Nothing In Her Way

by Charles Williams

  “Yes. I noticed that.”

  “I was afraid he’d brag about it—the way he does everything else—before we had a chance to nail it down. He won’t now. Your bawling me out for being a lengua larga has scotched that.”

  She coached me on the Peruvian angle until I felt as if I’d lived there for years. Complete saturation was what she was after, and nothing less would satisfy her. I protested, pointing out that Lachlan had never been to Peru and wouldn’t know if I did make a mistake, but she paid no attention. I not only had to know everything about Dr. Rogers; I had to be him.

  The next day Juan Benavides showed up and he went through the mill.

  It was about two in the afternoon. The buzzer sounded, and he was in the corridor looking very sharp in his electric-blue suit and wide-collared shirt.

  “Come in, Juan,” I said. I took his hat and he looked around in awe, probably kicking himself for not having started his bargaining at five hundred instead of three hundred dollars.

  I gave him a cigarette and called Cathy. She was wearing blue pajamas and a long robe with wide sleeves, and you could see he was much impressed with her. She shook hands and smiled, and then curled up in a big chair.

  “We are very fortunate,” she said, giving him an approving glance. “Already I can see that Juan is just the man for the job.”

  From then on he was hers. The two Spanish-speaking gringos were without a doubt completely crazy, but this one was of unbelievable beauty and she thought highly of him.

  She told him everything he was supposed to do and say, and then she told him again. She sweated him through it for an hour. I wrote down the telephone number of the hotel where he was staying. We told him to be there where we could reach him any afternoon after four, and then I went back downtown with him and let him pick out the gold watch chain.

  “Where is your watch?” I asked.

  “Perhaps someday I will have one,” he said. “Who knows?”

  I gave him some more expense money and asked him about the bus ticket. He thought it over and decided El Paso would be a good place to go. After I dropped him off I went around to the bus station and bought it. We were all ready for the next act.

  On an impulse I ducked into a cigar store and called the Sir Francis Drake. Bolton had checked out and had left no forwarding address. It could mean anything at all, and probably meant nothing, but for a moment I felt a chill just thinking about it. He could tip Lachlan off from anywhere, and we’d never know it until they slipped the handcuffs on us.

  When I got back to the apartment she was gone again, and she didn’t get back until nearly six. She was elated when she did come in. She’d run into Lachlan and he had taken her down Bayshore to San Jose in that Italian car of his to show her how it performed. Or at least, that was his excuse.

  It was good, but I was irritated. “Wait a minute,” I said. “How much of this are we going to have, anyway? I mean, going off with him all afternoon—”

  She laughed. “Mike, for heaven’s sake, have you forgotten who he is? That’s Lachlan, the man we both wanted to kill when I was ten years old. Stop growling and listen. We’re doing wonderfully.”

  She’d got a pretty good line on his plans this time and we could set up some sort of timetable. Apparently they had talked a lot. He was going to be around San Francisco for at least another month, she said, before he went back to Mexico for some more fishing. His lawyers wanted him to stay around until they got this latest property settlement worked out.

  But that wasn’t the big news, she told me excitedly. “He actually stopped talking about himself long enough to ask me what you were doing. Incidentally, he was curious about me, too—his idea being, of course, that I must be the one with money, since you obviously couldn’t be. I dispelled that by telling him my father was a bookkeeper for the Lima office of a mining company. I said we both grew up in Peru, but that we didn’t meet until we were at Columbia. So now, if it’s bothering his sense of logic any, he’s right back where he started. You don’t do anything resembling work, your father was a missionary, mine was a bookkeeper, and still we live like millionaires.”

  She jumped off my lap and started prowling the living room the way she always did when she was excited or thinking. She paused to light a cigarette, then waved it at me. “He asked me outright what kind of research you were doing—or had been doing. I was properly evasive about it, and vague. He wouldn’t have to be a genius to figure out that you had given me unadulterated hell for talking too much the other night and that I still remembered it.

