"Thompson, Jim - Wild Town" - читать интересную книгу автора (Thompson Jim)

She was the last customer in the place, the only remaining person aside from Bugs and Ford. An ash-blonde, she had a kind of washed-out but interesting prettiness; full, high breasts, and a waist approximately half the circumference of her hips.
"Now, that was a hell of a thing to do!" she said angrily. "Honestly, Lou Ford! I--I---could just absolutely murder you!"
"Told you to keep out of these joints," Ford said. "Told 'em to keep you out."
"And just who are you to order me around? Where do you get off at telling me what to do with my own money?"
"But it ain't your own," Ford said gently. "Might not be none of your own either, if you got hard-pressed and had to start grabbin'. No, sir, sure might not be, and that's a fact."
The woman looked at him sulkily. "Well," she said. "Well, anyway, you didn't need to act like _this!_"
"No?" Ford shrugged. "Well, maybe not. But, look--I want you to meet a fella. . . Mrs. Hanlon, Mr. McKenna."
Her eyes swept Bugs contemptuously, taking in the worn clothes, the run-down shoes, the tired haggard face. Then she reddened, for far from flinching, she found Bugs looking her over in exactly the same way; adding her up point by point, and arriving at an obviously unflattering total.
"_Well!_" she said, unconsciously sucking in her breath. And then she smiled suddenly and extended her hand. "I'm very glad to meet you, Mr.--Mr. McKenna, is it?"
"Yeah. That's right, Mrs.--Mrs. Hanlon?"
He grinned at her insolently. But Joyce Hanlon refused to be offended. She moved in on him, clinging to his hand, until her breasts were almost against his body. She looked up at him through silky eyelashes, spoke in the voice of a plaintive child.
"I'm sorry. Don't be mad, hmmm? Pretty please? Pretty please with sugar on it?"
Bugs had no defense for that kind of stuff. He turned six different colors at once; mumbled desperately that s-sure, he wasn't angry and he hoped she wasn't and he was sorry, too, and--and so on, until he was sure he must sound like the world's biggest horse's ass.
At last Ford rescued him with the suggestion that they get out of the place. Go somewhere they could talk. They went to one of the old-town restaurants, with Joyce holding to Bugs's arm. And strangely it didn't fluster him much now. When she sat down in the booth opposite him and Ford, he missed the pressure on his biceps, the intimate, secretive probing of her fingers.
A waitress brought coffee. Ford brought up the subject of the house dick's job, stating Bugs's qualifications along with a casual mention of his criminal record.
"Plenty husky and gutsy. Been a big-city dick. An' like you can see, he's a real friendly fella to boot. Shouldn't ought to matter much that he's done a few things that wasn't exactly legal."
"It shouldn't?" Joyce looked at him doubtfully. "I mean, well, no, it shouldn't. It certainly wouldn't matter to me, I know. But . . ."
She stared, frowning, into Ford's eyes, seeking some clue to his reasoning. The deputy looked back at her blandly. "Well, it won't matter to Mis-ter Hanlon, then," he said. "People's all alike, the way I figger. All kind of brothers under the skin."
"Oh, Lou! You corny so-and-so. But seriously--"
"Ain't never been nothin' but serious. I'm one of these Pag-lee-atchee fellas, serious as all hell behind a mask of laughter. So you just do like I say. Take Bugs, Mr. McKenna, here, right to the head man, so's he don't get lost or strayed in the application-blank stage. And Mis-ter Hanlon'll sign him up as fast as fox-hair."
"I don't think so. The mere fact that I want him hired will be enough to get him turned down. I'm perfectly willing to do it, Bugs"--she used the nickname easily, slanting a smile at him--"but I know how Mike is.',
Bugs nodded uncomfortably. He started to say that they could forget the whole thing as far as he was concerned: he didn't want to be pushed off on anyone. But Ford was already talking:
"Seems to me you _don't_ know how he is," he said. "Or what he is. Hard-headed. Long-shot player. Can't run his own game, he'll tackle the other fella's, try to take the play away from him. That's your husband, honey, and I don't figger he'll step out of character with Bugs."
"Mmm, yes. I see what you mean." She took a thoughtful sip of her coffee and pushed the cup aside. "I think you're right, Lou. Now, do I mention that I met Bugs through you, or--?"
"It's up to you, but it don't make much difference. He'd probably think it, even if you didn't tell him."
"And don't you know it! Trust him not to give anyone the benefit of the doubt!"
"Well, doubts is cheap these days," Ford said. "Goin' at the same rate as their benefits, which was nothing-minus the last I heard." He slid out of the booth and stood up. "Guess I better run along, now that we're all squared away. Some fellas I know are leavin' town, and I want to give 'em a send-off."
"Have fun," Joyce smiled and flirted a hand at him. "I'll let you know how everything comes out."
"And thanks," Bugs said gruffly. "Thanks a lot."
"What for? Ain't done nothin' to call for thanks," Ford declared. "No, sir, I sure ain't. And that's a fact."

3
Most of the Hanlon employees worked the more or less standard long-day, short-day of the hotel world. A shift came on duty at seven in the morning, quit at noon, returned at six and remained until eleven. The following day, this shift would work a short-day--from noon until six--with the opposite shift catching the double-watch long day.
