The Collection

by Fredric Brown

  The old man walked with Wiley out of the house and down to the iron fence. After he'd closed the gate behind Wiley, he went over to the tree and untied the dog again.

  Wiley looked back over his shoulder at the gate, and at the sign upon it: “Beware of the Dog.”

  There was a padlock on the gate too, and a bell button set in the gatepost. If you wanted to see old man Erskine you had to push that button and wait until he'd come out of the house and tied up the dog and then unlocked the gate to let you in.

  Not that the padlocked gate meant anything. An able-bodied man could get over the fence easily enough. But once in the yard he'd be torn to pieces by that hound of hell Erskine kept for a watchdog.

  A vicious brute, that dog.

  A lean, underfed hound with slavering jaws and eyes that looked death at you as you walked by. He didn't run to the fence and bark. Nor even growl.

  Just stood there, turning his head to follow you, with his yellowish teeth bared in a snarl that was the more sinister in that it was silent.

  A black dog, with yellow, hate-filled eyes, and a quiet viciousness beyond ordinary canine ferocity. A killer dog.

  Yes, it was a hound of hell, all right.

  And a beast of nightmare, too. Wiley dreamed about it that night. And the next.

  There was something he wanted very badly in those dreams. Or somewhere he wanted to go. And his way was barred by a monstrous black hound, with slavering jowls and eyes that looked death at you. Except for size, it was old man Erskine's watchdog. The seed of murder grew.

  Wiley Hughes lived, as it happened, only a block from the old man's house. Every time he went past it on his way to or from work he thought about it. It would be so easy. The dog? He could poison the dog. There were some things he wanted to find out, without asking about them. Patiently, at the office, he cultivated the acquaintance of the collector who had dealt with the old man before he had been transferred to another route. He went out drinking with the man several times before the subject of the old man crept into the conversation — and then, after they'd discussed many other debtors. “Old Erskine? The guy's a miser, that's all. He pays for that stock on time because he can't bear to part with a big chunk of money all at once. Ever see all the money he keeps in—?”

  Wiley steered the conversation into safer channels. He didn't want to have discussed how much money the old man kept in the house.

  He asked, “Ever see a more vicious dog than that hellhound of his?”

  The other collector shook his head. “And neither did anybody else. That mutt hates even the old man. Can't blame him for that, though; the old geezer half starves him to keep him fierce.”

  “The hell,” said Wiley. “How come he doesn't jump Erskine then?”

  “Trained not to, that's all. Nor Erskine's son — he visits there once in a while. Nor the man who delivers groceries.

  But anybody else he'd tear to pieces.”

  And then Wiley Hughes dropped the subject like a hot coal and began to talk about the widow who was always behind in her payments and who always cried if they threatened to foreclose.

  The dog tolerated two people besides the old man. And that meant that if he could get past the dog without harming it, or it harming him, suspicion would be directed toward those two people.

  It was a big if, but then the fact that the dog was underfed made it possible. If the way to a man's heart is through his stomach, why not the way to a dog's heart?

  It was worth trying.

  He went about it very carefully. He bought the meat at a butcher shop on the other side of town. He took every precaution that night, when he left his own house heading into the alley, that no one would see him.

  Keeping to the middle of the alley, he walked past old man Erskine's fence, and kept walking. The dog was there, just inside the fence, and it kept pace with him, soundlessly.

  He threw a piece of meat over the fence and kept walking.

  To the corner and back again. He walked just a little closer to the fence and threw another piece of meat over. This time he saw the dog leave the fence and run for the meat.

  He returned home, unseen, and feeling that things were working out his way. The dog was hungry; it would eat meat he threw to it. Pretty soon it would be taking food from his hand, through the fence.

  He made his plans carefully, and omitted no factor. The few tools he would need were purchased in such a way that they could not be traced to him. And wiped off fingerprints; they would be left at the scene of the burglary. He studied the habits of the neighborhood and knew that everyone in the block was asleep by one o'clock, except for two night workers who didn't return from work until four-thirty.

