David Goodis: Five Noir Novels of the 1940s and '50s (Library of America) by David Goodis Read Free Book Online

dropped, the vague thud that told him they had reached bottom. Knowing that Studebaker’s clothes and the prison shoes were going to burn and become ashes he felt slightly happy.
    He walked into the bathroom. It was yellow tile, all of it. There was a glassed-in shower and he got it started and used a rectangle of lavender soap. He made the shower very hot, then soaped himself well, got the hot water on again, switched to full cold, let it hit him for the better part of a minute. Then he was out of the shower, using a thick yellow towel that he could have used as a cape.
    The skin cream mixed well with the soap, resulting in a decent lather that gave the razor a smooth ride. He shaved in three minutes and then he went into the parlor and lit a cigarette. He had the yellow towel wrapped around his middle and tucked in. He looked over the Basie records and decided to play
Shorty George
.
    He let the needle go down and just as it touched the black he felt something coming into the apartment. It was only a noise but to him it had form and the ability to clutch and rip at his insides.
    It was the buzzer.
    Parry lifted the needle and stopped the phonograph. He waited.
    The buzzer sounded again. Parry slowly lifted the cigarette to his lips and took a long haul. He sat down on the edge of the davenport and waited. He gazed at the phone attachment beside the door and as the buzzer hit him again he decided to lift the phone and tell the person down there to go away and leave him alone. He let his head go into cupped hands.
    Then the buzzing stopped.
    The tears started again, coming into his eyes, collecting there, ready to gush. He told himself that he had to stop that sort of thing. It was bad because it was soft and if there was anything he couldn’t afford now it was softness. The lukewarm and weak brand of softness. Everything had to be ice, and just as hard, and just as fast as a whippet and just as smooth. And just as accurate as a calculating machine, giving the buzzer a certain denomination. Now that the buzzer had stopped a key wasclicking into position and crossing off the denomination. The buzzer had stopped and it was all over. The person down there had gone away. Check that off. Then check off all the other things that needed checking off. Get another key in position and check off San Quentin. Go back further than that and check off the trial. Come back to San Quentin, go ahead of San Quentin and check off the barrel and the truck, the pale-green meadow, the hills and the dark-green woods. Check off the Studebaker, the man in the Studebaker, the ride to San Francisco and the motorcycle cops. Check off Studebaker’s clothes. Get started with now and keep going from now. Check off the buzzer. Start
Shorty George
again.
    He turned the lever that started the phonograph running. The black record began to spin. He put the needle down and
Shorty George
was on its way. Parry stood a few feet away from the phonograph, watching the record go round and listening to the Basie band riding into the fourth dimension. He recognized theBuck Clayton trumpet and he smiled. The smile was wet clay and it became cement when he heard knuckles rapping against the apartment door.
    All of him was cement.
    The rapping was in series, going against
Shorty George
. The first series stopped and Parry tried to get to the phonograph so he could cut off the music that wasn’t music any more, only a lot of noise telling the person out there that someone was in the apartment. He couldn’t get to the phonograph because he couldn’t budge. The second series of raps came to him, stopped for a few moments and then the third series was on and he counted three insistent raps.
    Then he knew it was impossible to check off all those things. They were things to be remembered and considered. This thing nowrapping at the door was the police. It was logical that they should be here. It wasn’t logical for them to have slipped up on that blanket episode. Then again