Seven Seats to the Moon Page 23

  “I was saying I’m glad to meet him,” Tony protested. “What’s snide about that?”

  J looked at the fat red letters on the doily. G can hear. Follow cues.

  J’s head began to come up, but she put her hand on his arm and said, “Please, Cousin J? You are going to help us?”

  “I don’t know,” said J in a bewildered mumble. He sat back and looked at the room and, sure enough, there was Goodrick, way over against the other wall.

  “After all,” Tony was saying in a voice that was not very loud but had some carrying quality, “I had a hard time believing in your existence, Mr. Little. Here’s my girl. I ask her to marry me. She says No, she won’t, and then and there she takes off for California. Can you blame me if I want to know what’s going on out here?”

  J said feebly, “That ain’t the way I heered it.” (How could Goodrick hear, from where he was?)

  “What kind of yarn have you been telling him?” Tony was demanding.

  “I just said I was confused about you,” said Annette, “and if that isn’t the truth, let lightning strike me down.” Her eyes caressed him.

  “Wait, wait,” said Tony. “She loves me,” he said to J, “with all her pore little heart. So she should marry me. Obvious?”

  “It’s not that simple,” said Annette.

  And Tony said at the same time, “It’s as simple as that.”

  “Hey, hey,” said J. “If I’m supposed to be the referee, give me one side at a time.” The drinks had come, and he sipped his gladly. There were devices, he guessed, for listening from afar. He’d seen them advertised.

  The young people put on quite a show, J thought, as they proceeded to have a lovers’ quarrel, making no sense whatsoever in a most realistic way. He even began to suspect there must be a grain or two of truth underneath.

  Goodrick was listening to this stuff?

  “I think you’re afraid of marriage,” Tony said disdainfully. “You won’t even try. Cousin J, she says she doesn’t want to move her furniture. What the …”

  “You heard him say try,” she cried. “That’s the way he thinks, Cousin J.”

  J was taking the opportunity to study this young man. He rather liked Tony’s looks, as looks go. The eyes were intelligent; the face was clean. If his manner and his tone were slightly scoffing, as if to say, Nobody fools me, that was the style among men of his age. Win could behave just so.

  J kept playing benevolent bewilderment, and they kept carrying on. Food came. J ate heartily.

  This wasn’t getting him anywhere. He had only agreed to the appointment to try getting something out of this Tony. But he had not. Not much. J felt he might as well take nourishment, anyhow.

  But after a while he realized that he wasn’t contributing a lot to the act, and why shouldn’t he have some fun?

  He rapped on the table. “Okay, you kids. Okay. Now, listen to wisdom.”

  “She’s asking for a guarantee I’m not going to give her,” said Tony angrily.

  “Nobody ought to marry anybody for a long weekend,” the girl said. “Cousin J knows what I mean.”

  “I do not think that you should marry him at all,” said J pompously.

  “You don’t?” she said, not sounding joyous.

  “And you,” said J to Tony, “shouldn’t marry her, either.”

  “Why not?” said Tony belligerently.

  “Because,” said J, “I am going to tell you both exactly what to do instead. Cousin Annie,” he shook his coffee spoon at her, “you go home.”

  “What?”

  “Get yourself on some airplane, quick, and go home, wherever that is. And maybe get a job that keeps you out of mischief. And find a man who bores you sometimes. You need a rest, child. And you, Tony.… On vacation, are you?”

  “Things are a little slow right now,” said Tony. “Why?”

  “Okay then, you stick around out here. Put this girl out of your mind. Stay a couple of weeks. Make the scene. You don’t want to marry her.”

  “I don’t?”

  “Because she’s right, and you’re wrong about marriage. But her trouble is, with all her fascinating moods and switches, she’s practicing to be a weekend woman.”

  They were both slightly stunned. They couldn’t know he had his clown face on.

  “The two of you come around, dragging me into this, begging my advice—I’ll tell you something you may not have thought of. Believe me,” said J, “on Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays a man needs a woman he can get used to. And maybe vice versa.”

  He pushed against Tony, who was forced to get up and let him out.

