The desperate hours, a novel

by Hayes, Joseph, 1918-2006

  When, not twenty minutes later, Cindy's black coupe edged itself into a parking space in the paved area before a block of stores, one of those new shopping centers that had sprung up on the edges of the city, the siren wails were distant, well beyond the woods to the northeast. Chuck dismissed his questions about these and drew to a halt behind the sleek white service station on the comer; he waved the attendant away and worked with the air hose at his rear wheels while he watched.

  Almost at once, a man emerged from the service station itself—a ponderous bulk of man in a rain-soaked gray suit, sloshing through the puddles—and at first Chuck made no connection between his direction and the coupe. Still, Mr. Hilliard and Cindy remained seated behind the steady swish-swish of windshield wipers. It was not raining. It had not been raining since they left the downtown office building. But apparently Cindy had not even noticed.

  Before Chuck could let the surprise of this observation reach him fully, he found himself clutching the air hose and staring. The man approached Cindy's car, spoke through the suddenly lowered window to Mr. Hilliard, waited while Mr. Hilliard climbed out of the car; then the man in the gray suit slid his great body into the seat beside Cindy. Mr. Hilliard, still without speaking, with not so much as a nod of recognition, stepped back in and closed the door. The car backed up, shot forward, returned to the street, splashing and shooting water like a jet spray from the angrily spinning rear tires.

  Chuck didn't wait. He was behind them then, well behind but with the coupe in clear vision on the north-south highwaylike street that skirted the city on the east. The square mass of the strange man's head was between the other two, and well concealed from both sides. Chuck considered passing the coupe, twisting to get a full look at the man, but the little sports car was conspicuous, and Cindy would recognize him at once. He didn't want her to know he was doing this. At least not yet. But something more than this held him back: the memory of the shambling walk, the furtiveness of the big man as he shot a quick suspicious glance around him back there before he climbed into the seat. And now the way he sat safely between them, low in the seat, only the top of his head visible from behind. The man wore no hat. This in itself was worth noting, Chuck decided; he wore none himself, but most men of middle age, especially on rainy days, would not think of going out without a hat. And the man wore no topcoat, either.

  Who was he? What could a man like that have to do with the Hilliards? The black-sheep uncle? The family drunkard, threatening social disgrace? He'd probably find the explanation that innocuous and simple in the end.

  Then what about the gun? What would a gun have to do with it?

  Chuck trailed the coupe all the way north, hardly surprised at the complicated route Cindy followed, aware that it was not the shortest but the least populated way to Kessler Boulevard. On the open countrylike stretches, he remained far behind, knowing that if Cindy glanced into the rear-view mirror she would recognize his car at once.

  In the end, Chuck had no answers: the coupe pulled into the Hilliard driveway as he knew it would. He stopped, far down the boulevard, out of sight.

  Well, now what have you got? Where does this leave you? Dead end, blind alley.

  "Where does it leave us, Jess?" Tom Winston asked, moving delicately on his fat legs away from the frail outstretched body of the dead man.

  Jesse Webb strode even farther away from the sodden lifeless thing lying half in a puddle by the corner of the ramshackle gray building; Jesse stepped to the two uprooted blue pumps and half-leaned against the red truck. Sudden and violent death, of which he had had a certain amount of experience both during the war and after, invariably drained him, at least for a short time, of all respect for his kind, for the human race in general.

  "Funny thing," Jesse said, one hand against the high fender, "I knew him. Not well. He was one of those old fellows used to play pinochle with my old man." Although it had stopped raining, the fender of the truck was still wet. Jesse wiped it dry with his handkerchief. "Lucky for us these tanks weren't loaded, huh?" He spread out on the flat top of the fender the few pitiful belongings he had taken from Mr. Patterson's pockets: a dog-eared wallet with the usual papers, a driver's license and $25 inside; four single dollar bills that had been folded in another pocket, a chewed-at stub of pencil, odd scraps of paper, a squashed package of cigarettes and a paper of matches, and nine checks, each made out for $2 payable to Floyd Patterson.

