Bindlestiff nd-10

by Bill Pronzini

  I took my foot off the floor pedal, and the doors snapped shut, and I started to turn away. Something that gleamed dully on the deck caught my eye; it was under the fireman’s seat, up against the footboard. I squatted on my heels and scraped it out and held it up in my palm.

  It was a piece of copper, elliptical in shape, about three inches long, with some sort of design etched into the metal; through an eye at the top was a broken length of thin chain.

  Bradford’s pendant, the one Arleen had made for him back in high school.

  That put the clincher on things. The chain must have caught on something and broken when Raymond stuffed Bradford’s body inside the firebox; he hadn’t noticed the pendant there on the deck afterward. I straightened, still trying not to gag, and put it into my pocket. The charred-flesh smell was making me nauseous. Raymond must be a cold-blooded bastard to have hung around in here after the cremation.

  Well, he wasn’t going to get away with murder this time. I had plenty enough evidence now to bring the local cops out here and have him arrested. And plenty enough to convict him of a third count of willful homicide.

  I turned into the gangway. Outside, a long way off, a locomotive’s air horn cut into the early-evening stillness-probably a freight coming into Oroville from the north. I dropped off the running board and swung toward the open doors.

  And Raymond was there, just walking into view on the gravel outside.

  He saw me at the same time and came to a sudden halt. There was a frozen moment during which we both stared at each other. He didn’t have a weapon of any kind, at least not in either of his hands. The air horn wailed again, and I thought: Goddamn it! and Raymond made a noise like an animal and turned and ran.

  I pounded after him, cursing myself for not having got out of here sooner. The side gate stood open now and he was heading straight for it. Heading for the cottage, I thought, going after a gun. I wasn’t in very good physical shape, but neither was he-a couple of overweight middle-aged guys unused to this kind of exertion. He stumbled just after he got through the gate, and I caught him ten steps beyond.

  I hit him from behind with my right shoulder and forearm, sent him sprawling. But the impact and my own momentum threw me off stride, too, and I went down on top of him just as he started to roll away. We flipped over together, clawing at each other, grunting like two pigs in a wallow. Pain erupted the length of my bad arm; gravel gouged into my body and the side of my face, stinging. When we came up we were both on our knees. He broke loose of me and swung at my head, and even though I saw it coming and tried to duck away, the blow caught me over the left ear and knocked me flat again.

  He scrambled to his feet, staggering, turning. But I was already heaving up onto all fours, with my head full of buzzing noises and my left arm half numb, and I was between him and the cottage. He might have charged me, tried to take me in a hand-to-hand fight, but he didn’t do it. He had no way of knowing about my bad arm, and maybe he sensed that I might be the stronger; or maybe panic had hold of him and he was not thinking at all. Whatever the reason, he turned his back to me and ran again-away from the cottage, back along the fence toward the woods at the rear of the museum grounds.

  I tried to get up too fast, lost my footing and toppled forward like an old tree, scraping skin off my right palm. By the time I made it to my feet again, he was thirty yards away and crashing through the underbrush that grew in close to the fence. I lumbered after him, panting and wheezing, with a chest pain starting that put a peripheral fear of a heart attack into my head.

  Tree shadows swallowed him, but I could still hear him thrashing around in the underbrush. Just before I reached the woods I became aware of a rumbling, rattling noise and the ground seemed to vibrate a little. Then the air horn bellowed again, and through the trees I could see the Cyclopean glare of a locomotive’s headlight as the southbound freight clattered into view on the right-of-way. The sweep of light also let me see Raymond: he was running straight toward the tracks and the oncoming freight.

  The train was not going very fast, throttled way down and crawling along the tangent, and when he scrambled up the incline I knew what he was going to do. The locomotive and its light swept on past; a short string of flats followed it. I came out of the trees just as the first of a line of boxcars drew abreast of him. He tried to catch hold of the iron ladder on the side of one, missed it, almost fell, and then straightened in time to lunge at the next in line. He caught hold of the ladder on that one, but by that time I was a couple of strides behind him, running sideways on the packed earth of the incline.

