7 - ‘Come gentle night…’

“So your Leif’s brother huh? Sure don’t look like him. Him all big and brawny and you looking like you barely tip the scales at one thirty if you’re lucky.”

“One forty-five. Well maybe not now, I’ve sort of been fasting.”

“In other words it’s like Leif said, you’re probably living on the streets pretty much.” The man Kemp’s brother had sent him to for new ID looked him over and shook his head. “Gonna be hard to make anyone believe you’re over twenty-one.”

“I will be in a couple of years. I’ll just tell people I look young and then piss and moan about no one believing me.”

“Not too much or they’ll know the ID’s fake no matter how good a job I do. You keeping your own name on it?”

Kemp thought and then nodded. “Yeah, that way I won’t blow anyone off when they say my name, the way I might if I took a new one. I read that in a book a while back. It’s not like I’m on the run or anything.”

The man cocked an eyebrow but said nothing other than to tell Kemp to stand in front of the screen. Once he had, the man looked through the camera lens and shook his head. “Don’t smile, and hell, do you have a comb? Do something about the hair. You look like a damned high school dropout.”

Kemp rolled his eyes but did as the man said, combing his hair back and smooth and then staring at the camera soberly. After a couple of tries the man got a picture he approved of.

“Now get out of here, go get lunch or something. Be back at 4:30 and not a second sooner.”

“Yes sir, and thanks.”

“Don’t thank me, thank Leif. He’s paying the freight on this.”

Kemp nodded and left. He found a cheap diner, where he killed an hour over a burger and coke while reading a book he’d found stashed in a drawer at the run-down hotel where he was staying. Then, with three hours still to go he decided to catch the trolley into the Quarter and check out the clubs. Surely one of them would be looking for help and once he had his ID he’d be able to get a job. He knew better than to think he’d snag one as a singer but if he could be a waiter, or even a busboy if clubs had such things, at least he’d have a foot in the door.