Night My Friend

by Edward D. Hoch

  She came over to him. “I like to hear you say that, Dave. I like to think maybe someday I’ll be dreaming about babies and a house in the suburbs instead of holdups and stuff.”

  “Got a cigarette?”

  “Sure. Before breakfast?”

  “I feel like one.” She lit it for him and he inhaled deeply. “But we need one more job, Helen. One more big job so we can head south and start a new life.”

  “In these stories on the TV it’s always the last job when the cops catch them.”

  “That’s on TV. I know when to quit while I’m ahead. Anyway, think about it, huh? Think about it and maybe something’ll come to you.”

  “Yeah.”

  They didn’t work that day. Instead, they strolled through the frosty afternoon along the banks of the river, and though the Hudson was no Mississippi, it did bring back memories of their early days together. They stopped at a nearby firehouse to get new license plates for the car, and later, as the city darkened for night, he took her out for a lobster dinner at a restaurant that charged more than they could really afford.

  “We’ll just relax,” he said later, back in the room, “and see what tomorrow brings.” The money was running low, and it had been a bit of an added shock to discover that the New York State license plates on his second-hand car were due for replacement.

  But he slept well, and didn’t awaken until nearly dawn, when he was aware of Helen padding about the room in her bare feet. “I had a dream,” she said, seeing his open eye watching her. “I dreamed I was back home at mother’s, cleaning the rug, and the vacuum cleaner turned into a snake, and then the snake turned into a lobster and it pinched my foot.”

  “That’s no dream,” he mumbled into his pillow. “That’s an upset stomach. Go back to bed.”

  When he awoke again the sun was already high in the morning sky, and he knew it was late. Helen was stretched out on her back next to him, still asleep, half uncovered by the milky sheet. But when he turned over she awakened quickly and sat up, rubbing her eyes. “What time is it, Dave?”

  “After ten.”

  “I had a dream.”

  “I know. About the lobster.”

  “No, another one. Just now, I think.”

  There was something in her voice that excited him. “Tell me about it.”

  She arranged herself cross-legged on the bed. “Well, remember the line at the firehouse waiting to get license plates yesterday? Remember all those guys plunking down their fifteen or twenty bucks or more for their plates?”

  “Sure. What about it?”

  “Dave, they have to get them by the end of this week. That firehouse is going to be taking in a lot of money the next few days.” She paused for breath. “I dreamed about it. I dreamed you turned in a false alarm, and when all the firemen were gone you just walked in and held up those two foolish women who sell the license plates.”

  He was silent for a moment when she’d finished, silent just thinking about it. Then his face slowly relaxed into a sort of grin. “You got some imagination, Helen,” he told her at last. “You’re the only gal I ever knew who could make millions while you’re sleeping.”

  “You think it’ll work, Dave?”

  “Of course it’ll work. And I’ll see you get a new dress out of it. Or better still, a good winter coat.” He’d been noticing the shabbiness of her old green one.

  “When, Dave?” she asked, her eyes sparkling with growing excitement, as they always did. “When will you try it?”

  “Tonight’s as good as any,” he told her. And he went to the closet and took the blue steel revolver from its hiding place.

  At exactly ten minutes to nine, Helen telephoned a report of a fire from a booth at the nearby drug store. Dave was waiting in the shadows across from the firehouse, watching as the massive red engines went shrilling off into the bleak winter night. When they were out of sight, leaving only the dying echo of their sirens like a scent to be followed, he walked quickly across the street, hoping there was no last-minute straggler buying his plates.

  But the two women were alone, counting out the money into neat banded stacks as their day neared its end. The younger of them, a handsome brunette with deep, pale eyes, looked up as he entered. “Our last customer,” she said.

  He raised the wool scarf over his mouth and nose, and showed them the gun with his other hand. “I’m taking the money,” he said, making it simple

  The older woman started to rise. “Oh, no!” she gasped, and then fell back onto the padded metal chair.

  He took a paper bag from his overcoat pocket. “In here. All of it. Skip the silver.”

  The brunette held the bag open, sliding the bills in with professional ease. When she had finished, she said, “You won’t get away with this.”

  “I’ll take my chances.” The bag was brimming with bills, and he wished he had brought a larger one. He backed slowly from the building, keeping the gun pointed in their general direction. “Just sit there and you won’t get hurt, ladies.”

  Somewhere in the distance he heard the slow clanging of a bell, and he knew the first of the engines was on its way back from the false alarm. He closed the door behind him and broke into a trot, letting the woolen scarf flap away from his face.

  Beneath his arm, the soft weight of the money felt good.

  “Almost nine thousand dollars,” Helen said as she finished counting it. “Who’d have thought there would be that much?”

  “It was there, just waiting for me,” he told her. “The thing went off like clockwork.”

  “Do we head south now, Dave? For that new life?”

  “We sure do! But not for a week or so. Somebody might get suspicious if we blew town right away. Look—we cool it for about a week, then drive down to New York and trade in this car on something that will get us to Florida. After that, we’re in the park.” He took four twenties from the stack. “Here. Get yourself that new coat, but nothing too flashy, understand. No fur or anything.”

