Murder Me for Nickels (3 page)

“Like what, then?”

“One stunk from liquor,” said Louie, “one stunk from horses….”

“Horses?”

“Horses. And the other—you should pardon the expression—to me he just stunk.”

They had broken some glass in the counter, twisted legs off the tables, had stolen a salami each. And the one who “just stunk” had mixed all the herring salad together with antipasto and two jars of British preserves.

“How would you know what a horse smells like?” I asked Louie.

“Because I was born in Russia. And at the time I was born in Russia….”

“All right, Louie,” and I kept wondering what there was in all this that could add to the picture. Benotti himself, was all I could think. I’d have to go see him.

“Benotti beat you, Louie?”

“Yes. Slow. He wasn’t mad.”

“And the others, wrecking the place?”

“They weren’t mad either.”

“Maybe I should look at the place downstairs. Maybe they dropped something.”

“No. I looked. Just the newspaper.”

“What?”

“One had the Herald in his pocket. There was something, at first, about the newspaper. Should they use the newspaper, one of them said, and kept rolling it up, if you get the picture….”

“I do.”

“But Benotti said nix, after thinking about it, and he said to let it show because it makes a better example.”

Then the doctor came. He took one look at Louie and told me to boil water. I put the water on, in the nook where Louie did his cooking, and I got the picture much more clearly now, of Benotti and his three men. Not a bum among them, because they were much too well-trained. They wrecked the place with method, and they knew about the trick with the rolled paper, how you can beat up a man with the paper so it hurts like hell but no marks left to show for it. Just the pain. Who they were I did not know, but I knew what they were. They knew their way and they were hoods.

Louie was making small sounds while the doctor fingered him, and I left. It was time for Benotti.

Chapter 3

B
enotti’s place of work had a listed number but nothing was listed for his home. I knew where he rented space for his shop—in the building of Hough & Daly, Electric Supply. That outfit was big, and we dealt with them, and I even knew the night watchman. I drove down to Hough & Daly, all shut down for the day. Benotti’s place, a big room off the loading ramp, was also shut tight. I had a two-minute chat about nothing with the old man who watched the plant and the offices, then I left with Benotti’s address.

I went back to the east side. I had to slow down when I got to the neighborhood because it was a warm night and there were great bundles of children all over the street I gave up and parked halfway down the block and walked the rest of it.

All the frame houses were alike. Two stories, porch in front, lawn in front of that, sprinkler going. Or a man in shirt sleeves doing the watering. The house I wanted had nobody in front but I could see the light on the back porch and went there.

They were all in the kitchen, four kids, a fat wife, and Benotti in his undershirt The shirt looked like a joke. The serious part was all the muscle. He had no neck because of the muscles, and his arms showed no bones on account of the muscles. In a suit he might have looked short and fat, but this way I knew better. Nevertheless, I knocked on the screen door.

Benotti got up from the table and came over to see who it was. He peered through the screen like something at the zoo.

“Mister Benotti?” I said. “I’m Jack St. Louis.”

We had never met but he knew who I was. I don’t know how much he knew, but I did not approve of his reaction because he looked at me through the screen and started to laugh. Hahaha, he went and came out on the porch.

“Good evening,” I said.

Benotti turned back to the door and told his kids to stay at the table and to his wife he said that he’d be right back in. No. She needn’t put the food back in the oven.

“Wellsir,” he said to me. “Jack St. Louis,” and looked me all up and down. “You all dressed for the funeral?”

I had thought, on the way over and while cooling off from that last sight of Louie, maybe I’ll just talk to the man, clever extraction of news, background, information. Talk to him and—who knows—maybe we’ll get along. But with his looks and his attitude, I had a hard time with that plan. I waited till he was done laughing again and then I said, “No. I came to talk to you in polite English.”

“He talks fancy, like an actor. May I have your autograph?”

“All right.”

It is a matter of chemistry in the nerves that the other guy can never react fast enough to get out of the way, if you don’t telegraph. I never do. So I gave him my autograph willynilly, very anxious for speed, because I wanted to get two in while the getting was good.

