The Bind

by Stanley Ellin

  Jake said: “Now I am like confused. How did I sound? Like George Wallace?”

  “You called him Raymond. His name happens to be Mr. Beaudry.”

  Jake said: “I stand corrected. In return, you ought to quit thinking a man might not have brains and nerve enough to be part of a highly successful blackmail ring because he happens to be colored. That’s what I call very deep-rooted prejudice.”

  Elinor looked blank. Then she said uncertainly: “No, it isn’t. I mean, you’re just turning it upside down.”

  “Right side up.” He removed the ticket from her hand and tossed it away. “No use taking a losing ticket home. Now let’s get going.”

  “It was only half losing.” Elinor pointed at the odds boards on the track. “I picked number three and number five on account of your age, and the five won. Only the three came in way back, and they don’t pay for half right, do they?”

  “Not on quiniellas.” He took her arm, but she held back.

  “Jake, it says only six minutes till the next race. Can’t we stay for it? I think three and five’ll be lucky this time. I’d like to put one more bet on it.”

  “Not with my money, sweetheart. I don’t have the courage of your convictions.”

  “All right, then I’ll buy my own ticket. Anyhow, that way I keep it all if I win.”

  They went outside after she bought the ticket, and watched the race from the rail near the finish line. A fine dirt raised by the pack sprayed the railbirds as the greyhounds went under the wire, number five in the lead, number three lagging far in the rear, and as Elinor brushed the dirt from her shoulders she said bitterly: “No-good, rotten dogs.”

  “Now you sound like an expert,” Jake said.

  43

  He woke to the sound of a torrential rain beating against the bedroom windows, looked at his wristwatch and saw it was twelve noon. Then he became aware that Elinor in her sleep had not only gathered his entire share of the blanket around her, but had, by some legerdemain, managed to extract his pillow from beneath his head and plant it over her own. She was sleeping like that now, head sandwiched between both pillows.

  He got into pajama pants and slippers, went into the study and dialed Magnes’ number. No answer. He had better luck with a garage, after trying several, and arranged for replacements for the Jag’s front tires. The arrangements settled, he phoned Magnes again. Still no answer.

  In the Florida room, he found the curtain against the broken window sodden, the floor beneath it a spreading pool of water. He taped a bath sheet over the window, mopped up the pool, and swept up the fragments of glass. The bullet hole in the living-room wall he covered with a large, ornately framed Boucher print from the bedroom, and finished off his housekeeping by cleaning up the glass and plaster on the floor. The torn and shattered remains of the Van Gogh he disposed of in the waste bin.

  One o’clock. He made another futile try at getting Magnes on the phone, then showered and shaved and went back to bed, where Elinor was still asleep with her head in the pillow sandwich. When he reclaimed his pillow and planted it under his head, she stirred a little. Then she said, barely exhaling the words: “What time?”

  “Almost seven.”

  “Is not. Went to bathroom eight o’clock.”

  “If you want to be argumentative about it,” Jake said, “it’s after one. Time to get up and make breakfast. I’m starved.”

  She peered at him through one half-open eye, then smiled broadly. “Mmm,” she said.

  “My sentiments, too. But I can’t live on love, so you’d better start renewing my strength quick. Skip the eggs or pancakes. Make it a steak and trimmings.”

  “Mmm,” she said again. “Steak’s not defrosted.” She opened both eyes wide. “Is that rain?”

  “Total.”

  “Do you have to go out in it?”

  “Not until I can get in touch with Magnes. So far, no luck.”

  Elinor said contentedly: “Rainy Sunday in bed.” She rid herself of the encumbering blanket and, naked, wormed her way up against him. “Maybe you can’t get in touch with him for a couple of days. We could have a bed-in and protest something.”

  “And what would a sellout like you have to protest? Hell, you’ve been completely corrupted by the Establishment. You even bet on dog races.”

