Whistling in the Dark (10 page)

"No trouble at all," Kent said. "Convincing, wasn't I? Good enough to be on the stage."

One of his cohorts spoke up. "You sure about him?"

Kent's smile thinned. "I made sure. He won't go to the police." He shoved Sutton into the arms of the other two and began to search his pockets, starting with his overcoat. He found the wallet and its pathetic contents right away. "Four dollars?" The wallet and money went into Kent's pocket and he resumed the search. "Where's the rest of it? You only had one drink, I know. You're too sober for more. Where is the goddamned rest of it?"

He punctuated the demand with a fist to the gut. Sutton doubled over, shocked at the pain and struggling for breath. He gasped, "That's all--"

"You're a lying son of a bitch. Expensive suit and shoes, three dollar drinks. Do I look stupid to you?"

Sutton turned up his palm to expose the calluses. "You didn't make sure enough," he pushed out, still breathless.

One of the men behind him snorted. "Queers putting you wise, Kent?"

"Shut your fucking mouth." Kent shoved Sutton again, nearly sending all three of them sprawling. "I'll get more than four dollars out of you."

The blow landed on his cheek, jerking his head backward, and the pain from the first punch faded into nothing beside the pain spreading through his head. The blow after that he barely felt, somewhere below his ribs. Hands pulled open his coat, dug through his pockets and, finding nothing, became fists again. He got an arm loose and swung blindly, to hit a bony jaw--and succeeded in making it worse for himself. They pushed him against the bricks and pain burst so sharp and sudden, he cried out. But as quickly as it came, it went, and everything else followed.

- Eleven -

Sutton woke to feel a hand, cool and comforting, on his forehead. He could make no sense of the muffled voices nearby and he couldn't find the strength to inquire before he drifted away.

The next time he woke, everything had gone quiet. He was draped with blankets, a cottony cocoon over limbs that had been still too long. If he had died and this was Hell, it was rather more tolerable than he'd expected.

He didn't want to, but he went to sleep again. No dreams came to jar him awake, and he was glad because he had a sense that waking hard would hurt. Hands returned occasionally, to smooth the blankets and touch his forehead. The voices, still not clear, reassured him all the same. He concluded he was in the hospital--unless Hell was populated by soft-spoken nurses, which seemed unlikely.

He turned his head, hoping to see something more than the white expanse of ceiling, and was rewarded with a row of ivory-linen beds and two ghostly figures trotting around between them. It was much the same as the hospital he'd lived in for a while after the war. His arm hadn't hurt right away, then, and whatever was broken now didn't hurt much either. But it would hurt later, and quite a bit.

For now, he was grateful to lie still and watch the white-gowned nurses glide from bed to bed. One would eventually come his way and he could find out what was broken without having to test it for himself.

"Good evening," said a voice at his elbow. Sutton looked up in confusion. He hadn't seen her moving to his bed and he wondered if he'd fallen asleep again.

"Good evening," he said without much of a voice at all, but the woman seemed pleased with his response.

"They're gray," she said cheerfully. "And Therese and I were certain they'd be blue. Now, dear, can you tell me your name?"

"Sutton." The peaceful haze began to melt away. "I've slept--how long?"

"You were brought in Saturday night. Today's Tuesday. Can you remember what happened? Do you know who robbed you?"

Nearly three days? It couldn't be. He tried to sit up and she pressed him back down. "No, not just yet. You've taken a nasty knock on the head. Nothing broken, but you're bruised enough to hurt like the devil for a few days."

She was right. Just trying to sit up turned his head into an aching weight. "I have to go. My job. If I haven't lost it already--"

"You're hurt and in the hospital, Sutton. They'll understand. Tell me whom I might call for you. Your family must be worried."

"You can't call anyone. I've no family here." He was awake now, painfully awake in mind and body, and he couldn't have said which felt worse. The nurse pushed for details, but he sensed she must already know why he'd been lurking in alleyways in the middle of the night. She might be too decent to put it into words, but she recognized him for what he was. He couldn't tell her anything more. If they had him arrested, he knew he wouldn't get away with a warning this time.