  There was the patrolman to consider. A few sleepless nights at a darkened window gave him the information that the patrolman passed at one and again at four.

  The hour between two and three, then, was the safest.

  And the dog. His progress in making friends with the dog had been easier and more rapid than he had anticipated. It took food from his hand, through the bars of the alley fence.

  It let him reach through the bars and pet it. He'd been afraid of losing a finger or two the first time he'd tried that.

  But the fear had been baseless.

  The dog had been as starved for affection as it had been starved for food.

  Hound of hell, hell! He grinned to himself at the extravagance of the descriptive phrase he had once used.

  Then came the night when he dared climb over the fence.

  The dog met him with little whimpers of delight. He'd been sure it would, but he'd taken every precaution possible. Heavy leather leggings under his trousers. A scarf wrapped many times around his throat. And meat to offer, more tempting than his own. There was nothing to it, after that.

  Friday, then, was to be the night. Everything was ready.

  So ready that between eight o'clock in the evening and two in the morning, there was nothing for him to do. So he set and muffled his alarm, and slept.

  Nothing to the burglary at all. Or the murder.

  Down the alley, taking extra precautions this time that no one saw him. There was enough moonlight for him to read, and to grin at, the “Beware of the Dog” sign on the back gate.

  Beware of the dog! That was a laugh, now. He handed it a piece of meat through the fence, patted its head while it ate, and then he vaulted over the fence and went up toward the house.

  His crowbar opened a window, easily.

  Silently he crept up the stairs to the bedroom of the old man, and there he did what it was necessary for him to do in order to be able to open the safe without danger of being heard.

  The murder was really necessary, he told himself.

  Stunned — even tied up — the old man might possibly have managed to raise an alarm. Or might have recognized his assailant, even in the darkness.

  The safe offered a bit more difficulty than he had anticipated, but not too much. Well before three o'clock —with an hour's factor of safety — he had it open and had the money.

  It was only on his way out through the yard, after everything had gone perfectly, that Wiley Hughes began to worry and to wonder whether he had made any possible mistake. There was a brief instant of panic.

  But then he was safely home, and he thought over every step he had taken, and there was no possible clue that would lead the police to suspect Wiley Hughes.

  Inside the house, in sanctuary, he counted the money under a light that wouldn't show outside. Monday he would put it in a safe deposit box he had already rented under an assumed name.

  Meanwhile, any hiding place would serve. But he was taking no chances; he had prepared a good one. That afternoon he had spaded the big flower bed in the back yard.

  Now, keeping close under cover of the fence, so he could not be seen in the remotely possible case of a neighbor looking from a window, lie scooped a hollow in the freshly spaded earth.

  No need to bury it deep; a shallow hole, refilled, in the
freshly turned soil would be best, and could never on earth be detected by human eyes. He wrapped the money in oiled paper, buried it, and covered the hole carefully, leaving no trace whatsoever.

  By four o'clock he was in bed, and lay there thinking pleasantly of all the things that he could do with the money once it would be safe for him to begin spending it.

  It was almost nine when he awakened the next morning.

  And again, for a moment, there was reaction and panic. For seconds that seemed hours he lay rigidly, trying to recall everything he had done. Step by step he went over it and gradually confidence returned.

  He had been seen by no one; he had left no possible clue.

  His cleverness in getting past the dog without killing it would certainly throw suspicion elsewhere.

  It had been easy, so easy, for a clever man to commit a crime without leaving a single lead. Ridiculously easy. There was no possible—

  Through the open window of his bedroom he heard voices that seemed excited about something. One of them sounded like the voice of the policeman on the day shift.

  Probably, then, the crime had been discovered. But why—?

  He ran to the window and looked out.

  A little knot of people were gathered in the alley behind his house, looking into the yard.

  His gaze turned more directly downward and he knew then that he was lost. Across the freshly turned earth of the flower bed, strewn in wild profusion, was a disorderly array of banknotes, like flat green plants that had sprouted too soon.

