Night Freight

by Pronzini, Bill

  "Truly."

  "Apiol Compound? I've heard that it's rich enough in mucilage to bring on—"

  "No, not that. Something more certain."

  "Oh, Miss Mercy, you're true to your name. You're an angel of mercy."

  And again, as always, she and Elias would be back on roads good and bad, empty and well traveled. Another town, another state—here, there, no pattern to their travels, going wherever the roads took them. Never lingering anywhere for more than a day or two, except when storm or flood or accident (and once, an Indian attack) stranded them. And as always the people would come, first to marvel and then to buy: morphine, digitalis, belladonna in carefully measured doses, Dover's powder, petroleum jelly, spirits of camphor and spirits of ammonia, bone liniment and witch hazel, citrate of magnesia, blackberry balsam, oil of sassafras, throat lozenges and eye demulcents, pile remedies and asthma cures, compounds for ailments of kidney and bladder and digestive tract.

  And then again, in one of their stopping places, in the deep dark lonesome night—

  "Miss Mercy, you don't know what your kindness means to me."

  "I do know, child. I do."

  "Such a burden, such an awful burden—"

  "Yes, but yours will soon be lifted."

  "Just one bottle of this liquid will see to that?"

  "Just one. Then you'll have no more to fear."

  "It smells so sweet. What does it contain?"

  "Dried sclerotia of ergot, bark of slippery elm, apiol, and gum arabic?"

  "Will it taste bad?"

  "No, my dear. I've mixed it with syrup."

  "And I'm to take the whole bottle at once?"

  "Yes. But only at the time of month I tell you. And then you must immediately dispose of the bottle where no one can ever find it. Will you promise?"

  "Yes, Miss Mercy. Oh yes."

  "And you must tell no one I helped you. Not even your dearest friend. Will you promise?"

  "I promise. I'll never tell a soul, not a living soul."

  And again, as always, she and Elias would be away at the break of dawn, when dew lay soft on the grasses and mist coated the land. And sitting beside him on the high seat, remembering the poor girl who had come in the night, she would ask herself once more, as she had so many times, what Father would have said if he'd known of the mixture of ergot and slippery elm, apiol and gum arabic. Would he still think of her as an angel of mercy? Or would he hate her for betraying a sacred trust? And the answer would be as it always was: No, he could never hate her; she must have no real doubt of that. He would understand that her only aim was to bring peace to those poor foolish girls. Peace and succor in their time of need. He would understand.

  And she would stop fretting then, reassured of Father's absent pride, and soon that day would end and a new one would be born. And there would be new roads, new settlements and towns, new needs to serve—so many needs to serve.

  And one day she saw that it was fall again, the leaves turning crimson and gold—time to turn south and west. But first there was another town, a little town with a name like many others, in a state that might have been Kansas or perhaps Nebraska. And late that night, as Miss Mercy sat weary but strong at her mixing table, her hands busy with mortar and pestle while the lamplight flickered bright, a rapping came soft and urgent on the wagon's door.

  Her name was Verity.

  Names and faces meant little to Miss Mercy; there were too many to remember even for a minute. But this girl was different somehow. The name lingered, and so she knew would the face. Thin, not pretty, pale hair peeking out from under her bonnet—older than most of the ones who came alone in the night. Older, sadder, but no wiser.

  Miss Mercy invited her in, invited her to sit. Verity perched primly on the stool, hands together in her lap, mouth tight-pinched at the corners. She showed no nervousness, no fear or embarrassment. Determined was the word that came to Miss Mercy's mind.

  Without preamble Verity said, "I understand you're willing to help girls in trouble."

  "What sort of trouble, my dear?"

  "The sort that comes to foolish and unmarried girls."

  "You're with child?"

  Verity nodded. "I come from Riverbrook, Iowa. Do you recall the town, Miss Mercy?"

  "Riverbrook? Iowa? There are so many places . . ."

