Small Felonies - Fifty Mystery Short Stories by Bill Pronzini Page A
Authors: Bill Pronzini
Tags: Mystery & Crime
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my parole board understand about birthrights and uncontrollable urges? Somehow I didn't think so; they had been unimpressed in the past. Well, maybe Warden Selkirk could arrange for me to have my old cell back. It had a nice view of the exercise yard.
A ll that took place three months ago, and I can hardly believe what has happened to me since. I have moved into a posh residential apartment building called the Nabob Arms, and have acquired the color television set and a car of my own—not a Lancelot, but quality merchandise nonetheless. And Dolores, this very buxom blonde I met in the park a while back, has consented to become Mrs. Harold Kenton when her divorce is final.
Everything is coming up roses for the first time in my life, particularly and primarily because I am now able to pursue my calling on an average of six times a week—the heisting of iron, the finest of iron from both sides of the Atlantic. Bliss, sheer bliss. Oh, I don't get as much per as I did from Honest Jack, but I have to look at it from the volume and organizational aspects, not to mention the safety standpoint.
I know what you're thinking: the owner of the Lancelot happened to be the ringleader of a large-scale hot-car outfit, and he liked my style enough to take me into the fold.
But you're wrong. And that is the beauty part. What I'm doing, you see, is perfectly legitimate. The owner of the Lancelot is one of this community's most respected citizens, a shrewd business type who recognizes talent when he sees it. His name is Potter, Lawrence D. Potter, of Potter's Repossessions, Inc., and we work for only the best banks and new-car dealers when their paper turns sour, when their car loans are in default.
Like my parole officer, Feeney, says, "It's a modern Horatio Alger success story, if ever there was one."
UNDER THE SKIN
I n the opulent lobby lounge of the St. Francis Hotel, where he and Tom Olivet had gone for a drink after the A.C.T. dramatic production was over, Walter Carpenter sipped his second Scotch-and-water and thought that he was a pretty lucky man. Good job, happy marriage, kids of whom he could be proud, and a best friend who had a similar temperament, similar attitudes, aspirations, likes and dislikes. Most people went through life claiming lots of casual friends and a few close ones, but seldom did a perfectly compatible relationship develop as it had between Tom and him. He knew brothers who were not nearly as close. Walter smiled. That's just what the two of us are like, he thought. Brothers.
Across the table Tom said, "Why the sudden smile?"
"Oh, just thinking that we're a hell of a team," Walter said.
"Sure," Tom said. "Carpenter and Olivet, the Gold Dust Twins."
Walter laughed. "No, I mean it. Did you ever stop to think how few friends get along as well as we do? I mean, we like to do the same things, go to the same places. The play tonight, for example. I couldn't get Cynthia to go, but as soon as I mentioned it to you, you were all set for it."
"Well, we've known each other for twenty years," Tom said. "Two people spend as much time together as we have, they get to thinking alike and acting alike. I guess we're one head on just about everything all right."
"A couple of carbon copies," Walter said. "Here's to friendship."
They raised their glasses and drank, and when Walter put his down on the table he noticed the hands on his wristwatch. "Hey," he said. "It's almost eleven-thirty. We'd better hustle if we're going to catch the train. Last one for Daly City leaves at midnight."
"Right," Tom said.
They split the check down the middle, then left the hotel and walked down Powell Street to the Bay Area Rapid Transit station at Market. Ordinarily one of them would have driven in that morning from the Monterey Heights area where they lived two blocks apart; but Tom's car was in the garage for minor repairs, and Walter's wife Cynthia had needed their car for errands. So they had ridden a BART train in, and after
A ll that took place three months ago, and I can hardly believe what has happened to me since. I have moved into a posh residential apartment building called the Nabob Arms, and have acquired the color television set and a car of my own—not a Lancelot, but quality merchandise nonetheless. And Dolores, this very buxom blonde I met in the park a while back, has consented to become Mrs. Harold Kenton when her divorce is final.
Everything is coming up roses for the first time in my life, particularly and primarily because I am now able to pursue my calling on an average of six times a week—the heisting of iron, the finest of iron from both sides of the Atlantic. Bliss, sheer bliss. Oh, I don't get as much per as I did from Honest Jack, but I have to look at it from the volume and organizational aspects, not to mention the safety standpoint.
I know what you're thinking: the owner of the Lancelot happened to be the ringleader of a large-scale hot-car outfit, and he liked my style enough to take me into the fold.
But you're wrong. And that is the beauty part. What I'm doing, you see, is perfectly legitimate. The owner of the Lancelot is one of this community's most respected citizens, a shrewd business type who recognizes talent when he sees it. His name is Potter, Lawrence D. Potter, of Potter's Repossessions, Inc., and we work for only the best banks and new-car dealers when their paper turns sour, when their car loans are in default.
Like my parole officer, Feeney, says, "It's a modern Horatio Alger success story, if ever there was one."
UNDER THE SKIN
I n the opulent lobby lounge of the St. Francis Hotel, where he and Tom Olivet had gone for a drink after the A.C.T. dramatic production was over, Walter Carpenter sipped his second Scotch-and-water and thought that he was a pretty lucky man. Good job, happy marriage, kids of whom he could be proud, and a best friend who had a similar temperament, similar attitudes, aspirations, likes and dislikes. Most people went through life claiming lots of casual friends and a few close ones, but seldom did a perfectly compatible relationship develop as it had between Tom and him. He knew brothers who were not nearly as close. Walter smiled. That's just what the two of us are like, he thought. Brothers.
Across the table Tom said, "Why the sudden smile?"
"Oh, just thinking that we're a hell of a team," Walter said.
"Sure," Tom said. "Carpenter and Olivet, the Gold Dust Twins."
Walter laughed. "No, I mean it. Did you ever stop to think how few friends get along as well as we do? I mean, we like to do the same things, go to the same places. The play tonight, for example. I couldn't get Cynthia to go, but as soon as I mentioned it to you, you were all set for it."
"Well, we've known each other for twenty years," Tom said. "Two people spend as much time together as we have, they get to thinking alike and acting alike. I guess we're one head on just about everything all right."
"A couple of carbon copies," Walter said. "Here's to friendship."
They raised their glasses and drank, and when Walter put his down on the table he noticed the hands on his wristwatch. "Hey," he said. "It's almost eleven-thirty. We'd better hustle if we're going to catch the train. Last one for Daly City leaves at midnight."
"Right," Tom said.
They split the check down the middle, then left the hotel and walked down Powell Street to the Bay Area Rapid Transit station at Market. Ordinarily one of them would have driven in that morning from the Monterey Heights area where they lived two blocks apart; but Tom's car was in the garage for minor repairs, and Walter's wife Cynthia had needed their car for errands. So they had ridden a BART train in, and after
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