  “I’ve got to get back to the office,” J said. “Thanks for the lunch. And you’re welcome for the wisdom. So long, children.”

  He went briskly away, threading diagonally between tables, not looking at Goodrick, although he was tempted.

  Tony thumped back into his seat and, keeping to the role, growled, “Well?”

  “Oh, listen, Tony,” she said, “I am going home. Don’t follow me. Please don’t?”

  “I’ll do what I feel like doing,” said Tony. “He’s not my fuddy-duddy old cousin. Now, don’t bawl!”

  Annette took the cue and began to cry into her table napkin.

  A man at the table just behind them put the small tape recorder into his pocket and got up. Across the room Goodrick got his signal, covered his teeth, and called for the check.

  In Tony’s car Tony said after a while, “No Goodrick after us.”

  “Is that good?” she said dully.

  “They can’t get him in his office. Better make a reservation, sweetheart.”

  “I’ll make it for Monday,” she said defiantly.

  “Check out,” he snapped, “at four this afternoon. Pay the extra day. Meet me at Travel Town, Griffith Park. That’s an order.”

  “Yes, sir. What are you going to do?”

  “Find you a hidey hole. And keep the guard on him. But no face Goodrick connects. Damn it,” he added under his breath.

  She sighed. They were on the Santa Monica Freeway. She took the doily out of her purse, tore it to pieces, and held the pieces to the rush of air outside the speeding car until they were torn, one by one, from her fingers.

  She said fiercely, “You’d better guard that old fuddy-duddy.”

  “I’ll have to,” said Tony.

  He wished he could call in the Army, the Navy, and the Air-Force. He thought there was no other sure way. Nothing was sure about this job. Unless it was that everything had narrowed in on one Little man. The brains were gathered; all of them had made it successfully. Even the religious contingent had slipped through into danger and had aroused no publicity. The only loose end was a Little man who did not know what he knew. Nor did Goodrick and Co. yet know for sure that J M. Little knew anything at all. So Tony must guard him while not seeming to guard, and all these uncertainties sucked power out of him.

  Tony recognized the added feature, that he ought to keep the Little man from harm for the man’s own sake. Tony was afraid he had made a mistake again. Should he have told the Little man the whole truth? Maybe he had played it too smart, taken the risk in the wrong direction.

  The girl put both hands to her face suddenly.

  “I’ll admit he wasn’t exactly what I expected,” said Tony, feeling funny. He beat this down as sentimentality.

  The tape from the restaurant having been played to him, Mr. Jones cried, “Lovers!” His head trembled. He looked as if he would like to do away with any and all lovers, they being the nuisance they were to serious men. “We have lost Halliwell Bryce,” he mourned. “Do you realize this was all we had? And now you say that Thees was following the man Little because he was a jealous lover!” Mr. Jones might weep at any moment.

  “Shall I pay off the help?” asked Goodrick in a practical way. “Here comes Clooney.”

  Another man entered the hotel room. “Thees dropped her at her hotel. Went on to his own,” he reported.

  “Ma
y as well take the men off the hotels, eh?” said Goodrick to his boss.

  “Where? Where? All I want is the target. Will there be another target?” Jones said brightly, trying not to cry.

  “She threw this out of the car on the freeway,” Clooney said. “I only got this one piece. Had to stop on the shoulder, and a man could get killed.”

  Goodrick took the piece of paper. “Lipstick, eh?” He read the four large letters. “CUES. What the devil English word has got that combination?”

  Mr. Jones was looking over his shoulder. “I’m surprised at you, Barry,” he chided softly. “That is an English word, is it not?”

  Goodrick’s upper teeth met his lower set, but not in a smile.

  CHAPTER 25

  Friday Evening

  When the Neebys appeared at a quarter of eight, J had the bridge table and chairs already set up in the family room. They settled down amid chirps and twitters from the females. The draperies were open. The glass wall on the back of the house, as seen from the depths of the garden, framed a bright stage.

  It was dark out there. The moon had not yet risen. A man, who was trying to make himself comfortable on the cold grass behind the heaps of elm boughs, could not see the shape that came prowling from the far side of the garage, turned the corner, and slipped along the deep shadow of the garage itself, where a jutting forth of the kitchen wing let no house light fall.

