I let his fist to over my shoulder and cut up in a judo jab at his sternum. He doubled forward and I chopped him on the side of the neck with the best karate cut I ever took. He went down like he was poleaxed. My old Air Force instructor would have been proud of me.
I turned just in time to catch Lorenzo coming at me. I caught him and pushed him back against the wall. I held him there, squirming. The girl began to scream as I held my hand, palm flat down, in front of his neck. “Now, where are the rest of those letters?”
Terror began to flood into Renzo’s eyes. He shook his head.
I rapped him light on the Adam’s apple. Just enough to make him choke a little. “I do that hard enough and you’re in the same daisy field with your hero Riccio.”
“I haven’t got them,” he gasped hoarsely. “I gave them to Coriano.”
I made a threatening gesture.
“Honest!”
“The pictures,” I said.
“Johnny’s got them.” Renzo was shaking with terror. I slapped him on the side of the face and let him slump to the floor. He sat there, moaning. The girl ran over to him. “Renzo, baby! Did he hurt you?”
I went over to Johnny. He was beginning to move a little. I rolled him over on his back, glad that I hadn’t killed him. I knelt down on the floor and began to go through his pockets. I’d just found the pictures when the door behind me opened.
The first thing that I saw when I turned around was the muzzle of a .38. It was pointed right at my belly and from where I stood it looked like a fifty-millimeter cannon. The next thing I noticed was the chubby little man behind it, his beady eyes almost lost in the rolls of fat around them.
“I’ll take those pictures if you don’t mind,” he said.
I held them out without speaking.
“Just put them on the table and back up against the wall.”
You don’t argue with a cannon. I did what I was told.
“Now turn around and put your hands high on the wall and lean against it. You know what I mean. Like they do on TV.”
I knew what he meant.
I heard him move to the table. There was a rustle of paper. “You can turn around now, Colonel.”
I turned around. “You’re Coriano?”
He nodded. He looked at Johnny, then over at Lorenzo. He smiled amiably. “Been having a little fun with my boys?”
“They were very cooperative,” I said.
“All ass and no forehead, both of them. But it doesn’t matter. I already made a deal on the letters with your ex.”
He pulled out a chair and sat down. “Nothing personal in this, you understand, Colonel,” he said. “Merely a matter of business.”
I looked at the pudgy little man. He seemed so content sitting there that the least I could do was shaft him a little. “How much did she give you?”
He waved the revolver negligently. “Twenty-five thou.”
“You’ve been had. The old lady would have gone to a hundred grand.”
He stared at me steadily for a moment, then shrugged. “That’s life,” he said philosophically. “I have the same kind of luck when I get into the market. The stock always goes up after I sell.”
“What about the pictures?” I asked.
“Insurance, Colonel. For me and for the lady who bought the letters.” He glanced at them. “A good likeness, aren’t they?”
I walked past him to the door. Coriano was still watching me; so were Renzo and his girlfriend. The only one that wasn’t was Johnny. He was lying on his back on the floor. I shook my head sadly, as if to commiserate with all of them, and went out.
My car was still where I’d left it. I started to open the door when I heard Anna’s voice. “Mr. Carey?”
I climbed into the car beside her.
“Are you all right?”
“I guess so,” I said.
“I couldn’t help it, Mr. Carey.” She began to cry. “They made me do it. Coriano was in the bar when I came downstairs.”
“Sure, Anna, sure.” I tapped the leather camera case on the seat between us. “You just happened to have your Polaroid along?”
“That’s right. Coriano saw the camera and that gave him the idea. He said it would keep you from squawking to the cops. I made sure I got each shot when your eyes were closed, so at least you can prove you were unconscious.”
I turned to look at her. Prove I was unconscious? Hell. I looked positively ecstatic.
“I had to do it, Mr. Carey,” she said earnestly. “If I hadn’t, Coriano would never have let me work again.”
“All right, Anna,” I said. “Now tell me where you live and I’ll drive you home.”
I dropped her off, and when I got to my room almost an hour later the red message indicator on the telephone was blinking. I picked it up. The old lady had just called and wanted me to call her back. I dialed the number.
Her voice was wide-awake and sharp. “Well, Luke,” she demanded. “Did you get them?”
“No.”
“What do you mean?” she asked angrily.
“There was nothing to buy. Nora got to them before we did.”
“Nora?” Her voice was surprised.
“Who else?”
She chucked. “I should have thought of that. Nora wouldn’t want us to have those letters. Well, at least we don’t have to worry anymore.”
“Sure,” I said and put down the telephone. Nobody but me. I barely had the energy left to get out of my clothes and into bed. It had been a long night.
12
__________________________________________
The matron opened the door to Dani’s room. “Your mother’s here to see you.” Dani got off the bed. “Where is she?”
“She’s waiting in the cafeteria.”
Dani followed the matron down the corridor and through the steel gate. They took the elevator down to the cafeteria level. It was just about three o’clock and the cafeteria was almost empty. A strange man and Miss Jennings were sitting with her mother.
Nora raised her cheek for Dani’s kiss. “Hello, dear.”
