Scratch Fever

by Collins, Max Allan

  It had taken her the best part of her entire first week back with him to worm the story out of him. Seemed the mutt had turned up at his back door, half dead; it had been in a bad dog fight or two, had half an ear chewed off, and hadn’t eaten for days. “A skeleton with a tail,” Nolan had described it.

  Apparently the dog had touched a nerve in Nolan that Sherry hadn’t known existed. He took the dog in; in fact, he took the dog to a vet—spent money on it! And, while saying Nolan nursed the dog back to health would be going too far, the dog had somehow survived. And somehow knew Nolan was responsible.

  If Nolan sat in his reclining chair, reading a paper, watching TV, the dog slept on the floor near his feet. When Nolan slept, the dog slept under the bed. When Nolan ate, the dog sat politely nearby, waiting for the inevitable scraps. Every now and then, Nolan allowed the dog up on his lap; he’d pet it, grant it a smile, and it would curl up and sleep there. But only now and then.

  Sherry was more openly affectionate to the dog, and the dog returned the affection; but it loved Nolan. It was, after all, a bitch.

  She let the dog in, and it followed her upstairs, tagging after her as she undressed. Then she heard its claws clicking on the stairs, heading back down to wait for Nolan again, as she got in the shower and let the hot needles wash away the hard-earned sweat from a day of shopping centers, pizza, and Robert Redford.

  Soon she was in a black Frederick’s nightie, sitting on the couch, waiting for Nolan to come home and fuck her. She knew it sounded harsh, but that was what she was in the mood for: a good, hard, horny fuck. And she’d bet that Nolan would feel the same.

  She was twenty and had a nice, if not busty, figure; she knew that her appeal to him was her youth, the suppleness of her body, the cuteness of her features, her California blonde hair (dyed or not). And she knew that his appeal to her (beyond this house and his affluence) was as a father figure. A coldly handsome, closed-mouthed father figure, perhaps; a father figure with bullet scars on his muscular body. A father figure who was great in the sack. But a father figure.

  She’d first met Nolan at the Tropical, a motel he was running for the Chicago Family. Initially, she’d been a waitress there, and a bad one: it was when she got called on the carpet for spilling food in customers’ laps that she ended up in Nolan’s lap, and that pretty much was where she’d stayed the rest of that summer.

  Then her father had called and told her her mother had had a stroke, and it was back to Ohio for Sherry. There would be no time to finish up college (she had a two-year community college degree and had hoped to get a four-year business degree) and the only job she could find was waitressing at a Denny’s. Which was better than hell, but just barely. And when she wasn’t waitressing at Denny’s, she was looking after her mother, which she didn’t mind, because she loved her mother, but it was sad. So very sad.

  Three months ago her mother had died.

  Sherry started back to college, and only a month in, she knew she couldn’t hack it. It wasn’t that she was stupid; she wasn’t particularly smart, either, but it wasn’t that she was stupid. More like bored. She was more bored than waitressing at Denny’s. It was a rare week that she didn’t think about her summer with Nolan. She had even cried herself to sleep a couple times, missing him, wishing she could have stayed with him.

  Then, last month, he called. She didn’t even know how he’d managed to track her down, but he had. And he wanted her to come live with him.

  “I need a hostess at my new restaurant,” he said.

  “That’s like a waitress, right?”

  “Right. Only you don’t spill shit on people.”

  “But Logan, that’s my speciality.”

  “I know. And can the Logan stuff.”

  Logan was the name she’d known Nolan by at the Tropical.

  “How come?”

  “I’m using Nolan here. So don’t call me Logan anymore. It’ll just confuse people.”

  “Well, I’m already confused.”

  “That’s how I like you.”

  “I’m also broke.”

  “I’ll send plane fare.”

  “I’m on my way, then.”

  Their month together had been a lot of fun, if not a honeymoon. Nolan wasn’t altogether humorless, though when he did make a joke, it was so dry, you could miss it if you weren’t looking. They made good love together. They got along. He didn’t insist that she cook—one thing he wasn’t stingy about was taking her out to eat, though he did collect receipts to deduct on the meals on his taxes, claiming he was “checking out my competition.” And when she did cook, he didn’t complain, even when the results (her Tuna Surprise, for instance) were less than spectacular. Memorable, yes; spectacular, no.

