Kingsbury Run was a good place to live.
That's how Ben saw it. Right in the middle of the city, here was a wide-open place where a man could fend for himself-and keep to himself. There was game to hunt-squirrels, wild dogs, pigeons, Hoover hogs (jackrabbits)-and if a man wanted to make his own fire and cook his own food, he would be left alone. At least Ben usually was. Folks in the jungle, the shantytown near the Thirty-fifth Street Bridge, knew about Ben, and Ben's knife.
Even without his king-size jackknife, Ben was nobody anybody in his right mind would mess with. That knowledge gave Ben a certain amount of satisfaction, if not exactly pride.
Only five six, Ben was broad-shouldered, a barrel-chested, threatening looking mole of a man whose dark blond hair was whitening; his clothes were old, even tattered, but he kept them clean. Unlike some, he had underwear; unlike some, he had shoes (boots, actually). He even had an extra pair, hid, in his cave, that he'd excavated high above the creek bed, away from shantytown, covering the opening with boards and tar paper. It was warm in winter, unlike the paper tents and cardboard hovels some of his neighbors endured. And when it got too damn cold, he could always flop at the Salvation Army-though a little bit of that pious Sally crap went a long way with Ben.
It wasn't like Ben was a hermit. He had friends in his world; he even made new ones from time to time. He was liked. He could sing songs from an Appalachian childhood, songs that were about all that was worth remembering from that childhood. Folks liked Ben's singing. Hobos (Ben didn't consider himself a hobo, but he put up with them, just as he did tramps-but he held no truck with bums) put a lot of stock in storytellers, joke tellers, and singers. There was a lot of time to kill in shantytown.
Nights when up the hill drifted the scent of a fine gump stew stewing-stolen chicken mixed with vegetables from the rubbish bins at Central Market-Ben would wander down, and get sociable. It would mean spending some time with folks-singing, putting up with the socialist talk that he'd once put so much stock in-but that was the price. Even in shantytown, nothing was free.
Ben liked being close to the city; there was something reassuring, comforting, about being in a wilderness bordered by city skyline. Best of both worlds, and both were at his fingertips.
With town so near, he could go scrounging for food at Central Market, mooch two-day-old bread from bakeries, or hit the soup kitchens or missions, and pick up the odd job here and there, when need be. Even a man like Ben needed some money. Coffee and sugar and cigarettes couldn't be scrounged. And drinking canned heat and moonshine got old-sometimes a man needed to sit in a saloon and put away some real honest-to-God beer and, praise the Lord and pass the ammunition, hard liquor. That took money. Sometimes a man needed to get his ashes hauled, too-and most of the women riding the rails were either hooked up with some 'bo, or queer. So that took money, too.
He'd never had a wife. He almost did once, when he was working regular, at the slaughterhouse. That was after the war. His brothers told him he was crazy to quit, but they were younger than him, they hadn't been where he'd been. They hadn't got gassed at the Argonne. They hadn't seen waves of young men with guns go charging across no-man's-land to the sound of bombs and bullets and the cries of the wounded and dying. They hadn't put a knife into a wounded comrade to put him out of his misery and stop his screaming.
His family had come from the backwoods to Cleveland around the time he was born (Ben was forty-seven, although he didn't know it, having long since lost track) to get pie-in-the-sky factory jobs like they'd heard so much about. His father worked in a steel mill for about year and then took off forever one day; his mother worked as a seamer in a knitting factory, a sweatshop job that killed her in her twenties. His brothers and sister wandered to other cities and found jobs; Ben had answered the call of the road, just another penniless, unattached drifter hopping freights in search of nothing in particular. Adventure, maybe. Seeing America.
Seeing the world was what he had in mind when he enlisted. And he had indeed seen things in the "great" war, things that had quenched his desire for seeing much more of anything else.
But back home, the public had been protected from the horrors soldiers like Ben had endured; like the song said, "Half a million boots went sloggin' through hell," but you had to have been there to understand. You had to wake up screaming, thinking you were still racing across no-man's-land through bombs and bullets and the cries of
…
His brother Ed was in Chicago, working at Armour in the smokehouse. He helped Ben get a job there; Ben started as a common laborer on the killing floor and made a good impression. He had decided he'd best learn a trade, so he tried real hard, worked real hard; soon the foreman saw that Ben had a way with a knife. Before long Ben was given a better-paying position.
He became a hog killer.
Hogs chained by one rear leg to an overhead conveyer were brought in, squealing, upside down. Ben, standing in one spot as the hogs came helplessly to him, would grip each pig by its throat and dig his knife into its jugular, in a thrust and turn motion. Blood ran off his leather apron; his boots got painted red.
He lasted a week. He didn't ask for any other position at the slaughterhouse; he just hopped a freight and reentered the world of the hobo.
