A selection from 12:01, a story included in my short story collection, "Slow Machine and Other Tales of Suspense and Danger" now on Amazon Kindle:
12:01
"All we know is whatever they tell us."
Will wondered if what he had said made any sense as he sipped his can of cola. He needed something sweet for washing down his dry sandwich with and to digest the bitterness and ugliness of what he was seeing on the big screen TV at the front of the lunch room.
It was tuned to the all news channel, 24/7 News, and the announcer in her sensible suit jacket and blouse was talking about a young woman named Rena who had been missing for three days.
While Will stared at a picture of Rena that was being flashed on the screen, a vision of wild blonde hair and wide blue eyes, and struggled to see if the woman in the picture was at all the same as a woman he knew, one of his coworkers offered his own speculation.
"Hmm. She says Rena was last seen at Sweet and Locust Streets.”
“Not far from here.”
“No. A little too close. You know, I think the cops are stuck for leads. That's why they're going public with these pictures."
Will replied without taking his eyes off the screen. There was something so familiar about the woman. What was it? While he struggled to remember, he said,"I don’t think they know anything, either."
Al sighed. "I hope they get the bastard who took her."
Will nodded, turning to look at Al. Will's stomach tightened with tension as anger burned in him. His throat seared. That old feeling again. Anger he could barely contain, but somehow held back. He said to Al, "I know. I wish they'd catch the freak and hang him."
Another picture of Rena on the screen caught Will's eye. More blonde hair. A winning smile. Faintest hint of a lowcut blouse. Something about her smile and her eyeliner screamed to Will. But just what did they scream?
He didn't want to know the answer. Nor did he care to admit that he was having a vision that almost brought a smile to his face. Better not to smile just yet, Will knew, even though he kept seeing in his mind's eye Rena standing nude before him, arms crossed in front of herself, trembling. What if Rena were the woman he knew? Suppose she had deserved...
He stopped the thought before it went any further.
Nobody deserved to disappear. Nobody deserved to get hurt, ever.
That was true, wasn't it?
Al was talking again. "There's no hanging in this country, you know that."
Will turned to Al, still fighting to keep the image of Rena out of his mind, his stomach boiling with hot anger. "More the shame. Sometimes that's all you can do with these creeps. Can't teach them any right or wrong. Better just to get rid of them than keeping them around, you know, a burden on everybody."
Al folded his arms across his expansive stomach, his face a set mask of hard opinion. "Too true. But they'll never understand that here, you know."
Will found himself nodding and smiling. Mental auto pilot had taken over, running his side of the conversation for him. "They will. Someday they will."
"But how many people will have to die..."
Will had had enough. Time to get out. Time to finish off the shift and leave. "There's some people I have to sign out, Al, then I'm done here. See you tomorrow."
Will washed his lunch things at the kitchen sink and put them away in his knapsack. He tossed out his pop can in the blue box. Used to be so easy, just toss everything out in the garbage, but now you had to sort it before tossing it. Guess it's better that way, he thought. Better for the planet. Better for everyone.
He left the lunch room and returned to the call centre. He sat at his cubicle, behind the big Plexiglas partition that separated him from the rest of the office, yet gave him an all round view of it.
He glanced up at the ceiling. The old flip card clock was there, as always. Will wondered how long it had been there, looking down on the ever shifting masses of people who had passed through the phone room. Not to mention whoever had passed through the room when it had been used by other businesses over the decades. How long had the clock been there? Thirty years or more?
The clock read 12:01, as it had for the five years Will had worked at the call centre. He had started working here not long after Dad died and the clock had said 12:01 back then and it still said that now. It was impossible to know if the clock meant noon or midnight; a dead clock reporting an unknown, forgotten time to a room that no longer noticed it.
Will shook his head. No time now for philosophy. He looked at his desk. Nothing new in his "in" tray. Just the same pile of ten time sheets left over from last night's shift that still needed to be inputted to the database.
With a sigh, Will logged into his computer account and went to work, careful to note discrepancies. Spotting discrepancies was the whole point of his job as timekeeper. If the number of sales orders taken during a shift was below company requirements, he highlighted the workers' case files for review. The workers would be spoken to by a supervisor and dismissal could follow if the workers had had conversations before about productivity issues.
Will had no problems with that. After all, each employee signed an agreement when they were hired committing them to meeting production goals. If they couldn't meet those goals, well, everyone knew the consequences. It was the same with any other job. Take it or leave it.
By the time he was finished, Will had highlighted two people in the pile, bringing their files under review with a click of his mouse on a spreadsheet. He noted the names. No women. Nobody worth meeting. He had met that one woman order taker after she had been released from the company; she worked nights and he never knew her when she had worked in the phone room and she had no idea of who he was when he approached her and he started a little conversation with her...
Best not to think of it here. Clearing his mind of messy, cluttered thoughts and his day's work complete, Will logged out. As he put on his windbreaker, he took a final look around. Typical afternoon crew. Mostly middle aged people and retirees. No students. Nobody interesting. Just hard workers who always filled out their timesheets the right way. Good people that he liked.
As he headed for the exit, he glanced at the order takers at their desks. It always felt good to be around hard working people. Will liked the mood of easy assurance and competence they gave off. How did they do it? How did they manage to keep their cool and meet all the production targets when so many of the customers they talked to were boors and idiots?
I wish I could do that, Will thought.
Much as he enjoyed being in the presence of a well-disciplined group of employees, Will knew he couldn't stay in the office all day. After all, this was a part time job and he only worked five hours a day.
Will shrugged, knowing nobody would look up from their monitors and notice the gesture.
Yes, there was a time for everything and now was the time for heading home.
*
The route home took Will along Locust Street and then a westward turn two blocks down took him to Sweet Street. Home was five blocks down this street. Hadn’t Al said that Rena was last seen around here? If only Al knew he'd lived on the same street associated with her disappearance. Would Al suspect him of anything? Of course not, because Will was a good guy and as Will knew, he had done nothing at all.
