«They do. We’re manufacturers and wholesalers, of course. But you’ll be able to get them at Brachman & Minton’s, here in town. I call on ’em tomorrow, and I’ll load them up. How’s about that shave, meanwhile. Got a date with an angel.»
«Sure,» said the little man. «Brachman & Minton. We buy most of our make-up and costumes there already. That’s fine.» He rinsed a towel under the hot-water faucet, wrung it out. He put it over the big man’s face and made lather in his shaving cup.
Under the hot towel the man in the green suit was humming—«Got a Date with an Angel.» The barber took off the towel and applied the lather with deft strokes.
«Yep,» said the big man, «got a date with an angel and I’m too damn’ early. Gimme the works—massage, anything you got. Wish I could look as handsome with my real face as with that there mask—that’s our Fancy Dan model, by the way. Y’oughta see some of the others. Well, you will if you go to Brachman & Minton’s about a week from now. Take about that long before they get the merchandise after I take their order tomorrow.»
«Yes, sir,» said the barber. «You said the works? Massage and facial?» He stropped the razor, started its neat clean strokes.
«Why not? Got time. And tonight’s my night with baby. Some number, pal. Pageboy blonde, built like you-know-what. Runs a rooming house not far from—Say, I got an idea. Good gag.»
«What?»
«I’ll fool ’er. I’ll wear that Fancy Dan mask when I knock on the door and I’ll make her think somebody really good-looking is calling on her. Maybe it’ll be a letdown when she sees my homely mug when I take it off, but the gag’ll be good. And I’ll bet she won’t be too disappointed when she sees it’s good old Jim. Yep. I’ll do that.»
The big man chuckled in anticipation. «What time’s it?» he asked. He was getting a little sleepy. The shave was over, and the kneading motion of the massage was soporific.
«Ten of eight.»
«Good. Lots of time. Just so I get there well before nine. That’s when—Say, did that mask really fool you when I walked in with it?»
«Sure did,» the barber told him. «Until I bent over you after you sat down.»
«Good. Then it’ll fool Marie Rhymer when I go up to the door. Say, what’s the name of your amatcher theatrical outfit? I’ll tell Brachman you’ll want some of the Skintex numbers.»
«Just the Grove Avenue Social Center group. My name’s Dane. Brachman knows me. Sure, tell him we’ll take some.»
Hot towels, cool creams, kneading fingers. The man in green dozed.
«Okay, mister,» the barber said. «You’re all set. Be a dollar sixty-five.» He chuckled. «I even put your mask on so you’re all set. Good luck.»
The big man sat up and glanced in the mirror. «Swell,» he said. He stood up and took two singles out of his wallet. «That’s even now. G’night.»
He put on his hat and went out. It was getting dark now and a glance at his wrist watch showed him it was almost eight-thirty, perfect timing.
He started humming again, back this time to «Tonight’s My Night with Baby.»
He wanted to whistle, but he couldn’t do that with the false face on. He stopped in front of the house and looked around before he went up the steps to the door. He chuckled a little as he took the VACANCY sign off the nail beside the door and held it as he pressed the button and heard the bell sound.
Only seconds passed before he heard her footsteps clicking to the door. It opened, and he bowed slightly, his voice muffled by the mask so she wouldn’t recognize it, he said, «You haff—a rrrooom, blease?»
She was beautiful, all right, as beautiful as he remembered her from the last time he’d been in town a month before. She said hesitantly, «Why, yes, but I’m afraid I can’t show it to you tonight. I’m expecting a friend and I’m late getting ready.»
He made a jerky little bow. He said, «Vee, moddomm, I vill rrreturrrn.»
And then, jerking his chin forward to loosen the mask and pinching it loose at the forehead so it would come loose with his hat, he lifted hat and mask.
He grinned and started to say—well, it didn’t matter what he’d started to say, because Marie Rhymer screamed and then dropped into a crumpled heap of purple silk and cream-colored flesh and blond hair just inside the door.
Stunned, the big man dropped the sign he’d been holding and bent over her. He said, «Marie, honey, what—» and quickly stepped inside and closed the door. He bent down and—remembering her «tricky ticker»—put his hand over where her heart should be beating.
Should be, but wasn’t.
He got out of there quickly. With a wife and kid of his own back in Minneapolis, he couldn’t be—Well, he got out.
Still stunned, he walked quickly out.
He came to the barber shop, and it was dark. He stopped in front of the door. The dark glass of the door, with a street light shining against it from across the way, was both transparent and a mirror. In it, he saw three things.
He saw, in the mirror part of the door, the face of horror that was his own face. Bright green, with careful expert shadowing that made it the face of a walking corpse, a ghoul with sunken eyes and cheeks and blue lips. The bright-green face mirrored above the green suit and the snazzy red tie—the face that the make-up-expert barber must have put on him while he’d dozed—
And the note, stuck against the inside of the glass of the barber-shop door, written on white paper in green penciclass="underline"
CLOSED
Dane Rhymer
Marie Rhymer, Dane Rhymer, he thought dully. While through the glass, inside the dark barber shop, he could see it dimly—the white-clad figure of the little barber as it dangled from the chandelier and turned slowly, left to right, right to left, left to right…
CARTOONIST
(in collaboration with Mack Reynolds)
There were six letters in Bill Garrigan’s box, but he could tell from a quick glance at the envelopes that not one of them was a check. Would-be gags from would-be gagmen. And, nine chances out of ten, not a yak in the lot.
He carried them back to the adobe hut he called his studio before bothering to open them. He tossed his disreputable hat onto the two-burner kerosene stove. He sat down and twisted his legs around the legs of the kitchen chair before the rickety table which doubled as a place to eat and his drawing board.
It had been a long time since the last sale and he hoped, even though he didn’t dare expect, that there’d be a really salable gag in this lot. Miracles do happen.
He tore open the first envelope. Six gags from some guy up in Oregon, sent to him on the usual basis; if he liked any of them he’d draw them up and if they sold the guy got a percentage. Bill Garrigan looked at the first one. It read:
guy and gal drive up to restaurant. sign on car reads «herman the fire eater.» through windows of restaurant people eating by candlelight.
guy:«oh, boy, this looks like a good place to eat!»
Bill Garrigan groaned and looked at the next card. And the next. And the next. He opened the next envelope. And the next.
This was getting really bad. Cartooning is a tough racket to make a living in, even when you live in a little town in the Southwest where living doesn’t cost you much. And once you start slipping—well, the thing was a vicious circle. As your stuff was seen less and less often in the big markets, the best gagmen started sending their material elsewhere. You wound up with the leftovers, which, of course, put the skids under you that much worse.
He pulled the last gag from the final envelope. It read: