Comfort to the Enemy and Other Carl Webster Stories Read online

  In the car again, turned around heading north, Gary said, I don't get it. We could have him in the back seat, cuffed.

  "You'd have to kill his sister."

  All right, what do you tell McMahon? We couldn't find him.

  "He'll believe you?"

  "Bob will call the sheriff and the sheriff will threaten to jail the snitch for making a false accusation."

  "All right, let me ask you something," Gary looking from the road to Carl. You said you made up your mind to add Peyton to your list. You gave him a number, he'd be number four at that time. He's close to getting away, pretty far down the road when you shot him."

  "What's the question?"

  "Why didn't you let him go? You're letting Joe Tanzi off the hook when he ought to be in prison. Why didn't you give Peyton a break, let him get away?"

  "Joe Tanzi was a criminal for a few days and did five years. Peyton Bragg killed four people the day he robbed the bank in Sallisaw with a Thompson sub-machine gun. Two of them were law officers. You don't allow a man like Peyton Bragg to go around with a Thompson sub-machine gun. That's th e d ifference. You have to know," Carl said, "when it's all right to use your gun."

  All this to get the hard-headed bullrider to quit thinking every offender was a criminal you ought to shoot ... and every German POW a Kraut you could beat up if you wanted. And if you could.

  Carl said, "We'll stop at the Deep Fork camp on the way. I want to introduce you to Jurgen Schrenk.

  I've met him.

  No you haven't.

  *

  In the bedroom of the Mayo suite, Carl and Louly were sitting up in bed talking, drinks on the night tables, an ashtray between them on the sheet that covered Carl to his waist while Louly was trying to keep it under her arms. Carl would use his foot to kick the sheet loose and Louly would have gto hang on to it; she did a couple of times and after that let it go. Carl said, "Why're you acting like you're so modest?" Louly said because she was, she was modest. Carl said, "How can you be modest and work at Teddy's? Everywhere you turn you're looking at bare bazooms." Louly said she never showed hers, even though they were way better than most everyone else's. Or unsnapped her teddy.

  Carl said, "You called yourself Kitty so it wouldn't be you working there, but you got to see all the monkey business going on. He l eaned over and she turned to kiss him. They loved to kiss each other, never in a rush. Their faces close he said, "You're my little monkey." the two grinning at each other.

  She told him the war bond rally this afternoon went okay, on the steps of the federal courthouse. They had the Andrew Sisters doing 'Any Bonds Today' piped over the PA system. "And then Anita O'Day and Roy Eldridge did 'Let Me Off Uptown' and 'Thanks for the Boogie Ride' with an entire 17 piece band behind them. Anita brought me up to the mike with her and we sang that part, 'I like riding in jalopies away from motorcycle coppies, I like riding just like you do aboard the Chattanooga choo-choo. So let me thanks you gates, thank you for the boogie ride it really was great.'"

  Carl said, "In your uniform.

  Of course.

  You snapped your fingers?"

  "I had the moves," Louly said, "don't worry.

  Carl had to grin. He sure loved this marine.

  She asked earlier if he wanted to go to the show, see "Lady in the Dark" with Ginger Rogers and Ray Milland, Louly reading from the ad in the paper, "The thrilling story of a woman' s secret loves based on the internationally famed stage success." Carl said, "What's it about?" Louly said the revealing of a woman' s secret loves. He stared at her now.

  "Yeah ...? ` She wasn't that crazy about seeing it. They'd skip the show and have something to eat.

  When he told her how he handled the Joe Tanzi business, Louly said, "The new guy didn't understand what you were doing? I don't understand it either, how you can decide to let the guy go. What're you, a parole board?"

  "They got mad 'cause they couldn't find the money and gave Joe twenty-five years.

  "'Cause he hid it."

  "You think he should do another twenty?"

  "What I think--what's that got to do with it? I don't have a say in it and you don't either."

  "But I said something, didn't I, whether I had a say or not. I said this isn't the guy we're looking for. I let him grow his cotton. You know what I wanted to ask him? What happened to his wife? The one left him when he robbed the bank. But I couldn't think of how to put it."

  The first thing they talked about in the hotel suite while they were taking off their clothes--then held up on that conversation for a while, until they had their highballs and cigarettes--was Carl introducing Gary to Jurgen.

