by Gil Brewer
The cop came in, the one who had given me the cigarette. He stood in the doorway, smoking and looking at me. “We know you didn’t kill her,” he said. “But how about the other one? Did he make you mad? That it? Was he going to tell your wife about her? That it?”
I looked at him and opened my mouth. He turned quickly away and I heard him walk across the room.
They began talking out there. I couldn’t make out what they were saying. I dropped the cigarette and stepped on it and sat there, staring at my hands. What to do?
That money. I had to keep it. Somehow.
It beat like a very small drum in the back of my head. A small and very distant drum…
Chapter 18
Armbruster came and stood in the doorway.
“Tell Lieutenant Gant I want to see him.”
“Sure thing, Nichols.”
He went away. A telephone rang. I could hear them talking out there. I was in a terrible sweat and I was going to tell it—my way. I had to tell something, and it would look all right. Anyway you looked at it, that money was still up there in the garage.
Gant came into the room and stood there.
“All right,” I said. “Here’s the story.” I told it to him straight. All of it. Only I left out the money and I left out Radan. “I don’t know why she wanted me to help her. She wouldn’t say. She just said she’d pay me. That’s all. I needed money. I need it bad. So I told her all right, it was a go.”
“You thought this Teece was dead?”
“Yes.”
“Did you check to make sure?”
“He looked dead. I thought he was dead, that’s God’s truth, Lieutenant. But he wasn’t, that’s all.”
“It could happen. Then why in hell did you keep on lying after she was dead?”
“I don’t know. I was scared.”
“Oh, hell, Nichols. You don’t scare that easy. I can tell.”
“It’s the truth. I was scared for Bess—my wife.”
“And how about when you saw Teece dead?”
“I didn’t know what to do. I figured you thought I’d killed him.”
“Hey, Ernie!” one of them called.
Gant left the room. Pretty soon he came back. He looked at me for a long time. “You telling me the truth, Nichols?”
I could sense something. It smelled good. But I had to doubt it.
“Yes. It’s the truth.”
“Get out of the chair and come on.”
I stood up. My back was stiff. I followed him through the other room, past Armbruster and three cops who were standing there. They didn’t look at us. I followed Gant and he led me out and into a hall. We walked down the hall, our heels echoing on the marble floors.
We reached the front doors and the street was out there, with cars going up and down.
A girl and a guy walked along the street out there, holding hands. He kissed her on the cheek and she laughed and they walked along out of sight. A truck went by, backfiring.
“All right,” Gant said. “Go on home, Nichols.”
I looked at him. “But, what in hell?”
He turned and walked back down the hall. And I smelled a rat. A great big dead rat. But I went on through the doors, and onto the street. It was like just waking up in the morning.
Down the street I hailed a cab and went home. During the ride, I sat there and I was numb. I couldn’t figure it. And I knew I had to do something.
It was crowding me hard. I knew it wasn’t over. Not yet…
“You’re back, Roy!”
“Yeah. I’m back.”
Bess had been sitting on the studio couch, waiting. When I opened the door and saw her, she looked up, scared to death, with worry all over her face. Then she ran across the room and jumped into my arms, like the old days.
“What did they want you for, Roy?” Her voice was tight.
I held her away, looking into her eyes. “About those two murders. They thought I was implicated.”
“But you weren’t—you weren’t!”
“No. Listen, Bess—I’ve got something to tell you. Something I should have told you long ago.”
“Yes?” She was smiling. I grabbed her and held her as close as I could. Then I thrust her away again and led her over to the couch. We sat down.
“I’m not asking you to forgive me,” I told her. “But I’ve been lying to you, Bess. Up and down and crosswise. I’m in a terrible jam. But I want you to know the truth. All of it. The police already know.”
“You’ve told them?”
