Home is the Sailor (13 page)

Then the whole thing would come out. And even if Jerry Wolkowysk had been Lippy Saltz, by disposing of the body I’d turned what I’d done into murder.

I sipped at the drink I didn’t want, tugging at my collar, watching Wally towel glasses. His fat face shone with excitement as he talked on and on and on, like a half-witted parrot.

“Wadda you know? Wadda you know, huh?” he asked me. “That slimy stinker Wolkowysk turning out to be Lippy Saltz. The nerve of him. A guy like him making a play for a sweet girl like Mrs. Nelson.”

I snarled at him. “Shut up.”

The rinse water was running in the drain. Wally didn’t hear me. He talked on.

“Why, if I’d known who the guy was, I’d a beat in his head with a bung starter. Instead of throwing him out on his tail. I’d a mashed him good. Then I’d a yelled for the cops. And maybe I’d a got a big reward, huh?”

It was hot in the bar. And still. I felt as if I were becalmed in the eye of a hurricane with not too distant winds building up to a blow. Then the bar stool began to revolve, faster and faster and faster.

“Hit him, Swede,” Corliss had said. “Hit him as hard as you can.”

I looked at my fist. I had. Then, instead of calling the cops, I’d disposed of the body, turning manslaughter into murder.

Wally started in again. “Boy. That Sophia Palanka dame must be some hot stuff, huh? I mean to get her hooks into a guy like Phillip E. Palmer the Third.” He leaned across the bar and confided, “Maybe they’re doing it even, huh? I mean when Lippy kills him.”

I yelled at him. “I told you to shut up.”

His fat baby-pink face turned red. “Why should I?”

“Because I said so.”

He was as big as I was, with plenty of beef under his fat. He started to get sore, then changed his mind. “Just as you say, Mr. Nelson,” he said meekly.

I stood up, gripping the lip of the bar. “Where can I contact Corliss?”

“That I wouldn’t know, Mr. Nelson.”

“You said this was her day to buy from the wholesalers.”

“It is.”

“What are their names?”

Wally shook his head. “Geez. She buys first one place, then another. I can give you a lot of names in Dago. But sometimes she even drives up to L.A. That’s where I think she is now.”

I grabbed him by the front of his shirt. “You’re lying to me.”

He protested, “Why should I lie to you, Mr. Nelson? If you want, I’ll give you a stack of receipted bills. A foot high.”

I released his shirt and sat back on the stool, then got up again and walked to the front door. I was too jumpy to sit still. I
had
to talk to Corliss before Green did. I had to warn her what to expect, warn her to keep her mouth shut, no matter how Green pounded at her.

“Is something wrong?” Wally asked.

“No. Nothing at all,” I told him. “I’ve been drinking too much, I guess.”

I debated asking him to lend me his Ford so I could drive into Dago and look for Corliss. I decided it wouldn’t be smart. San Diego is a big city. Three hundred and sixty-five thousand people live in it. I might drive down one street while Corliss drove down another and return to the court to find Green waiting. I didn’t want that to happen. I wanted to be on deck when Green talked to her.

I corked the bottle I’d been working on and put it in my pocket. “I’m going over to the cottage. If Corliss should call here, tell her to call me. Tell her it’s very important.” I added, lamely. “I — I want her to bring me something from Dago.”

“Yes, sir, Mr. Nelson,” Wally said. “If Mrs. Nelson should call, I’ll tell her.”

He leaned a little too hard on the “Mr.” I turned in the doorway and looked at him. His fat face was as sober as ever, but there was a certain quality to his voice that made it sound as if he was laughing. Inside. To himself.

I considered walking back and asking him what was so funny. But I’d met Wally’s kind before. He looked soft but he wasn’t. All it would mean was more trouble.

I walked out under the neon parrot and stood looking at the closed door of the office cottage. Now, with this new development, Mamie had said too much or not enough. I wanted another talk with her. Alone. A long talk.

I crunched across the gravel to the cottage. The screen door to the porch was hooked. I banged the wood. Then I rang the bell under the small metal plaque with the word “Manager” on it.

Meek opened the inside door. “Oh. It’s you, Mr. Nelson,” he said. He didn’t move out of the doorway.

I rattled the screen door. “If it’s not too much of an imposition, I’d like to talk to Mrs. Meek.”

Meek acted embarrassed. “Could you come back a little later, Mr. Nelson?”

“No,” I said flatly. “I want to talk to her right now.”