  "Not so lucky for him, maybe," Tom Winston conjectured mildly, unable to pull his eyes away completely from the vari-

  ous official-looking figures now bending over the sprawled dead thing. "Maybe he'd rather a-gone that way."

  "Who gets to choose?" Jesse said, unfolding the scraps of paper, flattening them out: a grocery list with the words "razor blades" circled heavily, a garage repair bill marked paid, and one other.

  "Shot in the back. Three times. Why, Jess?"

  Jesse rubbed the back of his neck, feeling the heat there despite the wet, winter-edged chill in the air. "It's a good question, Tom. He was a sweet guy. Why'd he try to smash into those pumps? Or was that an accident? You tell me, Tom."

  "The state police are making a circle, starting at Arlington. The truck won't go, so they figure—and I'm with them—the killer had to take off on foot. They've got ten men in those woods and more coming. But hell, it happened so long ago now. Hardly nobody uses this road now that Twenty-first Street is paved all the way. My hunch is "

  "Hold it," Jesse Webb said, and very, very quietly—so that, hearing the words, Tom Winston felt a slow, odd shiver moving up his back. "God," Jesse breathed. He was holding between his long fingers, fingers that were beginning to shake just a little now, the last small scrap of soiled paper from Mr. Patterson's pocket. "God, Tom."

  Winston bent over, studied the figures printed in pencil on the paper, then straightened and looked up into the thin, expressionless face of Jesse Webb.

  Far off a siren wailed. The sound cut through Jesse, cut to the bone.

  "He might've got just a quick glance," Winston said, beginning to breathe a little tightly himself. "He might've been in a hurry, y'know. That'd explain the 3."

  "Maybe he heard it on the radio," Jesse drawled in a thin voice that said he knew better—or hoped. "Maybe he jotted it down from the radio, just in case, the way an old man might."

  "People do that," Winston conceded, but he couldn't get enough of the thin cold air into his lungs. "But if you change the 3 to an 8, you got it. I reckon he was in a hurry, y'know, and his eyes not what they once was. If you change that 3, you got it."

  "Just for a while," said Jesse Webb slowly, eyes squinting, "just for a while now, Tom, we're going to change that 3 to an 8. We'll just kind of pretend Mr. Patterson doesn't have a radio in that Uttle old house he lived in alongside the dump out west. We're going to pretend he saw that license, hear? And then we're going to locate that car. First, these checks. Are they all from the same neighborhood? How many other houses in that neighborhood that Mr. Patterson might have seen today, huh? Or maybe in some woods around there. I'm going to find out where he's been today, Tom, and I'm going to scour it all down with a wire brush." He was beginning to speak faster now—no drawl, no thoughtful hesitation. "And you're going to start working backwards on those checks—and all the rest of Mr. Patterson's customers—names and addresses and telephone numbers, kind of people, where they work, what they've been doing. The works. That might include a hundred, two hundred people."

  "Go ahead, Jess, say it."

  "I don't like to say it, Tom."

  "Say it, Jess. This is it!"

  "God, Tom—it might be. It might be. We got the license again. Right here in town Hke I said all along. I said it, Tom!" He was moving toward the Sheriff's car, in long swift strides. "We got the license. Now we're going to get that car. Get on it, Winston. If they pick up anybody in the woods, give it to me fast. Tell 'em who we're looking for now, Tom. Let's get on it, hear?"

  Behind the wheel, he felt the hope t
hrust aside the nagging apprehension, overpower even the outrage and disgust. You can't stretch coincidence too far, he warned himself; on the other hand, you can't overlook a single alley. Alleys were where

  rats hid. He trounced on the accelerator and flipped on the siren. Something very like joy, very like hope, was ripping through him.

  That car had been seen in town. Today! It might still be in town. Glenn Griffin would be capable of pumping three slugs into the back of that poor old man. The District Attorney would work all the other angles. For his part, Jesse Webb was sticking to the original tack. It all figured. The telephone angle had played itself out. Every call from Columbus to Indianapo-Hs last night had been checked. Nothing doing. But this

  He was going to find that gray sedan with the license number that was imprinted on his mind like a steaming brand.

