by Gil Brewer
I tried fixing a stiff drink. It only made things worse. So I quit trying to sleep. I took a scratch pad, and pencil, and got in bed, and lay there figuring loopholes. I made lists of everything I could think of. I put her down in black and white. Shirley Angela. I tried to coldly analyze all the movements she would make from the time Victor had The Attack until after the will was probated, and we had the money, and then the waiting after that. I’d find myself lying back staring into a misty pastel Rio de Janeiro, with her laughing and pushing against me with her hip, or maybe the two of us lying in a ritzy hotel bedroom on one of those oversized beds. And she would be naked, with that auburn hair fanned out around her head on the pillow.
So then I began all over again, with the intercom units. I would solder the coupling condenser to the grid terminal, and do a sloppy job.
I thought about how I would act, how sorry I would be when they told me it was my fault he died. So I got off that tack, right away, and began thinking about the big beds with her again, and somewhere along in there I konked off and Shirley Angela turned into Mayda Lamphier. I kept chasing Mayda Lamphier through an endless living room full of TV sets. She would stand on a TV set, and take off pieces of clothing, until she was leaping from one TV set to the other with nothing on but a raggedy blouse, flapping out behind her. I caught her. Just as I got my hands on her, she gave a yell, and this Doctor Miraglia popped up from behind all the TV sets. I came awake in a sweat.
I got up and burned all the paper I’d been figuring on, and flushed it down the john. It was daylight outside.
The buzzer sounded. It was Grace at the door.
“I just stopped over to say goodbye,” she said.
“Okay,” I said. “Goodbye.” I started to close the door.
“Goddamn you, Jack!”
She lunged against the door and came into the apartment. She stood there looking at me. I wasn’t sure whether she would cry or scream or what.
“I told you not to come here,” I said. “For Christ’s sake, it’s practically still dark outside.”
She began pacing up and down, rubbing her hands together. I watched her. I didn’t like any part of it. All I wanted to do was get her the hell out of here. She was slim and blonde, with a tightly packed, well-shaped body. She had on a fresh pink dress, and she wasn’t carrying anything, not even a purse. She always walked kind of heavy on her heels, and I watched her breasts jiggle as she moved around the room. She was trying to look determined, and having a hard time of it.
“What do you want?” I said. “Look, Grace. Start using your head, will you?”
She turned and stared at me for maybe three seconds, her eyes real cool. “All right, Jack. I wanted this to go right. I see it hasn’t. It never will. I’m going away, leaving town. I’ll quit bothering you. I wanted to say I’m sorry.” She started pounding toward the door, and stopped in front of me, and her lips twisted with it. “But I’m not sorry.”
“Okay. So long, Grace. Take care of yourself, for old times’ sake.”
She was a finagling woman. Sometimes she more than just scared me. I stood there waiting for her to go, afraid to say anything else for fear she’d take it wrong. No matter what you said, Grace would take it as an insult, or some kind of probe among her defenses.
“You won’t see me again,” she said. “Don’t worry.”
I still didn’t say anything. I wondered if she was going to start the suicide bit again. She didn’t. She kept looking at me for a minute, with her mouth kind of twisted up that way, then she went over to the door, and out into the hall. She slammed the door. I listened to her walking away down the hall, the heels smacking.
The next day was rough. I worked hard and got the intercom units wired into the house. I left the business about the television set on the ceiling in his bedroom until last, because I figured to get the intercoms in so he could fiddle with them and get tired of them as soon as possible.
We had a few minutes in the kitchen when I first started working; we went over everything together again. She had come up with one or two minor snags, like Doctor Miraglia showing right at the moment when Victor was dying, or Victor maybe somehow getting out of bed and running into the street because she wasn’t helping him. I told her those were chances we had to take. I convinced her they wouldn’t happen.
“I spoke to Mayda,” she said. “I told her Victor had to have absolute quiet from now on, and he mustn’t get excited, so she shouldn’t come into the house. I told her I was very sorry. She understood, all right.”
“She’s a big mouth,” I said. “She might mention it to Miraglia, later on, and he’d say he never gave any such orders.”
“I’ll tell him about her, when I see him. I’ll tell him I used him as an excuse to get rid of her because she’s such a bore.”
“Good. That’s perfect.”
“She mentioned you.”
“Yeah.”
“It’s all right, though. I fixed that. I told her you were an awful dope, stuff like that. How you couldn’t wait to finish the job. I didn’t make any big thing of it, of course.”
“Shirley,” I said. “I just thought of something. You’ll have to impress this on your mind until it’s an automatic action. The speakers I’m going to put up out back in the yard will have a volume control. You’ll have to see that they’re turned off. And as soon as he’s—gone, you’ll have to turn them on—and you can’t be seen doing it. It would cook us. If he started yelling over the intercom before the unit grounds out, somebody would sure as hell hear him.”
“Could they hear him from inside the house?”
“His voice is too weak to carry that far. Like as not, the unit will short right out. Now, don’t worry about that. I can do it perfect. But you’ve got to be sure you turn those speakers on, because that’s where you’ll say you were when it happened. In the dark, by the Gulf, sitting. You can say you like to sit out there at night.”
