Stop This Man!

by Peter Rabe

  “With whom did she spend the evening?” Herron asked.

  “I don’t know. Some young man or other.”

  “Where is he?”

  “I couldn’t tell you that, sir.”

  “I think we’ll throw you out now, lovin’ cup,” said the detective. “Shall I throw him out, Herron?”

  “No. Mr. Paar may stay. As soon as his lady friend has recovered, he’ll want to take her home, I’m sure.”

  Paar was very anxious to take Selma home. He didn’t like Herron. Polite cops made him uncomfortable and Herron smelled like FBI.

  “Selma, are you ready to leave?”

  “Oh, Jaysis,” she said, holding her head.

  “Did they annoy you, Selma? Question you?”

  “Jaysis.”

  Paar couldn’t make anything of that remark and it upset him. He straightened himself and looked at Herron. “I demand an explanation. What is this lady doing here?”

  “She is suffering from a hangover,” the detective said.

  “And we wanted some information from her about an acquaintance of hers,” Herron added.

  “Well, you must realize by now that you’re wasting your time,” Paar said. “If I can be of any assistance—”

  “No, thank you, Mr. Paar. Our information is complete, for the moment.”

  “If you’re wondering about her escort, Mr. Catell has left town New York, I think.”

  Herron shifted his head slightly and the man next to him made notes on a stenographer’s pad in front of him.

  “You didn’t know this?” said Paar, who had noticed the movement.

  “No. We were actually interested in one Otto Schumacher.”

  Paar cursed himself under his breath. Now they had Catell tagged and Paar himself had done the damage. He smiled nervously.

  “Well, it’s of no consequence. And as I was saying, Mr. Catell was here only briefly. He mentioned to me how anxious he was to get back to New York. In fact, I believe he took the one-o’clock train.”

  Herron made no comment. The stenographer was sharpening his pencil, the detective stood near the wall picking his teeth, and the fourth man was holding a paper cup of water to Selma’s lips.

  “Oh, Jaysis!” she said.

  The silence made Paar uncomfortable. He still didn’t know whether they had got anything out of Selma.

  “If you gentlemen are through, I believe I’ll accompany the lady home now.” Paar took Selma by the arm.

  “Of course, Mr. Paar. We’ll be in touch with her. And you,” Herron added.

  Paar helped Selma out of the chair. One shoulder of her deep-cut dress was slipping down her arm and her left stocking sagged She looked terrible. Outside, even the cold night air didn’t seem to help her. Selma sat in one corner of Paar’s big limousine, never saying a word. Nor did Paar. It could wait till morning, he figured. He and Selma were going to stick together for a while, seeing they were both after the same man. Meanwhile, there’d be some compensations, and he looked at Selma’s inert figure leaning in the corner of the seat.

  “End of the line,” Paar said in a cheery voice. It didn’t cheer Selma.

  “Jaysis,” she said.

  He helped her out of the car and into the apartment building. They went up in the elevator. Once in the apartment, Paar locked the door.

  “Selma, dear, sit down and be comfortable. Your wrap, oops, thank you. And now, sweet, the hair of the dog for you.”

  Selma straightened up and patted her hair. She looked more animated now and struck a saucy pose. The dress had slipped off one shoulder again.

  Paar sat down next to Selma and handed her a glass of straight whisky. She drank it fast, wrinkling her eyes at him over the rim of the glass.

  “Paar, baby, you’re a lover.” She put a whisky-wet kiss on his big forehead.

  “How would you know?” Paar said. He patted her shoulder. “But it’s good to see you cheered up again, Selma. Your ordeal at the station—”

  “One more, Paar baby.” She handed him her empty glass.

  “Did they question you long, dear?” Paar refilled Selma’s glass and held it just out of reach.

  “Come on, baby, come on.” He gave her the glass quickly, noticing how easily she could lose her temper. After two swallows Selma put the glass down and leaned back, sighing. “Paar, you’re so good to me.”

  “Don’t mention it, my dear. And stay as long as you like. In fact, Selma, what do you say you move in with me? The place is large, I’m alone, I could use an attractive hostess when I entertain.”

