by Craig Rice
Something was very wrong here.
Bingo glanced at the sleeping girl. She hadn’t moved. Her lovely long lashes might have been painted on her cheeks. Her lips were parted, just a little.
Yet he kept having the curious feeling that she was watching him, even in her sleep.
Think of something pleasant.
That was what the orphanage nurse had kept telling him, the time a baseball had broken his tooth, and it was a long while before the doctor could come to kill the pain. She’d let him cling to her hand, and gone on saying, “Think of something pleasant.” He’d shut his eyes tight and thought of peanuts, and Coney Island, and ice cream. After it was all over, she’d seen to it he had all of them, and a movie besides.
Only, don’t go to sleep. Mustn’t go to sleep.
He tried letting his eyelids close while he counted to five and then keeping them open while he counted to ten. It didn’t work very well.
Think about being rich and famous. Think about—
Even if those guys did come back, the sound of their car would wake him, even if he did doze a little.
He didn’t really want to sleep, anyway. Just rest his eyes a little, that was all.
Something pleasant—
He murmured, “Tweeds—town car—maroon upholstery—chauffeur—two hundred thousand—” His chin hit his chest.
It might have been the next minute that Handsome was shaking him. He woke slowly in spite of the shaking, with a feeling that he still wanted hours and hours more of sleep in this comfortable bed.
Bed? Huh?
He was in one of the bunks, the one where Handsome had gone to sleep, a blanket pulled up to his chin.
“Handsome,” he said. “You didn’t—”
“You looked so uncomfortable on the floor,” Handsome said. “So I moved you. Bingo, you’d better wake up, right now. Because of something.”
Bingo yawned, rubbed his face, and sat up.
“Bingo,” Handsome said. “Look.”
Bingo looked. The girl was gone.
“I went to sleep on the floor, too,” Handsome said unhappily. “I didn’t mean to, but I just did.”
“Maybe she’s—outside some place.”
“She isn’t,” Handsome said. “I waited a long while, and then I yelled to her, and then I looked, and then I woke you up. She isn’t anywhere around.”
“We dreamed it,” Bingo said sleepily.
“No,” Handsome said. “Because she left her shoes.”
Henny was gone, but the red-and-white wedgies were still beside the bunk.
“Now, why would she go away and leave her shoes?” Handsome asked.
“I don’t know,” Bingo groaned. He drew in a couple of long, slow breaths. That was supposed to clear the head, but it didn’t clear his. “Handsome, we’d better talk to the sheriff. That’s what we should have done in the first place.”
“Well, wait,” Handsome said. “There’s something else. I want to show you.” He handed Bingo his shoes and said, “I’m afraid you’ll have to get up.”
Bingo fumbled his way into the shoes, stood up, stretched, yawned, and said, “All right, what?”
“I’ll show you,” Handsome said.
They went into the yard. The morning sun made Bingo blink. The sun didn’t blaze in New York in the morning; it just shone. He wished he were back in New York. He wished he were anywhere except here.
Handsome led the way around the shanty to the front yard. An unexpected, but not unfamiliar noise met them by the time they’d rounded the corner.
“What the devil?” Bingo said.
“Well, see?” Handsome said.
Bingo saw. There, in the yard, was a lot of turkeys. A whole lot of turkeys. The ones, Bingo realized, that belonged to farmer Chris Halvorsen. They were back again.
“I bet this is going to make that Mr. Halvorsen feel pleased,” Handsome said.
“Maybe,” Bingo said. “But it don’t make me feel pleased. Handsome, we’re getting out of here, now. Even if there was a million dollars in gold buried under the floor. A guy gets killed. A bunch of escaped convicts run around loose. Turkeys disappear and come back again. And a crazy girl shows up in the middle of the night and she disappears, only she leaves her shoes. Shoes! Shoes!”
“What’s the matter?” Handsome said anxiously. “Have you gone crazy, too?”
Bingo didn’t answer. He ran back into the shanty. He looked on the floor. He looked under the bunks. Then he just stood still in the middle of the room, his face white.
“Hey!” Handsome said, coming in the door.
