Mr. Conn. You I could handle easily.”
“I could almost handle you myself, Sandy,” said June. “This man is telling the truth, you silly son of a bitch. He was protecting your interest.”
“I ain’t worried about the bottle, Mr. Conn,” said Jack.
“I’m thinking,” said Conn. “What’d you say the name of this cop was?”
“Edwards. He’s a patrolman.”
“You don’t have to tell me. If he was a sergeant I’d know him.” Conn went to the telephone booth and was gone about five minutes. “I guess I owe you an apology,” he said, when he returned. “Edwards has the key.” He turned to Jack. “Okay, Jack. Thanks.”
“That’s all?” said Jack.
“Come around the office tomorrow and I
’ll give you a check.”
“You wouldn’t have five or ten on you?” said Jack.
“Here,” said Conn, handing him a bill. “Goodnight, Jack.”
“Thanks, Mr. Conn. Goodnight all,” said Jack, leaving.
Conn sat down, across the table from June. “Too bad about Ernie, but the amount of liquor he consumed. Where you from, Hickman?”
“Why?”
“Well, I liked the way you took charge tonight. I like a take-charge guy. Bill Dickey, you remember used to catch for the Yanks? A real take-charge guy. You ever owned a joint, or managed one?”
“No.”
“I know you got no police record, but give me the names of some places where you worked before.”
“Why?”
“Well, June here will tell you, I got an interest in five other saloons. I kind of specialize in cafés.”
“That’s what you specialize in?” said Rich.
“I got other clients, naturally, but I been building up a café-owner practice.”
“I thought there for a minute you specialized in something else.”
“Like what? Explain.”
“Like hiring some goon to beat up a woman,” said Rich.
Conn tapped his fingernails on the table and watched Rich in silence. “Don’t start anything, Hickman,” he said presently.
“Jack ought to be a long way off by this time,” said Rich.
“You lay a hand on me and it goes on your record downtown.”
“Then I better make it good, huh?” said Rich.
Conn pointed to June. “She don’t work, either.”
“I’d of been in great shape after Jack got through with me, too,” said June.
“What’ll we do with him, June?” said Rich.
“If it was me, I’d kill him.”
“What’d be the best way?” said Rich.
“Knock him out and dump him in the river. You got a car,” said June.
“I told you the car don’t belong to me, June.”
“Oh, yeah, that’s right. You got any other suggestions?”
“They got a walk-in icebox back in the kitchen. We could leave him there.”
“I know you’re kidding, you two,” said Conn. “I tell you—”