You would have to be a weight lifter to clean this place. He walked over to the den and looked in. It was paneled, stained a gray-green with canvas chairs and big blue and green ashtrays. He wasn’t sure of the paintings; maybe they were all right, but he couldn’t put a price on them. The color TV he could get a hundred and a half for. He came back into the living room to the sliding glass doors along the front wall. Below, out past the sun deck, he could see the swimming pool and the lawn. Standing closer to the glass, he could see part of the patio.
He turned as Nancy came down the stairs-brown legs and a straw purse, then tan shorts and sweater and her dark hair.
She said, “Did you go to the lodge?”
It came as a little shock feeling inside him that he hadn’t gone out to look at Ray’s hunting lodge, that he had forgotten all about it.
“I didn’t have time.”
She stared at him a moment and turned away.
“I got hung up with work,” Ryan said, following Nancy down to the lower level, to the activities room bar, then through the sliding screen doors out to the patio: Ryan watched her drop the purse on the umbrella table.
“Is it loaded?”
She was facing him now, her cool look gone and smiling a little. “Of course it’s loaded.”
“What kind is it?”
“Twenty-two.”
“You going to shoot something?”
“We could. Windows are good.”
“We’ve done windows.”
“Not with a gun.”
“Have you?”
“Not in a while. Hey, are you hungry?”
“I guess so. Were the windows around here?”
“Uh-huh, when I first came up. I knew there wouldn’t be anything to do.”
“So you brought a gun to shoot at windows.”
“And boats. Boats are fun.”
“I imagine they would be. How about cars?”
“I didn’t think about cars.” She seemed pleasantly surprised. “Isn’t that funny?”
“Yeah, that is funny.”
“I just wanted you to know we have it.”
“There’s a difference,” Ryan said, “between breaking and entering and armed robbery.”
“And there’s a difference between seventy-eight dollars and fifty thousand dollars,” Nancy said. “How badly do you want it?”
The telephone rang in the activities room. Nancy’s gaze held on Ryan; she was watching for his reaction. He showed nothing, keeping his eyes on hers, and she smiled a little and walked off.
When she was inside, Ryan took the long-barreled target pistol out of her purse. He knew the kind; he’d sold them at the sporting goods store. He extended his arm, aiming and putting the front sight on the lamppost. He pulled the clip out of the polished hickory grip; it was loaded, all right. Then he shoved it back in and returned the gun to her purse.
He walked out by the swimming pool with his hands in his pockets, past the swimming pool and across the lawn. He could still feel the polished grip in his hand and the balanced weight of the gun. He saw himself pulling the gun out of his raincoat as he walked up to the cashier’s window-not a bank, God no-a small loan company like the one Bud Long worked for, with two or three people behind the counter. As he pulled the gun Leon Woody would turn from where he was filling out a loan application and go over the counter and clean the place. They would have studied the place and timed it so that he’d walk in a few minutes before closing. Hit the place and then get out fast. They had talked about it once. Just once. Because it would be robbery, armed, and it could take all the nerve they had ever used during all the B& E’s put together and it still might not be enough to go in with a gun.
He walked to the edge of the lawn, to the bluff that dropped steeply to the beach, down to all the sand and water. The boat was gone; the guy from the club must have come and picked it up.
It was quiet and the grass felt good. He turned and started back. It was a funny thing, he had never in his life cut grass. The lawn had been cut recently and it was better than any infield he had ever played on. You would have to play the ball different on grass like this; it would skid and take low hops. You’d have to get used to playing it and then it wouldn’t be too bad.
Nancy was on the patio holding a tray, placing it on the umbrella table now and looking out toward him.
He felt all right but not completely at ease. It was a before-the-game feeling, or a walking-through-somebody’s-house feeling. He wouldn’t show it; he’d had enough practice not showing it; but he couldn’t do anything about the feeling being there. The girl and the swimming pool and the patio, but something was wrong. For some reason it wasn’t as good as sitting in the Pier Bar at six o’clock with an ice cold beer and not having to think about anything.
“Beer or Cold Duck?” Nancy was waiting for him with two bottles of beer on the tray, a bottle of mixed Cold Duck, and a pasteboard bucket of fried chicken. “I phoned for it,” Nancy said. “It isn’t very good chicken, but I didn’t imagine you’d be taking me out to dinner.”
Ryan opened a beer and sat down in a canvas chair. He lit a cigarette and now he waited. But she outwaited him and he said, “Who was it? Ray?”
“Ray called this afternoon. It was Bob Junior,” Nancy said. “He wants to come over.”
“What did you tell him?”
“I told him I’m tired and I’m going to bed early. He said something clever and I told him if I saw his truck drive up, I’d call his wife.”
“I don’t get that,” Ryan said, “going out with him.”
“It was something to do.” She was pouring a glass of Cold Duck at the table. “I guess to see if he had the nerve more than anything else.”
“You’ve got a thing about nerve.”
She turned with the glass in her hand. “What else is there? I mean, that you can count on.”
“What if your nerve gets you in trouble? What if Ray finds out?”
