Part 6

I could hardly contain myself. "Did you hear that, Joe?"

Joe wasn't so easily excited. "What's the job?" He knew how he'd treated Nellie, and was rightfully suspicious of any favor she offered.

"It's three weeks in Florida," Nellie offered.

I think I may have squealed. "Florida?"

Nellie began to lay it on as thick as a flapper troweling on rouge. "It's at the Seminole-Ritz, in Miami--transportation and all expenses paid."

Thst won Joe over. He smacked her a wet one on the cheek. "Isn't she a bit of terrific? Come on," he started toward the back office. "Let's talk to Poliakoff."

Nellie stopped us cold. "Hold up a minute, boys. He's got some people in there with him."

I didn't mind waiting. My mind was busy conjuring up golden sandy beaches instead of streets filled with dirty slush, palm trees instead of those skinny, shivering excuses that peep out of holes in the sidewalk, with little fences around them in a vain attempt to keep the city dogs from watering them. Millionaires instead of cheesy gangsters. Sounded good to me.

A few minutes later Sig came out with a brassy looking blonde broad and a prissy looking dude in thick specs. He shook hands with them, saying, "Sue, Bienstock, don't worry. I'll have your replacements on the train by eight." They didn't look too confident, but they left.

The moment they were gone, Joe and I followed him back into his office. "Sig, can we talk to you?"

"Just a second." Poliakoff got on the phone. "Nellie, get me long distance, wouldya?" He turned his attention back to Joe. "What is it?"

"It's about the Florida job."

"The Florida job?"

"Nellie told us about it," I blurted. "We're not too late, are we?"

Poliakoff blinked at us. "What are you, a couple of comedians? Get out of here!. Long distance? Get me the William Morris Agency in New York."

Joe wasn't giving up that easily. "You need a bass and a sax, right?"

"The instruments are right, but you..." he looked us up and down dismissively. "You are not." he spoke into the phone. "I want to speak to Mr. Morris."

I couldn't let a prime opportunity like this slip away without a fight. "What's wrong with us?"

"You're the wrong shape. Good-bye. No, not you, operator. I'm holding."

Joe frowned. "The wrong shape? You looking for hunchbacks, or something?"

I shuddered. "Please, Joe!" He'd suckered me into seeing Lon Chaney in 'The Hunchback of Notere Dame' by telling me that a hunchback was something like a tailback, or a linebacker, and it was a film about French football. I didn't sleep for two nights. Luckily he was between side sweeties, and kept me company.

Poliakoff gave us a peculiar look, and said, "It's not the backs that worry me."

Joe kept at him. "What kind of band is this, anyway?"

Poliakoff sighed. "You got to be twenty-five..."

I piped up, "We can pass, we're close enough."

He continued. "You got to be blonde."

"We could dye our hair."

"And you got to be girls."

"We could..."

"No, we couldn't!" Joe snapped.

It finally hit me. "You mean it's a girls' band?"

"Yeah, that's what he means. Good old Nellie! I ought to wring her neck."

Okay, I was crazy, but I was desperate. "Wait a minute, Joe. Let's talk this over." I looked at Sig. "Why couldn't we do it? We've done a little of it before. Remember the Gypsy Tearoom? We wore gold earrings for that. And what about that gig with the Hawaiian band?" I shimmied to refresh their memories. Sig, God bless 'im, was actually distracted from the phone for a second. "Grass skirts, right?"

But Sig cleared his throat, and looked at Joe. "What's with him? He drinks?"

"No, and he ain't been eating too good lately, either. His belly is empty, and it's making him act like his head is the same. Jerry, you've flipped your wig."

I clapped my hands. "Now you're talking. We get a couple of second hand wigs. A little padding here, a little padding there. We can call ourselves Josephine and Geraldine."

He wasn't buying. He started to drag me toward the door. "C'mon, you. Josephine and Geraldine."

Sig covered the mouthpiece of the phone and said, "Look, if you boys want to pick up a little money tonight, at the University of Illinois they are having, you should excuse the expression, a St. Valentine's Day dance. Six dollars a man."

"We'll take it," Joe snapped.

"You got it. Be on campus in Urbana at eight o' clock."

"Joe," I protested. "All the way out to Urbana for twelve bucks?"

"We can at least get one of the coats out of hock."

As we headed for the door, I heard Poliakoff saying, "Mr. Morris? You got two girl muscicians available--a sax and a bass?"

I had to give it one more shot. "If Morris can't come through..."

Joe grabbed my arm. "Come on, Geraldine!" and jerked me out the door.

As we went into the outer office I whined. "It's a hundred miles out there, and it's snowing! What are we gonna do?"

"I'll think of something. Don't crowd me."

Nellie smiled at us sunnily. "How'd it go, girls?"

"You!" I fumed. "We ought to wring your neck!"

Joe snapped, "Please, Jerry! That's no way to talk to a lady."

I looked around pointedly. "Where?"

