The Stalker

by Bill Pronzini

  Suppose he’s already killed him!

  I’d be an accessory before and after the fact, and wouldn’t that make me equally as guilty as Drexel in the eyes of the law? Wouldn’t that mean the gas chamber for me, too? The gas chamber—no, there weren’t any more executions in California, were there? They only gave you life imprisonment now, life in a cage—what does it matter, anyway, because one is no more preferable than the other and there’s no Statute of Limitations on the crime of murder—The doorbell chimed.

  Kilduff started, and a cold slimy thing attached itself parasitically between his shoulder blades. He sucked breath into his lungs like a gaffed fish. But then he rubbed a hand across his face and thought: Take it easy, now, just take it easy. No jumping at shadows, no reading malice into everyday sounds. Easy, son, easy. Hell, it was probably Mrs. Yarborough, the manager. He hadn’t paid the rent for the month yet. Sure, Mrs. Yarborough. He went out to the foyer and pulled the door open.

  Two men stood in the hallway outside. One was tall and thin, in his early thirties, with sandy hair immaculately combed and expressionless brown eyes and a chin that came to a long V-point. He wore a neat gray suit and a gray and white striped tie and a pale yellow button down shirt with silver teardrop cuff links. The other man was shorter, older by ten years, but of the same leanness. He had a narrow, protracted nose that curved oddly, like a fishhook. He was dressed in a dark brown shiny-trousered suit, and in his left hand he carried an old brown hat with a torn sweatband.

  The sandy-haired one said, “Mr. Steven Kilduff?” in a soft, almost mellifluous voice.

  Kilduff looked at them and knew instantly who they were. He had an insane desire to fling the door closed, to turn and run, flee, run, run, but there was no place for him to go. The knot in his chest tightened until his lungs seemed to be rejecting the entrance of oxygen, and he tried to control the panic that was rising like a flood tide within him. It’s something else, he thought, a traffic violation, something else; but he was lying to himself and he knew it. He put out his hand involuntarily against the door jamb, and washed saliva around in his mouth, and forced words past the dryness of his throat. “Yes, what is it?”

  “My name is Commac,” the sandy-haired one said. He brought his left hand up, and nestled against the palm was a leather case with a shield pinned inside. “Inspector Neal Commac, San Francisco police. This is my partner, Inspector Flagg.”

  His knees were suddenly jellied, and he knew the color had drained out of his face. He just stood there, holding onto the door jamb.

  Commac watched him with his expressionless eyes. “Is something the matter, Mr. Kilduff?”

  “No, I... no,” Kilduff answered.

  “We’d like to talk to you, please.”

  “About—what?”

  “Inside, if you wouldn’t mind.”

  He worked some of the saliva onto his lips. “No, of course not.”

  The two men came in past him and entered the living room. They stood with their eyes moving slowly over the interior, photographing it. Kilduff shut the door and went in there. “Well,” he said, facing them, trying to get a smile on, trying to brazen it out, knowing that he wasn’t even close to pulling it off, “sit down, won’t you?”

  “Thank you,” Commac said, and they sat down on the sofa. Flagg put his hat on his knees, balancing it there.

  “Can I... offer you anything? Some coffee?”

  “Nothing, thank you.”

  Kilduff sat on one of the chairs opposite, leaning forward, and got a cigarette out of his pocket. He managed to keep his hand steady as he lit it. “What is it I can do for you?”

  “You attended the funeral of James Conradin in Sebastopol on Tuesday, yesterday,” Commac said. That right, Mr. Kilduff?”

  The urge to take flight came back on him, and he had to make a concentrated effort of will to throw it off. They know, he thought, somehow, in some way, they’ve found out and they know. All right, what do I do now? Do I tell them, admit it, get it done with? They have ways of dragging information out of you, they’re professionals, cops, they know how to trap you into making admissions. I can’t get away with lying to them, not for very long, not when they already know. All right, then, all right. All I have to do is confirm it, tell it straight, make it easy on myself, sure, no agonizing decisions to reach, no more sweat and no more fear, it’s over and the choice has been made for me and all I have to do is confirm it ...