“About Bob Junior?”
“Of if somebody tells him they saw us together.”
Nancy shrugged, the little girl movement again. “I don’t know. I’d think of something.” She pulled a chair close to his and sat down. “Why all the questions? A little nervous, Charlie?”
“You said Ray called earlier.”
“He won’t be up until Saturday. He has to go to Cleveland.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means he’ll be in Cleveland and won’t be here Friday night. How does that grab you?”
“But the money will.”
“It has to be if they pay them Saturday.” Nancy waited. “That’s why I’ve decided we should sneak in the lodge tonight.”
Ryan shook his head. “Not till I look at it in the day.”
“You’ve seen it before.”
“Not with this in mind.”
“I’ve been thinking about it all day,” Nancy said. “Sneaking in and going through it in the dark.”
“Tomorrow’s my day off,” Ryan said. “I can go over sometime tomorrow.”
“Okay, I’ll go with you. Then we’ll sneak in tomorrow night.”
He wished he could ruffle her, shake her up a little. “It might not work,” Ryan said. “You know there’s that possibility.”
“But we’ll never know unless we try,” Nancy said. “Will we?”
Ryan ate some of the chicken and with the second bottle of beer began to relax. But as he relaxed he became aware of something happening. Nancy sat next to him, facing him, a brown knee almost touching his chair. She would hold a piece of chicken in both hands and take little bites as she watched him. She would sip her wine and look at him over the rim of the glass. She would move her hair from her eye and let it fall back again. They ate in silence and he let it work on him. Sitting low in the chair and now lighting a cigarette, aware of the dark-haired girl close to him, giving him the business, and Ryan said to himself: You are being set up.
He was being offered the bait, shown what it wo
uld be like. He had been taken up on a high mountain by Ann-Margret and was being shown all the kingdoms of the world, all that could be his. While off from them, across clean tile, the underwater lights of the swimming pool glowed in the dusk.
How do you get that sure of yourself? Ryan thought.
And then he thought, She makes it look easy.
She’ll do it one time and get fifty grand and never know it’s hard.
He could break into a place and Leon Woody could break into a place and all kinds of other guys could break into places, most of the guys pretty dumb or strung out, but that didn’t mean she could do it. It wasn’t like throwing rocks and running, it wasn’t a game; it was real and maybe she could do it without clutching up, but how did she know until she had done it and found out what it was like? That’s what got him. If it was so easy, what did she need him for? Like he was some stiff she was hiring to do the heavy work. Like she could do it, but she didn’t want to strain herself and get a hernia.
Ryan said, “If you were going to break into a place, how would you do it?”
Nancy thought a moment. “I’d try the door first.”
“What if somebody’s home?”
“Oh, I thought you meant the lodge.”
“Anyplace, if you wanted to break in.”
“I guess,” Nancy said, “I’d still try the door.” She smiled a little. “Very quietly.”
“What if it’s locked?”
“Then I’d try a window.”
“And if the windows are locked.”
“I don’t know; I guess I’d break one.”
“You know how to do that?”
“Hey, but in the summer you wouldn’t have to,” Nancy said. “You could just cut a hole in the screen.”
“If there’s a window open.”
She sat up. “Let’s do it. Break into somebody’s house.”
“What for? There’s no reason.”
“For fun.”
And Leon Woody said, “Like, man, a game?” And he said to Leon Woody, riding along in the carpet cleaning truck, “Yeah, sort of a game.”
Ryan said, “Have you ever done it?”
Nancy shook her head. “Not really.”
“What do you mean, not really? You either have or you haven’t.”
“I’ve looked through people’s houses when they weren’t home.”
“And you think it’s fun.”
“Uh-huh, don’t you?”
And Leon Woody said, “Do you know what you get if you lose the game?” And he said to Leon Woody, “That’s part of it. The risk.”
“How do you know if you have the nerve?” Ryan said to her.
“Oh, come on.” Nancy reached toward the umbrella table for a cigarette. “What’s so hard about sneaking into a house?”
There.
Ryan waited. He watched her light the cigarette and exhale smoke to blow out the match. He waited until she looked at him and then he said, “Do you want to try it?”
“No rocks tonight,” Ryan said. “Okay?”
“No rocks,” Nancy said. “I’ve decided if there aren’t any lights on, no one’s home. It’s dark enough but it’s too early for people to be in bed.”
“Maybe they’re on the porch.”
“Maybe,” she said. “Of course where the lights are on, they might still not be home. I always leave a light on.”
“I guess most people do.”
“So we’ll have to go up close and take a look.”
She was at ease, Ryan could feel that. He couldn’t imagine her not at ease. But she still could be faking it. It was still talking and not doing and there were a few miles of nerve between the two.
“Which house?” Ryan said.
“I was thinking that dark one.”
“Let’s go.”
He would remember, after, that he’d said it. She didn’t have to plead with him or push him. She stood relaxed, watching him, and when he said, “Let’s go,” she smiled-he would remember that too-and followed him across the beach, up into the tree darkness that closed in on the houses, out of the trees and across a front lawn and up the steps to the porch of the house that showed no lights, doing it now and not fooling around, hoping he was shaking her up a little.
