The Complete Crime Stories (24 page)

“I don't want your dime. I want a job. If the clothes were better, that might help, mightn't it?”

“If the clothes were good enough for Clark Gable in the swell gambling-house scene, that wouldn't help a bit. Not a bit. I just don't need anybody, that's all.”

“Suppose I got better clothes. Would you talk to me?”

“Talk to you any time, but I don't need anybody.”

“I'll be back when I get the clothes.”

“Just taking a walk for nothing.”

“What's your name?”

“Hook's my name. Oscar Hook.”

“Thanks, Mr. Hook. But I'm coming back. I just got a idea I can talk myself into a job. I'm some talker.”

“You're all that, kid. But don't waste your time. I don't need anybody.”

“Okay. Just the same, I'll be back.”

He headed for the center of town, asked the way to the cheap clothing stores. At Los Angeles and Temple, after an hour's trudge, he came to a succession of small stores in a Mexican quarter that were what he wanted. He went into one. The storekeeper was a Mexican, and two or three other Mexicans were standing around smoking.

“Mister, will you trust me for a pair of white pants and a shirt?”

“No trust. Hey, scram.”

“Look. I can have a job Monday morning if I can show up in that outfit. White pants and a white shirt. That's all.”

“No trust. What you think this is, anyway?”

“Well, I got to get that outfit somewhere. If I get that, they'll let me go to work Monday. I'll pay you soon as I get paid off Saturday night.”

“No trust. Sell for cash.”

He stood there. The Mexicans stood there, smoked, looked out at the street. Presently one of them looked at him. “What kind of job, hey? What you mean, got to have white pants a white shirt a hold a job?”

“Filling station. They got a rule you got to have white clothes before you can work there.”

“Oh. Sure. Filling station.”

After a while the storekeeper spoke. “Ha! Is a joke. Job in filling station, must have a white pants, white shirt. Ha! Is a joke,”

“What else would I want them for? Holy smoke, these are better for the road, ain't they? Say, a guy don't want white pants to ride freights, does he?”

“What filling station? Tell me that.”

“Guy name of Hook, Oscar Hook, got a Acme station. Main near Twentieth. You don't believe me, call him up.”

“You go to work there, hey?”

“I'm
supposed
to go to work. I
told
him I'd get the white pants and white shirt, somehow. Well—if I don't get them, I don't go to work.”

“Why you come to me, hey?”

“Where else would I go? If it's not you, it's another guy down the street. No place else I can dig up the stuff over Sunday, is there?”

“Oh.”

He stood around. They all stood around. Then once again the storekeeper looked up. “What size you wear, hey?”

He had a wash at a tap in the backyard, then changed there, between piled-up boxes and crates. The storekeeper gave him a white shirt, white pants, necktie, a suit of thick underwear, and a pair of shoes to replace his badly worn brogans. “Is pretty cold, nighttime, now. A thick underwear feel better.”

“Okay. Much obliged.”

“Can roll this other stuff up.”

“I don't want it. Can you throw it away for me?”

“Is pretty dirty.”

“Plenty dirty.”

“You no want?”

“No.”

His heart leaped as the storekeeper dropped the whole pile into a rubbish brazier and touched a match to some papers at the bottom of it. In a few minutes, the denims and everything else he had worn were ashes.

He followed the storekeeper inside. “Okay, here is a bill, I put all a stuff on a bill, no charge you more than anybody else. Is six dollar ninety-eight cents, then is a service charge one dollar.”

All of them laughed. He took the “service charge” to be a gyp overcharge to cover the trust. He nodded. “Okay on the service charge.”

The storekeeper hesitated. “Well, six ninety-eight. We no make a service charge.”

“Thanks.”

“See you keep a white pants clean till Monday morning.”

“I'll do that. See you Saturday night.”

“Adios.”

