Like a Hole in the Head

by James Hadley Chase

  “Yes.”

  “If there’s anything else you want, buy it. Have you looked at the food they’ve delivered?”

  “Not yet.”

  “Well, look at it. If there’s anything missing, get it. Okay?”

  “Yes.”

  I heard the Cadillac start up. Turning, I saw the car heading down the drive. Timoteo Savanto still stood where I had left him in the sun. He had his hands clasped behind his back and he was looking after the departing car. Even with the sun goggles hiding his eyes, he looked like a pet dog watching his master leave him.

  “I have to take care of Timoteo,” I said. “See you lunch time.”

  I left her and walked across the sand. When I came up to Timoteo he stiffened and turned his goggles towards me.

  “Let’s go over to the range and have a talk.”

  Beyond him, I saw the truck moving away from the shooting gallery and head towards the distant palm trees.

  We walked in silence to the gallery and entered the cool, dim leanto. Away from us were the targets, a hundred yards out in the hot sunshine.

  By one of the wooden benches were two cases of ammunition and a rifle in a canvas case.

  “This your gun?”

  He nodded.

  “Sit down and relax.”

  He lowered himself on to the bench as if he expected it to collapse under him. His thin swarthy face was covered with sweat beads. His hands shook and jerked. He was as fit for a morning’s target practice as an old lady who finds a burglar under her bed.

  I’ve had them before: the guys who hate guns, who hate the noise a gun makes, who can’t see anything exciting in using a gun well. There are two ways of handling them in the Army. First, the sympathetic approach, gentling them along as you gentle a nervous horse. Then if that doesn’t work, you scare the crap right out of them, and if that doesn’t work, you forget them, but I knew I couldn’t forget Timoteo. He wasn’t a man : he was a fifty thousand dollar bond.

  “I’ve an idea you and I will get along together,” I said. I sat on the other bench and took out my packet of cigarettes. I offered it.

  “I don’t smoke.”

  “That’s fine. That helps. I shouldn’t smoke, but I do.” I lit a cigarette and drew smoke right down into my lungs, then breathed out slowly. “As I said, you and I will get along : we have to.” I grinned. “You have a tough job ahead of you, but I want you to know I’m here to help you. I can help you, and I’m going to help you.”

  He sat there and stared towards me. I couldn’t tell his reaction. The goggles hid the expression in his eyes, and men’s eyes are important to me when I’m sounding off.

  “Can I call you Tim?”

  His eyebrows came together, then he nodded.

  “If you want to.”

  “You call me Jay… right?”

  He nodded.

  “Well, Tim, suppose I take a look at the gun your Dad has bought for you?”

  He didn’t say anything. He shifted on the bench and looked helplessly towards the gun in its canvas case.

  I stripped off the case and examined the gun. As I knew it would be, it was a beautiful job. Weston & Lees don’t produce anything but beautiful jobs. If he couldn’t shoot with this gun, he wouldn’t shoot with any gun.

  “Very nice.” I broke open one of the boxes of ammunition and loaded the gun. “I want you to look at the first target on the left.”

  He turned his head slowly and stared across the hundred yards of sand at the target.

  “Just keep watching it.”

  The gun wasn’t built for me, but in the Army I had to use a lot of guns that weren’t built for me nor for anyone else. I braced myself. To me, it was easy shooting. I fired off six rounds. The centre of the target came away and fluttered to the sand.

  “You’re going to shoot like that pretty soon, Tim. Hard to believe, isn’t it? I assure you you will do it.”

  The black goggles gaped at me. I could see myself in their twin reflections. I saw I was looking tense.

  “Will you do me a favour?” I asked, forcing myself to relax.

  There was a long pause, then he said in husky voice, “A favour? I’ve been told to do anything you say.”

  “You don’t have to do anything I say, Tim, but will you take those sun glasses off?”

  He stiffened and reared back, his hands going protectively to the goggles that were forming a wall between us.

  “I’ll tell you why,” I went on. “You can’t shoot behind sun glasses. Your eyes are as important as your gun. Take them off, Tim. I want your eyes to get used to the light here which is pretty strong.”