Sure, there was that time many summers ago when he had lost his temper with the only real girlfriend he’d ever had, a college co-ed he’d met at that trailer park in the Muskokas. He’d lost his temper with her over something. He couldn’t remember what it was, but he’d given her a real talking to, but he hadn’t gotten carried away with himself. He was no killer.
Killing was a messy business not easily forgotten. Since Will couldn't remember anything, he couldn't possibly have done anything could he? Better to keep things easy and simple. Nothing worse than having a lot of clutter and mess in one's life, Will mused.
He passed the cool green woods of Friendly Hollow and followed Sweet Street as it sloped downward and intersected with a freeway overpass. He walked quickly here. This was the Valley of Shadows where phantoms tormented him, like the one he saw three days ago...
Never mind that. Concentrate on the here and now. Don't let the mind wander. Wasn't that a shadow drifting toward him now, emerging from the larger darkness of the underpass?
No just a passing car that kicked up a cloud of dust and underpass filth. He raised his arm to his face to keep from inhaling any of it. There might be pigeon droppings and worse mixed in with it - one breath and - death. Will wanted not to die so badly he tasted it, tasted it just like the salty taste of the grit that had blown into his mouth in spite of his uplifted, sleeve covered arm.
In the wavering orange light of the bonfire the gold braid and studded buttons of the jacket sleeve looked impressive. Even real. He would have no trouble presenting himself as some cop or government official cast adrift but still bloated with his own neutered importance and vanished authority. No trouble at all.
Now he had a plan, a plan to take food and other things he needed from people who passed by. No more hiding in the shadows, waiting for the right moment, waiting for the inevitable plunge down the hill and certain death in the pit. No more hoping that food or other valuables would fall out along the way to the pit, available for him only by chance. With this newly found uniform, he could emerge in the open and boldly demand what was his as keeper of the prize in the secret gallery.
He pulled the cuff back and checked his watch. One past twelve. The time it had shown ever since...well, everyone knew when "ever since" was. And those who didn't were dead, or anticipating death in the bonfire just up the road, or just like him, leaning against the crumbling remains of walls and waiting...
Will shook his head and blinked. Graffiti spray painted to the underpass wall spiralling ever outward in a jagged explosion of red and orange reminded him of where he was. He had to get out of the Valley of Shadows. These dreams always haunted him here: dreams of wastelands and death and an ever burning bonfire of hellish misery at the end of things. Dreams of being a guardian of a hidden realm.
He pressed forward and walked slowly out of the overpass and into the early afternoon sunlight.
Soon, he was passing before the faded brownstone business plaza that was his home. His pace quickened as he strode into the parking lot. He had chores to take care of. Especially the guest that he had...
At one time, four stores had operated here: a convenience store, a men's clothing store, a travel agency and the TV shop that Dad had ran until he had passed away five years ago. The other stores had closed in the recession and no one had moved in to the vacant spaces. Yet, the sign for Dad's store - an old neon sign nowadays never lit - secretly announced to anyone who still noticed: IT'S NEW IT'S HERE IT'S COLOR TV. Will couldn't bear to have it taken down. Dad had loved it even though it was so old. He had loved the colors of the neon.
Yes, the sign had too many memories. Memories of a time when it still might have been possible...
He looked away and his mind froze. A car was parked in front of the store. Will came to a halt as the driver got out.
That old real estate guy. Ross Creston. Will curved his lips into a bright smile as Creston approached, his hand outstretched in a gesture of greeting.
"Hi, Will, how are you?"
Will shook Creston's hand. His grip was firm and sure. "Pretty good. What's up, guy?"
Creston pulled a small rolled up newspaper from inside his navy blue sports jacket. Will saw it was one of those free newspapers passed out around town. For a split second, he caught a glimpse of a picture of Rena on the front page and then Creston opened it to a full page ad showing a sketch of a highrise building.
Creston pointed to the vacant lot across the street. "Got the go ahead yesterday afternoon from the city planning office. Just in time to place this ad in the paper for today's edition. It's going to be running for the next while too. It's on my website as well."
Will looked at the vacant lot, fenced off and barren, nothing but a carefully graded rectangle of dirt and gravel. Nothing but that sign posted at the corner of the fence saying AN APPLICATION HAS BEEN PLACED WITH...
Will tried to sound happy, but he knew his voice sounded skeptical. "Your condo scheme got the okay?"
Creston laughed. "Scheme? You make it sound like some ripoff. No way. This condo development will revitalize the neighbourhood. Room for five hundred residents. There'll be a shopping plaza in the basement. Open to the public, too, not just the residents. I want to bring lots of new people and business to the area. You should really think about getting aboard. On the ground floor, so to speak."
Will chuckled. Creston could be a real joker sometimes. "Thanks but no thanks."
Creston smiled sympathetically. "I know you've been here a long time. Forty years at least. And I know you don't want to part with the property that used to be your Dad's shop. But things change, you know. This part of the city's gone totally stale. We got to wake it up somehow. I know your Dad and your Mom, bless their souls, would've agreed."
The words tumbled from Will's mouth. He knew he should've kept quiet, but the rage forced them out. "I was one when Mom died. I never knew her."
Creston's mouth fell open. "I didn't mean you to take it that way, Will. I'm sorry. Please forgive me."
The anger fading, Will managed a grin. "Don't mention it."
Recovering quickly, Creston passed the paper to Will. "Take this. Please. And check out the website. If you change your mind, give me a call."
Creston strode back to his car, started it and fled the parking lot, with a squeal of tires.
Will looked at the ad and shrugged, the anger throbbing again. As his hands shook, he folded up the paper. No way he was giving up this space. No way. Creston could burn in hell.
Tuesday, August 23, 2011
Saturday, August 20, 2011
Charles Williams: The Hot Spot
Like Cornell Woolrich, Charles Williams was a brilliant and innovative author of hard boiled noir fiction. He was at his height in the 1950s and early 1960s and his debut novel was a million seller. Alas, like Woolrich, he is largely unknown today.