  And asleep on the grass, his nose beside the torn oiled paper in which Wiley had brought him the meat and which Wiley had used later to wrap the banknotes, was the black dog.

  The dangerous, vicious, beware-of-the-dog, the hound of hell, whose friendship he had won so thoroughly that it had dug its way under the fence and followed him home.

  LITTLE BOY LOST

  There was a knock on the door. Gram put the sock she was mending back into the work basket in her lap and then moved the work basket to the table, ready to get up.

  But by that time Ma had come out of the kitchen and, wiping her hands on her apron, opened the door. Her eyes went hard.

  The smile of the sleek young man in the hallway outside the door showed two gold teeth. He shoved his hat back from his forehead and said: “How ya, Mrs. Murdock? Tell Eddie I'm-”

  “Eddie ain't here.” Ma's voice was hard like her eyes.

  “Ain't, huh? Said he'd be at the Gem. Wasn't there so I thought—”

  “Eddie ain't here.” There was finality in Ma's repetition.

  A tense finality that the man in the hallway couldn't pretend to overlook.

  His smile faded. “If he comes in, you remind him. Tell him I said nine-thirty's the time.”

  “The time for what.” There wasn't any rising inflection in Ma Murdock's voice to stamp those four words as a question.

  There was a sudden narrowing of the eyes that looked at Ma. The man with the gold teeth said: “Eddie'll know that.”

  He turned and walked to the stairs.

  Ma closed the door slowly.

  Gram was working on the sock again. Her high voice asked: “Was that Johnny Everard, Elsie? Sounded a bit like Johnny's voice.”

  Ma still faced that closed door. She answered without turning around. “That was Butch Everard, Gram. No one calls him Johnny any more.”

  Gram's needle didn't pause.

  “Johnny Everard,” she said. “He had curls, Elsie, a foot long. I 'member when his dad took him down to the barber shop, had 'em cut off. His ma cried. He had the first scooter in the neighborhood, made with roller-skate wheels. He went away for a while, didn't he?”

  “He did,” said Ma. “For five years. I wish—”

  “Used to be crazy about chocolate cake,” said Gram.

  “When he'd leave our paper, I'd give him a slice every time I'd baked one. But, my, he was in eighth grade when Eddie was just starting in first. Isn't he a bit old to want to play with Eddie? I used to say your father—”

  The querulous voice trailed off into silence. Ma glanced at her. Poor Gram, living in a world that was neither past nor present, but a hodgepodge of them both. Eddie was a man now — almost. Eddie was seventeen. And sliding away from her. She couldn't seem to hold him any longer.

  Butch Everard and Larry and Slim. Yes, and the crooked streets that ran straight, and the dark pool halls that were brightly lighted, and the things that Eddie hid from her but that she read in his eyes. There were things you didn't know how to fight against.

  Ma walked to the window and looked down on the street three floors below. A few doors down, at the opposite curb, stood Eddie's recently acquired jalopy. He'd told her he'd bought it for ten bucks, but she knew better than that. It wasn't much of a car, as cars go, but it had cost him at least fifty.

  And where had that money come from?

  Steady creak-creak of Gram's rocker. Ma almost wished she were like Gram, so she wouldn't lie awake nights worrying herself sick until she had to take a sleeping powder to get some sleep. If there was only some way she could make Eddie want to settle down and get a steady job and not run around with men like—

  Gram's voice cut across her thoughts. “You ain't lookin' so well, Elsie. Guess none of us are, though. It's the spring, the damp air and all. I made up some sulphur and molasses for us. Your pa, he used to swear by it, and he never had a sick day until just the week before he died.”

  Ma's tone was lifeless. “I'm all right, Gram. I — I guess I worry about Eddie. He—”

  Gram nodded her gray head without looking up. “Has a cold coming on. He don't get outdoors enough daytimes. Boy ought to play out more. But you look downright peaked, Elsie.

  Used to be the purtiest girl on Seventieth Street. You worry about Eddie. He's a good boy.”