  Selma wasn’t answering. Her face was flushed now and she was staring at the ceiling with a vague smile.

  “Selma, my dear, are you all right?”

  “Jaysis.”

  Paar saw it was no use. She didn’t resist when he pulled her up and steered her toward the bedroom. He hadn’t expected she would. Sitting on the large bed, Selma smiled pleasantly when Paar started to unbutton her dress.

  “You’ll be comfortable soon now.” His hands were sweating. “We’ll talk about Catell in the morning, sweetness. And you’ll tell me all about your bad, bad time with the police.”

  He took her dress off, Selma lifting her rear so he could pull it up. Sitting down again, she swayed a little, eyes closed. Paar steadied her and started to fumble with her brassiere.

  “Soon now, my dearest, soon you’ll be all right, eh, Selma?” He got the brassiere unhooked and pulled the straps off her shoulders. His voice was shaky when he said, “Darling.”

  Selma sank back on the bed, sighing. With nervous movements Paar fumbled with his dinner jacket while he ran to the light switch. He was pulling his tie off when he clicked the light switch.

  Out of the darkness Selma said, “Jaysis.”

  Chapter Six

  “Why’d you let ‘em go?” The detective was still picking his teeth.

  “I got all the information I need at the moment,” Herron said. He was shuffling through the stenographer’s notes,

  “Coffee, anyone?” The fourth man stuck his head in the door.

  “Not for me.” Herron lit himself a cigarette and shuffled through the notes again.

  “Bring me one, Charlie, black,” the detective said.

  The detective walked from the door to the window, looked down into the dark street, and walked back again. “I got all night yet,” he said.

  “Yeah?”

  He walked again. The stenographer had put his overcoat on and gone out.

  “What you learn, Jack?” the detective asked. He spat out a little piece of toothpick and sat down opposite Herron.

  “Well, for one thing, that Catell didn’t go to New York.”

  “Yeah, that Paar sure was anxious for you to think so.”

  “Where’s the phone?”

  “Next room. Wish Charlie’d hurry up with that coffee.”

  Herron went next door and dialed a number. “Hello? Herron here. Who’s on duty?…O.K., give me Agent Polnik.” Herron waited, scribbling in his notebook. “Polnik? Listen. Have somebody check if there was a train for New York at one A.M. Get the New York office to have a man wait for the train, if there was one…What? Not till five A.M.? O.K., then skip that angle. Now, listen. We’re looking for Anthony Catell. Look him up in the file I left in the office…Yes, one of the files I got there. Next, cover the station, airport, bus terminals for the next twenty-four hours…Yes, same man. Pay special attention to anything leaving for Los Angeles…No, I’m not sure. We have one informant to go by, but she was drunk. But Catell might fit into the picture because of other information…Uh-huh, he knew Schumacher. One more thing, and this is important. Have the men carry Geiger counters. And check baggage rooms…Yeah. O.K., ‘bye.”

  Herron hung up and went back to the other room. The detective was drinking black coffee and chewing a fresh toothpick. Charlie was spooning a milk shake out of a paper carton.

  “How you can eat that stuff is beyond me,” the detective was saying.

  “
Makes more sense than eating toothpicks.”

  “Well, Jack, what next?” The detective looked up when Herron came in.

  “We’re covering the usual. Probably useless. Catell is no greenhorn. Lemme have a sip.” Herron took the coffee cup and drank.

  “Whyn’t you buy one? Charlie asked you if you wanted one.”

  “I don’t want a whole cup, just a sip. Coffee keeps me awake.”

  “So let’s have my cup back.”

  Herron stacked his notes together and got up to leave. “Does Paar have any connections in L.A.?”

  “Yeah,” Charlie said. “Some syndicate tie-up. You can find out downstairs.”

  “O.K., I will. Anybody here to take the teletype?”

  “Try three doors down the hall, you can’t miss the racket.”

  “Thanks. Night, all.”

  “Night.”

  “Lucky bastard.”