He went ratatat on the clapboard behind him with the back of his head and then he said, fairly loud, “Eat your supper in there! I’ll be right in.”

He was just warning those kids in the kitchen to mind their old man. To me he said, “All right, you.”

I got while the getting was good. I got right back to the porch railing because I don’t like to give a man an advantage, especially if I just hit a man and nothing happens. I got out of the way of his short swing for fear it might break something inside of me, and the next move, if he wanted me, would have to be his.

He came as expected and this time I let him do all the work. He ran into my fist. I thought my wrist would snap. I jumped over the railing. He jumped over the railing.

I was getting worried by now and feeling doubtful, which is the worst state of all. None of the clean tricks had worked, and next he would ruin me.

When he came down I fixed it so he would land on one foot. While he was busy with balance I tried for his face again but with the edge of the hand this time and none of those Queensberry locations. When he ducked away from that he ducked into my knee with a sound like a watermelon. This snapped him back up and when that angle was right I whipped across with one elbow. Benotti said, “Gaa,” or something.

We were both breathing hard but Benotti was down. We had pretty well torn up the flowerbed. He was down and I was up but I couldn’t think of a single damn thing which would sound significant. “Stay away from Louie,” I said, and walked off.

The kids and the mamma were in the kitchen. They were eating, like the old man had told them.

Chapter 4

I
was over an hour late when I got to Lippit’s apartment and not much to show for it. I had managed to learn nothing new since being with Louie, except how Benotti looked through a screen door and then how he looked on the flowerbed. And that he and I were not apt to be friends. Also, I had lost a button on the front of my jacket.

I rang the bell and hoped that the party was fine, busy and not too attentive. Pat opened the door and I could hear this was a very quiet party. The first thing everybody would notice, I had lost a button.

“Hi, Jack,” she said. “You’re late.”

“Yes. Is everybody….”

“You lost a button.”

“All right.”

“Aren’t you coming in?”

She left the door open for me and walked through the little anteroom holding one arm bent on her back and her hand to the top of her zipper. The zipper ran up her midline but not very high up so as to show more of the girl. Similarly, in front. It wasn’t a formal, because her pretty legs showed, but it was one of those five to ten numbers, to cover cocktails, dinner and whatever you do at ten in the evening.

“You’ve got to help me with my zipper,” she said and walked on ahead into the front room.

“What kind of a party—” but she didn’t hear me, having passed through the door.

It was a very quiet party. When I was through the door I saw that there wasn’t any party. Just Patty and me.

“Aren’t you coming in?” she said again.

“Am I early or late?”

“You’ve got to help me with my zipper.”

“In other words, I’m that early.”

“Late. They’re gone.”

“What kind of a—”

“Jack. For heaven’s sake, I can’t stand here and hold this thing forever.”

I closed the door, leaned up against it for an effective moment, and smiled at Pat She didn’t smile back but she looked good just the same. She was holding the dress front and rear but that didn’t matter too much because Pat had a figure you look at, and you try to discount what she’s wearing.

“For heaven’s sake, Jack.”

“Patty, let me help you with that zipper.”

“No!”

We had that kind of a relationship. It always came out no.

“Walter Lippit trusts me,” I said, “my friends trust me, even I myself….”

“All right,” she said. “Just remember it goes up, not down.”

The thing was, this dress had no straps. She sat down on the big couch, her back turned to me, and I sat down behind her. Pat had brown hair with a lot of lights in it and cut short all around. This left me a fine view of her neck, shoulders, back and the whole thing looked very prettily naked.

“How come the party’s over?”

“Are you getting that zipper fixed?”

“If you’ll get your hand out of the way here, maybe….”

“All right. But I’m holding on in front, Jack St. Louis, so no shenanigans are going to do you any good anyway.”

“I look upon this the way a mechanic would.”

“All right.”

“A mechanic who loves his work.”

