Frails Can Be So Tough

by Hank Janson

  The door swung open and the driver clambered out. She was a dame dressed in a blood-red frock, her blonde, windswept hair attractively dishevelled. She clip-clopped across the road on high-heeled shoes, peered at me with anxious eyes. ‘Are you all right?’ she asked.

  I worked up a grin. ‘I’ll be all right in a minute,’ I croaked. I brushed my hair back off my forehead, swayed once again. Instinctively helpful, she stepped close, took my arm. Then her nose crinkled and her attitude changed. ‘I wouldn’t do any more driving if I were you,’ she said severely. ‘You’d better sleep it off.’

  Her eyes were cool and blue. They were staring at me like she was willing me to obey her. I liked her looking at me like that. It helped to steady me. I was remembering other things now, little disjointed things. A flashy-smile guy named Gunn and a hard-faced night-club cashier. There was something else too, something really important. I couldn’t figure it out right then.

  ‘I wanna drink,’ I managed to say. I tried to moisten my dry mouth. ‘I wanna drink,’ I repeated.

  ‘Just you take it easy,’ she advised. ‘You’ve had too much to drink already.’

  I reached down into my mind, came up with an idea. ‘No,’ I said vaguely. ‘That’s not it. Not too much to drink. There’s something else.’’

  ‘You’ve got yourself a skinful,’ she said. ‘Just sit down and sleep it off. You’ll feel better afterwards.’

  I was suddenly afraid she would leave me. ‘No, don’t go,’ I said urgently. And there were other things in my mind now; dark, ugly things, fleeting impressions that eluded me. I fought hard to clutch them, hold them still so I could examine them.

  ‘You do as I say,’ she said firmly. ‘You get back in your car, sit there and sleep it off.’ Even as she was talking, she was urging me towards the door, opening the door for me.

  She saw it the same time as I did. It was on the car-floor, squat and ugly. Her fingers tensed on my arm. ‘Say! That thing’s not loaded, is it?’ she asked.

  I stared at it. It was coming to me now. Manton and Frisk. The hypodermic! It was a dream, a wild fantastic dream. But it was true. The gun was there, just like they said it would be.

  Seeing it was like a cold water douche. Suddenly everything became clear like a shutter had lifted in my mind and I could remember everything that had happened. There was the whisky bottle on the seat – empty! I stunk of whisky, and the incriminating revolver was on the floor. I’d had only a small jolt from that hypodermic. I’d come around sooner than they expected, recovered consciousness before curious cops pulled into the side of the road to investigate why a man was slumped over the wheel of a stationary car.

  I knew it all in a flash. Realized this dame herself could be a witness against me. I pulled away from her. ‘Forget it, sister,’ I said harshly. ‘Scram, will ya?’

  She tugged at my arm. ‘You’re high,’ she said contemptuously. ‘Get inside off the road, where you won’t be knocked down. And don’t start playing with that gun or you’ll …’ Her voice broke off.

  There was sudden, hard tenseness inside her that I sensed immediately. I followed the direction of her eyes. She was staring into the back of the car. I could see it the same as she could. It was Manton right enough, lying there on the floor of the car, doubled up strangely and with the kinda motionlessness that told you right away he was dead.

  She gaped, her blue eyes filled with horror. She let go my arm, backed a coupla paces, like she was being approached by a poisonous snake. Then her eyes flicked to mine, filled with terror. She spun around, began running madly towards her coupe.

  She didn’t leave me much time for thinking. That look of terror in her eyes showed she’d jumped to the obvious conclusion, believed I’d killed him. She wanted to get away as quick as she knew how. And the first telephone she came to, she’d have the cops sealing off the district, rounding up all suspects. Rounding up me!

  I acted instinctively. I was in a jam, a real tough jam. If I was gonna get myself outta that jam, I had to have time. I just had to stop that dame giving the alarm. I went after her, reached her just as she swung open the door of her car. I grabbed her wrists, pulled her back into the road.