  She clutched at the bills with a grateful smile. “We still make a good team, Dave.”

  He was reading a newspaper account of the robbery when she returned the following evening with the new coat, a fuzzy red thing with black speckles that matched her hair. “That’s not supposed to be flashy?” he asked with a laugh.

  “It didn’t cost much, honey. Only seventy dollars. You like it?”

  “I like it.”

  “Dave, why did I buy a new winter coat if we’re goin’ to Florida next week?”

  “You need one, don’t you? Maybe we won’t be spending our lives down there.”

  “You’re not going to give it up, are you?”

  He sighed and reached for a cigarette. “This one went so smooth, doll.”

  “Don’t call me that.”

  “All right. But be sensible, Helen. You don’t quit when you’re ahead.”

  “No! You wait till you’re lying with your face in the gutter and some cop’s bullets in your back! Then you’ll decide to quit!”

  “All right, calm down.” He slipped into his fleece-lined jacket. “I’m going out for a walk.”

  “So they can find you easier?”

  “We agreed to stay here a week, didn’t we? So how is it going to seem if I never show up at the garage? I’ll just look in on them, and I’ll be back in an hour or so. Here.” He gave her another twenty. “Think nice thoughts while I’m gone.”

  “Sure. I’ll have myself a dream or two about a castle in Spain.”

  Outside, a January wind had come up, cutting through Dave’s jacket like a knife and driving him quickly to the shelter of a nearby bar. He ordered a beer, although he could have afforded whiskey, and carried it, foaming, to a damp cigarette-scarred table because he didn’t like to stand at bars.

  He had been sitting alone for only a moment when a vaguely familiar woman with dark hair and pale eyes entered the place, and headed unhesitatingly for his table. “You’re Dave Krown, aren’t you?” she asked in a low voice he
barely heard.

  “I guess I am. You look familiar.”

  “May I sit down?”

  “Sure.” He half rose to pull out the opposite chair for her. But the first beginnings of something like fear were building within his stomach.

  “I’m surprised you don’t remember me. You robbed me of nine thousand dollars just last night.”

  He kept his hand steady on the beer, hoping his face didn’t reflect the sudden emotion that shot through him. “I guess you must have the wrong guy. I don’t know what you mean.”

  She glanced around to make sure no one was within earshot. “Look, you can drop the act. I’m not going to yell for the police—not right now, anyway. I recognized you, even with the scarf over your face. I remember faces, and I remembered yours. I remembered you had been in for your plate the night before, and I remembered you had an odd name. I looked through the forms I had turned in, and I found yours. Dave Krown, with address. I was waiting outside, wondering what to do next, when I saw you come in here.”

  She had fixed him with the intenseness of her deep pale eyes, and the fascination of it was enough to keep him from running. She was serious, and she had no intention of calling the police. Maybe she was just a girl out after kicks. Well, he’d see that she got them. “What’s your name?” he asked suddenly.

  “Susan Brogare,” she answered.

  “What do you want?”

  “Just to know you, to know what kind of a man you are.”

  “Come on,” Dave said, suddenly deciding on a course of action. He led her through the beaded curtains at the rear of the room, into a dim dining area of high-partitioned booths. In one booth a couple was kissing, leaving their beer untouched.

  “Why back here?” she asked.

  “It’s better for talking.” He slid into the booth opposite her. “You’re not afraid of me, are you?”

  The pale eyes blinked. “You probably should know that I’ve left a very detailed letter with a friend at the office. In it I give your name, address, and description, as well as the license number and description of your car. I identify you as the holdup man, and I say that I’m going to confront you with the fact. I end up by saying that you’ll be responsible for my death if I’m killed.” She paused for breath and then hurried on. “That letter goes to the police if I die or disappear for more than a day.”

  “Are you some kind of a nut or something?” he asked, baffled now by this strange woman. “Look, lady, if…”

  “I said my name was Susan.”

  “Look, Susan, if you think I’m some sort of criminal, you should call the police. If not, just let me alone.” He didn’t know if the part about the letter was true or not, but the cool brazenness of her approach made him willing to bet that it was.

  “I’m sorry if I frightened you. Would you buy me a drink?”

  “Sure. Beer?”

  She shook her head slightly. “Vodka martini.”

  While he was getting the drinks he considered the obvious solution—leave her sitting there, and be ten miles away with Helen before she caught on. But that was just the point. He wouldn’t be more than ten miles away before she had the police on his tail. He could lure her to the apartment and tie her up (or kill her?) but there still was the problem of the letter. Dave was not a man to spend the rest of his life hiding in alleys.

  So he carried the drinks back to the booth as if the whole thing were the most natural situation in the world. Just a girl and a guy on a date. “Are you married?” he asked, because another thought had just crossed his mind. He’d read about women like that.

  “I was. For a bit over a year. My husband was killed in a plane crash.” She played with her drink. “I know what you’re thinking—maybe I’m lonely. And I guess maybe I am. You’re the most exciting thing that’s happened to me in two years.”