  Slowly, his right hand reached for the goggles like a virgin taking her pants off in mixed company. He hesitated, then slowly the goggles came off.

  Now I saw him for the first time. He was younger than I thought : maybe around twenty, not more than twenty-two. His eyes altered the whole of his face. They were good eyes : direct, honest and without guile : the eyes of a thinker, but right now they were also frightened eyes. He was no more like his father than I was like Santa Claus.

  I was sitting by Timoteo’s side, explaining the parts of the rifle to him when Lucy appeared in the doorway.

  I knew I was wasting time going over the rifle with him, but I wanted him to relax, to get to know me and to stop shaking. This was the gentling process. I spoke quietly. I was trying to will into him that this rifle could come alive in his hands, could obey him, could be his friend. I didn’t say all this crap in so many words, but I tried to convey it. So far, my words were bouncing off him like a golf ball against a concrete wall. But years as an instructor had taught me that often just when you were despairing, you get the break-through. Lucy’s sudden appearance broke the beginning of his concentration and sent a rush of blood to my head.

  “I’m sorry, Jay,” she said, seeing the way I reacted. “I didn’t mean to disturb you…”

  “What is it?”

  The snap in my voice made Timoteo stiffen. It also made Lucy take a step back.

  “The car won’t start.”

  I drew in a deep breath. I looked at my watch. I was surprised to see I had been talking to this beanpole for close on an hour. I shot him a quick look. He was staring down at his feet and I could see a vein in his forehead pounding. Lucy and my barking voice had undone the work of an hour.

  I put down the rifle.

  “What’s the matter then?”

  She looked like a kid caught with her fingers in the jam.

  “I — I don’t know. It just won’t start.”

  I made an effort to hold down a burst of temper and succeeded, but only just.

  “Okay, I’ll come.” I put down the rifle. Then to Timoteo, I said, “I won’t be a moment. Stay here now your eyes are getting used to this light. Don’t put those sun glasses on.”

  He mumbled something, but I was already moving to the door. Lucy fell back, giving me room to pass.

  “Did you put your foot hard down on the gas pedal?” I asked as she trotted alongside me to keep up with my strides.

  “Yes.”

  “A hell of a time for it to play up. Well, I’ll get it going.”

  I was sure she had done something stupid and it infuriated me that she had come to me just when I was getting this goddam beanpole in a more relaxed state of mind.

  The Volkswagen was parked under a palm thatched lean-to. I jerked open the door, slid into the driving seat, sure that under my hand, the car would start.

  Lucy stood by watching.

  I jiggled the gear lever to check it was in neutral, then I shoved the gas pedal to the floor and switched on. I got a noise, but no start. I did this three times. Finally, the noise convinced me that the engine wasn’t going to fire. I cursed under my breath, my hands resting on the steering wheel as I glared through the dusty windscreen. I weighed up the importance of making the car start against the importance of getting Timoteo to shoot.

  I had this twenty-five thousand dollar bond.
This was like having twenty-five thousand dollars in cash. This bond had to be lodged in the safe keeping of a bank. Suppose someone stole it? Suppose our bungalow caught fire and the bond got destroyed? I was now responsible for it. I could imagine Savanto’s reaction if I had to tell him I had lost it.

  I got out of the car, went around to the back and opened the lid. I looked at the engine. When a car makes the noise this one is making, the first thing to do, if you know anything about cars, is to check the distributor head and he prepared to clean the points. So I looked. The distributor head was missing.

  That cooled me. My temper and my irritation with Lucy went away. Again I felt that itchy Prickle run up my spine.

  “No wonder you couldn’t start it… the distributor head has been taken away. Have you the bond with you?”

  With wide eves, Lucy stared at me, then opened her bag and gave me the bond.

  “I never expected it would be easy. honey,” I said. “No one can earn money this big without sweating for it. Now listen : there was something Savanto said to me which I haven’t told you. He said you would be best off away from here while I’m teaching Timoteo to shoot. I can call a taxi and you can go to a hotel. We have the money, and it will be only for nine days. What do you say?”