  On stage J was doing his story about the mishap in Chicago, the dowager, the traffic jam, cops and ambulance, the trouser-napping, and his pitiable plight in the hospital. Gladstone Neeby was a big man with a deep laugh, but when the tale had been told, he wanted to know if J had got any damages out of the deal. “Seven hundred and fifty bucks,” J told him. Susie looked enlightenment at Sophia, and Sophia winked.

  Goodrick had found the back door from kitchen to yard. It was not locked.

  Tony’s man, nesting in the elm boughs, pricked up his ears. What was that click?

  They were paired off, a man and the other man’s wife, as usual. Susie dealt, chattering on about that gorgeous gown. Sophia said she’d changed her mind and taken it back. Couldn’t face the upkeep. Susie cried woe.

  Nanjo came out of the bedroom wing with a long white sweater over her cotton frock. She greeted and was greeted and said she was going to run over to Debby’s for a little while.

  “Don’t be too late,” said Sophia, as usual.

  “It’s not a school night.”

  “Have fun,” said J, as usual—thinking that her peers might help her more than he could.

  “On foot after dark?” frowned Susie when Nanjo had gone.

  “It’s two blocks,” said Sophia. “Some boy will see her home. One club.”

  J, at her left, said, “Pass.” (And thought he guessed he did.)

  Glad said, “Two no trump,” in a firm and manly voice.

  Susie wrinkled her brow and began to count her points again.

  “Say,” said Glad in the interim, “how come they’re checking up on you, J? I didn’t realize you had to have clearance.”

  “What you don’t know won’t hurt you,” said J blandly. (He did not believe this, he realized with a pang. It wasn’t true.)

  “That so?” said Glad cheerfully.

  Goodrick was moving silently across the dim kitchen.

  Win answered their phone.

  “Win? Amy,” said his sister. “Hey, I need some money. Bad.”

  “Ow! So do I, little sister. What’s wrong now?”

  “I’ve had Avery here in the hospital all day,” she told him, “and it’s not good. They’re going to operate first thing in the morning.”

  “Gosh, I’m sorry. What is it?”

  “Oh, Lord,” his sister said, “it’s something back of his eyes. It’s going to be a long, hard thing they’ll have to do. It’s going to cost like hell. And I’m supposed to put down something for the hospital right away.”

  “How much?”

  “They say a hundred dollars, and they won’t kick him out into the street.” Her voice was tight.

  “I’ll get it to you,” said Win. “We’re in a mess, selling the house and most of the stuff. But I’ll get that much to you. Don’t worry.”

  “Oh, Amy!” said Marion on the other phone. “What’s the matter?” Amy told her. “Couldn’t you call your father?” Marion said. “Does he know about this?”

  “No, and I’d kind of rather not—ask him for money. But if it’s too much on you guys, I can do that.”

  “No, no,” said Win. “Don’t bother Dad. I’ll be right down.”

  When he hung up, he said to Marion, “Leave my father out of this. Will you do that?”

  “Win, you can’t afford it. And besides, I don’t like being left …”

  “I don’t give a damn whether I can afford it or not,” he said furiously.

  After he left the house, Marion locked all the doors very carefully.

  The man behind the elm boughs saw Goodrick’s shadow cross the pale kitchen window, and he whistled like a bird.

  “Where is your mother tonight, Sophia?” asked Susie Neeby. “She hasn’t left, has she?”

  “No, no. She’s off hobnobbing with some friends in Hollywood.”

  “Hollywood?” Susie was ready to be amused if this would sit well with her friend.

  “They live in a hotel called the Wimple,” Sophia explained, “and Mother likes to go there.”

  “Why?” said Susie innocently.

  “Because they’re a pack of nuts,” said Sophia calmly.

  “Down one, partner,” said Glad woefully. “Couldn’t do a thing with it.”

  Sophia felt a ripple in her shoulder blades. “Does anybody feel a draft?” she asked.

  “Not me,” said Susie. “My deal?”