  It was a foolish thing to do, but I grabbed onto the ladder, too, with my good right hand. Even as slow as the freight was traveling, its momentum almost jerked my arm out of its socket, almost tore my fingers loose from the rung; if that had happened I might have fallen under the wheels. But I managed to hang on, to get one foot anchored on the bottom rung an instant after Raymond hoisted himself up and through the open door of the car. And I swung in right on his heels, barreled into him as soon as he let go of the ladder and his feet hit the swaying floorboards.

  The boxcar was empty; the odor of dust and apples assaulted my nostrils as we smacked together, tumbled to the floor. The collision broke us apart, and for two or three seconds I couldn’t find him in the darkness. Then I heard him scrabbling around on my left, and lunged in that direction, and my good hand scraped across his shirtfront. The material ripped, but I got hold of him anyway and hauled him in against me. We rolled over a couple of times, his breath exploding sourly into my face, his fingers clawing at my cheek. I came up on top and swung down at him, a blind, wild swing, then flailed at him again.

  That second blow took him somewhere on the head; he grunted in pain. I hit him a second time, more solidly than the first. He stiffened under me and I knew he was hurt and I thought I had him. But one of his hands clutched at my groin, found enough purchase to make me cry out and try to twist aside. I pawed at his hand to keep him from rupturing me, and he swatted me in the ribs with his other arm, and the next thing I knew I was over on my back and he was pinning me with the bulk of his upper body, fumbling at my neck with both hands. I kicked at him, didn’t connect; missed with an awkward punch. And by then it was too late: he had his fingers wrapped around my neck in a stranglehold.

  He slammed my head against the floorboards, did it again, did it a third time…

  Pain. Disorientation. A sudden feeling of distance and time-stoppage, as if part of my mind had been jarred out of whack. I couldn’t move; I couldn’t seem to breathe either. A thought came out of the swirling black inside my head: He paralyzed me! I screamed in rage and terror, but the scream was inside my head too, and it had no voice.

  Raymond let go of my neck; I felt his weight lift off me, heard him panting, dimly saw him get to his feet and brace himself against the sway of the car. He was giant then, looming, swaying-a massive silhouette outlined against blobs and flickers of light, against a blur of confused shapes sliding past the open door. He kept staring down at me, and I thought through sweeps of pain: Move! He’ll kill you if you don’t move. But except for helpless little twitches, I could not make my body respond.

  He turned away abruptly, lurched over to the door and leaned out. The blobs and flickers of light, the blur of shapes, were slowing down. He glanced back at me again, hesitated-and disappeared. Now you see him, now you don’t. Gone. Poof, like magic stuff.

  Jumped off, I thought. For God’s sake, move!

  But all I could do was lie there, jouncing and swaying and twitching. Slowing down like the train. Going away like Raymond. Going, going…

  Gone.

  Chapter 13

  There was light shining in my eyes. I reached up and swiped at it, the way you’d try to brush away an insect. But the light would not go away; it just kept shining, hot and bright, burning into my skull like some kind of powerful laser beam.

  Somebody said, “Come on, ’bo, wake up. You can’t sleep here. This ain’t a
frigging hotel.”

  I turned my head to one side, to avoid the light, and realized I was lying still: no more jouncing and swaying. I opened my eyes. Dusty floorboards came into focus in a wide splash of light. Boxcar. Raymond. Christ, Raymond!

  I rolled over and tried to lift up; my left arm was numb and wouldn’t support me and I sprawled face down. When I tried it again I used my right hand, and this time I made it up onto my knees. The back of my head throbbed as if somebody was beating on it with a stick. A wave of nausea washed through me; bile pumped into the back of my throat, clogged for an instant, then rose again. I knelt there with my head hanging down, vomiting.

  “Drunk,” a different voice said disgustedly. “You’d think these tramps would learn-”

  “Wait, Frank,” the first voice said. “He’s not drunk-he’s hurt. Look at the back of his head.”

  Part of the light moved at the same time I finished emptying my stomach. “You’re right. Shit, it looks stove in.”