“Handsome,” Bingo said. “The money. Our money. The hundred and seventy-two bucks we had left. I put it in my shoe last night, like I always do. She took it. It’s gone.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
“It’s as much my fault as it is yours,” Handsome said. He had been playing variations on this theme ever since they had left the shack and begun to drive. “I shouldn’t of gone to sleep. It was my turn to watch.”
“Shut up,” Bingo said.
“I should of known she was pulling a gag. But she fooled me, too. She seemed like the genuine article.”
“Shut up,” Bingo said.
Handsome said, “Sorry.” He drove in silence for a minute. Then, “But, Bingo.”
Bingo sighed and said, “Well?”
“Look. I just thought of something. How’d she get here?”
“Huh?” Bingo blinked and sat up straight.
“How’d she get here? And where’s her clothes?”
Bingo said, “Say, wait a minute. How did she get here?”
“There’s no railroad into Thursday,” Handsome said. “But there might have been a bus. Only, it’s a long walk out from Thursday, and she didn’t have no dust on her shoes. And she must have had a suitcase somewheres. A person don’t travel all the way from New York without bringing some clothes and stuff, even if they’re in a hurry. So, Bingo, where—”
“Let me think,” Bingo said. Handsome was silent.
Thinking didn’t seem to get him anywhere except around in a silly circle and back to the same place. No matter from what new angle he considered the whole business, it still just didn’t add up to anything.
He was going around in the same circle when Handsome parked the car in front of the jail. Bingo looked up at the doorway and sighed again.
“Well, anyway,” he said wearily, “this time we’re here with a complaint of our own.”
He thought about Sheriff Henry Judson, and Herb, and Earl. He began to feel a little hopeful. They’d find the girl, all right. She couldn’t get far, in that costume, and with no shoes.
“I wonder how much of that story she told us was true,” Handsome said.
Bingo said, “Who cares?”
Find the girl, and get back the hundred and seventy-two dollars. Return the turkeys to farmer Halvorsen, and be heroes in Christine’s eyes. Then, and then only, consider the question of sticking around Thursday, Iowa, and looking for that buried gold.
“I wonder who her accomplices were,” Handsome said.
Bingo paused on the second step of the jail building. “Huh?”
“She must of had some,” Handsome said. “Account of someone must of brought her out to our house in a car. Which means they most likely picked her up again. I wonder who they were, and where they went.”
Bingo’s heart went down again. Way down. He gulped. He said, “Don’t worry, the police will find her.” He hoped.
The door opened into a hallway running the length of the building. To the left another door led into a small anteroom, furnished with a desk, three chairs, a telephone, and a picture of George Washington. Two doors were on the far side of the anteroom, one to the sheriff’s office, one to the deputies’ room. Both those doors were closed when Bingo and Handsome came into the anteroom.
A man was sitting at the anteroom desk. On the desk were several small pasteboard airplanes. In front of him was a big dime store book of pl
anes, buildings, and trucks, to be pushed out and pasted together. At the moment Bingo and Handsome came in, he was worrying over an odd-angled pasteboard roof.
“Good morning,” he said cheerfully. “Do either of you know where this piece fits on?” He added, “The sheriff’s busy. Herb is shaving. Will you have a chair?”
It was Ollie, Bingo realized. But he didn’t look anything like Bingo expected him to look. He didn’t look in the least like—well, Bingo wasn’t sure what he had expected. Certainly not someone like this.
Ollie was a small, slender man in dark-blue denim overalls and a faded red sweater. He had silvery white hair, not very much of it, and a pink, shining face, like a happy baby’s. His eyes were bright blue, and merry and innocent. And he was having one wonderful time with the dime-store toy.
“I think it folds this way,” Handsome said, “and this fits here, like—no, it doesn’t either.”
“Let me see,” Bingo said, fascinated. “Look, you got it backward. It goes like this. There!”
“That’s it,” Ollie said joyfully. “I’ll punch out the chimney now. You’re a very smart man. What did you do with Chris’s turkeys, anyway?”
“Oh,” Bingo said, “you know us.”
