Michael Gray Novels

by Henry Kuttner

  She nodded brightly, smiling at him.

  “You like Eddie?”

  “Sure,” she said. “I like Matt better, but Eddie’s okay.”

  “Do you remember,” Gray said, “what it was you wanted to tell Eddie a couple of weeks ago, around the time he got into this trouble?”

  “I wanted to tell him?” she echoed, blinking at him and still smiling brightly.

  “Matt Witczak told Mrs. Reiner you had a message for Eddie.”

  “Oh, yes!” Her sallow little face lighted up. “Well, I changed my mind about that later on. I remember, though. It was something about Blanche. Eddie’s mother. You know Blanche?”

  “I’ve never met her. I didn’t know you had.”

  “Oh, sure, I know Blanche. We’re real good friends when she—when she’s feeling okay. When she feels bad, she’s nobody’s friend.” Stella laughed. “You know how it is.”

  “I don’t think I do,” Gray said. “Why does she feel bad sometimes?”

  Stella gave him a bright-eyed glance and then shook her head, laughing. “You don’t catch me!” she said. She jumped up suddenly and walked bouncily over to the mirror.

  “Gosh, I’m a mess,” she said. “I wasn’t feeling so good myself this morning.” She picked up a comb, ran it through her tangled hair, said, “Ouch,” and laid it down in favor of an eyebrow pencil. With a steady hand she began to sketch in her soaring brows, making intent faces at herself as she worked.

  “About Blanche Udall,” Gray reminded her.

  She glanced back at him, smiled, and waved her hand at the window overlooking the crowded street. Streetcars clanged, traffic roared. Fog hung low over the city.

  “Isn’t it a nice day?” Stella said. “Makes you feel good just to look outside.”

  Gray got up and looked out. “Yes, it does,” he said. He leaned against the window frame, watching her.

  “You were going to tell Eddie something about Blanche Udall. Do you remember what it was?”

  “Sure I remember.” She turned back to work on her eyebrows. “Only I can’t tell you. Matt wouldn’t want me to talk about it.”

  She dropped the eyebrow pencil. Gray retrieved it. She said, “Thanks,” and started on the other brow.

  “You see, I happened to hear Blanche having a fight one day. I was outside the door and I just happened to hear her hollering at Ann—”

  She broke off, listening. “You hear anything? Out in the hall?”

  Gray shook his head. “She was hollering at Ann—who? Ann Avery?” His breath was coming a little faster. If Blanche Udall knew Ann in spite of all the evidence to the contrary, maybe Gray was getting somewhere at last. Maybe—

  A loud kick thudded against the door.

  The door crashed open hard against the wall, making all the pictures jump. A short, slight figure stood in the opening. In the same instant Gray heard something whistle past his side and thud into the wall. When he tried involuntarily to jump aside, he couldn’t move.

  He looked down.

  The heavy haft of a switchblade knife stood out from the wall, its blade pinning a fold of his coat against the window frame.

  Matt Witczak came into the room softly, closing the door. His girlishly good-looking face was smiling coldly and blankly. His eyes were fixed on Gray. Without glancing aside, he spoke to Stella.

  “What’s he doing here?” he demanded. “Stella? What’s he doing?”

  Stella answered as calmly as if nothing were happening.

  “He’s doing no harm,” she said. She ran a finger along her upper lip and picked up a lipstick. “He’s just asking about Eddie. That’s all.”

  “You tell him anything?”

  “Not a word,” Stella said, evidently believing it.

  Witczak sidled over to her, still watching Gray, and took Stella’s chin in his hand. He turned her face to his and for a quick moment glanced into her eyes. He made a sound of disgust.

  “That’s what you say. You’ve probably spilled your guts.”

  “No, honest, Matt.” She twisted petulantly. “Let go.”

  Witczak looked back at Gray. “If she’s talked—”

  Gray said in a voice he tried to keep placid, “I wish she would talk. I’m trying to help Eddie. I seem to be the only friend he’s got.” He looked down at the knife, took hold of the haft gingerly, and worked the blade loose. He pressed the catch, and the blade sprang backward into the haft.

