The Fabulous Clipjoint by Fredric Brown (free ebook reader TXT) 📕

I knocked on the door of Uncle Am’s room and his voice called out, “Come on in,” and I did.

He was still in bed.

I asked him, “Did I wake you up, Uncle Am?”

“No, kid, I been awake half an hour or so. I been lying here thinking.”

“Claire’s gone,” I said. “She left town—I think.”

“What do you mean, you think?”

I sat down on the edge of the bed. Uncle Am doubled the pillow under his head to raise it up, and he said, “Tell me about it, Ed. Not the personal passages. Skip those, but tell me everything that gal told you about Harry Reynolds, and what happened about Dutch last night, and what happened this morning. Just start at the beginning, from the time you left here yesterday evening.”

I told him. When I got through he said, “My God, kid, you’ve got a memory. But don’t you see the holes in it?”

“What holes? You mean Claire changed her story about herself, yeah, but what’s that got to do with what we’re working on.”

“I don’t know, kid. Maybe nothing. I feel old this morning, this afternoon, whatever it is. I feel like we’ve been chasing our tails and getting nowhere. Hell, maybe you got more sense than I have. I don’t know. I’m worried about Bassett.”

“Has he been around?”

“No, that’s what worries me. Part of what worries me. Something’s wrong, and I don’t know what.”

“How do you mean, Uncle Am?”

“I don’t know how to put it. You’re nuts on music; let me put it this way. There’s a sour note somewhere in a chord, and you can’t find it. You sound each note by itself and it’s right, and then you listen to the chord again and it’s sour. It’s not a major or a minor or a diminished seventh. It’s a noise.”

“Can you come closer to saying what instrument it is?”

“It’s not the trombone, kid. Not you. But listen, kid, it’s in my bones; somebody’s putting something over on us. I don’t know what. I think it’s Bassett, but I don’t know what.”

I said, “Then let’s not worry about it. Let’s go ahead.”

“Go ahead and do what?”

I opened my mouth, and then closed it again. He grinned at me.

He said, “Kid, you’re starting to grow up. It’s time you learned something.”

“What?” I asked.

“When you kiss a woman, wipe off the lipstick.”

I wiped it off and grinned back at him. I said, “I’ll try to remember, Uncle Am. What are we going to do today?”

“Got any ideas?”

“I guess not.”

“Neither have I. Let’s take the day off and go slumming down in the Loop. Let’s see a movie and then have a good dinner and then go take in a floor show. Yeah, we’ll pick one with a good band if there are any. Let’s take the day and evening off and get our perspective back.”

It was a funny time, that afternoon and evening. We went places, and we enjoyed ourselves, but we didn’t. There was a feeling about it like the quietness of the air while the barometer drops before a storm. Even I could feel it. Uncle Am was uneasy like a man waiting for something and not knowing what he’s waiting for. For the first time since I’d known him, he was a little crabby. And three times he called the Homicide Department to try to get Bassett, and Bassett wasn’t there.

But we didn’t talk about it. We talked about the show we saw, and the band, and he told me more about the carney. We didn’t talk about Pop at all.

About midnight we called it a day and broke up. I went home. I still felt uneasy. Maybe it was partly the heat. The hot wave was coming back. It was a sultry night and it was going to be hot as the hinges tomorrow.

Mom called out from her room, “That you, Ed?” When I answered, she slipped on a bathrobe and came out. She must have just turned in; she hadn’t been asleep yet.

She said, “I’m glad you came home for a change, Ed. I wanted to talk with you.”

“What is it, Mom?”

“I was in to the insurance company today. I took them the certificate, and they’re putting it through, but the check’s got to come from St. Louis and they say it’ll be a few days yet. And I’m broke, Ed. Have you got any money?”

“Just a couple of bucks, Mom. I’ve got twenty-some dollars in that savings account I started.”

“Could you lend it to me? Ed, I’ll give it back as soon as the insurance check comes through.”