Dani looked at Miss Jennings, then at the man. “Hello, Mother. Hello, Miss Jennings.”
Sally Jennings got to her feet. “Hello, Dani.” She turned to the others. “Well, I’ve got to get back to my office.”
They nodded and she went out.
“Don’t stand there, Dani,” Nora said, with some asperity. “Sit down.”
Dani sat down obediently. “What did she want?”
“She didn’t want anything. We walked to talk to her.”
“What about?” Dani’s voice was suspicious.
“You. You seem to be making a great deal of trouble.”
Dani looked at her mother steadily for a moment, then at the man. “Who’s he?” she asked bluntly.
“Dani!” Nora’s voice was shocked. “You have better manners than that.”
Dani’s voice was impatient. “Not here, Mother. There isn’t enough time for manners here. Who is he?”
Nora looked at the man eloquently. “This is Dr. Weidman, Dani. I’ve asked him to examine you.”
“What for?”
“For your own good! They can’t seem to find out what’s the matter with you.”
“Is he another head-shrinker?”
Nora’s voice was angry. “He’s a psychiatrist, Dani.”
“I don’t want to talk to him.”
“You must!” Nora insisted.
“Why, Mother? Do you think there’s something the matter with me?”
“What I think doesn’t matter, Dani. It’s what they think that does. They could send you away for a long time.”
Dani was still watching her mother’s face. “What you think matters to me, Mother. Do you think there’s something the matter with me?”
Nora stared back at her, then drew a deep breath. “Of course not, dear,” she said. “But—”
“Then I don’t want to talk to him.”
The doctor got to his feet. H
e was smiling. “I don’t think you have any need for concern, Miss Hayden. Miss Jennings has an excellent reputation and I think you can rely on her appraisal.” He turned to Dani. “It wouldn’t hurt, young lady, if you were to have a little more trust in Miss Jennings. The worst she could do is help you.”
He made a sort of bow and left them.
They sat there silently, staring at each other. “Do you have a dime, Mother? I want to get a Coke.”
Nora looked at her absently. Dani knew that her mother was thinking of something else. She always was when she looked like that.
“A dime, Mother?” she repeated gently.
Nora opened her purse. “Do you think you could get me a cup of coffee?”
“Sure, Mother.”
Dani got up and went back to the kitchen door. “Hey, Charley! Can I get a cup of coffee for my mother?”
A shining dark face appeared in the doorway. “Sure thing, Dani.”
Dani brought the coffee back to the table, then went for her Coke. When she came back and sat down, Nora lit a cigarette. Dani looked at her and Nora pushed the package toward her with a reluctant sigh. She took one and lit it.
“I thought you didn’t believe in head-shrinkers, Mother.”
“I don’t know what to believe in anymore.”
Dani looked at her mother curiously. This wasn’t like her. Nora usually had very definite ideas about everything.
Nora sipped at the coffee and made a face.
Dani grinned. “It isn’t much like the coffee at home, Mother.”
“I guess not,” Nora said. She looked at her daughter. “Is the food as bad?”
“The food’s all right.”
“I saw the letters you wrote to Rick,” Nora said in a low voice. “Why didn’t you tell me about them?”
Dani felt the flush burn its way into her face. “I didn’t think about it. I forgot.”
“If someone else had gotten them it would have been much worse. I—I didn’t know it had been going on for such a long time,” Nora said awkwardly.
Dani felt her throat constrict. She stared back at her mother silently.
Nora’s eyes fell again. “When did it start?”
“That time in Acapulco. Remember, you had to fly to San Francisco? That was when it happened.”
“You should have told me, Dani. What did he do to you?”
“He didn’t do it to me, Mother,” Dani said steadily. “I did it to him.”
The tears came to the edge of Nora’s eyes. “Why, Dani, why?”
“I wanted to, Mother. I got so very tired of pretending to be a little girl.”
She fell silent, staring at her mother and dragging on her cigarette. “I guess there’s not very much else to talk about, is there, Mother?”
Nora shook her head. “I guess not.”
There was so much for them to talk about, but Dani couldn’t talk to her and she couldn’t talk to Dani, anymore than she’d been able to talk to her own mother. Each generation was an island to itself.
She made one more attempt. “Dani,” she said earnestly, “please talk to Miss Jennings. She may be able to help you—help us.”
“I don’t dare, Mother. With her you can’t always stop where you want to. One thing will lead to another and the next thing you know she’ll know the truth about what happened that night. And I don’t want anyone to know, anymore than you do.”
Nora looked at her daughter. This was what it all came to, she thought. The only thing they had to share was a common guilt.
Dani looked up at the wall-clock. It was almost three thirty. “I have to go back,” she lied hesitantly. “I have a class.”
Nora nodded. Dani got out of her chair and walked around the table and kissed her mother’s cheek. Impulsively Nora put her arms around her.
“Don’t worry, Mother. Everything will work out all right.”
Nora managed a smile. “Of course it will, dear. I’ll see you Sunday.”