  “I told him you’d been at the Hipodromo San Felipe in Lima as a veterinarian for the track, and then somehow”—she paused and grinned wickedly—“somehow we got onto horse doping and saliva tests, and I said that although they weren’t part of your work, you’d become interested in them. Just chatter, you see. And then I shut up and listened to him.”

  We ran into Lachlan again that night in the cocktail lounge as we were going out to dinner, but declined his drink invitation a little coolly and eased out without talking to him. The following night we avoided the bar altogether. The thing to do was to let him rest a little.

  The night after that, however, we went back and he was there ahead of us, sitting at a booth this time. He stood up and insisted we join him.

  The drinks came. “How about having dinner with me tonight?” he urged.

  “Why, we’d love to,” Cathy said. “Wouldn’t we, Mike?”

  “Sure,” I said, with scarcely any enthusiasm at all.

  “Fine,” he said. “I know a swell place down in the financial district. Never find it unless you knew this town like a book.”

  Cathy had her head down and was poking into her purse. “Oh, darn,” she said. “I left my lipstick upstairs.” She stood up. “If you’ll excuse me. I’ll only be a minute.”

  She went out and we sat down again. I wondered how the thing would come off. She had gone to call Benavides.

  She was gone about ten minutes, stalling to give him time. Lachlan and I nursed our drinks and made an attempt at conversation. Without her there it fell apart like bricks without mortar.

  I thought about him and tried to figure him out. Somehow he either wasn’t the man I’d always expected or he was putting on an act too. The boasting and ostentatious show of money and bully-boy virility that characterized this middle-aged clown didn’t seem to match up with the cold-nerved piracy of the man who’d engineered a coup like that one in Central America sixteen years ago. Maybe it was just a front, or maybe he was over the peak and softening up now, degenerating into a sort of propped-up wolf chasing girls half his age.

  In the face itself there wasn’t much evidence of breakdown. The eyes were steel-blue and sharp and a little too domineering, and the hawk nose and solid jaw gave him the look of a man who was able to take care of himself. Maybe it was in a number of small things. He was a little too loud. He dyed his hair to cover up the gray at the temples. You could see it—the reddish brown around the ears didn’t quite match the rest of it. His clothes were too young for him. He wore double-breasted gray flannel suits with built-in shoulders and Hollywood drape, and topped them off with explosive ties and the modified Texas hat. It was funny, I thought; at first glance, when you knew his record, he looked dangerous, but when you got closer to him he began to sound a little hollow.

  Was it an act? That was the bad part of it—there was no way to know until it was too late. But the thing we couldn’t afford to forget for a minute was that he’d lived by his wits for a long time, and he’d always come out on top.

  “Mrs. Rogers tells me you used to be with the Peruvian Jockey Club,” he said, leaning back against the white leather.

  I shrugged. “Not as a member, if that’s what you mean. I worked at San Felipe as veterinarian for a while. A long time ago.”

  “How is the racing down there? Pretty crooked?”

  “No,” I said, a little impatiently. “Probably as clean as it is here.”

&nbs
p; He gave me a superior smile. “Whatever that means.”

  “It means it’s pretty straight. Thoroughbred racing is one of the most rigidly governed sports in the world, and they do a good job of keeping it clean.”

  “You think so?” He didn’t, it was obvious. And he had the knack of implying that if I did I was a fool.

  I shrugged it off and changed the subject, as if reluctant to talk about horse racing. We got onto fishing, which wasn’t much better. He had only amused tolerance for fly fishermen. In a few minutes Cathy came back.

  “More trouble,” she complained with a wry smile as we sat down. “Sometimes I envy men. I had a run in a stocking and had to change it.”

  I ordered another round of drinks to make sure Benavides would have time to get here. When we had finished them, Lachlan said, “We’ll take my car. It’s already out front.” We went out through the lobby with Cathy in the middle chattering about something. It was after seven, and when we got out the big doors in front it was dark except for the street lights and the glow from the sign over the cocktail lounge. Fog was coming in across the hill and cutting off the tops of the buildings. Benavides wasn’t in sight. He’d had plenty of time, I thought angrily. Where the devil was he? Then I saw him. He had just come around the corner of the building, walking very fast.

