the Hot Kid (2005) (24 page)

Louly was in the kitchen making them each a Tom Collins, Carl's without the cherry he always picked out and set in an ashtray, and she'd have to take it out before they were flicking ashes on it making a mess. Carl came in and she asked if he'd got through to Teddy.

"Yeah, but he said Luig came on his own. He said he fired him, but if Luig was able to do me, Teddy would consider taking him back. I asked where he was staying. Teddy said it wouldn't be fair to tell me. You imagine him saying that?"

"It wouldn't," Louly said, with a cute foam mustache on her upper lip.

"When's Teddy ever fair? He walked off with your Bankers Association check."

"He can't send the guy to shoot you and then tell you where he's staying."

"He said he didn't send the guy."

"Well, you know he did. Why would Lou come on his own?"

"Make up for not pulling on me. So I said okay, give him my address and I gave it to Teddy."

"You're telling the guy who wants to shoot you," Louly said, "where you live?"

"He won't come to the door. He'll wait outside for me to come out
,
in the morning. That's how he should do it. If I wanted him, I'd go upstairs and take him out handcuffed."

"You come out in the morning," Louly said, "and you know he's waiting for you, what do you do?"

"I'll think of something. In the meantime, from now until this happens, you have to stay at the Mayo. I worked it with that assistant manager for events--"

"Winona?"

"Is that her name? I told her it's Justice Department business and got a special rate. Housing a federal witness."

"I'm not going," Louly said. She had her hands on her hips, to Carl, a bad sign. She said, "You're not here half the time you're supposed to be, and now you're pulling this. You're here and you make me leave."

"You liked it the last time, didn't you?"

"I had a suite."

"Is that what you want, a living room you won't need?"

"And a girl to do my hair."

"I'll see what I can do."

"And I get to stay in the suite at night and not in some dinky room."

"You know who I saw in the lobby, I was talking to Antonelli? Amelia Earhart."

Louly had another Tom Collins, Carl switched to bourbon and they were on the sofa fooling around, not sure yet if they were going all the way and then they'd eat, or hold up and eat first, since Louly had a chicken in the oven. The phone rang. Louly said, "It looks like we eat and do it tonight at the regular time."

Carl went in the kitchen to get the phone.

Jack Belmont said, "Hey, Carlos, this guy shoots at you going in th
e
hotel and runs and you think it's me? Tries to shoot you in the back? I told you, I'm bustin' you on sight, but it won't be from behind. I have to I'll call your name. You know who this guy sounds like?" "It was."

"Lou Tessa?"

"I called Teddy to check. He said Luigi came on his own."

"Yeah, after you showed him up. But he's still a punk, huh? I'm not surprised he shot at you and ran."

"I said to Teddy, why don't you put him on Belmont? He said he'd never find you."

"You won't either," Jack said. "You can't even start to guess where I am."

Carl said, "Sapulpa?" and listened to a silence.

"I stayed there at one time, when I was with Emmett Long? Stayed at the St. James Hotel, where Heidi was working at the time cleaning rooms. Me and Norm Dilworth. I'd hump her when Norm wasn't looking. I don't need her right now, but that girl's still my favorite hump."

Carl said, "You still want to shoot me?"

"Hell, yeah. I made a vow."

"You want my address?"

"I know where you live, Carlos, over on Cheyenne. Anthony told me. He says he hasn't been to your apartment, but visited your daddy's place near Okmulgee, his nut farm. Tony says he likes your dad, he's interesting to talk to. He says you start to tell him something and change the subject in the middle of it."

Carl said, "I do?"

"Tony said you and Lou-Lou go down there to visit your old dad. I might look in on you there at the nut farm. Get 'er done like a couple of cowpokes. I been thinking, I want to be facing you from not too far."

"You want to meet somewhere?"

"Has to be a surprise."

"I can come wherever you're hiding," Carl said.

"Boy, if you knew. I've acquired more respect in the past few days . . . I'm gonna stop right there before I give it away. You gonna take care of Lou Tessa?"

"I hope so."

"Well, you get me next. Be seeing you."

Jack hung up the phone.

Carl turned to Louly looking at the chicken in the oven.

"You know who that was?"

"Your buddy Jack. I could tell."

"He's dying to let me know where he's hiding, 'cause I'd never believe him."

"He's at home," Louly said, "with mommy and daddy. Right here in Tulsa."

"I thought of that," Carl said. "But his mom told me she'd shoot him if he ever showed up. And he might sense that she would."

"You believe it?"

"She showed me her thirty-two. Then Jack started to say, 'I've acquired more respect in the past few days . . .' and stopped. He said, 'Before I give it away.' "

"More respect for what," Louly said, "a person? A place? A way of living? A kind of work?"

"I asked him was he in Sapulpa," Carl said, "and it caught him by surprise. That's where his dad's girlfriend has her boardinghouse."

"Does Jack know her?"

"I heard one time he tried to kidnap her."

Chapter
20

He was almost to her house and still hadn't made up his mind how to play it.

Not exactly beaten but hat in hand? "Miss Polis, you remember me? I'm Oris Belmont's son, Jack." And hope she sensed a change in him, his tone so different it touched her heart, gave her a tender feeling she couldn't help. Except that time he had kidnapped her and realized she knew who he was, she was the one said, "You want to be a real crook, go rob a bank."

Remind her of it.

"Nancy, remember what you told me in Norm Dilworth's house that time? The one near Kiefer by the railroad tracks?" Then with kind of a grin, "Well, I took your advice."

Or tell her the truth.

"Nancy, I've always thought of you as a woman dying to get in bed naked with a man just about anytime, and I'd try to imagine you with Oris if I wasn't the one myself jumping on your bones, getting in there between your legs." And then, " 'Cause I have this passionate affection for you I'd hate to have to shoot you."

Something like that, but toned down.

He had left the car parked behind the St. James Hotel and walke
d
the three blocks to the big, two-story frame house painted white, kept up, flower beds around it, young redbud trees along the street. Nancy Polis opened the door as he came up the walk, stood there in a cotton shift with thin straps, the skirt halfway to the anklets she wore and heels with bows that looked like tap shoes. But look at her--standing with her hip cocked, her hand high on the edge of the door.

"You come to kidnap me again," Nancy said, "you're out of luck. I haven't seen your daddy in close on a year."

But Oris had given her a farewell speech and enough money to live on for the rest of her life, a hundred thousand dollars. She told Jack not to get any ideas, the money was in the Exchange National Bank, which Oris swore would never close but might change its name. And if for any reason she ran out, Oris said to let him know. Jack hadn't got around yet to thinking of robbing her. No, but it put him in mind of that Creek at McAlester, his cell mate, telling him about Virgil Webster putting away money to last so many years, a lot of money if he was to keep up running his nut farm, sounding like at least as much as Nancy had, a hundred thousand, Jesus Christ, but cash. Inside his house. That was one thing to think about. See how he could work out popping Carlos and picking up Virgil's extra cash at the same time. A trip to Okmulgee for a twofer. The other more immediate thing was Miss Polis. She certainly had a nice plump figure. You'd never call her fat. The only word for her figure was plump. You wanted to dive on it. She was way more relaxed than when he first met her as a Harvey Girl in that uniform. He walked in the house, looked at her pumps with the bows and said, "What're you fixing to do, some tap dancing?"

She said, "If I feel like it," looking him in the eye. It was the same as telling him they'd be in bed by the time the sun set. She had whiskey, Choc beer, and a sign she put on a tree out front that said no vacancy. Nancy had five rooms upstairs counting her own and eight beds for boarders, but no one staying here this week; so she put up the sign and told her colored girl, Geneva, who cleaned and did some of the cooking for ten bucks a week, she'd let her know when to come back to work. Got rid of her so they'd have the house to themselves. Jack told Nancy some of what he'd been up to since the last time they had seen each other: mostly about robbing banks, doing time for the storage tank fire and running a roadhouse. Nancy ate it up, listened with a look of amazement, and said she'd love to manage a roadhouse sometime. She said working as a Harvey Girl was like she imagined serving in a high-class prison cafeteria, if there was such a thing.

Jack said, "You couldn't sell prison food if everybody's starving to death."

"Remember that lacy apron I wore," Nancy said. "They still wear it. No makeup, no jewelry, no stains allowed on the uniform. No conversing or flirting with patrons. The head waitress was like a prison guard."