  Carl said Gary eyed the Kraut officer in his short pants sitting across his cot with his back against the wall, Jurgen showing no interest in Gary until Carl introduced him as a former rodeo bullrider from Kosse, Texas, no t f ar from Waco. And Jurgen said, Kosse? Do you know Bob Wills? He's from there. Gary said no, but he's heard him enough on the radio.

  Gary said Bob was great but he preferred the down home sound of his favorite, Roy Acuff. It got Jurgen sitting up, Jurgen saying Roy Acuff, it was Acuff who tuned his ear to hillbilly music. He'd started listening when he lived in Detroit. Saturday nights he'd tune in the Grand Ole Opry broadcasts.

  Carl said once they got into the music, and started talking about, Uncle Dave Macon, The Carter Family, Pee Wee King, the war between Gary and Jurgen was over. Jurgen hadn't yet heard of Eddie Arnold, a new singer, so Gary said he'd bring over some records. "That's how it went," Carl said. "Toward the end Jurgen was asking Gary, 'What's this about riding bulls?'"

  *

  "Guess who I saw in the lobby, when I got back from selling war bonds.

  They were in the bathroom now getting ready to go out, Louly plucking her eyebrows, Carl patting Aqua Velva on his face.

  "Teddy Ritz. I forgot to tell you. He was talking to a couple of gangsters.

  "Why do you think they're gangsters?" "They look like gangsters, and they weree with Teddy."

  "You talk to him?"

  "He looked over, but he wouldn't of recognized me in my uniform.

  I'm surprised you didn't go up to him.

  "If he doesn't remember me, what's the point? But listen, Teddy wasn't checking in, the two hoods were checking out. With big suitcases they wouldn't let the bellboys get their hands on. But now I didn't see Teddy. The two guys were leaving the hotel.

  Carl said, You followed them.

  To see if Teddy was outside. He was standing by a Packard, the high-priced one. The two guys put their grips in the trunk ... The car was delivered by a hotel valet, he's standing there waiting for a tip. Teddy and the two guys got in, one of them driving, and took off. The valet still waiting for the tip they didn't give him. I went over and asked him, 'You know where they're going?'

  No beating around the bush, Carl said. The valet said Okmulgee. I gave him a quarter.

  Chapter Eight

  Tutti and Frankie Bones

  Shemane took a sip of her martini, placed it on the cocktail table and picked up the Tulsa paper, the World.

  NAZI CHIEF ESCAPES DEATH IN BOMB PLOT

  Shemane said, "Mom, the paper you're reading is three months old." The edition about Hitler escaping death and FDR accepting the nomination for a fourth term; she laid it on the stack of newspapers between them on the sofa.

  Her mom was holding her martini and reading a Sunday edition's Society page. On her lap and on the sofa she ha d t he World as far back as summer, even older ones in her room, Gladys keeping up with the Tulsa money people, once her neighbors. She didn't know how the paper got to Okmulgee, but there it was on the front stoop every morning. Shemane watched Gladys in her green velvet with the emerald necklace and rings, always her rings, her veined hand reaching for the cigarette in the silver holder resting in a silver ashtray.

  "It's gone out.

  Shemane had on a nifty black jersey this evening with a scoop neck, no jewelry. She said, "Let me have it," flicked a silver
lighter to get the joint going again, took a deep draw through the holder and held her breath saying, Mom? Here, take it."

  She had read about the attempt to assassinate Hitler, one of his guys, Goring--no, it was the naval guy, Doenitz saying, "by a clique of mad generals. Jurgen knew about it, he said Hitler was crazy, not the generals, one of them being Field Marshal Rommel, Jurgen's all-time hero. She had read only a couple weeks ago Rommel had died of injuries received last July in France when his car was strafed by a Spitfire and went out of control. Jurgen said, "He takes all that time to die of injuries? He was a war hero, loved by the German people. It's why they couldn't hang him." His voice quiet then saying , "They made him take poison."

  He said it during his last visit, the two of them on the sofa. She put her arm around him and brushed his hair from his forehead and kissed his cheek telling him she was so sorry, kissing and patting him and touching his hair.