  Witczak said, “Next time I won’t miss.”

  “You didn’t miss this time.” Gray weighed the knife in his hand. “You wanted to scare me. Okay, I’m scared. I still wish you’d let Stella tell me whatever it was she wanted Eddie to know.”

  “We don’t owe you a thing,” Witczak said. “The cops are after me right now because of you. I shouldn’t even be out on the street. If I didn’t have friends keeping an eye on Stella I wouldn’t even know you were here. If the cops pick me up because of you—”

  “Why would the cops want you?”

  “Don’t snow me. After last night—”

  Gray said, “Mr. Quentin didn’t press charges. Neither did I.”

  “Crap.”

  “It’s the truth. The officers who were there could always pick you up, I suppose, but not unless Quentin or I identified you. We haven’t.”

  “You’ve got a real kind heart,” Witczak said. “Maybe I ought to reform. What’s your angle, anyhow?”

  Gray said, “You didn’t start that fight.”

  Witczak blinked. Then he grinned easily.

  “That’s right. Wasn’t my fault. I got mixed up with bad company. Now suppose you get out of here.”

  Gray shrugged. “All right.” He looked at Stella. “Good-by,” he said. “Stella, I—”

  Witczak broke in swiftly. “Get out and stay out!” he said. “And don’t think you’ll get to Stella again without my say-so. I’m moving her out of here until the heat’s off. Where you’ll never find her. Now go on—get.”

  Gray stepped past him into the hall. Outside, beyond Stella’s view, he beckoned to the boy. Witczak stared. Gray said, “Will you come out here a minute? I want to tell you something.”

  Wary and curious, the boy came cautiously.

  “I guess you don’t care what happens to Eddie,” Gray said in a quiet voice. “But maybe you do care about Stella. What’s going to happen to her, Witczak?”

  “Mind your own God-damn business,” Witczak said.

  “She’s a user, isn’t she? I could see her eyes even from where I was standing. And I’m pretty sure she took a fix about ten minutes ago. She’s young enough to kick the habit now, Witczak. After a while she won’t be. The stuff builds. You know that. Maybe you think you can get her all she needs. But there’s always the time when she’ll need too big a dose. That’s what can kill, Witczak. Addicts build to where one or two shots don’t give them any lift. They know it’s dangerous to take more, but they’ve got to have more. They can’t help it. So one day they take that extra shot.” He paused. “It could happen to Stella,” he said.

  Witczak started to speak. Gray said quickly, “Here.” He dropped the knife into Witczak’s hand and went down the creaking stairs without another word.

  He felt the boy’s eyes on his back all the way down. When he reached his car he got in, locked the doors, and leaned back, breathing deep and feeling all the nerves in him shivering.

  He had been very much frightened back there in the room when the knife had thudded through his coat. But even in the midst of it he had felt a shaky little quirk of amusement. It made him smile now, at the same time he shuddered. He had been more afraid at that moment of newspaper publicity than he was for his own life. If after everything that had happened, Zucker were to pick up the papers a couple of hours from now and read, PSYCHOANALYST MURDERED BY TEENAGER…

  13

  Outside Gray’s office windows the darkening city had begun to glitter. The great black Bay would leave a yawning hole in the center of the dazzle, its blackne
ss spanned by the necklace of lights that was the bridge. Looking down, Gray massaged the stiffness at the back of his neck. Last night’s fight in the street had left him aching at unexpected points all over.

  He had completed two appointments this afternoon, and now as darkness deepened over the city he stood here still, not quite ready to go home. Not quite easy about the day.

  Eddie, he thought. Eddie Udall. No legal evidence anywhere to show that he hadn’t killed Ann Avery. But there are other kinds of evidence than legal, and years of practice had made Gray into a sensitive instrument tuned to the subtle clues of personality itself. It seemed to him that in all his talks with the people around Eddie a kind of pattern was emerging, still too intangible to put his finger on. A pattern that centered—somewhere.

  But it didn’t center on Eddie.

