“You’ve come to me,” she whispered. She buried her face against me. But almost at once, she pulled away a little. “Marty, you smell like a brewery.”
I was feeling the electric charge of her all the way through me. “The hell with that. I just spilled a little on my shirt.”
“Drinking?” she frowned. “This time of the morning?”
“Don’t worry about it, baby. I’ve been through hell.”
She pressed against me. “I have too, Marty.”
“It’s over now,” I told her. “It’s all over. And you’re out of it. All out of it. Just like I promised.”
Her mouth was hot on mine. “I knew. I knew all the time. You could do it, Marty. You could do it for me.”
“Sure. I made him confess. It was everything I knew against what he knew.” I began to laugh. “Hell. He didn’t have a chance!”
Her hands were moving over me. Exploring. Feeling. As if she were trying to convince herself that I was real. That it was over and that we were together.
Suddenly she burst out crying. She sobbed out loud and pulled away from me. She turned and tried to walk away. The sobs wracked her. She stumbled and I grabbed her.
I sank to the thick rug and pulled her down after me. “It’s all right,” I whispered. “We’re all right now. We’ll go away. We can do it. Hell, they know I hate it here. We can do anything in the world we want to do.”
She struggled against me. Her movements were fierce. “You know what I want, Marty!”
My arms tightened on her. Forgot to comfort. She was hot under my hands. Pliable.
“The servants,” I gasped out at her. “Where are they?”
“Sent them away. Knew. Marty. Waiting. God, Marty. I’ve been waiting so long. Don’t make me wait any more!”
I didn’t make her wait any more.
• • •
We were still there when the doorbell rang. But it was all right by then. For the moment we could lie quietly side by side. It was torment when we were together. It was savage. And it was more like hatred and killing than it was love.
But I knew. It was what we wanted. We were alike and we had found each other of all people on earth. We had to have each other. The doorbell shrilled again. Insistent.
Liza scrambled up, straightening her fragile green negligee around her. “You answer, Marty,” she whispered. “Stall them. I’ll get dressed. I’ll be right back..”
And she ran for the stairway, streaking up it and leaving me sitting there in the middle of the foyer looking just like I’d been loser in a street fight.
I had to let the doorbell ring four more times. Somebody wasn’t giving up. I tried to slap some shape into my fouled-up clothes. I got up straightening my tie as the bell wailed again.
I was whipped. I was dead from the ankles to the top of my head. My eyes burned and ached with weariness and it took all my strength to unlock that front door and pull it open.
It was Carl Dill. His mouth was a straight line in a rigid pale face. His eyes were tormented and he looked almost as rumpled as I did. But I could look at him and see that sex hadn’t entered Dill’s life since I’d seen him, defeated and sick, in Hilligan’s office last night.
“I’ve been looking for you,” Dill said.
“I’m not so hard to find.”
“I know,” Dill said. He glanced at the glass windows flanking the front door. I didn’t care. To hell with what Dill saw. All he could do was burn.
“I got to talk to you.”
“Talk.”
“Outside here, Marty. Out to my car.”
“Why not right here?”
He didn’t raise his voice, but he got that stubborn look. I knew I was going to have to do what he said or have trouble. And right now I was too tired. To hell with him anyhow.
“I got somebody in my car, Marty,” he said. “Somebody that can prove Vinson never murdered George Flynn.”
I was already tired. I sagged more. I think I would have fallen but I was too damned mad. This plodding, meddlesome Dill! “Why the hell don’t you keep out of this?” I snarled at him. But my mouth was dusty all of a sudden. I followed Dill across the veranda to his car.
And there I saw her. The joker. Hell, I ought to have known there had to be one. A perfect hand, and somebody tops it. It was Helen. The blonde I had seen clinging to Vinson’s arm in Larry’s penthouse. They’d had to drag her off.
“Get in,” Dill ordered me. “Meet Helen. She was with Vinson the whole night when Flynn was killed. She can prove Vinson is innocent and I think we better talk it over.”