  "You were there four months ago. In June. The second week of June."

  "The second week of June. Well. If you say I was, my dear, then of course I was."

  "A girl named Grace came to see you then. Grace Potter. Do you remember her?"

  "So many come to me," Miss Mercy said. "My memory isn't what it once was . . ."

  "So many girls in trouble, you mean?"

  "Sometimes. In the night, as you've come."

  "And as Grace came."

  "If you say so. As Grace came."

  "You gave her something to abort her fetus. I'd like you to give me the same . . . medicine."

  "If I do, will you promise to take it only at the time of month I tell you?"

  "Yes."

  "Will you promise to dispose of the bottle immediately after ingestion, where no one can ever find it?"

  "Yes."

  "And will you promise to tell no one that I helped you? Not even your dearest friend?"

  "Yes."

  "Then you shall have what you need."

  Miss Mercy picked up her lamp, carried it to one of Elias's cabinets. When she handed the small brown unlabeled bottle to Verity, the girl removed its cork and sniffed the neck. Then Verity poured a drop onto her finger, touched her tongue to it.

  "It tastes odd," she said.

  "No odder than sweetened castor oil. I've mixed the compound with cherry syrup."

  "Compound. What sort of compound?"

  "Dried scierotia of ergot, bark of slippery elm, apiol—"

  "My God! All those blended together?"

  "Yes, my dear. Why do you look so shocked?"

  "Ergot contracts the womb, tightens it even more. So do dried slippery elm and apiol. All mixed together and taken in a large dose at the wrong time of month . . . cramps, paralysis, death in agony. This liquid is pure poison to a pregnant woman!"

  "No, you mustn't think that—"

  "I do think it," Verity said, "because it's true." She had risen to her feet and was pointing a tremulous finger at Miss Mercy. "I've studied medicine. I work in Riverbrook as a nurse and midwife."

  "Nurse? Midwife? But then—"

  "Then I'm not with child? No, Miss Mercy, I'm not. The truth is, I have been three months searching for you, ever since I discovered a bottle exactly like this one that Grace Potter failed to dispose of I thought you guilty of no more than deadly quackery before tonight, but now I know different. You deliberately murdered my sister."

  "Murdered?" Now it was Miss Mercy who was shocked. "Oh no, my dear. No. I brought her mercy."

  "You brought her death!"

  "Mercy. Your sister, all of them—only mercy."

  "All of them? How many others besides Grace?"

  "Does the number truly matter?"

  "Does it truly—! How many, Miss Mercy?"

  "I can't say. So many miles, so many places . . ."

  "How many?"

  "Thirty? Forty? Fifty? I can scarce remember them all . . ."

  "Dear sweet Lord! You poisoned as many as fifty pregnant girls?"

  "Unmarried girls. Poor foolish girls," Miss Mercy said gently. "There are worse things than death, oh much worse."

  "What could be worse than suffering the tortures of hell before the soul is finally released?"

  "Enduring the tortures of hell for years, decades, a lifetime. Isn't a few hours of pain and then peace, eternal peace, preferable to lasting torment?"

  "How can you believe that bearing a child out of wedlock is so wicked—?"

  "No," Miss Mercy said, "the lasting torment is in knowing, seeing the child they've brought into the world. Bastard child, child of sin. Don't you see? God punishes the unwed mot
her. The wages of sin is death, but God's vengeance on the living is far more terrible. I saved your sister from that. I brought her and all the others mercy from that."

  Again she picked up the lamp. With a key from around her neck she unlocked the small satin-lined cabinet Elias had made, lifted out its contents. This she set on the table, the flickering oil lamp close beside it.

  Verity looked, and cried out, and tore her gaze away.

  Lamplight shone on the glass jar and on the thick formaldehyde that filled it; made a glowing chimera of the tiny twisted thing floating there, with its face that did not seem quite human, with its appendage that might have been an arm and the other that might have been a leg, with its single blind staring eye.