  No, there was an emptiness instead of a center in his thinking, a dark emptiness like the blackness of the Bay. No face in it, no personality, nothing but a sense of blind, furious destruction…

  The outer door clicked and opened. Gray looked up, surprised. The doctor who shared the other half of the suite with him was not in on Saturdays, and Gray expected no more patients today.

  He heard the quick, hard thud of high heels across the outer office. Then his own door opened with a sudden, uneven motion, and a big-boned woman stood there looking at him. She was carrying the shabby purse with the B on its flap, and a long, narrow paper sack the shape of a fifth bottle. Her face was shiny with sweat, though the evening air must have been cool outside. The unevenly bleached hair looked dank around her broad face.

  She said, “Your name’s Gray?”

  “That’s right. Can I help you?”

  She peered at him. “Help me? That’s a good one.” She laughed harshly. “I can help you—maybe. You’ve been going around asking questions about my boy. I’m Blanche Udall, in case you don’t know.”

  “I see,” Gray said noncommittally.

  She shifted the paper sack to her other arm and glanced uneasily around her.

  “Anybody in that other office?”

  Gray said, “No,” and waited.

  She blinked and then ran a crooked knuckle under her eyelids, smearing moisture. “Eye’s watering,” she said. “Hot in here. How a girl gets into these things, anyway, I’ll never…I don’t know what to do. I can’t go on like this forever, you know. Nobody could. God damn that Eddie. If he’d stayed out of trouble—”

  Gray said, “Did you want to see me about Eddie?”

  “I’ve got something to sell,” she told him with sudden intensity. Gray remembered Avery. Was this the story she had given him, too?

  “What is it?” he asked.

  “It’s worth plenty,” she said. “Plenty of money. But I’ve got to have something right now. Five hundred, say. How about it?”

  “What is it you have to sell?”

  “I can tell you something that plenty of people would pay to know. Plenty. Only…if I do tell, I’ve got to grab the next plane out of here and never come back. Mexico, South America—I don’t know. I could change my name and nobody would ever find me. Would they?” She rubbed her wet face with an unsteady hand. “But I’ll need money. A hell of a lot of money.”

  “What is it you want to sell?” Gray asked again, his voice calm.

  “You’re some kind of doctor, aren’t you?” she said suddenly, paying no attention. “Got anything around here for nerves? I need something.”

  “Nothing but aspirin.”

  She shook her head. “I’ve got to have something right now. I said that before. I’ve got to! You sure you haven’t got anything for nerves around?”

  “I’m sorry. I can’t give prescriptions.”

  “Can’t or won’t?”

  “Can’t,” Gray said. “About this money you want. How much? And what’s it for?”

  “It’s for information. I don’t know just how to play this. I’ve been nearly crazy the last few weeks. What about the money? I won’t tell until I see your money.”

  “We’ll try to work out something. There aren’t any banks open now.”

  “Aren’t there? What day is this?” She looked at the window. “Oh, Jesus. It’s night. I can’t take another night of this.” She rubbed the grimed front of her dress under the coat she wore. There was already a streak of damp discoloration over her stomach from many previous rubbings.

  “I don’t have much money on me,” Gray said. “If twenty or thirty would do—”

  She took the bills Gray extended, but shook her head hard. “It always gets cut,” she said bitterly. “Twenty or thirty’s not enough. I’ve got to hold out for big money. It’s my only chance. This time it’s all or nothing. Maybe—fifty thousand? What about a hundred thousand? Isn’t it worth that?”

  “I don’t know what you have to sell yet,” Gray reminded her, watching her eyes. She knuckled away moisture again.

  “Didn’t I tell you? I’m not thinking straight, I guess. I haven’t been for days now. Or nights…” She looked at the window and shuddered. “It’s the nights,” she said.

  Gray waited.

  “I’m not kidding you,” she said suddenly. “I’ve got information that’s worth plenty. I’m not asking for something for nothing. I can tell you plenty. But I want the money first. It’s worth money, what I know. I’m not lying.”

  Gray said, “Can you tell me one thing? That sapphire ring Eddie’s supposed to have stolen. Did that ever belong to you?”

  She blinked, trying to concentrate. With her free hand she rubbed her stomach again, her face contracting with a flash of sudden pain.

