tonight. You gents can liven things up.”
“We’re not that dry,” I replied, printing Bud’s name on the card Rooney produced. “But you never can tell.”
Having said that, I pushed Bud ahead of me through the unlocked doors. Glancing right, he immediately spotted the six-stool, mirrored cocktail bar, complete with silver cocktail shaker, martini glasses and bartender in a monkey suit.
The club room, formerly a banquet hall, had been expensively redone to match what passed for modernity in after-dark Miami. Besides a white baby grand, the fittings included cobalt rugs with a pattern of silver stars and moons, brushed metal tables and cocktail chairs with silver cushions and a grove of artificial palm trees. A froufrou decorator from New York had painted the trees white, sprinkled them with silver glitter, cut them in half and applied the pieces to the walls as what he called “Greek pee-lasters.”
The mirrored bar, white ceiling, metal doors and base of the central dais were outlined in blue and white neon. A pair of plaster fountains were accented with spotlights.
To our left a light-skinned black man with waved, pomaded hair picked out “Moon Over Miami” on the albino Steinway. His spotlighted piano was raised on a round dais at the far end of the bar.
Looking up from his keys and smiling, Tommy Carpenter nodded in my direction and shifted into a Richard Rogers–style version of “Anchors Aweigh.” After four or five bars of nautical rolling and pitching, he bridged back through “Popeye the Sailor Man” and a reprise of “Moon Over Miami,” ending up in “Laura.”
“And she’s only a dream,” he crooned.
Surprise washed over Bud’s face. “You running a mixed-race club?”
“Not officially,” I answered. “My boss hired the best people he could find. Tommy’s a pretty good saloon singer. He’s worked in New York clubs.”
“Don’t bother me none,” Bud replied to my unvoiced question. “Bunked next to a mulatto guy on the troopship out of ’Frisco. He was from Indiana. We got to be pretty close friends out there.”
“How close?” I said, verbally leering and thus missing the subtle, sad note in Bud’s tone. “You dig any foxholes together?”
Bud looked away. “He made it over one fucking reef at Tarawa. Him and his buddy, another colored kid, they got their foxholes dug for them. With white crosses for decoration.”
As if to emphasize that the dead are always with us, Doc Shepherd looked up from a felt-topped poker table, waved and put down his cards. “Mr. E-e-wing,” he called, his voice honking and his many chins wobbling. “Are we safe here? Last time I saw you two boys together, the shooting had already started.”
Doc and two other men, each seated behind stacks of cardboard chips and half-full glasses, appeared ready for a long night.
Bud stiffened but followed me over to the group.
“I’m buying this hero a lemonade,” I answered, raising my voice a little, “as a thank you for jumping in front of a pistol-packing widow.” Tapping the table next to Shepherd’s glass, I added, “It’d probably be unethical for a public servant such as Detective Wright to accept free beer. But can I offer you and your friends another round of iced tea?”
Doc introduced his pals—a pathologist and an obstetrician from the county hospital—and said they’d have whatever Bud was having, as long as it was bourbon and water.
From experience, I knew that what sounds like unwelcome innuendo is often no more than idle conversation. But when the innuendo has to do with two single men being viewed as a pair, I also knew that defusing the potential bombshell is better than letting it tick.
“Detective Wright and I were in the same convoy during the war,” I fibbed. “Turns out his lieutenant ate in my ward-room from Pearl Harbor to Kolombangara. And my mess chief and Marine Sergeant Spencer ‘Bud’ Wright here got to be pretty close friends in the CPO’s mess
“We’re not that dry,” I replied, printing Bud’s name on the card Rooney produced. “But you never can tell.”
Having said that, I pushed Bud ahead of me through the unlocked doors. Glancing right, he immediately spotted the six-stool, mirrored cocktail bar, complete with silver cocktail shaker, martini glasses and bartender in a monkey suit.
The club room, formerly a banquet hall, had been expensively redone to match what passed for modernity in after-dark Miami. Besides a white baby grand, the fittings included cobalt rugs with a pattern of silver stars and moons, brushed metal tables and cocktail chairs with silver cushions and a grove of artificial palm trees. A froufrou decorator from New York had painted the trees white, sprinkled them with silver glitter, cut them in half and applied the pieces to the walls as what he called “Greek pee-lasters.”
The mirrored bar, white ceiling, metal doors and base of the central dais were outlined in blue and white neon. A pair of plaster fountains were accented with spotlights.
To our left a light-skinned black man with waved, pomaded hair picked out “Moon Over Miami” on the albino Steinway. His spotlighted piano was raised on a round dais at the far end of the bar.
Looking up from his keys and smiling, Tommy Carpenter nodded in my direction and shifted into a Richard Rogers–style version of “Anchors Aweigh.” After four or five bars of nautical rolling and pitching, he bridged back through “Popeye the Sailor Man” and a reprise of “Moon Over Miami,” ending up in “Laura.”
“And she’s only a dream,” he crooned.
Surprise washed over Bud’s face. “You running a mixed-race club?”
“Not officially,” I answered. “My boss hired the best people he could find. Tommy’s a pretty good saloon singer. He’s worked in New York clubs.”
“Don’t bother me none,” Bud replied to my unvoiced question. “Bunked next to a mulatto guy on the troopship out of ’Frisco. He was from Indiana. We got to be pretty close friends out there.”
“How close?” I said, verbally leering and thus missing the subtle, sad note in Bud’s tone. “You dig any foxholes together?”
Bud looked away. “He made it over one fucking reef at Tarawa. Him and his buddy, another colored kid, they got their foxholes dug for them. With white crosses for decoration.”
As if to emphasize that the dead are always with us, Doc Shepherd looked up from a felt-topped poker table, waved and put down his cards. “Mr. E-e-wing,” he called, his voice honking and his many chins wobbling. “Are we safe here? Last time I saw you two boys together, the shooting had already started.”
Doc and two other men, each seated behind stacks of cardboard chips and half-full glasses, appeared ready for a long night.
Bud stiffened but followed me over to the group.
“I’m buying this hero a lemonade,” I answered, raising my voice a little, “as a thank you for jumping in front of a pistol-packing widow.” Tapping the table next to Shepherd’s glass, I added, “It’d probably be unethical for a public servant such as Detective Wright to accept free beer. But can I offer you and your friends another round of iced tea?”
Doc introduced his pals—a pathologist and an obstetrician from the county hospital—and said they’d have whatever Bud was having, as long as it was bourbon and water.
From experience, I knew that what sounds like unwelcome innuendo is often no more than idle conversation. But when the innuendo has to do with two single men being viewed as a pair, I also knew that defusing the potential bombshell is better than letting it tick.
“Detective Wright and I were in the same convoy during the war,” I fibbed. “Turns out his lieutenant ate in my ward-room from Pearl Harbor to Kolombangara. And my mess chief and Marine Sergeant Spencer ‘Bud’ Wright here got to be pretty close friends in the CPO’s mess
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