“Sure, Mom. Anyway, I’ll lend you twenty of it. I’d like to keep the few odd dollars myself. I’ll draw it out tomorrow. If you need more than that, I’ll bet Bunny could lend you some.”

“Bunny was here this evening awhile, but I didn’t want to bother him about it. He’s worried; his sister in Springfield’s going to have an operation early next week. A pretty bad one; he’s going to take off work next week and go there, he thinks.”

“Oh,” I said.

“But if you can give me twenty, Ed, that’ll do all right. The man said the check’ll be only a few days.”

“Okay, Mom. I’ll go to the bank first thing tomorrow. ‘Night.”

I went in and went to bed in my room. It felt funny. I mean, it seemed like I was going back there after having been away for years. It didn’t seem like home or anything, though. It was just a familiar room. I wound the clock, but I didn’t set it to go off.

Somewhere outside, a clock struck one and I remembered it was Wednesday night. I thought, just about this time a week ago Pop was getting killed.

Somehow it seemed a lot longer time than that. It seemed a year, almost; so much had happened since then. It had only been a week. But I thought too: I’ve got to get back to work. I can’t keep on staying away from work much longer. It’s been a week. Next Monday I’ll have to go back. Yet going back to work, I thought, would be even stranger than coming back to this room to sleep.

I tried not to think about Claire, and finally I went to sleep.

It was almost eleven when I woke. I dressed and went out to the kitchen. Gardie had gone out somewhere. Mom was making coffee; she looked like she’d just got up.

She said, “There’s nothing in the house. If you want to go to the bank now, will you bring some eggs and some bacon back with you, Ed?”

I said “Sure” and went out to the bank and got stuff for breakfast on the way back. Mom cooked it and we’d just about finished eating when the phone rang. I answered it, and it was Uncle Am.

“You up, Ed?”

“Just finished breakfast.”

He said, “I finally got Bassett—or he got me. He called up a few minutes ago. He’s coming round right away. Something’s going to break, Ed. He sounded like the cat that ate the canary.”

“I’m coming over,” I said. “Leave in a few minutes.”

I went back to the table and picked up my coffee to finish it without sitting down. I told Mom I had to meet Uncle Am right away.

She said, “I forgot, Ed. When Bunny was here last night, he wanted to see you, and because he didn’t know when or where he could get in touch with you, he left a note. Something in connection with his going down-state next week.”

“Where is it?”

“I think I put it on the sideboard, in the living room.”

I got it on my way out and read it going down the stairs. Bunny had written: “I guess Madge told you why I’m going to Springfield this week end. You said a guy named Anderz who had sold insurance in Gary had moved to Springfield, and you’d wanted to see him. Want me to look him up while I’m there and interview him for you? If you do, let me know before Sunday, and tell me what questions to ask.”

I stuffed the note into my pocket. I’d ask Uncle Am, but he’d said he didn’t think the insurance agent would be able to tell us anything. Still, it might be worth a try if Bunny was going anyway.

When I got there, Bassett was just ahead of me. He was sitting on the bed. His eyes looked more tired and washed-out than I’d ever seen them. His clothes looked as though they’d been slept in. He had a flat bottle in his pocket, wrapped in brown paper, twisted above the cork.

My uncle grinned at me. He looked cheerful.

He said, “Hi, kid, shut the door. Frank here is about ready to explode with news, but I told him to hold it till you were here.”

It was hot and stuffy in the hotel room. I tossed my hat on the bed, loosened my collar and sat down on the writing desk.

Bassett said, “We got the gang you been looking for. We got Harry Reynolds. We got Benny Rosso. Dutch Reagan is dead. Only—”

“Only,” my uncle cut in, “none of ‘em killed Wally Hunter.” Bassett had opened his mouth to go on. He closed it again and looked at Uncle Am. Uncle Am grinned at him. He said, “Obvious, my dear Bassett. What else bright and cheerful could you have been going to say with that tone of voice and that look on your ugly mug? You’ve been letting us pull chestnuts out of the fire for you.”

“Nuts,” Bassett said. “You didn’t get near Harry Reynolds. You never saw him. Did you?”

Uncle