Ryan pushed the doorbell.
“What do you say if someone comes?” Her voice was calm, above a whisper.
“We ask if they know where the Morrisons live.”
“What if that’s their name?”
He rang the bell again and waited, giving them enough time to come down if they were upstairs in bed. He waited another moment, putting it off, then opened the screen and tried the door. The knob turned in his hand.
“I told you it wasn’t hard,” Nancy said. She started past him into the house.
“Wait till I look.”
He went in, through the darkness to the back of the house, to the kitchen, where he looked out the window and saw the rear end of the car in the garage. He moved back through the house.
Nancy was sitting on the porch rail smoking a cigarette. He took it from her to throw it away, but he saw the way she was looking at him and he took a drag on the cigarette and handed it back to her.
“Well?”
“They’re close by. They won’t be gone long.”
“How do you know?”
“I just know. Okay?”
She shrugged, standing up. He saw the movement and maybe a faint smile, though in the dark he wasn’t sure of the smile. She came down the steps after him and they crossed the lawn to the beach.
“If the car’s there,” Ryan said, “they’re not far away.”
“I’ve been thinking, Jackie. If we go in where we know they’re not home, what’s the fun?”
Ryan stared at her and he heard Leon Woody say, “You go in when they’re not home, when you know it and have it in writing they’re not home.”
He kept looking at her until she was about to say something, until he said, “Come on,” and they went up from the beach into the trees again, moving in on the house closest to them that showed lights, running hunch-shouldered-the same way they had gone in to throw the rocks-keeping to the trees and bushes and deep shadows until they were next to the house and could edge up to a window and look in.
“Playing cards,” Ryan said.
“Gin. She just went down and he’s mad.”
“Come on.”
There wasn’t anything to see. There wouldn’t be, either, Ryan was sure of that. Not when you were expecting something. Like the carpet cleaning job, expecting to see the broads going around without any clothes on. They moved along the beachfront from one house to the next. They saw people playing gin, people reading, people watching television, people eating, people drinking, people talking, and more people drinking.
“Maybe we’ll catch somebody in bed,” Nancy said.
“If they’re in bed, they’ll have the lights off.”
“Not everybody.”
“Would you like somebody watching you?”
“I’ve never thought of it,” Nancy said.
They saw people playing bridge and people sitting, not doing anything. They saw a woman alone, reading, and Nancy drew her fingernail down the screen. The woman jumped visibly and sat staring at the window, afraid to move.
When they were in the trees again, Ryan said, “That was fun. Maybe we can find some old lady with heart trouble.”
Ryan didn’t recognize the brown house when they came to it. If they had come up from the beach, he would have, even in the dark. He knew the house was along here, but he wasn’t looking for it and by the time they were across the side yard and to the porch, he was too close to the house to recognize it.
They moved around the far side, past dark windows, and came to the back porch and he still didn’t recognize the house. He was watching Nancy now as she walked out to the garage and looked in.
As she reached him she said, “There’s no car in the garage, but let’s go in anyway.”
<
br /> Both the front and back doors were locked, but it was still easy. They went in through a living room window off the porch after Ryan poked a hole in the screen with a stick and flicked open the latch; Ryan first and then Nancy. She followed him to the front hall and stood close while he checked the back door, opening it and closing it quietly, feeling better now with a way to go out on three sides of the house.
The light, throwing a shadow on the wall, startled him, turning him from the door.
Nancy had opened the refrigerator.
“Beer?” She was hunched over, looking in, offering him a can of beer behind her back. “They don’t have a whole lot to offer.”
“They didn’t know we were coming,” Ryan said. He popped open the top and took a good swallow of the beer.
“Salad dressing, mustard, milk, pickles, jelly, mustard-they’ve got enough mustard, God-four jars, and catsup-two, three-they must live on mustard and catsup.”
“Maybe they had a party.”
As he said it, moving toward the doorway to the hall, he knew where they were and was sure of it even before he stepped into the hall and saw the stairway on the right and the faint outside light coming from the two windows on the landing.
“Kitchens aren’t much,” Nancy said. She was behind him now. “I like bedrooms the best.”
It was funny being here. At first, realizing where he was gave him an uneasy, on-guard feeling, as if something were wrong. But it was all right. So it was the same house. It could be the one next door or down the beach; it was a house. Going into it again didn’t mean a thing. Right? And Leon Woody would say, “Right, man, it don’t mean anything. You just walk in the same house and don’t know it.” But kidding. He wouldn’t really mean it.
They went up the stairs holding the rail, Ryan still in front. At the top he stopped a moment to listen, then went into the first bedroom on the right, the one where he and Billy Ruiz had found the men’s clothes. The room was familiar: the window over the back porch, the dresser, the twin beds, the night table where he had put his cigar. He remembered now that he must have left the cigar in the ashtray and he moved between the beds to see if it was still there, not expecting to find it but curious. Nancy went past him to the dresser and began going through the drawers.
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