“Okay. You just—Jack!”

I gave her a slow kiss on the curve of her neck and she didn’t dare move because of the zipper. I was holding on to it and when she moved it went down.

“Jack, please! This just makes me shiver.”

“That’s very small potatoes compared to what it does to me.”

“Then why don’t you stop it!”

“I adore you.”

“I know what you adore.”

“That’s what I said, Patty.”

I worked on the zipper. The problem was that it wouldn’t lock but kept sliding each time she took a breath.

“What are you doing back there, Jack?”

“I was very honestly studying the problem of this zipper, right this moment.”

“Well, hurry up. We’re late.”

“The party’s over.”

“They all went to the club,” she said. “When Carey came he started talking business with Walter and they all got upset. Walter said—Jack!”

“Was that cold?”

“I’m getting mad, Jack.”

“Why did they go to the club?”

“Because Walter wanted those labor people to come, too. And he didn’t want that to be here.”

“You know what would be best, Patty? You should just take this dress off and then maybe I could do a regular job on this.”

“I know what kind of a regular job.”

“And the zipper too. Honest, Patty.”

“Jack!”

I put my hands on her bare shoulders and she couldn’t do very much about that because she was holding the dress up in front.

“It just makes you shiver. I know.”

“Jack, please. You’re supposed to—”

“I will.”

“You’re supposed to go too. They’re waiting for you.”

“Good.”

“I mean now. Right now.”

“Yes.”

I pulled her around a little and turned her face and held it that way for an earnest kiss.

“No,” she said.

I went back to the kiss. Then she said, “Jack, it’s all the way down. The zipper….”

I switched her around and put my hands on her back where the zipper used to be and to hell with the mechanical interest.

“No!”

Her hands were still in the way. She was still holding the dress in front and I could feel her knuckles where she should be soft.

“Jack, if you don’t stop that,” she said, and later, with a little less breath, “Please, Jack. Walter wouldn’t like it.”

“He’d be mad.”

“I know That’s what I meant.”

“We won’t tell him.”

“You’re hurting my hands.”

“Move them.”

“No!”

I gave her a kiss and leaned her back on the couch. As soon as she noticed that maneuver she put back her hands, to keep herself up, but that left the dress mostly to its own devices. When she tried to take care of that error she had to move her hands and I got her down on the couch. And she couldn’t get her hands back in front because I was too close.

“Don’t get mad,” I said. “Because if you wriggle too much—”

She held still.

“Gimme a kiss.”

She moved her head to one side and I got her ear.

“No!”

I moved my hands away from her back so she would lie more comfortably. “—no.”

With that “no” I felt much less uncertain and I leaned up on my elbows and smiled down at her.

“Patty, if you’ll let me have that dress, like I said, I’ll be able to do….”

“I know what you want to do.”

“You sensed that, Patty. You just sensed that without my having to tell you a thing.”

“Don’t! Don’t move away, I’m all bare in front!”

“I sensed that.”

I stayed close to her because why move and because she was holding me that way. Then we didn’t talk for a while, but when I gave her a chance she said:

“I told you, Jack. You’re supposed to
be
there.”

“I’ll be late.”

“They’re going to wonder. And Walter, he’s going to wonder!”

“I’ll explain to him. I’ll explain why.”

“Don’t you dare!”

“Hold still.”

“Don’t you dare!”

“You think I’m crazy?”

“Yes!”

“I wouldn’t spoil that for you. Walter Lippit’s all right.”

“Don’t tell me about Walter!”

“You don’t think he’s all right?”

“Of course he’s all right!” she said. “I
like
Walter.”

“Don’t yell in my ear.”

“Better than you, I like him.”

“That’s only because you have never given yourself, and, of course, me, the most elementary chance which both you and I….”

“I don’t
mean
that, Jack St. Louis. Let me up. No!—I was talking about how he helps me.”

“Your career. Ah yes. Your career.”

“You
know
I’m a good singer.”

“You’re much better, given half a chance, in more elemental….”