The Fabulous Clipjoint Page 6

  “Was there any indication of a struggle?”

  “Well, his face was scratched, but that could have been from falling. He fell face forward when he was hit.”

  “You don’t know that,” said the coroner, sharply. “You mean, he was lying on his face when you found him?”

  “Yeah. And there was broken glass from several beer bottles and the spot smelled of beer. The alley and his clothes were wet with it. He must have been carrying — Oh, all right, that’s a deduction again. There was beer and beer-bottle glass around.”

  “Was the deceased wearing a hat?”

  “There was one laying by him. A hard straw hat. What they call a sailor straw. It wasn’t crushed; it couldn’t have been on him when he was hit. That, and the way he was laying makes me think he was slugged from behind. The heister came up on him, knocked off his hat with one hand and swung the billy with the other, like. You can’t take off a guy’s hat to slug him from the front without him knowing it and he’d put up a —”

  “Please confine yourself to the facts, Mr. Horvath.”

  “Okay — what was the question, now?”

  “Was the deceased wearing a hat? That was the question.”

  “No, he wasn’t wearing one. There was one laying by him.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Horvath. That will be all.”

  The cop got down from the witness chair. I thought, we were figuring things wrong last night, because we figured on that street light. It was off at the time. It would have been plenty dark at the Franklin end of the alley.

  The deputy coroner was looking at his notes again. He said, “Is there a Mr. Kaufman present?”

  A short, heavy man shuffled forward. He wore glasses with thick lenses and behind them his eyes looked hooded.

  His name, he testified, was George Kaufman. He owned and ran the tavern on Chicago Avenue known as Kaufman’s Place.

  Yes, Wallace Hunter, the deceased, had been in his tavern Thursday night. He’d been there half an hour — not much longer than that anyhow — and then had left, saying he was goinghome. In Kaufman’s place he’d had one shot and two-three beers. In answer to a question, Mr. kaufman admitted it might have been three or four beers, but not more than that. He was sure about it being only one shot.

  “He came in alone?”

  “Yeah. He came in alone. And left alone.”

  “Did he say he was going home when he left?”

  “Yeah. He was standing at the bar. He said something about going home, I don’t remember the words. And he bought four bottles to take out. Paid for’em and left.”

  “You knew him? He’d been in before?”

  “A few times. I knew him by sight. I didn’t know his name until they showed me his picture and told me.”

  “How many others were in your tavern at the time?”

  “Two guys together were there, when he came in. They were getting ready to leave then, and they left. Nobody else came in.”

  “You mean he was the only customer?”

  “Most of the time he was there, yeah. It was a dull evening. I closed early. A little after he left.”

  “How long after?”

  “I started to clean up the place for closing then. It was about twenty minutes before I got it closed. Maybe thirty.”

  “Did you see how much money he had?”

  “He broke a five. He took it out of his wallet, but I didn’t see inside his wallet when he took it out or put the singles back. I don’t know how much more he had.”

  “The two men who left when he came. Do you know them?”

  “A little. One of ’em runs a delicatessen on Wells Street. He’s Jewish; I don’t know his name. The other guy comes in with him.”

  “Was the deceased in an intoxicated condition, would you say?”

  “He’d been drinking. He showed it, but I wouldn’t say he was drunk.”

  “He could walk straight?”

  “Sure. His voice was a little thick and he talked kind of funny. But he wasn’t really drunk.”

  “That’s all, Mr. Kaufman. Thank you.”

  They swore in the coroner’s physician. He turned out to be the tall guy with the long thin nose, the one I’d thought looked like a faro dealer in a movie.

  His name was Dr. William Haertel. His office was on Wabash and he lived on Division Street. Yes, he’d examined the body of the deceased.

  What he said was technical. It boiled down to death from a blow on the head with a hard, blunt object. Apparently it had been struck by someone standing behind the deceased.

  “At what time did you examine the body?”

  “Two forty-five.”

  “How long would you say he had been dead at that time?”

  “One to two hours. Probably closer to two.”

  A hand touched my shoulder, timidly, as I was leaving Heiden’s. I looked around and said, “Hello, Bunny.”

  He looked more like a scared little rabbit than usual. We stepped to one side of the doorway and let the others go past us. He said, “Gee, Ed, I’m — You know what I mean. Is there anything I can do?”

  I said, “Thanks, Bunny, but I guess not. Not a thing.”

  “How’s Madge? How’s she taking it?”

  “Not too good. But —”

  “Look, Ed, if there’s anything at all I can do, call on me. I mean, I’ve got a little money in the bank —”

  I said, “Thanks, Bunny, but we’ll get by okay.”

  I was glad he’d asked me instead of Mom. Mom might have borrowed from him, and probably I’d have had to pay it back. If we didn’t have it, we’d get by without it.

  And Bunny didn’t have money to lend out and not get back, because I knew what he was saving for. A little printing shop of his own was Bunny Wilson’s dream, but it costs plenty to start one. It’s a tough game to get started in, and it takes capital.

  He said, “Should I drop around, Ed? To talk to you and Madge? Would she want me to?”