  Three doors down Herron dictated his message. In St. Louis, Chief Jones watched the teletype as it hammered out: “Herron to Jones. Circumstantial evidence of association with deceased O. Schumacher and former girlfriend of same make T. Catell definite suspect. Screening of Detroit exits ordered. No present trace of stolen object. Presumably in suspect’s possession. Am proceeding Los Angeles via plane to cover suspect’s connections and possible arrival there. Details follow. Communicate L.A. district office.”

  At ten-thirty-five A.M. the next day, Herron boarded a through plane to Los Angeles. He arrived late that evening, checked into the district office, then got himself a hotel room. He slept for nine hours and then went back to work. He checked leads, covered angles, made reports, waited. He did this for days without finding a trace of Tony Catell.

  On a hot stretch of road in Arizona, Catell stopped the car and wiped the sweat off his neck. He listened to the gurgling of the radiator, watching the steam hiss out from under the hood. He pulled out a cigarette. Before he got it lit the thought of the smoke made him feel sick and he threw the thing away. He got out of the car. For a moment he fought nausea that rose in his throat like wet cotton. The feeling passed.

  It had started a few days after he’d left Detroit, and now it came every day, at odd times, first a vague dizziness, later sick waves of nausea and knots of pain, till the car would swerve and he’d pull himself together again. Then it would pass away. Sometimes he wondered whether Schumacher had been right about the gold. He’d called it rotten. But there was a better reason. Catell looked at his watch and pulled a sticky candy bar out of his pocket. Two o’clock. Time.

  Every two hours Catell ate a candy bar, whether he was hungry or not. By the time he reached Los Angeles he would have gained ten, fifteen pounds, maybe. Already he looked like a different man, with more bulk, the lines of his face less deep. He had a tan, and his hair, black and straight, was getting longer.

  When the car had stopped sizzling, Catell walked around to the front and lifted the hood.

  “Troubles, Buddy?”

  Catell jumped around and saw the police car. A lean man in uniform and cowboy hat looked at him.

  “Jumpy, ain’t ya?”

  “I didn’t hear you come up.”

  “Stranger here, ain’t ya?” The man climbed out of his car and stretched his long legs. There was a sheriff’s badge on his blue shirt. “I said, you must be a stranger here, huh?”

  Catell didn’t like the man. Not just because he was a cop, but because there was that grinning curiosity on his face, that eager prying of a lean dog scurrying around to find something, anything. The man stuck his neck out, red and wrinkled like a turkey’s, and spat.

  “Speak up, stranger.”

  “Yeah. I’m a stranger here.”

  “Where from?”

  “Look at the license.”

  The sheriff looked without wanting to. It said Louisiana.

  “I’m asking you.”

  “New Orleans.”

  “City fella, huh?” He stalked around the car and kicked at the loose fender in the rear. “You drive this junker all the way up from the Gulf?”

  “Sure. And don’t kick it again.”

  The man just laughed. “You know, city feller, we got an ordinance about junkers. We like people comin’ through here to drive a safe car. Don’t want folks around here to get endangered.”

  “So stop kicking at it, hear?” Catell’s voice shook with rage and he suddenly felt cold under his wet shirt. That bastard was getting to him.

  “How about pullin’ that heap off the pavement some more, city feller? We got an ordinance about highway parking.”

  Catell got behind the wheel and kicked at the starter. The gears crashed and the car jumped ahead a few feet, off the paved strip of highway. That bastard, that lousy hick bastard. Catell took a deep breath. What he could do to that raw-necked, rat-faced—Better not think like this. Better think of the big things at stake here, better look like you’re taking it. Got to take it.

  “One more thing, city feller. Don’t park where you’re parkin’ there. We got an ordinance.” He laughed, his Adam’s apple bobbing. He jumped back in his car and pulled it up even with Catell’s.

  “I’ll be by after a spell. Better not be here no more.” He shot away, the wheels spitting gravel at Catell’s windshield.