A hobo, which is what Ben was in those days, traveled around looking for work. Whereas tramps were those looking for the open road, for thrills; that described the prewar Ben. But he never was a bum, which was how Ben classified those who never worked at all, beggars who slept in doorways, drunks and junkies, the sort of vagrant that gave folks like Ben a bad name.
In those days after the war, after the slaughterhouse, Ben always thought he'd find work somewhere and settle down. Maybe get back in touch with Ida, the girl in "dry casings" at Armour who he'd been going with when he up and quit the slaughterhouse.
But instead he'd found himself on the hobo circuit, hitting the same towns year after year, seeking out jails to winter in, getting used to a life where lack of material belongings was a blessing, not a curse. He heard a lot of talk about socialism and communism; there was a sort of hobo underground, with organizations and such, hobo "colleges" and coffee houses, mostly under the wing of the I.W.W., the radical labor party.
And the Depression had swelled the ranks of the wandering homeless, with free-spirited adventurers being outnumbered by the evicted and the desperate. Still, these folks fell right in with the kind of life Ben and others were living. After all, a lot of the men were war vets, like Ben, and had endured much worse. They had lived out of backpacks before.
The last time Ben believed in anything but his animal needs had been back in '32, when he got swept up in the Bonus Army. Ben was pretty radical back then, took it real serious, and that June, Ben and twenty thousand or so other war veterans and their families poured into Washington, D.C.. They were demanding the government cough up the war bonus the vets were not due to receive till 1945. President Hoover liked to say there weren't any hungry people in America, but Ben and thousands of other vets and their thousands of stomachs knew better; starving, jobless, they knew they needed their bonus dough, now.
They put up a Hooverville on Anacostia Flats in the southwest of the nation's capital. This army camp had no tents or barracks; just lean-tos cobbled together out of cardboard boxes and packing crates and scrap metal and tar-paper roofing. Desperation and hope mingled in the air, as communists, socialists, Wobblies, and the just plain hungry climbed on the Bughouse Square-type platform, preaching to the converted about the bonus they had coming. Congress wasn't sold, but did vote to pay passage home for the ex-soldiers.
Hardcore radical leaders urged the Bonus Army to stay on, and only a few thousand took Congress's bribe; the leadership assured those who remained that this battle, this war, would be won. Hoover was already campaigning for reelection-he could hardly afford to oust the Bonus Army by force. Use bayonets against unarmed war veterans, many of whom had their families with them, an army whose only weaponry was petitions? It would never happen.
General Douglas MacArthur, astride a white horse, led four troops of cavalry, four companies of infantry, a mounted machine-gun squadron, half a dozen tanks, several hundred city cops, and a phalanx of Secret Service and Treasury agents against the Bonus Army. Ben saw one veteran shot to death, heard of another; saw veterans slashed and stabbed by bayonets and sabers-saw a man's ear cut off. The shanties were torched; smoke clouds hovered over the capital city. Countless men, women, and children were teargased, Ben among them.
Gassed at the Argonne; gassed at Anacostia.
It had soured Ben on just about everything. He didn't blame the soldiers-they were just kids, like he'd been a kid when he was in the army, taking orders and doing what they were told, like he had.
To him the radicals were little better than goddamn Hoover. Here it was, four years later, and the revolution that they promised wasn't here yet. Ben's revolution had been an internal one. He would no longer answer to any authority but that of his belly, presidents and radicals be damned.
He had gotten off a freight at Cleveland-home-and had been part of the landscape of Kingsbury Run ever since. He and his knife had carved out a place for themselves. He cut a few 'bos who got tough or tried to steal from him, carved a homo or two who got cute, and the word spread. Feared and respected, he was. Just how he wanted it.
Today was Wednesday, but Ben was unaware of that; the only time he became aware of what day it was, was Sunday, because of the church bells. He would then know it was time for his weekly bath, which he'd accomplish in the lake usually, or at the Sally in winter; he kept himself and his clothes clean. Then, his weekly hygienics accomplished, time would turn into the vague, meaningless thing that it was in his life.
Yesterday and today, the newspapers had been filled with the story of the Torso Clinic, with much being made of Safety Director Ness taking on the Mad Butcher case personally. Ben was unaware of this, too: newspapers were of no interest to him in the summer. In the winter, newspapers had value: they kept you warm.
What was on Ben's mind this early evening was getting drunk and getting laid, in no particular order. He had spent the long, hot day at the Central Market, unloading boxes, and now had two dollars to help him fulfill both those needs. He knew just the place to get the job done, too. A nameless, seedy little saloon near Central and Twentieth; it had been a speakeasy during Prohibition and had never gotten around to making itself look legal.
If getting drunk had been all he had in mind, Ben could have just bought a bottle and retreated to his cave. But this saloon-in a neighborhood of rooming houses, secondhand-store fencing operations, and bookie joints, on the edge of an industrial area-was a hangout for professional beggars, one of whom, Blister Betsy, was a sort of sweetie of Bens.
Ben entered the room and inhaled, with satisfaction, the aroma of stale smoke mixed with beer-soaked sawdust. An exhaust fan churned noisily, fighting with the sound of Amos and Andy on the radio. Half a dozen men dressed in sweaty work clothes stood at the bar, a foot on the rail, putting away beers; some were talking, several were listening to what the Kingfish was up to.
The pasty-faced fat bartender nodded at Ben noncommittally, drawing a beer from the tap.
Ben put fifteen cents on the counter and said, "Boilermaker, Pete. Betsy been in?"
"Nope."
"Well, it's early yet."
"Yeah."
Ben took his glass of beer and his shot of whiskey and sat in a booth and drank them slowly, savoringly. More patrons began wandering in, and they were a shabby-looking lot, but they had money to spend. They were professional beggars who gathered every evening at this nameless saloon after a day of shamming downtown, leaving their phony afflictions behind.
A few of the beggars had genuine handicaps-the wingies, who had one or no arms, and the peggies, who had one or no legs. There were also the blinkies (the fake blind ones), deafies, dummies, D and D's (a combination of the latter two categories), and fitzies (epileptics). Blister Betsy put acid on her arms to make it look like she had ugly sores that needed a doctor's care.
Ben didn't as a rule have much respect for beggars or panhandlers, but he thought people like Blister Betsy gave value for the dollar. It was a job; it was show business. The person paying got to feel good about himself, for helping out a poor needy soul.
Betsy herself was a skinny thing, with mousy brown hair and a face as plain as a plank; but she laughed real pretty when she drank, and Ben liked the way her hips moved when he was in her.
A skinny character called Sightless Red spotted Ben and, after getting himself a beer, came over and joined him.
"It's been a while, pard," Red said, smiling, showing very decayed teeth, where teeth remained. Ben had all his teeth; he took care of himself.
"Yes it has," Ben said.
"Betsy was asking for you, while back."
Ben felt warm inside, and it wasn't just the boiler-maker. "That's good. Betsy and me get along fine."
Every month or so, Ben would show up at the nameless saloon, spend a buck or so of odd-job money on Betsy, getting her well-oiled, then go to her room at the boarding house nearby and do the time-honored lying-down dance.
"Hope she'll be along pretty soon," Ben said.
"I don't know," Red said, shrugging. "Ain't seen her in a week at least."
Ben tried not to let his sinking feeling show. "Oh?"
"She was talking about visiting her sister in Akron."
"Oh."
"Anyways, she hasn't been around for a couple weeks."
"Oh."
"But hell, you never know. She might show. I don't stop in here every night, you know-and Betsy and me don't work the same district. Maybe she'll be in."
Ben shrugged like it was no matter.
"You still hiding out in that hole on the Run, pard?"
"Sure."
"Beats paying the landlords," Red said. "Thought you might be flopping at the Sally."
"Why? It's summer."
"Yeah, but at the Sally you can sleep and eat and be safe and sound."
Ben frowned. "Hunting's good on the Run, this time of year."
"Yeah, but it ain't just jackrabbits bein' hunted."
"What else is?"
"People! Heads! I'd think shantytown woulda emptied out by now, with this here Mad Butcher on the loose."
Ben snorted a laugh. "I killed more people than that piker."
"What, with your jackknife?" Red grinned greenly. "Don't tell me you're the Butcher, Ben!"
"In the war," he said quietly.
"What?"
"I killed more than that bastard did."
"Maybe so, but you can still get killed out there."
"I can take of myself."
"I know. But I'd be sleeping inside, if I was you."
Ben shrugged, and so did Red, who grinned his green-and-yellow grin and went back to the bar for another beer. Pretty soon Ben shambled up after another boilermaker and went back to his booth and sat and got morosely drunk, wondering whether he should wait for Betsy to show or try to make Peggy Peg. She was kind of fat, but that didn't bother Ben. Fucking a one-legged woman didn't, either. He just had his heart, and hard, set on little Betsy.
"How you doing tonight, Ben?"
Ben looked up from the whiskey half of his fourth boilermaker and saw Andy, a husky, pleasant worker who frequented the saloon from time to time. They'd spoken before.
"Doing okay, Andy. Have a seat."
Andy sat; he was a good-looking man about thirty with sandy blond hair and a ready smile.
"Where's your honeybun?" Andy asked.
"I ain't got a honeybun."
"You know who I mean. That little girl with the blisters on her arm that you're always walking out of here with."
Ben smiled, but he felt sad. "I think she's seeing her sister. I don't think she's gonna be in tonight."
Andy sighed. "Yeah. I bet you been looking forward to seein' her, too."
