KNOW MORE (gotta know, gotta know), but you can’t help it, you fall asleep, and from there the story takes other turnings of its own. You become her lover, or else the cop, and the other guy is the fat man in the white suit and panama hat you once tailed through the alley. Are you his double? No, this is a different caper. Nevertheless, you are quite fat and you cannot move very fast. You also have the disadvantage of being dressed in women’s underwear. Maybe you are the Flame person, not the lover or the cop. The widow is in it, but more like the chief of police. Her brother is in it somewhere and he is said also to be wearing women’s underpants and a bra. You both have toe tags. Is he your double? No, you don’t have a bra. Things are becoming clear at last, the case is almost solved. At the same time, you are about to be shot. Neither happens. You wake up.
I think Joe put something in my drink to knock me out, you say.
Yeah. It’s called alcohol. It’s morning, handsome, and your clothes are here. We had another visit from Blue and his boys last night. Time to hit the road, Phil. You’re not safe in this place.
When does a man get a breakfast in this life? you want to know, but the question is received as a gratuitous comment. You return Flame’s bloomers and pull on your own clothes, laundered, pressed, and folded: the old black pinstripe suit with the baggy knees and threadbare elbows, a white shirt, frayed but clean and crisply starched, dark tie, and black socks and shoes, holes in the heels of the former, in the soles of the other. Blanche has already folded a white handkerchief into the jacket lapel pocket, dropped a loaded bill clip in the pants. Collar and tie pins, cuff links, rumpled fedora, borrowed .45 in your trenchcoat pocket. In short, a somewhat seedy version of any self-respecting gangster’s threads.
There’s a basement link to the bookies next door, they’ll show you the safe route from there, Flame says, handing you sandwiches and a bottle in a brown paper bag and a passkey and slapping your butt affectionately. See you, baby.
WHEN YOUR LATE DEPARTED CLIENT, THE VEILED widow, turned up on your couch in your darkened office after your mazy trials in the alley, she also had a story about a brother. My brother has come to the city, she said from under her veil, peaked by the tip of her nose. He says he has come to protect me, but he is a naïve boy, easily influenced, and I fear for him here. And for myself.
The football player.
No, basketball. Does that make a difference?
His hands.
Oh, I see. His hands?
Listen, I’m bushed, kid. Mind if I stretch out there beside you while you tell me your story?
I certainly do mind, Mr. Noir. You stay where you are. My brother, as I have suggested, is a likeable easy-going fellow, a playful smalltown boy with a big heart who, in spite of our father’s stern discipline, is inclined to get into ridiculous trouble from time to time. Often this is due to his rather singular passion for hardboiled detective novels and films. He is an impressionable fellow and he likes to act out what he has seen or read, or perhaps he feels compelled to, driven by some inner need to create a persona for himself, otherwise lacking.
Well, there are worse lives to take up than a private eye’s, you grumbled, somewhat defensively. Her hands, not those of a basketball player, were folded softly on her belly. Not much flesh was visible; you had to enjoy what there was. They were crowned, as a small knoll might be crowned by a lighthouse, by her large glittering ring. A lure. For catching bigger fish than you.
I am afraid, Mr. Noir, that it excites him rather to emulate the villains. She sighed and her hands rose and fell as if lifted by a gentle wave. So he has robbed some banks, turned to gambling and easy women, killed a few people, and so on, behavior that may well be tolerated in the city, but is not acceptable in our little town. He submits meekly to our
I think Joe put something in my drink to knock me out, you say.
Yeah. It’s called alcohol. It’s morning, handsome, and your clothes are here. We had another visit from Blue and his boys last night. Time to hit the road, Phil. You’re not safe in this place.
When does a man get a breakfast in this life? you want to know, but the question is received as a gratuitous comment. You return Flame’s bloomers and pull on your own clothes, laundered, pressed, and folded: the old black pinstripe suit with the baggy knees and threadbare elbows, a white shirt, frayed but clean and crisply starched, dark tie, and black socks and shoes, holes in the heels of the former, in the soles of the other. Blanche has already folded a white handkerchief into the jacket lapel pocket, dropped a loaded bill clip in the pants. Collar and tie pins, cuff links, rumpled fedora, borrowed .45 in your trenchcoat pocket. In short, a somewhat seedy version of any self-respecting gangster’s threads.
There’s a basement link to the bookies next door, they’ll show you the safe route from there, Flame says, handing you sandwiches and a bottle in a brown paper bag and a passkey and slapping your butt affectionately. See you, baby.
WHEN YOUR LATE DEPARTED CLIENT, THE VEILED widow, turned up on your couch in your darkened office after your mazy trials in the alley, she also had a story about a brother. My brother has come to the city, she said from under her veil, peaked by the tip of her nose. He says he has come to protect me, but he is a naïve boy, easily influenced, and I fear for him here. And for myself.
The football player.
No, basketball. Does that make a difference?
His hands.
Oh, I see. His hands?
Listen, I’m bushed, kid. Mind if I stretch out there beside you while you tell me your story?
I certainly do mind, Mr. Noir. You stay where you are. My brother, as I have suggested, is a likeable easy-going fellow, a playful smalltown boy with a big heart who, in spite of our father’s stern discipline, is inclined to get into ridiculous trouble from time to time. Often this is due to his rather singular passion for hardboiled detective novels and films. He is an impressionable fellow and he likes to act out what he has seen or read, or perhaps he feels compelled to, driven by some inner need to create a persona for himself, otherwise lacking.
Well, there are worse lives to take up than a private eye’s, you grumbled, somewhat defensively. Her hands, not those of a basketball player, were folded softly on her belly. Not much flesh was visible; you had to enjoy what there was. They were crowned, as a small knoll might be crowned by a lighthouse, by her large glittering ring. A lure. For catching bigger fish than you.
I am afraid, Mr. Noir, that it excites him rather to emulate the villains. She sighed and her hands rose and fell as if lifted by a gentle wave. So he has robbed some banks, turned to gambling and easy women, killed a few people, and so on, behavior that may well be tolerated in the city, but is not acceptable in our little town. He submits meekly to our
Similar Books
