A Moment on the Edge:100 Years of Crime Stories by women

by Elizabeth George

  Very carefully, in a state of fearful pleasure, he put all the pieces of paper in order. One copy of the manuscript he put into an envelope and addressed it. The other copies he put into an empty suitcase. Then he called an airline and was lucky. A seat for New York in the morning. Morning? What morning? St. Patrick’s Day in the morning. He had been out of this world. But now he stretched, breathed, blinked, and put out feelers for what is known as reality. See now. He was Mitchel Brown, playwright (God willing), and he had finished the job of revision he had come home to Los Angeles to do. Wowee! Finished! The hour was a quarter after one in the morning and therefore already the seventeenth of March. The place was his ground-floor apartment, and it was a mess: smoky, dirty, disorderly…Oh, well, first things had come first. His back was aching, his eyes were burning, his head was light. He would have to clean up, eat, sleep, bathe, shave, dress, pack. But first… He slammed a row of airmail stamps on the envelope and went out. The street was dark and deserted. A few cars sat lumpishly along the curbs. The manuscript thumped down into the mailbox—safe in the bosom of the Postal Service. Now, even if he, the plane, and the other copies perished… Mitch laughed at himself and turned the corner, feeling suddenly let down, depressed, and forlorn. The Parakeet Bar and Grill, he noted gratefully, was still open. He walked the one block and went in. The Bar ran all the way along one wall and the Grill, consisting of eight booths, ran all the way along the other. The narrow room was dim and felt empty.

  Mitch groped for a stool.

  “Hi, Toby. Business slow?”

  “Hi, Mr. Brown.” The bartender seemed glad to see him. He was a small man with a crest of dark hair, a blue chin, and a blue tinge to the whites of his eyes. “This late on a weeknight, I’m never crowded.”

  “The kitchen’s gone home, eh?” Mitch said. The kitchen was not the heart of this establishment.

  “That’s right, Mr. Brown. You want any food, you better go elsewhere.”

  “A drink will do me,” said Mitch with a sigh. “I can go home and scramble yet another egg.”

  Toby turned to his bottles. When he turned back with Mitch’s usual, he said in an anxious whine, “Fact is, I got to close up pretty soon and I don’t know what to do.”

  “What do you mean, what to do?”

  “Look at her.” Toby’s gaze passed over Mitch’s left shoulder.

  Mitch glanced behind him and was startled to see there was a woman sitting in one of the booths. Or perhaps one could say lying, since her fair hatless head was down on the red-checked tablecloth. Mitch turned again and wagged inquiring eyebrows.

  “Out like a light,” said Toby in a hoarse whisper. “Listen, I don’t want to call the cops. Thing like that, not so good for the place. But I got a kid sick and my wife is all wore out and I wanted to get home.”

  “You try black coffee?”

  “Sure, I tried.” Toby’s shoulders despaired.

  “How’d she get this way?”

  “Not here,” said Toby quickly. “Don’t see how. So help me, a coupla drinks hit her like that. Trouble is, she’s not a bum. You can see that. So what should I do?”

  “Put her in a taxi,” said Mitch blithely. “Just ship her where she belongs. Why not? She’ll have something on her for identity.”

  “I don’t want to mess around with her pocketbook,” Toby said fearfully.

  “Hm. Well, let’s see…” Mitch got off the stool. His drink had gone down and bounced lightly and he was feeling cheerful and friendly toward all the world. Furthermore, he felt very intelligent and he understood that he had been born to understand everybody.

  Toby came too, and they lifted the woman’s torso.

  Her face was slack in drunken sleep; but even so it was not an ugly face. It was not young; neither was it old. Her clothing was expensive. No, she wasn’t a tramp.

  Then she opened her eyes and said in a refined voice, “I beg your pardon.”

  She was not exactly conscious; still this was encouraging. The two men got her to her feet. With their support she could stand. In fact, she could walk. Mitch ran his left arm through the handle of her expensive-looking handbag. The two of them walked her to the door.

  “The air maybe?” said the bartender hopefully.

  “Right,” said Mitch. “Listen, there’s a cab stand next to the movie theater. By the time we walk her over there…”

  Toby said shrilly. “I got to lock up. I got to take care of the place.”