Once again, the movies come to the rescue. Thanks to them, for a time, his name and reputation were kept going. Back in 1990, around the time Jim Thompson's Hollywood re-birth was unfolding, The Hot Spot, directed by the infamous Dennis Hopper and starring Virginia Madsen, was released. Oddly enough, although the The Hot Spot is a title of a Williams novel, the story for the movie was actually taken from another Williams book, Hell Hath No Fury.
Too bad, because The Hot Spot is a fine novel with an intense plot.
It focuses on Madox, a discharged sailor from the US Navy who is languishing in a small Texas town, struggling to sell cars and pretending to belong in a world he quietly and secretly loathes. At the novel's outset, Madox is sent by Harshaw, his boss, to accompany Gloria, the office's book keeper, on a run to re-possess a car from Sutton, a notorious deadbeat customer. When the two get to Sutton's place, Madox finds that things get very strange. Sutton leers at Gloria and makes numerous insinuating comments about her. After she meets with Sutton in private, Gloria returns to tell Madox that they can leave. Madox asks about the car, but Gloria nervously brushes off his inquiries.
One of Madox's idle days on the car lot is interrupted by the arrival of Delores, Harshaw's wife. She invites Madox to ride with her up to an old house where a charity she volunteers for stores the old clothes and books it donates. Outwardly friendly but inwardly cursing, Madox accompanies her.
His annoyance dissolves once they get to the house, which he quickly finds is so overloaded with discarded furniture and clothes that it is a fire trap - "A fire marshal would take one look at it and run amok" he thinks.
Earlier in the book, Madox was sardonically amused by how easily distracted the local citizenry was by a fire downtown. Seeing the dangerous condition of the old house makes him him go to the washroom on the pretext of washing his hands of the grime and dirt that covered the house:
"There was no idea or plan in my mind...There was a window in the washroom all right, as I thought there would be. It was closed and locked with an ordinary latch on top of the lower sash...I reached over and took hold of the latch and unlocked it."
This is an interesting passage as it reveals the subtle genius of Williams's style. Madox insists he doesn't know what he's doing, but he's already setting in motion a plan to torch the house as a distraction for a robbery he would like to commit on a poorly protected bank downtown.
It's interesting how this passage ties together various elements brought out in the first twenty-five pages of the book. Madox sees the fuss caused by a fire which arouses his cynical contempt of the local populace. His dealings with Harshaw, the boss, are argumentative. Madox can't be bothered putting up with a man he thinks nothing more than a pompous shill: the early sections of the novel are littered with classic exchanges of cynical badinage between the two men.
It is the genius of Williams to show how this garden variety cynicism quickly degenerates into out right sociopathic behavior when Madox spots the unlocked latch in the washroom. The Hot Spot of the title is the fire Madox wants to set off, the sweltering heat the town is trapped in, the heat of Madox's passion for Gloria, with whom he starts a torrid affair, but it is also the heat of the barely contained rage and violence that burn under Madox's casually cynical and flippant exterior.
In the following chapters Madox travels far afield from the town to buy materials to build a bomb that will blow up the old house. Soon,he goes through with the plot, climbing through the unlocked washroom window to enter the house and plant the time bomb. When the house blows up, he robs the bank and afterward, as a newcomer in town, police finger him as a suspect and interrogate him in a brilliantly described scene that would fit in nicely in Arthur Koestler's Darkness at Noon. Madox also learns that Gloria is being blackmailed by Sutton and that Delores has various extortion schemes in motion to ensnare him in her grip forever.
I won't go into detail the hair raising ways these plot lines are played out. That is a special pleasure that will be yours when you read this classic of noir fiction.
I'd love to read more of Williams's books, if I can find them. Hopefully, some of them have been re-issued as e-books. I'll investigate this in the near future.
Once again, the movies come to the rescue. Thanks to them, for a time, his name and reputation were kept going. Back in 1990, around the time Jim Thompson's Hollywood re-birth was unfolding, The Hot Spot, directed by the infamous Dennis Hopper and starring Virginia Madsen, was released. Oddly enough, although the The Hot Spot is a title of a Williams novel, the story for the movie was actually taken from another Williams book, Hell Hath No Fury.
Too bad, because The Hot Spot is a fine novel with an intense plot.
It focuses on Madox, a discharged sailor from the US Navy who is languishing in a small Texas town, struggling to sell cars and pretending to belong in a world he quietly and secretly loathes. At the novel's outset, Madox is sent by Harshaw, his boss, to accompany Gloria, the office's book keeper, on a run to re-possess a car from Sutton, a notorious deadbeat customer. When the two get to Sutton's place, Madox finds that things get very strange. Sutton leers at Gloria and makes numerous insinuating comments about her. After she meets with Sutton in private, Gloria returns to tell Madox that they can leave. Madox asks about the car, but Gloria nervously brushes off his inquiries.
One of Madox's idle days on the car lot is interrupted by the arrival of Delores, Harshaw's wife. She invites Madox to ride with her up to an old house where a charity she volunteers for stores the old clothes and books it donates. Outwardly friendly but inwardly cursing, Madox accompanies her.
His annoyance dissolves once they get to the house, which he quickly finds is so overloaded with discarded furniture and clothes that it is a fire trap - "A fire marshal would take one look at it and run amok" he thinks.
Earlier in the book, Madox was sardonically amused by how easily distracted the local citizenry was by a fire downtown. Seeing the dangerous condition of the old house makes him him go to the washroom on the pretext of washing his hands of the grime and dirt that covered the house:
"There was no idea or plan in my mind...There was a window in the washroom all right, as I thought there would be. It was closed and locked with an ordinary latch on top of the lower sash...I reached over and took hold of the latch and unlocked it."
This is an interesting passage as it reveals the subtle genius of Williams's style. Madox insists he doesn't know what he's doing, but he's already setting in motion a plan to torch the house as a distraction for a robbery he would like to commit on a poorly protected bank downtown.
It's interesting how this passage ties together various elements brought out in the first twenty-five pages of the book. Madox sees the fuss caused by a fire which arouses his cynical contempt of the local populace. His dealings with Harshaw, the boss, are argumentative. Madox can't be bothered putting up with a man he thinks nothing more than a pompous shill: the early sections of the novel are littered with classic exchanges of cynical badinage between the two men.