Out in the street, he stuck his hand in his pocket, felt something, pulled it out. It was a $1 bill. Then he understood about the “service charge,” and why the Mexicans had laughed. He went back, kissed the $1 bill, waved a cheery salute into the store. They all waved back.

He rode a streetcar down to Mr. Hook's, got turned down for the job, rode a streetcar back. In his mind, he tried to check over everything. He had an alibi, fantastic and plausible. So far as he could recall, nobody on the train had seen him, not even the other hoboes, for he had stood apart from them in the yards, and had done nothing to attract the attention of any of them. The denims were burned, and he had a story to account for the whites. It even looked pretty good, this thing with Mr. Hook, for anybody who had committed a murder would be most unlikely to make a serious effort to land a job.

But the questions lurked there, ready to spring at him, check and recheck as he would. He saw a sign,
5-COURSE DINNER, 35 CENTS
. He still had ninety cents, and went in, ordered steak and fried potatoes, the hungry man's dream of heaven. He ate, put a ten-cent tip under the plate. He ordered cigarettes, lit one, inhaled. He got up to go. A newspaper was lying on the table.

He froze as he saw the headline:

L. R. NOTT, R. R. MAN, KILLED.

IV

On the street, he bought a paper, tried to open it under a street light, couldn't, tucked it under his arm. He found Highway 101, caught a hay truck bound for San Francisco. Going out Sunset Boulevard, it unexpectedly pulled over to the curb and stopped. He looked warily around. Down a side street, about a block away, were the two red lights of a police station. He was tightening to jump and run, but the driver wasn't looking at the lights. “I told them bums that air hose was leaking. They set you nuts. Supposed to keep the stuff in shape and all they ever do is sit around and play blackjack.”

The driver fished a roll of black tape from his pocket and got out. Lucky sat where he was a few minutes, then climbed down, walked to the glare of the headlights, opened his paper. There it was:

L. R. NOTT, R. R. MAN, KILLED.
The decapitated body of L. R. Nott, 1327 De Soto Street, a detective assigned to a northbound freight, was found early this morning on the track near San Fernando­ station­. It is believed he lost his balance while the train was shunting­ cars at the San Fernando siding and fell beneath the wheels. Funeral services will be held tomorrow from the De Soto Street Methodist Church.

Mr. Nott is survived by a widow, formerly Miss Elsie Snowden of Mannerheim, and a son, L. R. Nott, Jr., 5.

He stared at it, refolded the paper, tucked it under his arm, walked back to where the driver was taping the air hose. He was clear, and he knew it. “Boy, do they call you Lucky? Is your name Lucky? I'll say it is.”

He leaned against the trailer, let his eye wander down the street. He saw the two red lights of the police station-glowing. He looked away quickly. A queer feeling began to stir inside him. He wished the driver would hurry up.

Presently he went back to the headlights again, found the notice, re-read it. He recognized that feeling now; it was the old Sunday-night feeling that he used to have back home, when the bells would ring and he would have to stop playing bide in the twilight, go to church, and hear about the necessity for being saved. It shot through his mind, the time he had played hookey from church, and hid in the livery stable; and how lonely he had felt, because there was nobody to play hide with; and how he had sneaked into church, and stood in the rear to listen to the necessity for being saved.

His eyes twitched back to the red lights, and slowly, shakily, but unswervingly he found himself walking toward them.

“I want to give myself up.”

“Yeah, I know, you're wanted for grand larceny in Hackensack, New Jersey.”

“No, I—”

“We quit giving them rides when the New Deal come in. Beat it.”

“I killed a man.”

“You—? … When was it you done this?”

“Last night.”

“Where?”

“Near here. San Fernando. It was like this—”

“Hey, wait till I get a card. … Okay, what's your name?

“Ben Fuller.”

“No middle name?”

“They call me Lucky.”

“Lucky like in good luck?”

“Yes, sir. … Lucky like in good luck.”