  “Go ahead,” said Mitch, standing in the sweet night air with the strange woman heavy in his arms, “I’ve got her.”

  He heard the lock click behind him as he set off on the sidewalk, the woman putting one foot ahead of the other willingly enough. Musing on the peculiar and surprising qualities of “reality,” Mitch had guided her halfway along the block before he recognized the fact that the bartender had taken him literally and was not coming along at all.

  Oh, well. Mitch was not annoyed. On the contrary, he felt filled with compassion for all human beings. This woman was human and, therefore, frail. He was glad to try to help her to some place of her own.

  The neighborhood business section was deserted. They were moving in an empty world. When Mitch had struggled all the way to the next corner, he could see ahead that there were no cabs near the theater. At this time of night the theater was dead and dark, as he should have known. He guessed he hadn’t quite been meshed with the gears of ordinary time.

  Anyhow, he couldn’t turn her over to a handy cab driver. Nor to the police, since there were no policemen around either. There was nothing but pavement, those few lumps of metal left at the curb for the night, and no traffic.

  Mitch wouldn’t have hailed a motorist anyway. Most motorists were suspicious and afraid. So he did the only thing he could—he kept walking.

  He guided her automatic steps around the corner and down the street, for surely, he thought, if he kept her walking she would begin to be conscious and he could then ask her what she wanted him to do about her. This he felt was the right thing. Perhaps he could get out his own car…

  But the air was not having the desired effect. She began to stumble. Her weight slumped against him. Mitch found he was almost carrying her. Then he discovered that he was standing, holding her upright with both arms, directly in front of his own building. Obviously, the only thing to do was take her inside, where he could investigate her identity and telephone for a taxi.

  The apartment had not tidied itself up during his absence. He let her weight go and she sagged down on his sofa. He guided her blond head to a pillow. There she lay, out like a light, a perfect stranger. To straighten the body and make it look more comfortable, he lifted the lower part of the legs. One of her shoes—beautiful shoes in a fine green leather, with a high spike heel and a small brass buckle—one of them came off.

  Mitch took hold of the other shoe and also removed it. Full of cosmic thoughts about females and heels, he put her shoes on his desk and slipped her handbag off his arm. It was the same fine green leather.

  It did feel sneaky to be rifling the property of a strange woman. Still, it had to be done.

  Her name, on the driver’s license, was Natalie Maxwell. Her address was in Santa Barbara. Mitch whistled. That knocked over his scheme of sending her home in a cab, since her home was a hundred miles away. Then he found a letter addressed to Mrs. Julius Maxwell and Mitch whistled again. So she was married!

  Furthermore, she was married to somebody whose name was familiar. Julius Maxwell. All that came to Mitch’s musing memory was an aroma of money. She probably wasn’t broke, then. He peered into her wallet and saw a few bills. Not many. So he riffled her checkbook and whistled for the third time. Well! No penniless waif, this one.

  Mitch ran his hand through his hair and considered his predicament. Here he was, harboring a wealthy matron from Santa Barbara who had passed out from liquor. What was he going to do with her?

  There was nothing in the bag to tell him where she was staying locally. Th
e letter was woman’s chatter from someone in San Francisco.

  So what to do?

  Well, he might phone the police and dump her on them. This he could not quite imagine. Or, he could phone the residence of Julius Maxwell, in Santa Barbara, and if her husband were there, ask for instructions; or, if he were not there, surely Mitch could ask somebody where Mrs. Maxwell was staying in Los Angeles, and dump her there. All this went through his mind and was rejected.

  Why cause another human being humiliation and trouble? He didn’t think she was ill. Just stinko. Sooner or later the fumes would wear away and she would come to herself. Meantime, she was perfectly safe, right where she was. Heaven knew he had no evil thoughts.

  Also, he—Mitchel Brown, playwright, artist, apostle of compassion—he was no bourgeois to conform, cravenly fearing

  for his reputation if he were to do what is “not done.” Was he, being what he was, to put this human being into a jam with the Law, or even with her own husband? When this human being, for some human reason, had simply imbibed a little too much alcohol? He couldn’t do it.

