Catch-As-Catch-Can

by Charlotte Armstrong

  “Yes, I know.”

  “You know? She’s called you?”

  “No, not again. She called Lorraine. Said then she was going back to the corner of … oh … Lemon Grove.…”

  “Yes, that’s what I’ve been hoping. I thought surely she’d turn up back here.”

  “I thought she had. You said you’d tell her. She hasn’t? That’s a long time ago, Talbot.”

  “I know it is.” Andy was suddenly tense again.

  “Of course, Dee can take care of herself,” said the doctor.

  “If she’s not sicker than she thinks she is.”

  “Dee’s got enough sense to know that,” scoffed the doctor. “She’s not Laila, remember. Probably she had to give up and sit down somewhere. Don’t worry. Dee’s O.K.”

  “I suppose so,” said Andy somewhat less anxiously. But he sat there a moment when he’d put the phone down. It didn’t seem likely that Dee would sit down somewhere. No, Dee was no Laila. Laila not Dee.

  He left the phone and went in to the invalid. His smile was grateful. “Mrs. Gilman, I know you’ll be glad to hear that everything has come out all right. It’s all over. Laila Breen has been found. She is at the hospital and she is going to be fine.” The old lady beamed and nodded and Andy said, “It’s plain to me that you saved her life.”

  The old lady was happy. Very thrilled, very happy, happy enough to cry. She was alive!

  “How we are going to thank you, I do not know,” said Andy. His eyes flickered to Agnes Nilsson. “If there is anything at all that I can ever do for you.…”

  Agnes came gushing. “Oh, I am so glad to hear that good news. It was wonderful of Mrs. Gilman, wasn’t it? So clever. Won’t her sons be proud?”

  “They sure will,” said Andy grimly, and he nodded at the old lady and he thought she winked one of her streaming eyes.

  “Going now,” said Andy. “Sorry if I’ve disturbed you, but it was well worth it, believe me. Now, I’ve got to go look for a certain human louse, a man who did his best to keep us from finding Laila Breen in time. He’s caused a lot of the difficulty. Happens to be her cousin and one of her heirs, you see. He’s gone into hiding someplace … but I’ll get him.”

  He patted the invalid’s shoulder.

  “Want this up, so you can hear it?” he asked courteously. He moved to the TV set.

  “So glad there’s been a happy ending,” gushed Agnes. And Andy winked at Mrs. Gilman.

  “… nothing living can survive,” the voice of the M.C. was saying. “Now that the house is entirely sealed, as we have shown you, the next step is the actual releasing of the cyanide gas. This is KROV, Channel 12, bringing you, every Wednesday evening, your fascinating program IT’S A LIVING. Tonight we are televising the complete story, how Mr. John Bowman of the Bowman Exterminating Company, makes his living. Now, Mr. Bowman, if you will show our viewers one of the most dramatic moments of your business.…”

  Andy Talbot stood at the front door of the Gilman house. His eyes were thoughtful on Agnes’ face. “I’ll see that her sons are proud of her,” he said warningly.

  Agnes said, “Of course. Oh, so will I!”

  “And if I were you, I’d listen a little quicker when she wants to get into the act. That’s a fine intelligent old lady.”

  “Of course, she is. And such a dear! I’m so glad we were able to help you.”

  Andy said, dryly, “Yes, thank you.” And he went out.

  Agnes closed the door. She noticed at once that Mrs. Gilman’s fingers were twittering and tapping again.

  Agnes’ nostrils dilated. She was tired of eating crow. It was easy to pretend that she hadn’t noticed. Mrs. Gilman heard her walk away and go into the kitchen.

  The old lady stared at her TV screen, bending forward, with the old scream in her throat.

  “You take all precautions of course?” Dave Ainsley was saying admiringly.

  “Naturally,” said Mr. Bowman. “Everything is sealed, even the chimney. Then we leave a guard on the house overnight. That’s so that no person can accidentally get in.”

  “Don’t want to gas even a burglar, eh?”

  “Not even a burglar, ha ha. Now, this is the container from which we release the gas.”

  “In that cylinder, eh? Pretty deadly, is it?”

  “Oh, absolutely. Even a plant will die,” said Bowman.

  “Is that so?”