It is the genius of Williams to show how this garden variety cynicism quickly degenerates into out right sociopathic behavior when Madox spots the unlocked latch in the washroom. The Hot Spot of the title is the fire Madox wants to set off, the sweltering heat the town is trapped in, the heat of Madox's passion for Gloria, with whom he starts a torrid affair, but it is also the heat of the barely contained rage and violence that burn under Madox's casually cynical and flippant exterior.
In the following chapters Madox travels far afield from the town to buy materials to build a bomb that will blow up the old house. Soon,he goes through with the plot, climbing through the unlocked washroom window to enter the house and plant the time bomb. When the house blows up, he robs the bank and afterward, as a newcomer in town, police finger him as a suspect and interrogate him in a brilliantly described scene that would fit in nicely in Arthur Koestler's Darkness at Noon. Madox also learns that Gloria is being blackmailed by Sutton and that Delores has various extortion schemes in motion to ensnare him in her grip forever.
I won't go into detail the hair raising ways these plot lines are played out. That is a special pleasure that will be yours when you read this classic of noir fiction.
I'd love to read more of Williams's books, if I can find them. Hopefully, some of them have been re-issued as e-books. I'll investigate this in the near future.
Excerpt From Slow Machine
A selection from Slow Machine, the title story of my new e-book collection of short stories of danger and suspense now for sale at Amazon Kindle:
SLOW MACHINE
“Why don’t you just rip that damn question mark down? You’ve always hated it!” Mindy said.
Nick smiled. “I play by the rules.”
In the years Nick had known her, he’d never seen anything like the smile that passed over Mindy’s lips at that moment, just after noon, as they sat together on the bench at the corner of Sunnyland and Foundry. Her perfect white teeth exposed, her smile so intense it could light up his dark, frozen world fifty times over, or blow it to bits in one flash of happiness disguised as agony.
“You sure? You have your past, Nick, like I have mine.” She clasped her hands behind her head, trying to pull back into a ponytail the unruly mane of black hair that was getting tangled in the hot wind of the muggy July day.
Nick couldn’t take his eyes off her. “Well, you know I won the Good Citizen Award every year from Grade Five to Grade Eight.”
“I remember. You were a great guy back then and you still are.” She kissed him on the cheek.
“Stop messing with your hair. It looks good.”
“I know. Nervous habit I guess.” Her hands fell to her sides as she gave up on making the ponytail.
Nick shoved his shaking hands in his jeans’ pockets. Better not let her see his own nervousness.
Anything to stop himself from staring at her, he glanced again across Foundry Street at the tourist information building with the whitewashed question mark up there on its front wall.
Nick laughed. “Yeah, I’m so hard up for a few bucks, I’m gonna steal that stupid question mark that’s been up there for years and years. It’s like a landstone for people around here, even if we all laugh at it.”
“What?”
“Land stone. A place that stands out, like, a place you tell people about when you tell them where they’re going so they know where they’re going.”
“You mean a landmark?”
“Whatever.”
“Well, I think for you that place is nothing but a land mark for bad memories. And you’ll be doing this job for more than just a few bucks.”
Nick squinted his eyes shut, remembering coming down the driveway of the sweatbox apartment building he lived in on Mary Street, in those childhood days, Mom holding one hand, Dad the other. Mom doing all the talking; Dad quiet like always; Nick grimacing as the heat of the asphalt burned through the worn out soles of his runners like they weren’t even there…
Sudden pressure on his hand made Nick open his eyes to the present day. Mindy’s hand was in his, her skin warm, smooth, not sweaty and rough like his own.
“Don’t go back too far, Nick. Remember, I’m your friend. I can help you.”
“I know.”
“Then don’t drift so bad.”
He looked over at the sports bar on the corner opposite the tourist office, a place called The Checkered Flag Pit Stop, and caught a glimpse of the waitress in the picture window out front.
She stood in yellow t-shirt and form-fitting black slacks, her blonde hair spilling over her shoulders, as she chatted with a trucker at the counter. Even at this distance, he could see the guy eyeing the sinewy body under her tight clothing.
Mindy nudged him in the ribs. “Yeah. Trish’s good looking I guess, a hottie. But she’s a pain in the ass, Nick.”
“Why?”
“I’ve never been good enough for her. Never. Didn’t like the way I dressed, wore my hair, nothing. I’m so sick of her, and after that fight he had with her last night, Grant is too…” Her voice trailed off.
“What about Grant? He knows something?”
“Don’t worry about him, just remember what you have to do. You know that stealing the question mark is just a trick to get people out of the Checkered Flag while I do what I have to do to Trish, okay?”
“A trick? Okay, I guess.”
“Listen to me, this is better than that job I gave you a few weeks back when you entertained all the guys passing by on the street with your yo-yo stunts while we took all those boxes out of that print shop Grant’s friend runs.”
“ It is?”
“You bet. More fun, more exciting, and nobody laughing about the boogers falling out of your nose. Listen, we’ll deal with Trish at one in the morning. Thanks to budget cutbacks, Officer Bill and his Keystone Kops won’t even be out on the beat. The streets will be deserted, there’ll maybe be only two or three jerks in the Checkered Flag on a Wednesday night. …”
“Okay, I’ll do it.”
Something rough pressed into his palm. Five scrunched up fifty-dollar bills.
“You’ll get the rest tonight once we’re through. Remember, I’ll leave a stepladder out for you by my front door. Now, for working on the question mark, you can get a screwdriver at your boarding house, can’t you?”
“I don’t know. Mrs. Merryman keeps an eye on everything.”
“Well, the main thing is to look like you’re up to something so whoever’s in the Checkered Flag will wonder what you’re doing and look away from Trish, maybe even walk out. I’ll drive by the bar about one.”