  “No, it’s not that bad.”

  “Bloody as hell. Hey, ’bo, what happened? You been in a fight?”

  I pawed at my mouth, got one foot down under me, and managed to heave myself upright. The boxcar’s side wall, the one with the door in it, was only a couple of steps away, and that was a good thing; I would not have stayed on my feet if it had been any farther away. As it was, I hit the wall sideways and slid along it to the edge of the door, knees buckling, before I caught myself and hung on.

  One of the voices said, “Hey, take it easy,” and a hand grabbed hold of my shoulder to steady me. But it was the left shoulder, the bad one, and I made a noise in my throat and shook the hand off. I could see the two men now, even though both of them were still shining big electric torches at me. A different kind of light, artificial-looking and faintly greenish, spilled into the car from outside.

  I looked away from them and out through the door. The freight yards. The artificial-looking light was coming from the strings of sodium vapor arcs that crisscrossed the work areas. It made the rails gleam, and for a couple of seconds I imagined they were moving, writhing along the ground like big silver snakes. The smells of oil and hot metal came to me from somewhere; I thought I was going to vomit again.

  “We better get him some first-aid, Frank,” one of the men said. Yard bulls, that was what they were. Railroad security cops. “He needs a doctor.”

  “Yeah.”

  No, I thought, get the police, I got to talk to the police. I tried to say the words, but they seemed to lodge in my throat like fragments of bone. Something wrong with my voice. Something wrong with my head, too. It ached like fury; the pain was so sharp I couldn’t think straight.

  Shit, it looks stove in…

  I put my hand back there: wet, pulpy. Jesus! I pulled the hand down and looked at it, and the fingers were stained with smears of blood; the artificial light made the stains look dark and unreal, like shadows clinging to my fingers.

  My knees buckled again. One of the bulls caught hold of me, braced my body against his. “Easy, ’bo,” he said. “We’ll get you mixed up. You’ll be okay.”

  “Can he walk?” the other one asked.

  “If he can’t we’ll have to carry him to the first-aid station.”

  I got a word out; it sounded thick and clotted like the blood on my head. “No…”

  “Don’t try to talk. Frank, jump down and take his legs.”

  “Police,” I said, “call the police.”

  “Sure. After we get you a doctor.”

  “No, the police. Quick. He’ll get away…”

  “Who’ll get away?”

  “Raymond. No, Dallmeyer.”

  “Somebody must have robbed him,” the other one, Frank, said from outside. He was down on the ground now, looking up at me. “Goddamn jackrollers.”

  “Listen,” I said, “you got to listen. Not robbery-murder. He killed Bradford.”

  “Murder?” the bull holding me said.

  “The police, call the police.”

  “All right, we’ll call them. You let us take care of you first. Okay?”

  “Yeah,” I said. “Okay.”

  The hands shifted, slid around under my armpits. He lifted me, and Frank took hold of my legs, and they lowered me down out of the car. I could stand up all right, but Frank yelled, “Hey, you guys give me some help,” and pretty soon two other men were there and more hands were supporting me. The first bull jumped down. He had a handlebar mustache, the biggest one I’d ever seen; I found myself gawping at it.

  “You boys take him to first-aid,” he said. “I’ll notify Buckner.”

  The hands moved me away, half-carrying me. I had a confused impression of lights, rail cars, gleaming tracks, corrugated-iron buildings; of faces and orange hard hats and muttered voices. Then we were inside one of the buildings, and there was a cot, and they made me lie down on my stomach. Somebody said, “Holy Mother, will you look at that?” and somebody else said, “Get some antiseptic-quick.”

  Sharp stinging pain.

  I yelled-and blacked out again.

  When I came out of it there was another light shining in my eyes-a pen-flash this time. I was still lying on the cot, turned on my side now with my right cheek against a pillow. The guy with the light was standing over me. “No, don’t close your eyes,” he said. “Keep looking at the light.”

  “Doctor?”

  “Yes. Do you feel nauseous?”

  “A little.”