The Girl in the Storm

H
e woke up suddenly, feeling that ice had touched him, but it was an interval before his mind caught up with what he saw. Through the open door of the boxcar it was pouring rain: that much was as he remembered it from the night before. But on the floor was a spreading puddle. It was the puddle, indeed, which had touched his ribs and awakened him; he was edging away from it, even while he was blinking his eyes. When he scrambled to his feet and looked out, the breath left his body in a wailing moan. For as far as he could see no land was visible, nothing but brown, swirling water full of trees, bushes, and what might have been houses, moving in the direction of the bridge, off to his right. It was already lapping at the door of the boxcar; it was what was causing the rapidly deepening puddle.

He stood staring out at it, and became fascinated by a pile of ties across from the car. One by one the flood lifted them, as though some invisible elephant were riding it, and carried them spinning into the current, to bang against the boxcar at his feet, then go swiftly on to the bridge. He watched several go by, then turned his back to them and caught the roof of the car with his hands. He chinned himself, in an effort to climb to the roof, but there was no support for his feet, and he dropped back.

When the next tie came by, he stooped down and caught it. Hugging it to his stomach, he dragged it into the car. Then he jammed it across the door slantwise, one end at the bottom, the other halfway up. He caught the roof of the car again and, clambering up the slanting tie, pushed up high enough to get his chin over the edge. Then he managed to reach the catwalk on the roof of the car, and pulled himself toward it. Wriggling on his belly, he was safely on the walk in a few moments, and stood up.

All around him was the flood, and behind him he could hear it thunder under the bridge. About a quarter of a mile ahead of him was a loading platform, and beyond that the station. No locomotive was in sight; he had been shunted with a string of empties onto a siding and left there. Beyond the station, on higher ground, was what appeared to be a village, and he could see trucks backed up there, evidently evacuating whole families. He wondered if he could get a place on a truck. But it took him ten minutes, clambering down from boxcars to flatcars, and then over boxcars again, to reach the loading platform, and when he ran around it to yell at them, they were gone.

He stood looking at the station, read the name of the place: Hildalgo, California. For the moment he was sheltered from the rain; but his respite was short. The loading platform was only a few inches higher than the floor of the cars, and even while he was standing there another puddle appeared and he was retreating from it. He found himself facing the county road. It was higher than the platform, and although water was running over it in a sheet, and back toward the bridge it dipped into the flood, between this point and the village it was not inundated. To reach it he would have to go through water at least waist-deep, and he eyed it dismally. Then he squatted down, held his breath, and plunged in.

When he scrambled up on the concrete he was so wet he could feel the weight of his denim pants hanging off his hips. He started up the road at a half trot, the storm driving him from behind. He didn't know where he was going, except that he had to find shelter. And who would shelter him he had no idea, for he knew from bitter experience that nineteen-year-old hoboes are seldom welcome guests, whether rain-soaked or not.

He passed a stalled car, with nobody in it. He passed several houses, in front of which he had seen the trucks. They were obviously empty, but they were below road level and surrounded by yellow ponds pocked with rain. He came to a sidewalk, but between him and the curbs was a torrent, and he stayed in the center of the road. He came to a filling station, but it was deserted and six inches deep in water. Next to the filling station was a store, a chain grocery store. He headed for it, going in up to his knees in the torrent. The force of it almost upset him and forced him several paces below his goal. When he gained the sidewalk he ran at the door, wrenching at the knob and driving against it with one motion.

It was locked. As his face smashed against the glass, he remembered it was Sunday.

He stood there, furiously rattling the door. Facing him, inside, he could see the clock: ten minutes to three. But nothing answered his rattling except the rain. He kicked the door, dashed away, and in a second was under cover. Next to the store was a half-finished house, and his dive for the porch was automatic. He turned in anger at the rain, stood stamping the water off his legs, then went inside. The floor was laid, but the walls were only half finished and there was a damp smell of plaster. Off to one side were piled lumber, tar paper, and sawbucks. But the doors and windows were not in place yet, and the air felt even colder than the air outside.