  During the first week, the Nolan/Logan thing had been a running gag with them; she’d kept right on calling him Logan, till he finally threatened to turn her over his knee and spank her. She dropped her drawers and said go right ahead. And he had, and more.

  But afterward he said, “Seriously—get used to calling me Nolan. I got to stick by one name in one place.”

  And from then on it was strictly Nolan.

  She was watching a “Mission: Impossible” rerun when she remembered the answer phone: she hadn’t checked for messages. She went into the kitchen, and the red light was flashing on the little tape unit by the phone on the counter. She rewound the tape and played it back.

  “Nolan, this is Jon. I’m calling from a place called the Barn, just this side of Burlington. I’m here with my band.”

  Jon. That was the kid Nolan was always mentioning. The one who was his partner or something, back when Nolan wasn’t respectable. She’d never met Jon, but she knew he was someone important in Nolan’s life.

  “This is going to sound crazy,” the voice was saying, sounding tinny coming out of the small speaker, “but I think I saw that bitch Julie. No, scratch that: I did see her, no mistaking it. She is not dead, Nolan.”

  What was this about? The kid sounded scared.

  “Now the worse news: she saw me. Nolan, if she’s been playing dead, she’s not going to be happy I found out she’s alive. She’s going to cause trouble. So what I’m going to do is finish out the night—it’s just before midnight, as I’m talking—and I’m going to confront her, if I can get the chance, and cool this down.”

  Very nervous, Sherry thought—even desperate.

  “In the meantime, if you get home by, oh, twelve-thirty, get in your car and drive down here. Come via 61 all the way, so that if for some reason I end up coming after you, I’ll spot you on the highway. It should take you about an hour and forty-five minutes to two hours to get here; the band quits at one-thirty, the club stays open till two, and then it’s another half-hour or forty-five minutes of tearing down equipment and loading. Which means there’ll be too many people around for her to try anything till three, I’d say. Or anyway, two-thirty. So if you can leave there by twelve-thirty, get down here. Otherwise, stay put and wait for me to get back to you.”

  It was a disturbing message. She didn’t understand it, but that only made it all the more disturbing; she rewound it, listened to it again, then rewound it again so that Nolan could hear it when he got home.

  But one thing was certain: the twelve-thirty deadline was past; it was quarter till one now.

  She went back to the TV, found an old crime movie with Cornell Wilde, which she started to watch, then switched to “Second City TV.” The crime movie was hitting just a little too close to home.

  It took only about four minutes of “Second City” to get her laughing; she hadn’t forgotten the disturbing answer-phone message, but it wasn’t dominating her thoughts now. But she did wonder when Nolan would get here.

  That thought had barely flicked through her mind when she heard the footsteps on the stairs and smiled. God, he was quiet coming in. Nobody was that quiet Usually, the dog would have yapped at him, though, happy to see him. Not tonight. That was odd.

  Still on the couch, she tu
rned her head and glanced back at Nolan.

  Only it wasn’t Nolan.

  It was two men: one of them, disturbingly, looked a little like Nolan, but a younger Nolan, about thirty-five, with no mustache and short, curly, permed hair that gave him a Caesar sort of look. He was in black—black slacks, black turtleneck, black gloves. The other man was coming up the stairs behind the Nolan clone, in shadows; she couldn’t see him yet.

  She reached for a heavy sculpted glass paperweight on the coffee table near the couch.

  It exploded before she could touch it, shards of glass nicking at her arm. Choking back a scream, she clutched her blood-flecked arm with her other hand and glanced back at the men. The Caesar type had an automatic in his hand; there was an attachment on the end of it—a silencer?—and smoke was curling out the barrel. He was smiling faintly.

  “I don’t like shooting at Art Deco pieces,” the man said. His voice was a smooth, curiously pleasant baritone. “Don’t make me shoot any more furniture, dear. I’d sooner shoot you.”