  “Nothing’s open,” said J, putting down the score. “Thirty on, partner. We didn’t get wiped out, remember.”

  “Say J,” said Susie, “I saw you with a pretty snazzy blonde the other day.”

  “Lemme see,” said J, “which day was it I saw the blonde? Tuesday was the redhead.” Everybody knew this was absurd.

  Cary Bruce had his foot on the accelerator; he played with it. The engine muttered, raced, fell to a purr, according to his mood.

  “If you’re going to keep on telling stupid lies …” he growled.

  “I am not!” said Nanjo.

  “Yah! Your Mom already bought the damned dress. You had it. Sure you did! But you don’t want it. So she takes it back. What kind of crappo.…”

  Nanjo hugged her bare arms. She’d left her sweater in Debby’s front hall. She’d walked the two blocks nervously and had seen no Cary. But almost before she had greeted Debby, they had heard him honking.

  Nanjo felt she really ought to try to help him. “Listen, Cary, never mind about the dress. Don’t you get in a big mess. Don’t do it. If you got caught, you’d have it on your back, and it’s not worth it.”

  Cary swore from sheer misery. He had just now heard that somebody else had hit the gas station last night. This was an outrage. He and his pals had even driven by the place, casing the job. The effort was wasted? He’d braced himself up to the daring deed to no purpose? He hadn’t told Nanjo this part. He wanted her to talk him out of it, and so acquire merit, somewhere. She was firmly in her posture of being a kind of Uncle Tom among squares. “It’s stupid,” she argued.

  “And you’re smart, eh?” Cary wasn’t going to succumb too soon on the basis of cowardly common sense.

  Nanjo switched her attack. “Okay, if you have to show off,” she said. “But don’t you ever say you did it for me. I don’t want to get messed up. I’ve got better things …”

  “Yah!” he growled. “You!” His motor raced. “Don’t want me to do it for you,” he mocked. His motor roared and subsided.

  “You didn’t think it through, anyhow,” Nanjo announced. “How could I wear the dress in the parade if you gave me the money?”

  “Why not?”

  �
��Because my folks would want to know where I got it. What could I—”

  “Why should they have to know?”

  “Stupid! They’ll be there, of course.”

  Cary, whose folks never came near anywhere that he was on display, said, “How come you’re so scared of your folks all of a sudden?”

  “I’m not scared all of a sudden. And my Mom did buy the dress.”

  “Hey! Hey! I get it,” pounced Cary. “This bird you dated Tuesday, he gave you the money. So you were the stupid one. So your folks took it back, and they grounded you. Yah! I get it.” He laughed raucously. “What did you do for him?”

  “I am getting right out of this car!”

  He yanked the lever. The car leaped.

  “Cary, I told you! I can’t go anywhere …”

  “So jump,” he said, accelerating.

  Life was too much for Cary this evening. He was furious with the whole universe, and for revenge only Nanjo Little was handy. Prolly she’ll think I did it last night, he thought. “Call the fuzz,” he jeered. “Baby, you know too much.”

  Nanjo drew into her corner and sat very still. This was the way you handled them. Don’t react. If they want to scare you, don’t be scared. The car hurtled on. It screamed on the corners. Nanjo was a little bit scared. She was afraid the police might pick them up. But she knew she had better not say so, or they would.

  “Some people don’t understand money a-tall,” J was proclaiming.

  “What do you mean by that?” Glad wanted to know.

  “I mean they don’t see it as I see it,” said J, “and I am absolutely right, naturally.”

  “Blood of trade, eh?” said Glad Neeby casually.

  “You’ve got it. Listen, if they abolished money, they’d just have to go ahead and reinvent it.”

  “That’s what they do,” said Neeby. “Cigarettes? Chocolate? Three hearts.”

  Susie passed. Sophia said, “Four hearts. What can I lose?”

  J passed and began to chuckle. “I had this nutty idea. I was thinking about all us folks in the middle … do the work … pay the taxes.…”

  “Not this, again,” said Sophia in mock dismay as she laid out the dummy.

  “What’s all this, J? Darned right, we pay taxes,” said Susie.