Anyway, she hopes it isn’t Carl.
She walks to the front door and looks through the peephole but sees no one and nothing but empty space. After a moment’s hesitation she pulls open the door. The welcome mat is empty but for a small bundle of white flowers. Several of them still have brown clods of dirt hanging from them, held in place by thin roots.
She leans down and picks them up and smells them, earthy and pleasant with a slight pollen sharpness. It reminds her of being a teenager. When she was fifteen she was courted by an eighteen-year-old Mexican boy named Albert. He gave her flowers like this and they went for walks. Once they did more than walk. She lay back and let him take her virginity. It was sweet and awkward and brief. She wonders what happened to him, but supposes she’ll never know.
She smells the flowers again. She wants to bring them into the house and put them in water, but something tells her she shouldn’t. They’re sure to be from Carl, she can think of no one else who’d leave flowers for her, and she doesn’t want to be reminded of him every time she looks at them over the course of the next week.
He was a mistake and she doesn’t want to think about it.
She tosses them aside, into the dirt to the left of the porch, looks toward them briefly with some regret, and closes the door.
Then she heads back to the bathroom. She has to finish getting ready for work.
2
Sandy watches from down the street, from behind a car. His mother opens the front door, looks around briefly, and then looks down. She picks up the flowers he left for her and smells them. It makes him smile to see her there. He misses her very much. Seeing her makes a large part of him wish that he could take it all back. If he could take it all back he could run up to her right now and hug her. He knows he’s supposed to be strong now. He knows the gun tucked into his pants is supposed to make him bigger than he really is. But seeing his mother makes him feel like a little boy.
She throws the flowers to the ground, steps inside, shuts the door.
She hates him now. She must hate him now to throw his flowers away. He left them for her to let her know he was okay, to let her know he loved her, and she didn’t care. She threw them to the ground and shut the door.
That’s it, then. He needs to stop thinking about her. He really is on his own. He knew he couldn’t go home, knew he couldn’t talk to her no matter how much he wanted to, but he thought he still had a mother somewhere. Now he knows he doesn’t. He has no one. He closes his eyes. He tells himself that men don’t cry. Men are big and strong. They don’t say please, they don’t say thank you, and they never, ever cry.
He turns and walks away from there, walks down to Macy Street and heads west, toward Hollywood.
He never should have come here. It’s getting late. It’s getting dark. Unless he goes back to the house he broke into earlier he has nowhere to sleep, and it doesn’t seem worth it. It’s far away, and he has no car and no money. He’s hungry again. He wishes he could steal a car like hoodlums in movies do, but he doesn’t know how. He doesn’t know how to do anything. He’s just a stupid little kid and he doesn’t know how to do anything and he was stupid for thinking he did. He was stupid for thinking he could do this on his own. He wishes he was tough and crazy like James Cagney, but he isn’t. He’s just a stupid little kid. No wonder everybody hates him. No wonder the other kids wipe boogers on his clothes and push him and punch him. He’s no good. He never was any good. It was only a matter of time before his mother saw it too. No wonder she threw those flowers away. If he was her he’d have thrown them away too. And ground them into the dirt with his foot. If he was tough like James Cagney he would’ve pulled out his gun earlier and taken all the money from that stupid shop. He wouldn’t have run. That’s not what toughs do. But he isn’t a tough, is he? He tries to be but he isn’t.
He wipes at his eyes with the heels of his hands and tells himself to stop being a baby. He reaches into his pocket and pulls out his packet of cigarettes. He lights one. He takes a drag, inhaling the smoke, and coughs. He takes a second drag.
He can be tough like James Cagney if he wants to be. He can be crazy like him too. He knows he can. He can make it on his own.
He’s a vicious dog. He’s a wild horse.
He’s killed people.
He doesn’t need anybody.
He reaches into his pants and pulls out the gun. It feels heavy in his hand. He rubs his thumb against the hammer spur, feeling the grooves in the metal. He can see a liquor store up ahead. There are lights on. He’s going to rob it.
He’s going to take all their money.
And he won’t say please.
And he won’t say thank you.
3
Candice parks her car in the lot behind the Sugar Cube and steps into the night. She looks toward the dark sky. She likes its depth, the way it just goes on and on. She closes her eyes and experiences the same depth in the other direction. That she likes less. She opens her eyes and walks into the bar through the back door. She makes her way through the stock room, past boxes of liquor and wine and beer, into the front of the place. It’s just beginning to come to life with talk and laughter.
She scans the room for Vivian, but there’s no sign of her.
She does, however, see Heath sitting at a table sipping a glass of Johnnie Walker Black and watching the room.
She walks over and asks about Vivian.
‘She called in.’
‘She all right?’
‘Didn’t say.’
‘How’d she sound?’
‘Fine. But you don’t need to worry about it. You been through too much as it is. I don’t even think you should be back at work yet.’
‘I don’t have anything else to do.’
He doesn’t respond. Eventually he looks away.