When the nurse went to find a doctor, Sutton got out of bed. It was a slow and miserable process just to get to his feet, but once he was standing, he thought he might be all right. As he moved past the row of beds, none of the other patients seemed to notice. Most slept, but one sat staring into the distance. Soldiers, men his age still recuperating from their injuries. It was a stark reminder of where he'd been thirteen months ago. He had been one of them, then--an honorable man who'd done the best he could. Since then, he had proved he was not so honorable or decent. What word had the judge used? Degenerate. It was as ugly as anything else he'd been called, and as true.

He found his clothes and a linen closet where he could dress. It was a wonder Kent and the others hadn't stolen his suit and overcoat. Perhaps they'd meant to and someone had come upon them and prevented it. As Sutton worked to button his coat with hands that wouldn't stop shaking, he tried to think what he would tell Ida and Esther. Ida would be furious and quite within her rights to fire him. What made him feel worse was that Esther wouldn't be furious, just disappointed. She'd been so kind and he had repaid that by vanishing on her. Though he'd surely lost his job, he had to apologize to Esther. He didn't know what he could say, but he owed her that.

When visitors occupied the elderly nun at the lobby desk, he slipped out into the cold evening. He hadn't a dime in his pocket and his head throbbed, but he was fortunate Kent had done no worse to him. He wondered if the three of them had been apprehended or were still on the loose, luring others like him into their trap.

Other degenerates.

No wonder everyone regarded him with doubt and disapproval--maybe even revulsion. His brother, his father, the boys at school, the police--he could imagine what they thought when they looked at him. It had been easier once to pretend he was respectable. With David, there had been friendship first, then something more--something tender and sweet. And it had been much the same with Paul for the two weeks they'd fought side by side, until they'd both been hurt and sent home. While he had never been able to explain those feelings to anyone, he hadn't believed they were something to be ashamed of. At least, he hadn't wanted to believe it.

He knew what he'd hoped to find at the party. He couldn't deny he longed for more than just a new friendship to fill his spare time and ease his loneliness. He'd wanted someone to catch his eye, make his blood race, steal his heart. Someone who would come to want him around all the time and miss him when he was away. Someone who would curl up with him so he wouldn't wake in the small hours and wonder if he were the only soul left in the world.

But wandering off with Kent--and the consequences of that decision--took the bloom off those romantic notions and left him feeling base and contemptible.

He stumbled into a doorway sheltered from the wind and leaned against the wall, needing its support. If he was going to pass out, better to do it someplace besides the middle of the sidewalk. He could still hardly grasp that in one stupid moment, he'd wrecked everything. He could have gone somewhere besides a hotel bar and he might have never tangled with Kent. If Ida wouldn't take him back, where could he go? Not home--not now. They'd see his bruises and they'd know how he came by them. He'd put his family through enough shame.

Where did one go when even New York wasn't far enough away? He could hop a tramp steamer bound for some remote spot. That life sounded lonely, too. He supposed he could get used to anything, even a hard life aboard a ship thousands of miles from the familiar. But it disheartened him to even consider it.

The clouds had gone black and he could feel the occasional stinging cold droplet on his face. Not wanting to be caught in a deluge, he pushed himself to put one foot in front of the other, staying near the buildings so he could hang on to something each time he had to stop to catch his breath. He didn't know the time, but with just a couple of blocks to go, he thought he could make it to the restaurant before closing. Then it occurred to him that Ida could have closed early. She sometimes did when a storm threatened.

Dreading the thought of being stuck outdoors all night in bad weather, Sutton forced himself to get moving again. The wind numbed his face as he trudged along a nearly deserted sidewalk.

Despite the rain, he stayed on the corner as he tried to put together an explanation for his absence. He'd gotten a glimpse of his battered face in a mirror in the window of Rosen's furniture shop. Ida and Esther would know he'd been in some sort of fight. He could tell them he'd been robbed and hoped they discerned no more than that. If his face was red with shame, maybe they would attribute it to the bruises.