  "The car's hot now, Pop. Not like it was before, see. But our pal Robish here, he got jumpy and he didn't go through the old guy's pockets way he should "

  "I told you he wrecked the——"

  "Shut up, Robish, let me talk. I got important things to say to Hilliard now."

  Hank Griffin leaned against the paneled wall of the den and, casting a glance every once in a while into the back yard or driveway on the side, he listened to them in the living room. Glenn had something in his mind; if you watched him and listened, you could almost see that motor clicking, purring along in there. Hank had always admired his brother's mind, the quick sharp way it worked, the way it made decisions. That mind was the reason he. Hank, was here now. And free.

  A slow, ironic smile curled inside him without reaching his face. Free. He had never been less free, not even in the cell.

  "See, Pop, it's like this. Robish here has got hold of a gun and he won't let go. He's not going to use that gun again because I'm not going to let him. You heard my Httle brother Hank a few minutes ago. He won't let go his gun, either. Not while Robish hangs onto his. So you might say, Pop, I'm helpless as you are. There's only one difference. Hank in there and Robish, they haven't got half a brain between 'em. Without me, they're cooked, and they both know it. Now. What are we going to do about that farmer's car out there in the garage?"

  Dan Hilliard did not answer. Since he came in with his daughter and Robish some time ago, he had said nothing to Glenn, not a word; he just sat bent forward in his chair like that, staring, looking almost dead himself except for those dark hot coals in the eye sockets. Hank knew that nothing made Glenn more furious than to be ignored, and he could feel the way the man's continued silence was rubbing along his brother's nerves.

  "I asked a question, Hilliard."

  Dan Hilliard shifted his head, glanced from his wife, who didn't move at all, to his son, who sat curled up on the sofa watching him, to his daughter. Hank followed the moving gaze, already feeling the tight anticipation rising in him as he looked at the girl. She was a httle apart from the others, standing in a certain aloof way that made Hank go all sick and faint inside. It wasn't the same kind of sickness he had felt when he heard Robish tell about killing the man; then, seeing Robish's light-hearted mood, almost gay, and sensing that under it lay something else, something uglier and more terrible—a kind of relief, relaxation, calm—Hank had been actually, physically sick. Then, seeing the girl's face twist with disgust, he had gone faint and empty, too. But this now was different. This was like looking in the window of a store, one of those fancy stores, and seeing a fine table all set up, with odd-shaped glasses glistening and silver with that high gleam on it, and the wood of the chairs all smooth and shining, and being able to picture people coming into that room, in their crisp-looking clothes, the women with their shoulders bare. A sick longing hollowed you

  inside, took everything away, left you weak and knowing. Knowing you'd lost something, something you'd never had and never could have, to hear Glenn tell it. But knowing that only made the hunger worse . . . This is the way it was every time he looked at the girl. And he couldn't fight it.

  "Hilliard, you speak when I talk to you. Got me?"

  The harsh, demanding growl wrenched Hank's attention back to his brother. For as long as Hank could remember, Glenn had told him, one way or the other, that if you wanted something, there was only one way to get it in this world: take it. Take it. Hank. Get a gun if you have to, but take it.

  Hank didn't have half a brain. Glenn had said it. One minute Glenn was joking with you, kidding along in that low-voiced way that made you feel he was thinking about you and taking care of you; next, he was making some crack like that, showing he thought you were a damn fool. But this was the first time Hank could remember that Glenn had said a thing like that straight out in front of other people.

  Especially in front of her.

  "Griffin " Hank relaxed slightly, a wire letting go somewhere inside, when he heard Dan Hilliard's voice. The man sounded tired, and old. "Griffin, by helping Robish to get back here after he'd shot a man, I've already placed myself in the position of being accessory after the fact."

  There it was; that was the phrase Hank had been reaching for ever since he heard Robish telling about it. Accessory after the fact. Only, in Hank's case, maybe it was worse; he remembered hearing once, somewhere, that even if you didn't pull the trigger

  "So if you think I'm going to do any more of your dirty work for you, you're wrong." Hilliard's voice was level and empty and dry.