"Why do you keep thinking of it like prison? I loved that chicken
a
la king."

"No men in dorm rooms, ever."

"You wanted to dress up and go out, didn't you? I remember you and my dad whispering."

"You'd leave and I'd hear it from the head waitress. I had to sneak out of the dorm while I was living there."

"I remember your uniform, your hair, how you fixed it."

"Hairnets were mandatory. But you know what?" Nancy starting t
o
smile. "At times it was a thrill. If you were a Harvey Girl you were somebody. You'd get recognized on the street like a movie star. Little girls would ask for your autograph."

She took Jack out to the kitchen and poured him a beer, Jack smelling vegetable soup on simmer. She said, "Do you know what I've been doing since I first met Oris? I've been waiting. Fourteen years, since I was twenty years old I've been waiting. Alone. By myself."

"Why'd you stick with him?"

"I thought he'd leave your mom."

"He promise you he would?"

"He'd say he had to get out of that house in Maple Ridge . . . with the roller-skating rink on the third floor where Emma would beat her dolls to pieces on the wood floor."

"He tell you all that?"

"He told me everything. I should've known he'd never leave her."

"My mama's tough," Jack said. "I have a feeling if I ever showed up she'd pull a gun out of her sewing basket and drill me."

These fourteen years, she told him, she was never so lonely. Drinking his beer and smoking a cigaret it was in his mind to tell her he was sorry for different things he had caused to happen, but thought, For what? He stubbed out his cigaret and said to Nancy, at the kitchen table with him, "That's over, what're you looking for, some action? Want to pull a job with me?" Seeing a light coming into her eyes. "Can you drive? Can you drive fast? I'll give you ten--no, I'll give you twenty percent of the take. What do you say?"

Now she was looking right at him with that sparkle in her eyes, lighting a cigaret, taking two puffs and stubbing it out. She said, "I want to go to bed with you. Right now."

"I'm ready," Jack said. "But tell me if you like the idea of turning gun moll."

"What would I wear?" "I think something sporty."

The next day they laid around, Nancy asking about his home life when he was a kid and Jack barely telling her anything. Then Nancy telling him about being raised on a farm, as boring as all stories about living on farms. It wasn't until late afternoon Nancy went to the grocery for coffee and a few things and came back with that day's Tulsa World. Jack opened it on the kitchen table, his drink and ashtray moved aside, and saw the story headline in two lines across two columns, marshal shot at, phones would-be killer. There was Carl Webster's picture in both columns, the one he's holding his Colt. "And there's a picture of me in it, smaller than his, with a number under my face. But it's not too bad for a mug shot. That son of a bitch. He knew it wasn't me."

Nancy had turned from the icebox to watch him as he read the story aloud, saying "That son of a bitch," a couple times, and then going to the phone carrying the paper coming apart and telling the operator he wanted Tulsa and give her the number.

So after he talked to Carl he had to settle down again with his drinks and cigarets and tell Nancy what was going on. Tell her about "Massacre at Bald Mountain" and not just about running a roadhouse. Nancy standing through the first part holding on to the back of a chair.

Tell her about shooting the seven spooks in their bedsheets and some of the gunfight inside--no mention of Norm Dilworth--and how he was able to slip away in Tony's car and end up in Kansas City. No mention of Heidi, either.

She thought some of it funny, most of it hair-raising and sat down at the table.

He told her how Carl tricked him into coming back to Tulsa and told how he'd shoot Carl on sight, or almost on sight, so he wouldn't have to listen to that If-I-have-to-pull-my-weapon shit. She said, "That what?"

He didn't tell her because he didn't want to hear it again. They had it in the news story he'd just read. He moved on to meeting the famous lawyer and his escape from McAlester on a streetcar. How he stole Tony's car for the second time, turned it in along the way and left the last one in back of the St. James. She made them new drinks and they lit cigarets.

"On the phone he wanted to know where I was. I said, 'You can't even begin to guess.' He says, 'Sapulpa?' "

Nancy said, "Oh, my God. I'm in it now."

"All it means," Jack said, "they're following the trail of stolen cars. Now they have to check on ones stolen from here, see if it keeps going."