A squeeze on his leg, no, his thigh. Why couldn’t she touch him where it really counted? How would Grant ever know? He smiled and thought about Mindy running across the vacant lot overgrown with weeds, the one he saw whenever he looked out his bedroom window at Mrs. Merryman’s boarding house on Tupper Way. She was running wild and free, her dark hair streaming behind her; her smile lighting up so bright the sun blinked, just for a moment, sending everything cold and dark.
Nick shivered and glanced up just in time to catch Mindy winking at him as she slipped off the bench and breezed down Sunnyland, past the wall mural on Teasdale’s Dry Goods - a street scene called “Bustling North Ridge, Strathaird County’s Seat of Prosperity, 1867” - where sun-drenched likenesses of well-scrubbed women in long full-skirted dresses and dapper men in top hats and tails, with carefully trimmed beards, went about their daily business.
He looked back at the question mark. The fierce sunlight bouncing off its white paint made it glow so bright, it almost seemed to have a light of its own. Could that light guide him through tonight?
SLOW MACHINE
“Why don’t you just rip that damn question mark down? You’ve always hated it!” Mindy said.
Nick smiled. “I play by the rules.”
In the years Nick had known her, he’d never seen anything like the smile that passed over Mindy’s lips at that moment, just after noon, as they sat together on the bench at the corner of Sunnyland and Foundry. Her perfect white teeth exposed, her smile so intense it could light up his dark, frozen world fifty times over, or blow it to bits in one flash of happiness disguised as agony.
“You sure? You have your past, Nick, like I have mine.” She clasped her hands behind her head, trying to pull back into a ponytail the unruly mane of black hair that was getting tangled in the hot wind of the muggy July day.
Nick couldn’t take his eyes off her. “Well, you know I won the Good Citizen Award every year from Grade Five to Grade Eight.”
“I remember. You were a great guy back then and you still are.” She kissed him on the cheek.
“Stop messing with your hair. It looks good.”
“I know. Nervous habit I guess.” Her hands fell to her sides as she gave up on making the ponytail.
Nick shoved his shaking hands in his jeans’ pockets. Better not let her see his own nervousness.
Anything to stop himself from staring at her, he glanced again across Foundry Street at the tourist information building with the whitewashed question mark up there on its front wall.
Nick laughed. “Yeah, I’m so hard up for a few bucks, I’m gonna steal that stupid question mark that’s been up there for years and years. It’s like a landstone for people around here, even if we all laugh at it.”
“What?”
“Land stone. A place that stands out, like, a place you tell people about when you tell them where they’re going so they know where they’re going.”
“You mean a landmark?”
“Whatever.”
“Well, I think for you that place is nothing but a land mark for bad memories. And you’ll be doing this job for more than just a few bucks.”
Nick squinted his eyes shut, remembering coming down the driveway of the sweatbox apartment building he lived in on Mary Street, in those childhood days, Mom holding one hand, Dad the other. Mom doing all the talking; Dad quiet like always; Nick grimacing as the heat of the asphalt burned through the worn out soles of his runners like they weren’t even there…
Sudden pressure on his hand made Nick open his eyes to the present day. Mindy’s hand was in his, her skin warm, smooth, not sweaty and rough like his own.
“Don’t go back too far, Nick. Remember, I’m your friend. I can help you.”
“I know.”
“Then don’t drift so bad.”
He looked over at the sports bar on the corner opposite the tourist office, a place called The Checkered Flag Pit Stop, and caught a glimpse of the waitress in the picture window out front.
She stood in yellow t-shirt and form-fitting black slacks, her blonde hair spilling over her shoulders, as she chatted with a trucker at the counter. Even at this distance, he could see the guy eyeing the sinewy body under her tight clothing.
Mindy nudged him in the ribs. “Yeah. Trish’s good looking I guess, a hottie. But she’s a pain in the ass, Nick.”
“Why?”
“I’ve never been good enough for her. Never. Didn’t like the way I dressed, wore my hair, nothing. I’m so sick of her, and after that fight he had with her last night, Grant is too…” Her voice trailed off.
“What about Grant? He knows something?”
“Don’t worry about him, just remember what you have to do. You know that stealing the question mark is just a trick to get people out of the Checkered Flag while I do what I have to do to Trish, okay?”
“A trick? Okay, I guess.”
“Listen to me, this is better than that job I gave you a few weeks back when you entertained all the guys passing by on the street with your yo-yo stunts while we took all those boxes out of that print shop Grant’s friend runs.”
“ It is?”
“You bet. More fun, more exciting, and nobody laughing about the boogers falling out of your nose. Listen, we’ll deal with Trish at one in the morning. Thanks to budget cutbacks, Officer Bill and his Keystone Kops won’t even be out on the beat. The streets will be deserted, there’ll maybe be only two or three jerks in the Checkered Flag on a Wednesday night. …”
“Okay, I’ll do it.”
Something rough pressed into his palm. Five scrunched up fifty-dollar bills.
“You’ll get the rest tonight once we’re through. Remember, I’ll leave a stepladder out for you by my front door. Now, for working on the question mark, you can get a screwdriver at your boarding house, can’t you?”
“I don’t know. Mrs. Merryman keeps an eye on everything.”
“Well, the main thing is to look like you’re up to something so whoever’s in the Checkered Flag will wonder what you’re doing and look away from Trish, maybe even walk out. I’ll drive by the bar about one.”
A squeeze on his leg, no, his thigh. Why couldn’t she touch him where it really counted? How would Grant ever know? He smiled and thought about Mindy running across the vacant lot overgrown with weeds, the one he saw whenever he looked out his bedroom window at Mrs. Merryman’s boarding house on Tupper Way. She was running wild and free, her dark hair streaming behind her; her smile lighting up so bright the sun blinked, just for a moment, sending everything cold and dark.
Nick shivered and glanced up just in time to catch Mindy winking at him as she slipped off the bench and breezed down Sunnyland, past the wall mural on Teasdale’s Dry Goods - a street scene called “Bustling North Ridge, Strathaird County’s Seat of Prosperity, 1867” - where sun-drenched likenesses of well-scrubbed women in long full-skirted dresses and dapper men in top hats and tails, with carefully trimmed beards, went about their daily business.