The exceptions to this routine were night workers, certain professional and maintenance personnel, employees of the store-room and laundry, Bugs McKenna, and Mr. Olin Westbrook, the executive manager. Bugs was on call at all times. But there was rarely any need for him during the day--he had been called only once during the month of his employment--so, in practice, he was a night worker. Mr. Olin Westbrook, on the other hand, not only was supposed to be available at all hours of the day, but invariably had to be.
Oh, perhaps he could retire to a checked-out room for an hour or so. Freshen up with a shower, or catch a few winks of sleep. But these brief periods were more tantalizing than satisfying; he couldn't really rest and relax. If someone didn't buzz him--and someone usually did--he would be expecting them to. And the expectation, coupled with the worry over what might be going on during his absence, kept him on nerve ends.
Westbrook was a hotel man of the old school, of the days when it was a pleasure to stop at a hotel instead of an adventure into indifferent food and accommodations, insolently or ignorantly administered. Now, at the Hanlon, he tried to do too much with too pitifully little. The job might be killing him, but he had to have it. He was in his late fifties, and for the last ten years he had been fired from every job he held. So it was this job or nothing.
. . . At eleven o'clock at night, he was in his mezzaninefloor office, re-auditing the hotel's books for the last three months. It was the third time he had been through them, and the result had been the same each time. There was a broad, fixed smile on his face: a frozen grimace. In his mind, deliberately overlaid with protective dullness, was terror.
Cold sober, Westbrook had many of the reactions of a man who is dead drunk. The direst personal catastrophe had no meaning for him. He could be face to face with a fact, yet remain completely withdrawn from it. He had been that way for years--God, how many years? Only when the alcoholic content of his blood was at a certain level could he think and act as he should.
At last he pushed aside the papers and took a pint bottle from his desk. It was about a third full. It was the last of three pints with which he had started the day. Westbrook drank half of it at a swallow and lighted a cigarette. After a few puffs on the cigarette, he drank the remainder. Warmth came back into his small paunchy body. His fixed, foolish smile gave way to a scowl of concentration.
_Well?_ he thought. And then: _I don't know_.
_But you've got to! It's your tail if you don't. You hired Dudley, did it over the old man's objections. You said that he was a hell of a good auditor, and you'd vouch for him personally. And now that the son-of-a-bitch has done this_ . . .
_I know! I know all that, dammit. But I still don't know. . . Perhaps if I had another drink--And of course I'll close out the watch before I take it; get the night shift under way_ . . .
Mr. Westbrook stood up resolutely, ignoring a small and despairing voice of warning. Rolling down his sleeves, he ref astened the links of the French cuffs and rebuttoned his fawn-colored vest. He put on a black broadcloth coat, carefully adjusting the white linen handkerchief in its breast pocket. Then, after swiftly examining his fingernails and flicking a speck of dust from one shoe, he stepped out onto the mezzanine.
Rosalie Vara, the mezz' maid, was dusting furniture a few feet away from him. Studying her from the rear, Westbrook again complimented himself for assigning her to her present duties. She would have got herself raped if he hadn't. Any girl who looked like she did--who could easily have passed for white and yet admitted to being a Negro-- was obviously too stupid to look after herself. All that was necessary was opportunity, which, on the job he had given her, was practically nonexistent.
Westbrook let his eyes linger on her a moment longer, his ultra-cynical mind again considering the possibility that instead of being stupid she might be very, very smart. Considering it, and again rejecting it. She couldn't be working a gimmick. He knew every trick and dodge in the book, and if there was any way that a gal could pull a swif tie by admitting that she was a Negro . . . well, there just wasn't. She was simply dumb, that was all. Too damned dull-witted to tell a lie. So he'd put her in a job where no one could take advantage of her.
Of course, she was upstairs occasionally. It was unavoidable, since all the day maids knocked off at eleven o'clock, and there were a few rooms, like Bugs McKenna's, which had to be put in order before the morning shift came on. For ninety-five per cent of the time, however, she worked as she was working now. Out in the open. Away from the danger of private bedrooms and locked doors.
Westbrook took a final look at the girl's delicately rounded bottom; a look of unconscious yearning. Then he turned away conscientiously and descended the curving staircase to the lobby. He walked with his head tilted slightly upward, as though about to sniff the air for some evil smell. His pale puffy face was as self-assuredly haughty as that of a pure-bred Pekingese, to which it bore some slight resemblance. People were tempted to smile at their first glimpse of Westbrook. But the very briefest contact with the little man was sufficient to still the temptation. Westbrook had begun his career as a page boy. Working his way upward, he had become not only highly efficient but exceedingly tough--a man who could cope with the hurlyburly hotel world at every level and on its own terms.
The staircase terminated in the lobby near the three front elevators. Two of the cars were out of service, as they should have been at this hour. The third was being manned by a member of the day crew, which it definitely should not have been.
Westbrook glanced up the lobby to the front-office desks. He moved toward them ominously. The youngish night clerk, Leslie Eaton, was in the cashier's cage. (The clerk handled all front-office duties at night.) Chaffing with him, his back turned to the lobby, was the dayshift bell captain. Neither he nor the clerk noted Westbrook's approach. They were suddenly made aware of it by a bellowed inquiry as to what the hell was going on.
The captain jumped and whirled. Westbrook let out another bellow. "You working this shift now? Well? Are you too stupid to talk? What about you, Eaton? You were doing plenty of yapping a minute ago!"