The Wounded and the Slain

by David Goodis

  “Come de day when he steal one time too many and dey catch he. Dey put he in de school for de bad ones. But dat only make it worse. He out less dan week when dey put he in again. Den out and den in again. Out and in, out and in. And what is to be done? It is a question I ask myself so many nights in de bed when I weep on de pillow, because even if he is bad, de fact remain he my brother and de devil is eating he up.

  “When he nineteen he past de age for de correction school and when dey catch he stealing on de docks dey send he to prison. I say to myself, Maybe now he will learn. But only things he learn in prison is more tricks and capers. In prison de art of wrongdoing has many professors and de pupils are willing and anxious to be taught. He twenty-three when he out and twenty-four when he in again. Next time dey let he out he twenty-nine, and he go back in when he thirty-one. Dere is occasion when I had some money saved from working in de tobacco factory, and I visit de prison and I say to Eustace, ‘I soon have money enough to start a business, to buy a license and sell drinks. When dey let you out, you come and work dere wid me.’ And Eustace say, ‘Dat is fine idea, Winnie. I like dat very much. You and me, we be in business together, we sell much rum and make much money. I buy nice clothes and be respectable mon.’ So den when he is thirty-six he out of prison and I obtain de license to sell de alcohol beverages. De first night when we are open for business my brother Eustace he go out wid two men and dey rob a store on King Street.”

  Bevan reached for the bottle and the water glass. He poured rum into the glass and offered it to Winnie. She shook her head, but he nodded coaxingly. She took the glass and drank the rum, all of it, holding the glass pressed tightly against her mouth with her head thrown far back. Then she was looking at the empty glass as she extended it slowly for a refill.

  He filled it, and also filled the tin cup. Now the bottle was three-quarters empty. For a while they stood there drinking and not saying anything. They finished the bottle and started another. He said he was paying for the second bottle. Winnie said no, whatever they drank was her treat. He insisted on paying and it became an argument, their drink-thickened voices mixing in a swirl of incoherent phrases that went round and round and didn’t get anywhere. But finally she gave in, and he put the money on the bar. They grinned at each other, then began to work diligently on the second bottle.

  But gradually the grin went away from her face. The rum tried to hold it there and couldn’t hold it and she was talking again about her brother. She said, “De last time he come out of prison it two years ago. He say to me, ‘Winnie, I have learned my lesson. I make solemn promise.’ I look at him and I say, ‘You tell me dat so often, I am tired of hearing it.’ But he say very seriously, ‘I prove it to you, Winnie. You will see.’ And when I tell he to bring he clothes here, he refuse so quietly, so much formality de way he say, ‘I thank you, my sister. But I cannot accept your generosity. Always it is you who do de giving, who make de sacrifice for a worthless brother. But in my heart I am a mon and it is time now to demonstrate de truth of dat.’ I watch as he walk away. He walk very straight, and de head it is up.

  “De very next day he get job in garage. I tink to myself it is maybe good sign. De weeks pass and den de months and he keep working at de job. In de afternoons I walk past de garage and I see he working harder dan anyone else. In de meantime he get woman to live with, a nice clean woman he bring to me for my approval. From time to time she come to visit me, and she tell me she very pleased wid Eustace, he kind to her and treat her wid much courtesy and respect. He not run out at night, and go to bed early, and I see de brightness in her eyes dat means she happy wid her mon.

  “Last year dey have child, a boy. And dis year twin girls. In de garage Eustace get raise in salary and dey move to larger rooms. Dey so contented wid each other and de children and at night when I say prayers I give thanks to de Lord.

  “But it could not last. I should have known it could not last. De garage it close down and Eustace he out of work. De times are bad and he cannot find employment. I tell he to come and work here, I need someone here to help me. He say, ‘Help you wid what? Where are de customers?’ De answer, of course, is dere are no customers when de condition of unemployment is prevailing in Kingston. Also, it is time when dere are no ships in de harbor. When dat happens, it is matter dat requires much thought and planning. When de belly is getting empty one must use de brains.

  “Eustace, he use he brains to gamble. He take what lew coins he have, he go out at night and flip de dice, deal de cards. Many times he win, only a few times he lose. He win because he clever wid dice and cards. But not cheater. Decidedly not cheater. He win dat money honestly to feed children and woman. But even so dere no excuse for what he do last night. I try to look for excuse and find none. In de alley he pounce on de mon, he take de mon’s life. And for what reason? “Reason is gambling debt. De mon owe de money and refuse to pay. De sum involved is grand total of one pound, two shillings.”

  Bevan was pouring more rum into the tin cup and the water glass.

  “One pound, two shillings,” Winnie said.

  She gulped the rum. But now it was too much rum and it really hit her and she started to laugh.

  “A piece of paper and two coins,” she said, laughing loudly, rackingly.

  “It wasn’t that,” he said.

  But she didn’t hear. Her laughter covered it.

  “I said it wasn’t that.”

  It didn’t get through; the laughter was too loud.