  She felt very naked in her Frederick’s nightie, and flashed onto an absurd thought: Thank God I didn’t go crotchless!

  Then she saw the other man. He, too, looked familiar. Then she placed him: he was a ringer for that guy that used to be on that Angie Dickinson police show. But, again, younger—perhaps thirty. He had curly, permed hair too, and a silly smile that scared her more than the tight, controlled smile of the other man. This one, too, was in black; this one, too, had an automatic with an attachment.

  The first man came over to her, with a gloved hand brushed the glass from the coffee table, and sat down, the gun casual in his hand, but pointing at her. He was tanned. Handsome, in an unsettling way.

  “Where’s Logan?” He said.

  “Logan?” she said.

  “Or Nolan. Whatever he’s calling himself here.”

  “He lives here,” she said. Stupidly, she thought.

  “We know,” the other’s voice said. She sat up, so she could see the other man. He was over turning off the TV, then crouching to look through the albums under the stereo. Looking through the records. Jesus. What kind of . . .

  “Sally,” the second guy said, holding up an album. “She’s got Barry Manilow.” Then to her: “You got good taste lady. How about Rupert Holmes? You got Rupert Holmes?”

  “Uh, no,” she said. What the fuck . . .

  “Put some records on, Infante,” the first one, Sally, said. “Put on the live Manilow album.”

  “That thing where he does the medley of commercials kills me,” Infante said. He had the slightest speech impediment: Elmer Fudd after therapy.

  “Does it kill you?” Sally asked her, smiling, apparently amused by his flaky partner.

  “I hope not,” Sherry said.

  “So do I,” Sally said. “I don’t like killing things, but I will if I have to. So will Infante, won’t you, Infante? It was Infante killed the dog. I didn’t have the heart to.”

  She brought her hand up to her face, bit her knuckles. She tried to hold back the tears, the trembling. It was no use. Barry Manilow was singing, “Even now . . .”

  “Go ahead and cry, dear. Infante!”

  Infante was right there, like a fast cut in a movie. “Yeah, Sally?”

  “Check out the house. This Logan or whoever isn’t here, but check out the lay of the land, and then get the lady some Kleenex. Her makeup’s starting to run.”

  “Sure, Sally.”

  And Infante was gone.

  Sally smiled; that the face was vaguely like Nolan’s did nothing to reassure her—if anything, it only terrified her more. She had never been so scared; she’d never been so conscious of her heart, pounding in her chest, as if trying to get out.

  Sally touched her arm; his touch was cold as a snake.

  “If you rape me,” she said, tightly, teeth clenched, “Nolan’ll kill you.”

  Sally laughed; it was almost a gentle laugh. He patted her arm. “We’re not going to rape you.” Then Infante was there, holding the Kleenex out to Sally, who took it and passed it on to Sherry. “We’re not going to rape her, are we, Infante?”

  Infante looked at Sherry as though she was a slug. “Are you kidding?”

  Sally held Sherry’s hand; in the background Barry Manilow sang. Sally said, “All we want to know is where Nolan is.”

  Sherry said nothing.

  “Is he coming back soon?”

  Sherry said nothing.

  “He’s out of town, isn’t he?”

  Sherry said nothing.

  Sally said, “Flick your Bic, would you, Infante?”

  “Sure,” Infante said. He got his lighter out. Sally held both of Sherry’s arms down while Infante grasped both of her feet around the ankles and locked them in the crook of one arm as he held the lighter’s flame to the bottom of her right foot, just under the toes.

  She screamed. The pain was intense; it went on forever.

  “Three seconds,” Sally said to her. “You want to try for ten?”

  “Please . . .”

  “I don’t get pleasure from this. Infante doesn’t get pleasure from this. Do you, Infante?”

  Infante, still gripping her ankles, grinned and said, “No.”

  “If we were sadists,” Sally said, leaning in close, “we’d burn your face, not the bottom of your feet.” He blew against her cheek; his breath was minty.

  “There’s nothing I can tell you,” she managed.