  Her mom thought Jurgen was a nice polite boy because he said yes ma'm and no ma'm. Shemane and her mom hardly ever talked about the war. Her mom would see a photo of Franklin Roosevelt in the paper and say Alvin called him a Communist Jew-lover. Gladys had grown up in Tulsa society, was snatched off a country club dance floor by Alvin Morrissey, who married her to get into Maple Ridge and make oil contacts. By the time Shemane was 12 she knew her dad was fooling around; she'd go through his things and find letters from girls, girls' names in his address book and rubbers in his billfold. She told Jurgen she told him just about everything because he liked to listen to her--that her dad had married Gladys because she was ditsy and loved all kinds of cocktails, loved to dance and drive to Hot Springs to gamble.

  Shemane said, "She misses her social life less and less. I'm thankful she knows enough to sedate herself. Mom can feel mellow whenever she wants.

  Shemane was surprised Jurgen had never tried reefer. He liked it, grinning and talking more, becoming less and less German each time he came, telling her how much he liked America and wanted to visit Detroit again after the war. He said you could ride the streetcar from the fairgrounds all the way downtown to the river for seven cents, and take the ferry to Canada for a nickel. He loved to read. He loved scotch whisky. He told Shemane he loved her and maybe he did, though a lot of guys had said they loved her. She told Jurgen she never tried to vamp her customers; she'd be herself, the nice polite girlnextdoor-type, like this was the first time she was ever in bed naked with a guy and a little nervous but still anxious to please. "I'd say. Do you like it when I do this? Very innocent. Like it honey, they loved all my tricks. She told Jurgen about Teddy Ritz, an honest-toGod gangster who'd set her up with dates and take her back to his bed after, because she had been with rich guys, gentlemen, and Teddy would ask what they talked about and if she had learned anything he could use.

  She asked Jurgen what being in North Africa had been like. He said, The best part? Being with Erwin Rommel, feeling his energy. It was exciting to watch him. He thought about North Africa and said, Otherwise it was armor in the desert, all that metal painted the color of sand. Metal you didn't want to touch. And at night you froze to death.

  She could tell he liked the she way she was herself with him in bed, not using any of her tricky moves on him and made him wear a rubber. He asked her if it was necessary and she said, "Trust me," Making love she would open her eyes and see him staring at her, very serious about it, and she would smile and see his face relax and everything would be all right. He never offered to pay her; she could tell it never entered his mind.

  The phone rang, on the secretary between the two front windows.

  "Teddy," her mom said. "What do you bet?"

  Shemane let the phone ring a few times before going over to pick it up. She said, "Teddy?" and listened and said, you're the only one that calls." Three times during the past few days. Her mom was smoking a cigarette now watching Shemane, hearing her say, I read the paper, Teddy. We get two every day of the week and I read them, I keep up with the war and I haven't seen anything about Now she was listening again. Now she was saying, "Yeah, but how do you know it's true?" He had been telling her about Warsaw, where his people were from originally--Teddy's grandfather with a store that sold musical instruments in the front half and the granfather's brother repaired shoes in the back--telling her what the Germans had been doing to the Jews for almost ten years, awful things, Teddy learning about it from someone who was there and wrote to him. What Shemane couldn't understand, why h e w as telling her all this. She was saying now, "You are? When?" Now she was listening. Now she was saying, "Where are you?" sounding surprised.

  Her mom picked up the cigarette holder and said, "Sweetie, it's out again. How come it doesn't stay lit?"

  Shemane returned to the sofa and sat down. She finished her martini before lighting the joint for her mom.

  "Teddy's coming.

  Here?"

  "For a visit. He's in Tulsa. Every time he calls he tells me what the Germans are doing to the Jews."

  I never did understand, her mom said, "what your father had against them.

  "Did you know any Jews?"

  I'm not sure, I must know some.

  "But Teddy never visits, you know, makes social calls.

  He goes somewhere, it's about business. You know what I think?"

  "Did you know," her mom said, "Irving Berlin wrote 'Any Bonds Today'? I'm sure he's Jewish."

  Shemane went back to the kitchen to pour another martini. The front doorbell rang, then again while she was adding olives and wondering who it was. Tony Antonelli or Carl Webster? Not Teddy, he'd still be in Tulsa or on his way. She hoped it might be Carl. I t w ould be fun to try some of the old stuff on him. Shemane walked out to th e l iving room in time to see her mom opening the front door to a soldier who was introducing himself, now looking past her into the house at Shemane coming to the sofa with her martini.