  Elinor raised herself on an elbow and propped her chin in her hand. She said seriously: “You know, I was thinking about that. If they keep records, and you find out from them what two numbers win most of the time—”

  “Oh my God,” Jake said.

  “Well, wouldn’t you win most of the time, too, if you kept betting on those numbers?”

  “Of course. I’ll tell you what. Instead of letting you put the track out of business, I’ll book your bets for you myself. Just give me the numbers you want and the two dollars, and we’ll see how you make out in the papers next day.”

  He kept his face impassive while she studied it suspiciously. Then she shook her head. “If you want to do it that way, there must be a catch to it. You’d probably wind up with all my money, wouldn’t you?”

  “Better me than the track. Always keep it in the family, I say.”

  She laid her head on his chest and draped an arm and a leg over him. “That sounds nice. Family. Do you like the way I look first thing in the morning? That’s supposed to be the real test.”

  “All I ever see of you first thing is a pillow. I’m surprised you haven’t suffocated to death long ago.”

  “No, because there’s a place to breathe in between them. I’ve been doing it since I was a little kid. I slept on a couch in the front room, and my father and his friends used to play cards all night with that big light burning. But do you like what you see first thing when you can see me?”

  “I like it.”

  “I like the way you look, too. All over. I love it. I am in love, love, love. And I’m not gentle in my mind about it either. It’s like all strobe lights going around in it.”

  “Breakfast,” Jake said.

  “In a little while.” She slowly rubbed her leg back and forth over him. “Doesn’t that get you excited? Sure it does. I can tell it does. See? You don’t need any steak at all.”

  44

  Half an hour later, wearing nothing more than a hair ribbon, she went in to make breakfast while he tried another call to Magnes. When he sat down to the table, Elinor said: “Was he in?”

  “No. And you ought to put something on. You are sure as hell going to burn one of your vital assets bending over the stove in that condition.”

  She looked down at herself. “The only thing’s likely to happen to me is getting black and blue marks from you.” There was a garish bruise on her lower ribs in addition to the now fading one on her forehead. “Anyhow, I’m only going around like this to hold your interest.”

  “Well, you’re holding it. I get a thrill every time you lean over that frying pan. Did you ever play in one of those skin shows? The new, new, new theater bit?”

  She shook her head. “I answered some calls for them, but I never made it. Those calls were a real bad scene. I mean, the creepiest kind of people telling you to get undressed right there in the office, and you had to do it. And they’d have their creepy friends sitting around just to look at you for kicks. And I don’t think any of them had enough money to back a kiddie show for the PTA.”

  “Show biz,” said Jake.

  “I know. But it’s better now because some people in Equity got sore and made them stop. I mean, they can’t make you get undressed right in the office any more, and it’s different if you do it on stage. You don’t mind that.” She put his plate of bacon, eggs, and French fries before him. “How does that look?”

  “Almost as appetizing as you.”

  She served herself and sat down at the table. “Well, you deserve it. I mean, not only to build up your strength again, but because I was expecting the house to be a mess from last night, and you cleaned it all up. Only where’s the Sunday paper? Didn’t
they bring it today?”

  “I suppose so, but I didn’t bother to go out and get it. If it’s been lying out on the doorstep since six this morning, it’ll just be pulp by now.”

  But later, when he was in the study taping a detailed recitation of the case to date, she came in triumphantly with the bulky Sunday edition of the Miami Herald.

  “Dry?” Jake said.

  “They had it in a big plastic bag all tied up tight. I guess they deliver that way any time it rains. You want to look at it now?”

  “No, you can have it. I’d like to finish this first.”

  He finished the tape, played it back, and went into the living room, where Elinor was stretched out on the floor, sections of the paper scattered around her. She said: “Jake, what was the name of that organization Thoren was helping out? The one Nera told you about. Wasn’t it Avispa?”

  “It was.”