She watched the matron get up and follow Dani out into the corridor, then the swinging doors closed and cut off her view. She looked down at the ashtray. Her cigarette was still smoldering. Slowly she ground it out and then picked up her handbag. She took out her mirror and made a minor repair to her makeup, then left.
“Your mother’s very beautiful, Dani,” the matron said as they walked back to her room.
Dani glanced at the matron. Everyone always said that the first time they saw her mother, then when they saw her she could almost sense their disappointment. “What a pretty child,” they’d say. But she knew how they really felt.
Dani went into her room and closed the door. She looked at the scratched and pencil-marked walls for a while, then stretched out on the bed.
Beautiful and talented. That was her mother. Everything that she was not. She remembered how she used to sneak down to the studio when her mother was away and try to copy some of the wonderful things her mother sculpted. But everything she did turned out a mess and she’d throw it away so nobody would see it.
Suddenly she found herself crying silently. After a while the tears stopped and she got out of bed and looked at herself in the small mirror. Even after crying, her mother still looked beautiful! Her eyes clear, her skin pale and luminescent. Not like this—eyes puffed and red, face swollen.
She took a Wash ’N Dri from the package her mother had sent her and tore the foil wrapper. She pressed it to her face, feeling the cool, slightly mentholated wetness soothing her skin.
She remembered how Rick used to tease her because she liked them so much. She always carried some in her handbag. Once after they had been together and he had been lying next to her with his eyes closed, she had taken one out with the idea of refreshing him.
But he had almost jumped out of his skin when she’d touched him with it. “For Christ’s sake, kid, what are you doing?”
“I was only trying to make you feel better,” she’d said.
He’d laughed and pulled her over against him. She felt the slight scratch of his beard as he nuzzled her throat. “You know, you’re a crazy kid!” Then he held her and his hands did all those wonderful things that made her feel so necessary to him.
She felt the tears come to her eyes again and she blinked them back. There was no use crying now. There was no one to turn to. When she’d been blue like this before she could always go to him. He’d smile and touch her and her blues would go away. But not anymore.
Carefully she ticked off the days. Sylvia had been shipped off yesterday. That made today Friday. Rick’s funeral must have taken place already. Idly she wondered if her mother had sent flowers.
She probably hadn’t. Probably not, if she knew her. Mother had forgotten her in Rick’s room. She’d screamed at him, and her fingers had left angry red marks on his bare shoulders. She’d thought her mother would kill him.
“No! Mother, no!” she’d screamed.
Then her mother had pulled her, naked, down the hall and had flung her into her room. She remembered huddling there, alternately shivering and crying as their fight raged all through the house.
No, she was sure now that Mother hadn’t sent any flowers. But she was also sure that her mother hadn’t forgotten about Rick either. Her eyes felt dry and burning. She took out another Wash ’N Dri and patted her face with it. She crumpled the tissues and threw them into the wastebasket.
Suddenly she felt very much alone As if the discarded tissues had been a link with the past and now that link had been broken. Only Rick had tried to understand, but now there was nobody. Nobody. She began to cry again.
Sally Jennings looked up at the clock. It was a quarter to six. She looked down at her desk impatiently. There were so many reports to get out. She began to put the neatly into her briefcase. Maybe she’d be able to get at some of them after she got home from the theater.
She had waited a long time to get tickets for this play and this was one time nothing was going to interfere with seeing it. By the time she got home and changed, t
hen downtown again, she’d just have time for a quick bite before curtain time.
There was a hesitant knock at the door. “Yes,” she called impatiently.
At first all she could see was the white uniform of the matron behind the glass door, then the door opened and Dani came in.
Dani stood there in the doorway. “Miss Jennings,” she asked in a thin, small voice, “can I talk to you?”
The psychologist looked at her for a moment. The child had been crying, she could see that, but there was also a forlorn look about her that hadn’t been there before. “Of course, Dani.”
Dani looked down at the open briefcase. “If you’re leaving, Miss Jennings, I can come back in the morning.”
Sally Jennings closed the briefcase and put it on the floor behind the desk. “No. As a matter of fact I’d been planning to stay and work tonight.”
Dani came further into the office. “I didn’t want to bother you.”
Miss Jennings smiled at her, and when she smiled she suddenly seemed very young. “Tell you what. Suppose we have supper in the cafeteria together? It will be so nice to have someone to talk to for a change.”
Dani glanced over her shoulder at the matron, still waiting outside the office. “Do you—do you think they’d let me?”
Sally Jennings reached for the telephone and dialed the chief probation officer. She put her hand over the mouthpiece. “I think it could be arranged.”
Maybe it wasn’t relief or gratitude that the psychologist saw in Dani’s eyes, but suddenly it seemed that the forlornness had disappeared from her face. Suddenly the play she’d been waiting to long to see just wasn’t important anymore.
13
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“The first time I found out that people weren’t forever was when my father stopped coming to see me.” Dani looked across the desk at Miss Jennings. They had just come back from dinner. “You know what I mean? When you’re little it’s like you’re the center of the whole world, but when you get older you find out you’re not. I cried every day for a month. Then I got used to the idea.
Where Love Has Gone (1962) Page 27