  "Now do you understand?" Miss Mercy said. "This is my son, mine and Caleb's. God's vengeance—my poor little bastard son."

  And she lifted the jar in both hands and held it tight to her bosom, cradled it and began to rock it to and fro, crooning to the fetus inside—a sweet, sad lullaby that sent Verity fleeing from the wagon, away into the deep dark lonesome night.

  "Night Freight," which originally saw print in Mike Shayne Mystery Magazine in early 1967, was my second published story. (The first, "You Don't Know What It's Like," a shameless Hemingway pastiche, appeared in Shell Scott Mystery Magazine for November of 1966.) I revised it slightly several years ago for its publication in an anthology, but it still has a number of youthful flaws. I debated rewriting it for its inclusion here, finally decided against it. In a curious way the rough edges add to rather than detract from its nightmarish effect.

  Night Freight

  He caught the freight in Phalene, down in the citrus belt, four days after they gave Joanie the divorce.

  He waited in the yards. The northbound came along a few minutes past midnight. He hid in the shadows of the loading platform, watching the cars, and half the train had gone by before he saw the open box, the first one after a string of flats.

  He trotted up alongside, hanging on to the big gray-and-white suitcase. There were heavy iron rungs running up the side of the box. He caught one with his right hand and got his left foot through the opening, then laid the suitcase inside and swung through behind it.

  It smelled of dust in there, and just a bit of citrus, and he did not like the smell. It caught in his nose and in the back of his throat, and he coughed.

  It was very dark, but he could see that the box was empty. He picked up the suitcase and went over and sat down against the far wall.

  It was cold too. The wind came whistling in through the open door like a siren as the freight picked up speed. He wrapped his arms around his legs and sat there like that, hugging himself.

  He thought about Joanie.

  He knew he should not think about her. He knew that. It made things only that much worse when he thought about her. But every time he closed his eyes he could see her face.

  He could see her smile, and the way her eyes, those soft brown eyes, would crinkle at the corners when she laughed. He could see the deep, silken brown of her hair, and the way it would turn almost gold when she stood in the sun, and the way that one little strand of hair kept falling straight down across the bridge of her nose, the funny little way it would do that, and how they had both laughed at it in the beginning.

  No, he thought. No, I mustn't think about that.

  He hugged his legs.

  What had happened? he thought. Where did it go wrong?

  But he knew what it was. They should never have moved to California.

  Yes, that was it. If they had not moved to California, none of it would have happened.

  Joanie hadn't wanted to go. She didn't like California.

  But he had had that job offer. It was a good one, but it meant moving to California and that was what started it all; he was sure of that.

  Joanie had tried, he knew that. She had tried hard at first. But she had wanted to go home. He'd promised her he would take her home, he'd promised her that, just as soon as he made some money.

  But she had wanted to go right away. There were plenty of good jobs at home, she said. Why did he want to stay in California?

  He'd been a fool. He should have taken her home right away, like she'd wanted, and to hell with the job. Then none of it would have happened. Everything would be all right, now.

  But he hadn't done that. It had started a lot of fights between them, her wanting to go home and him wanting to stay there in California, and pretty soon they were fighting over a lot of things, just small things, and he had hated those times. He hated to fight with Joanie. It made him sick inside; it got him all mixed up and made his head pound.

  He remembered the last fight they had. He remembered it very well. He remembered how he had broken the little china figurine of the palomino stallion. He hadn't wanted to break it. But he had.

  Joanie hadn't said much to him after that fight. He'd tried to make it up to her, what he'd done, and had gone out and bought her another figurine and told her he was sorry. But she had gotten very cold and distant then. That was when he knew she didn't love him anymore.

  And then he'd come home from work that one night, and Joanie was gone, and there was just a note on the dining room table, three short sentences that said she was leaving him.