  “I’m not going!”

  Although she looked scared, she also looked determined.

  “Fine.” I put the bond in my hip pocket, then went to her, and put my arms around her. “I don’t want you to go. Go and keep Timoteo company while I talk to Raimundo. It’s my bet he’s taken the distributor head.”

  “Be careful, Jay. That man frightens me.”

  “He doesn’t frighten me.”

  I kissed her, then set off across the sand towards the distant palms.

  It was a longish walk in the sun and I was sweating by the time I was within sight of the truck.

  Raimundo and Nick were pitching a tent. They had picked a good spot. There was shade, plenty of beach and the sea. As I approached, I saw Nick, his Hawaiian shirt black with sweat, doing most of the work. Raimundo was singing. He had a good voice. It sounded good enough to come out of a transistor.

  He stopped singing when he saw me, turned and said something to Nick who looked up, stared at me and then went on driving in a tent peg.

  Raimundo came towards me. He moved well, and he was very sure of himself.

  I stopped when I was within six feet of him. He stopped too.

  “You have the distributor head of my car,” I said. There was a bite in my voice, but I wasn’t bawling. “I want it.”

  “That’s right, Mr. Benson. I have it… orders.”

  “I want it,” I repeated.

  “Yeah.” His grin widened. “Mr. Savanto gives orders too : he said no one comes in; no one goes out. That’s his idea of security. You call Mr. Savanto if you don’t believe me.” He cocked his head on one side. “You’re doing your job. I’m doing mine. The truck doesn’t work either.”

  I thought fast. Savanto could have given this order. We had no reason to leave the range now except to put the bond in the bank. If Savanto considered security so important, he wouldn’t want either Lucy or myself to leave the place, and yet this could be Raimundo’s way of getting even with me for the way I had bawled him out.

  “I’ll talk to your boss,” I said. “If you’re being smart, I’ll be back and you’ll be sorry.”

  “You do that.” He was very sure of himself. “You talk to your boss. He’ll tell you.”

  He threw a lot of weight on the word your. It wasn’t lost on me.

  I walked back to the bungalow. It was a long walk. I didn’t hurry. It was now getting too hot to hurry and I had some thinking to do. If what Raimundo had said was true, then I had a problem on my hands. I had in my hair twenty-five thousand dollars that didn’t belong to me.

  I reached the bungalow and walked into the sitting-room. I went over to the telephone and lifted the receiver. There was no dialling tone. The telephone was as dead as an amputated leg.

  I sat down in my favourite armchair and lit a cigarette. I sat there for some minutes thinking. No car… no telephone… fifteen miles from the highway. To say we were cut off was an understatement.

  I wasn’t fazed. This kind of situation was something I thrive on. I got to my feet, went into the kitchen and inspected the food that had been delivered. It was quite a selection : at least we wouldn’t starve. I went over the dozens of cans of food: all of the best and enough to keep three adults eating well for a couple of months. There was an impressive selection of drink including six bottles of champagne, lots of canned beer, whisky, gin and tomato juice.

  So being cut off from Paradise City wasn’t a problem. But what was I going to do with this bond which didn’t belong to me?

  I thought about the problem, knowing I was wasting time, but this was important; more than important.

  Finally, I went to our store cupboard and found a small empty biscuit box. I put the envelope containing the bond into the box. Then I found a roll of adhesive tape and taped the lid to the box.

  I left the bungalow by the rear door and crossed over to a row of palm trees that gave the bungalow its only shade. I paused to look around the way I had so often looked around before setting up an ambush in Vietnam. When I was satisfied I was on my own and no one was watching me, I scooped a deep hole in the soft sand under the third palm tree in a row of five and buried the biscuit box against the tree root. I smoothed down the sand. It took me some minutes to get rid of my footprints around the tree. I was finally satisfied.

  I dusted the sand off my hands and looked at my watch. The time was 09.26. Timoteo had been on the range for close on three and a half hours and he hadn’t fired a shot.