Chapter 15
HELEN broke down and started sobbing. Just the sight of me seemed to be more than she could take. And the funny part was I’d thought she was so drunk the time I’d seen her at Vinson’s apartment that I was sure she’d never know me if she saw me again.
She knew me all right. Dill’s hand on my arm was tight. “Get in,” he told me again.
“Where’d you find this jane?” I said. But I got in the back seat.
Dill climbed in front and started the engine. But for the moment he didn’t shift gears. We faced each other.
“She came to me,” Dill said. “As soon as she read the paper. You better be glad she came to me instead of Hilligan. Like it is, I’m giving you a chance.”
“A chance?” I said. “What kind of chance?”
“A chance to resign, get off the force, and get out of town. It’s going to be hot for you. If you stay here, you’re going to jail.”
I was hearing him, but I was still drugged from loving Liza. This couldn’t be happening. I was lying on that thick carpet in that house and this was another terrible nightmare.
His eyes were cold. I knew better than to fool with him until I found out how much he knew. I stalled. “Will you give me an hour?”
“I won’t give you anything! You’ve fallen for that tramp inside. I know all about it. I got suspicious right at first. Right when you locked yourself in the bedroom with her. I’ve followed you, Marty, and I know what you’ve done. You’ve been so blinded by her that you couldn’t see the obvious. You’ve hounded a confession from an innocent man.”
A wail spilled across the shivering lips of the blonde.
“Drive around, Carl,” I said. “Let’s talk about it.”
“There’s nothing to talk about. We’ve got you dead to rights.”
“I got to think.”
Dill laughed. There was no mirth in his laughter. He looked back at the house once and put the car in gear. He drove south to the bayshore and followed it, driving carefully, under thirty-five.
“Tell him, Helen,” Dill said.
The blonde began to sob out her story. It clicked. Hell, I knew it would. I should have known from the first that a guy like Vinson got around. He liked to go places where he could be seen, where he could see people. That’s why he liked babes like Helen. Girls who looked nice clinging to his arm, and who really liked to cling to it.
She had one of those pictures that they take in night spots. This one was the Starlight Roof of the Southern Hotel. Swank. The picture was dated. It had been taken the night of Flynn’s death. At the late floor show. And the last floor show at the Starlight is 1:30 A.M.
She had folded and crumpled the picture so she could stuff it in her purse. Now it was caked with powder and was sweet scented. But somehow the odor was unpleasant to me. It smelled like death.
But the Starlight Roof was only one of the many places they’d been. Like I’ve already told you, I knew Vinson from reading about him in the society and night-life columns of the newspapers. Well, he really enjoyed doing the spots. He was a guy who loved a good time.
I knew without Helen’s reminding me that Larry Vinson must have at least a hundred reliable witnesses for every step of his gay path through the night in question. The only reason, I thought, that he didn’t tell me all this was that he was naturally cocky. And drunk.
And I knew Helen’s story could never be bro
ken down. When Larry Vinson’s high-priced lawyers got through with me, I’d feel worse than Larry had when I’d finished with him in the basement.
They were going to peel off my skin.
• • •
I could see Dill’s reflection. I knew now how bitterly Dill had always hated my guts. As I had hated him for being careful and plodding. My cockiness rubbed him raw and always had. He must have had a chafed place a foot deep after all these years.
What a laugh! He’d said he was giving me a chance. I could look at his reflection and know what kind of chance he was giving me.
What was happening was that Dill was gloating. He was having himself a hell of a time watching me writhe. And when he was through enjoying himself, I knew what he was going to do. He was going to collect all the evidence against me — the way he’d raked all the charred clothing out of that furnace — and dump it into Hilligan’s lap. The whole mess. When I got out from under that, I’d have nothing left. I’d just be the dumbest ex-cop in town.
And Liza would be in the death chamber at Raiford.