  We turned and went down the sidewalk toward Lachlan’s car. Just before we reached it I could hear footsteps behind us, beginning to run now, and then he called out.

  “Senor Rogers. Doctor! One moment, please.”

  We all turned, just as he came up and put a hand on my arm. I shook it off angrily, brushing at him with my hand. “Get away,” I said irritably, continuing to walk toward the car.

  He came after me, talking very fast in Spanish. “Please you must listen. You will tell me when there is another one, no?”

  “What are you talking about?” I said coldly. I had him by the arm now, and was hustling him away. “Shut up, you stupid idiot!” I hissed at him, still jockeying him along. I turned to Cathy and Lachlan and apologized in English. “I’m sorry. I’ll get rid of him in a minute. You go ahead.”

  They went on toward the car with Lachlan turning to look curiously over his shoulder. I walked Juan back, being careful not to get completely out of earshot.

  “Now, you big-mouthed fool,” I lashed at him, winking at the same time, “what are you doing here?”

  “Senor Barnes sent me away from Miami. He said he would kill me. But I must have money. I cannot live in this country without money. You will tell me when there will be a long race, no?”

  “You’re lucky Barnes didn’t kill you,” I said angrily. “I heard about it. You talked your stupid head off. There was so much comeback money at the track we didn’t get five to one.” I chopped it off suddenly as if just realizing I was talking too loudly myself.

  “But, Doctor, how am I going to live?” he begged. “You must tell me when there is another so I can bet—” He stepped back, holding out his hands, as I made a step toward him.

  I took out my wallet and handed him the $260 and the bus ticket, folded up between the bills. “Here,” I said. “And you stay away from here. If I see you around here again, I’ll call Cramer. You know what he does to long tongues.”

  He tried to follow me back to the car, still talking. I waved him off furiously, and he turned finally and shuffled away. He had done it nicely, and I hoped he’d use that bus ticket.

  They were in the car waiting, and looked questioningly at me as I slid in beside Cathy. “I’m sorry,” I said. “Damned nuisance. The only way you can get rid of him is to give him a couple of dollars.”

  “Oh?” Lachlan asked casually, easing the car away from the curb. “Do you know him?”

  “He used to work for my father, in Peru. Dad brought him back to the States with him three or four years ago, but he won’t work any more. Just a bum now.”

  He didn’t say anything more as we drove on down the hill through the early-evening traffic. I was eager for a chance to talk to Cathy, to find out how it had gone over and how much of it they’d been able to hear. All through dinner I was hoping to get a moment alone with her, but I never did. Afterward he suggested we go to the Fairmont, but Cathy begged off, saying she had a slight headache. We came back to the apartment about ten o’clock.

  The minute we were inside the door she pulled my head down and kissed me. “You and Benavides should go on the stage.”

  “Was it all right?”

  “Perfect.”

  * * *

  We avoided Lachlan completely for the rest of the week, and then, as she said he would, he came to us. Early in the morning after the Benavides incident I went downtown to the hotel where he was staying, intending to build a fire under him if he was still hanging around. He was gone, however, and the chances looked good that he had taken the bus for El Paso. As soon as we got back to the apartment we packed a couple of bags and took off for Carmel. Everything was under control, and all we had to do was play hard to get and just wait.

  It was wonderful at Carmel. I forgot the whole thing for three days, and stopped worrying about Bolton, and Donnelly, and whether the police were watching us. It was a fine time.

  We hadn’t been back in San Francisco more than a few hours when he called us. He had four tickets to a play at the Geary, he said. How would we like to join him and his date for it, and then go dancing afterward?

  “We’re beginning to click, darling,” Cathy said, looking speculatively at a row of gowns hanging in a closet.

