by Jerry eBooks
Henderson and Aterbury stood in front of the closed door, Aterbury a little behind Henderson. Aterbury was grinning, showing his mouthful of false teeth. Henderson was grinning, too. But it wasn’t a nice grin. He had a big black Colt .45 in his hand. And it was pointing straight at my belly.
I had my .38 in my inside coat pocket. I could feel its weight against my chest, and my fingers itched to feel it in my hand. But I didn’t have a chance. Henderson had me covered, and he wasn’t three feet away. For a second the three of us just stood there looking at each other.
And then Henderson said, nasty, “Didn’t you get enough this afternoon?”
Aterbury giggled.
Ignoring them, I turned my head and looked at the girl. She was standing perfectly still, her face white. “Maybe I’m dumb,” I said. “Do these punks live here?”
“I can’t help it,” she said, and there was a kind of desperation in her voice. “I can’t help any of this. I didn’t know that they were here—really, I didn’t. I don’t know how they got in—maybe the fire escape—”
“Maybe,” I grunted. And then all of a sudden I believed her. There was something about her eyes, the sound of her voice. I grinned at her then. “Okay, girlie. Take it easy.”
I looked around at Henderson. “What’s the play?” I said.
Henderson said, “Shut up, you fat slob,” and he waved his gun at the girl. “All right, sweetheart, we’re all through fooling. Get going.” He motioned towards the door.
She looked at me. Her eyes were dark with fear. Whatever Henderson’s game was, he meant business. And the girl knew it. She took a step backwards. “No,” she said. “I’m not going anywhere. Not with you.”
Henderson shifted his gun to his left hand, kept the muzzle pointed at me, and stepped swiftly over to the girl. He grabbed her arm, jerked it. “Come on, sweetheart. We ain’t got all night.”
I said, “Leave her alone. You heard what she said. She’s not going.”
Henderson looked at me, said, “Who rattled your chain?” He jerked his head at Aterbury by the door. “Doc, take care of Fatty, here. And watch him this time.”
Aterbury slithered up behind me and I saw the gleam of the knife in his hand. He pressed the point against my kidneys again, not easy, and he giggled. “Stand still, sir. My hand is not too steady tonight.” Henderson jerked the girl towards the door. She tried to pull away from him. He let go of her arm and slapped her hard across the mouth. She stumbled back against the wall, her head down, her eyes tight shut. Her lower lip began to bleed. Henderson took a quick step towards her and there was a kind of a vicious look of pleasure on his face. He slapped her again and her head banged up against the wall. “Don’t,” she moaned. “I’ll go.” Maybe I’m old-fashioned but I don’t like to see a girl—any girl—treated like that. And anyhow I was tired of standing still for the slimy little punk behind me. Him and his knife! I twisted sideways away from him, and as I twisted I grabbed for the .38 in my inside coat pocket. But Aterbury darted right after me, his knife out in front of him. He handled it like a sword, low, in front of him. He came right on in, showing his too-even teeth and the fake pink of his gums. I swung up a leg and kicked him in the belly, hard, and his mouth clicked shut and he went backwards. I had my .38 in my hand then, and as Henderson whirled around, snarling, I brought it up, my finger tight on the trigger. But I didn’t dare shoot. The girl was right behind him.
The three of us stood there for a split second, all action suspended, like a lobby-still at a movie. Henderson had his gun out in front of him, but he didn’t shoot. I found out why.
A crisp voice behind me said, “Drop it, Allen.” I jerked my head around. Mr. Preston Rowden stood in the doorway, Homburg, cane, and all. He had a stubby little blue steel revolver in his hand. He said again, “Drop that gun, Allen.”
“Like hell,” I said. “What’s the idea, Rowden?” Behind me I heard the girl gasp, “You!” and her voice sounded hard and unnatural. And then she gave a little scream and in almost the same instant something heavy and hard slammed me on the back of the head and the floor came rushing up to meet me. Close beside me I heard Aterbury’s sickening giggle, and then I stopped hearing anything at all.
For the second time that day I was out cold.