  Winnie was saying, “We announce de list of casualties. De mon who died in de alley, he got woman and five small children. We add dat number to four in family of mon who will die for deed. Six and four is—”

  “Listen, lady. Listen to me—”

  “—is nine? No, is ten. Dat is correct, dere ten of dem. Dere eight children and two mothers. And when dey visit de graves of de fathers—”

  “But listen—”

  “Dey will look at de graves, dey will remember why it happened. A gambling debt, de sum amounting to one pound, two shillings.”

  And she laughed again, more loudly now. The laughter was choking her. But all at once she stopped laughing and looked at him. She saw his eyes focused on the open door.

  She turned her head to see what was in the doorway. There was nothing in the doorway, just the sunlight coming in, the slanting ribbons of bright yellow with billions of dust particles floating downward through the stream of light. Then again she looked at his face, watching his eyes, which were aimed level at the doorway, as though he saw something or someone coining in very slowly, coming toward him.

  He took a backward step, then another, and another.

  But that was all. Because there was no getting away from it. He stood waiting, his lips gradually curving in a twisted grin, his rum-glazed eyes saying, I’m ready now.

  His arm moved out just a little, as though a hand had fallen on his wrist and were leading him toward the door. He was going toward the door and Winnie was saying, “What is it, mon? Why you leaving?”

  “The party’s over,” he said.

  She gaped at him as he walked out.

  Chapter Eleven

  He walked in a straight path down the alley to Barry Street, then along Barry to the first corner that allowed him to turn north, toward Queen. Queen Street was crowded and his path was blocked by groups of people chattering and laughing, or engaged in various business transactions that consisted mostly of loud dispute and vigorous gestures of negation. But he saw none of it, heard none of it. He drifted through it in a trancelike manner that they noticed as they saw him coming. It caused them to step aside and make way for him, staring at him as he passed, then staring at one another in the sudden stillness induced by wide-eyed wonder.

  “Dat mon, he move like sleepwalker,” one said.

  “Or hypnotized,” another commented. “He look hypnotized.”

  “You both wrong,” a third one said. “Dat mon, he drink too much.”

  “But look how straight he walk
,” the first one said. “He walk too straight to be drunk.”

  “I insist de mon is drunk,” the other said. “He do not know where he go. I will make wager—”

  “You would lose,” the first one said. “Dat mon, he know precisely where he go.”

  They stood there watching the neatly attired tourist, who had crossed to the other side of Queen Street and was headed toward the entrance of police headquarters.

  He told it to three dark-skinned policemen, facing them where they stood just inside the entrance. They listened impassively, and then one of them said, “Come with me, sir,” and took him across the anteroom to a desk where a very fat police sergeant sat with folded arms, glaring at two skinny women who wore excessive lipstick and rouge and powder. The sergeant’s skin was coal black, but somehow it reflected a vermilion tint, a sulphurous glow that was more the heat of anger than the heat of the day. The sergeant was saying to the women, “Last time I let you off with warning. But dis time—”

  The policeman interrupted, moving in close to the sergeant and whispering in his ear. The sergeant’s mouth opened very slowly, became wide, and stayed that way as the policeman went on whispering. A large blue-winged fly settled on the sergeant’s nose, but he made no move to brush it away. Finally the policeman stepped back and waited for a comment. There was no comment. The sergeant just sat there and let the fly stay on his nose as he gaped at the American tourist, who stood grinning.

  Then the fly went away. It flew around in wide circles above the sergeants head. Bevan watched it, the grin saying, How is it up there? and the fly replying, it’s simply grand, provided you have wings. Bevan lost the grin for a moment. He got it back as one of the skinny women forgot where she was and winked at him. He winked back. Then the woman was smiling invitingly and trying to flaunt her bony hip, but the policeman came in close and loomed above her, his pointed finger moving like a needle toward her forehead. So her hip went back into place and she gave a little shrug that told the law it had won the round and she was passing up this customer. The sergeant nodded to the policeman, who wrapped his large hands around the wrists of the women and led them away. Then the sergeant said to Bevan, “I cannot believe what de policeman tells me. Perhaps you can clarify?”

  So then he told it to the sergeant. The sergeant took out a handkerchief and mopped his sweating face as he got up from the desk. “This way, sir.” He led Bevan toward a corridor. They went down the corridor to a door marked “Lieutenants.”

  He told it to a lieutenant, and presently he was telling it to several lieutenants. They didn’t know what to do with it, and decided it was something that needed the captain. They took him into the office of the captain, who subsequently called in another captain. There was some whispered discussion between the captains, and finally they agreed they couldn’t handle this, the only thing to do was bring it to the inspector.

  The inspector’s name was Archinroy and he was the product of mixed races several generations back. His skin was a yellow-gray, some of the yellow resulting from a liver condition, but most of it due to the great-great-grandmother who had been a native of Sumatra and had married the British heir to a rubber plantation.

  As a result of the marriage, the heir was disinherited and didn’t mind it too much. Gradually he lost his Oxford accent and developed a taste for rice and dried fish. They had seven children and one of the sons went to Africa, where he married a Nigerian girl who gave him three black children, one of them an ambitious boy who went to England and studied law and married a mulatto girl who had come over from British Honduras. Their only child was a son, who also wanted to be a lawyer, but a war intervened and he got hit during tie First Battle of the Marne. A few months later, his young widow gave birth to an undersized boy with slightly slanted eyes and a yellow-gray skin.