  Ma whirled. “Gram, I never said I thought he wasn't—”

  Gram chuckled. “Brought home a special merit star on his report card, didn't he? And I met his teacher on the street, and she say, says she: 'Mrs. Garvin, that there grandson of yours — ' ”

  Ma sighed and turned to go back to the kitchen to finish the dishes. Gram was back in the past again. It was eight years ago, when he was nine, that Eddie'd brought home that report card with the special merit star on it. That was when she'd hoped Eddie would—“Elsie, you take a big spoonful of that sulphur 'n' molasses. Over the sink there. I took mine for today a'ready.”

  “All right, Gram.” Ma's steps lagged. Maybe she'd failed Eddie; she didn't know. What else could she do? How could she make Butch Everard let him alone? What did Butch want with him?

  There was a dull ache in her head and a heavy weight in her chest. She glanced up at the clock over the door of the kitchen, and her feet moved faster. Eight-forty, and she wasn't through with the supper dishes.

  Eddie Murdock awoke with a start as the kitchen door closed. It was dark. Golly, he hadn't meant to fall asleep. He lifted his wrist quick to look at the luminous dial of his watch, and then felt a quick sense of relief. It was only eight-forty.

  He had time. Then he grinned in the darkness, a bit proud that he had been able to take a nap. Tonight of all nights, and he'd been able to fall asleep.

  Why, tonight was the night. Lucky he'd waked up. Butch sure wouldn't have liked it if he'd been late or hadn't showed up. But if it was only eight-forty he had lots of time to meet the boys. Nine-thirty they met, and ten o'clock was it.

  Suppose his wrist watch was wrong, though. It was a cheap one. With a sudden fear he jumped off the bed and ran to the window to look at the big clock across the way. Whew!

  Eight-forty it was — on the dot.

  Everything was ducky then. Golly, if he'd overslept or anything, Butch would have thought he was yellow. And —why, he wasn't even worried. Hell, he was one of the gang now, a regular, and this was his first crack at something big.

  Real money.

  Well, not big money, maybe, but that box office ought to have enough do
ugh to give them a couple hundred apiece.

  And that wasn't peanuts.

  Butch had all those angles figured. He'd picked the best night, the night the most dough came in that window, and he'd timed the best hour — ten o'clock — just before the box office closed. Sure, they were being smart, waiting until all the money had come in that was coming in. And the getaway was a cinch, the way Butch had planned it.

  Eddie turned on the light and then crossed over to the mirror and examined himself critically as he straightened his necktie and ran the comb through his hair. He rubbed his chin carefully, but he didn't seem to need a shave.

  He winked at his reflection in the glass. That was a smart guy in there looking back at him. A guy that was going places. If a guy proved to Butch that he was a right guy and had the nerve, he could get in on all kinds of easy money.

  He pulled out the shoe box from under his dresser and gave his already shiny shoes another lick with the polisher to make them shinier. The leather was a little cracked on one side. Well, after tonight he'd get new shoes and a couple of new suits. A few more jobs, and he'd get a new car like Butch's and scrap the old jalop'.

  Then — although the door of his room was closed — he looked around carefully before he reached down into the very bottom of the shoe box and took out something which was carefully concealed by being wrapped in the old polishing cloth, the one that wasn't used any more.

  It was a little nickel-plated thirty-two revolver, and he looked at it proudly. It didn't matter that the plating was worn off in a few spots. It was loaded and it would shoot all right.

  Just yesterday Butch had given it to him. “ 'Sall right, kid,” Butch had said. “It'll do for this here job. There ain't gonna be no shootin' anyway. Just one bozo in the box office that'll fold up the minute he sees guns. He'll shell out without a squawk. And outa your share get yourself something good.

  A thirty-eight automatic like mine maybe, and a shoulder holster.”

  The gun in his hand felt comfortingly heavy. Good little gun, he told himself. And his. He'd sure keep it even after he'd got himself a better one.