When I opened my eyes again it was dark. Dark all around me. And very quiet. My head hurt like hell, and I closed my eyes again to see if the pain would go away. It didn’t. I opened them again and I began to remember things. I tried to move and I found out I couldn’t. They had me trussed up good, both hands and feet, with my arms behind me. I raised my head, tried to make out where I was. I was lying on a bare board floor and the planks were very hard. Directly in front of me was a window. Through the window I could see the night sky, and over beyond a dark blotch of trees on a hillside I saw the reflection of the lights of some town. I stretched out again and tried to figure out what kind of a mess I had gotten myself into.
From somewhere near me a low voice said, “Mr. Allen.”
I recognized the voice of the girl. I turned my head and I could barely make out her form across the room lying close to the wall. She appeared to be in the same fix I was.
“Call me Pete,” I said, low. I talked quiet because she had. “I guess the situation is informal enough.”
“Are you all right?” she whispered.
“Yeah,” I said. “I guess so. How about you?”
“Yes,” she replied. “Only I can’t move.”
“What is this?” I asked. “A snatch, or what?”
“Listen,” she said. “I’ll have to talk fast. They carried you down the fire escape from my room and the three of them brought us out here. Rowden and Henderson have gone away, but Aterbury is somewhere around. We are in a deserted farm house somewhere in Westchester, not very far off the Post Road. Rowden is my stepfather—”
“Yeah,” I said. “I knew that. He is the reason I sprung you out of the jug tonight.”
“Yes,” she said. “I know that now. I know a lot of things now. They may be back any minute . . .”
“I don’t get it,” I said, “but the first thing we got to do is get out of here.”
I tried to get to my feet, but with my hands tied behind me and my feet lashed together I couldn’t make it. So then I started to roll. I managed to make it over to the girl’s side, but when I got there I had to lay still a minute. My head was pounding and I felt pretty weak. I turned on my side and looked at the girl. The moon had come up and she lay there in the pale light, her eyes bright, watching me. Her dress was torn down one round shoulder and I saw the white gleam of her legs where her dress had been worked halfway to her waist. She was tied hand and foot, the same as I was, and her sheer stockings were twisted and torn by the cords around her slim ankles. My eyes were on a level with hers. I felt pretty tough. There was a roaring in my head, and I shut my eyes, but the roaring didn’t stop.
I heard her say, “They are coming back. We’ve got to get out of here.” Her voice sounded far away.
“Okay,” I muttered. “I’ll figure out something.” I didn’t know what I’d figure out. All I wanted to do right then was to close my eyes and relax and wait for my head to stop hurting.
The girl whispered, “I want you to know this. My mother loves him—Rowden, I mean—I don’t know why. Henderson and Aterbury are friends of his; they came to our house soon after Rowden married my mother. Rowden could fool my mother but he couldn’t fool me. Things at home became unbearable. And then Rowden began to—make passes at me. I couldn’t tell my mother; it would break her heart. So I left. Rowden had Henderson and Aterbury keep track of me. I couldn’t get rid of them. And then, after I left, Rowden got this idea of paying Henderson and Aterbury to kidnap me—and keep the money that Mother would pay for my release for himself. He intended to keep out of it entirely. That is why he came to see you, to establish an alibi for himself. But you and the police spoiled his plans, and he was forced to show himself tonight when you made that b
reak in my room. He had tipped off Henderson and Aterbury that you were bringing me back there. He was hiding in the hall.”
I openend my eyes and looked at her. My head felt a little better. “And now Rowden is in up to his neck,” I said. “And he can’t back out. If he tried to, Henderson and Aterbury would probably blackmail him.”
“That’s it,” she said. “They were arguing about it. Henderson wants an equal share of the money—or else he will expose Rowden to Mother.”
“Very pretty,” I said. And then suddenly the whole nasty setup was very clear to me and I began to sweat. I think the girl must have known it all along—ever since Rowden had showed himself at her room. Rowden could never go back to his easy living with the girl’s mother now—not as long as the girl was alive. And it wasn’t only the girl. I was in on this, too, and I could just about picture what was going to happen to me when Rowden and Henderson got back. And it wasn’t a pretty picture. I wasn’t going to lay there and wait for Rowden to come back and put a slug in my ear—not if I could help it.