“Certainly,” Ollie said. “Everybody in Thursday knows you by now. I’ve got a message for you I took down over the phone just a little while ago.” He began moving toy airplanes and houses and wastepaper. “You’re in the motion-picture business. I went to the motion pictures last night. It was a good show. I go almost every night. It’s always a good show. Usually I see all the shows five or six times, because they only change twice a week. Here it is.” He pulled out a slip of paper. “I wrote it down for you, but I can’t read it to you. I can write, but I can’t read.”
Bingo blinked. “You what?”
“Just try me. For a dime, I can write any word you care to name. Like anthroposomatology, or stethokyrtograph. In my youth I won a tristate medal for spelling, defeating my opponent—a Nebraska boy—on the word vernacularism. But I am not able to read. Purely psychological, I assure you. There is no deterioration of the brain involved.”
Bingo looked at him sharply. He’d been kidded by some champion experts. But Ollie’s eyes looked back at him, mild, blue, and guileless. Bingo read the note, written in a beautiful, copperplate hand.
“If Mr. Riggs or Mr. Kusak come in. Miss Christine Halvorsen called. Miss Halvorsen’s mother wished Miss Halvorsen to call and express her appreciation for their kindness to Miss Halvorsen. Miss Halvorsen’s mother hopes that Mr. Riggs and Mr. Kusak will be able to join them at dinner on Sunday, at about two in the afternoon. Mr. Riggs or Mr. Kusak kindly call Miss Halvorsen or Miss Halvorsen’s mother. The number is 218-J.”
Bingo was not quite halfway through reading it out loud to Handsome when the door of the deputies’ room opened and Herb came into the anteroom. Bingo went on reading and then looked up and saw Herb.
“Oh, hello,” he said brightly. “How are you this morning?”
Herb had a gun in his armpit holster, another in his belt, and a nasty look on his face. He said, “You guys again.”
“We’ve just been invited to Sunday dinner at the Halvorsen home,” Bingo said in haste. “I suppose we’ll see you there.”
“Why?” Herb said.
“Well, after all,” Bingo said. “You and Chris—Miss Halvorsen—”
“I ain’t been invited,” Herb said.
“Probably an oversight,” Bingo said. “Of course, though, by Sunday we’ll probably be in Hollywood.”
“You better be,” Herb growled. He relaxed a little and moved his hand an inch or two away from his gun. “Henry’s busy. What do you guys want?”
“We’re looking for a girl,” Handsome said.
That was exactly the wrong thing to say. Herb didn’t bother to reach for the gun, he just took a poke at Handsome. Handsome ducked in time, and it didn’t connect.
Bingo moved strategically behind a chair and said, “Hey, you! Lay off my partner!”
“Looking for a girl!” Herb said bitterly. “How many girls do you guys want? I suppose you’re looking for a girl so you can double-date with Chrissie. I’m warning you—”
“Wait a minute,” Bingo said. “You don’t understand.”
“And I suppose you want me to find this girl for you,” Herb went on, as though there hadn’t been any interruption. “I suppose that’s what you came here for.”
“Sure,” Handsome said. He was a little bewildered by the whole thing. “That’s right.”
“Now, look,” Bingo said hastily, as Handsome ducked again. “Let’s get this straightened out. Handsome ’n’ me, we aren’t looking for a date. We think Christine is a very lovely little lady, and you’re very lucky to get her, and we aren’t trying to steal her from you.”
“I ain’t got her,” Herb grumbled. “I had her, or I thought I had, but I ain’t got her now. And you fellers coming along, you just made it worse.”
“Why?” Bingo said, blinking. “I don’t get it.”
“You will,” Herb said gloomily, “when you meet her ma.” He glared at them. “And I warned you before, and I’m warning you again. I’m a reg’lar deputy, and—”
“We know,” Bingo said.
“And,” Herb said, “now, why are you looking for a girl?”
“Because—” Bingo paused. “We came here to see the sheriff.”
“Sheriff’s busy,” Herb said. “I’m a deputy. Go on now, about this girl.”
Before Bingo could answer, the phone rang. Ollie answered it, saying with great formality, “Thursday County Sheriff’s Office. Good morning.” Then, “Yes. Yes. Just one moment please.”
He put one hand over the mouthpiece and said, “It’s Miss Christine Halvorsen on the telephone. She wishes to know if Mr. Riggs and Mr. Kusak got her message, or where could she get in touch with them.”
