Pulp - Charles Bukowski [60]
He looked at me like he didn’t hear so good.
I gave him a wan smile and clicked the safety catch off the luger.
Tommy was dumb but not totally.
He dropped to his hands and knees, shaking the whole 6th floor like a 5.9 earthquake. My fake Dali fell to the floor. The one with the melted watch.
Tommy clumped there like the Grand Canyon and looked at me.
“Now, Tommy,” I said, “you are going to be the elephant and McKelvey is going to be the elephant boy, got it?”
“Huh?” asked Tommy.
I looked over at McKelvey.
“Go on! Get on! Mount!”
“Belane, are you nuts?”
“Who knows? Insanity is comparative. Who sets the norm?”
“I don’t know,” said McKelvey.
“Just get on!”
“All right, all right! But I never had trouble like this before when a lease ran out.”
“Get on, asshole!”
McKelvey climbed onto Tommy’s back. He had real trouble getting his legs over the sides. Almost split his butt.
“Good,” I said. “Now, Tommy, you’re the elephant and you’re going to carry McKelvey on your back, down the hall and into the elevator. Begin now!”
Tommy began crawling across the floor of the office.
“Belane,” said McKelvey, “I’ll get you for this. I swear by my mother’s pubic hairs!”
“Mess with me again, McKelvey, and I’ll ram your cock down a garbage disposal!”
I opened the door and Tommy crawled out with the elephant boy.
He crawled on down the hall and as I slipped the luger back into my coat pocket I felt something in there, a crumpled up piece of paper. I took it out. It was my examination paper for the written test to renew my driver’s license. It was full of red marks. I had failed.
I tossed the paper over my shoulder and followed my friends.
We reached the elevator and I pressed the button.
I stood there humming a bit from “Carmen.”
Then out of nowhere I remembered long ago reading about how they found Jimmy Foxx dead in a skid row hotel room. All those home runs. Dead with the roaches.
The elevator came up. The door opened and I gave Tommy a boot in the ass. He crawled in bearing McKelvey. There were 3 people in there, standing, reading their newspapers.
They kept reading. The elevator went down.
I took the stairway. I was 30 pounds overweight. I needed it.
I counted 176 steps and then I was on the first floor. I stopped at the cigar stand, bought a cigar and The Daily Racing Form. I heard the elevator coming.
Outside, I moved through the smog resolutely. My eyes were blue and my shoes were old and nobody loved me. But I had things to do.
I was Nicky Belane, private detective.
5
Unfortunately, I ended up at the racetrack that afternoon and that night I got drunk. But the time wasn’t wasted, I was cogitating, sifting out the facts. I was right on top of everything. Any moment, I’d have everything figured out. Sure.
6
The next day I took a chance and went back to the office. After all, what’s a dick without an office?
I opened the door and who was sitting there behind my desk? Not Celine. Not the Red Sparrow. It was McKelvey. He gave me a sweet, false smile.
“Good morning, Belane, how they hanging?”
“Why do you ask? You want a peek?”
“No thanks.”
Then he scratched his, and yawned.
“Well, Nicky, my boy, your lease has been paid up for the next year by some mysterious benefactor.”
Lady Death, said a voice inside of my head, is playing with you.
“Anybody I know?” I asked.
“Swore on my mother’s honor to keep it quiet.”
“Your mother’s honor? She’s handled more turkeyneck than the corner butcher!”
McKelvey rose up from behind the desk.
“Take it easy,” I told him, “or I’ll turn you into a basket case.”
“I don’t like you getting on my mother.”
“Why not? Half the guys in this town have.”
McKelvey moved around the desk toward me.
“Come closer,” I said, “and I’ll have your head breathing up your butt.”
He stopped. I looked awesome when I was pissed.
“All right,” I said, “fill me in. This benefactor…it was a woman, wasn’t it?”
“Yeah. Yeah. Never saw a babe like that!”
His eyes looked glazed but they always looked like that.
“Come on,