5 Detective Novels Magazine Cover — page 12: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

12 It was a section I was very familiar with and most of my professional career had been spent in areas just like this. I knew them from one end of the city to the other. Which made my job a little easier. You can always collect long overdue money from people you know something about. I walked into the one-man barber shop near the middle of the block. The barber was busy sleeping, but when I pushed the door open, a bell tinkled and he came to life. He ran to the chair, held up a rather dirty sheet, and then threw it onto the chair in disgust. He knew me. ; “Hello, you louse,” he said. I sat down next to a chair heaped with ancient dog-eared magazines. “How have you been, Nick?” “Okay—until you showed up. What is it this time?” I said, “Take it easy, Nick. I’m not here on business.” He seemed doubtful. “You don’t need a haircut,” he said. “You’re damned right I don’t—not at the prices you robbers charge these oe Nick, I treated you okay, didn’t “Well—maybe.” He wasn’t too sure. You have to be patient in these things. “You owed a hundred and sixty bucks on your barber chairs. I could have had them taken out and you wouldn’t be in business.” “Okay. You treated me fine.” “T let you off at so much a week. I didn’t make a dime acting like a bill col- lector.” “T said you treated me okay.” “Now you can do me a favor.” He picked up a razor and started stropping it for want of something else to do. “Somebody else in a hole, huh?” “Not too much. Do you know Mrs. Haven? She lives in the next apartment house.” The razor caressed the leather very slowly. “What about Mrs. Haven?” “She bought an electric dishwasher eleven months ago from a mail order house. There’s ninety bucks due on it.” poe razor moved faster, and he laughed. “An electric dishwasher in this neighborhood? Mr. Craig, there FIVE DETECTIVE NOVELS MAGAZINE ain’t another woman on the block who’d want an electric dishwasher, except Mrs. Haven.” “Does she work, Nick?” The razor moved even faster. “Well, there’s some who call it work. Not being a woman, I don’t know myself.” “Come off it, Nick,” I said. “You know what I want—information, so I’ll know whether or not to yank the dish- washer out or give her a chance to pay for it.” “You’re in a lousy racket, Mr. Craig.” “They don’t come any worse.” Who was I to disagree? “Ain’t you a lawyer? honest lawyer?” . “That’s right.” “Then why do you bother people by collecting bills? Answer me that one.” “Because I’m a rotten lawyer, Nick. Because I have to eat and I keep half of what I collect.” He lifted the razor off the strop, held it at eye level, and studied the edge lengthwise. “She’s a very loose woman, Mr. Craig.” “So who’s interested in how she makes it? Does she make enough ?” “In this neighborhood? I have to chisel on my prices, the bar down the street makes its own hooch so they can sell it for twenty cents a shot. Use your own judgment.” He closed the razor, and I got to my feet. “Well, I’ll have to see what I can do. Nick, should I give her a break?” He shrugged. “In this block every- body needs a break, Mr. Craig. Some- times she’s got money, sometimes she ain’t. Mostly, she ain’t because when she gets her hands on some, she buys gin. Gallons of it. Between times she borrows from me but she always pays me back, see?” I made up my mind then. If she could buy booze, she could pay for a luxury item. I went out on the dirty, squalling, brawling street. It was about five-thirty and everybody who lived here was home. Half of them sat on the front steps. A man in typical neighborhood uniform—an undershirt and old pants —threw an apple core toward the gut- ‘ter. He wiped his face with the back of a grimy hand, cleared his throat and A regular, CoOMmiclooo S (C(O)