The Freeloaders

  PASCALE

  Passing an isolated rocky beach, she slowed the scooter down and asked if I wanted to take a swim. I said it didn’t matter to me. We could wait until reaching the plage in Nice. Pascale suddenly pressed my fingers deeper into her stomach and asked coyly, “Can we wait, Al?”

  … She quickly moved my astonished hands up to cup her trim breasts. “Al, what’s wrong with you?” she asked, her French shrill with anger. “Or me? Am I so undesirable?”

  “Pascale, you know damn well you’re a very …”

  “Call me a beautiful child and I’ll split your head with a rock! Can’t you feel I’m a woman!”

  I pulled my hands gently away, got off the machine. Then I hugged her, keeping her eager hands at her sides, and gave her a long kiss. Her lips—opening to mine—made me feel anything but calm.

  I said, “This should answer whether I think of you as a child or not!”

  THE

  FREELOADERS

  ED LACY

  a division of F+W Crime

  I SUPPOSE YOU can call this a preface, if you go in for that sort of thing. Since writers rarely have the chance to write the blurbs for their own books, and only the Lord knows what the cover on this one will claim, I’m sneaking in my own blurb.

  Therefore, I hereby begin in a straightforward-type manner and do solemnly state this is a novel about three American men (four, counting myself) and their women, all living in Nice, France, for various reasons. And how one of them (not me) was killed. The time is not many months ago. That the story starts on July 4th and more or less ends on July 14th, Bastille Day, has no significance. Things merely happened that way.

  Frankly, I don’t know what kind of a novel this is. (Nor do I understand the need for classifying novels—except as being interesting or dull.) Although it concerns a shooting and a robbery, it is not a mystery book. It has sex (of course) but I doubt if even in Boston they’d peg this as a “hot” yarn. All the guys involved were or are romanticists—whether they knew it or not—but this is hardly a love story. It may be a plug for Nice (I openly love the city), but neither is this a travel book. Nor is it a problem story, for I’m too mature (and old) to take myself that seriously. Despite these opening lines, I sincerely hope it isn’t a coy, wisecracky book—something like the “sick” jokes or “insult” comedians we now suffer with. Nor have I intended it to be mere cynicism. Doris, my ex-ex-wife, calls cynicism the shallowest and cheapest form of ignorance. Doris is generally correct—which is mainly why I can’t stand her. (Although at the moment we are having a tender reunion in this San Juan hotel, and I hope it lasts.)

  Actually I look at this as a conversation. (Now, I don’t mean it’s one of these mood novels which talk you to death: it has plot, action, movement.) If we were in Nice this second, sitting at a table outside Le Sansas, drinking a citron presse or a Perrier, watching the tourists and chicks strolling toward the promenade, and were leisurely talking about, say, Pascale, I would tell the story like this.

  It’s easy to list the many things this novel is not: what sort of book, then, is it? Well, you decide. But I’m not taking an easy out: if you’re the kind who insists books must have a moral, I’m with you. I firmly believe every written word contains a moral within it. However, exactly what this moral is each reader will decide against his yardstick of values.

  Roughly, for me, the moral here is that expatriates, or tourists of a shorter duration, are only happy in a foreign country when they are spectators. They will heatedly deny this, proudly claim they are truly part and parcel of their adopted country. But in reality they do not wish to be an integral part of anything, for once they enter into the actual life of their new country, they run up against the same problems they tried to flee in the States. As the ancient joke goes, “… After that it was the same as in the Bronx.” (If you have not heard this joke, don’t fret. It’s the high-school variety of dirty joke and it has been damn near a quarter of a long century since I was in high school.)

  The three Americans in Nice made the sad mistake of leaving the grandstand and trying to become players—without ever joining the team. They were trampled in the rush. I never made that error. Not that I was wiser, but rather because, as a writer, I’ve always played the observer, the curious spectator. So there’s the moral—for me.