He stood shivering in his soaking denims; started to take off the coat. As the air met his wet chest, he pulled it around him again. At the touch of the clammy cloth he gritted his teeth and took it off. He took off his shoes and his pants. He wore no socks or undershirt. He was left in a pair of tattered shorts, and while he was draping the denims over a sawbuck he collapsed on the tar paper, shaking with chill. But soon he was quiet, and he could think of but one thing: that he had to get warm. He thought of fire, and looked around.

On one side of the room was a fireplace, the mortar in it still damp. The tar paper would do to start it, all right, and there were bricks outside he could use to build it on. The lumber would burn, if there were any pieces short enough to go in the fireplace. He spied a kit of carpenter's tools in one corner, went over to examine it, wincing as the crumbs of plaster hurt his feet.

The main tool in the kit was a saw. Quickly he set up two sawbucks, laid a joist between them and cut it up with the saw. The exercise made him feel better. When he had a pile of wood, he got two bricks and began to build the fire. He tore up tar paper and laid it on the bricks, found the carpenter's trimming knife and whittled kindling, laid the big pieces he had sawed on top. But when he went to his coat and fished the matches out of the pocket, the tips were nothing but smelly wet smears.

He cursed, screamed, and pounded his fist against the wall. He went all through the house, searching every place he could think of, trying to find a match. He began to shake from chill again, and ran to the front door to shake his fist at the rain.

Down the road, creeping slowly, came a car, its lights on. It was a small sedan, and it went cautiously past him. Bitterly he wondered where the driver thought he was going, for the lake of floodwaters down by the station would make further progress impossible. About this time the driver seemed to see the flood too, for a little beyond the grocery store the car came to a stop. Then, as though it were part of a slow movie, it began to slide. It slid into the torrent, lurched against the curb, stopped. Almost at once the taillight went out. That, he decided, was because the water had shorted the ignition. This car, like the other one, was there to stay awhile.

He watched, wondered if the guy would have a match. Then the door opened, the left-hand door, next to the road, and a foot appeared, then a leg. It wasn't a man's leg; it was a woman's. A girl got out, and staggered as the storm hit her. She was a smallish girl, in a raincoat. She slammed the door shut and started toward him, around the back of the car, heading for the curb. He opened his mouth to yell at her, but he was too late. The water staggered her and she went down. She tried to get up; the current tumbled her under the wheels of the car.

He leaped from the porch, went scampering to her in his shorts. Taking her by the hand, he jerked her to her feet, put his arms around her, ran her to the house. As he pulled her into the cold interior, her teeth chattered. He grabbed her dripping handbag, clawed it open. “You got a match? We'll freeze if we don't get a match!”

“There's some in the car.”

He dashed out again, ran down to the car, jerked the door open, jumped inside. In the dashboard compartment he found a package of paper matches, wiped his hand dry on the seat before he touched them. He looked around for something to wrap them in, to keep the rain off them. On the back seat he saw robes. He grabbed them, wrapped them around the matches.

When he got back to the house he waited only to open the robes and dry his hands again, pawing with them on the wool, Then he struck a match, and it lit. He touched the tar paper with it. A blue flame appeared, hesitated, spread out, and licked the wood. The fire crackled. It turned yellow and light filled the room. He felt warmth. He crowded so close he was almost in the fireplace.

“Come on, kid, you better get warm.”

“I'm already here.”

She picked up one of the robes, held it in front of the fire to warm it, put it around him. Then she warmed the other one, pulled it around herself, squatted down beside him. He sat down on the robe, tucked it around his feet. The fire burned up, scorched his face. He didn't move. The heat reached him through the robe. His shivering stopped, he relaxed with a long, quavering sigh. She looked at him.

“My, you must have been cold.”

“You don't know the half of it.”