  “Mr. Kilduff?”

  He came out of it. “What?”

  “I asked you if you attended the funeral of James Conradin yesterday.”

  “I... yes, yes I did.”

  “Conradin was a friend of yours?”

  “I knew him in the service.”

  “When was this?”

  “From 1956 to 1959.”

  “You were stationed together?”

  “Yes.”

  “Where?”

  The Bellevue Air Force Station.”

  “That’s in Illinois, isn’t it?”

  “Yes.”

  Commac studied him for a long moment. Kilduff just sat there with his lips pressed tightly together and the cigarette curling smoke upward into the still air of the room. He couldn’t do it. He couldn’t do it, he couldn’t say the words, he couldn’t even meet Commac’s eyes. He couldn’t do it, not now and not later, and now was the time because Commac had already begun to probe, still playing along the surface, yes, but it wouldn’t be long before he would penetrate deeper and deeper; now was the time and he simply couldn’t do it.

  “When was the last time you saw Conradin, Mr. Kilduff?” Commac asked. “Alive, I mean.”

  “It must have been ... oh, eleven years ago,” he answered, and that was the first lie. It came flowing out of his mouth like warm butter, without effort, without conscious consideration. And he knew the ones which would follow would be just as smooth and just as accomplished. “It was right after we were discharged.”

  “When was that?”

  “February of 1959.”

  “And you hadn’t seen him since that time?”

  “No”

  “Did you know he lived in Bodega Bay?”

  “Before I heard of his death, you mean?”

  “Before then.”

  “No,” Kilduff said. “No, I didn’t.”

  “I see,” Commac said. “Were you close friends in the service?”

  “I... guess we were, yes.”

  “How is it you never kept in touch after you got out?”

  “I don’t know. People drift apart. You know how that is, Inspector.”

  “Uh-huh,” Commac said.

  Flagg took a stick of spearmint gum from the pocket of his brown suit, unwrapped it carefully and wadded the foil into a little ball and put the ball in the ashtray on the coffee table. He chewed with his mouth closed, quietly.

  Kilduff thought with self-loathing and with self-pity: You goddamned coward, you goddamned frigging coward, you yellow gutless wonder—it’s never going to be this easy again, if you can’t do it now you’ll never do it.

  And he still couldn’t do it.

  Commac said, “Who was the other man, Mr. Kilduff?”

  “What other man?”

  “At the funeral with you on Tuesday.”

  “I don’t know who you mean.”

  “You were sitting with a dark-complected man, Latin features, expensively dressed. Together, in the last row of chairs during the service.”

  “Oh, yes, that man,” Kilduff said. “Well, I don’t know his name.”

  “You just happened to sit by one another, is that it?”

  “Yes, that’s it.”

  “And you neglected to introduce yourselves.”

  “You don’t usually observe the amenities at a funeral.”

  “Come on now, Mr. Kilduff,” Commac said mildly. “You came in together and you sat down together.”

  “I told you, I don’t know the man. I never saw him before yesterday. Listen, what’s this a
ll about? Why are you asking all these questions?”

  Flagg continued to chew his gum quietly. He had begun to rotate his hat between his thumb and forefinger. Commac’s expressionless eyes never left Kilduff’s face. He took a small clothbound notebook from the inside pocket of his gray suit and opened it and studied a page. He frowned. “Bellevue, Illinois,” he said. “That’s near Granite City, isn’t it?”

  “Yes, it’s near Granite City.”

  “That was where they had that big Smithfield armored car robbery,” Flagg said, speaking for the first time. His voice was as soft as Commac’s. “April of fifty-nine, wasn’t it, Neal?”

  “March,” Commac said. “March 15th.”

  “Sure,” Flagg said. “Six men got away with over seven hundred and fifty thousand in cash. They were never caught.”