“I’ll remember. You’ll have to show me the volume controls.”
“Yeah.”
“Jack, you don’t think they’ll suspect us.”
“How can they? Don’t you worry. It’ll be my fault, like I said, and that won’t mean a thing. I’m just a television repairman, see? There’s nothing between you and me. We’ve only just met. That’s the first thing. Any number of people can attest to that. They’ll never suspect you. All they’ll think is that you got a break.” I hesitated, and pulled her to me, and kissed her, then let her go, because I didn’t want anything starting up right then. “Know what the word will be?” I said. “They’ll say, Poor old Spondell, he’s better off dead. He was suffering. It’s a shame to say it, but you’re better off, and he’s better off. All these years you’ve nursed him, waited on him hand and foot. If they think anything bad, it’ll be counteracted by their own thoughts that he’s better off dead.”
“Don’t say it anymore, Jack.”
“I know. It kind of gets you, sometimes. But, listen, Shirley. We can’t be seen together, and you can’t call me. I’ll contact you somehow, if need be. We can use the alibi of my coming out here to adjust something—once, maybe twice. No more. I’ll be out once to solder the condenser. We should leave it at that.”
“I’ll go crazy.”
“No, you won’t.”
It wasn’t easy, the way she paraded around the rest of the day. She had on a pair of white shorts and a white sweater. The only thing that kept me from busting a seam was the thought of what we’d have when it was all over.
I explained to Victor how the unit in his room worked. He got a kick out of it. He was like a kid.
“All you have to do is flip that switch, and talk,” I told him. “Simple.”
“Maybe you’re not such a son of a bitch, after all, Ruxton,” he said, grinning up at me. There were little dabs of bright red coloring on his cheeks today, and his eyes were bright. He looked over where she was standing at the foot of the bed, by those feet. “Shirley,” he said. “Honey, you go out i
n the kitchen and listen for me. Say something.”
She did. It went on that way. He kept her jumping and pretty well tied up, talking nonsense from one room to the other, playing radio announcer, and imitating Jack Benny.
Like a kid, he was.
Just the same, he was going to die.
All the time I worked, I kept going over and over every point on the program. I examined each point from all angles. It occurred to me that Victor would want to show Miraglia how the intercoms worked. Shirley would have to go along with that and show some excitement. I told her, and she okayed it.
While I was out back putting up the two PA speakers, one on the coconut palm and the other on the side of the house, somebody called.
“Hello, handsome.”
It was Mayda Lamphier, over in her yard, beyond the hedge. I nodded and kept working. She stood there for a while, wanting to say something. She gave it up, and went inside her house.
I put the speakers down just low enough so Shirley could reach the volume controls.
We had to move his bed so I could fasten the TV set on the ceiling. I worked with a ladder, with him lying in bed, watching. I got the set up there with a sling hoist, and bolted it to brackets fastened through the ceiling to rafters.
Shirley kept saying, “Are you all right, Mr. Ruxton? Can I help you, Mr. Ruxton?”
I just grunted.
When I finished, I was knocked out, but it was up there to stay. You could chin yourself on it, if you wanted, it was that solid. There was a fair picture even without the antenna, so we rolled his bed over into place and let him watch some local hillbilly program. He seemed happy.
Outside, she held the ladder while I headed for the roof with the antenna.
“He can have two days to play around,” I said. “Will the doctor be here by then?”
“He comes tomorrow.”
“Good; then Victor can put on an exhibition with the intercoms and get that out of his system. He can have tomorrow and the next day—then I’m coming to fix the condenser.”
“How will I make him think something’s wrong?”
“I’ll show you,” I told her. “You’ll pull the main light switch, and knock everything out.”
She didn’t say anything. I looked at her and got that feeling. She was staring at me, with her eyes hot, her teeth tight together, and her lips parted a little.
She spoke softly. “I want to see you, Jack.”
“Yeah.”
“What will we do?”
“I don’t know.”
It was hell, what she did to me. She was right there, asking for it. And I could have her, only I couldn’t have her. She pushed against the edge of the ladder and said, “Jesus, Jack. What will we do?”
“We’ll have to wait,” I said. “You’ll have to be here when the doctor comes tomorrow. I want to know everything they do and say.”
“All right. But, I can’t wait, Jack. I’m burning up.”
“We’ve got to wait. You think it’s easy for me?”
She just watched me. Her look really got me. I went up the ladder fast, and put up the antenna, a double V, and fixed the lead. Then I came down and went in to see how Victor was making out.
“He’s sleeping,” she said. “He always naps along about now. He’ll sleep for at least fifteen minutes.”
Her eyes were foggy.
“Where’s the fuse box? There’s time to show you.”
I followed her out through the kitchen, watching the way she moved under those tight white shorts. The fuse box was in a utility room off the back of the house. There was a lot of junk in the room; a wicker clothes hamper, electric hot-water heater, washing machine, some garden tools, and an electric lawn mower. There was a big pile of clothes on the floor.
I showed her the switch and told her to pull it the first thing in the morning, three days from now, and then phone me at the store.
