One Endless Hour

by Dan J. Marlowe

  "That'll do for this one," Dahl assured me. He led the way to the bedroom of the eleven-year-old across the hall. The mechanics of the operation went exactly the same except that Dahl wasn't quite as rough. "Lie still, honey. Nobody's gonna hurt you," he whispered before we departed.

  Ellen's room was next. I was afraid of this one. It was unlikely that the seventeen-year-old would be as heavy a sleeper as the younger children. The door to her room was closed. Dahl eased it open an inch at a time.

  I was standing right behind him. I couldn't imagine why he kept opening the door wider and wider, far more than was necessary to slip inside. I put my lips to his ear. "What's the matter?" I murmured.

  He opened the door all the way and moved to one side to let me see for myself.

  Ellen Barton's bed was neatly turned down, but it hadn't been slept in.

  And of Ellen Barton herself there was no trace.

  13

  "D'you think she's sleepin' at a girl friend's?" Dahl muttered.

  "More likely a boyfriend's," I replied, thinking of the Schemer's report on the elder Barton daughter. "Let's make sure of the Bartons."

  Ellen Barton's disappearance from her room was just one more thing gone wrong in a night notably full of same. We backed out of her bedroom and moved down the hall. The door to the master bedroom was closed, too. I could hear snoring.

  There was no need for finesse now. There was no one left to be wakened by a scream. I opened the bedroom door and walked in. Behind me, Dahl flicked on the light switch. Dahl and I were standing on either side of the bed by the time Thomas Barton struggled from the depths of sleep to a sitting position. Thelma Barton snored on.

  The bank manager blinked at Dahl's mask. "What- what-" he stammered.

  "Quiet," Dahl ordered. His eyes on the sleeping Thelma Barton, he picked up the husband's pillow.

  At the sound of Dahl's voice, the snoring stopped. Thelma Barton spoke with her eyes closed. "Put out that light, Tom," she said. "You shouldn't have had that last bottle of beer."

  "Dear," her husband began.

  I don't know what it was she thought she heard in his voice, but her eyes snapped open. I could see the scream starting from her toes. Dahl saw it, too. He dropped the pillow onto her face. The scream dissipated itself in a hissing sound. Dahl held the pillow in place till she stopped fighting it. "Quiet," he warned again, and removed the pillow.

  Thelma Barton sat up. She was the picture of indignation. Her hair was in curlers and her nightgown had slipped off one shoulder, disclosing an undersized breast. "You two will go to the electric chair for this," she proclaimed, jerking the gown back into place. She had a jaw-line like a grenadier guard. "Where are my children?" she demanded, glaring at Dahl.

  "In their beds," Dahl replied. I could tell from his voice he was enjoying himself. "Except Ellen."

  "Except Ellen?" Mrs. Barton's voice rose an octave. "What do you mean 'except Ellen'?"

  "Her bed hasn't been slept in."

  "Hasn't been-" Thelma Barton's bare feet hit the floor with a splat. Beneath her gown, her long, thin legs scissored toward the doorway. Dahl followed her. I could sense his smirk at the woman's semitransparent dishabille.

  When they disappeared down the hallway, I looked at the man in the bed. "We're going to the bank shortly," I said.

  "The bank!" he exclaimed, his eyes bulging. "I thought-"

  "It's not a house burglary."

  "But you can't possibly hope to accomplish-"

  I was listening to Thelma Barton's audible return from her daughter's room. "Imagine!" she was saying as she burst into the master bedroom. "That vixen has gone out over the roof again! After all our lectures, Tom! I'll-"

  "Get dressed, Mrs. Barton," I said.

  "Dressed? What for?"

  "We're all going to the Mace home."

  She got the picture. Her tone lost some of its incisive-ness. "What about Margie and Tommy?"

  "They'll come when Tommy delivers his paper route."

  "How did you know-"

  "Evidently they have it all planned, dear," Thomas Barton said quietly. "For the children's sake, we must do what they say." He slid out of bed. He was a short, paunchy man. Both Bartons began to dress.

  I moved over to Dahl, who was lounging in the doorway. "Sure wish I'd brought my camera inside with me," he said wistfully. He was eyeing Thelma Barton's struggle to dress under cover of her nightgown.