  Inspector Archinroy retained the slightly slanted eyes through all the years of growing up in the Limehouse section of London, where at first he went in for petty thievery, his eyes getting narrower as he learned all the tricks. Later, when he decided to become a policeman, his former associates tried to do away with him, but his slanted narrow eyes were both telescopic and microscopic, and he saw through every move they made. He foxed them right and left and achieved quite a reputation for making arrests and making the charges stick. Of course, he was promoted, promoted again and then again, the promotions continuing through fourteen years in New Scotland Yard. What ultimately removed him from New Scotland Yard was the need for high-grade law-enforcement officials in certain of the crown colonies where criminal activity had got out of hand. It was mostly homicide, and Archinroy’s specialty was the interrogation of suspects, playing with them as though at a game of billiards, fooling them into thinking they were scoring with their answers, then quietly and almost caressingly touching them with the one question that shattered all the alibis, sending them to the rope or the prison where they’d stay for the rest of their lives. He did a lot of that in Georgetown, British Guiana, and more of it in San Fernando, Trinidad, where outbreaks of homicide came periodically, like epidemics. He remained in Trinidad for eleven years, and then was assigned to Kingston, Jamaica. They felt his special talent was badly needed in Kingston. The police were making arrests but not getting convictions, and the situation required someone who could obtain quick confessions so that the newspapers could announce the date of the hangings, thus telling Kingstonians it was no longer easy to get away with homicide. At that time there was considerable homicide in Kingston.

  Now he’d been in Kingston six years. He was fifty-six and should have looked at least ten years older, considering the type of work he did, but actually he looked twenty years younger. The only lines on his face were a few scars. Two were knife scars and one was from the thumbnail of a woman who had drowned her several children and later went berserk during the questioning. Things like that should have put some gray in his hair, or removed a portion of his hair. But there was no gray hair and he had all of it, parting it close to the middle, brushing it flat across to the temples, oiling it lightly so it was a shiny black, but not too shiny. The same applied to his shoes. His shoes were never excessively shined. It appeared he knew just when to stop using the rubbing cloth. With his meals and with his use of tobacco, too, the degree of moderation never changed. He seemed to use some invisible measuring device that told him exactly where and when to stop.

  He was only five-six and weighed around 130, but he didn’t look small as he sat there at the desk, his slanted narrow eyes shooting out a yellow gleam that seemed to surround him and magnify him, so that whatever it was that came from his eyes, it made him appear much taller than five-six, much heavier than 130.

  He said to Bevan, “Is that all of it?”

  “Yes,” Bevan said.

  “Are you quite sure?”

  Bevan shrugged. “Why dig for more? I’ve given you all you need.”

  “Possibly,” Archinroy murmured. But then he did something that was either a negative gesture or a meaningless gesture or an attempt to tighten the gears of his mind. He put his hands flat on the top of his head and pressed hard.

  They were alone in the room. It was a small office furnished with a few chairs facing the desk, a couple of filing cabinets, and a floor-model electric fan that revolved very fast but made only a little noise. This was a fine electric fan and it cooled the room to just the right degree. Or maybe it isn’t the fan, Bevan thought. Maybe the coolness is coming from the inspector.

  He’s certainly a cool one, this inspector. Oh, well, they’re supposed to be cool. That’s their stock in trade. But this one is really a cucumber, a perfect model for an advertisement featuring light-weave suits. But what about his sweat glands? Doesn’t he have any sweat glands? The others were all sweating, the captains and the lieutenants and especially that fat sergeant. I sure had them sweating. I’ll bet they never heard anything like that. This one ought to be sweating, too. He’s top turkey here and it’s up to him to make the decision, but look at the coolness o
f him. Except for the way his hands are pressing on his head, as though he’s got a migraine headache or something. Yet his face is strictly zero, nothing moving, nothing showing. It’s as though he were alone in here, taking a nap with his eyes open.

  But then Archinroy came out of it, whatever it was. He lowered his hands to the desk, his fingertips lightly playing on the blotter pad. He did that for several moments, watching the play of his fingers, as though rehearsing something he intended to perform on a piano. Finally he looked up at Bevan and said, “Let’s try it again.”

  “You mean you want me to change it?”

  “Not unless it needs changing.”

  “What do you mean by that?”

  “It might need changing,” Archinroy said. “If you think about it—”

  “There’s nothing to think about. I’ve told you what happened, how it happened, and why it happened. I’ve given a full confession, and if you want me to put it on paper and sign it, I’ll be glad to do so.”

  “Why?”

  Bevan winced. Then he grinned at the inspector, He said, “Is that a teaser?”

  “It could be,” Archinroy murmured. “Depends on the way you take it.”

  “It doesn’t worry me.” He sent the grin past the inspector. He wasn’t talking to the inspector as he said, “Nothing worries me. I’m worryproof.”