Tom didn’t play the Backroom for two months. Business stayed pretty good even though Kevin booked the odd lame act. One guy set a Panasonic tape recorder on a wooden chair. He hit play and the machine blared out tinny renditions of Tin Pan Alley tunes. The singer slouched at the microphone with his hands in his pockets and sang along. His audiences were thin and inattentive.
Other weeks were better. Ron Nigrini was there around the time that “I’m Easy” was a hit. Kevin got Spoon and the Plates back a couple of times. He experimented with a female blues singer who had some style, and a rockabilly trio that was fine until Thursday night when the bass player arrived too drunk to stand. He lay at the back of the stage hugging his bass and plucking it erratically. The next night, the place was jammed with the curious, hoping for a repeat performance.
No matter who played, Debbie did not show up. Then Kevin got the next call from Tom saying he was available. By the time Tom took the stage, she was back.
“Do me a favor, buddy,” Kevin said. “Take this money to Tom?”
“Why doesn’t he come get it?” I wasn’t keen. My car was in the shop and Tom’s apartment wasn’t convenient to public transit.
“Don’t know.”
“It can’t wait?”
Kevin knew me. “Be a good chance to ask Tom about your book,” he said.
A hardware-store truck was pulling up as I reached Tom’s building. Maybe they were there to fix the door lock in the lobby. It was broken, so I let myself in.
The staircase had been beautiful once, with intricately carved spindles in the railing. Several were missing now, replaced with unfinished lengths of two-by-two. Still, Tom’s building was in better repair than some in the neighbourhood. The ceiling had ornate plaster flourishes and delicate corner trim and, despite a network of cracks, it was still impressive. The doors were impregnable-looking oak. They had been burnished by time and shone in a way that made me want to let the tips of my fingers linger against the wood, until I came to Tom’s.
Someone had carved words into the smooth surface. The letters were large, jagged, and so deep that it must have taken a lot of strength, and a very sharp blade, to engrave them. “Thief of souls,” it said. I knocked reluctantly, rapping with a single knuckle.
“Who is it?” Tom’s voice was so soft that I thought I had the wrong apartment.
“Tom?” I sounded as tentative as he did.
“Who wants to know?”
“It’s me. Kevin sent your money.”
The door opened a crack. Tom peered out and then opened the door slightly wider, holding out his hand.
I gave him the money. “What the hell is that?”
“A fan letter.”
“You know who did it?”
He nodded as he counted.
“Who?” He didn’t answer, so I tried, “When?”
“This morning.” He started to shut the scarred door.
“It must have taken a long time.”
“It took one hour and nine minutes,” he said.
“This is Tom’s last night,” Kevin told me the next evening.
I was shocked. Tom had just started his second set. He seemed the same as every other night. There were ways in which he was a pain in the ass. But the people came to see him and they spent money. I wondered what had happened to get him fired so abruptly.
“Can’t you let him finish the week?” I asked.
“It’s not my idea,” Kevin said. “He was gonna just take off, but he wanted to warn me. He said not to tell anybody. Keep it under your hat.”
I was out back when Debbie pulled up. She bathed me in her headlights again, but this time shut them off right away. “Is Tom inside?” she asked.
“Not for long,” I said. Kevin’s news had me shaky and sad.
“What do you mean?”
“He’s leaving.” I hadn’t meant to say it aloud. I’m still not convinced that I did. It certainly wasn’t spoken any louder than a whisper, the kind you say to yourself when you’re not quite able to comprehend what you think you’ve just heard.
Debbie stared at me, head tipped to one side. “Leaving,” she said, in that same kind of whisper.
After his third set, I said to Tom, “Have you had a chance to look at my manuscript?”
He snapped his fingers, something he did with authority. “Damn, I’ve been meaning to give that to you.” He opened his guitar case and took out a sheaf of papers held together with an elastic band. “I kinda spilled coffee on it. Sorry. And there’s a little jam about page one seventy, one eighty. It has potential.” He handed it to me. “There’s notes here and there. Let’s discuss it after the show.” He started for the back door.
I took the manuscript to the best-lighted table. His notes were surprisingly thorough. Some were effusive in their praise. Others pointed out redundancies, ugly metaphors, and places where I used too many words. His comments on plot weaknesses and clichéd scenes were lucid and clear. Nothing he said was without support and, although I didn’t agree with all his remarks, I knew that if I followed his guidelines the work would be better. I was so engrossed that I didn’t notice that he was late for the fourth set.
He always started on the dot of twelve. At twelve ten, I went outside to look for him. Debbie’s Parisienne was still there, now backed into its spot against the fence. She was leaning against the car, smoking, and breathing heavily. The cigarettes were taking their toll. Good, I thought.
“Have you seen Tom?” I asked.
“Why?”
“I wanted to thank him.”
“I’ll tell him,” she said, “when I see him again.”
Back inside, Tom’s guitar was still on the stage. I knew he wouldn’t have left it behind. I went out back again. He still wasn’t there, and Debbie’s car was gone.
Maybe Tom had decided to quit singing for good. That didn’t seem like him, though. I took the guitar home, sure that one day he’d return and want it back. I’ve kept it ever since. It’s the least I can do.
The Theft of the Blue-Ribbon Pie
by Edward D. Hoch
Copyright © 2006 Edward D. Hoch
Nick Velvet, the most popular of Ed Hoch’s series characters, has been under almost continuous option for television over the past decade. With any luck, 2006 will finally see him make his American TV debut. French TV ran a short series starring the thief of valueless things back in the ’70s. How much longer must U.S. fans wait? For statistics on other Hoch characters, see this month’s Jury Box.
When Nick Velvet told Gloria he’d never at-tended a county fair, she couldn’t believe it. “Never? In your whole life? That’s like saying you’ve never been to a circus or ridden on a train. Everyone’s been to a county fair.”
They were driving across northern New Jersey, bound for the fair in Jackson County, just over the Pennsylvania line. It was a hot August afternoon with only a few wispy clouds drifting across the blue of the sky. “I don’t think they have county fairs in Manhattan,” he told her. “At least I never heard of any. I grew up in Greenwich Village, remember.”
“Still—” She twisted in her seat to face him as he drove. “Didn’t you have an aunt or uncle that you visited on a farm every summer? I sure did!”
“They sent me off to a boys’ camp one summer and I hated it. I wouldn’t go back the following year. I guess I was always a city boy.”
“So here we are, heading for the Jackson County Fair. What happened?”
“Milo Marx is paying me to steal an apple pie — whichever one wins the blue ribbon at the fair tomorrow morning.”