When we were done I retired my army, disbursed mustering-out pay plus bonus of one bottle of beer, and called up Walter Lippit. Pat answered and the first thing she said was, “No.”
“I haven’t even asked…”
“You were going to ask if Walter is here and the answer is no.”
“Maybe I was going to ask…”
“Anything else, the answer is no, too,” and she hung up.
I called up the club where he had that room and somebody answered to tell me Mister Lippit was in the steam room. That’s when I felt that the rest of the operations must be going all right.
It was a nice forenoon with bright sun and a breeze to keep the heat down, at least till noontime. I put the top down on the car and drove to the club.
There were athletes even at that hour. I could hear them make sports noises in the gym and that health odor of theirs came as far as the lobby.
“Where is Mister Lippit at the moment?” I asked at the desk.
“He maintains a room on…”
I nodded and went up there but Lippit wasn’t in the room. There was a kid at the table, by the name of Davy, and he was supposed to hold down the phone. There hadn’t been any phoning he said, and Lippit was still in the steam room, or at the next stage, he said, which he thought might be the masseur.
“You mean nobody’s checked in from the West Side or anything?”
“There haven’t been any calls,” said Davy. “But I’ve called the West Side every hour, the way Mister Lippit said.”
“And?”
“Nothing.” The kid smiled politely but he was clearly impatient. He was rolling and unrolling a magazine about how to do it yourself-I couldn’t tell what-and I was interrupting him.
“Did you reach Folsom?”
“No. He’s not at the number I got. He’s out running things.”
Good commander, that Folsom.
“And he hasn’t called in either?”
“No, Mister St. Louis.”
Requiring no supervision, that Commander Folsom.
I went downstairs and checked around for Lippit, but he was still sweating himself in the steam room. So I left.
Perhaps it was the clear, pretty morning, but there seemed to be real peace on the West Side. Not that I had expected a war, but some war nerves, maybe. At least that. But Morry, in the bowling alley, was toting up last night’s receipts, and he was happy. Louie, who had a very clean looking patch on one side of his nose, was also happy, because he felt secure and protected. Then I went to a couple of bars, but bars always look peaceful in the forenoon. There were just the few who drink before ten in the morning, but they never talk and are silent types. There was peace. Dead, maybe, but peace.
I went to the bar on Liberty and Alder where Folsom had one of the goon squads waiting. I didn’t see them at first because the place was so dark. There was the long bar, with one morning drinker and the bartender was doing a crossword puzzle. And there was a gray cat. She sat on top of the jukebox and her eyes were closed. Suddenly she gave a screech like a woman and flew off the machine. Somebody laughed. They were sitting behind the jukebox, at a round table, playing cards. But without much interest. One of them was laughing.
The bartender came over with the cat on his arm. The cat was clawed into his shoulder as if she were afraid of the height.
“Listen,” said the bartender. “Who done that?”
The cat smelled a little bit of burnt fur and the bartender knew very well who had done that But he was short and thin and the one who was laughing was big and fat.
“Phew,” he said, “what a stinker,” and threw his cigarette on the floor.
It hit me on the shoe and I stepped back a little. Then I stepped on the cigarette and rubbed it out.
“They been bothering you?” I said to the bartender.
He knew me and didn’t know what to say. He knew that those punks and I worked for the same outfit, but he felt different about them and me.
“It’s just the cat here, Mister St. Louis. They keep bothering the cat.”
“We’re here to see nothing happens to jukeboxes,” said the big one, “and cats sitting on top of jukeboxes is not allowed. Right, fellers?”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” they said, or something like that.
“She just sits there,” said the bartender. “The light from underneath keeps her warm and she likes that.”
“Not allowed,” said the big one.
“Put the cat back up there,” I told the bartender.
He did it and nobody said anything while this went on. There wasn’t any noise at all except for the slow scrape of the chair when the big one got up. He leaned one arm on the jukebox and looked at me.
“So you’re that feller with the name,” he said. “New Orleans, wasn’t it?”