She stands there a moment, then turns toward the bar. There she sees a gentleman in a suit sitting alone, sipping his drink, looking around the room. She walks over and slides onto the stool to his right, hoping he can help her temporarily escape herself.
‘You look lonely,’ she says.
He turns toward her and smiles.
FORTY-ONE
Eugene twists the key, listens to the thwack of the deadbolt as it retracts, and pushes open the door. He knows the room’s supposed to be empty, but his mouth is dry and his heart beats erratically in his chest. Last time he did something like this he ended up stumbling upon a couple corpses, and is still wanted by the police because of it.
He steps inside and closes the door behind him. No one else is here.
A bed fills the room, nightstands resting against the wall to its left and right. A Gold Medal paperback, something called The Brass Cupcake by John D. MacDonald, sits open on one of the nightstands, its narrow spine broken. A chair sits in the far right corner with a pinstriped suit coat draped over its arm. A desk and a lamp. An oak dresser with two suitcases resting on top of it, laundry piled high on the floor beside it.
A lived-in hotel room.
He pulls the switchblade knife from his pocket and walks to the nearest nightstand. He opens the drawer. But for a Gideon bible the drawer is empty. He sets the switchblade knife in the drawer beside the bible and pushes it closed. He walks to the dresser. A large leather suitcase sits on top of it beside a small square leatherette case. He begins with the large suitcase, unlatching it and looking through the contents. He finds socks, underpants, some T-shirts, half a bottle of whiskey, and a dress shirt. The dress shirt’s presence in the suitcase is strange. It’s the only piece of clothing which should be on a hanger. It’s the only piece of clothing that looks to have been worn. He picks it up. A bit of color catches his eye, blood on the left cuff. A few drops like an ellipsis. But enough for the police to find if they search the room thoroughly.
Evelyn might be right. They might simply be able to pin those murders on Louis Lynch. They belong to him, anyway. Come here, sweetie, let Momma stick this note to your shirt so you don’t lose it on the way to scho
ol.
But Eugene doesn’t think a switchblade knife and a shirt with blood on it will be enough to do the job. That police detective, Bachman, saw him at the murder scene, saw him drop one of the murder weapons. A knife and a few splashes of blood won’t convince him that someone else did the murders. Without a story to make them mean something, a knife and a shirt are just random items. Even if the police searched this room and found them, Eugene would remain the most likely suspect. The police have a story for him. They have motive, and they have him at the scene. They search this room, what do they have? A switchblade knife like a million other switchblade knives and a few drops of blood that could be the result of careless shaving.
He closes the suitcase. He needs more.
He looks to the small leatherette case. He unlatches it and pulls open the top, revealing a black Royal typewriter. He looks down at its QWERTY grin.
What were you expecting, the queen of England?
For some time he merely stands there unthinking. Then turns in a circle, looking around the room, not quite sure what he’s looking for. Then once more looking at the typewriter it comes to him. He needs a piece of paper. He walks to the desk and finds a few sheets of hotel stationery there. He peels off the top sheet and rolls it into the typewriter. He stares down at the keys for a long time, puts his fingers against them. The gloves provide a distance he doesn’t like. It makes him feel disconnected from what he’s doing. He misses the feel of cool plastic against the pads of his fingers. He begins typing, simply banging out the first words that come to mind:
In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth and the earth was without form and void and darkness was upon the face of the deep and God hovered over the surface of the water.
He looks down at the words hammered into the paper. The ribbon needs replacing. The letters are light gray and difficult to read. The ‘t’ is angled to the right, making it look like a malformed ‘x’. The ‘h’ sits higher on the line than the other letters.
This, he can do something with. He knows it. But he needs a story and he has no idea what that story will be.
Could he simply call the police and let them know this room is here? Would they create their own story? This typewriter is the typewriter on which his blackmail note was hammered out. He left the note on his table at home, so the police are certain to have picked it up. The switchblade knife in the nightstand is of the same kind as that which was used to stab the cop who he is suspected of murdering. The blood on the shirt cuff is evidence that something happened. It is, at least, if you add in the other evidence. And the police should be able to match the blood type to one of the victims. Would a simple phone call be enough? He thinks there’s a chance it would.
But there’s still a problem, and not a small one. Even if Louis Lynch takes the fall for his own murders, the Man will never let Eugene live.
He needs to think of a way to finish this once and for all, but his mind is blank. There was a time when he was good at creating stories, but that time is gone.
Then something does come. It isn’t a full story, but it might be enough to get him started. If it goes wrong it might end in his death, and there’s a good chance it will go wrong. Unlike Evelyn’s plan, this one is no hammer. But it’s the only thing he can think of that might also end with him walking away free and clear, neither wanted by the police for murder nor wanted murdered by the Man.
And doesn’t he deserve that?
He’ll have to do some ugly things. Merely thinking about what he’ll have to do makes his stomach ache. But the only people he’ll be hurting are those responsible for putting him in this situation in the first place, and if anybody deserves to face harsh consequences for what’s happened, it’s them.