  She rattled a section of the paper at him. “So listen to this. The guy who used to be head of it died yesterday. Emilio Figueroa. And a few years back, the government almost put him in jail for buying one of those little baby submarines like the Japanese used in World War Two and fixing it up to fight Cuba, only they dropped the charges.”

  “Let’s see that,” Jake said.

  He read the brief news story and then the half-column given Figueroa on the obituary page. Emilio Figueroa, longtime associate of deposed Fulgencio Batista, combatant at the Bay of Pigs, founder of Avispa, a leading organization of Freedom Fighters against the Castro terror, dead of a heart attack at sixty. Five years ago, raised funds for the purchase and reconstruction of a wartime Japanese two-man submarine for the smuggling of saboteurs and their equipment into Red Cuba. Was indicted for illegally arming the boat, but the indictment was later dropped on a technicality. Counsel for Figueroa had been the office of State Senator Harlan Sprague.

  “Sprague,” Jake said. “Thoren’s brother-in-law,” and Elinor said mournfully, “I had to go bring in the paper. Now I probably spoiled the whole rest of the day for us.”

  “Spoiled nothing. This happens to be a stakeout, not Honeymoon Haven.”

  “Well, all right. You don’t have to sound that hairy about it.”

  “Forget how I sound. There’s something you told me about those old newspaper files you researched that ties in with this news story. Now what the hell was it?”

  Elinor shrugged. “Only that there wasn’t anything in them about a ship’s captain disappearing here. A ship’s officer.”

  “No.” He sat down on the couch and leaned forward toward her. “Now listen. Don’t say a word, just listen carefully. I picked you up at the library, and you got into the car all wound up because I was late, and you started talking off the top of your head. Just chatter. First it was about my being late, then something about the war. World War Two. But what was it you said?”

  “Well—” She arranged herself into an approximation of the lotus position and broodingly scratched an elbow. “Well, didn’t you ask how many of the newspapers I went through, and I told you?”

  “You told me more than that. Something about the war. The fighting. Come on, concentrate.”

  She tried, but quickly gave up on it. “It’s no use, Jake. I can’t think when you sit and look at me that way. Anyhow, what could be so important about what I said? It didn’t have anything to do with Thoren, did it?”

  “Yes. I have this feeling you somehow tied him in with the news story about Figueroa.”

  “Oh, a hunch.”

  Jake said: “Sweetheart, a good solid hunch simply means you’ve fitted some pieces of a puzzle together in your mind quicker than you can think. Somehow, what you said that time fitted together Thoren and Figueroa for me, as far back as World War Two. Now do you see why it’s important?”

  “I suppose so,” Elinor said doubtfully. Then she suddenly lit up with excitement. “Wait a second. Submarines. That’s what I told you about. There was a big fuss because some papers here gave out that German submarines were coming right up to Florida, and the government said it was supposed to be a secret. Jake—” She reached out and rocked his knee back and forth. “Hey, are you listening? What are you looking so glassy-eyed for?”

  “Submarines,” Jake said wonderingly. “Son of a bitch. A submarine.”

  “Not just one. A lot. That’s what surprised me, because I kind of thought the war was all in Europe and Japan, but here they were, right around Florida. And in California they were worried about Japanese planes bombing them. I told you that too, didn’t I?”

  “Yes. But it’s the submarine part that counts. Don’t you see? If Thoren was the big idea man for Avispa, he could be the one who came up with the plan for smuggling saboteurs into Cuba by submarine. And he was too damn intelligent and practical to just pull any such idea out of his hat. He could have had experience in that line. And that ties in with my feeling that before he showed up here in Miami, he had something to do with ships.”

  “Submarines?”

  “Submarines are ships. And during the war saboteurs were being landed from them all around the world. Remember, according to Nera he was a demolitions expert.”

  Elinor said: “According to Nera he was an army man too. What’s somebody like that doing in a submarine?”

  “Getting transported to where his mission was. There’s no contradiction in it. Matter of fact, it clears up what I thought were contradictions in what Nera told me. It proves she really was leveling with me.”