“Yes. Only not all of it. Not the part I’m going to tell you.” And I told her. I gave it to her straight and hard, without any holding back. The whole business, from the beginning on the Georgia road when the truck driver let me off, to the barbecue joint and the Lincoln. The hotel room. Vivian and me, in that room, and the money. I told her everything and she sat there, listening, with no change in expression and her eyes got wet just as I finished.
“So, I’m not asking you to forgive, unless you can. If you can’t, I understand. I had to tell you. I just found out I had to tell you, coming home tonight from the police station. I was sitting in the cab and I knew you had to know. That’s why I’ve been like I’ve been. I couldn’t stand it. That girl—it was only the one night, I want you to understand that.”
“You were drunk, weren’t you?”
“It makes no difference. I’m not making excuses.”
I wasn’t. She had it in her lap now. All of it.
“That guy Radan, he’s right next door.”
The only thing I didn’t tell her was where the money was.
“All right, Roy.”
She got up and turned her back to me and I saw her shoulders stiffen a little. She walked over to the hallway, turned and looked at me. She wasn’t saying anything. Her eyes were a little cold now. I couldn’t blame her. It was bad, but she had it straight, anyway.
“I’ve known something was wrong for a long time,” she said. “I just didn’t know what. You told the police about the money?”
“No.”
“But Roy—!”
“It’s our money, Bess. You’re not going to tell them, either. I’ve been through too much for that money. It’s got to be somebody’s money, and it’s ours.”
“No, Roy.”
“I mean it.”
“Where is it?”
“I’m not saying. If you tell the cops, Bess, I’ll say it’s all the bunk. I’ll lie up and down, all over again. They’ll never prove different. I mean it, honest to God, I do.”
“Yes. You and that girl. Yes.”
I watched her put her hands to her face. But she didn’t cry. She brought her hands back down and came over to the couch and stood there in front of me.
“You’ve got to tell the police, Roy. You’ve got to!”
I shook my head. “I’m sorry, Bess. I can’t do it. I’ve had that out with myself. It means too much for us, and they don’t know anything about that.”
She turned around and stood with her back to me. I looked at her hair, falling thickly to her shoulders, and the line of her back and her legs and her feet. I saw her hands along her sides, the fists half-clenched, and she was perfectly still. I wasn’t sure how she was taking it, or what she was thinking.
“All this time—” she said.
“That’s right. I’ve lied and I’ve lied.”
“When that girl was here, Roy. Did you go over to number six and be with her? Did you?” She turned and looked at me then. “Because, if you did—if you—”
“No.”
“I believe you. God only knows why.”
I couldn’t look at her face. I didn’t feel any better, having told her. I felt worse, because it was hurting her. I didn’t want that. Yet, she had to know.
“Roy,” she said. She came to the couch and sat down and looked at me. Her voice was pitched low. “You’ve got to tell them. We don’t want that money. It’ll stand in the way of everything for the rest of our
lives. We’d never be happy with it.”
“We’ll never be happy without it. We’ve been without it all along, and it’s not going to be that way any more.”
“Roy, I’m telling you—you’ve got to listen.”
“I’m not listening.” I stood up.
“For me, Roy.”
“Not for you—not for anybody. The money’s ours. It stays that way.” I leaned over and looked her in the eye. “I went through a lot to keep it. And now we’ve got it.”
“Not ‘we’, Roy. You. You’ve got it.”
I turned and walked out of the office and down the porch steps. On the grass, I half expected her to come after me. She didn’t. I looked back in the screen door and she was sitting there on the studio couch, staring vacantly at that wall. I walked away from there.
I heard the hiss of feet on the grass and somebody grabbed my arm, whirling me around. “Nichols.”
It was Radan.
I was mad and I went straight into him. He stepped back and I saw the gun.
“Take it easy, will you?” he said softly.
I stopped, watching him.
“Come on, now,” he said. He stepped up to me and rammed the gun into my back. “Move. Over to number seven.”
In the apartment, he closed the door and looked at me. He needed a shave, and he looked harried and I realized he’d been drinking a lot more than he should. But that gun was very steady, and so were his eyes.