  "You stay here and wait for Ellen," I said to Dahl in an undertone. "I'll take this pair to the Mace's, then come back and go with the kids on the boy's paper route when it's time. Margie's presence should assure Tommy's cooperation. When I'm ready to take them to the other house, hopefully you'll have corralled Ellen and added her to the collection. Give me your car keys and"-mentally I counted heads-"five pairs of your tie-cords."

  Dahl handed them over. Five minutes later I ushered Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Barton out the back door of their home. I had no fear of antics on their part. They knew that Dahl was remaining with the children.

  I drove Dahl's rental to the Mace house and delivered the Bartons to Preacher Harris in the basement. I had time only for a glimpse of the startled looks on four faces as the Maces and the Bartons met under other-than-ordinary circumstances. Rachel was as beamingly nude as before although there was a shredded sheet beside her on the mattress floor. "I tried to cover her up but she tears everything," Harris explained.

  "So I see." I handed him the tie-cords. "You've got enough here now so they might be tempted to jump you. Tie them up. The girl first." I explained the hangup with Ellen and the fact that Dahl was waiting for her. "I'll be back with the kids," I concluded.

  I left the house and started down the driveway to the car. A police cruiser was moving slowly through the block, one of the occasional "irregulars" that the Schemer had warned the police put on to avoid being typed by people like us. I stopped in the shadows. The cruiser's spotlight flicked on and lingered on the rental license plate, but the cruiser kept on going.

  The danger would come on the cruiser's next swing through the area, if there was a next swing. Nine nights out of ten all the cops would have been back at the station, drinking coffee and writing up their reports, but this was the tenth night. One more look at those rental plates and the cop in the cruiser was liable to stop and try to find out the reason for its presence.

  I went back into the house and called down to Harris in the basement. He came halfway up the stairs, looking angry. "I'm going to gag that goddam Barton woman," he declared.

  "What's the matter?"

  "She's getting everyone upset, running her mouth about the criminal irresponsibility involved in keeping the idiot girl a prisoner all these years. Mrs. Mace is almost in tears, and the two men are sitting there trying not to listen. We don't want Mace upset before he gets to the bank, do we?"

  "Suit yourself about the gag, but find out from Mace where he keeps his car keys." I explained about the police cruiser. "I'm going to drive the Mace car and put the rental job in his driveway."

  "Good deal." Harris went down the steps. "They're in a mixing bowl inside the first wall cabinet as you come in the back door," he called up to me in a moment.

  "Right." I closed the basement door. I found the car keys and went outside again. I switched cars, although the sound of the Mace Rambler station wagon's engine made me uneasy. The car was unlikely to be dependable for anything but short hauls.

  Dahl was waiting for me at the head of the stairs when I climbed to the second floor of the Barton home. He was grinning widely. "Ellen came in the window ten minutes ago," he said. "And would you believe she's stoned on Mary Jane? How do you like these small-town kids?"

  "Let's take a look at her," I said.

  Dahl led the way to her bedroom. "She'd never have made it if a couple of her pals hadn't boosted her up onto the porch roof. You never heard such giggling," he said. He turned on a bedside lamp. A tall, black-haired, beautiful girl was sprawled on her side in the bed, clad on
ly in a pair of transparent panties. She was breathing raggedly but deeply. I could detect the sweetish odor of marijuana. A trail of feminine clothing extended from the open window to the bed. "She shed her clothes like they were on fire," Dahl continued. "How we gonna move her to the other house?"

  "Mummified in a blanket, if we have to."

  Dahl was staring down at the girl on the bed. "Great pair of teats. Nothin' wrong with the ass, either, even if she has been workin' it overtime tonight."

  "Working it overtime?"

  He smiled knowingly. "You don't have the eye for these things that I have, cousin. That isn't goose grease smeared all over her pussy hair."

  I turned away from the bed. "Tie her up in case she comes around. Then we'll wait downstairs for Tommy's papers."

  Dahl rejoined me in a few moments in the downstairs sitting room. "I just checked the younger kids," he said. "They're okay. The Little girl is mad, though. When I took her gag off for a second, she told me I was a bad man." Dahl chuckled.