I didn’t have to answer because he filled the space right after that crack with a long, phlegmy laugh. After a while it even sounded stupid to him and he let it die down. Then he talked as if he had never laughed before in his life.
“Folsom’s been telling me about you, New Orleans.”
“St Louis. And now I’m going to tell you about me.” I came just a little closer to make it more personal. “Folsom is running you and the rest of the apes, but the orders come from me. You sit down and hold still. You wait till you hear from Folsom before practicing your art and in the meantime no extracurricular activities. And leave that cat alone.”
He looked at me and then at his buddies and I think he didn’t answer anything right away because he wasn’t sure of all the words I had used.
Then he said, “You come all the way down here to tell me about that cat?”
He hit the ridiculous part of the conversation right on the head and I didn’t feel very impressive. Which was no trick anyway. I’m just built average but he wasn’t. I felt I should talk about something else.
“You don’t look,” I said to the men at the table, “as if you’ve been doing any work today.”
“I might any minute though,” said the big one at the jukebox.
“I’m asking because we haven’t heard from Folsom. There’s been nothing today?”
“Just the cat,” said somebody at the table.
“And you,” said the big one.
I was getting that feeling in my hands and along both shoulders, that fine little tickle and tension I always get before I just have to take a sharp swing. I would have enjoyed that Only it wouldn’t have been part of the business. Besides, I felt he was too big for me.
“I’m leaving,” I said. “So don’t worry.”
“I’m worried? I’m not leaving. I’m not worried.”
“When Folsom comes, ask him to call, will you?”
“St Louis,” said the big one. “Are you trying to change the subject?”
“Yes,” I said. “Frankly, yes.”
It was now a good time to leave because what I had said made him open his mouth in sheer wonderment I nodded and turned but then he thought of a way to revive his spirits.
“You gonna go like that and no instructions about this cat?”
I turned to look back and he was just pointing his finger at the cat The cat sat, hunched, and its eyes gleamed as it watched the finger.
I was wishing he wouldn’t think of anything else to do. I don’t really like cats and I didn’t feel then, or any other time, like Saint Francis or Sir Francis, or whatever his name was, who loved all those creatures-and why in hell couldn’t that cat sit someplace else, like on the roof.
“Now you leave her alone,” said the bartender. “Tell him, Mister St. Louis.”
“Nice gray cat,” said the big one, and all his brother apes were watching. “Nice and gray, this one. Not yellow at all.”
I don’t take that kind of thing up. It doesn’t make me feel self-conscious and besides, why should I be at the beck and call of every punk who gets his kicks that way. But this time I had to take it up somehow.
“Leave her alone,” I said, “before she eats you up.”
“To save you the trouble?” and he poked his finger at the cat.
This cat had been made very nervous by now. She whipped at the finger and dug in fast, so when the big one yanked back he did most of the work himself. He let out a terrible yowl and his finger had two smart, red lines in it, deep and straight, with a lot of blood.
The cat jumped off the jukebox, made way station on top of the guy’s head, catapulted across to the bar from there, and disappeared. It was very funny.
“Yes sir,” I said, “You got to watch those gray ones,” and on that note I was meaning to leave.
When the big one jumped me.
He tried to, at any rate. But if nothing else, I am fast, and-of no less importance-the bartender tripped him. The big one clattered all over the floor and while I stepped back some three pack members jumped up from the table.
I was badly worried, wishing quickly that I were the cat, until I got the picture. The other three piled all over the big one, yanked him up, bundled his arms, sweated and strained, and then when the big one relaxed a little the one on the right said, “You better get out, St. Louis. While the gettin’ is good.”
The big one looked choked and much more dangerous now than before.
“You don’t know Paul when he gets this way,” said the one on the right. “Walk, while the walking’s good.”
I walked. I knew it did not make a good impression but neither did anything else. The whole West Side set-up stunk and I had to find Folsom.