  After a few minutes Catell got out of the car again and slammed the hood shut. It made a nasty sound and something came loose, leaving the hood jammed at an angle. The damn car was corning apart at the seams. First he’d had a pretty good one, but it had Michigan license plates and the car had to be ditched. He hid it in a ravine somewhere in Indiana and buried the license plates. Then he hitchhiked for a hundred miles. Next he bought a prewar job in southern Indiana and drove it as far as Kentucky. That’s where he drove it into an abandoned mine after throwing away the plates. At night he walked to the nearest town, took a train for two hundred miles, and then bought the third car. He drove it to Terryville, Louisiana, left it in a vacant lot, and bought his last car. This was a real junker, but there wasn’t much choice. Selma’s two thousand was almost gone.

  Catell started the car and headed it back on the hot pavement. There better be a town close by. The radiator was almost empty and there probably wasn’t much oil left. The old car gathered speed, whining down the white road and shooting thick black clouds out the tailpipe.

  A sign flipped by, saying: “You are entering—” and it was gone. After a bend in the road a tree appeared, two trees; then Catell saw the houses. They were gray clapboard and looked old. Some were adobe. The only new-looking place was the filling station, rigged up like a fort, and Catell breathed easier.

  When he pulled up to the pumps he heard the gravel crunch on the right. A car stopped sharply and the voice said, “City feller, don’t they got not ordinance about speeding where you come from?”

  The sheriff got out of his car and grinned, crackly lips drawn back over his gums.

  “Get out,” he said.

  “What in hell do you want now?”

  “Don’t get porky, stranger. I’m the law around here and you just broke one of our ordinances.”

  “What goddamn ordinance?”

  “The one about speedin’. You gonna pay up or you gonna spend some time in our jail?”

  “How much will you take, officer?”

  “Seeing it’s you, city feller, that’ll be seventy dollars.”

  “Why, you stinking sonofabitch!” Catell jumped out of his car. His door hit the gas pump and slammed back into his chest. Before he could get free, the sheriff had come around the car, swinging a sap that came down hard and caught Catell on the shoulder. But the sheriff was slow; too slow for Catell, anyway. Twisting his injured shoulder back, Catell lashed out with one foot and caught the tall man in the groin. Before he had time to double over and groan, Catell’s hand caught the back of his neck and jerked it down, and a knee smashed up into the sheriff’s face. Then a sharp kick into the chest and the half-conscious man flew back, crashing hard into a pump. There wasn’t
any time for Catell to enjoy the sight because a sharp blow from behind made him buckle and pitch, and then all turned black.

  “I guess they both ain’t gonna be much for a while,” said the thickset man who was holding a two-by-four in his hand.

  “Reckon,” said the short one next to him. “What’ll we do now?”

  “To the jailhouse. The stranger here has some explainin’ to do, and Harry—well, Harry just natcherly belongs in the jailhouse, seein’ he’s our sheriff.” They both laughed.

  “Sure makes me feel good, seein’ our Harry get his for a change. Had it comin’ for a long time,” said the short one. “I just feel kinda sorry for that stranger here, once Harry starts feelin’ like himself again.”

  They laughed again and then started to drag the two limp figures over the gravel.

  Chapter Seven

  A bottle fly kept buzzing around the cell. It hit the walls with a small flat sound. Every time it hit, fine yellow dust sifted down from the adobe. A few times it made for the light that came through the barred window, but even though there was no glass, the fly didn’t find its way out. Then it angled down into the shadow, hit the wall again, and landed on Catell’s face. It sat there for a long tune without Catell’s knowing it. When he came to, he did so with a start, slapping his hand over his forehead with a wide awkward swing. He jumped up, but weaved and doubled over. There was a blue ache in his left shoulder, and the pain in his head made red fire flash before his eyes.

  After a moment he straightened up. His eyes ran over the adobe walls, the barred hole of a window, and the bars that made one wall of his cell. There was a room beyond, but Catell didn’t take it in because closer by, near the iron door, the sheriff sat hunched on a three-legged stool. His eyes and nose were puffed with a purple shimmer, and his lips were curled back, showing his long yellow teeth. Three teeth in front were missing, and his tongue was probing back and forth over the reddened hole.

  “Sleep good, city feller?” He talked with a hiss. Catell walked up to the bars but didn’t answer.

  “I’m askin’ because for a spell now that’s goin’ to be your last good sleep.”