  “No,” Commac said, “they never were.”

  “Consensus seemed to be that it was an amateur job, the way it was pulled off,” Flagg said. “Lacked the professional touch.”

  They were talking through him now, watching him, testing him for a reaction. Oh, they knew, all right. He hadn’t had any doubt in his mind from the beginning. He sat there and tried to make himself tell them about Granite City, and about Drexel and Helgerman, but it was just no use.

  Commac said, “Do you remember the Smithfield robbery, Mr. Kilduff? It made quite a splash in the Illinois papers.”

  “I remember it,” he answered softly. “But I don’t see what that has to do with Jim Conradin. Or with me.”

  “Maybe it has a lot to do with him,” Flagg said carefully.

  “Are you saying Jim was mixed up in that?” Kilduff tried to make his voice incredulous, but the words came out flat and toneless.

  “There’s a good chance of it,” Commac said. “A very good chance of it.”

  “How do you mean that?”

  “Conradin’s wife opened their safe deposit box this afternoon,” Flagg said. “Up in Santa Rosa. What do you suppose she found in there?”

  “I don’t have any idea.”

  “Money.”

  “Money?” The incredulity was there this time, and genuine.

  “Forty-one thousand and some-odd dollars.”

  “But that—”

  “And a newspaper clipping,” Commac said. “Dealing with the robbery.”

  “That doesn’t prove Jim was involved.”

  “No, it doesn’t. But just the same, it opens up a lot of possibilities, wouldn’t you say?”

  “Look, why come to me? I don’t know anything.”

  “Mrs. Conradin remembers you from the funeral,” Commac said.

  “She says you spoke to her at the mortuary.”

  “Well, so what?”

  “That newspaper clipping I mentioned. It carried general descriptions of the only two bandits whose faces were seen.”

  “So?”

  “They match both Conradin and you, Mr. Kilduff.”

  “For Christ’s sake!” he exploded. “You just said they were general descriptions. I look like a million other guys, and so did Jim Conradin.”

  “Sure,” Flagg said. “We know that.”

  “Do I strike you as some kind of hoodlum?”

  “Nobody said anything about hoodlums.”

  “Who else would rob an armored car?”

  “Six young guys who thought they had a foolproof scheme worked out,” Commac said. “Maybe ex-soldiers, regimented and disciplined.”

  “What is it you’re trying to say, Commac?” Kilduff asked. “That I was one of the six men? That Jim Conradin and I were both in on it? Is that it?”

  “Were you?” Commac asked quietly.

  Well, there it was. The question. No long speeches now, Kilduff. One word, that’s all, just one word. Yes. Say it. Just open your mouth and say it. Say it, you son of a bitch!

  Yes.

  “No,” he said. “And I resent your accusations.”

  “I’m not making any accusations, Mr. Kilduff.”

  “What the hell else would you call it?”

  “You know,” Flagg said softly, “if you were involved there’s nothing we can do to you now. The Statute of Limitations ran out a long time ago.”

  “If I was involved, and I’m not, I’d still be a fool to admit it.”

  “Maybe so,” Commac said.

  “Listen, I don’t know where Conradin got that money his wife found and I don’t care. If he was in on that robbery, I never knew anything about it.”

  “All right, Mr. Kilduff,” Commac said in a placating way. “Now, suppose you tell us a little more about Conradin.”

  He lit another cigarette from the butt of the first one. “Like what?”

  “Do you remember the exact date of the last time you saw him?”

  “No, I don’t.”

  “Just like that? Without consideration?”

  “I don’t remember. It was after we were discharged.”

  “Then it was in February of 1959.”

  “Yes, February.”

  “And where was that?”

  “I don’t remember.”

  “Granite City?”

  “No.”

  “I thought you didn’t remember.”

  “Goddamn it, you’re trying to confuse me!”

  “Take it easy, Mr. Kilduff,” Flagg said.

  “Christ,” Kilduff said.