  “Need to vomit?”

  “No.”

  “Can you see me clearly? Any double vision?”

  “No. I can see you.”

  “Do you know where you are?”

  “Freight yards,” I said. My head still ached hellishly, but most of the disorientation seemed to be gone. I told him that. I told him my name, too, for good measure.

  “Can you remember what happened to you?”

  “Yeah,” I said, “I remember.”

  He stepped back. “Let’s see if you can sit up.”

  It took me a few seconds, but I managed it. The room swam a little at first, then settled into focus and stayed that way. There were three other men in it: the yard bull with the handlebar mustache, a thick-necked guy wearing one of the orange hard hats, and a heavyset, graying policeman in uniform.

  The doctor put the light in my eyes again for a couple of seconds, switched it off. He was middle-aged and trim, the kind who probably played tennis as well as golf. “Mild nausea,” he said, to the others as well as to me. “Slight dilation of the right pupil. No apparent retrograde amnesia. Concussion, certainly, but it doesn’t appear to be any more serious than that.”

  I said, “All the blood…”

  “Skin lacerations. You have a bad bruise, too. I’ll have an X ray taken at the hospital to be sure the skull isn’t damaged.”

  “Hospital?”

  “Yes. For the X ray and to have your wounds treated properly.”

  “What time is it?”

  He frowned. The thick-necked guy took out a railroad pocket watch, looked at it, and said, “Quarter past ten.”

  More than two hours since I’d had my run-in with Lester Raymond. Damn! “I can’t go to the hospital right now,” I said. I gestured toward the uniformed cop. “I need to talk to the police. It’s urgent.”

  The four of them held a short conference. Then the doctor went away, still frowning; the yard bull went with him. But the thick-necked guy stayed.

  The cop said, “I’m Sergeant Collins, Oroville police. This is Mr. Buckner, the night yardmaster here.”

  “I’m a private investigator,” I said. “But I guess you know that by now.”

  He nodded. “We looked at your ID. You’re the man who was in to see Sergeant Huddleston this afternoon, the one who turned up the kid thief.”

  “Right. And that’s not all I turned up today.”

  I told him the full story of Charles Bradford and Lester Raymond, everything I knew for certain and everything I had surmised. I le
ft nothing out, including my ill-advised excursion to the museum tonight and the rationale for it and what had happened afterward. I also gave him Bradford’s pendant, which was still in my pocket.

  He was not happy with any of it, but he didn’t openly condemn me for my actions. Like Huddleston, he was a professional; upholding the law was more important to him than anything else.

  Buckner, however, looked shocked. “By Christ,” he said, “I can’t believe it. I’ve known Jim Dallmeyer for years. Hell, we played softball together…”

  “I know him, too,” Collins said. “But maybe neither of us knows him or anybody else as well as we think we do.”

  “I still can’t believe it.”

  “Well, we’ll damn well check it out.” Collins looked at me. “You feel up to taking a ride?”

  “Down to the police station?”

  “The hospital first, then the station.”

  “Whatever you say. But you’d better hurry. Raymond-Dallmeyer-has had better than two hours to go on the run again. He might have figured he finished me off in that boxcar, but with a triple homicide rap hanging over him, he can’t take the chance. He’ll be gone by the time you can get your men out to the museum.”

  “We’ll see about that,” Collins said. “If he isn’t gone, if all of this is a load of crap…”

  “Believe me, it’s not a load of crap.”

  “For your sake, mister,” he said, “it better not be.”

  A brace of uniformed patrolmen drove me to the hospital. Collins went elsewhere, presumably to the railroad museum to check out my story. The trim doctor was waiting for us when we arrived; he saw to it that I got my head x-rayed and partially shaved and bandaged. He seemed to prefer that I spend the night at the hospital, as a simple precaution, but he didn’t put up much of an argument when the patrolmen told him their orders were to take me to the police station. I did not put up any argument at all. I had had enough of hospitals to last me the rest of my life; just the few minutes I’d spent in this one made me twitchy, and I couldn’t wait to get out of it again.