I turned on the light in the utility room, then pulled the main switch, to show her how everything went off. Then I turned the juice back on, and turned off the light.
“Jack?”
The utility room door was partially closed. We were in shadow. I turned when she spoke, hearing the way she breathed. It was like being dragged fast through a knot hole. She had peeled off those shorts and she wanted to make sure I knew it.
I held her and she squirmed and panted. “I couldn’t wait, Jack. I couldn’t wait!”
We fell down on the pile of clothes. Right then it started. All through the house, from every room. His voice. Calling. Echoing:
“Shirley? Hey, Honey. Oh, Shirl? Bring me a coke, will you? Hey, Shirley. Come on, Honey—calling all cars, come to the corner bedroom, Victor Spondell is in dire need of sustenance in the way of a cold Coca-Cola.”
She crouched and began to curse him. I’d never heard anything like it. The language she used would have shamed a drunken Marine.
“Honey? Shirl? Where are you? Calling all cars. Disregard code signals. Go to the bedroom of....”
I got up and hauled her to her feet.
“You’ve got to go in there. Get a move on.”
Her face was flushed, her mouth twitching.
“Hurry up,” I said.
She yanked her shorts on.
“You wait right here,” she said. “I’ll be back!”
She went into the kitchen. I heard her speak to him over the intercom, sweet as syrup, and he came back with some of his bright wit. The refrigerator door slammed and shook the place. I heard her uncap a bottle of coke and pour it into a glass. Then she thundered through the house.
I waited. Nothing. Silence.
I waited a long time, sitting on the pile of clothes.
Finally I went through the house, and looked into the bedroom. She was seated in a chair beside his bed, reading to him.
I said, “Sorry to interrupt. I guess everything’s in order now.”
She looked up at me. Her expression was as if somebody had shot her in the face with salt. “Victor wanted me to read to him,” she said. She turned to him, smiling. “I’ll have to pay Mr. Ruxton, now, Victor.”
“All right,” he said. He said to me, “Thanks for everything you’ve done, Ruxton. Sure appreciate it. Makes things a lot easier, eh?” He laughed and coughed a little.
She came out, fuming.
I said, “You’d better pay me, and I’ll write out a receipt, just in case.”
He had already written out a check, and she had cashed it at the bank, to cover the expense of the installations. She counted out the money in bills, from her purse.
“Wouldn’t he arrange for a joint account?” I said.
She shook her head. “He never went for that. He won’t let anybody take care of him but me. He could afford nurses around the clock, and live in the finest places. He wants it this way. But he writes the checks. Sometimes, when we’ve had little arguments, he’s hinted how I may have it tough now, but I’ll get mine, someday. I honestly think there’s a mean streak in him—he gets enjoyment out of doing things the way he does.”
We were in her bedroom. She was in bad shape.
I said, “Remember, after I fix that condenser, it’s not going to be easy. The units will probably go out, and you’ll have to stick close to his room, so it’ll seem they’re on. You won’t be able to talk back to him—he wouldn’t hear anything. It’s a ticklish part, Shirley. If he catches on, before anything happens, you’ll just have to call me and we’ll go through the whole thing again.”
“I couldn’t stand it.”
“Well, then I was thinking. If you can excite him, some way—help bring on an attack. Think you could swing it?”
“Yes. I’ve seen it happen.”
I took hold of her shoulders. “That’s what you’ll have to do. We’ve got to work fast, once I do that soldering job.”
“I wish he were dead. God, how I wish it.”
“He will be.”
There wasn’t anything in the world now, but us. I held her
close and tight and it all started up again. I had never wanted any woman the way I wanted Shirley Angela.
“Shirley?” His voice blared from the unit beside her bed. “This is Car 77, calling Headquarters....”
Seven
Waiting for her to call the store was a nightmare. Every time the phone rang, I had to grit my teeth to keep from jumping. I thought of a thousand things that could go wrong, but the big one was that she might lose her nerve.
Finally she called on the morning of the third day. I let Pete Stallsworth answer the phone, even though I was practically running standing still.
“Jack?” he said. “It’s for you.” He grinned, covered the mouthpiece, and whispered, “Sounds like real stuff. What a voice. Va-voom!”
“Okay.” I was plenty nervous. I said, “Ruxton speaking.”
“It’s all set,” she said. “I flipped the switch. And it’s like you said, Jack. It doesn’t bother him much that it’s not working. He’s over the excitement of it, and I’ve talked him into using it only for emergencies. I told him to remember, that was why we really had it installed. He’s taken to watching TV, now.”
“I see,” I said, loud enough so Pete Stallsworth could hear. “I’ll be right out. I’m very sorry you’ve had this inconvenience.”
“He just says to have it fixed.”
“All right.”
“There’s something I’d personally like fixed, too.”
“What’s that?”
“You guess.”
She could be like a bomb, sometimes. I went out there, driving the truck like a madman. I had been practicing soldering connections and making a sloppy job of it, for two days. The right kind of perfect, sloppy job. I had it so pat I could make a unit ground out with my eyes closed, and time it to within a matter of seconds.