He looked back at the question mark. The fierce sunlight bouncing off its white paint made it glow so bright, it almost seemed to have a light of its own. Could that light guide him through tonight?
My E-Book Slow Machine and Other Tales of Suspense and Danger Now for Sale at Amazon Kindle E-Books!
My new e-book, Slow Machine and Other Tales of Suspense and Danger is now for sale on Amazon Kindle E-Books. It is a collection of four short stories of action and suspense:
The title story tells of Nick, a misunderstood young man who is the laughingstock of his small town. A girl friend talks him into helping in a plot to murder her rival to collect insurance money. Sure, Nick stumbles into the scheme, but how innocent is he once he starts lashing out in ways no one would ever expect?
"A Prison for Identities" is the story of Ed and the intrigue and danger he falls into when he suddenly and violently learns his girl friend is involved in an identity theft ring.
"No Time Like Now" chronicles a former photographer's struggle to do one last pinup shoot - in a totalitarian society of the future where photographs have been banned!
"12:01" shows the life and world of Will, an ordinary guy with an ordinary job who is obsessed with clocks and morality- and who hides a terrible crime in his home.
Slow Machine is filled with quirky characters and situations and edgy plots that shed new light on old genres. If you enjoy classic noir tales transferred to a contemporary setting, you'll love this collection. Follow the link on the left side of the page to buy your copy now!
The title story tells of Nick, a misunderstood young man who is the laughingstock of his small town. A girl friend talks him into helping in a plot to murder her rival to collect insurance money. Sure, Nick stumbles into the scheme, but how innocent is he once he starts lashing out in ways no one would ever expect?
"A Prison for Identities" is the story of Ed and the intrigue and danger he falls into when he suddenly and violently learns his girl friend is involved in an identity theft ring.
"No Time Like Now" chronicles a former photographer's struggle to do one last pinup shoot - in a totalitarian society of the future where photographs have been banned!
"12:01" shows the life and world of Will, an ordinary guy with an ordinary job who is obsessed with clocks and morality- and who hides a terrible crime in his home.
Slow Machine is filled with quirky characters and situations and edgy plots that shed new light on old genres. If you enjoy classic noir tales transferred to a contemporary setting, you'll love this collection. Follow the link on the left side of the page to buy your copy now!
Friday, August 19, 2011
Hard Case Crime Returns in September
September marks the publishing return of the Hard Case Crime imprint. That month will see the release of the new Christa Faust title, Choke Hold. Also on the way will be a new book from Lawrence Block, Getting Off, which will be Hard Case's first hardcover release. In October, Mickey Spillane will make a posthumous return with The Consummata, a novel dating back to the Seventies that was completed and prepared for publication by Max Allan Collins. The book is a sequel to The Delta Factor. Looks like a must read for fans of old school noir.
Hard Case makes a welcome return after more than a year's absence. They have a new publisher, Titan, replacing Dorchester, which had to let Hard Case go after they decided to go exclusively into e-books and on demand publishing. Hard Case seems to be holding their own in today's wildly fluctuating and transforming publishing biz and should continue bringing noir storytelling to twenty-first century audiences.
While Hard Case was on hiatus, I explored some of my Black Lizard paperbacks, including Lionel White's The Killing and David Goodis's Black Friday. I also delved into the murky underworld of Richard Stark's Parker novels, among them Slayground, Deadly Edge and the Sour Lemon Score, all classics which I hope to review here eventually.
Hard Case makes a welcome return after more than a year's absence. They have a new publisher, Titan, replacing Dorchester, which had to let Hard Case go after they decided to go exclusively into e-books and on demand publishing. Hard Case seems to be holding their own in today's wildly fluctuating and transforming publishing biz and should continue bringing noir storytelling to twenty-first century audiences.
While Hard Case was on hiatus, I explored some of my Black Lizard paperbacks, including Lionel White's The Killing and David Goodis's Black Friday. I also delved into the murky underworld of Richard Stark's Parker novels, among them Slayground, Deadly Edge and the Sour Lemon Score, all classics which I hope to review here eventually.
Hardcase Crime Re-Publishes Cornell Woolrich and Lawrence Block Classics
One of the best genre fiction imprints to come along in recent years is the Hard Case Crime Fiction series, which revisits classic noir crime fiction novels of old and presents new works that offer present-day takes on the genre's conventions.
I love noir fiction, which I first caught on to back in the 90s, when a number of the Jim Thompson novels, such as The Grifters, The Getaway, and After Dark My Sweet, were filmed. I've since sounded the considerable depths of Patricia Highsmith, whose Talented Mr Ripley was filmed in the late-90s (I've yet to see it) and the brilliant Raymond Chandler. What I love most about noir crime fiction is that many people simply dismiss it as nothing more than low-brow diversion, yet these books have so much to offer. Highsmith, with Ripley and her other amoral protagonists, explores the problem of evil and the strange workings of criminal psychology. Chandler's eerie descriptions of murder scenes, especially in the Lady in the Lake, are unforgettable in their evocation of mood, place and the inner, secret meaning of things.
The Hard Case Crime series, although aimed at both crime fiction buffs and general readers, offers some books that approach the high quality of these authors. It also tweaks and pokes fun at the highbrow prejudice against the genre by packaging the books with calculatedly retro, erotically provocative artwork.
I read two from this series this year that were particularly good: Lucky at Cards by Lawrence Block and Fright by Cornell Woolrich.
Lawrence Block has been active in crime fiction for almost half a century and he still publishes new work today. Lucky at Cards is from his early days and the Hard Case Crime publication of it marks its first wide release in 40 years.
The book is certainly a lost treasure. It is written in a tight, spare, misleadingly straightforward way and tells the story of Bill Maynard, a card mechanic who once made his living doing card tricks in magic shows and doing other, less innocent card tricks at poker games. He once tried to throw a poker game in Chicago and was severely thrashed for his troubles, cracking several teeth in the process. He fled the city within inches of his life, as the cliche goes, and hid in an unnamed, non-descript Midwestern US city to regroup, re-order and re-charge - and to get his teeth fixed:
If it hadn't been for the dentist, I would've headed on out of town. The guy had a two-room office on the main drag, and I saw him Monday and Wednesday and Friday of the first week I spent in town. It took him that long to cap a pair of incisors. It hurt like hell, but by the time he was through I was no longer afraid to smile in public.