  ‘Now listen to me,’ I said. ‘I can explain all this. If you’ll only …’

  There was no mistaking the terror in her eyes. She was frantic to get away from me, burying small, even teeth in my wrist, wresting herself free as I grunted with the sudden sharp pain of it. Then she was running down the centre of the road, like her life depended on it.

  It was the blind instinct to survive that motivated me then. I just had to have time. Once in the hands of the cops, I wouldn’t have a chance. I went after her, my shoes pounding heavily on the gravel behind her.

  Though she was scared, she musta been using her head, figuring the right moves at the right time. At the last moment, as I was reaching to grasp her shoulder, she shot me a swift, terrified glance, twisted unexpectedly, dodged beneath my outstretched arm and thrust her foot between my legs so that I staggered, sprawled on hands and knees.

  It was sheer terror that gave her strength. By the time I’d scrambled to my feet, she was half way back to her car, her feet barely touching the ground. I went after her, ran like I’d never run before. If she hadn’t been so panic-stricken and had remembered to turn on the engine, she’d lave got away. As it was, she was thumbing the starter hopelessly for the third time when I reached her.

  I pulled open the door. Like an eel, she slipped to the other side, evading my outstretched hands. I made another grab for her, but the gear lever got in my way. She scrambled over the seat into the back of the car.

  She wasn’t an easy dame to reason with. And I just had to keep her quiet. I launched myself over the back seat and fell, dragging her down with me. She squealed loudly, clawed my hands with sharp finger-nails, kicked with murderously sharp heels, and somehow scrambled to her feet.

  In that moment, on the early morning air, I heard the sound of another car approaching. That got me really scared. I pictured other folk arriving on the scene, the girl’s hysterical account of how I was assaulting her. I forgot all scruples then. I grabbed her legs, jerked hard so she sprawled on top of me. Now I was really manhandling her. This was no time for half-measures. I wrestled her around until she was lying face downwards. I twisted her arms up behind her back and put on a lock she was powerless to move. I spread-eagled myself across her, rammed her nose and mouth hard against the carpet so she couldn’t scream. I held her that way with my heart in my mouth until the roar of the passing car diminished a distant hum.

  Now I was in trouble. Real trouble. The dame wasn’t easy to reason with in the first place. With every passing minute, more and more traffic would be on the roads. Now I had to figure up some way of keeping the dame quiet until I could get clear from the district.

  But how to keep the dame quiet?

  Then I got it. At first it was so fantastic I almost rejected it. But it was the only sure way. I let her lift her head to draw a few breaths while I told her what I intended to do. But she took only one breath. Then she began screaming her lungs out.

  I couldn’t reason with her. I’d have to do it and explain why later.

  That gave me another problem. It was a cinch she wasn’t going with me willingly. I shrugged my shoulders. In that case, she’d have to go whether she liked it or not.

  Lying on her belly the way she was, with her arms doubled up behind her, she couldn’t give me much of an argument. I put on the pressure, forced her arms even higher until bones creaked and she screeched with the pain of it. I kept her hands in that position, held them with one hand. Pain strained her body to rigidity. Her slightest movement made the pain unbearable. She was tense and rigid, grinding her teeth with the agony of it. I used the handiest thing for binding her wrists. She was already terrified of me. It wasn’t difficult to guess what more she was afraid of when I fumbled and unclipped her suspenders. Her sobs of pain became dull protests of tortured apprehensio
n. But with her arms firmly held in an agonising wrestler’s lock, she was unable to resist as I fingered the stocking top, rolled it down a warm, slim leg.

  I hated to treat the dame this way. But I was in a serious jam. I held her arms firmly while I lashed her wrists together. I looped the free end of the stocking around her throat, tied it securely. She wasn’t very happy. Her arms were strained upwards in a painful position, and every time she tried to lower them, it almost choked her.

  That shoulda been enough to keep her quiet. I rolled my weight off her, said considerately: ‘I’d like to explain about this. You see ...’

  She had plenty of grit. Although her arms were tied in that painful position, she hacked upwards with her foot, the one still shod. The sharp heel gouged into my shin.