  Glenn thought this was funny; he laughed; he even threw an arm over Hilliard's wide, thick shouldei'S. "Pop, you're a smart cookie, and you got guts. But you got to be reasonable. Look at my position. The kid's been yammering at me all day to go. I can't go, I tell him—throw all this over just cause we run into a little guy who can't mind his own business? You know what'd happen then, Hilliard? That dough"d come to your office tomorrow morning and I'd be miles away, and no chance to get my little job here in town taken care of. I worked for that money, Pop. Me and Hank. We can't throw any of it away. We pleaded innocent, see. That means we didn't get the money in the first place. Now you follow me, Pop?"

  The money wasn't worth it. Paying ofT Jesse Webb wasn't worth it. Nothing was worth sticking here now with a man dead and the cops liable to close in any minute! Another part of Hank's mind also cried, These people have had enough! His muscles throbbed with the certainty that they should go, move, get out. But Glenn was making the decisions. Glenn always made them. And he was usually right.

  Dan Hilliard was shaking his head. "I don't know what to tell you. The car's safe enough in the garage. No one else is likely to come and if you try to take it out "

  "I'm not going to take it out, HilHard. You are."

  The words silenced the room, stopped Hank Griffin's heart. You're crazy, Glenn, he said in silence. Crazy.

  "Soon as it gets good and dark out, but not too late, see, cause you don't want any prowl cars spotting you after all the other cars're off the street. You're going out there to the garage and you're going to take the license plates off it. Tell you what, put the ones on from the redheads coupe. You wouldn't want to get pinched for driving without plates, Hilliard. Ruin your reputation."

  "Griffin " This time it was Robish's voice, and he was

  pushing himself into the room from the hall. "Griffin, they pick up this guy, he'll start talking. Let the car alone."

  "Is that right, Hilliard? Would you start talking?"

  Dan Hilliard shook his head slowly, no expression on his broad face.

  In the den Hank, who had writhed and blistered for years under the stinging mockery of his brother's tongue, felt that thin wash of pity in him again. He hated it. He clenched his fists to kill it: what the hell did he care about these people anyway? Hilliard—just another sucker living a sucker's life, going to work every day, getting old fast, for peanuts! Dumb bastard. "See, Robish? Hilliard's too wise to start talking even if he is caught. Me, I trust Hilliard. He'd pull a fast one if he figured he had a chance, but he knows now he hasn't got a chance, so he's going to play ball. I got him where the
hair's short, that's why I trust him. You listening, Hank? That's the only time you ever take a chance trusting anybody."

  Lesson noted, Hank thought bitterly, a constriction in his chest. Same lesson. He had it. He had to admit the truth of it, too. Glenn was reminding him that the last time he'd pleaded with his brother to go, Glenn had warned him that Hilliard couldn't be trusted once they didn't have one of the family right alongside. This was why Glenn planned to take the wife and the girl along when they did leave. Hank had balked; not the girl. But Glenn's smile had withered his rebellion; the taunting, knowing look had stomped it down, even as Glenn had agreed with a shrug: Hell, we'll take the kid then, it make you feel any better. Hank. Only don't go soft on me, see. You go soft, you're licked.

  Hank wasn't going soft. Not now. This time they'd really let him have it; this time he was a murderer. He hadn't killed, but that ape Robish had, and that meant the chair for all three of them. Life, anyway. // he was caught. He wasn't going to be caught. But if Glenn kept running these damn-fool risks, they'd all be shooting it out, or feeling the 'cuffs hard and cold over their wrists. Only not him. Before that, he'd get out on his own. He didn't like the idea of Robish's gun at his back anyway— after what happened last night.

  But he was still glad he let Robish have it; without knowing it until then, he'd been wanting to do that for a long time. And he knew he could. He could use his fists. If Robish got close enough to pull him down, to get that weight working—well, maybe then he couldn't handle the big man. But with his arms free, hell, he could rip the man apart without Robish's even seeing what was happening. It was the one thing he could do well. The one thing. He realized it. He had always thought it was something, quite a lot. Now