That opening paragraph, as any good opening paragraph should, captures the tone of the novel: The "If if hadn't been for the dentist..." is a telltale of the unreliable narrator; it, along with the numbering of days he's been to the dentist and the admission the process "hurt like hell" seem to set a confessional tone, yet there's that last line about "no longer (being) afraid to smile in public." The tone is just a little too easy, a little too confiding and the mention of smiles sets off red flags: this is the oily manner of the con artist, who gets by on pleasant appearances and needs to be everyone's best friend in order for his schemes to work. Teeth also bite, in addition to adding an inviting glow to a smile.
We soon see that Bill has a weakness for felony. Bill lets slip to the dentist that he's into cards and the dentist invites him to a card game at his home. During the game, in a brilliantly described scene in the basement rec room of the dentist's comfortable post-war era home - you can almost see the magazine advertisements screaming that it "boasts all the modern conveniences" - Bill meets Joyce, the dentist's trophy wife, who soon figures out that Bill is a card cheat. They fall for each other and Bill is ensnared in an elaborate plot to bump off the dentist so that he and Joyce can take his money.
Yes, the "kill hubby for the bucks" story is a hoary cliche among crime scribes, but this is done so well, with so many twists and turns and knowing bits of irony about human nature, that the book is thoroughly enjoyable. I definitely recommend it as an introduction to crime fiction.
Cornell Woolrich is an interesting case. Although a prolific, highly successful writer in his day, he was haunted by alcoholism and various personal issues. He became a recluse and when one of his novels, The Bride Wore Black, was filmed by Francois Truffaut in 1968, he did not attend the premiere, although it was held in his home city of New York. Woolrich died later that year.
Woolrich's best known work is Rear Window, which was filmed by Alfred Hitchcock in the 1950s, with James Stewart and Grace Kelly starring. The Hitchcock movie still makes for impressive viewing. Although the Woolrich original doesn't read as well today, the continued renown of the movie keeps Woolrich's name in circulation.
Before reading Fright, my favorite Woolrich had been the tense, tightly constructed novella, Three O'Clock, in which a man is tied in a chair next to a ticking bomb set to go off at three o'clock and he has to figure a way out of his predicament before the bomb goes off.
Fright, the Woolrich novel re-printed this year by Hard Case, is, like Lucky at Cards, a lost gem. Although at times hampered by Woolrich's strained attempts at overblown, almost John Donne-like metaphors, the story is eerie and fascinating. A dashing young man on the make, Prescott Marshall, falls in love with Marjorie Worth, a beautiful society girl from an old money family. They are getting ready to marry, but there is a problem: Marshall is fond of the bottle and during one of his drinking bouts, described with a lurid, hallucinogenic eeriness that rivals anything in Malcolm Lowry's Under the Volcano, he has a fling with a girl who, when she finds out who he is and who he will soon be marrying, blackmails him.
He gives her money to keep her quiet, but she keeps returning for more. When she materializes wraith-like at his apartment on his wedding day he can't take it any more. In a sudden flash of impulse, he strangles her.
Minutes later, his best man knocks at the door and in a nail-bitingly horrific scene, Woolrich describes Marshall's frantic and agonized struggles to hide the body in a closet and then present a face of normalcy to his best man once he lets him into the room.
After enduring his wedding, and flashing back the whole time to the crime he has committed, Marshall forces his new wife to re-settle with him in a small town far from New York where he takes an office job and becomes convinced that a co-worker is a private investigator sent from New York to unmask him and expose his crime.
Fright is an incredible, even harrowing novel. But, its early, well-constructed promise suffers from trying to telescope its plot over too long a period. We follow Marshall's collapse point for point over several years as he commits various crimes to conceal his original felony and his pathetically submissive wife - whose credibility would be doubted by many contemporary readers - withers away in a town she loathes, far from her family and friends.
The opening section of the novel is a must-read and although the latter sections lose focus and become almost numbing in their repetition of Marshall's failures, there is a fascinating tension at work here. It is a tension between a very modern, knowing awareness of human frailty and fallibility and corruption and capacity for nihilistic violence on the one hand and a quaint, Victorian, Sunday school morality on the other. This Sunday school morality lends a self-righteous, suffocating oppressiveness to the later chapters, but at the same time, it seems to reflect the contradictions and conflicts in Woolrich's own life. His flight from the world into 35 years of seclusion - he apparently lived that whole time with only his mother for company (evidently he didn't allow her to read any of his books) - was fuelled by a number of factors: a failed marriage, continued bouts with alcoholism, as well as various other health problems that led to the amputation of one of his legs. Perhaps this morality was a way of making this daring and unusual book more palatable and marketable in more conservative times, but it also shows how Woolrich punished himself for never being able to bring together the fragments of his broken life.
Fright is more than just a powerful novel from a brilliant, but almost forgotten master. It is also the author's haunted, highly personal vision of the conflicts and drives in every human heart.
I love noir fiction, which I first caught on to back in the 90s, when a number of the Jim Thompson novels, such as The Grifters, The Getaway, and After Dark My Sweet, were filmed. I've since sounded the considerable depths of Patricia Highsmith, whose Talented Mr Ripley was filmed in the late-90s (I've yet to see it) and the brilliant Raymond Chandler. What I love most about noir crime fiction is that many people simply dismiss it as nothing more than low-brow diversion, yet these books have so much to offer. Highsmith, with Ripley and her other amoral protagonists, explores the problem of evil and the strange workings of criminal psychology. Chandler's eerie descriptions of murder scenes, especially in the Lady in the Lake, are unforgettable in their evocation of mood, place and the inner, secret meaning of things.
The Hard Case Crime series, although aimed at both crime fiction buffs and general readers, offers some books that approach the high quality of these authors. It also tweaks and pokes fun at the highbrow prejudice against the genre by packaging the books with calculatedly retro, erotically provocative artwork.