He pulls the paper from the typewriter and folds it up and puts it into his pocket. He’ll burn it later. He puts the lid on the typewriter case, latching it, and pushes it back into place. He’ll need to use it again, but not yet. He’ll have to return once he knows more about how he’s going to approach this. For now he has other things to take care of, the first of which is getting out of here.
He looks around the room, making certain everything is back the way it was when he arrived, then steps into the corridor and latches the door behind him. He walks to the elevator, takes it down to the lobby, leaves his address at the front desk with the message that Evelyn should come see him as soon as she gets in.
He heads out into the night.
He wishes he could think of another way out of this, but he has no choice. He’s been put in a corner and this is his way out.
He kicks his motorcycle to life and pulls out into the street. He heads toward his motel room, where he will await Evelyn’s arrival.
THE ABANDONED WAREHOUSE
FORTY-TWO
1
In the dream, they finally catch up with him. He isn’t sure how. He’s been walking down and down constantly for months — years, decades — and no one went past him, but one of the cannibals managed to get below him anyway, managed to get in front of him and block his downward journey. This lone cannibal now stands in rags before Eugene, slump-shouldered but full of vitality and madness. His skin jaundiced, the color of a fading bruise. His eyes bloodshot, the eyelids red-rimmed and raw. His hands are black. His beard thick with filth and glistening with oily moisture around the mouth. He grins, revealing yellow teeth from which the white gums are receding bloody and swollen. He reaches into a leather satchel and removes a human heart. It throbs in his hand. He holds it out to Eugene. Thick strands of blood run off it, dripping from ragged meat-hoses, splashing to the concrete floor.
‘It’s the boy’s,’ the cannibal says. ‘We saved it for you.’
‘No,’ Eugene says, shaking his head. ‘Thank you, but. . but no. . no.’
He turns around, heading back up the stairs. He doesn’t know where he’ll go. He simply knows he must get away. The cannibal doesn’t follow him, but as he reaches the next landing he hears the others only a floor above, and they’re heading down.
They’ve pinned him in. Somehow they managed to pin him in. He looks to his right and sees a door. He can’t go up and he can’t go down, but he can go through the door. He pushes into a corridor, the door slamming shut behind him. He walks down the corridor despite the fact he knows there’s nowhere to go.
The overhead lights flicker.
The door behind him opens and closes, followed by the shuffling of feet.
He looks over his shoulder.
The cannibals walk slowly after him, the one with the heart in his hand leading the way.
He looks forward once more and continues his retreat. He walks to the end of the corridor and steps into the last door on the left, the only place to go. It’s an office like all the other offices. There’s a desk against the wall with a typewriter and a telephone on it. A chair pushed up to the desk. A sheet of blank paper rolled into the typewriter.
He walks to the window and looks out.
The sky is gray. Lightning flashes in the distance. Sheets of clouds block his view of the ground below. He still has no idea how close he is to the bottom, no idea what floor he might be on. He wonders if he’s any nearer escape than when he began. He supposes he must be. The ground is down there somewhere and he’s been steadily heading toward it.
A voice behind him: ‘There’s only one way out.’
He turns around.
The cannibals stand in the doorway.
The one with the heart in his hand holds it out toward him. Behind the beating heart he grins with yellow teeth.
‘You must be hungry.’
‘No,’ Eugene says, backing away. ‘No.’
But then he’s against the wall and can back away no further.
‘You haven’t eaten for months,’ the cannibal says, pushing the beating heart toward his face.
It smells of iron; it smells of blood.
He turns his head away.
‘It’s the only way out,’ the cannibal says.
‘You’ll see. Eat.’
Then: a strange knocking sound from within the walls. The floor drops out from under him and he’s swept into a brief blackness before sitting up in bed.
Someone is knocking on the hotel-room door. It must be Evelyn.
What time is it? He picks up his glasses and puts them on. He looks at his watch to see it’s just past midnight.
He hadn’t planned on falling asleep. He was only going to lie down a moment, exhale some of this tension he feels. But he did fall asleep, and he’s now disoriented. He feels lost, detached from everything that’s happening. He isn’t ready for this. He isn’t at all ready for this.
Doesn’t matter what he’s ready for. Evelyn is here. It’s time.
He inhales, exhales.
It’s time.
He gets to his feet, turns on the lamp. As well as the rest of the room it illuminates a roll of duct tape, a pair of leather gloves, and his Baby Browning. They sit beside one another on the room’s rickety dining table.
How’s he going to do this?
He doesn’t want to hurt Evelyn but needs her immobile, and the only way he can think to get her that way is with a fight. She won’t simply sit still while he tapes her up, and he can’t hold a gun on her to force her to, because if he’s close enough to tape her up he’s close enough for her to take the gun away and turn it around on him, and she would. This is the business she’s in. He’s a mere tourist.
She knocks again and says his name.
‘I’ll be right there.’
The Last Tomorrow Page 28