“Well,” he said. “Well.” He crossed the porch and unhooked the screen. “In that case, come in, Mr. Nelson.” He stepped aside to allow me to pass him. “I’ll see if I can wake her up. But I don’t know if I can.”

All the cottages were the same, one big room with a bath, a porch, and a carport. Mamie was lying on an unmade bed, bare-legged, in her slip, snoring soddenly. Her slip rose and fell with her breathing. There was an empty gin bottle on the floor and a small vial of red capsules that looked like seconal on the table by the bed. Her breathing was labored. Her lips drew tight across her teeth, then blew out as she exhaled. Her face was slack and unattractive. All of her charm was gone. She was just another drunken dame.

“What’s the idea?” I asked Meek.

He picked at the fuzz on his dirty sweater, nervously. “I’m sorry you should know about it, Mr. Nelson. But Mamie does this every once in a while.”

“You mean, goes off on one?”

“Yeah.” Meek tried to excuse her. “But only when she gets blue or depressed. And she was awfully blue about something this morning. She’s been blue since last night, in fact.”

“She didn’t say about what?”

“No. She didn’t.” Meek wiped his nose on the back of his hand. “Then the next thing I knew, this had happened. You want me to see if I can wake her?” He shook her. “Mamie. Wake up. Mr. Nelson wants to talk to you.”

Mamie snored on.

Meek started to shake her again.

“Don’t bother,” I told him. “Let her sleep.”

He drew a sheet over her, tardily. “Just as you say, Mr. Nelson.” He wiped his nose on his hand again. “And don’t worry about Mamie’s work. I can do hers as well as mine. I’ve done it before. Quite a few times.”

There was a sour bilgelike smell about the cottage. I edged toward the door.

Meek followed me. “And if you please, Mr. Nelson, don’t say anything to Mrs. Nelson. She fired the last couple she had for getting drunk. And Mamie and I like it here. We like the work.”

I said I wouldn’t say anything to Corliss.

“Thank you,” Meek said. “Thank you a
lot,
Mr. Nelson.”

He closed the door while I was still standing on the porch. I had the same feeling I’d had in the bar, that Meek was very amused by something.

I crossed the drive to Corliss’ cottage. The blinds were closed. The one big room was dark and smelled of Corliss. Without bothering to switch on the light, I lay down on the bed and waited. Thinking of a lot of things.

Love. A will-o’-the-wisp. St. Elmo’s fire. A biological urge. The chemical affinity of one body for another. The deep-rooted urge of the male to propagate his kind. A package of cigarettes. A Hershey bar. A ten-thousand-dollar mink coat. Five dollars.

I was too jumpy to rest. I walked to the window and looked out. The late afternoon was gray. As I looked out the window the purple neon parrot perched on the roof of the bar winked on. Its beady eyes, veiled by wisps of fog, had a somehow evil, waiting look.

I took my wallet from my pocket and looked at the bus ticket to Hibbing.

For some reason I felt trapped.

At five I began to drink again. It was almost seven when Corliss returned. I heard her car purr into the port. Then she slipped in the side door and stood in the room with her back against the door.

I was still standing in the dark, the only illumination the light slanting in through the blinds from the spotlighted palms. The light formed silver bars across her face and chest. Corliss looked tired. From her chest down she was in darkness.

“What’s the idea of standing there in the dark?” she asked me.

I asked her if she’d stopped at the bar.

“No,” Corliss said. “I didn’t. Why?”

I told her. “They’ve found Wolkowysk.”

Her white face moved up and down behind the silver bars as she swallowed. “Who found him? Sheriff Cooper?”

“No. Two surf fishermen. That is, they found the car.”

“But not his body?”

“No. The tide must have sucked it out.”

Corliss pushed through the silver bars of light and sat on the edge of the bed. “How do you know?”

I said, “Sheriff Cooper was here. About three o’clock this afternoon.”

Corliss took off her shoes. “He was?”

“Yeah.”

“Was he suspicious? Did he seem to suspect you?”

“Us,” I corrected her.

“Us, then.” Corliss pulled at the toes of her stockings.

I said, “He didn’t say. I think he was. They know he was in the bar that night. They know it wasn’t an accident.”

She laid back her coat. “Give me a cigarette. Please, Swede.”

I lighted a cigarette and gave it to her.

Corliss sucked at it until its tip glowed like a miniature running light. “Well, not finding his body is a break. Even if they are suspicious, they can’t do anything to us unless they find his body. Can they, Swede?”