I read two from this series this year that were particularly good: Lucky at Cards by Lawrence Block and Fright by Cornell Woolrich.
Lawrence Block has been active in crime fiction for almost half a century and he still publishes new work today. Lucky at Cards is from his early days and the Hard Case Crime publication of it marks its first wide release in 40 years.
The book is certainly a lost treasure. It is written in a tight, spare, misleadingly straightforward way and tells the story of Bill Maynard, a card mechanic who once made his living doing card tricks in magic shows and doing other, less innocent card tricks at poker games. He once tried to throw a poker game in Chicago and was severely thrashed for his troubles, cracking several teeth in the process. He fled the city within inches of his life, as the cliche goes, and hid in an unnamed, non-descript Midwestern US city to regroup, re-order and re-charge - and to get his teeth fixed:
If it hadn't been for the dentist, I would've headed on out of town. The guy had a two-room office on the main drag, and I saw him Monday and Wednesday and Friday of the first week I spent in town. It took him that long to cap a pair of incisors. It hurt like hell, but by the time he was through I was no longer afraid to smile in public.
That opening paragraph, as any good opening paragraph should, captures the tone of the novel: The "If if hadn't been for the dentist..." is a telltale of the unreliable narrator; it, along with the numbering of days he's been to the dentist and the admission the process "hurt like hell" seem to set a confessional tone, yet there's that last line about "no longer (being) afraid to smile in public." The tone is just a little too easy, a little too confiding and the mention of smiles sets off red flags: this is the oily manner of the con artist, who gets by on pleasant appearances and needs to be everyone's best friend in order for his schemes to work. Teeth also bite, in addition to adding an inviting glow to a smile.
We soon see that Bill has a weakness for felony. Bill lets slip to the dentist that he's into cards and the dentist invites him to a card game at his home. During the game, in a brilliantly described scene in the basement rec room of the dentist's comfortable post-war era home - you can almost see the magazine advertisements screaming that it "boasts all the modern conveniences" - Bill meets Joyce, the dentist's trophy wife, who soon figures out that Bill is a card cheat. They fall for each other and Bill is ensnared in an elaborate plot to bump off the dentist so that he and Joyce can take his money.
Yes, the "kill hubby for the bucks" story is a hoary cliche among crime scribes, but this is done so well, with so many twists and turns and knowing bits of irony about human nature, that the book is thoroughly enjoyable. I definitely recommend it as an introduction to crime fiction.
Cornell Woolrich is an interesting case. Although a prolific, highly successful writer in his day, he was haunted by alcoholism and various personal issues. He became a recluse and when one of his novels, The Bride Wore Black, was filmed by Francois Truffaut in 1968, he did not attend the premiere, although it was held in his home city of New York. Woolrich died later that year.
Woolrich's best known work is Rear Window, which was filmed by Alfred Hitchcock in the 1950s, with James Stewart and Grace Kelly starring. The Hitchcock movie still makes for impressive viewing. Although the Woolrich original doesn't read as well today, the continued renown of the movie keeps Woolrich's name in circulation.
Before reading Fright, my favorite Woolrich had been the tense, tightly constructed novella, Three O'Clock, in which a man is tied in a chair next to a ticking bomb set to go off at three o'clock and he has to figure a way out of his predicament before the bomb goes off.
Fright, the Woolrich novel re-printed this year by Hard Case, is, like Lucky at Cards, a lost gem. Although at times hampered by Woolrich's strained attempts at overblown, almost John Donne-like metaphors, the story is eerie and fascinating. A dashing young man on the make, Prescott Marshall, falls in love with Marjorie Worth, a beautiful society girl from an old money family. They are getting ready to marry, but there is a problem: Marshall is fond of the bottle and during one of his drinking bouts, described with a lurid, hallucinogenic eeriness that rivals anything in Malcolm Lowry's Under the Volcano, he has a fling with a girl who, when she finds out who he is and who he will soon be marrying, blackmails him.
He gives her money to keep her quiet, but she keeps returning for more. When she materializes wraith-like at his apartment on his wedding day he can't take it any more. In a sudden flash of impulse, he strangles her.
Minutes later, his best man knocks at the door and in a nail-bitingly horrific scene, Woolrich describes Marshall's frantic and agonized struggles to hide the body in a closet and then present a face of normalcy to his best man once he lets him into the room.
After enduring his wedding, and flashing back the whole time to the crime he has committed, Marshall forces his new wife to re-settle with him in a small town far from New York where he takes an office job and becomes convinced that a co-worker is a private investigator sent from New York to unmask him and expose his crime.
Fright is an incredible, even harrowing novel. But, its early, well-constructed promise suffers from trying to telescope its plot over too long a period. We follow Marshall's collapse point for point over several years as he commits various crimes to conceal his original felony and his pathetically submissive wife - whose credibility would be doubted by many contemporary readers - withers away in a town she loathes, far from her family and friends.
The opening section of the novel is a must-read and although the latter sections lose focus and become almost numbing in their repetition of Marshall's failures, there is a fascinating tension at work here. It is a tension between a very modern, knowing awareness of human frailty and fallibility and corruption and capacity for nihilistic violence on the one hand and a quaint, Victorian, Sunday school morality on the other. This Sunday school morality lends a self-righteous, suffocating oppressiveness to the later chapters, but at the same time, it seems to reflect the contradictions and conflicts in Woolrich's own life. His flight from the world into 35 years of seclusion - he apparently lived that whole time with only his mother for company (evidently he didn't allow her to read any of his books) - was fuelled by a number of factors: a failed marriage, continued bouts with alcoholism, as well as various other health problems that led to the amputation of one of his legs. Perhaps this morality was a way of making this daring and unusual book more palatable and marketable in more conservative times, but it also shows how Woolrich punished himself for never being able to bring together the fragments of his broken life.
Fright is more than just a powerful novel from a brilliant, but almost forgotten master. It is also the author's haunted, highly personal vision of the conflicts and drives in every human heart.
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