Free Nightfall by David Goodis Page A

freight and still another and finally arrived in New Orleans. He called himself Wilson and got a job on the water front. The pay was good, and with time and a half for overtime he soon had enough for more travel.
      In Memphis he called himself Donahue and worked as a truck driver. Then up from Memphis, a short stay in Washington and winding up in New York with three hundred dollars in his pocket. He called himself Rayburn and took the room in the Village. He went out and bought artist's materials and for two weeks he went at it furiously, building up a portfolio.
      Then he went around with the portfolio and after a week of that he received his first assignment. At the beginning he had a thick mustache and wore dark glasses and combed his hair with a part in the middle. Later he discarded the glasses, and after that the mustache, and eventually he went back to the old way of combing his hair. He knew he was taking a big gamble, but it was something he had to do. He had to get rid of the hollow feeling, the grotesque knowledge that he was a hunted man.
      He worked, he ate, he slept. He managed to keep going. But it was very difficult. It was almost unbearable at times, especially nights when he could see the moon from his window. He had a weakness for the moon. It gave him pain, but he wanted to see it up there. And beyond that want, so far beyond it, so futile, was the want for someone to be at his side, looking at the moon as he looked at it, sharing the moon with him. He was so lonely. And sometimes in this loneliness he became exceedingly conscious of his age, and he told himself he was missing out on the one thing he wanted above all else, a woman to love, a woman with whom he could make a home. A home. And children. He almost wept whenever he thought about it and realized how far away it was. He was crazy about kids. It was worth everything, all the struggle and heartache and worry, if only someday he could marry someone real and good, and have kids. Four kids, five kids, six kids, and grow up with them, show them how to handle a football, romp with them on the beach with their mother watching, smiling, so proudly, happily, and sitting at the table with her face across from him, and the faces of the kids, and waking up in the morning and going to work, knowing there was something to work for, and all that was as far away as the moon, and at times it seemed as though the moon was shaking its big pearly head and telling him it was no go, he might as well forget about it and stop eating his heart out.
      The moon expanded after a while, and it became a brightly lit room that had two faces planted on the ceiling. One of the faces was big and wore glasses. The other face was gray and bony and topped by a balding skull. The faces flowed down from the ceiling and became stabilized, attached to torsos that stood on legs. And Vanning groaned.
      Then he blinked a few times and put a hand to his mouth. The hand came away bloody. He looked at the blood. He tasted blood in his mouth.
      A door opened. Vanning turned and saw John entering the room. He grinned at John.
      John had his hands in trousers pockets and was biting his lip and gazing at nothing special. Vanning stood up, stumbled and hit the bed and fell on it.
      Pete moved toward Vanning and John said, “No.”
      “Let me work on him alone,” Pete said. “Sam gets in my way.”
      “You hit him too hard,” Sam said. “You knocked him out too fast. That ain't the way.”
      “I don't need Sam, I can operate better alone,” Pete said. He was removing brass knuckles from his right hand. He rubbed his hands together and took a step toward the bed.
      “Leave him alone,” John said. “Get away from him.”
      “I'd like a drink of water,” Vanning said.
      “Sure,” John said. “Sam, go get him a drink of water.”
      Sam walked out of the