"Yeah."
"I got stood up, too."
Ben bristled. "I wasn't stood up-"
"Hey, same thing. Neither one of us is getting laid tonight."
Ben nodded. Gulped some whiskey. His belly felt warm. That much, at least, was going right.
They had another round, Ben his fifth Boilermaker, Andy a beer.
"That's what I get for trying to date a girl in the front office," Andy said, bitter but accepting it.
"Snobby?"
"Yeah. Sometimes I think a guy's better off paying for it."
Ben nodded agreement, but said, "I like it better when they like you. Buy 'em some drinks and they like you. That's how I see it."
"Not a bad philosophy."
Ben stared into his whiskey. "I used to have a girl. Back in Chicago. At the slaughterhouse."
"You worked at a slaughterhouse?"
"Sure."
"God." Andy shivered. "Didn't that give you the willies?"
"No."
By eleven it was clear that Betsy wasn't going to show. Ben was feeling drunk, but not enjoying the feeling. Hell of a thing, working all day and getting screwed out of screwing.
He was digging in his pocket for his second buck when Andy shook his head and said, "Hey, save your dough. I got a bottle back at my place."
"Yeah?"
"Hell, I got two bottles. One for you and one for me."
Ben looked through bleary eyes at Andy. Andy seemed like a nice enough guy, but Ben didn't trust guys who looked as good as Andy. Andy's mouth was soft, like a girl's.
'That's white of you, but-"
"Hey. If you'd prefer to wait around for Betsy… maybe she'll show."
"She ain't gonna fuckin' show. But look, I got to say something and I don't want you to take it wrong."
Andy shrugged, smiled. "Okay."
"I don't cotton up to queers."
"Neither do I," Andy said matter-of-factly.
"Okay. I don't know you all that good, so I just wanted to make it plain. Sharing a bottle is white of you. But I gotta warn you. I got a knife."
"Ben…"
"I ain't no wolf. And I killed punks before."
A "punk," in Ben's parlance, was a young homosexual. And a "wolf" was an older homosexual man who craved punks.
"Ben, I know there's a lot of that kind of thing down in shantytown," Andy said, "but I always knew you weren't a part of that. I hate that unnatural shit. Queers should all be killed."
Ben nodded. "Them that touches me is going to be."
"No argument from me. What do you say we blow this joint? If you'll excuse the expression."
Andy grinned at his own joke, but Ben was too drunk to get it.
In fact, Andy had to help Ben out of the saloon; as they walked down the dimly lit street, Andy supported Ben's arm, as if the man were a cripple like the beggars they were leaving behind pretended to be.
Andy lived a few blocks off the Run, on Central. Drunk as he was, Ben was impressed, even surprised by the place. Not that it was nice-it was a small, paint-peeling clapboard bungalow-but the single-story, single-dwelling frame structure, which even had something of a lawn about it, differed from the crowded-together, two-and three-story rooming houses that were its neighbors. The front windows were blotted out by dark drapes; a basement window in front was boarded up; at left, rickety stairs and a rusted iron rail rose to an entrance.
Unlocking the door, Andy led Ben into a small foyer. A connecting hall led to the whiteness of a kitchen, and straight ahead, to the right, was a living room. At left, on the wall, were a dozen screwed-on coat hooks. Andy motioned Ben into the living room, which was also small but seemed expensively furnished to Ben. The sofa and chairs were overstuffed and plush; oriental tapestries and pictures decorated the walls.
"How's a bottle of beer sound?" Andy said.
"Fine," Ben said, wobbling, not knowing if he should sit down on such an elegant sofa.
"Why don't you help yourself?"
"What?"
"Cold beer in the Frigidaire. Help yourself. I'll get us some whiskey and we'll put our own boilermakers together."
Ben nodded, smiled. "Sounds good."
He wandered on shaky legs down the hallway, past several closed doors, into the small, very clean, very white kitchen; the grayish-white linoleum floor glistened. This guy had money. Trusting soul, too, Ben thought, sliding a hand into this pocket, fingers on his jackknife. It would be easy to take this joe for everything he had. There was money in this place. There just about had to be.
But, drunk or sober, Ben just wasn't that kind, and he knew it.
He snorted a laugh and opened the refrigerator door, and Betsy looked right at him.
Betsy's head, that is.
Her eyes were open, and so was her mouth. Bottles of Hamm's beer sat on the shelf on either side of her.
He was frozen there, for a moment, mouth dropped open as wide as Betsy’s, and just as his drink-clouded mind was forming the thought that he must get the hell out of here, he felt fingers grip the hair atop his head and something thin and cold and sharp pressed against the back of his neck.
The last thing Ben saw was Betsy’s gray face.
Just as Andy's words were the last thing he heard: "Ben… I have a knife, too."