“What do you want?”
“You know what, Nichols. You’re going to tell me where that briefcase is. You’re the one who hid it, and we know that. You’re going to tell me—all alone—just me.”
“That’s what you think.”
“So. At last you admit it.”
We watched each other. He stepped in toward me and brought the gun down. It raked across my face. I grabbed his wrist and he grunted a little and his other fist flashed around and I saw the brass knucks.
I went down and sat against the wall. My face was ripped open and bleeding from the knucks.
“All right, Nichols. Tell me.”
Chapter 19
He stood up there looking down at me with the gun in one hand, the brass knucks in the other. I was seeing Wirt Radan for the first time. I brought my hands down, braced against the wall and pushed. He wouldn’t use the gun, I was sure.
I hit him hard in the legs. He didn’t fall, but his fist did. The gun bounced off my skull and the pain flashed through me. I raked at him with my arms and got a leg and pulled. He fell on top of me.
I felt the quick impact of the knucks against my head. Once—twice—three times and I got groggy and lay back on the floor, staring up at him. He brought his foot back and let me have it hard in the head. My teeth jarred and I bit my tongue. I tried to catch his foot, but it was like working in slow motion. My head was one great big knot of pain and the pain shot down in my chest.
Then it was quiet and I gradually began to hear him breathing. I looked up and he was over there, sitting on the edge of the couch, resting, holding the gun, and the knucks glistened in the dim light from the lamp on the end table. He still wore his suit jacket and his tie wasn’t even out of place. His breathing began to slow down.
“Where is it, Nichols? You may as well tell me. I think you understand that by now.”
I didn’t say anything. I just lay there, looking up at him, trying to get my breath and let the pain chip away. The pain came into my head in great sheeting waves, and my eyeballs hurt like crazy. Finally, I began to get up. He rose quickly and stepped over and lashed out with the gun barrel, hitting and raking, back and forth. He did it mechanically, without emotion—as you might swing a hammer at a nail. I tried to catch his wrist.
I caught it and the knucks landed again. I was on the floor, flat out again. He was killing me. He was quick and I knew he wanted that money, and if he got it he would kill me, and that would be that.
It was quiet. I heard water dripping in the kitchen sink and the sound of our breathing whispered harshly in the room. There was no other sound. It was as if everything was dead and gone and there was only this pain, throbbing inside me.
“You’d better tell me,” he said “You’re going to, you know.” He cleared his throat gently. “Honestly, you really are, Nichols. Can you believe that?”
I watched him. “I gave it to Teece.”
“No, you didn’t. I killed Teece, Nichols. Just as I’m going to do to you. He told the truth, I know that. He was crying and pleading like a small child. He said he didn’t have the money. Those were his last words, Nichols.”
“He lied.”
“We know he didn’t. I’ve been sent on this job, and I’m going to finish it. I always do. It’s my turn for the briefcase now.”
“The double cross from you?”
“Only halfway. They aren’t sure how much is in that briefcase.”
I came up off the floor and at him fast. I got him. I sank one into his gut and chopped with my other fist and he started to go down. I saw it in his face, the hanging on. Those damned knucks flashed again.
I lay there. He leaned down and smashed at me with the gun. Then he stood up and cleared his throat. Then he waited. “All right. I wasn’t going this far, Nichols. But now I am. I’m going to tie you up and I’m getting your wife over here. Then you’re going to watch something. And you’ll talk, Nichols. They always do. It’s the last thing we try. We don’t have any other way. But it’s a good way. It produces.”
I looked at him and I knew he meant it. There was nothing to do.
“O.K., Nichols? You know I would.”
“Yes. All right. I’ll show you.”
“One wrong move. That will be all.”
“It’s all right. I’ve got the money.”
“Get up.”
“I can’t yet.”
He waited. After a time the pain began to drift away and I got to my knees. Finally I got up on my feet. The blood was in my eyes and I rubbed my hands across my face, knowing it was all done.