  I must also admit writing this book as a form of self-protection. If whoever may be “chasing” me reads this book, I trust they will finally believe I’m not involved in their little racket, whatever it is. Should Charley read this (which I doubt), I hope he’ll forgive me. (I am aware these last few lines make absolutely no sense to you; they should be at the end of the book. So I suggest you reread these opening pages when you finish the novel. Perhaps it will all add up then. Please do it.)

  So … (Hello? Hello? Are we still connected? … buddy-buddy, if you can stand a modest windup before the fast ball, allow me to wander leisurely a bit before the change-up pitch. Please don’t change trains. I can’t promise it will be worth waiting for—but I doubt that you want any such guarantee.

  Now, let us start.

  Al Cane

  San Juan, Puerto Rico,

  November

  1

  I’M ONE JOKER you don’t have to tell that science has shrunk our world. A guy I never saw gets his backside kicked on Madison Avenue and I immediately feel the full impact of the boot some four thousand miles away, in Nice.

  Of course, the way things have worked out these last ten days, I’m literally sitting pretty. I’m typing this in the nude on my private terrace overlooking the clean and deep-blue Mediterranean. Nor am I making a pun when I say this is the best writing pad I’ve ever lucked up on.

  I also have a loaded carbine beside my typing table. While you don’t especially need a college education for it, I’m quite adept with this carbine. I’ve killed eleven men with the very gun, and I carry it in my luggage wherever I go. Understand, it isn’t a thing I glory over—nor worry about, either. Rather, it gives me a deeper insight on life. Like you say (if you’re the type) only five per cent of the population has an income of over a hundred thousand a year—or whatever the silly statistics are. Well, what percentage of the population has killed eleven men? Now, I don’t consider myself a part of any elite, or any such nonsense as that. My main worry at the moment is that my luck might run out and I may have to make the killings an even dozen.

  I’m not a gunman, at least not professionally. I’m a writer. Around the end of June my agent phoned me at Greenport, Long Island, where I happened to be living for several weeks, with the great news that some old published yarns of mine dealing with the Caribbean were being considered for a TV serial. Things hadn’t quite reached the signing of contracts, but he assured me it had absolutely jelled and some independent producer was very hot for the idea. The price wasn’t big (except to me) but my agent said, “Since you know the islands well, if you’re on the scene I think you can talk yourself into scripting the entire ten shows. Not only be a real bundle, but a fine TV credit. Al, I hesitated about phoning you; I don’t want to break up your new honeymoon with Doris. But since this can be a big deal … well….”

  “Doris and I parted five days ago.”

  “Sorry. This one was real brief. You receive my boat kit? I thought it would be a great gag.”

  “Yeah, we got it. Thanks. Doris has the boat. Listen, why can’t we settle the scripting job before I go anyplace?”

  “The producer has already left the States. Al, you get on location fast and I’m positive you can write the pilot show. After that, with you on hand the rest will fall into line.”

  “I’m already packed. Where they shooting, Puerto Rico, Havana, or Jamaica?”

  “In Nice. That’s on the southern coast of France.”

  I played it cool; hardly anything about TV can astonish me any more. I asked mildly, “They changing the locale?”

  “Nope. Seems they have palm trees and the rest of the bit in Nice, along with a motion-picture studio. Also the producer’s main backer has piles of francs stuck in France. Brush up on your French on the plane.”

  In my best French, which is pretty good, I said I’d be on the next plane. While I’d never visited the Cote D’Azure, I’d spent time around Normandy and the northern part of France—courtesy of Uncle Sam. In fact Uncle also issued me this carbine at the time.

  There wasn’t a thing holding me in Greenport. A week before, Doris and I had happily started another of our periodic reunions. Doris had taken a few weeks off from her top-ad-agency job. Like all our other attempts, this reunion broke up over a minor and silly incident. Some ass had sent us this do-it-yourself kit which was supposed to turn into a ten-foot punt. There was even an idiotic note about “… at your ages you’ll have plenty of time on your hands so….” I’ve never been able to drive even a thumbtack in straight, while Doris has no idea what a hammer looks like. But one muggy night when she couldn’t sleep, Doris carefully read the boring instructions through a few times, and by morning she had the damn boat almost finished. To my mildly sarcastic remarks she accused me—as usual—of being a goddamn male jingoist and anti-intellectual … never mind how Doris’ big brain arrived at all that … and we took things from there.