  We sat in darkness, waiting. I was trying to think of so many things at once that my nerves were fluttering. Had we overlooked anything? What exactly remained to be done, and in what order? I made mental lists, adding and subtracting.

  A whistling noise brought me halfway up out of my chair. I stared through the window at the darkened porch. The noise was repeated, and I realized that it was behind me. The whistle ended in a snort. Dahl had fallen asleep and was snoring. I reached out a foot and kicked him in the ankle. "What the hell, Dahl! Do your sleeping later!"

  "Restin' my eyes," he grunted. "The papers here?"

  "Not yet. Stay awake and listen for them. I'm going upstairs and get the kids ready."

  I climbed the staircase and went into Tommy's darkened room. I sat down on the edge of the bed beside him before speaking. "You and Margie and I are going to deliver your papers this morning, Tommy," I said. "I know the number of your deliveries and where you make them. If you're tempted to give an alarm, Margie will still be in the car with me. Do you understand?" He nodded, and I removed his gag and his wrist and ankle cords. "Get dressed," I told him.

  I went across the hall to Margie's bedroom. Despite her uncomfortable tied-up position, she had fallen asleep. The healthy nerves of children. "You and I are going with Tommy when he delivers his papers, Margie," I said to her when I shook her awake. "If you try to give an alarm, it won't go well with Tommy." I removed her bonds. "Now get dressed."

  I was on my way across the hall again when Dahl's whistle floated up the front stairs. "The papers just came," he informed me when I went to the head of the stairs.

  "We'll be right down."

  I went back into Margie's room. She was dressed in blouse and shorts, and her face was damp from a quick washing. I motioned toward her socks and sneakers on the floor. "Bring those along and we'll go to Tommy's room."

  She led the way, her pigtails bouncing on her slender shoulders. There was a light on in Tommy's room. The boy was seated on the edge of his bed, dressed. I was getting my first good look at him. He was a handsome kid with wavy dark hair and a clear complexion but with a sullen expression. He grinned at his sister but said nothing.

  I moved to turn out the light. "Better leave it on," he said casually. "People are used to seein' lights upstairs here at this time of the morning." He had a point. I removed my hand from the switch. "Where's Ellen?" he continued.

  "In her room."

  "Flaked out as usual?"

  I glanced at Margie, who had seated herself on the bed and was drawing on socks and sneakers. "She's asleep."

  "Asleep!" he said derisively. "Stupid broad!"

  I studied him. "You feel that way about Margie, too?"

  "Not yet." He grinned. "She still thinks it's to sit on. She'll be givin' it away one of these days, though."

  "I do too know what it's for!" Margie said indignantly.

  "That Ellen, though," Tommy went on. He shook his head. "A commercial setup I could at least understand. She-"

  "That's enough of that," I cut him off, looking at the pigtailed Margie.

  "Oh, I know all about Ellen!" the younger girl said scornfully. "She hasn't got brains enough to sell it."

  Eleven years old, I thought to myself. Eleven years old.

  "Stop showing off, Marge," Tommy frowned. He was looking at me. "This is about the bank, isn't it?"

  I saw no point in lying. "Yes."

  "I hope you take 'em for plenty," he said. His tone was serious. "I hope you shake up the whole crummy town."

  "Why?"

  "Because you'd be hittin' 'em where it hurts. All the parents I know spend their time tryin' to figure out how to swindle someone. At least you've got the guts to go take it."

  I remembered something. "How many mornings a week do you take a violin lesson?" I asked the girl.

  "Only on Mondays."

  "You really cased this job, huh?" Tommy said. He was looking at me with respect. "If I was a couple years older, I'd go with you." He scuffed at the carpeting with a sneakered foot. "I'm at a hell of an age," he concluded gloomily.

  "You certainly are," Margie said smugly. "Standing in front of your mirror nights and admiring-"

  He reached out and slapped her. She jumped up from the bed and kicked him in the shins. I grabbed a shoulder of each and pulled them apart. This was a demonstration of the familial love I'd been depending upon to make the pair solicitous of each other's welfare? I felt gloomy myself.