  He didn't know what to do. He'd tried everywhere he could think of that she might have gone, the few friends they had made, hotels, but she had simply vanished. He thought at first she might have gone home, and made a long-distance call, but she was not there, and no, they didn't know where she was.

  A week later her lawyer had come to see him.

  He brought papers with him, a copy of the divorce statement, and told him when he was to appear in court. He had tried to make the lawyer tell her whereabouts, so he could see her and talk to her, but the lawyer had refused and said that if he tried to see her there would be a court order issued to restrain him.

  He quit his job then, because he didn't care about the money anymore. All he cared about was Joanie. He could remember very little of what happened between then and the time the divorce came up.

  He hadn't wanted to go to court. But he knew he had to go, if only just to see her again.

  And when Joanie had come in, his heart had caught in his throat. He had stood up and called out her name, but she would not look at him.

  Then her lawyer had gotten up and said how he had caused Joanie extreme mental anguish, and threatened her and caused her to fear for her life. And how he would go off his head and rant and rave like a wild man, and how he should be remanded by the court into psychiatric custody.

  He had wanted to shout that it was all a lie, that he had never said anything to cause Joanie to fear for her life, never done any of the things they said, because he loved her, and how could he hurt the one person he truly loved?

  But he had sat there and not said anything and listened to the judge grant Joanie the divorce. Then, sitting there, it had come to him why Joanie had left him, and told all those lies to her lawyer, and why she wanted a divorce and didn't love him anymore.

  Another man.

  It had come to him all of a sudden as he sat there that this was the answer, and he knew it was true. He did not know who the man could be, but he knew there was a man, knew it with a sudden and certain clarity.

  He had turned and run out of the courtroom, and gone home and wept as only a man can in his grief.

  The next day he had gone looking for her, through the entire city, block by block. For three days he had searched.

  Then he had found her, living alone, in a flat near the river, and he had gone up there and tried to talk to her, to tell her he still loved her, no matter what, and to ask her about the other man. But she would not let him in, told him to go away and would not let him in. He had pounded on the door, pounded. . . .

  His head had begun to pound now, thinking about it. His mind whirled and jumbled with the thoughts as he sat there in the empty box.

  He lay down on the floor
and pulled the suitcase to his body, holding on to it very tightly, and after a time, a long time, he slept.

  He awoke to a thin patch of sunlight, shining in through the open door of the box car. He stood up and stretched, and his mind was clear now. He went over to the door and put his head outside.

  The sun was rising in the sky, warm and bright. He looked around, trying to place where he was. The land was flat, and he could see brown foothills off in the distance, but it was nice and green in the meadows through which the freight was passing. He could smell alfalfa, and apple blooms, and he knew they had gotten up into northern California.

  As he stood there, he could feel the train begin to slow. They came around a long bend. Up ahead he could see freight yards. The freight had begun to lose speed rapidly, now.

  He could hear the hiss of air brakes and couplings banging together, and the train slid into the yards. There were two men standing in the shade of a shed out there, half-hidden behind it, dressed in khaki trousers and denim shirts, open down the front, and one of them had on a green baseball cap.

  They just stood there, watching the freight as it slowed down.

  He turned from the door and went over and sat down by the suitcase again. He was very thirsty, but he did not want to get off to go for a drink. He did not want anyone to see him.

  He sat there for fifteen minutes; then he heard the whistle from the engine and the couplings banging together again, and the freight pulled out.

  But just as it did, there was a scraping over by the door, and he saw two men, the same two who had been out by the shed, come scuttling in through the box door.

  The freight picked up speed. The two men sat there, looking out. Then one of them stood and looked around, and saw him sitting there on the floor at the opposite end of the box.

  "Well," this one said. He was the one in the green baseball cap. "Looks like we're going to have some company, Lon."

  "Sure enough," Lon said, looking around.

  They came over to where he was.

  "You been riding long?" the one in the baseball cap said.

  "Since Phalene," he said. He wished they had not come aboard. He wished they would go and leave him alone.