  “Infante. Flick your Bic.”

  “No!”

  “Wait a second, Infante.”

  Barry Manilow was singing about the Copa; Infante was singing along, softly.

  “Well?” Sally said to her.

  “He didn’t tell me where he was going. He just said he’d be gone most of the day, on business.”

  “Flick your Bic, Infante.”

  “That’s the truth!”

  The other foot, this time; the pain was searing, like a branding iron, lasting for days.

  “Five seconds, that time,” Sally said. “You want to get serious, dear? Or you’ll never dance again.”

  Infante snickered at that, still singing to himself.

  “I’m telling the truth!” she said.

  Sally thought about that.

  “Please,” she said, “he didn’t tell me, he didn’t tell me, why should he bother telling me?”

  “When will he be home?”

  “I thought he’d be back by now. He said about midnight.”

  Sally let go of her arms, looked at his watch. “Jesus,” he said to himself.

  “Maybe she’s telling the truth, Sally,” Infante said, still gripping her ankles, the lighter in hand.

  “Maybe. I wouldn’t want him coming in on this, that’s for sure.”

  The phone rang.

  Sally looked at her sharply. “Could that be him?”

  She nodded.

  “Where’s the phone?”

  Another ring.

  “In the kitchen,” she said.

  Infante said, “Extension’s in the bedroom,” releasing her ankles and running to the bedroom.

  “Pick it up on the fourth ring!” Sally called out.

  He was dragging her to the kitchen; she felt the skin on her burned feet catching and tearing against the carpet.

  He pushed her toward the phone, and she picked it up on the fourth ring.

  It was Nolan.

  She answered his questions, Sally’s automatic with its attachment kissing her neck.

  Got to warn him, give him a sign, she thought.

  “I’ll be back in a few hours,” he was saying.

  “Fine,” she heard herself say.

  “Bye, doll.”

  “Bye, Logan.”

  She hung up.

  Would he pick up on it? That she’d called him Logan? Had that been warning enough?

  In the other room, Barry Manilow was singing, “This Time We Made It.”

  Sally dragged her back to the couch and she passed
out.

  8

  NOLAN LEFT his LTD on the street, a block away, and made his way up behind the house, through the sloping woods. He stayed within the trees, not going across the lawn until he was parallel to the corner of the house—some lights on, upstairs—and then, keeping low, made for the sliding glass doors off the patio.

  It had taken him just under an hour-and-a-half to get here; he’d come via Interstate 80, and no Highway Patrol had stopped him despite his speeding. He was grateful for that much. Whoever had Sherry in the house wouldn’t expect him back this soon. He was grateful for that, too. But he wished he had a gun.

  Somebody inside the house had a gun. He saw the concave pucker in the glass where the bullet had gone through. Beyond it he saw the slumped form of his small dog. The door’s lock had been jimmied, so he didn’t bother with his key. He just slid it carefully open. And stepped inside.

  No lights on down here. But his night vision was in full force, and moonlight came in the doors behind him, and he could see the big open room, which would be a game room when he got around to putting a pool table in. There was a fireplace, as there was upstairs, but no furniture yet. Nowhere to hide, unless it was in one of the rooms off the hallway directly across from him: the two guest bedrooms, extra john, furnace room. He stood silently for a good minute. He heard muffled sounds upstairs. Nothing down here.

  He slid the door shut behind him.

  He knelt and gave his dog a pat.

  He didn’t have a gun. He didn’t have a goddamn gun. He’d been in such a goddamn hurry to get here, he hadn’t even stopped to ask Wagner for something. And he didn’t have anything stashed down here, no weapon of any kind. He always went to the precaution of coming in the back way, but he hadn’t bothered with stashing a gun. Stupid. He looked at the boxes stacked over against one wall. What was in those? Anything useful?

  Still kneeling, he smiled to himself. Patted the dog’s warm body. Got some blood on his hand but didn’t wipe it off.

  Some of that stuff in the boxes was Sherry’s. She’d told her father she was getting an apartment when she moved here, so he’d given her some things: pots, pans, and so on. Also silverware.