I never did. He had been and gone in a couple of places, checking, they told me, and making everyone nervous. Nothing else had been happening. I went back to the club to see how the headman would feel about this.
Upstairs, in the room, there was just the kid with his do-it-yourself book and the telephone next to him. There had been no calls and I was interrupting him. Lippit, he said, was getting a work-out.
I went downstairs and looked for Lippit. Why should he have to pay for his work-out when he could get it for free, just running his business this particular morning?
I got routing instructions at the desk and went on my way.
The first door said “Physical Culture.” There was a long guy ahead of me, with the big feet of the thin type and the loose sweatshirt to round out the bony structure. He went in before I got there and when I got there a transformed type came out. This one was tall, too, but he groaned with muscle. I felt that my jacket was much too loose.
“That was fast,” I said to him. “This is a miraculous place.”
He didn’t understand a word of what I said and just grunted. The next door said “Members Only.”
It had a pneumatic gadget on top which made the door very hard to open. The door jumped out of my hand and another muscle man came out. My jacket felt like a tent.
“How long have you been a member?” I asked.
“I just joined, sir.”
“Miraculous place.”
He didn’t understand a word of what I said, either.
The next door said “Shoes Off,” so I took my shoes off. I figured, what the hell, it might have said “Heads Off.”
An athlete walked by, springy as a cat, and he looked me up and down.
“What’s the matter,” he said. “You ashamed of your toes?”
“I certainly am not ashamed of my toes, and why…”
“Take your socks off. Around here, we all take our socks off.”
I took my socks off and wondered how many more doors there would be and what I would do with an armful of clothes once I went through the last one.
Then it said “Massage.”
I figured, what the hell, I’ll first try it with clothes on. There was a bald Finn with large, hairless arms, and now he looked me up and down.
“What are you trying to do, sir,” he said. “Are you trying to give somebody athlete’s foot?”
I explained I was trying to find Mister Lippit, nothing else.
“Around here you will please wear clomps,” he said. “We all do.”
He gave me a pair of clomps which was a wooden shoe-type effect which went “clomp” when you tried to walk.
I figured, what the hell, this one at least didn’t ask me to take off anything.
“And Mister Lippit,” he said, “is in the swimming pool.”
So, the next door said “Swimming Pool.”
I walked in and an Australian with glistening skin and a whistle around his neck came over and looked me up and down.
“What are you trying to do, crush somebody’s toes?” he said.
“I’m looking for Mister Lippit. All I…”
“Please take off those watchamercallems.”
“Clomps?”
“Yes.”
I now carried two socks, four shoes, and felt unsteady on the wet tiles. There had been entirely too much talk about feet I was getting self-conscious, as if I were bare-toed in a bowling alley.
“Mister Lippit,” said the lifeguard, “is working out in Lane Five.”
My toes curled temporarily and then I went to the other side of the pool. Lippit was swimming along the edge.
He had a breast stroke which kept his head above water and which pushed him along at a go-stop-go clip. I waited for him at the end of the pool. He saw me stand there and touched the rim.
“Hi. Okay?” Swish.
He made a very smart turn, a big wave, and I saw the back of his head taking off in the other direction.
It was now a matter of walking along the side of the pool, timing the conversation to his go-stop-go cycle, and to keep holding on to all the socks and shoes I was carrying. My fingers felt twisted.
“Walter. You can hear me?”
“Yes. Okay?”
“Yes. It went okay. Equipment is all shot to hell.”
“My turn is what I meant. Was okay?”
“Very smart. Walter?”
“I can hear you. Don’t yell.”
“You haven’t heard from Folsom.”
“I know that.”
“What I mean is, why haven’t you heard from Folsom?”
“Huh?”
“Why!”
“He hasn’t called.”
It was time for the turn which was just as well because I felt like starting the conversation over. The first one hadn’t been any good.
There were two swimmers standing at the edge of the pool and they were watching. They weren’t watching Lippit and his smart turn, but me.
“You’re going to crush one of those toes any minute,” said one of them. “You got a clomp slipping.”