  Okay. He had been dragooned by his mood and by the perfidious desertion of Toby the bartender into acting the Samaritan. Why not be the good Samaritan, then? Give her a break.

  This pleased him. It felt lucky to him. Give her a break. God knows we all need them, he thought piously.

  So Mitch scribbled a note. Dear Mrs. Maxwell: Use my phone if you like. Or be my guest, as long as you need to be.

  He signed it, went into his bedroom, got a light blanket, and spread it over her. She was snoring faintly. He studied her face a moment more. He put the note on the rug under her shoes where she would be sure to see it. Then he went into his bedroom, closed the door, and went to bed.

  Mitchel Brown woke up on St. Patrick’s Day, early in the morning, absolutely ravenous. He had forgotten to eat anything. Now he remembered. New York! Catch plane! Pack!

  He started for his kitchen and at the bedroom door remembered the lady. So he turned and put a robe on before emerging.

  He needn’t have bothered. She was gone. Her shoes were gone. Her bag was gone. His note was gone. In fact, there was no trace of her at all.

  He did not wonder whether he had been dreaming. So she had come to and fled. Hm, without even a “Thank you”? Oh, well, panic, he supposed. Ah, human frailty! Mitch shrugged. But he had things to do and not enough time to do them in.

  He went into a spell of demon housekeeping, threw everything perishable out of his refrigerator, everything dirty into the laundry bag, everything wearable into his suitcase. He caught the plane by a whisker.

  Once on it he began to suffer. He reread his manuscript in his mind’s eye and squirmed with doubt. He tried to nap and could

  not, and then, suddenly, he could…and then he was in New York and God was willing and his producer was still hot and eager…

  Six weeks later Mitchel Brown, playwright, got off the plane in Los Angeles. He had a play on Broadway. The verdict was comme ci, comme ça. Time, box office, word of mouth…personally he could bear no more. He wasn’t licked, but he knew he would be unless he got home and got to work on something else and that, soon.

  He had been out of this world all this time, for when one has a play in rehearsal, earthquake, major catastrophe, declaration of war mean nothing. Nothing whatever.

  He got to his apartment about five a.m. and kicked aside the pile of newspapers he had forgotten to stop. The place smelled stale and wasn’t really clean, but no matter. He opened all the windows, mixed himself a highball, and sat down with the last paper on the heap to catch up with the way the Western world had wagged since he had left it. International affairs he had glanced over, the last week in the East. Local affairs, of course, were completely unknown to him.

  The latest murder, hm…Los Angeles papers are always hopeful that a murder is going to turn out to be a big one, so any and every murder gets off with a bang. This one didn’t look promising. A mere brawl, he judged. Would die down in a couple of days.

  He skimmed the second page where all the older murders were followed up. He had missed two or three. Some woman knifed by an ex-husband. Some man shot in his own hall. Run-of-the-mill. Mitch yawned. He would get out his car, go somewhere for a decent meal, he decided. Tomorrow, back to the salt mines.

  At 6:30 p.m. he walked into his favorite restaurant, ordered a drink, settled to contemplate the menu.

  She came in quietly about ten minutes later and sat down by herself at a table directly across from Mitch. The first thing he

  noted, with the tail of his eye, was her shoes. He had seen them before. Yes, and held them—held them in his hands.

  His eyes traveled higher and there was Mrs. Julius Maxwell. (Natalie was her given name, he remembered.) It was not only Mrs. Julius Maxwell in the flesh, but Mrs. Julius Maxwell in the very same clothing she had worn before! The same green suit, the same pale blouse, and no hat. She was a lady, well groomed, prosperous, pretty, and poised—and now perfectly sober.

  Mitch kept his head cocked and his eyes on her, waiting for her to feel his stare and respond to it. Her eyes came to his in a moment, but they were cool and empty of recognition.

  Well, of course, he thought. How would she know me? She never saw me. He glanced away, feeling amused, then glanced back. Natalie Maxwell was ordering. She sat back, relaxed, and her gaze slipped past him again, returned briefly to note his interest, then went away, indicating none on her part.