  “Sapphire ring? Sapphires are worth money, aren’t they? I’d have hocked it long ago.”

  “Did you ever have a ring like that?”

  She held out a big-knuckled hand, fingers spread, not noticing how much they trembled. Her laugh was cracked coquetry. “You ought to see I don’t wear blue. I never looked good in blue. No, I never had a sapphire.”

  “Did you know Ann Avery, then?” Gray asked. “Did you ever have an argument with Ann Avery?”

  She laughed, and then broke off as if hearing the harsh sound with surprise. “I’m not giving out any free information. What good’s your lousy thirty bucks to me? I’m tired of getting everything cut. You can’t pay what I want, you don’t get the information. I know where to go.”

  Gray said, “You need help, Mrs. Udall. I can phone a doctor and get him to you in half an hour. He’ll give you what you need.”

  “How do you know what I need?” she asked, her voice suddenly breathless.

  Gray looked at her steadily.

  “It’s nothing like that,” she cried, her voice cracking. “I drink a little too much, maybe. But I never—”

  Gray shook his head.

  “It’s just that I’ve been nervous,” she argued. “So I drink too much.” She reached into the paper sack and pulled out a fifth of whisky, unopened. With a grimace of disgust she looked at the bottle.

  Gray said, “Maybe you’ve kept this quiet until now, but it’s gone too far to hide. It’s showing. All the symptoms—cramps, sweating, eyes watering, restlessness, dilated pupils—you’ve got withdrawal symptoms written all over you. And liquor doesn’t help. It’s no substitute. How big a habit have you got?”

  “No,” she said. “I need a drink. See?” With a wrench she uncapped the bottle and tipped it to her mouth. But when the liquid ran against her lips she choked a little and set it down again, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand. She had not swallowed at all.

  “You need a fix, don’t you?” Gray said. “I could arrange it. You need medical attention, too. I could—”

  She said violently, “Get away from me! Shut up! I won’t do it! Locking me up in a hospital, tapering me off … oh, my God, you don’t know what it’s like! I tried it once!”

  “You tried it yourself? It hardly ever works that way, you know. You need help. It all depends on how big the habit is, how long you’ve been on i
t.”

  She said, “I don’t take much.”

  “What is it—H?”

  She hesitated. Then she nodded rapidly. Gray said, “I can help you if you’ll let me.”

  She balanced for a moment on the very verge of agreement. Gray saw the thoughts and doubts and hopes move across her face in swift succession.

  Then she said, “No! No, I won’t do it. I couldn’t stand all that again! What I need is money, and this time I’ll get it. I’m not afraid any more. Nothing’s worse than this. You and your lousy thirty—I know where I can get all the money I want.”

  “Where is that?” Gray asked.

  “I know where! And I’m not afraid. I tell you, nothing scares me now! I’ll go and get it and they won’t stop me! And after that I’ll catch a plane so fast I’ll be safe. I can change my name, and nobody will ever find me again.”

  Gray said quickly, “It sounds dangerous to me. Why not stay here and let me help—”

  She swung around to face him, her face glistening with sweat and her eyes wild.

  “Get out of my way. I’m going out that door and you can’t stop me. I’m going to get the money, and I’m not afraid of anybody in the world.”

  Gray said, “Wait! Please wait! I don’t know where you’re going, but you could get into bad trouble if you take chances with—”

  “I said get out of my way!”

  Gray measured her with his eyes. She was a big woman, but unsteady on her feet, probably quite weak. He thought desperately that if she left the office now he might never see her again. There was so much danger hovering around her he could almost see it in the air. What she planned he didn’t know, but she knew, and the thought of it made the sweat gather in heavy drops on her forehead. Her eyes were terrified.

  He said, “If you go now, you may never come out of it alive. You know that, don’t you?”

  She reached behind her blindly, seized the bottle by the neck and heaved it high. With a blow he hadn’t thought her capable of dealing, she brought it down in a splintering crash across the edge of the desk. Whisky cascaded to the floor, filling the room with its pungent scent. Holding the jagged fragment by the neck, she swung toward Gray.