My hand bumped the whisky I’d bought and shoved into my coat pocket. I wished I could take a drink. But drinking right now might cause Dill to blow his top. All I had to do was act nonchalant and he’d lower the boom before I got a chance to think.
Think. I couldn’t think. My heart was pounding and I could hear it. But I couldn’t think. My brain was numb. I could feel it like a dead thing inside my skull. But I couldn’t think.
Helen was still sobbing her heart out but I wasn’t listening. I knew I had to bluff.
“There is something mighty wrong here,” I said. “After all, they found the sap in Vinson’s apartment. Hilligan’s own detail found it. I didn’t find it. It was there.”
“I’m glad you brought that up,” Dill said. “I’m pretty sure I know how it got there. I been over the Flynn garden. You see that maid Tina told me that you sneaked in the backway through the garden. So I went out to take a look. I found a place that had been dug up. I found some smears that might be blood.”
“And what will that prove?”
Dill glanced over his shoulder. “Wait. Wait until you hear the rest of it. You ain’t heard the best part of it yet. I’m pretty sure I’ve found blood smears and clods of that same garden earth. You know where I found ’em, Marty? Under the front seat of your car.”
I didn’t say anything. Hell, what could I say?
“And I can even top that,” Dill said. “In case that ain’t enough, and you’re thinking about getting rid of those smears and that earth, I’ve called an old friend of yours, Marty. Mearsley. The photographer for the Trib. You know he’s going to love taking pictures of your car. You busted his camera and slapped him in the gutter. Remember, Marty? Well, Mearsley can take good pictures and he’ll outdo himself for you!”
The breath was tight in my throat. Somebody had ripped out my tongue and replaced it with an awkward wad of cotton. “All right,” I said. “It looks like you got me. What you want me to do?”
“I’ve written out something here,” Dill said. “If you’ll just sign it — ”
He was grinning as he slowed down and pulled the car into the curb before a vacant lot. He reached into his inner coat pocket.
I moved fast. I brought the side of my police positive down hard just behind Dill’s right ear.
He crumpled forward over the steering wheel. The blonde screamed and dove for the door. I grabbed her with my right and yanked her back hard. I shoved Dill over between us and climbed over into the front seat. The whole thing took less than the time it takes to tell it.
The blonde sat there whimpering but she didn’t make a move for that door again. She knew I’d break her arm off before I’d let her out of that car.
Hell, I don’t know who they thought they were dealing with. But one thing I knew. This was still going to be my show. I wasn’t giving up just when I’d found what a chump I’d been. I had me a mission now. Liza, baby, don’t you cry. I’m on my way home.
“What are you going to do?” Helen wailed when I started the engine.
The grin I gave her nearly ripped my mouth. “Don’t worry, baby. I’m going to take care of everything.”
I didn’t speak to her again. I stepped up Dill’s car to fifty as I worked my way through the outskirts to the north side of town. I whipped through Sulphur Springs and turned right through Temple Terrace.
The town faded behind me. The tires whistled on the curves. Seventy, Eighty. There was a place I knew.
Once I glanced at Helen. She was watching me and her face was contorted. I don’t think I ever saw a woman so afraid. I thought she was paralyzed but when I laughed at her, she clawed at the door. She was trying to get out of the car even at this speed. I slammed the back of my hand across her face.
I must have hit her harder than I intended, or else she fainted. Anyway, she slumped against Dill, out cold.
I never remembered the place I was looking for was so far from town. It was the longest ride in the country I ever took. The pines got thicker and the sun was cut off from the road. It must have been my imagination, but I was sure it got colder in the car.
I kept waiting for Dill to come out of it. But he didn’t. I must have put more power behind that blow than I realized.
There was a sand road and I whipped Dill’s car off the narrow highway onto it. The road was short. It wound through a dense thicket of water bushes, elders and bay and water oaks. There was a shack on a bluff overlooking the Hillsborough.