I said, “I don’t know. Maybe. Maybe not. But their finding Wolkowysk’s car wasn’t the worst of it.”

“What do you mean?”

“There was an F.B.I. man with Cooper. A lad by the name of Green. Working out of L.A.”

The bars of light were across her hair now, setting it on fire. All I could see was her hair, her forehead, and her eyes. The eye Wolkowysk had punched was still slightly swollen. There was fear in her eyes. “An F.B.I. man? Why should the F.B.I. be interested in Jerry Wolkowysk?”

I said, “It seems Jerry Wolkowysk was an alias. His right name was Lippy Saltz.”

Corliss lighted the night light on the bed table. She looked small and worried and lovely. “Is that supposed to mean something to me?”

“You don’t know the name?”

“No.”

“Wolkowysk didn’t tell you his right name was Saltz the one time you went out with him?”

“No.”

“Did he tell you where he was from?”

“No.”

“But you do read the newspapers?”

“Of course.”

“Saltz was half of the murder team in that Phillip E. Palmer affair. In Chicago. He and a red-haired strip-teaser by the name of Sophia Palanka took Palmer for a quarter of a million dollars.”

Corliss pulled at the toes of her stockings again. When she looked up she was breathing harder than she had been. Her lower lip thrust out. “I knew he was no good. Look what he did to me. I’m glad you killed him. You hear me, Swede? I’m glad you killed him.”

I caught at her wrist. “For God’s sake, not so loud.”

“Well, I am.”

“All right. So you are. Shut up. Let’s keep it to ourselves.”

Corliss screamed, “Don’t yell at me.”

I screamed back, “I’m not yelling.”

I sat in an easy chair facing the bed. Corliss pulled her skirt up to her knees and unfastened her stockings. I looked away.

“What did you say the federal man’s name was?” Corliss asked.

“Green. Lyle Green.”

“And he and Cooper were here — when?”

“About three o’clock.”

Corliss looked at her watch. “Are they coming back?”

“They said they were.”

“What time?”

“They didn’t say.”

Corliss wriggled her bare toes in the loops of the white pile rug we’d bought to replace the one I’d burned. Then she squeezed her hair together with both hands and held it at the back of her neck.

“I’m scared, Swede.”

“So am I.”

She seemed glad to have company. “You are?”

“Yeah. I told you we shouldn’t try to hide the body.”

Corliss released her hair. “I know you did.” She swallowed. “But I was just about as scared then as I am now. Did the federal man say he wanted to talk to me?”

“He wants to talk to both you and Mamie.”

“Why?”

I quoted Green. “He said, ‘It can just be that during their one date Wolkowysk told her something that might be of interest to us.’ž”

“But he didn’t,” Corliss protested. “He didn’t tell me anything about himself. What else did he ask you?”

“What your background was.”

“What did you tell him?”

“What you told me.”

“Oh,” Corliss said. “Oh.” She squeezed her hair to the back of her neck again in a nervous gesture.

I said, “Then he asked Wally how old you and Mamie were and if you were blonde or brunette. Wally said Mamie was brunette and you were blonde. Then Green asked me if you were a natural or an artificial blonde. I told him natural.”

One corner of Corliss’ mouth turned down. “You ought to know.” She stood up, pulled her dress over her head, and laid it across the back of a chair. All she was wearing under it was a garter belt and bra. “Well, there’s no use sitting here crying in our beer. What’s done is done.” She padded barefooted to the dresser and began to comb her hair back, preparatory to tying it. “I’m going to take a quick shower. Then let’s go up and eat. I’m starved.”

She unhooked her bra and scratched where the strap had been. As she did, she dropped the comb. She stooped and picked it up.

I said, “Before you shower, come here a moment. Please.”

Corliss padded back across the room and stood in front of me. “Again? Before we eat?”

I patted my face with my handkerchief. “Sit down. I want to talk to you.”

Corliss sat on the edge of the bed. Then she fluffed a pillow and lay back, one knee raised and waving slightly, the way it had in Tijuana. “All right. Go ahead. I’m listening.”

I leaned forward in the chair. “Why are Meek and Wally laughing at me? Why should Mamie tell me I’m in danger, that I’m being played for a fall guy?”

Corliss settled her head more comfortably on the pillow. “I haven’t the least idea what you’re talking about.” Her eyes narrowed. “Are you drunk again, Swede?”