Dreaming of Babylon. Richard Brautigan
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Rink said.
“‘Positive,’ I said.
“‘Then forget about it,’ he said.
“‘You don’t believe me?’ I said.
“‘We believe you,’ he said. ‘But don’t tell anybody else. I wouldn’t even tell your wife.’
“‘I’m not married,’ I said.
“‘Even a better reason not to.’
“Then they left.
“They all took a good long look at me before they left. I got the message but still that son-of-a-bitch had been alive, so I didn’t want to take any more chances with all the dead murderers, bank robbers and maniacs that come in here. You never know when they’re not dead, when they’re just playacting or unconscious or something and they might suddenly attack you, so I got the gun I keep here in the desk. I’m prepared now. The next time: BANG!”
That’s where I’d borrow the bullets I needed.
I’d get them from my friend Peg-leg who works at the morgue and keeps a gun around to shoot dead people.
1934
Suddenly I remembered that earlier in the day I was supposed to make a phone call but I didn’t have a nickel then, but now I did, thanks to Sergeant Rink, so I stopped at a telephone booth and made the call.
The person I was supposed to call wasn’t home and the telephone didn’t return my nickel. I hit it a half-a-dozen times with my fist and called it a son-of-a-bitch. That didn’t work either. Then I noticed some mustard on the receiver and I felt a little better.
I’d have to call again later on and my original seventy-five cents was busy wasting away. This could be very funny if it was a laughing matter.
Anyway, I wasn’t hungry, any more.
Got to keep looking at the bright side.
Can’t let it get to me.
If it really gets to me I start thinking about Babylon and then it only gets worse because I’d sooner think about Babylon than anything else and when I start thinking about Babylon I can’t do anything but think about Babylon and my whole life falls to pieces.
Anyway, that’s what it’s been doing for the last eight years, ever since 1934, which was when I started thinking about Babylon.
The Blonde
When I walked into the morgue just behind the Hall of Justice on Merchant Street, a young woman was walking out crying. She was wearing a fur coat. She looked like a very fancy dame. She had short blonde hair, a long nose and a mouth that looked so good that my lips started aching.
I hadn’t kissed anyone in a long time. It’s hard to find people to kiss when you haven’t got any money in your pocket and you’re as big a fuckup as I am.
I hadn’t kissed anybody since the day before Pearl Harbor. That was Mabel. I’ll go into my love life later on when nothing else is happening. I mean, absolutely nothing: zero.
The blonde looked at me as she came down the stairs. She looked at me as if she knew me but she didn’t say anything. She just continued crying.
I looked over my shoulder to see if there was somebody else behind me that she might be looking at, but I was the only person going into the morgue, so it had to be me. That was strange.
I turned around and watched her walk away.
She stopped at the curb and a chauffeur-driven 16-cylinder black Cadillac LaSalle limousine pulled up beside her and she got in. The car seemed to come out of nowhere. It wasn’t there and then it was there. She was staring out the window at me as the car drove away.
Her chauffeur was a very large and mean-looking gent. He had a Jack Dempsey-type face and a huge neck. He looked as if he’d get a lot of pleasure out of going ten rounds with your grandmother and making sure she went the whole distance. Afterwards you could take her home in a gallon jar.
As the limousine drove away he turned and gave me a big smile as if we shared a secret: old buddies or something.
I’d never seen him before.
“Eye”
I found my morgue pal Peg-leg back in the autopsy room staring at the dead breasts of a lady corpse lying on a stone table, obviously waiting to get her very own autopsy. You only get one in this world.
He was thoroughly engrossed in staring at her tits.
She was a good-looking woman but she was dead.
“Aren’t you a little old for that?” I said.
“Oh, ‘Eye,’” Peg-leg said. “Haven’t you starved to death yet? I’ve been waiting to get your body.”
Peg-leg always called me “Eye.” That was short for private eye.
“My luck’s changing,” I said. “I got a client.”
“That’s funny,” Peg-leg said. “I read the paper this morning and I didn’t see anything about any inmates escaping from the local asylums. Why did the person choose you? They’ve got real detectives in San Francisco. They’re in the phone book.”
I looked at Peg-leg and then at the corpse of the young woman. She had been very beautiful in life. Dead, she looked dead.
“I think if I’d come in here a few minutes from now, you’d be humping your girlfriend there,” I said. “You ought to try a live one sometime. You don’t catch a cold everytime you fuck them.”
Peg-leg smiled and continued admiring the dead broad.
“A perfect body,” he said, sighing. “The only flaw is a five-inch-deep hole in her back. Somebody stuck a letter opener in her. A real shame.”
“She was stabbed with a letter opener?” I asked. That rang a bell but I couldn’t place it. Somehow it was familiar.
“Yeah, she was a lady of the night. They found her in a doorway. What a waste of talent.”
“Have you ever gone to bed with a living woman?” I said. “What would your mother think if she knew you were doing things like this?”
“My mother doesn’t think. She’s still living with my father. What do you want, ‘Eye?’ You know your credit isn’t any good but if you want a place to sleep, there’s an empty bunk downstairs in cold storage, waiting for you, or I can tuck you in up here.” He motioned his head toward an eerie-looking refrigerator built into the wall that had enough space for four dead bodies.
Most of the bodies were kept downstairs in “cold storage,” but they kept a few special ones in the autopsy room.
“Thanks, but I don’t want any perverts staring at me while I’m sleeping.”
“How about some coffee, then?” Peg-leg asked.
“Sure,” I said.
We went over to his desk that was in the corner of the autopsy room. He had a hot plate on the desk. We poured ourselves some coffee from a pot and sat down.
“OK, ‘Eye,’ spill it. You didn’t come down here because you wanted to pay back the fifty bucks you borrowed from me. Right? Right,” he answered himself.
I took a sip of coffee. It tasted like he got it out of the asshole of one of his corpse friends. I was going to say that but I changed my mind.
“I need some bullets,” I said.
“Oh, boy,” Peg-leg said. “Repeat that.”
“I’ve got a case, a client, cash