  What could be done with a dame like that? She just had to be tied down. I grabbed her ankle as the vicious heel jagged towards me again, pulled off her shoe. The bare heel of her other foot nearly pulped my nose. She wasn’t giving me any alternative. The first stocking had been relatively easy to remove. Now she was squirming, twisting and shrieking all the time. I had to clamp her kicking legs under my arm while I fumbled to strip off her other stocking. She acted like I was taking her for a ride and this was her last chance to keep alive. I was sweating by the time I managed to lash her ankles together. I eased up then. But she didn’t. As soon as I released her, she kinda rolled over, somehow struggled to her knees.

  That was the final straw. I pushed her down, doubled her legs behind her, used my tie to draw her ankles towards her bound wrists. That did quieten her! When she tried to straighten out, her ankles pulled on her wrists and her wrists pulled on her throat, threatening to choke her. She learned quickly. She only tried straightening out once.

  But she still had lungs and still had a mouth. She used them both. She was a dame who never knew when it was smart to stop resisting. I used my handkerchief to gag her, and nearly lost the top of my finger doing it. I had to seize her hair, strain her head back until her neck almost cracked, before she let up. My pain was so intense, I barely restrained myself from punching her.

  That dame sure caused me trouble. It took ten minutes or more to fasten her that way. I spread-eagled myself over her while another car flashed by, and then reached over to the driving seat for a gaily-coloured travelling blanket. It covered her completely. I checked to make sure no other cars were approaching, crossed the road to the car that contained Manton. I took the empty whisky bottle, slung it in the bushes. I picked up the revolver carefully with my handkerchief, scrupulously cleaned off all fingerprints and, with a shudder of revulsion, pressed Manton’s cold stiff fingers around the butt. It wasn’t likely the cops would believe Manton committed suicide. But it would give them something to think about.

  I went back to the coupe, climbed in behind the steering wheel. It was a beautiful job, musta cost a small fortune. I glanced over the seat at the gaily-coloured blanket behind me. It moved just slightly. ‘Sorry, lady,’ I apologised aloud. ‘But you just wouldn’t let me do it any other way.’

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  I was on the highroad, ten miles from Clevedon. I drove back towards town, bypassed it and drove on to my recently rented house. It was still so early, I didn’t pass anyone within five miles of my place. I drove up to the front door, nailed the car at the steps and opened up the front door. I went back to the car, pulled back the blanket and saw she’d managed to squirm around so she was lying on her back. I saw more than that. Her eyes were closed and her face was blue.

  It scared me. I’d never seen anyone that blue before. I ripped open the car door, tore the gag from her mouth. Her tongue lolled out. That got me worried even worse. I released the stocking that was cutting into her windpipe and carried her into the house. Only my room was furnished, so I took her there, laid her on the bed and released her wrists and ankles.

  Her face was still blue. She didn’t seem to be breathing. I opened her bodice, pulled her underclothing to one side and pressed my ear to her heart. I could detect a faint beating. I was so worried, my hands were shaking. I got brandy, forced it between her lips a spoonful at a time. Then I turned her on her belly, began to bear down on her the way you do on folk who are almost drowned.

  I’ve never felt so relieved as when I saw a red flush begin to replace the bluish tinge of her cheeks. But her eyes didn’t open for a full twenty minutes after that.

  First she stared at me dazedly, uncomprehendingly. Then, a few moments later, fear sprang into her eyes, and she screamed, rolled across the bed to the opposite side from me, made a wild dash towards the door. I caught her around the waist, lifted her off the floor. ‘If you’ll only just listen to me …’ I began.

  She wasn’t willing to listen to anything or anybody. She was screaming madly, flailing at me with bare feet and sharp fingernails. Fear gave her new strength. She twisted away from me, put the bed between us, shrieked frantically: ‘Don’t touch me. Don’t dare touch me.’

  Her dress was unbuttoned at the front and her underclothing disarranged. She’d figured she had plenty of reason to keep away from me.

  ‘You don’t understand,’ I began. ‘There’s a perfectly reasonable …’

  She picked up a light chair, swung it above her head. Her eyes were panic-stricken. ‘Keep away,’ she warned fiercely. ‘Keep away from me.’