With the lies and half-truths on his tongue, it took everything in him to go inside. The restaurant was toasty warm, as always at the end of the day, and humming with the chatter of diners. He wanted to just stand by the door and absorb the warmth and the host of smells awakening hunger despite the nausea that came and went. A chair at an unoccupied table nearby looked inviting, but as he considered it, Dan came through the cellar door, lugging a pail of apples. It should have occurred to him that Ida might quickly replace him. Of course she needed someone and Dan was a smart boy, big for his age, and probably reliable. Certainly more so than her former errand boy.

"Sutton?" Esther moved past him with a tray in hand and placed it on a table before turning back. "Sutton, where in the world--" Her eyes widened at the sight of his face. "What happened? Were you robbed?"

He just nodded. The lies wouldn't come and the truth couldn't. "I'm all right. Only bruised--"

"Heavens. Why didn't you let us know? It's been days and Ida figured you'd gone for good."

"She's hired Danny?"

Guilt shadowed the sympathy in her face. "I told her we ought to find out where you'd gone, because I didn't think you'd leave your things. You might not have wanted to take the work clothes, but your suitcase--" She shook her head. "I had a mind to send a message to your folks, but I didn't have the money." She reached out to touch his cheek. "I'm so sorry. God, Sutton, what they did to you."

He forced his voice to stay steady. "I hope you will forgive me for disappearing. I would hate to lose your friendship, Esther. You've been so kind."

Her face lit with affection. "You poor thing. Sit and I'll bring you a cup of coffee. We can talk later, okay?" She patted his arm and pushed him toward the table before she went.

But he couldn't sit. If Ida saw him, he didn't suppose she would be as generous as Esther. And there was no use in making Dan feel bad about winning his job. It would be better to go.

Remembering his suitcase, he knew Esther might feel obliged to contact his parents about it and that wasn't a good idea. He would have to take it with him. One leaden step at a time he made it upstairs, to find the suitcase outside his door. The sinking regret in his stomach was worse than the nausea. He couldn't go home. He didn't want to think about the shame and public embarrassment his parents had dealt with since his expulsion. They would have been spared that if he had just died in the war, instead of returning with his arm entombed in plaster from collarbone to fingertip, his future forever changed. His father would have employed him, but he'd chosen to go back to school--and that hadn't lasted long.

Now there was no going back. There was no going anywhere because there was no place that would welcome him, no haven where the eventual questions wouldn't leave him exposed and outcast.

He was so tired--too tired to even curse his own stupidity.

Someone was coming up the stairs--Ida, to take her opportunity to rail at him. She might as well have the satisfaction of turning him out. He picked up his suitcase and, briefly closing his eyes when the effort made his head spin, he turned, to find himself face to face with the last person in the world he cared to see.

"Where have you been?" Jack was cheerful as ever. "We thought you'd caught the train for--oh, Jesus." Sutton ducked his head too late to hide his face. Jack touched his chin gently, then let loose a low whistle. "I hope the other guy looks worse."

"Other guys." Sutton coughed, trying to rid his voice of the hoarse edge. "I believe they came through all right. A few dollars ahead, in fact."

Jack grimaced in sympathy. "Welcome to New York. Guess we should've warned you--"

"It's no one's fault but mine." Which only made him feel worse. "Anyway, I'm glad Dan's got the job. He'll be able to buy his own radio parts."

A corner of Jack's mouth lifted. "A good thing, since I've got nothing left to trade."

"I'd give you my suitcase but it's all I have left, myself."

"Yeah, hang on to it. Always good to have something to hock. So--" A note of concern superseded the humor in Jack's voice. "You're leaving?"

"Yes--" Sutton laid a steadying hand on the bannister. "Tell Esther good-bye for me, would you? She's busy and I didn't get to say a proper farewell. So if you would."

"Sure. You don't want to wait around? Have some supper? You look like you could use a bite to eat."

"I'm all right. Thank you, Jack. I'm sorry..." He wasn't sure what he was sorry about, in Jack's case. He hadn't really thought they might be friends. "Well, I'm sorry to have to go so suddenly."