I’d let myself down. And Bess, too. I should have got Radan before, on my own. It had been the only way, and I’d missed it.
“Coming, Nichols?”
We went on out the door. I staggered off the porch and nearly fell. He stood back. He watched while I hung onto the porch railing, trying to see right. I couldn’t see right—everything was blurry.
“Around back, Radan.”
We started down between the apartments. It was a cool night and the wind washed against my face. Everything was a big blank, and I had drawn it. There was no use.
We came around behind the apartments. I still couldn’t walk right. Something inside my skull kept crackling, and my teeth hurt bad. I knew I was spitting blood and I didn’t give a damn, not any more.
We came by the garage and I reached up and grabbed the door and flung it open. “You climb on the hood of the car. Then pull yourself up by a beam and the briefcase is up there under the far eave, under some loose boards.”
“Stand right there, Nichols. Remember, I’ve got a gun. I can see you against the light. Don’t go away.”
I didn’t say anything. I stood there waiting. I knew I was waiting for a slug. It was almost as if I didn’t care about that, either. He would kill me as sure as the night was dark. Then I thought, Maybe he won’t.
He was up on the hood of the car. “Stay right there,” he said. “I can see you.”
I watched him pull himself up. Now was my chance to run. I didn’t. I waited. I heard him up there, prowling around in the darkness. He was on the boards, over against the eave.
“God!” he said. “I’ve got it.”
He came down fast, in a single leap from the beams to the car’s hood to the ground. I turned and started walking toward the house.
“Nichols!”
“The hell with it.”
I started up along the side of our apartment, heading toward the office door. I heard him coming fast on the grass.
“Nichols!”
Somebody else said, “Hold it right there, Radan!”
I whirled and saw him lift his gun and fire at the dark. He fired twice and I flattened myself against the side of the house and he came by me, running like hell.
He took a shot at me as he passed. It thocked into the wooden side of the house. A car moved along out in front by the curb and a spotlight blinked on, coming slowly bright and it picked him up.
I ran out after him. I saw him stand there on the front lawn all alone, with that briefcase swinging and he fired at the spotlight and missed.
“Stop—Radan!” I recognized Gant’s voice.
Radan didn’t stop. Somebody fired rapidly twice from down by the corner and Radan turned and knelt down and fired. Somebody fired from the car out there in the street. Radan stood and whirled on the car and his gun clicked empty.
The front sign went on, bright and glowing. Then the floodlights came on and it was like daylight out there on the grass and he stood there holding his empty gun. He drew his arm back and flung the gun sailing at the car. He turned and started across the lawn, running toward the far corner and I saw the briefcase come open. That broken clasp. Money streamed and tumbled out as he ran.
They shouted for him to stop. They gave him every chance.
But he didn’t stop. They cut him down. He skidded into a pile right by one of the floodlights, landing on his face.
Then everything became still. It had been sudden. Now it was over. I walked out across the lawn.
“You all right, Nichols?”
“Sure.”
It was Lieutenant Gant. He came across the lawn in a steady shuffle, putting his gun away. I walked over to Radan lying on the ground. There was nothing left inside me.
We stood there and looked at him. About six slugs had nailed him. He was crumpled over on his face, with his grip still tight on the handle of the briefcase, only most of the money had spilled out. He’d left a scattered green trail of it all the way across the lawn.
A cop started toward us, picking up the packets of money, softly whistling through his teeth.
“Well?” I said.
Gant looked at me. He shrugged. “It was your wife. She knew about that money, Nichols. She saw you put it in the garage. She checked and found the money, only she didn’t tell us until just now, when she phoned. We’d freed you, thinking maybe you’d lead us somewhere. She wanted you to find it in yourself, to straighten it out without any help. That’s why she never said anything to you about the money. I don’t know. The hell with it. You know how woman are. You should know how your wife is.”