  ‘If you’ll only just listen ...’ I began. I took a coupla paces towards her. She hurled the chair at me. I saw it coming all the way, went in underneath it and caught her around the waist.

  I couldn’t do a thing with her until she’d cooled down and was ready to listen to reason. She fought every inch of the way as I wrestled her out of my room, along the corridor and into another room. That room was completely bare. I thrust her inside, turned the key in the lock and listened to her hammering the panels, screaming to be let out.

  I sighed wearily. After all that had happened, I was exhausted. Yet there was still so much to do. I went downstairs, drove her car around back into the garage. It was a big garage. I pulled my car across in front of hers, in case anyone with big eyes should happen to be around.

  When I got upstairs, she’d quit pounding the door. That was all to the good. Give her an hour to cool off, and she’d listen to facts.

  But what were the facts? There was no point in evading the issue. The main fact was, I was out to get Frisk. More than that, I had to duck out from under this murder rap he’d swung on me. All ways, it added up to one thing. That dame was gonna have to stick around until I’d fixed everything and was ready to melt away into the obscurity America, assuming my own real name in that distant part of the States where I’d lived for most of the past fifteen years.

  Yeah, the girl had to stick around. And although I hadn’t known her long, I was sure of one thing. She wasn’t gonna stick around without persuasion.

  Where was she going to stay? She was a dame, and it wasn’t her fault she was gonna be my guest. I had to make her comfortable. She would have to have my room, the only furnished room in the house.

  I wanted more than anything else to sit back and take a rest. But this job was urgent. I went downstairs, got my tool box and a length of fine but strong chain.

  I measured off ten feet of chain, allowing a couple of feet around her waist and eight feet of slack. I chose the position for it carefully, firmly screwed a hasp into the door-frame of the bathroom door. It prevented the door from closing. I attached one end of the chain to the hasp with a strong padlock and looped the other end around my own waist, tested it. The chain allowed me enough movement to wash in the bathroom but not to reach the window. Then I tested in the other direction, and realized I’d have to move the bed nearer. All other moveable articles that could be thrown or used as offensive weapons, I shifted beyond range of the chain.

  All I had to do now was fasten the chain tightly around her waist and padlock it. She’d have freedom of movement and relative comfort, be able to shower when she wanted and sleep comfortably i
n bed. It was gonna be tough on her. But it was liable to be much tougher on me if I didn’t do this. I went into the corridor and along to the other door, unlocked it. One swift glance told me everything. I ran to the open window, stared down. She’d taken off her red dress, ripped it into lengths and tied them together. One end of the home-made rope was tied to the window-blind

  catch. She was half-way down, lowering herself carefully, levering the soles of her bare feet against the wall.

  It was a crazy thing to do. That dress fabric was woven, liable to snap beneath her weight.

  I ran down the stairs, burst out of the house and ran around back. I reached her just as she reached ground. She actually lowered herself into my arms. And having got so near to freedom, she was even more desperate to escape. She fought me furiously, biting, scratching and kicking. Once again I acted ungentlemanly, twisted her arms painfully, herded her in front of me, she whimpering with pain and resisted every step of the way.

  She made me feel a heel. I didn’t wanna treat her that way. But I had no alternative. And she was in her underclothes now; brief, scanty underclothing that meant all the time I was grappling with her, I was handling bare flesh. She made me feel worse by resisting, like I was mauling her deliberately.

  She struggled every inch of the way, threw her weight backwards on me as I forced her up the stairs, twisted and writhed like she had the strength of ten dames. When I got her into my room and forced her towards the bed, her resistance doubled. She was quite sure now what I had in mind. She made me put pressure on her arms, which I hated, knowing I was hurting her cruelly. She made a superhuman effort when we reached the bed, one final attempt to squirm away. I exerted my strength, lifted her from her feet, threw her on the bed, face down. She was expecting other things. That maybe was why she didn’t resist when I looped the chain around her waist, pulled it tight and sealed it with a padlock.