She said, "Does he know I live here?"

"Carl? He might, but I doubt it."

Sapulpa Police called the Marshals Service responding to the all-points on Jack Belmont: they had a Ford Coupe stolen in Muskogee that might trace back to the end of the streetcar line. The marshals located the points in between where motorcars were stolen before coming to Anthony Antonelli in Hartshorne, his coupe stolen again by Belmont. There was reason to believe he was still here. The next day Carl Webster was showing Belmont's mug shot around the St. James without any luck. Now he sat in his Pontiac outside the hotel asking himself if Jack would've gone to see his dad's girlfriend. Why? 'Cause he and his dad were so close?

The minute Jack wasn't looking, like taking a leak or something, she'd of run out of the house to find a cop.

In the conversation Carl had going in his head, he said, "You're sure of that, huh? But what if they were seeing each other--something Jack would think was funny--during these last few years, while his daddy was buying her things, like her '32 Chevrolet coupe. At the roadhouse Norm Dilworth had told him Jack tried to kidnap her one time. It was when he set the storage tank on fire and brought her to Dilworth's house near Kiefer. But Nancy knew who he was, so the kidnapping wouldn't of worked.

There was too much going on at the roadhouse to look into it then. Go back to the time of the storage tank fire, Jack went to prison for it, and Nancy Polis never filed a kidnapping complaint. What Carl could do, drop in on her now, say he was investigating the rumor of a kidnapping.

Finally, huh? It had only been seven years.

Jack was in the living room, the door open, and saw the Pontiac pull up in front. He called out, "Nancy? Where are you?"

Her voice, faint, came back, "Upstairs."

"Look out a front window."

"What is it?"

"Take a look."

He ran up the stairs two at a time, the stairs polished, slippery in his socks without shoes. Nancy was at the window of the bedroom they'd used last night, the bed unmade, a mess, looking at the Pontiac seda
n
parked on the street and the man in a light gray suit and panama hat starting up the walk. Not having any idea who it was, she said, "He looks like an in-surance salesman. I don't answer the door, he'll go away."

"You have to," Jack said. "It's wide open to let some air in the house. And you got that Lanny Ross record on the Vic."

"He's just selling something."

"Then you don't care if I get rid of him." Jack reached under the pillow he'd used last night and brought out Fausto Bassi's .45 automatic, telling her, "Honey, that's the marshal, Carl Webster. Can you beat it, he's come to see me?"

Nancy said, "You're not really going to shoot him," smiling a little, letting him know he'd had her fooled.

Jack said, "You have to talk to him while I put on my shoes. It's bad luck ever since Billy the Kid was in his socks when he was shot dead. It's a fact. He says, 'Quien es?' Wanting to know who's come to see him in the dark."

She sounded more determined than nervous saying, "Jack, you're not going to shoot him in my house and get me involved."

It was good she was thinking instead of becoming hysterical, and what she said made sense, but it didn't move him. He laid the .45 on the pillow and sat on the side of the bed to put on his shoes. He said, "I thought you wanted to be a gun moll."

She didn't say yes or no. Jack looked around with a shoe in his hand to see her up next to the bed holding Fausto's .45. She said, "I'll throw this through the window and scream as loud as I can and run downstairs."

The doorbell rang.

There was a silence in the bedroom until Jack said, "The first situation that tightens your butt, you don't want to be my girlfriend no more? I was with a nervous woman in a bank one time and it's no fun."

The doorbell rang again. "It's a shame, though, 'cause you're a smart babe. You're older than I am, but I think we could've gone to town together. For a while anyway." Jack said, "Come on back when you're through."

They took off their clothes in another bedroom to get in a fresh bed.

"He wanted to know why it says there's no vacancy when there's no one here but me. I said I'm getting ready to do housecleaning and I want the house empty."

"What'd he ask you, if I'd been here?"

"I started the conversation. I said is this about Oris Belmont? Acting nervous. He said no, his son, Jack. I started to shake my head to say I never met you in my life and he's telling about the time you wanted to kidnap me. That's what it was about. That dumb idea you had, as if I didn't know who you were. He asked if I'd seen you since then. I said, 'You think it's likely?' "