Authors: Jim Thompson

Tags: #Fiction, #Crime, #Mystery & Detective, #Hard-Boiled, #General, #Detective and mystery stories, #Veterans, #Criminals, #Psychological fiction, #Psychology, #Criminals - Fiction, #Veterans - Psychology - Fiction

The Nothing Man (19 page)

… TODAY'S WEATHER IN SOUTHERN

AND LOWER

CALIFORNIA. CLOUDY WITH

THUNDER SHOWERS

THIS MORNING, FOLLOWED BY…

"You know what I figured on doin', Brownie? Why I came up here? Well, I was goin' to give you the old horse laugh, keed. You were at the end of the line, I figured, and you'd be sittin' here waiting for someone to pick you off. Maybe you'd kidded yourself you was going to do a brodie, but I knew you wouldn't. You couldn't, any more'n you could have killed those other people. You'd make a pass at doin' it, but that'd be as far as it would go. You couldn't carry through with it. And like I been tellin' you, no one else is goin' to do it. There ain't going to be no pinch-no gas chamber. No easy way out. So I was going to lay it on the line for you, and watch you squirm. Make you beg like you've made me beg. Laugh at you like you've laughed at me. But-well, I'll tell you something keed…"

… FOLLOWED BY CLEARING SKIES,

STRONG TO

MODERATE WINDS AND…

"… There's one thing about bein' a louse, keed. A nogood like maybe I am. When you're that way-"

"You're not that way," I said. "You're a long way from being a louse, Stuke. I don't know why I ever thought-"

"I'm telling you. When you're a louse yourself, keed, when you know you're a long way from being perfect yourself, the other lice don't look so bad to you. You're all in the same family, and you don't hurt 'em unless you have to. You don't make things no tougher on 'em than you have to. Look at me, Brownie." He gripped me by the shoulders. "I ain't laughin', am I? I didn't stay here to laugh. I'm here to help you."

He gave me a little shake, a brisk puffed-lipped nod of his head.

I said, "There's just one way you can help, Stuke. I-"

"Huh-uh," he said, firmly. "That's out, keed. I couldn't do it. I ain't goin' to. So forget it. You're goin' to snap out of it, Brownie. You're goin' to get your mind off of that- off of yourself, and start thinkin' about something else. That-it ain't everything. It-"

"Isn't it?" I said. "Isn't it rather easy for you to talk, Stuke?"

"It'd be easier not to, keed. A hell of a lot easier."

"But you don't know! You don't know what it's like to-"

"Keed"-he tapped me on the chest-"don't tell me what I don't know. You'd be talking for the next forty years and we ain't got much time. You've got to get cleaned up, get yourself something to eat and a little sleep. You've got to be in here on the job in the morning, and you've got to work harder than you ever worked before. You're going to go on swinging your weight against the rats and the cheaters in this town, but this time you're going to swing it the right way. It ain't going to be a needle job. It's going to mean something… Remember what I told you the other night? Well, I meant it. If the graft wasn't here to take, I wouldn't be taking it."

"But you don't know-I can't! God, how can I?"

"You ain't got no choice," he said.

His eyes were soft, sympathetic, friendly. They were firm and unwavering.

I looked away from him to the Teletype machines and the last lines of the weather forecast:

… THUNDER SHOWERS IN THE

AFTERNOON.

POSSIBLE CLEARING BY EVENING.

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