Wild Town (4 page)

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.”

M
ost 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 mezzanine-floor 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 refastened 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 swiftie 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 hurly-burly 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!”

“I—I—I’m sorry, sir,” the clerk stammered. “I m-mean—”

“Been getting a lot of kicks on you. Not answering your phones. Chasing all over the house instead of staying where you belong. I know, I know”—Westbrook made a chopping motion with his hand. “You have a little auditing to do. Have to check up on the coffee-shop and the valet and so on. But that’s no reason to be gone from the desk for thirty or forty minutes at a time.”

“I’m not!—I mean,” Eaton corrected himself, “I’m not aware that I have been absent for more than a few minutes.” He was a rosy-cheeked young man addicted to college-cut clothes.

Westbrook looked at him distastefully, advised him that he was aware of it
now,
and turned back to the captain. “Well,” he demanded, “where’s the night bellboy? What’s that day man doing on the elevator?”

“We’re both working over,” the captain shrugged sullenly. “Night boys haven’t shown up yet.”

“Why not?”

“Don’t know. Look, Mr. Westbrook,” the captain protested, “what are you jumping on me for? Those birds aren’t on my shift.”

“And aren’t you tickled to death that they aren’t!” Westbrook jeered. “Got you buffaloed, haven’t they? Bet they’re in the locker-room right now, and you haven’t got the guts to run ’em up!”

The arrival of a guest ended his harangue. The captain scurried away, gratefully, to take the man’s baggage. Westbrook left the lobby and started down the back stairs. The door to the bellboy’s locker-room was partially open. Pausing in the dimly lit corridor, Westbrook looked through the aperture.

Like many “boys” in the hotel world, Ted and Ed Gusick, respectively the night bellboy and elevator operator, were boys in name only. Ted was about forty, Ed perhaps a year or so older. They had prematurely graying hair, and pinkish massaged-looking faces. They were well-built but slender; narrow-waisted, flat-stomached: wiry and strong. Born of the same mother, they may or may not have had the same father. Even she was unable to say. Amoral, vicious, treacherous and dishonest, they bore the hard polish of men who have spent a lifetime squeezing out of tight places.

They were fighting, standing almost toe to toe while they slugged each other. A veteran of a thousand such locker-room brawls, Westbrook watched them with a feeling of nostalgia. Every blow was intended to cripple. Anything went, except hitting the other man in the face. Boys didn’t fight that way anymore, Westbrook was thinking. They didn’t fight period. They came whining to the management with their disputes: always, as in every difficulty, they wanted someone to do something for them. They were incompetent, indifferent, completely lacking in pride in their work—“too good” to do the job they were paid to do.

Well…

Westbrook sighed, shook his head and pulled himself back from the happy past. Then, setting his face in a ferocious scowl, he dashed into the locker-room, managing, by a miracle of foot-work, to give both boys a solid kick before they could elude him.

“Up!” he roared, pointing dramatically to the ceiling. “Up on the g’damn floor! What’s the matter with you, anyway? You know what time it is? What d’you mean keeping a watch waiting?”

“Sorry, sir,” said Ed.

“Sorry, Mr. Westbrook,” said Ted.

And they edged warily toward the door. Westbrook advanced on them, one hard little fist drawn back.

“What were you fighting about, huh? Hah? Answer me, you friggers, or I’ll—”

Ted said they had been fighting about nothing. Ed said they had no excuse. These replies were exactly the right ones, in Westbrook’s opinion. In the old days, boys often fought out of sheer high spirits, and they made no excuses if caught. Nevertheless, as a matter of discipline—and because they expected it—he took a vicious swing at the brothers, cursing them roundly as they fled out the door and up the stairs.

Now, those were real boys, he thought, as he left the locker-room. You’d never catch boys like that whining or complaining. They knew how to wait on a guest, to get their own way with a man and do it so ingratiatingly that he was glad to pay for the privilege. In the last twenty years, they had worked with Westbrook in perhaps a dozen different hotels. Shrewd and suave, knowing hotels from subbasement to roof garden, they could probably have managed one as well as he. But they remained bellboys by choice. They were good at hopping bells, and it left them free of onerous responsibilities. Also—unless Westbrook missed his guess—they made more money than he did.

Ordinarily, neither of the brothers would have accepted employment as an elevator operator. One of them had done so in this case because only the night bellboy’s job was open and they insisted on working together. At the time he had hired them, Westbrook had promised to give them day jobs on bells as soon as they became available. But they had later advised him not to bother, that they were completely satisfied with things as they were.

Westbrook correctly suspected that their preference for the night shift was largely due to the scanty supervision thereon. Certainly they would be able to run circles around that goofy clerk, Leslie Eaton. But no one had caught them in any forbidden activities as yet, and until someone did catch them, or at least came forth with a valid complaint…

Well, that was that, Westbrook shrugged. They were good boys.

The dopey dullness of sobriety was creeping back over him. He was passing out on his feet, and there was still that all-important matter of Dudley to settle.

Westbrook hurried out the back door, fighting to keep the telltale smirk from his face. When he returned, some twenty minutes later, he was once again brisk and alert. And there were two half-pints of whiskey in his pockets, and another half in his stomach.

He entered the unattended service elevator and switched on the light. He shot upward, the control pushed all the way over, arriving seconds later at the twelfth floor. It was a perfect stop, with the car exactly level with the landing. Westbrook rewarded himself with a couple of “short ones”—adding another half-pint of whiskey to his interior content.

He tossed the empty bottle into the incinerator chute. Turning away from it, he suddenly staggered wildly and flailed the air with his arms. The fit was gone almost as soon as it came: he had moved in an insane blur for a moment, and then it was all over. But Westbrook knew that it signaled the crossing of an invisible line. From now on the booze would be working against him, sweeping him finally into the dark and disastrous void which he had penetrated so often in the past.

Westbrook shivered slightly, remembering those occasions. He remembered the agony that had followed them, the terrible sickness and the equally terrible shame and embarrassment. He couldn’t go through it again.
God, he couldn’t do it!
He could not, must not, take another drink tonight!

Except, of course, one very small one. Just enough to see him through this Dudley matter.

He took it. He re-corked the bottle, then slowly uncorked it and took another one. Seemingly, there were no ill effects.

He did feel a rising anger, but that was natural enough. Goddammit, how long could a man go on catching the dirty end of the stick without getting fed up? He never got any rest. He never had a minute to call his own. Work, by God, that was all he ever got. Work and more work, and then still more work. And what did he have to work with, hah? A bunch of bumbling, bastardly lunatics! And was it appreciated, hah? Did he ever get a goddamned word of thanks, hah?