  “Sure,” I told him. “Mom likes you a lot. I guess you’re about the only one of Pop’s friends she really likes. Come around any time.”

  “I will, Ed. Maybe next week, my evening off. Wednesday. Your dad was a swell guy, Ed.”

  I liked Bunny, but I didn’t want any more of that. I got away from him and went on home.

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  Chapter 5

  Over the phone, Uncle Ambrose said, “Kid, how would you like to be a gun punk?”

  I said, “Huh?”

  “Hang on to your hat. You’re going to be.”

  “I haven’t got a gun and I’m not a punk.”

  He said, “You’re half right. But you won’t need a gun. All you’re going to do is scare a guy half out of his wits.”

  “Sure it won’t be me that’s scared?”

  “Go ahead and be scared. It’ll stiffen you up and help the act. I’ll give you some tips.”

  I asked, “Are you really serious?”

  He said, “Yes,” flatly, just like that, and I knew he was.

  “When?” I asked him.

  “We’ll wait till day after tomorrow, after the funeral.”

  “Sure,” I said.

  After I’d hung up, I wondered what the hell I was letting myself in for. I wandered into the living room and turned on the radio. It was a gangster program and I turned it off again.

  I thought, I’d make a hell of a gun punk.

  Now that I’d had time to think it over, I had an idea what he meant. I was really a little scared.

  It was Friday evening, after the inquest. Mom was down at the undertaker’s, making final arrangements. I don’t know where Gardie was. Probably a movie.

  I went to the window and looked out. It was still raining.

 
In the morning it had stopped.

  It was still damp and misty, and it was a hot muggy dampness. I put on my best clothes, of course, for the funeral, and they stuck to me like they were lined with glue.

  I’d put my suit coat on, just to be all dressed, but I took it off and hung it up again until nearer time.

  I thought, a gun punk. Maybe my uncle is a little nuts. All right, maybe I’m a little nuts too. I’ll try it, whatever he wants.

  I heard Mom getting up. I went out.

  I stood looking at the outside of Heiden’s.

  After awhile, I went in. Mr. Heiden was in his office, in his shirt sleeves, working with some papers. He put down a cigar and said, “Hello. You’re Ed Hunter, aren’t you?”

  “Yes,” I said. “I wondered — I just wanted to know if there’s anything I can do?”

  He shook his head. “Everything’s set, kid. Not a thing.”

  I said, “I didn’t ask Mom. Have you got pallbearers and everything?”

  “Fellows from the shop where he worked, yes. Here’s the list.”

  He handed me a slip of paper and I read the names. The foreman at the shop, Jake Lancey, was at the top of the list, and three other linotype operators and two hand-men. I hadn’t thought about the shop at all. It made me feel a little funny to find they were coming.

  He said, “The funeral’s at two. Everything’s set. We’re having an organist.”

  I nodded. “He liked organ music.”

  He said, “Sometimes, kid, members of the family would rather — well, take a last look and kind of say good-bye in private. Like now, and not file past the bier at the funeral. Maybe that’s why you came in, kid?”

  I guess it was. I nodded.

  He took me into a room just off one of the halls, not the one where the inquest had been, but one the same size off the other side of the main corridor, and there was a coffin on a bier. It was a beautiful coffin. It was gray plush with chromium trimmings.

  He lifted the part of the lid that uncovered the upper part of the body, and then he went out quietly, without saying anything.

  I stood looking down at Pop.

  After awhile, I put the lid down gently, and went out. I closed the door of the little room behind me. I got out of the place without seeing Mr. Heiden again, or anybody.

  I started walking east, then south. I walked through the Loop and quite a way out on South State Street.

  Then I slowed down and stopped, and started back again.

  There were a lot of florists’ shops in the Loop, and I remembered I hadn’t done anything about flowers. I still had money from my pay check. I went in one and asked if they could send out some red roses right away for a funeral that would be in a few hours. They said they could.

  After that, I stopped for a cup of coffee and then went home. I got there at about eleven.

  The minute I opened the door I knew something was wrong.

  I knew by the smell. The hot close air was full of whiskey. It smelled like West Madison Street on Saturday night.

  My God, I thought. Three hours till the funeral.

  I closed the door behind me, and for some reason I locked it. I went to the door of Mom’s bedroom and I didn’t knock. I opened it and looked in.

  She was dressed, wearing the new black dress she must have bought yesterday. She was sitting on the edge of the bed, and there was a whiskey bottle in her hand. Her eyes looked dazed, stupid. They tried to focus on me.

  She’d put her hair up, but it had come down again on one side. Her face muscles had gone lax and she looked old. She was drunk as hell.

  She swayed a little back and forth.

  I was across the room and had the whiskey bottle before she knew what was happening. But after I had it, she made a grab at it. She got up to come after it and nearly fell. I pushed her and she fell back on the bed. She started to curse me, and to get up again.

  I got to the door, took out the key and put it in on the outside. I locked the door on the outside before she got hold of the knob.

  I hoped Gardie was home; she had to be home to help me. She could handle Mom better than I could. I had to have help.