He ignored me. He was good at that, sometimes, but he had a reason this time. He turned on the charm. I mean, I heard the switch flip. "Nellie, baby," he purred. "What are ya doin' tonight?"

She regarded him suspiciously. "Why?"

"Because I got some plans." Joe's eyes said that those plans involved Nellie doing some sweating and moaning.

She was melting already, but fighting it. Fool. "Oh, I'm not doing anything. I thought I'd just go home and have some cold pizza."

Joe leaned closer, voice seductive. "And you'll be in all night?"

The bones were gone now. She whimpered, "Yes, Joe."

Joe's lips were against her ear as he said softly, "Good. Then you won't be needing your car."

That woke her up. "My car? Why, you..."

Joe shut her up with a kiss. All I could do was shake my head in admiration. "Isn't he a bit of terrific?"

A little while later we were making our way down a slush filled street toware Charlie's Garage, dragging our cases with us, and I just couldn't let it go. That job had sounded so perfect. "We could've had three weeks in Florida," I whined. Yes, whined. I'm not ashamed of it. Some situations call for a self-pitying tone. "Laying around in the sun, frying fish..." Joe just growled at me to knock it off.

We stepped over the chain across the entrance and went in. It was your typical garage: a row of parked cars, lube rack, gas pump, and a couple of mechanics in greasy overalls. The only thing different was the table against the wall where five gents sat under a bare bulb playing stud poker. And hey, this was Chicago. If it wasn't typical, it certainly wasn't out of the ordinary.

The dealer had a toothpick stuck in the side of his mouth, and it waggled while he called the cards. "King high. Pair of bullets. Possible straight. Possible nothin'. Pair of eights..."

He looked up. I don't know exactly what caused the reaction. I mean, I know Joe and me looked a little rough around the edges, but... The guy turned the color of a piece of limburger, jumped to his feet, and whipped out a gun! The other four must've thought this was a swell idea, because a second later we had five guns pointing at us. I almost plotzed.

Toothpick snarled, "All right, you two! Drop 'em!"

I was bewildered, as well as scared. "Don't you mean, 'put 'em up?'"

He sneered, "Wise guys."

Joe said, "We're just here to pick up a car."

"Oh, yeah?" He nodded to one of the grease monkeys, who came over and started to open our cases.

Joe clarified. "Nellie Weinmeyer's car."

The garage guy grinned, showing the base and sax to the others. "Muscicians."

Toothpick snorted, wiping sweat off his forehead. "Muscicians? Comedians, more like it." But they all put the gats away and went back to their game. As the mechanic started to lead us back to the cars, I could hear him. "Okay, aces bet..." I was a little surprised Joe didn't try to sit in on the game, but then he's always liked the ponies and hounds more than cards. I guess he prefers to lose his money with something that can't laugh in his face.

Joe was telling the mechanic, "It's a '25 Hupmocile coupe--green."

The car was near the gas pump. "Need some gas?" the mechanic asked.

Joe looked at me, and I sighed and started digging through my pockets. "Maybe about forty cents worth."

"Put it on Miss Weinmeyer's bill?"

Joe signalled me to put away my silver. "Yeah. Fill it up." The guy unscrewed the cap and stuck the nozzel in the tank.

Right about then I heard tires squeeling, so I cast an eye back toward the entrance. I was just in time to see a big, black Duesenburg bust through the chain and skid to a halt maybe ten feet from the poker table. I didn't like that. Most garage customers aren't in that big of a hurry for service.

It must've struck the card players as funny, too, because they all jumped up and went for their guns again, but they were too late. Four men jumped out of the Dues, two of them carrying machine guns, and the other two had sawed-off shotguns. I never can keep the hands in poker straight, but I know for damn sure that if you have four handguns in the hole, you should never try to draw against two pair (tommyguns and sawed offs) showing.

The new arrivals looked familiar. I realized that the last time I'd seen them had been in The Chapel, at the reserved table, with glasses of buttermilk in front of them. Spats Colombo's 'immediate family'.

One of them barked, "All right, everybody. Hands up and face the wall."

I think maybe Jerry saved my life. I was just staring, mouth open like I was trying to catch flies. He grabbed me and pulled me down behind the Hupmobile just before the second goon looked over and saw the mechanic, standing frozen at the pump. He grinned and waved his tommygun at the poor schmo. "Hey! Join us!" Like he was asking the guy over for sloe gin and the Charleston. The garageman put up his hands and went and lined up against the far wall with the others, and the guy yelled, "Okay, boss."

We were near ground level, so I had a perfect view of the perfect pair of immaculate spats on the feet of the man who got out of the Duesenburg. I grabbed Jerry's arm and whispered, "It's Spats Colombo!" He slapped a hand over my mouth.

Spats strolled over to where the men were lined up, at gunpoint, against the wall. "Hello, Charlie. Long time, no see."

