“Yeah? Christ, it's been what, two years?” He stood up, more or less steadily-he'd had a few but he wasn't drunk-and punched my arm. He seemed genuinely glad to see me. “You lost some weight, paisano. Looking good.”
“So are you,” I lied.
“Bullshit. Listen, sit down, sit down, have a drink. You've got time for a drink, haven't you?”
“Sure. If you've got time to talk.”
“Anything for you, pal, after what you did for me. Hey, Mama Luz! Drag your fat ass down here and meet an old friend of mine.”
The enormous female behind the bar waddled our way. She was Mexican; she must have weighed at least three hundred pounds, all of it encased in a tentlike muumuu thing emblazoned with pink flamingos; and she wore so much powder and rouge and makeup that she resembled a mime. She might have been one, too: she didn't say a word, even when Dancer told her who I was. All she did was nod and stand there waiting.
“So what'll you have?” Dancer asked me. “You still just a beer man?”
“Always. Miller Lite, I guess.”
“Miller Lite, Mama. Cold one, huh? Give me another jolt too.” She went away to get the drinks and Dancer said, “So how'd you track me down?”
“Card you sent me last Christmas.”
“Social call or you working?”
“Working. You might be able to help.”
“Me? How so?”
“The job has to do with a pulp writer named Harmon Crane. Cybil Wade told me you might have known him.”
A corner of his mouth twitched. “Little Sweeteyes,” he said. He was talking about Cybil, not Crane. “How is she?”
“Fine.”
“And that son of a bitch she's married to? Tell me he dropped dead of a coronary, make my day.”
“No such luck.”
“He'll outlive us all-like Nixon. You still seeing her daughter?”
“We're engaged, more or less.”
“Good for you. Tell Sweeteyes I said hello, next time you talk to her. Hell, give her my love.” He grinned lopsidedly and drained what was left in his glass. Still carrying the torch, I thought. He'd carry it right into the grave with him.
“About Harmon Crane, Russ. Did you know him?”
“Old Harmie-sure, I knew him. Met him at a writers' lunch the first time I came out here from New York. I'd read his stuff, he'd read mine. We hit it off.”
“That was early 1949?”
“Spring, I think. I hadn't made up my mind to move to California yet, but I figured I would if I could find a place I liked. Tried L.A. first; forget it. So I came up to Frisco.”
“You get to know Crane well?”
“We palled around a little, got drunk together a couple of times. Even tried collaborating on a pulp story, but that didn't work out. Too much ego on both sides; believe it or not, I had one back then.”
“You had reason. You know what I think of Rex Hannigan.”
“Yeah. But Hannigan was a second-rate pulp private eye compared to Johnny Axe. You remember the Axe series?”
“I remember.”
Dancer chuckled, as if something funny had just tickled his memory. “Harmie had a hell of a sense of humor. Always good for a laugh. Last book he wrote, Axe gets framed for a murder of a guy that owns a soup company, see, so Harmie called it Axe-Tailed Soup. Perfect title, right? But his editor wouldn't let him use it. Too suggestive, she said; some blue-nose out in the Bible Belt might read a dirty double meaning into it and raise a stink. The editor, this shriveled-up old maid named Bangs, Christ you should have seen her, this Bangs broad wants him to come up with another title quick because the production department and the art department are all set to move. So Harmie waits a couple of days and then sends the new title by collect wire, no comment or anything, just one line. What do you think it was?”
“I don't know, what?”
“‘How about A Piece of Axe,’” Dancer said, and burst out laughing. I laughed with him. “Man, Bangs almost had a shit hemorrhage and Harmie almost got thrown out on his ear. But he figured it was worth it.”
“Uh-huh.”
“I remember another time,” he said, “we were kidding around with titles for mystery novels-you know, trying to see which of us could come up with the worst one using the word death. Things like Death Plays Pattycake and Death Gets a Dose of the Clap. But Harmie won hands down. Best title for a tough-guy mystery I ever heard.”
“What was it?”
“Fuck You, Death.”
That didn't strike me quite so funny, considering the way Harmon Crane had died, and I didn't laugh much. Not that Dancer noticed; he was too busy reaching for the fresh highball Mama Luz had set in front of him. He suggested we take our drinks to one of the booths, and we did that.
He said as he lit another cigarette, “How come you're interested in Harmie? Christ, he's been dead what… thirty-five years? He did the Dutch, you know.”
“I know. That's why I'm interested.” I explained it to him briefly. “Were you still in San Francisco when it happened?”
“No. I went back to New York the end of September, to tie up some loose ends. I'd finally made up my mind to settle out here, but I didn't make it back to California until early the next year.”
“Were you surprised when you heard about Crane's suicide?”
“Yeah, I was. I never figured him for the kind who'd do the Dutch. I mean, he was one funny guy. But then I knew he had problems, a whole pack of 'em.”
“What kind of problems?”
“His marriage. That was the big one.”
“Oh? I thought he was happily married.”
“Who told you that?”
“His widow.”
“Yeah, that figures. She always did pretend she was Cinderella and Harmie was some poor schmuck of a Prince Charming.”
“What was the trouble between them?”
“They weren't fucking,” Dancer said. Leave it to him to choose the most delicate phrasing whenever possible.
“Why not?”
“She didn't like it. An iceberg in the sack.”
“Oh,” I said.
“Yeah,” he said.
“Were they doing anything about it?”
“You mean was she seeing a shrink?”
“Yes.”
“Uh-uh. She wouldn't go. Wouldn't discuss the deed with Harmie, let alone some stranger.”
“No sex at all between them?”
“Not in close to a year, when I knew him.”
“Did he talk much about it?”
“Some. When he was looped.”
“Was he seeing other women?”
“Harmie? Nah, I doubt it. He wasn't the type.”
“A year is a long time to do without sex,” I said.