  I ran into the kitchen first and held the whiskey bottle upside down over the sink and let it gurgle out. It seemed to me that the first thing I had to do was to get rid of the whiskey.

  Mom’s voice came from behind the locked door. She was cursing and crying and trying the knob. But she didn’t yell and she didn’t hammer; thank God she wasn’t loud.

  The doorknob quit rattling as I put down the empty bottle on the sink.

  I started for Gardie’s room and then there was another sound that stopped me cold.

  It was a window going up. The window from Mom’s bedroom into the airshaft.

  She was going to jump.

  I ran back and got hold of the key to unlock the door. It stuck a little, but the window was sticking too. That window had always stuck, had always been hard to open. I could hear her struggling with it. She was just sobbing now, not cursing or crying.

  I got the door open and got there just as she was trying to go through. She’d got the window open only a little over a foot and it had stuck there, but she was trying to crawl through.

  I yanked her back and she reached for my face to scratch me.

  There was only one thing. I hit her on the chin, hard. I managed part way to catch her before she fell too hard. She was out cold.

  I stood there a minute, trying to get my breath back, and trembling, cold clammy wet with sweat in that hot and stinking room.

  Then I went for Gardie.

  She’d slept through it. Somehow she’d slept through it. It was eleven o’clock and she was still sound asleep.

  I shook her and she opened her eyes and then sat up. Her arms folded across her breasts in sudden modesty because she wasn’t awake enough yet to be immodest and her eyes went wide.

  I said, “Mom’s drunk. Three hours to the funeral. Hurry up.”

  I handed her a wrapper or robe or whatever it was off the back of a chair, and hurried out. Her footsteps came right behind me.

  I said, “In her bedroom. I’ll get the water going.” I went into the bathroom and turned on the cold water in the tub. I turned it on all the way; it would splash out for a while while the tub was empty, but to hell with that.

  Back in the bedroom, Gardie had gone right to work. She was taking off Mom’s shoes and stockings.

  She asked, “How did she do it? Where were you?”

  I said, “I was out from eight till just now. She must have got up about the time I left and gone right down and bought the bottle. She’s had a full three-hour start.”

  I took Mom’s shoulders and Gardie took her knees and we got her on the bed and started working her dress off over her head.

  I got worried about something. I said, “She’s got another slip she can wear, hasn’t she?”

  “Sure. Think we can get her around in time?”

  “We-got to. Leave her slip on then. The hell with it. Come on; we’ll walk her to the bathroom.”

  She was a dead weight. We couldn’t walk her. We had to half-carry half-drag her, finally, but we got her there.

  The tub was full by then. Getting her into it was the hardest part. Gardie and I both got pretty wet, too. But we got her in.

  I told Gardie, “Keep her head out. I’ll start some coffee and make it thick as soup.”

  Gardie said, “Open a window in her room and let that smell out.”

  I said, “I did. I opened a window to air it out.”

  I turned on the fire under the kettle and put coffee in the pot ready to pour water through. I put in as much as it would hold, way up to the top.

  I ran back to the bathroom. Gardie had tied a
towel around Mom’s hair and was splshing cold water in her face. She was waking up. She was moaning a little and trying to move her head to get away from the splashing water. She was shivering, and her arms and shoulders were covered with goose flesh from the cold water.

  Gardie said, “She’s coming around. But I don’t know — My God, Eddie, three hours —”

  “A little less,” I said. “Listen, when she comes to, you can help her out of the tub and help her dry off. I’m going down to the drugstore. There’s some stuff. I don’t know what you call it.”

  I went in my room and quick put on a dry shirt and pair of pants. I’d have to wear my everyday suit to the funeral, but that couldn’t be helped.

  When I went by the bathroom the door was closed and I could hear Gardie’s voice and Mom’s. It was thick and fuzzy, but it wasn’t hysterical and she wasn’t cursing or anything. Maybe we can do it in time, I thought.

  The coffee water was boiling. I poured it in the dripolator top and put a low bead of fire under the dripolator to keep it hot.

  I went down to Klassen’s drugstore. I figured I’d do better to level with him, because I knew him and I knew he wouldn’t talk about it. So I told him enough of the truth.

  “We got proprietary stuff,” he said. “It’s not so hot. I’ll fix you something.”

  “Her breath, too,” I said. “She’ll have to be close to people at the funeral. You got to give me something for that.”

  We did it. We got her straightened out.

  The funeral was beautiful.

  I didn’t mind it, really. It wasn’t exactly Pop’s funeral, to me. When I’d been alone with him, there in the little room, well, that was it, as far as I was concerned. I’d said good-bye to him, sort of, then.

  This was just something you had to go through with, on account of other people and out of respect for Pop.

  I sat on one side of Mom, and Gardie on the other. Uncle Ambrose sat next to me on the other side.

  After the funeral, Jake, the foreman from the shop, came up to me. He said, “You’re coming back, aren’t you, Ed?”

  “Sure,” I said. “I’m coming back.”

  “Take as long as you want. Things are slow right now.”