“He was. When I got out of the san, Dad told me if he ever caught me using heroin again I’d go to the san for life. Calvano got me started again, and threatened to tell Dad if I didn’t pay him. I tried to get into Dad’s safe, but never had a chance. Then when I heard Calvano was looking for you, I came here. I was going to tell you about him. He came in while I was here.”
“While you were reading my Joyce.”
“I hit him with a book end. Don’t the police take fingerprints?”
“Not of everything, but I’m surprised they overlooked a book end. If they did. And what about Tommy?”
“He phoned, told me to come over. I came.”
“Making your second mistake. You brought your dad’s hunting-knife along. Another clue; with any kind of a break at all through the manufacturer, enough to nail your dad. But your dad was talking to Jaekels at the time. Did Tommy blackmail you?”
“He tried.”
“Paul,” I said. “Were you—drugged, when you came?”
No answer. Gas rumbled in my stomach, and pain lanced my temple. No answer in my dreams. But my eyes were open, and I never dream with my eyes open.
Dark, and I moved my head very slowly toward the upholstered chair, my body suddenly rigid. The chair was empty, and my breath expelled audibly.
From the darkness to my left a voice said, “They thought I’d come for Vicki Lincoln. I wonder how stupid they think I am.”
I put my hands flat against the corduroy spread of the studio couch, my wet hands. My muscles jerked spasmodically. I couldn’t raise myself; all my training told me to lie low. Sweat ran down into my eyes.
I said quietly, “Where are you, Paul? I can’t see you.”
“Why do you want to? Are you frightened, Mr. Worden?”
I started to edge toward the wall, crowding my back against it. I said, “Only a few people know you were in that san, Paul. And nobody can prove you killed Tommy and Calvano. Don’t mess it up now. I’m probably being watched. This would be awful stupid, Paul.”
“What would?”
Where had his voice come from? I moved my eyes without moving my head, trying to catch a shadow, a directional sound. My brain was dulled by alcohol, but operating despite all that.
“Your dad must know you left the house,” I said. “He’ll be following you.”
“He wasn’t home.”
I’d caught it now. From the head of the studio couch, from the direction of the bathroom.
“And besides, he only suspects. He doesn’t know.”
That hadn’t come from the direction of the bathroom, damn it. That had come from the direction of the upholstered chair.
The chair was empty. That much I could see.
From my left I heard the scrape of a shoe against wood. The floor was carpeted. What could it be? A foot against—The end table.
Damn it, this was no way to meet whatever was coming. Underneath me the couch creaked as I forced my body toward its lower end. If I couldn’t see, he couldn’t see.
I kept moving down—and stopped. My foot had hit something, something like a knee. He was standing there at the foot.
I scrambled for the far end and rolled off the edge as he grabbed at my ankle. I felt his hand slide off, and then I was rolling along the floor, and I heard his footsteps and I was on my back, my legs bent, ready for a double kick at anything that came close.
A creak, and something prodded my side, and I rolled, and rolling, grabbed, and caught a leg below the knee. I jerked, and felt him topple, and I swarmed on top, reaching for his arms.
Pain slashed at my forearm, fire and the sticky warmth of blood, and I had that hand in mine, and crawled up toward his face.
I could feel the wiry strength of him as he twisted, could hear his grating breath. I half rose, crouching, trying to locate his face, both my hands now gripping his knife hand.
His other hand scratched at my eyes, and I turned my head, and got his arm over my knee. And put my strength into the jerk, every bit of my weight.
And heard the elbow crack, and heard him scream, and the knife fall to the carpeted floor.
I groped for it, and got up. No sound from him, as I went to the light switch. He was out cold, his arm bent at a ridiculous angle because of the smashed elbow.
I phoned Vicki’s apartment where the cops were waiting.
Hovde took me home from the station. It was late, and he was weary, but he said it was cleaned up now, and maybe he’d be able to catch some sleep before another tough one came up. Paul had signed a complete confession.
“Was he—under the influence, Sergeant?”
“It’s still a good confession. That would be department business.”
“Some business,” I said. “If I hadn’t been on my toes, you’d still be waiting over there. And if I hadn’t been sensitive, intuitive, and a reader of Chandler, you wouldn’t even have had that lead.”
“You maybe saved us a couple days,” he admitted. He was slowing the car. We were on Sepulveda, and he stopped in front of some apartments. “Come on up. I’ll make you a cup of coffee.”
“Your wife will love that,” I said, “bringing a stranger in this time of the night.”
“I haven’t got a wife,” he said.
“Well, your boy, then, the one with my picture on the wall.”
“I haven’t got a boy,” he said. “Don’t tell me you fell for that.”
“Et tu, Brute,” I said. “Sergeant, you were my last rock. You were one guy I thought I could believe in.”
“Believe in yourself,” he said. “That’s all there is. C’mon, let’s go, move.”