The dude who'd first drawn down on us, the one who still had the toothpick in his kisser, said, "What is it, Spats? What do you want here?"

"Just dropped in to pay my respects." Well, a man in the undertaking business...

"You don't owe me nothing."

"Oh, I wouldn't say that. You were nice enough to recommend my mortuary to some of your friends." Spats was at the table now. He picked up the discarded deck and calmly began to deal out another round of cards.

Charlie was sweating now. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"You know, now I got all those coffins on my hand. I hate to see things go to waste."

"Honest, Spats. I had nothing to do with it." He was sounding desperate, and you know what? I didn't blame him a bit.

Spats laid down a fifth card at Charlie's place, then turned up the hole card. He frowned ostentatiously. "Oh, too bad, Charlie! You would've had three eights." He tossed down the cards. "Good-bye, Charlie."

"No, Spats! No, no, no..... No!"

Spats nodded, the tommyguns came up, and they started to chatter. I closed my eyes and moaned, "I think I'm going to be sick." That's when the gas tank of the Hupmobile overflowed, shooting the nozzle out onto the floor with a thud and a gush.

They heard it, of course, and wheeled around, zeroing in on us. Spats barked, "All right, come out of there."

We did, doing our best to raise our hands while holding on to the instruments. I couldn't help taking a quick look at the foot of the bullet pocked wall. I wish I hadn't. Joe said quickly, "We didn't see anything."

Staring, mesmerized, I murmured, "No, nothing. Anyway, it's none of our business if you guys want to knock each other off." Joe nearly drove the air out of me with his elbow.

Spats was looking at us speculatively. "Don't I know you from somewhere?"

"We're just a couple of musicians," Joe assured him. "We come to pick up Nellie Weinmeyer's car. There's a dance tonight." Nudgeing me, he started to edge away. "C'mon, Jerry."

Spats almost looked amused. "Wait a minute. Where do you think you're going?"

"To Urbana. It's a hundred miles."

"You ain't going nowhere."

Oh, I didn't like the sound of this. "We're not?" I piped.

He sneered. "The only way you'll get to Urbana is feet first."

We would have been gonners if Spats' men had been a little more thorough. See, there was one tiny spark of life left in one of the guys at the wall. Toothpick Charlie, covered in blood, but toothpick still clenched between his teeth, had started to try to crawl to a phone. Spats and his men were preoccupied with terrorizing us before they offed us. Ever notice how many villains lose their chance to kill the hero because they just have to flap their gums?

Spats said, "I don't like no witnesses."

"We won't breathe a word," Joe assured him.

"You won't breathe nothing, not even air!" He gestured toward one of his goons and the guy leveled the machine gun at us. My insides went from 98.5 to about zero in a split second.

But right about then, Charlie reached the phone. He was too weak to hang on to it, though. All he did was pull it off onto the floor. The gangsters whirled at the sound. Spats snatched the tommygun from his henchman, and thoroughly perforated ol' Charlie--no oversights this time. Then he walked over, his spats now spattered with blood, and kicked the toothpick out of the corpses mouth.

Some day I gotta find out where Charlie is buried and send flowers. While they were all preoccupied Joe and I sneaked off. Well, we ran for the entrance like scalded jackasses, instruments in hand. They fired a couple of blasts at us as we made it out the door.

I think they would have followed us, but right about then the sirens started up. I heard a car start up and squeal away, but they didn't seem to be following us. We ducked down an alley. As I ran, I moaned, "I think they got me!"

Joe gasped, "They got the bull fiddle!"

I felt myself as we high-stepped. "You don't see any blood?"

"Not yet. But if those guys catch us there'll be blood all over. Type O."

"Where are we going?"

"As far away as possible."

"It won't be far enough! We don't know them, but they know us. Every hood in Chicago will be looking for us, and that's a lot of hoods, Joe!"

A couple of motorcycle cops flashed past the end of the alley we were in, and several beat patrolmen on foot. They were all heading in the direction of the garage. News was spreading fast. Joe dragged me into a cigar store on the corner. "Got a nickle?" Same old Joe. The world falling down around our ears, and he wants to borrow money. Same old Jerry--I gave it to him.

He dropped it in the slot of a pay phone and started dialing. At last, sanity. "You're calling the police?"

"The police? Are you kidding? Not a chance. We'd never live to testify against Spats Colombo." He gave the operator the number.

"But we got to get out of town!" I stroked my cheeks. "Maybe we should grow beards."

"We are going out of town, but we're going to shave."

"Shave?" I yelped. "At a time like this? Those guys got machine guns, they're going to blast our heads off, and you want to shave?"

"Shave our legs, stupid."

"But Joe..." I stopped. I thought. "Ooohhh."

Joe started speaking in a soprano. "Hello? Mistah Poliakoff? I understand you're looking for a coupla goil musicians. Mhm. Mhm. Well, It just so happens that me and my friend..."

I started trying to decide if I wanted to be an ash blonde, or a gold blonde.