Myra and gave her a passionate kiss in front of the young man and her mother. “Don’t drink any wood alcohol,” he admonished, whisking out of the apartment, laughing.
Why did he let Judd hang onto him? Her question resounded as he walked. Certainly he had been too damn softhearted in letting Judd hang on. Ever since the beginning, every piece of trouble had been on account of Judd, and now Dog Eyes had brought him to the edge of real danger.
Walking on Stony Island, purposely past the police station, Artie was now conducting the trial of Judd Steiner. All-powerful, in his hands was the life-or-death decision.
Take the second summer Judd came up to Charlevoix. They hadn’t seen each other much that year, because that was the year Artie had transferred to Ann Arbor. Morty Kornhauser, from the Ann Arbor chapter of Alpha Beta, was visiting him just then, too.
Sunday morning, Judd had to walk into Artie’s room through the connecting bathroom, to wake him up. They were going canoeing to an island where Artie knew a couple of girls—fishermen’s daughters. As Judd started pulling him out of bed, Artie made a playful grab, and then they were wrestling and fooling around.
And Morty had to walk in. They didn’t even hear him. Morty had a sneaky way of slipping around, with a look of apologizing for intruding. Who the hell knew how much he had watched, before Judd finally noticed him standing there with his mouth open like at some goddam stag show?
Artie made the best of it and said, “Want to join the fun?” But that prig Morty said, “No, I don’t indulge, excuse me”—and walked out.
For a while they lay silent, except for that silly giggle Judd had. There was nothing to laugh about; Morty was the biggest tattler at the frat. Then, when they were putting on their trunks, Judd remarked, “Hey, didn’t that sonofabitch say he can’t swim? It might be dangerous for him in a canoe.”
Their eyes caught, and Judd let out his giggle. The day before, when they had all gone down to the lake, Morty had indeed remarked that he didn’t swim. With three boys in a canoe, anything could happen.
They hurried down to breakfast, so as not to give Morty a chance to talk to anyone. Then, rather sullenly, he walked down with them to the boathouse.
When they were a good way out on the lake, Artie stood up, complaining, “For crissake, Judd, you don’t know your paddle from your asshole,” and Judd insulted him back and started a scuffle. Before Morty knew what was happening, they were all in the water.
They saw the bastard come up thrashing. He glared at them, and with his mouth full, sputtered, “. . . on purpose!” and then went under, thrashing. They swam away. But Judd looked back, treading water. Morty was flailing, but keeping his head up.
Artie saw it, too. The whole damn thing was Judd’s fault, he swore. He’d heard the bastard wrong. “I don’t swim” didn’t mean “I can’t swim.”
Morty came ashore some distance from them, and they hurried over to him solicitously. Panting, he gasped out, “You did it on purpose. I know, you filthy degenerates!” His eyes were narrow, meaningful. He wouldn’t walk back with them, but trailed, slowly, by himself.
All day, they stuck to him. When they told the story of the accidental overturning of the canoe, he was silent. And that night he discovered he had to cut his visit short and return to Lansing.
Then the bastard wrote his letters.
He sent them to their brothers. One to Max Steiner, and one to James Straus. They were neatly typed, sanctimonious letters—“unpleasant as the subject may be, I feel it is my duty” and “by chance came upon an exhibition of unmentionable character” and “not my place to give advice but perhaps you are unaware of—”
Brother James brought it up on the tennis court, just before starting to play. “Say, Artie, what was your friend so sore about when he left here, that Kornhauser kid?”
“Why? Has Morty been telling any stories?”
“Well, he wrote me a letter.”
“That stinking little crapper. Sure he was sore. We took about forty bucks away from him, shooting craps, up in my room, Saturday night, so he got mad and the little bastard even tried to suggest the dice were loaded—”
James had on his knowing smile.
“Is that what he wrote about?” Artie demanded.
“Oh, it was some junk about you and Judd.” In the look James gave him, everything was included. All the things James had covered up for him—the swiped things, the dose. But he wouldn’t spill this either; James had to imagine himself a real guy, protecting his kid brother. “It’s all a dirty lie!” Artie exclaimed. “Morty’s just a dirty troublemaker!”
James said, “Listen, Artie, this is for your own good. That Judd’s a freak. You know, funny. Maybe you fellows had better not be seen so much together. People make up all kinds of stories. Maybe there ought always to be somebody with you if you go with him—”
“Why, that dirty-minded lousy— Why, for crissake I know what it is he made a story out of. Why, we were just horsing around.”
“You try to let Morty drown?” James asked coolly.
“Why, he fell out of the canoe. Why, that—” Their eyes met. Artie grinned. James shook his head, but could not hide the beginning of a smile as he thought of Morty flailing in the water.
It was lucky the letter hadn’t been sent to Lewis, because Lewis would have insisted it was a matter for Momsie and Popsie, a matter, Christ, affecting the family reputation. But James, Artie felt he could handle. James didn’t like trouble. He liked a good time himself. And he couldn’t have already told anyone, or he wouldn’t be bringing it up like this. Christ, if the family knew about this one, it would be worse than that time with the car accident.
Artie took it easy with James, giving him the boyish wink, and letting him win the set.
But that was a mark against Judd, Artie told himself, turning down 49th Street toward Judd’s house and casting quick glances right and left. Ha, that elderly woman walking her dog might be a secret police agent. He would give her the slip. And he curled his hand around the barrel of the automatic.
Judd’s fault, that time with Morty. First, being such a damn fool as to start playing around, with the door unlocked. Hell, he himself didn’t get any special kick out of it, but he let Judd play around just for the hell of it. Judd was the one who started all that stuff. And then, once Morty had seen them and once they had got him out in the canoe, and when they saw he had tricked them about not being able to swim, they ought to have held the tattler’s head under water. If you start something you should go through with it. If Judd hadn’t been so scared, scared pissless, Morty would have been taken care of right there.
Instead, they had let him leave. So he not only had the story to tell of catching them fooling around, but, even worse, about their trying to drown him. Morty told everybody he saw that summer. Then, instead of coming back to the frat in the fall, he had to spend a year in Denver, with TB—the reason he didn’t exert himself swimming.
Even with Morty Kornhauser away from the frat, Judd should never have insisted on coming to Ann Arbor. That was another mistake to charge up against Judah Steiner, Jr. First he had to go and make a whole issue of it with his brother Max, who had received the