  “Oh yes, anything that breathes. For animal life, death is instantaneous. For a plant, it takes a little longer.”

  Mrs. Gilman rolled her chair, she reached the table, she took paper and pencil, she began to write. She was a witness. She had seen a man in a gray suit, that worried one, the one who was, of course, that wicked cousin. The one who was in hiding, now. She had seen him. She knew where he had gone to hide.

  She did not suppose he was still in the Baxter house. And yet, he might be. So she wrote. The words came back on the paper. But she was all alone in the sitting room. There was no eye to read what she was writing, and on the screen, Mr. Bowman continued, his eyes glazed with pride and glory, to explain in detail his murderous business.

  Dee Allison could hear Mr. Bowman’s loud, happy voice perfectly well, right through the thin walls.

  “… all kinds of pests,” Mr. Bowman was saying importantly. “Of course here, as I say, we have an infestation of fleas. Which is quite a problem. Now, when we can seal a house entirely and let the gas do a wholesale job, you might call it, why, I feel better satisfied with the job. Not many exterminators use this method any more, but, properly handled, it is perfectly safe. Especially in an area like this one, where we have air. After twenty-four hours, we must release the gas but it will leave the house and be dissipated harmlessly.…”

  “And everything in the house that breathes will be dead?”

  “That’s right,” Bowman beamed. “We give a guarantee.…”

  “You do?”

  “And we make good on it. When the Bowman Exterminating Company says the bugs are gone, they are gone. Ha ha. There will not be a living thing in this house.…”

  “Suppose a mouse has a nest in there?”

  “He had better move his wife and family in the next five minutes, ha ha.”

  “Ha ha.”

  “Ha ha.”

  Dee could hear the laughter. She punched at Clive’s limp flesh with her knuckles and knees. He would not respond. He was still unconscious from that blow. He would not wake up. Until he woke, he could not call out. He could not make a noise.

  She could not call out. She could make no noise but a low mutter in the bottom of her throat or the soft thud of her heels, and the men on the other side of the wall were absorbed, and very conscious of themselves before the cameras and the microphone. They were not listening for soft thuds and mutters in this house, sounds no louder than a mouse might make.

  “I, myself, release the gas of course,” Mr. Bowman was saying grandly. “I never let anyone else do that. Now, if we can move around to the front door, which has not yet been sealed, why I.…”

  “I think we can get a look in through the front door. All right.” Dave Ainsley’s voice changed. “Ladies and gentlemen, this is your fascinating program IT’S A LIVING. We are about to watch Mr. John Bowman of the Bowman Exterminating Company demonstrate one of the interesting and dramatic things he does to make a living.…”

  Dee Allison worked in the striped dark to turn by the muscles of her eye socket the knob on the old radio. For Clive would not wake. And nothing more would crash or fall. She worked by the friction of the skin of her cheek and the gag that was bound across it to turn the knob on the old radio. She thought to herself with desperate mirth, How will they figure it, when they find us? Will they say Clive murdered me? Or that I have murdered Clive?

  She had no hope that anyone was looking for her, here. She had some hope. She remembered a voice had said it was going to ask for a key. Although that was long ago. A better hope, if she could turn this knob. If the radio had a battery wi
th any life in it, then there would magically be some sound.

  No one but herself to do anything about it. No Andy, swearing to heaven she would not die. Dee’s bright hair stirred. She was not licked yet. The muscles of the eyes that hold a monocle were not strong and would not turn the little knob. But she began with courage to try once more to get her hands out, somehow, and turn the radio on.

  CHAPTER 23

  Talbot came up beside Vince, careful not to look at the lighted house, since its brilliance would blind him to all else at the crossroads. He murmured the news, “Laila Breen’s beem found. They’ve got her. She’s O.K.”

  “Say,” said Vince, “am I glad to hear that. You’re glad too, eh?”

  “Yes. Haven’t seen Miss Allison?”

  “Nope.”

  “Or Breen?”

  “Not a sign of him.”

  “Forgot to say, I guess I don’t really need you,” Andy said. “There’s no doubt, any more. Breen was in it, just as we thought.”