At this point I had more slipping than a clomp. I nodded at them, rearranged my fingers, and went after Lippit again.
“Walter?”
“I can hear you. Wasn’t so good, was it?”
“Very smart. Listen, Walter. I don’t like what goes on the West Side.”
“What goes?”
“I don’t know. I haven’t seen Folsom. Just some of his friends.”
“I haven’t seen him either. I just told you.”
Somebody walking by knocked into me at that point, so Lippit thought all the cursing was about that. He tried to look up at me but it was the wrong angle. He kept swimming as before.
“Jack?” he said.
“I hear you.”
“You got crazy looking toes, did you know that?”
“No. I didn’t. I really didn’t, Walter.”
“What I mean is, from this angle. They’re probably all right, any other angle.”
“Thank you.”
“I mean, don’t get me wrong.”
“God forbid. When are you coming out, Walter?”
“Two more laps. Watch this turn, will you please?” and he touched, swiveled, ducked under, pushed off.
“Okay?”
“Very smart. Listen. I want you to come out and talk this thing over. I don’t like what goes on.”
“You said nothing is going on. What’s the matter with you today, Jack?”
“I don’t like those men Folsom’s got working for him.”
“I’m getting all out of breath talking to you, Jack.”
“I’m sorry. How about coming out now, Walter.”
“Can’t do that.”
“Listen. You’re just as winded now as you expect to be after all those licks…”
“Laps.”
“All right All right!”
Then came the turn again. The two swimmers were still standing at that end of the pool and they were watching me. One of them held a sock.
“You’re pacing him too fast,” said one of them. “That’s not good for him, his age.”
“You dropped this,” said the other one. He draped the sock over one of my fingers somewhere and then it was Lippit’s turn again.
“Okay?”
“Very smart.”
“What those guys say, something about my turns?”
“They think you should stop swimming. They think you’re pacing me too fast.”
“Very smart. But I can’t laugh now. I’ll swallow water.”
I quickly tried to think of a joke, a real killer of a joke, but nothing came to me. And my fingers felt as if they had been doing all the walking.
“You swim, Jack?”
“Some. Mostly summers.”
“That’s not enough, Jack. You need exercise.”
“I get that. I really do, Walter.”
There was more health talk from him and then no talk at all, this being the last lap. He had to concentrate and I tried not to concentrate on anything at all, hoping for sheer blankness to relax me. This time there was no smart turn at the end of the lap, but a wild thrashing for ultimate speed and then a great slap of the hands on the tiles. Lippit stood up in the water and breathed like a pump going. The two swimmers were still standing there.
“You made it,” said one of them.
“Made it? What in hell do you mean, made it?” said Lippit.
“We mean him there,” said one of the swimmers and he nodded at me. “We had this bet on he’d let go the clomp.”
But Lippit was still offended. He climbed out of the pool and huffed and puffed a few times. Then he and I walked to the door.
“Who’s he think he’s kidding with that accent,” said Lippit. “Like he was some kind of a lord or something?” He snorted water. “What were you clamping, anyway?”
“I was clamping clomps.”
Lippit just gave me a look and then one of the swimmers caught up with us. He was holding a sock. I said, “Thank you,” and, “just hang it on the same place,” and then we went into the locker room. While Lippit took a shower I sat on a bench and unbent my fingers. When he came back and got dressed I was well enough to dry my feet.
“Your toes look all right now,” he said.
“Yes. I was going to ask you about that.”
“But what’s the matter with your fingers?”
I said, “Walter. I wouldn’t worry about that. It’s probably just the angle, you know? I mean it isn’t like having the wrong toes or too many feet or something like that, right?”
“Christ. You are huffy today.”
“I just don’t want any more talk about it. Like I’m a freak.”
I bent down for my things and it now turned out I had two shoes, one clomp, and three socks.
Lippit saw this but said nothing. He turned away and coughed into his towel the way anyone might who’d been swimming more than was good for his age.