  I marched them down the stairs. Margie slid behind me as Dahl approached us. Evidently his size impressed her, if anything impressed her generation. I took the wrapped and tied bundle of papers that Dahl handed me, then herded my charges out the front door and onto the porch.

  "Hey, that's of Mace's car!" Tommy exclaimed at first glimpse of the Rambler across the street. "Is that where the folks are?" He followed up that question immediately with another. "Can I drive the car?"

  "You can deliver the papers," I told him. The sky was still dark but beginning to lighten. "You have twenty minutes."

  "I don't like the Maces," Margie announced. "They don't give parties."

  Once under way, the paper delivery went swimmingly. Tommy folded papers while Margie gave me driving directions in a superior tone of voice. She knew the route as well as her brother did. At each stop he opened the door on the passenger's side and with a flick of his wrist scaled folded papers toward doorways. His percentage of hits was high.

  There was only one untoward incident during the short run, but it was a heart stopper. In the middle of the second block of deliveries, I saw the same police cruiser heading toward us. Tommy was out of the car, firing a paper up onto a second-floor balcony. I placed a hand on Margie's arm. The cruiser stopped opposite us. Tommy turned in its direction and sailed the folded paper in his hand across the street and through the cruiser's open window. The cruiser blinked its lights and moved away. I breathed again. "Stupid cops," Tommy said contemptuously when he returned to the car for another paper. "They graft a free one from me every morning that they're out."

  "Stupid cops," Margie echoed.

  We completed the route and returned to the Barton home. Dahl was waiting inside the front door when I brought the kids in. "Get Ellen," I told him. "We're ready to go."

  He went upstairs. When he came down, he was half leading, half carrying the good-looking girl, whom he had swathed in a blanket. She looked the gathering over fuzzily. The pupils of her eyes were pinpoints, but I judged that the depth of her involvement was lessening. "How's the easiest lay in town this morning?" Tommy inquired with brotherly affection.

  "Shut up, you little wart." The girl's voice was blurry but functional. "What's-you're not cops. What's this all about?"

  "Shut up yourself and walk," Dahl ordered.

  She tried to kick him. His return kick was more accurate. I broke that one up and we went out to the Rambler. I drove. Ellen had drifted off into the land of hashish dreams again. When we reached the Mace house, Dahl carried
her inside. Harris heard us coming and met us at the top of the basement steps. He and Dahl muscled the tall girl's dead weight downstairs.

  The younger kids blinked at the transition from shadowy darkness outside to the stockade's bright illumination. Tommy's fascinated gaze fastened upon the slavering nude Rachel, who was chewing at the bonds on her wrists. Margie favored her brother with a superior sisterly smile.

  Harris had gagged Thelma Barton. Dahl dumped Ellen to the floor where she sprawled three-quarters out of the blanket, then marched over in front of Ellen's mother. "What the hell kind of a parent are you?" Dahl demanded. "Don't you know where your kids are nights? Don't you care?"

  Thelma Barton's features turned purple from the intensity of the abortive effort she made to reply. Dahl turned away. Harris drew me to one side. "Mrs. Mace wants to talk to you privately," he said. "She says it's important."

  "Bring her outside, then. And get the tie-cords off Barton and Mace and onto the kids."

  I went out into the basement proper. Harris led out Shirley Mace and then went back inside. The woman wasted no words. "There's a burglar alarm at the bank in the writing desk just inside the side door," she said. "You'll have to keep everyone away from it."

  I couldn't help thinking that never in my life had I had more cooperation from such unlikely sources. First the bank manager's kids, now the assistant bank manager's wife. "You have a reason for telling me this, of course."

  Her eyes met mine levelly. "I do. You're a ruthless man. I want you to kill Rachel before you leave. You can make it look like an accident."

  "Well, now-"

  "You'll be doing everyone concerned a favor," she insisted. Her tone turned acid. "I've spent twenty-two years in slavery because of George's truckling to his conscience. I don't propose to do it any longer. I've given you information which might easily make the difference in your getting away or not. You owe me a favor."

  "We'll see," I said in the manner of a parent speaking to a petulant child, avoiding the outright "no" because of fear of the resultant emotional explosion. "Get back inside." She hesitated as if there were something more she was about to say, then led the way.