  The ironical part is, for once in her sharp life Doris was dead wrong. It wasn’t a matter of male or female attitudes. An inept clown like me resents any perfectionist.

  I was on a plane the following morning and in Nice a day later. Acting like a big-time author, I put up at the swank Ruhl Hotel and immediately
hired a car to take me out to La Victorine studios on the outskirts of Nice. Expecting to find a barn, I was neatly surprised to find a completely modern setup, as large as anything Hollywood has to offer. Rex Ingram built the studio some thirty-five years ago, and made The Garden of Allah here. His imposing mansion is still standing, although it’s used for offices now. They have a complete staff, workshops, and a fine bar and restaurant with an excellent view of the sea below. Also the nearby airport. I wondered how they made sound pictures with planes coming and going less than a mile away.

  The producer was in Paris but had left a note that I was to phone him at once. I did, and he told me everything was ready; he was rounding up some featured players in Paris. He suggested I rough out the first show, that he would be at La Victorine within a few days. When I mentioned a contract, he said they were already typed and being checked by lawyers in the States, and would be in my agent’s hands any day.

  I had two happy days. Every morning I’d leave the Ruhl and take a long swim, then drive out to the studio. Sitting on the veranda of the bar and sipping Cinzanos like a VIP, I roughed out the opening sequences. Each noon the producer phoned from Paris and we’d talk for half an hour. He was delighted with my ideas. I would then eat a big salade Nicoise, bull in French with the staff, and do a little more work, then drive back to the hotel and take another swim, walk off a good supper along the Promenade Des Anglais, and sleep the sleep of the just.

  Actually it’s odd more outfits don’t use Nice to make movies. It has everything Hollywood offers in the way of weather, and better scenery. Beach, ocean, palm trees, swank houses, coves and harbors, mountains, snow, and rugged country—all within a half hour’s ride. Of course the noise of the planes worried me. I made a note to ask the producer about the noise.

  On July 4th he phoned from Paris to ask if I’d heard the news? There’d been a shake-up on Madison Avenue and his boy was out. Everything was off. While I sputtered over the phone with foolish questions, he told me he didn’t know how he’d get his plane fare back to the States, and hung up.

  I had a Cinzano—as a chaser over a stiff hooker of rhum—and took stock of the situation. Counting my return plane ticket, I was out over $600 on this fool’s errand. I had $220 in travelers’ checks in my pocket, loose francs, and some five faithful green friends in the moneybelt around my soggy belly—five $100 bills. I figured if I moved from the Ruhl to my usual threadbare environment I could stay around Nice for a few weeks, and at least soak up the sun.

  As I left, the bartender asked if he should call me a cab and I cornballed, “No, call me a jerk,” and walked the dusty dirt road down to the gate. From there I knew it was a few blocks downhill to a bus which would carry me into the heart of Nice for less than a hundred francs.

  The main gate is a long red-and-white bar across the road, which can be raised or lowered much like an old railroad-crossing gate. The watchman’s office and house stand next to this. There was a mild commotion at the gate.

  The watchman was an elderly Frenchman with a complete set of fascinating steel teeth, and a fierce walrus-gray moustache. He was gesturing and arguing with a stocky man, obviously an American by his shoes and clothing, who looked as if he had stepped out of a crime picture. Not the featured-role type, but one of the gang. He seemed a year or two older than me, say about forty-three, and his head was almost as bald as mine. But he was solidly built with a bull neck, and the arms coming out of his loud sports shirt were thick with muscle. He was deeply sunburnt and his face had a lean, rough look. His nose must have been broken years ago. He could easily pass for an ex-middleweight pug. He was yelling in very bad French, with the watchman trying hard to get in a few words.