  Mitch could not help feeling that this was not fair. He got up and crossed to her. “How do you do, Mrs. Maxwell?” he said pleasantly. “I am glad you are feeling better.”

  “I beg your pardon?” she said. He remembered that he had heard her say this, and only this, once before.

  “I’m Mitchel Brown.” He waited, smiling down at her.

  “I don’t believe…” she murmured in genteel puzzlement. She had a nice straight nose and, although she was looking up at him, she seemed to be looking down that nose.

  “I’m sure you remember the name,” Mitch said. “It was the sixteenth of March. No, it was Saint Patrick’s Day in the morning, actually.”

  “I don’t quite…”

  Was she stupid or what? Mitch said, with a bit of a sting in the tone, “Did you have much of a hangover?”

  “I’m very sorry,” she said with a little exasperated laugh, “but I really don’t know what you are talking about.”

  “Oh, come now, Natalie,” said Mitch, beginning to feel miffed, “it was my apartment.”

  “What?” she said.

  “My apartment that you passed out in—here in Los Angeles.”

  “I am afraid you are making a mistake,” she said distantly.

  Mitch did not think so.

  “Aren’t you Mrs. Julius Maxwell?”

  “Yes, I am.”

  “From Santa Barbara?”

  “Why, yes, I am.” She was frowning a little.

  “Then the apartment you woke up in, on Saint Patrick’s Day in the morning, was my apartment,” said Mitch huffily, “and why the amnesia?”

  “What is this?” said a male voice.

  Mitch swivelled his head and knew at once that here was Mr. Julius Maxwell. He saw a medium-sized, taut-muscled, middle-aged man with a thatch of salt-and-pepper hair and fierce black eyes under heavy black brows. Everything about this man blazoned aggression and possession. He reeked of push and power, of I and Mine.

  Mitchel Brown, playwright, artist, and apostle of compassion, drew his own forces together, as if he folded in some wings.

  “Julius,” said the blond woman, “this man knows my name. He keeps talking about Saint Patrick’s Day in the morning.”

  “Oh, he does?” said her husband.

  “He says I was in his apartment, here in Los Angeles.”

  To Mitch Brown came a notion that would explain all this. Obviously, Natalie’s husband had never found out where Natalie had been that night. So Natalie had to pretend she didn�
��t know Mitch, because she knew, as he did not, that Julius Maxwell was nearby and would appear. But something in the woman’s manner did not quite fit this theory. She didn’t seem to be concerned enough. She looked straight ahead and her bewilderment was perfunctory.

  Still, he thought he should be gallant. “I must have made a mistake” he said. “But the resemblance is remarkable. Perhaps you have a double, ma’am?”

  He thought this was handsome of him and that it gave her a way out.

  “A double?” said Julius Maxwell nastily. “Who uses my wife’s name?”

  Well, of course, if the man was going to be intelligent about it, that tore it. “Sorry,” said Mitch lightly.

  “Sit down and tell me about it,” said Maxwell commandingly. “Mr.…er…?”

  “Brown,” said Mitch shortly. He was of a mind to turn on his heel and go away. But he glanced at Natalie. She had opened her handbag and found her compact. This stuck him as either offensively nonchalant or pathetically trusting. Or what? Curiosity rose in Mitch—and he sat down.

  “Why, I happened into a bar where a lady had had too much to drink,” he said, as if this were nothing unusual. “I volunteered to put her in a taxi but there was no taxi. I wound up leaving her passed out on my sofa. In the morning she was gone. That’s all there is to the story.”

  “This was on Saint Patrick’s Day?” said Maxwell intently.

  “In the small hours. In the morning.”

  “Then the lady was not my wife. My wife was with me in Santa Barbara at our home that night.”

  “With you?” said Mitch carefully, feeling a bit of shock.

  “Certainly.” Maxwell’s tone was belligerent.

  Mitch was beginning to wonder. The woman had powdered her nose and sat looking as if she couldn’t care less. “Not simply in the same building,” Mitch inquired, “as you may have assumed?”

  “Not simply in the same building,” said Julius Maxwell, “and no assumption. She was with me, speaking to me, touching me, if you like.” His black eyes were hostile.