“I almost died, myself. If you hadn't come, I don't know what I would have done. I went clear down, in that water.”

“I yelled at you, but you was already in it.”

“I don't know what's going to happen to the car,”

“It'll be all right soon as it dries out.”

“You think so?”

“Just got water in it, that's all.”

“I hope that's all.”

“Some rain!”

“It's awful, and it's going to get worse. I had the radio on in the car. They're warning people. Over in Hildalgo they took everybody out. Half the town's washed away.”

“Yeah, I seen them.”

“You were in Hildalgo?”

“Yeah. … What you talking about? This
is
Hildalgo.”

“This is Hildalgo?”

“That's what it says on the sign at the station.”

“Oh, my! I thought Hildalgo was on the other road.”

“Well? So it's Hildalgo.”

“But there's nobody here. They took them all away.”

“O.K. Then it's us.”

“Suppose this washes away?”

“Till it does, we got a fire.”

She got up, holding the robe tightly around her, and pulled a sawbuck over to the fire. On it, he noticed for the first time, were her sweater, stockings, and skirt. She must have taken them off while he was down in the car. She looked around.

“Are those your things over there? Don't you want me to move them closer to the fire, so they'll dry?”

“I'll do it.”

The sight of her absurdly small things had made him suddenly aware of her as a person, and he was afraid to let her move his denims to the fire for fear that in the heat they would stink. He got up, pulled the pile of tar paper to the fire for her to sit on. Then he took the denims off the sawbuck and went back with them to the kitchen. The fixtures were in, though caked with grit, and on his previous tour of the place he had seen a bucket and some soap. He dumped the denims on the floor, filled the bucket with water, carried it to where she was. By poking with a piece of flooring he made a place for it on the fire, and while it was heating, studied her.

She wasn't a pretty girl exactly. She was small, with sandy hair, and freckles on her nose. But she had a friendly smile, and she wasn't bawling at her plight. Indeed, she seemed to take it more philosophically than he did. He took her to be about his own age.

“What's your name?”

“Flora. Flora Hilton. … It's really Dora, but they all began calling me Dumb Dora, so I changed it.”

“Yes, I guess that was bad.”

“What's yours?”

“Jack. Jack Schwab.”

“You come from California?”

“Pennsylvania. I—kind of travel around.”

“Hitchhike?”

“Sometimes. Other times I ride the freights.”

“I didn't think you talked like California.”

“What you doing out in this storm?”

“I went over to my uncle's. I went over there last night, to stay till Monday. But when it started to rain I thought I better get back. It wasn't so bad over where he lives, and I didn't know it was going to be like this. They've got no radio or anything. But then, when I turned the car radio on, I found out. I still thought I could make it, though. I thought I was on the main road. I didn't know I was coming through Hildalgo.”

“Well, they'll be coming for you. The cops, or somebody. We'll see them when they find the car.”

“I don't know if they'll be coming for me.”

“Oh, they will.”

“My father, he don't even know I started out, and my uncle, he probably thinks I'm home by now.”

“Then we got it to ourselves.”

“Sure looks like it.”

The water was steaming by now. He wrapped the hot bucket handle in tar paper, lifted it off the fire, and went back to the kitchen with it. First washing out the sink, then using a piece of tar paper as a stopper, he soaped the denims and washed them. The water turned so black he felt a sense of shame. He put them through two or three waters, wrung them dry. The last of the hot water he saved for the shorts he had on. With a quick glance toward the front of the house, he stepped out of them, washed them, wrung them out. Then he spread them, to step back into them. They were no wetter than when he took them off, but he hated the idea of having them touch him. However, they were hot from the water, and felt unexpectedly pleasant when he buttoned them up.

Back at the fire, he draped the denims on the sawbuck, beside her things, to dry.

“Well, Flora, nice climate you got.”

“Sunny California! It can rain harder here than any place on earth. Well, you know what they say. We only have two kinds of weather in California, magnificent and unusual.”