The Fumbling Phantom

VI

Bill slid into his clothes fast. He pulled on his camels-hair jacket as he ran up the stairs to the trophy hall. Through the plate glass doors he could see Zomby, across the street, climbing onto a Culver City bus.

The bus pulled away from the curb before Bill got out to the sidewalk. He flagged a cruising taxi.

“Chase that bus, bud,” he told the hackie, “but don’t catch up with it. Guy on it... I want to see where he’s heading.”

The driver raised his eyebrows, pulled down the corners of his mouth. “Sherlock Holmes stuff?”

“Uh, uh. Nothing like that.” Bill sat forward on the edge of the seat, so he could watch the bus at the stops.

It was ten minutes and three miles later when he saw Zomby hop out.

“Hold it.” He paid off the taxi, kept his eyes on Zomby, hurrying toward a neon sign proclaiming:

Bill had heard about this place, not exactly a club, just one of those superdupe joints where there was no parking attendant and no doorman. You had to have a key to the door to even get in the restaurant. If you went there with other ‘members’ and the proprietor liked your looks, he might come around and ask if you would like a key.

If you did, you paid a buck, and from then on could get in whenever you wanted.

Bill was sure Zomby wouldn’t have access to a setup like this. And when he got to the parking lot he saw Lou Ann’s convertible, empty, he knew his, hunch had been right. Zomby was inside there with her now!

Bill marched across the parking lot, pounded on the door. Nothing happened. Nobody came. Evidently the management prided itself on never letting anyone in.

He started to circle the building. A station wagon rolled up. A party of six spilled out, made for the locked door.

Bill sauntered over, joined the group. At an inquiring look from one of the men, Bill grinned:

“My gal’s inside. I came out to see a man about a Saint Bernard and went through the wrong door.”

They laughed; he went in with them.

A checkroom, but no attendant. A long, low grille room with bare oak tables scattered in a wide semicircle before a stone fireplace with logs blazing brightly under a gleaming brass kettle. At one of the tables... Lou Ann and Zomby.

He went over to their table:

“Hiya, you criss-crossin’ louse.”

Lou Ann said quietly: “Hello, Bill. Pull up a smile and sit down. We were just talking about you.”

Bill eyed Zomby. “I bet you were! About how neatly you’d sidetracked me!”

Zomby said: “Don’t be a fathead.” He pushed out a chair; the gesture might have been taken as an invitation but it also put the chair between Bill and his teammate.

Lou Ann grabbed Bill’s sleeve. “I asked Zomby to meet me here!”

“Sure,” Bill said tightly. “That makes everything jake, I suppose!” He pulled away from her. “I’m asking him to step outside with me.”

Zomby scowled. “Either sit down and talk sensible, or shut up, Bill.”

Bill reached out, got his fingers into the cloth of the checkered sports jacket, yanked Zomby to his feet.

Lou Ann jumped up tried to get between them.

One of the women at the next table screamed.

Zomby struck at the hand holding his coat. Bill jabed a left. Zomby swung a right. Bill ducked, threw a fist at Zomby’s chin.

They clinched, fell against the table, tipped it over. Glass shattered, crockery splintered on the hearth. A white-aproned waiter came running.

Men from other tables grabbed Bill. Knuckles banged at his mouth, his nose. Somebody tripped him.

“Bill! Bill!” That was Lou Ann, terrified. “Stop it!”

It was too late, now. Even if he’d wanted to, which he didn’t. He felt a savage satisfaction in butting the top of his head at Zomby’s face, even though he was taking more than a little punishment in return.

On one knee, he got his arms around two pairs of legs, straightened up, tottered toward a window. Something smashed him in the pit of the stomach, knocked the wind out of him. A blow caught him on the Adam’s apple. He gasped convulsively for breath.

Black specks gyrated in front of his eyes. The room tilted on edge. He felt himself being dragged, helplessly.

A hard voice said: “You want to come along nice, fella? Or do I have to put twisters on you?”

Dimly, Bill realized there must have been a cop out in the kitchen or some other part of the establishment; he was under arrest.

He tried to wrench around, in the policeman’s grasp, to see if Lou Ann was all right. The officer jammed Bill’s right wrist up in back of his neck until it felt as if the shoulder was going to jump right out of its socket.

He went quietly. To the corner call-box. To the station house at Culver City.

The sergeant studied him with a bored air:

“D and D?” he asked.

The officer shrugged. “He don’t have any smell of liquor on him. Maybe he’s drunk on miggles or some other kind of hop. Anyway, he was disorderly enough.”

“Name?” inquired the sergeant.

“Zombrorowski,” Bill answered, sourly.

The sergeant frowned. “Don’t gimme no wise yoks, now. Spell it.”

Bill did. If there was going to be anything in the papers, at least it wouldn’t be about Bill Cady. He gave a phoney address but admitted he was a student at the university.

They put him in a four by six with a pine bunk and a lot of Kilroy scribbling on the walls.

He sat on the edge of the bunk and held his head in his hands.

He’d really cooked himself. With Lou Ann, certainly. With the University, too, because this would be all over the campus by morning... and voom! — his scholarship would be taken away. And for what? He banged his fist against the foot of the bunk.

They brought him supper on a paper plate; he passed it up.

At ten o’clock, a disinterested jailer came, unlocked the door: “You can go.”

“Yeah?” Bill was stupefied. “When do I... when am I supposed to come back?”

“It’ll be oke if we never see you again, bub.”

“Mean I don’t have to go to court... or anything?”

“Nah. Somebody came around and got the captain to squash the complaint. They squared up for the damage you did, over at that Kitchen Key... so you’re not even on the blotter.” The jailer squinted at him. “You want a little advice, go home an’ sleep it off.”