Bingo and Handsome looked at each other, then both of them looked at Herb. Bingo decided he didn’t like the expression on Herb’s face. Or the guns that Herb wore. He remembered vividly, too vividly, “I’m a deputy—nobody’d ask me no questions—”
“Look, Herb,” Bingo whispered. “You take the phone. Say you expect to be talking with us soon, and can you take the message. That ought to fix it.”
Herb scowled for a moment, deep in thought. Then he got the idea. He grabbed the phone from Ollie’s hand and said, “Hello, Chrissie, this is me, Herb. What message d’ya want to give them guys? I can give it to them.” He paused, listening. Bingo winked at him. “Yeah. Dinner, Sunday. Two o’clock. O. K. They should call you back. Huh? Me? Well—yeah, I guess I can make it. Two o’clock. Sure. Thanks, Chrissie, I’ll be there.”
A sudden thought struck Bingo. He signaled frantically at Herb, who said, “Just a minute, hold the phone.”
“Tell her,” Bingo said, “to tell her pa about the turkeys. We got ’em, and they’re all O. K.”
Herb stared. “Tell her—!” He picked up the phone and said, “Chrissie, call your pa. I don’t care where he is, call him.” He sat waiting, the phone in his hand, and said, “Where’d you find them turkeys?”
“We didn’t find them,” Handsome said. “They just came back.”
“We woke up this morning,” Bingo said, “and there they were.”
“Somebody’s crazy,” Herb said.
“I am,” Ollie spoke up brightly. “Not dangerously so, however, and not due to any actual deterioration of the brain tissue. Certain faculties are unimpaired, such as the ability to spell; and my memory is perfect.”
Under other circumstances, Bingo would have followed up that statement. Right now, he was too concerned with keeping Herb from getting mad again.
“That’s exactly what happened,” he said. “This morning they were all right out there in the yard, and as far as we know, they’re still there. But last night—”
Herb interrupted him by saying, “Hello, Chris,” into the phone. “Your turkeys are back. Ba
ck where? Back where they were. No, I don’t know how. Wait a minute.” He held the phone toward Bingo and said, “Maybe you’d better tell him yourself.”
Bingo took the phone and said brightly, “Hello, Mr. Halvorsen. This is Mr. Riggs. Remember me?”
“Sure,” the voice came over the wire. “I remember.”
It was Chris Halvorsen’s voice all right, but something about the sound of it bothered Bingo. He thought about Halvorsen’s cheerful red face and hearty laughter. There was a tired, almost despairing note in his voice now. It was the voice of a man who had been awake all night, and dreaded what might be going to happen today.
“Well,” Bingo said, trying to sound enthusiastic, “we found your turkeys, all right. Or, rather, they found us. They were back in the yard this morning, just as if they’d never been away. Don’t ask me how they got there, because I don’t know. But we’ve got ’em, and they’re well and happy.”
He’d expected a shout of joy from farmer Halvorsen at the news. At least that. Instead, there was a moment’s silence, and then, “Oh. That’s good,” in an almost disinterested voice.
Maybe, Bingo thought, Chris Halvorsen hadn’t understood. He repeated. “The turkeys. They’re safe. We’ve got ’em.”
“Heard you the first time,” Halvorsen said. “Thanks. I’ll be round to get ’em soon’s I can.” He hung up.
Bingo scowled. “What’s the matter with him?”
“I dunno,” Herb said. “He don’t act like himself at all. He acts scared, but I never knew nothing to scare Chris Halvorsen before, and anyhow, what’s he so scared of all of a sudden?”
“Maybe because there’s a murderer loose in the neighborhood,” Bingo said.
Herb shook his head. “The time a coupla guys held up the A & P store, Chris took after ’em himself in his car, and brought ’em back singlehanded. He was a reg’lar deputy then, under Bert Miller. They had guns, too. All Chris had was his rifle. No, Chris Halvorsen wouldn’t be scared of just one ordinary murderer.”
Bingo didn’t answer. Something had scared Chris Halvorsen, to the point where he’d stopped worrying over his lost turkeys, and wasn’t particularly interested in the fact that they’d been found.