There are three more bits, having nothing to do with murder. If you only like mysteries and have followed this doubtful one this far, you can get off here. Only remember this, the rest is about Pete Worden, and you’re Pete Worden. Three scenes to go.
Ellen. Her apartment above the paint store. Ellen, in sweater and skirt, her hair up. 7:30 p.m. Tuesday.
I sat on the davenport, a drink in my hand. She stood near the windows.
I said, “Well, it’s Tuesday. What have you decided?”
“I’ve decided,” she said, and she didn’t look at me, so I knew what she’d decided.
“It’s no,” I said. “I can tell the setting for a no. But would there be a qualification, or even a reason I could argue against?”
She didn’t look at me. She continued to look out the window. I don’t know what she was looking at. She said, “It’s a final no, to you. I’m marrying Nick.”
A great and hammering silence moved through the room, though there wasn’t any reason I should be surprised. I said, “Wham.”
His money she was marrying. Of course. She was smart enough to know what money meant today. A person can take a lot with money, she knew—now.
I stood up, though it took a bit of doing. I said, “I hope you’ll be very happy.”
“You do like hell.”
“Why not?” I said. “Why should we both be unhappy?”
“Go, please,” she said. “I’m sorry, but there’s no words that will do you any good. It isn’t a quick decision or one I’m going to change. Will you go? Will you get the hell out of here?”
Good-by, my love. Take your fine body and filled mind to that home in the Valley. Preside at Nick’s table, scintillate among the bookies, smile at Nick, and buy a new mink when things are dull. Don’t ever dream of us, don’t ever cry for me. Send your folks money, money from the big take. You’ve finally left the church. Good-by, my love.
I got through the night with a toss or two and some turns, with the aid of a few small snifters.
Wednesday morning about nine, and I was consuming coffee and the Times when the knock came at the door.
Chris. Scene two.
He stared at me. I stared at him. I’d broken his brother’s arm at the elbow.
“Pete,” he finally said. “Oh, Pete.” He was crying.
I put my arm around him, around my brother
Chris. “Pete,” he said. “God damn it, Pete.”
“We’re—all right, Chris? I should have kept my nose out of it. I should have shut my mouth.”
He had control. “I had to see you. I wanted to say good-by, Pete. I’m signing up.”
“A good idea,” I said. “The best all around. Oh, hell. Chris—” Some awful words.
I put an arm around his big shoulders and wished him all the luck there was, and I’d see him again, for sure.
He left, ending scene two, and I sat down to coffee again, and the Times. No flavor in either. Joe Devlin.
Blacky Felker, Andy Gelatti, oh, Lord, Lord, Lord—And now Chris Arnold.
Punks, all of them, kids who knew from nothing. Why, always the kids? What’s the matter with—
What else? Where else? Who else?
Some savvy that might help, some things lived through before, some leadership experienced and passed on. And they were what Mr. Arthur Miller so aptly expressed, they were all my sons.
The setting for scene three in this epilogue was a big room, with lots of benches, the benches filled with kids. Kids who didn’t know from nothing. I stood in the wide doorway looking, Pete Worden, the unmarried father.
And there was Chris at the other end of the room, in one of the front rows, his back to me, his crew cut one of many. I made my way to him.
He looked up smiling, “Hey, Pete—”
“Why not?” I said, and there was room next to him, and I slid in. “What else am I good for? And who else would keep you out of trouble?”
“I don’t want to keep out of trouble,” he said. “Don’t worry about me, Pete. Hell, we’d never stick together anyway, would we?”
“It could be done,” I said. “You grease a first sergeant here and a personnel clerk there. It could be arranged, with luck.”
“Maybe? Hey, maybe we could. Pete, how about the quiff? Nobody ever leveled with me about the quiff. Lots of it?”
“All you can handle,” I said. “All colors, shapes, and sizes. The world’s full of it.”
“It’s for me then,” he said. “I can take the rest.” He nudged me. “Buddies, huh, Pete?”
“Buddies,” I said.
Serving as inspiration for contemporary literature, Prologue Books, a division of F+W Media, offers readers a vibrant, living record of crime, science fiction, fantasy, western, and romance genres. Discover more today:
www.prologuebooks.com
This edition published by
Prologue Books
a division of F+W Media, Inc.
4700 East Galbraith Road
Cincinnati, Ohio 45236
www.prologuebooks.com
Copyright © 1952 by William Campbell Gault, Registration Renewed 1980
All rights reserved.
This is a work of fiction.
Names, characters, corporations, institutions, organizations, events, or locales in this novel are either the product of the author's imagination or, if real, used fictitiously. The resemblance of any character to actual persons (living or dead) is entirely coincidental.
eISBN 10: 1-4405-3964-2
eISBN 13: 978-1-4405-3964-0
Don't Cry For Me Page 19