  By the dim indirect lighting of the back room, she might have been on either side of thirty. He guessed the far side, closer to his own age. She was about the same size and coloring as Helen, but there was a world of difference between them. “Isn’t it usually exciting on your job?” he asked, just making conversation while he continued to size her up.

  “At the Motor Vehicle Bureau? Are you kidding? A job’s a job.”

  “So now that you’ve met me, you’re looking for more excitement. Is that it?”

  “I told you, I just wanted to see what sort of man you were. I’ve known lots of people, but never an armed robber. And the way you went about it was quite experienced. The police are properly baffled.”

  “Thanks. But I’m still not admitting anything.” He had read somewhere about miniature tape recorders hidden in women’s purses.

  “Are you going to run away now?”

  “Maybe.”

  “Alone, or with a girl?”

  “There’s a girl,” he admitted, thinking this might discourage her seeming advances.

  “Do you love her?”

  “How do I answer that? I’ve lived with her for two years now.”

  “I suppose she’s waiting across the street.”

  “Yes.”

  Presently they ordered another drink, and the talk drifted almost imperceptibly to their past lives. He found himself (fantastically) listening to her account of college days with all the interest of a fellow on a first date, and it was only with an effort that he managed to pull himself back to the fuzzy reality of the situation.

  It was almost midnight when he returned to the apartment, and he did not mention the encounter to Helen, though his exact reasons for not doing so were unclear even to himself. She was already in bed, not yet asleep, and as he entered she said, “I called the garage. You weren’t there.”

  “I stopped for a drink and got talking to a guy.”

  Helen seemed to accept the explanation. She rolled over on her wrinkled pillow and said, “I was afraid the police had picked you up.”

  “Not a chance.”

  “We’ve got to get out of it, Dave. I can’t take the worrying any more. I think that’s why the dreams are coming harder.”

  “That last one was a beauty. Come up with a few more like that one.”

  “What about Florida, Dave?”

  “I’m remembering.”

  “I hope you are.”

  The following night he met Susan Brogare again in the dim room behind the bar. This time they left quite early and drove out along the river in her car, because he feared that Helen might discover them at the bar.

  “You’re a strange woman,” he told Susan once, while they parked by the river watching fat white snowflakes drift aimlessly down from the darkened sky.

  “I just want to get something out of life, that’s all.”

  “By blackmailing me into making love to you?”

  “I’m not blackmailing you. You’re free to leave any time you want.”

  “But you know I won’t,” he said quietly, wondering in that moment where it was all going to end.

  They never spoke of the holdup after that first night; not directly, though it often intruded onto the fringes of their thought and conversation. He learned more about this strange girl with the pale eyes than he had ever known about Helen, and found himself at the same time telling her things he had never spoken of to another person.

  By the end of their third night together, he knew he was going to leave Helen.

  “Do you know what today is?” Helen asked him in bed the next morning.

  “Sunday, isn’t it?”

  “But it’s Groundhog Day too! And the sun is shining. What does that mean?”

  He rolled over and tried to go back to sleep, but it was useless. “All right,” he said finally, “I’m awake. And the sun is shining.”

  “Dave?”

  “What now?”

  “When are we going to Florida?”

  He was silent for a long time as he puttered about the bedroom in his bare feet and pajamas. Finally he said, “I’ve been meaning to talk to you about that, Helen.”


  “About what?”

  “Florida and all. I’ve been thinking maybe it’s time we split up. You know, went our own ways for a while.” He saw the expression on her face and hurried on. “I’d give you your cut from the job, of course. I’d even give you an extra thousand just to get settled.”

  Her face was frozen into a pale mask. “Two years, Dave? Is this all I get after two years?”

  “Just for a while, that’s all. Maybe we could get together again in six months or so.”

  “You’d leave me, just like that?”

  “Don’t make it sound like something—dirty. We’ve had two good years together.”

  “Where do you think you’d be without me, Dave? Without my dreams?”

  “Maybe I’ve got to find out. At least you’ve got those dreams. They’re always with you.”

  She looked away suddenly. “Dreaming is a pretty lonely thing when there’s nobody to tell them to.”

  “You’ll find somebody.”

  “No I won’t.” She seemed suddenly decided. “Dave, I won’t let you leave me like this. I won’t let you.”

  He fumbled for a pack of cigarettes and wondered why the thing was suddenly being so difficult. For two years of wanderings, she had been nothing but a woman, a paid companion who ate with him and slept with him and remembered her dreams. He had always been the boss of the situation, always knowing in the back of his mind that the day of their parting would sometime come. He had needed her, but only because there was no one else for him to need.

  “What will you do about it?” he asked, suddenly angered at her resistance.

  “I think I’d turn you in to the police before I’d let you go, Dave. I really mean it.”

  And he could see by her eyes that she did.

  The next two nights were difficult ones for Dave. He was still meeting Susan Brogare secretly, but there was a feeling about the thing that made him think of a water-soaked log being pulled slowly into the vortex of a whirlpool. He knew now that this girl—this woman—would accompany him anywhere, to Florida or the moon. And he knew, just as certainly, that Helen Reston would not simply pack up and leave. He was involved, deeply involved, with two women, and both of them had the knowledge to destroy him.