  Sitting on a lovely pink Italian scooter was a French girl who could have been fifteen, eighteen, or even twenty years old. She wore a bright-red flared skirt which showed off her strong dancer’s legs and silly stilt-heeled shoes. She wasn’t wearing stockings and her legs were tanned a golden brown, as was the rest of her. She also was wearing a waist nipper, a thin white blouse, and no bra over her neat small breasts. Her lips were heavy and painted a pale purple, and her eyes were lousy with the same color eye shadow. She had a baby-blue kerchief around her long ash-blonde hair, with a crazy red basket hat perched on top of everything. Her face was cute rather than pretty, but mainly there was this delightful air of vitality about her—even while she looked bored with the talk, although quite childishly pleased that it was about her. The blonde hair made a wonderful contrast to her golden skin.

  Upon seeing me, the watchman clapped his big hands, said in French, “Ah, Monsieur Cane! Will you kindly explain to this American….”

  The other man cut in with, “Mac, you from the States?”

  The watchman said in broken English, “Monsieur Cane is an American writer from Hollywood.”

  The rough-looking joker cut in again with, “I was just asking this old goat how I can get Pascale into the movies. He’s stalling me.”

  “I tell him he must make an appointment with the directeur, who is away in Spain. Surely I cannot do anything for him,” the watchman said in French.

  “Cane, are you a motion-picture writer here? I’m Charley Martins.” He held out a strong hand.

  As I shook his hand I told him, “I’m merely a writer who will never have to worry about the noise of the airport.”

  “What? Hey, I’ve seen you on the beach. You swim way out.”

  “I like to swim,” I mumbled, feeling flattered and confused.

  Charley put his hard face next to mine and said in a confidential voice, “Look, I want to do something big for Pascale, like get her into the movies. You see what a beautiful child she is, better looking than Bardot. How do I go about it?”

  I had my firecrackers for the day: first finding I’d sent myself on a fool’s errand, and now this idiot. I turned to look at Pascale—that is, look at her openly. She stared back with bold curiosity.

  “Is she an actress?” I asked.

  “She’s got the looks; what’s there to acting?” Charley asked.

  It was hot in the sun and I was in a rush to check out of the Ruhl before I was hooked for another day’s 6,700 francs. “You for real?” I said, starting to walk around him.

  He sidestepped, blocking my way. “What’s the matter? I asked you a question.”

  “You’re a horse’s ass. Find out what being an actress means, then see if she has any talent, and the will to learn diction, poise, and perhaps even acting. It’s hot and I’m in a small hurry, so get the hell out of my way.”

  His eyes actually narrowed. “For a skinny slob you got a tough mouth. Looking for a bruise?”

  “Try it and I will kill you,” I said.

  Don’t get the idea I’m a brawler, or tough. I haven’t been in a fist fight since I was sixteen. But on the few drunken occasions I’ve been threatened with physical violence, saying, “I’ll kill you,” seems to have a remarkable cooling effect on the other guy. I’m rather sure I’d never kill them, but ever since the war (and I’m not harping on the subject) and those eleven men I killed, I think there is a kind of tone to my voice when I say the words; perhaps there’s the chilling ring of experience to it. This is partly what I mean about all those deaths having changed my outlook.

  Whatever the reason, it had the usual effect on Charley Martins. He suddenly stepped away from me, muttering, “I’m wasting time with a dud like you. Wait here, Pascale honey, I’ll go up and talk to the boss-man. Where the hell is this directeur’s office?”

  Pointing up the road, the watchman added, “But he is not there.”

  “Just don’t get in my way, Pops!” Martins growled. He yanked out a thousand-franc note, tossed it at the old man, and started trotting up the dusty road I’d come down. Again he reminded me of an old pug doing roadwork.

  The watchman picked up the bill and pocketed it, then jumped back into his office and got on the phone, warning the main office that a nut was on his way.

  Walking out, I passed Pascale still sitting on the scooter, coolly watching me. I asked, “Do you wish to be an actress?”