  I hurried across the sand towards the shooting gallery. I felt under sudden pressure. If I was going to teach this beanpole, I just could not have any further trouble. And even before I made a start to teach him, I had to get him relaxed !

  I reached the gallery. The sand deadened my footfalls. I heard Lucy’s voice. She sounded animated. I slowed, then stopped in the shadow of the lean-to and I listened.

  “I was like you before I met Jay,” she was saying. “You may not believe it but I was. I’m pretty bad now, but I am better. Before I met Jay I was so mixed up, just looking in a mirror made me jump. I guess it was my father…” A long pause, then she went on, “They say most kids when they are in a mess blame their parents. What do you think?”

  I rubbed the sweat off my face and edged closer. This was something I wanted to hear.

  “It’s as good an excuse as any.” I scarcely recognised Timoteo’s voice. He too sounded animated. “We are all looking for excuses. Maybe our parents are to blame, but we’re to blame too. It is a comfort to us to say if our parents had only been different. There are special cases of course, but I think we just have to help ourselves.”

  “You’re lucky to be able to think like that,” Lucy said. “I know my father was a lot to blame.”

  “For what?”

  “For why I am a mess. You see, he wanted a boy. He was set on it. When he got me, he just refused to accept me as a girl and I couldn’t have been more girl. He always made me wear trousers. He always expected me to do the things boys do. Finally, he realised it was hopeless, then he dropped me… ignored me. All the time I was struggling to get some love from him. To me love is important.” A long pause, then she asked, “Don’t you think so?”

  “I wouldn’t know.” Timoteo’s voice was suddenly flat. “I’ve been brought up in a different way. Didn’t your mother give you love?”

  “She died when I was born. How about your mother?”

  “Women don’t count in the Brotherhood. I scarcely ever saw her.”

  “Brotherhood? What’s that?”

  “A way of life… something we don’t talk about.” Again there was a long pause, then he said, “You said you’re in a mess. Why do you say that? I don’t think so.”

  “I’m in less of a me
ss than I was, but I’m still messy. I have no confidence in myself. I feel inadequate. I scare easily. I almost die if there’s a thunderstorm. I was much worse before I met Jay. You mustn’t think because he shouts and scowls he isn’t kind and understanding. He is… anyway, you’ll find out. I don’t know why I’m talking like this.” She laughed. “You looked so depressed and worried, the same way I know I look sometimes, I just couldn’t help sounding off.”

  “I appreciate it, Mrs. Benson.”

  “Please call me Lucy. After all you’re going to live with us. I know we’re going to be friends.” A pause, then she asked, “Is that your rifle?”

  “Yes.”

  “Can I try it? Jay never thinks of letting me shoot. He’s a marvellous shot. I’ve often wondered what it is like to be able to shoot so well. Will you show me how to shoot, Tim?”

  “I don’t think Mr. Benson would like that.”

  “He wouldn’t mind. Besides, he’s busy trying to fix the car. Please show me.”

  She must have picked up the rifle because Timoteo said sharply, alarm in his voice, “Be careful. It’s loaded.”

  “Show me.”

  “I’m no good at it. I don’t think… I think we should wait for Mr. Benson.”

  “You must be better with it than I am. I’m not going to wait. I’m going to try. What do I do?”

  “You’d better not.”

  “I’m going to.”

  Lucy had never fired a rifle. She might kill him. He might kill her. I started forward, then stopped. She was handling him better than I could. This was a risk that might pay off.

  I heard him say, “Wait! You’re holding it too loosely. You must hold it hard against your shoulder. The recoil can hurt if you don’t. Don’t you think we’d better wait…”

  “Like this?”

  “Harder against your shoulder. Lucy, please… you shouldn’t…”

  Then the rifle went off. I heard Lucy squeal.

  “It hurt!” She was all feminine now.

  “You’ve hit the target!” His high-pitched voice showed his excitement. “Look !”

  “I meant to.” A pause. “It’s not bad, is it for a first shot. Now, you try.”