  It was easy to see Lachlan had something up his sleeve when we met them downstairs in the cocktail lounge and I got a glance at his date. No aging buck on the prowl would want to be chaperoned by a married couple when he could have been alone with all those natural resources. She was a brown-eyed blonde who overflowed her gown to within a short drool of being arrested for blocking traffic. The gown itself was a plunging-neckline affair in a sort of ripe-avocado green, and above the timber line she looked like whipped cream squeezed out of a tube. Her name was Bobbie Everett and she was in radio, she said, and when I made the obvious and somewhat asinine observation that she ought to be in television she thought that was cute. This was odd, considering that she had probably heard the same remark ten thousand times since TV had taken the bosom to its bosom.

  The strategy began to be a little obvious by the time we’d left the theatre and had gone to a night club. Really, I was the most interesting man she’d ever met. Honestly, I was. I simply must tell her all about myself. Working with race horses, imagine that. Didn’t I think racing was just simply divine?

  She had to have something to report to Lachlan, so I blossomed into a brilliant conversationalist under all this flattering attention and told her all about myself. I told her how to treat bowed tendons.

  Of course, I didn’t know anything about it, but since practically anything was news to her, I was on safe ground. It was about five dances before I was able to outmaneuver Lachlan and get a dance with Cathy.

  “Well,” she said, “and how are you and your little friend? You don’t seem to be feeling any pain.”

  “I’m all right,” I said. “A little snow-blind, but otherwise O.K.”

  “Yes,” she said, “I thought you looked like a homesick skier. But remember, you’re the close-mouthed type. What has she learned so far, besides the fact that your vision seems to be all right?”

  “I haven’t told her anything except the story Lachlan already has from you.”

  We compared notes as soon as we were back at the apartment. She was elated. There wasn’t any doubt at all now that he was going for it.

  “He’s going for something,” I said. “Maybe it’s you.”

  “Don’t be silly. Listen, Mike, we’re turning for home now. I can tell. From the things he said tonight—when he wasn’t playing the big shot, of course—I’ve got a pretty good picture of just how much he’s figured out. He knows you’re mixed up in horse racing in some way, but he ca
n’t quite see where or how. I mean, you’re not anywhere near an operating track, you’re obviously not a bookie, and if you were an owner or trainer you’d say so. And that thing Benavides kept saying about a ‘long race’ is getting him. Why should long races be any different from any others? He hasn’t quite enough information to complete the picture, but he will have, very shortly. I’ve got a date with him tomorrow. You don’t know it, of course, but he’s taking me out to lunch.”

  Fourteen

  We didn’t get up until late, and around noon she went out. She was enchanting in a whole new spring outfit, smart and very lovely from nylons to short-veiled hat, and when she came to kiss me she left a hint of fragrance that lingered in the apartment after she was gone.

  “I’m off to betray you, darling,” she said.

  I prowled irritably around the apartment. Was he going for it, or was he just going for her? She was convinced he was rising to the bait, but just how sure were we as to what he considered the bait? Maybe, as far as he was concerned, she was it. Lachlan had money already. He didn’t chase girls to get money; he used money to chase girls. And what if Bolton had tipped him off, as he’d threatened, and he was laughing about the whole thing, playing along with us while the police watched, just waiting to spring the trap? I shuddered.

  I kept thinking about Bolton, and after a while I started wondering about Charlie and why we hadn’t heard anything of him. After a while I couldn’t stand my thoughts and the apartment any longer and went out and walked downtown. I had to locate a good bookie joint, and they weren’t very plentiful any more. The federal tax and the clampdown by the police had driven most of them out of business. It took a number of telephone calls to some old friends before I got on the trail of one. It was in the rear of a saloon on the other side of Market. I finally got in, and sat around for a while reading a scratch sheet and watching the Santa Anita results go up on the board. I didn’t need the place yet, but I wanted to get the telephone number and be sure I could get in when I did. I made a few random bets, and lost on all of them.