  “That so? What a louse, eh? I’d still like to see him get his, Mr. Talbot. I’m going to hang around, watch this program. If I do see him.…”

  “You haven’t been seeing anything but the program,” Andy chided, “staring at that light.” He turned his own back on it.

  Back in the Gilman house, Agnes Nilsson marched past the wheel chair with her mouth in a hard line. She turned off the TV set in one angry snap. As the scene died off the tube’s end, she said sternly, “Mrs. Gilman, I’m sorry, but anyone can see you are much much too exhilarated. I just can’t let this go on.”

  Mrs. Gilman leaned forward and her eyes were commanding.

  “I’m very sorry if you don’t like it,” said Agnes haughtily, “but your own health is my concern and more important than a silly show. And whatever.…”

  Mrs. Gilman was not moving a muscle or an eyeball. Her piercing gaze was steady and even threatening. She held the piece of paper out in her hand. Mrs. Gilman was alive, from head to ankles, and it counted. It commanded. Agnes huffed breath out. “What is it? What is it now?” In spite of herself, Agnes stepped across the rug and took the paper.

  Andy saw her figure against the light in the door and then darkly running down. Traffic flowed between them but he could distinguish Agnes lifting and waving the bit of white paper. He raised his arm to hail her, to show her where he was. He would have crossed to her but Vince had his sleeve.

  “Hey,” Vince was saying. “I just happened to think.…”

  “What? Wait a minute.”

  Agnes was crossing.

  “You know,” Vince said, “he coulda gone in there to hide. My God, if he did! Mr. Talbot, they’re going to let cyanide gas in that house.”

  “What?”

  “Lookit, the house! On the program!”

  But now Agnes was there and thrusting the bit of paper into Andy’s hand. He tilted it to the right. Mrs. Gilman had written on it, “Tell Mr. Talbot I saw the man in gray go into the Baxter house by the back door.” Concise and plain. But not complete. Andy frowned. He said aloud, “But when?”

  “When what?” Vince craned to see.

  Andy read the sentence from the paper.

  “This house? Is this the Baxter house?”

  “It is,” said Agnes stiffly.

  “So what did I tell ya! And listen, if he didn’t get out again.…”

  “In all this light,” said Andy frowning. “Someone besides Mrs. Gilman must have seen him.” Agnes kept a malicious silence. “Did you?” he demanded.

  “I? No.”

  “When could it have been?”

  “When?” Agnes smiled. “She doesn’t say when, does she? You were so insistent, Mr. Talbot, I supposed I ought to bring that right over.…”

  “They musta checked,” said Vince. “They always do. Listen, that stuff they’re letting loose in there kills every living thing. I heard them say so.”

  Agnes looked queer.

  “When?” pounced Andy. “You must have some idea when?”

  “It must have been before those lights went on at all,” she faltered. “Because I had taken her inside.…”

  Andy said, “Thank you,” icily. He swung to look at the Baxter house.

  “They’re not going to gas any person,” she said scornfully. “Mrs. Gilman may be smart but it is not likely even she will save two lives in the same evening. Excuse me?” She went away.

  Talbot walked nearer to the house. The cameras were close on the front door now. The bystanders had been drawn to a tight knot behind them. One camera was almost directly in the doorway, and shooting through the door.

  Vince said, “This guy’s an exterminator, see. They already showed how they block the windows and they nailed up this here kitchen door. The whole house is tight like that, Mr. Talbot. What if he can’t get out?”

  “He must have realized what was going on, long ago,” said Andy crisply. “He could hear. You don’t imagine he’d stay hidden in there and let himself get gased to death.”

  “Well, no,” said Vince nervously. “Not likely. Probably he ain’t in there no more.” His eyes gleamed in his nutbrown face. He was intrigued by the possibility.

  Talbot drew into the light that still blazed on this side door. He went all the way across the narrow grass.

  The other side of the wall, Dee’s sweating fingers slipped on the knob, but it turned. It turned at last! She dropped her face upon the strong smelling paper. If the radio had a battery, if the battery had any juice, if the dial was set to a station … now, soon, there would be a saving sound. She, herself, listening until her ears seemed pointed, began to hear men’s voices.