“Where’s Aterbury?” I said.
“Outside, somewhere. He may be listening now.”
“Never mind,” I whispered. “Turn over. I’m going to try and untie you.”
She turned over on her side with her back to me and I wriggled around so that I could get my teeth at the knots in the heavy cord around her wrists. But it was no use. The knots were too small and too tight. I bit and chewed and I damn near broke off a couple of teeth but I couldn’t even loosen the cord. I gave up finally and tried to think of something. She turned over so that she faced me again. “What are we going to do?” she whispered.
“I don’t know,” I said. “Whatever it is, it’s got to be quick.”
And then I had an idea. It might work, and it might not, but it was a chance worth trying.
I said, “Listen. I’ve got a cigarette lighter in my right-hand coat pocket. If you can get it, see what you can do about burning the rope on my wrists.”
She nodded silently and squirmed around until her back was to me, and even with her hands tied behind her she managed to get into my pocket and get hold of the lighter. She got it out and I heard her clicking it, trying to light it. She dropped it on the floor a couple of times, and suddenly she had it lit. The tiny flame cast faint shadows on the wall and I hoped that Aterbury, wherever he was, wouldn’t notice. I twisted around and tried to get my hands into position so that she could apply the flame to the rope around my wrist.
It was pretty awkward work. I couldn’t see what I was doing, and neither could she. The flame hit my hands, and then my wrists before I could smell the rope burning. I tried to hold the rope over the flame, but when I managed to hit it, my wrist burnt as much as the rope. It hurt, sure, but I held on as long as I could. I could smell the scorched strands of rope, and there was another smell—the grease frying out of my hide. I stood it as long as I could, and when I finally pulled my hands away I could feel the sweat all over me and I discovered that I was biting the hell out of my lower lip. I could taste the blood.
The girl flicked the flame off. I jerked at the ropes, tried to pull my wrists apart. But it was no-go. The rope wasn’t burning enough. I took a deep breath, said, “All right, girlie. Give me a light.”
She flicked the flame on again, and in the faint illumination I saw a black shadow fall across our bodies. The girl saw it, too. I heard her suck in her breath, and the flame suddenly went oat. I rolled over on my back, looked at the doorway.
A man’s dark figure stood silhouetted there against the night sky. The figure moved slowly into the room and stood in the path of moonlight which streamed through the window, and I saw the ugly wink of steel in his hand. And then I heard Aterbury’s silly giggle.
“Well, well,” he said. “What is going on in here?” He stepped up to us, lit a match, and peered at the cords which bound us. Satisfied, he stood up, and I heard his false teeth click. “Is it—ah—necessary for you two to be so close together?” he asked, giggling. He wagged a forefinger. “I don’t approve, you know. I think I had better stay right here and chaperone you.”
I struggled to a sitting position. “Listen—” I began, but before I could say more he lifted his foot and kicked me in the face and my head hit the floor. I lay there a minute, a red haze of hate covering my brain. I heard the girl grate through her teeth at Aterbury: “You dirty coward.”
My face hurt, and I could feel the blood beginning to ooze out of a gash in my chin. I would have given an awful lot to have gotten my hands on Aterbury’s scrawny neck at that moment. But I said, “You play rough, but it’s the hot seat for you if you play around here much longer.” And I let that sink in.
For a second Aterbury didn’t say anything. I saw his eyes flash in the moonlight as he shot a glance out the window. He giggled, then, but it was a kind of a nervous giggle.
I began to talk fast, but I was thinking faster. “Listen, sap. Rowden came to me tonight and told me the whole setup, offered to cut me in but I didn’t want any part of it. He and Henderson are collecting the dough right now—and they won’t be back. They are going to leave you here for the cops to find, and keep the dough—all of it. How long have they been gone? Too long, haven’t they? The cops will be here any minute and it won’t do you any good to squeal on them because after Rowden showed his hand tonight he has to take it on the lam anyway. And you take the rap.”