I could hear the sluggish swirl of the narrow black river below me when I halted Dill’s car. I stepped out on the loose gravel. I looked around. I took my time. I looked everywhere, and I waited, listening. There was no one in sight.
I uncapped the bottle of whisky. I looked at the bottle a moment. Then I glanced in at the sleeping people inside that car. I had to have a drink. The liquor warmed me, steeled me. I looked in at Dill and the blonde. They were still out. I went over to the shack. It had a rusty padlock on the door.
I kicked it off. The wood was rotten. The shack was old, in rotten shape since I had last used it for hunting and fishing, several summers ago.
Inside I found the rope I knew was there. I took it with me. Back at the car, I dragged the blonde out first, tied her hands and feet. Not too tightly.
I dragged her into the shack, propped her against the corner. Dill followed her, tied up the same way, only tight.
I figured it would take her time to get herself free, longer to get the ropes off Dill. By the time they got out, it’d be dark. They’d have a long tough hike to find help.
I went back to the car, got in, pulled out the hand throttle, let the clutch in, shoved it into second gear. When I released the clutch, the motor roared.
The car lurched forward. Straight toward the cliff side. It hung crazily for a moment on the brink. It was a long rocky way down to that narrow span of water. I watched, tense.
It toppled, spun out over the side of the sheer precipice. I watched the car being battered all the way down the incline. It toppled far out into the water. Dill and his blonde were going to look hard to find a car to drive back in.
I heard something. I don’t know what. A rabbit. Somebody walking. A car on the highway. A meadowlark. But my nerves were drawn to a hairline.
I scrambled back up on the cliff and ran. I ran into the bushes and I kept moving, downstream. I tried to follow a bridle path, but I was in too much of a hurry. Hell, no horse was fast enough for me. Because now I knew.
The devil was on my tail.
Chapter 16
IT TOOK me an hour to get back down that damn river to Nebraska Avenue.
I tried to tell myself that I could be calm. I still had a little time. But I wasn’t so sure. When the devil starts riding your tail, you don’t get much time out for breathing.
A bus came along and I hailed it. But when I had slumped into my seat by the window, I realized what a mistake I had made. It seemed t
o me everybody on the bus was staring at my ripped and stained clothes. I looked as though I had been on a two-day drunk. I looked like what I was. A dangerous character.
I wanted to jump up and run off that bus. I saw a bar up ahead and I jerked the signal cord. The bus lurched to a stop and I slunk off it, feeling all the eyes burning into the back of my neck.
I stumbled across the sidewalk and into the cool darkness of the bar. There were only a few people at the bar. But all of them stared at my torn clothing. It was all I could do to keep from snarling at them. I’d beat their heads off. I’d fix ’em. But I knew better. I couldn’t start anything. I had to be careful. I had something special to do.
I got out of there. I knew what I had to do now. I knew I had to get Liza and get her out of this town.
I had to hurry.
I walked across the street to a run-down second-hand clothing store. The place looked shoddy and smelled damp and sour. But I had to have some different clothes — and quick. “I got into a kind of mess,” I told the little round-shouldered proprietor. “I can’t go home like this. My wife. She’ll raise Cain. You know.”
The little man just looked at me. “I’ll fix you up.”
He brought an ugly ill-fitting herringbone brown suit that wouldn’t have cost twenty dollars with two pairs of pants when it was new. “Be twenty-five dollars,” the little man said.
He knew something was wrong. He knew I wasn’t going to argue. I didn’t. I paid him. Then I changed clothes behind a curtain in the rear of the store. I watched the little man while I changed. And when I wasn’t watching the little man, I was watching the street outside his door. I got out of there fast.
• • •
There was a taxi at the corner. I pulled my hat down so it shaded my eyes and got in the hack. I rode out to Grand Central. I got out at a Spanish restaurant. I went inside and found a telephone booth. I called Liza. The telephone rang twenty times before she answered.
“Oh, thank God,” she said. “I’ve been afraid to answer the phone. When you went away with that Dill, I was frightened.”
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