  “Listen, don’t monkey with that seal, Mr. Talbot,” shrilled Vince beside him. “Because they’re going to let a deadly gas loose on the whole inside.…”

  Andy said, “Even if Clive Breen did slip in here to hide, he’s probably slipped out, long ago.”

  “Yea,” Vince said. “Say, though … kind of a louse, this Breen, ain’t he? Wouldn’t it be sumpin if he should get exterminated! Holy … Hey, that’s poetic …!”

  “Poetic justice,” said Andy Talbot. “I see what you mean.”

  “Can you beat that!” Vince cried, entranced by the dramatic dream. “Aw, leave it lay, Mr. Talbot. We don’t know, do we? Maybe he’s in there. Maybe he ain’t. Listen, he’s the crumb who was going to let this Laila get lost. So?”

  “So he was,” said Andy.

  “Then it’s practically an act of God. It’s perfect!” cried Vince. “He knew about her, see and he didn’t do a thing to save her, did he? All right. So it’s fair enough. What’s he got a right to expect? He should be done unto the way he did! That’s fair enough.”

  “Pipe down,” said Andy.

  The sweating skin of Dee’s face, slipping on the wood of the box, grew colder. Her lashes trembled and fell.

  Clive didn’t stir.

  She could hear their voices but in here where she lay there was no sound.

  Mr. MacMahon said crossly, “What’s with those birds around at the side, George? Go tell them to shut up, will you? We’re on the air. Don’t they know that?”

  George said, “Sounds like a crackpot to me. Get the sound of it?” They could hear the lift of Vince’s excitement, the ranting quality.

  “Yeah, in that case, somebody better handle them,” said MacMahon nervously, “so they can’t get on mike. Or we’ll be cut off, if they should start with any religious stuff.…”

  “One of them’s a husky type.” George was on the slight side, himself.

  “We’ll get them,” the little workman, Coolie, promised. “Me and Al. Listen, Mr. Bowman would be fit to be tied was he to get cut off the air. This I know.”

  “Sounds like one of those soapbox types all right,” MacMahon groaned. “Everything happens to us. You go, too, George.”

  Dee’s eyes were shut. She lay still. No sound came from the old dusty box that had once held a radio. Long ago, somebody must have taken the insides out,
for fun, to play with. No magic now. No song. No selling spiel. Just silence.

  The two workmen loomed up behind Andy and Vince and seized their arms. They yanked and moved their victims away from this spot, out of the light, away from the crowd, apart from the people. Vince struggled and a bystander’s head turned briefly, but no one was drawn from the TV show.

  Andy surprised his captors by saying quietly, “Listen to me a minute, both of you. There was a man hiding in that house. Did you see him leave it?”

  “No man in there,” scoffed Coolie, the little one in the hat.

  “Naw, we been working here all afternoon,” Al was scornful, too. “That house is empty.”

  “O.K., wise guys,” said Vince, recovering from surprise to anger. “O.K. You know everything, you guys. That’s all right with me.”

  “Hold it,” said Andy. “Listen, I have a witness who saw him go in.”

  “Musta been Bowman.”

  “No, it wasn’t Bowman. It was a man named Breen.”

  “When was this?” said Al, indulgently, using his strong arms against Andy’s quiet resistance.

  “After the accident.”

  “What accident?”

  “What accident!” raved Vince “You wise guys!”

  “Cars. Smashup. You heard it.” Andy turned his head. “You told me you had,” he said to the smaller man.

  “Sure. Sure we heard that. So what, Mister?”

  Vince struggled and started to say something shrill but Andy said, “Hold it Keep still, will you, Procter? Now, tell me this. You men were working here. Was this side door sealed at the time of that crash?”

  “No, it wasn’t,” Coolie said. “Mr. Bowman wanted to show that on TV.”

  “A man could get in.” Andy was calm and logical. “Now, could he get out on the far side of the house?”

  “No, he couldn’t,” Coolie said.

  “Will they check?”

  “Sure. Sure.” Al wasn’t worried.

  “We checked already,” said Coolie a trifle nervously.

  “Nobody’s in there,” Al said, “or believe me, he’d a sung out, long ago.”

  “Leave it alone, Mr. Talbot,” Vince said. “So O.K. So nobody listens. So this is going to be quite a program, maybe. They start killing everything in there, they might find out.…”