In the moonlight I could see Aterbury’s shifty eyes flicking back and forth from me to the girl and he kept switching his knife from one hand to the other. “Lies,” he said, and his voice was almost a hiss. “All lies. A trick. They’ll be back.”
I figured that he was right, and that they would be back—pretty quick. And then the game would be up.
The girl spoke up. “That’s right, Dr. Aterbury. Cut us loose and go home with us and we’ll see that the police won’t bother you. And I’m sure that Mother will make it worth your while. Only hurry.” I had to give the girl credit. She was using her head, all right. I thought I could scare him, but she used the only language that rats like Aterbury can understand—money.
Aterbury hesitated a second. Then he said, “How much?” His voice was hoarse, and for once he wasn’t giggling. I could see his bright eyes watching the girl.
She said, “Anything—whatever you want.”
“Ten thousand dollars?” asked Aterbury. “Yes,” she said. “Ten thousand dollars.”
There was silence for a second. Then Aterbury laughed. “Oh, no,” he said. “What proof have I that I can trust you?”
I was afraid that he would ask that, but I had an answer ready for him. “I’ll stay here. Take the girl and get your money.”
The girl said, “No, Pete, I can’t let you do that.” It was the first time she had ever called me by my first name. I kind of liked to hear her say it.
“Never mind,” I said. “It’ll be all right.” Aterbury wasn’t so dumb. I think he realized that we were trying to pull a fast one, but the ten thousand bucks all for himself looked pretty good to him. He stood trembling in an agony of indecision. He turned quickly to the window, shot a quick glance both to the right and left. I felt the girl’s hand touch mine. She was pressing something into my palm. It was my lighter. She had kept it hidden in her fist since Aterbury had come in.
Aterbury turned quickly from the window. He had made up his mind. He jumped to the girl’s side. He was breathing hard. Feverishly he cut the rope which bound her hands and feet. I guess he was plenty scared and now that he had made up his mind he wanted to get the hell out of there. While he was cutting the girl loose he was careful to stay clear of me. When she was free she got to her feet and Aterbury almost dragged her to the door. She hung on to the door jamb a second looking at me.
“I’ll be back,” she said, “as fast as I can.”
“Okay,” I said, and I hoped that I would still be alive to see her when she did come back.
And then Aterbury pulled her away and I heard
them cross the porch and go down the steps. Silence settled down. I got to work with the lighter, but I couldn’t do much good. I pretty near sprained a wrist trying to get the flame into position, and when I finally did get it so that I could smell the rope burning instead of my hide, the fluid gave out. When I discovered that the wick was no longer burning, I just lay there a minute thinking things over.
I figured that it would take at least an hour for the girl to go home and get back to me, and a lot of things could happen in that hour. When they had been gone about ten minutes I had another idea and I cussed myself for a fool for not thinking of it sooner. I rolled over to the window, got up on my knees, and began to drag the rope on my wrists against the rough wooden edge of the window sill. Almost immediately I could tell that the rope strands were getting ragged with the friction. I rubbed harder and I was sweating and breathing hard when the first strand let loose. It was fairly easy from then on, and in a couple of minutes I had my hands free. I began to rub my wrists to bring back circulation and I saw my hands in the moonlight. They were not a pretty sight. The rope had rubbed my wrists raw and blood was running into open blisters made by the lighter. I bent over to untie the rope around my ankles. And then I heard a car coming up the road, fast. Rowden and Henderson were coming back at last.
I worked harder on the knots, but they were tied tight, and tangled. I tugged and pulled and tore loose a fingernail but I couldn’t get the rope even loosened. I shot a quick glance out the window. The car was close. I could see the headlights bouncing over the rutty mud road. It turned into the yard in front of the house and stopped. I heard a door slam, and then the voice of Rowden. “I’ll wait here. Do it quick.”
“Like hell,” I heard Henderson say. “You’re in this, too. Come on.”
Rowden’s answer was lost in the slamming of the car door, and then I saw the two of them walking across the yard toward the house, Henderson in front.