  She heard him say, "Shemane? How you doing? Remember me? PFC Larry Davidson, Remember that pecan farm across the river? You stopped and I came over to your car, that Lincoln Zephyr you were driving?" Yeah, Larry--she remembered him, his overseas cap cocked over one eye and the carbine slung over his shoulder. She remembered asking him if he was friends with any of the POWs and Larry saying, "Are you nuts? Why would I want a Nazi for a friend?" It was the first time she had thought of those nice German boys working on farms around here as Nazis.

  She was surprised Larry hadn't stopped by before this. He wasn't her first choice, but he was company and her mom seemed glad to see him, so she waved at him to come in.

  "Larry, what're you drinking, hon?"

  *

  Teddy Ritz was making the trip in the comfort of his Packard touring car, ninety thousand miles on it. Teddy, in his black chesterfield had the back seat to himself.

  His two hired hands were in front, the Tedesco brothers, Salvatore and Frank, known as Tutti and Frankie Bones. They both were wearing shirts and ties with their dark suits and felt hats straight on their heads, both with the brims snapped down on their eyes.

  Teddy was telling them how the Germans were sending six thousand Jews a day to Treblinka, the death camp only forty miles from Warsaw. "The Krauts announce they're giving each person a loaf of bread for the trip. So these people starving to death think well, if they're feeding us they're not gonna kill us, right? Grasping at straws. They make the trip to the concentration camp and end up in the gas chamber screaming. Some the Krauts save to shoot and dump them in a pit. You imagine living there," Teddy said, "seeing this going on every day? Wondering when your time is coming?"

  He watched the Tedesco brothers shake their heads. No, they couldn't imagine it. Frankie Bones, the one not driving, turned his head to say to Teddy, "I don't think I ever heard of that many people getting knocked off on purpose at the same time. St. Valentine's Day, how many was that, seven?"

  What Teddy loved about the Tedesco brothers, before coming to Kansas City they were members of Abe Bernstein's Purple Gang in Detroit, during Prohibition. The Purples were a
Jewish gang that hijacked liquor comin g a cross the river from Canada and always shot the crew bringing it in. Al Capone tried to set up a base in Detroit and they told him, "The river belongs to us." They did do business with him, sold him booze and supplied him with gunmen, the guys Al meant when he said, Get me Detroit.

  Teddy asked the Tedesco brothers if they were ever in The Little Jewish Navy, the speedboat fleet operating on the Detroit River. They said no, they never went in for hauling liquor. Frankie Bones said, "We take it over once it's been hauled." They were strong-arm guys, enforcers going back twenty years you could hire today. Tell them what you wanted done, they agreed, you had a deal. They didn't need stories about Germans exterminating Jews to give them a reason; you offered five grand apiece to come down to Oklahoma and do a job.

  Tutti and Frankie Bones. Teddy asked them, you guys say you're Jewish?" They said absolutely. Teddy had never heard of anyone with an Italian name pretending to be Jewish for any reason. But they were, they were Jews on their mother's side, Diane Levine; she lived on Hastings and got to know Joe Tedesco from down the street.

  Whatever they were, guinea or Jew, was okay with Teddy. They said they'd do the job.

  The Packard turned off the main highway into Okmulgee and Teddy said, It's on the corner of Seventh, the Parkinson Hotel. We have three rooms under the name David E. Davis, who at one time cooked the best whiskey in the state of Missourah."

  Tutti said, "Here's Seventh we're coming to. "

  "You guys check in," Teddy said. "1'm gonna take the car and go see somebody."

  *

  They moved the newspapers off the sofa so PFC Larry Davidson could sit between them while Shemane showed him how to hold the lighter over the bowl of the pipe as she drew on it. She said in a strangled voice, "You see what I did?" handing him the pipe, a little briar she'd had forever and held the light for him.

  Now Larry was coughing and choking. Shemane's mom took the pipe and the lighter and drew herself a good hit while he choked. She told Shemane to give Larry the cigarette, you didn't get as big a jolt. Shemane said to him, Here, take a sip, bringing his martini to his mouth. She was good at tending to men, seeing to their ease, soothing them, saying to Larry, "That's it, baby, sip it. Another little sip. Now take a breath, ahhhh.