  “Can you give us the names of some of Conradin’s friends?” Commac asked. “Other than yourself, that is.”

  “I don’t remember.”

  “You don’t remember any of his friends?”

  “No.”

  “I thought the two of you were buddies?”

  “We were.”

  “Well, all right. Then give us the names of some of your mutual friends.”

  I can’t do it, Kilduff thought, I can’t tell them, it’s no use, and I’m going to pieces sitting here. I’ve got to see Drexel, I’ve got to talk it out with him, I’ve got to have some time to think. He got on his feet and stood there trembling. “I don’t have to answer any more of your questions,” he said. “You’ve got no right to come here like this and accuse me, and I don’t have to answer any more.”

  They looked up at him impassively.

  “Listen,” Kilduff said, “if you think I’m some kind of criminal, why don’t you arrest me? Why don’t you take me downtown and book me and grill me in the back room? Isn’t that the way you people do it?”

  “No, that’s not the way we do it,” Commac said softly. “And we couldn’t arrest you if we wanted to. You know that as well as we do. The Statute of Limitations has long since run out on the Smithfield robbery.”

  “Then what are you digging it up again for?”

  “It’s our job,” Commac said simply.

  “Well, I think you’d better leave now. I don’t have any more to say to you.”

  They got to their feet in unison. Commac said, “I think you’ve said quite a bit already, Mr. Kilduff.”

  They moved unhurriedly to the door and Commac opened it and Flagg said, “We’ll be in touch.” They went out and Commac closed the door very softly behind them.

  12

  In his room at the Graceling Hotel, the limping man lay in darkness, his hands clasped behind his head, resting, thinking. Through the rain-streaked glass of the single window, he could see the coral-tinged light from some proximate but unseen neon sign blink on and off, on and off, on and off through the thinly falling night mist. Faint automobile sounds drifted through the panes and beneath the wood frame, muted, directionless.

  The luminescent dial of his wristwatch read: 10:25.

  Five minutes.

  Everything was ready. He had all the items he needed—save for the one he would buy on the way—in a large, double-strength shopping bag with braided-twine handles. The Ruger .44 Magnum Blackhawk revolver was freshly oiled and freshly cleaned and freshly loaded, wrapped again in the chamois cloth at the bottom of the American Tourister briefcase. He wouldn’t nee
d it, of course; but it was there, and it was ready. Just in case.

  He watched the greenish second hand of his watch sweep another minute away.

  10:26.

  In one hour, perhaps an hour and a half at the outside, barring difficulties unforeseen, Green would die.

  And there would only be Orange.

  The limping man smiled faintly in the darkness and swung his legs off the bed and sat up and gained his feet. He found his canvas shoes and put them on, and put on his overcoat, and lifted the shopping bag and the briefcase from the glass-topped surface of the writing desk. He went to the door and opened it and stepped out into the hallway and locked it behind him.

  He looked at his watch again.

  It was exactly 10:30.

  Fran Varner stared at the telephone in the kitchen of her Santa Clara apartment, willing it to ring, willing Larry’s voice to be on the other end, knowing that it wouldn’t ring at all, waiting for a few more minutes to pass so that she could dial his number again for the twentieth or thirtieth time since six o’clock.

  Thinking about the growing foetus deep in her womb.

  She hadn’t been able to put off seeing a doctor any longer; she had finally realized that yesterday. She had to know, one way or the other. She had made an appointment with a physician in San Jose whom she had once seen for a virus infection. Embarrassed and ashamed by the absence of a wedding band on her left hand, she had refused to meet the doctor’s eyes during the consultation and the subsequent examination; but he had been very nice, and very kind, and very understanding. He wasn’t there to make moral judgments, he had told her; that wasn’t his profession—or his inclination. He would know the results tomorrow, he had told her. Call him at three.

  She had called him at two-thirty, holding her breath as his nurse put the call through to him, telling herself the tests would prove negative, they simply had to prove negative . . .