  “Oh sure, you can always count on Mrs. Ortega in the clutch.”

  “And you. If it wasn’t for you, sweetheart, I might have passed right by that Figueroa story.”

  Elinor said too sweetly: “It’s so kind of you to mention it.” The sweetness became unmistakably acid. “But I wouldn’t be that sure about Nera leveling with anybody. Like that army man bit. Thoren would be kind of a hero in the army, going out on those missions, wouldn’t he?”

  “Probably,” Jake said. “If he pulled them off.”

  “So what’s a hero doing, walking away from the action and going into business right in the middle of the war?”

  “Some heroes were carried away from the action. That scar on his back—”

  Elinor cut in sharply: “You’ve been saying all along that scar on his back wasn’t any war wound. And that if he had been in the service, he would never have settled down here after he pulled off a murder or something, because Miami was all full of the military during the war. So it looks to me like you put together a good solid theory about this case, and then Nera comes along and kicks it all apart with one cute little foot. I mean, all that stuff she handed you about Thoren and the army and sabotage and Avispa. Man, if you buy that package, you are buying a whole load of contradictions. You know that, don’t you?”

  “What I know, sweetheart, is that there’s a strong smell of personal bias in your analysis.”

  “So? That still doesn’t change anything, does it? If you go along with what she says, you’re still stuck with all those questions and no answers.”

  Jake said coolly: “That’s my worry. I told you from the start it’s none of your concern whether I break this case or not. And considering this isn’t show business, you might as well put some clothes on.”

  “I knew it,” Elinor said to his departing back. “I knew as soon as I opened my big mouth about Figueroa, the whole rest of the day would be spoiled.”

  It was an accurate prediction in more ways than one, Jake found. The garage man showed up and not only brutally overcharged for the two new tires, but was much too curious about what had happened to the damaged ones. When Elinor called McCloy about the broken window, he made it icily clear that he was not the Daystar janitor, and that the Service Department was the one to call on for repairs. And when the service man arrived to grudgingly replace the broken glass, he took notice as well of the gouge overhead in the doorway between the Florida room and the living room and remarked pointedly that old Mr. and Mrs. de Burgo had lived in this same h
ouse for twenty-two years and never left an inch of damage to show for it. That cost him the fat tip Jake had ready in his hand, and when he went out he slammed the front door hard enough to loosen its hinges.

  Meanwhile, there was no response to the phone calls to Magnes made every half hour.

  At midnight Jake made the last call and went to bed, Elinor, in pajamas, giving him an excess of space for himself. He lay there sleepless, his eyes fixed unseeingly on the glowing hands of the clock on his night table. Occasionally, as if to demonstrate that she was also wide awake and actively rejecting him, there was a sharp little flurry on Elinor’s side of the bed. A shifting of position, punching of the pillow into shape, kicking of the blanket straight.

  At two o’clock he slipped out of bed, went into the study, and softly closed the door behind him. He took out Thoren’s dossier and read it through carefully line by line, making notations on a pad as he read. Finished, he went into the living room, poured himself a large belt of Chivas Regal, and brought it back to the study. Luxuriously stretched out in the swivel chair, feet on the desk, glass of Scotch in hand, he went through the list of notations, giving each item long and hard thought. Then he dropped the pad into the folder along with the rest of the dossier, locked it away, and went into the bedroom.

  He stood at the foot of the bed for a minute, but there was no sound of deep, regular breathing from it, only an intense silence. “Are you awake?” he whispered, and Elinor said in a flat voice, “No.”

  “Too bad, because I’ve got some news.” He felt his way along the bed and turned on her lamp. She immediately flung herself away from him, face buried in the pillow. He sat down beside her and pulled her around to face him. Her eyes glimmered wetly, her nose was pink, there were the marks of tear stains on her cheeks. “Crying,” Jake said. “A big girl like you.”

  “You mean a dumb Polack like me, don’t you?”