One Night Stands; Lost weekends

by Lawrence Block

  “No!” He heard her gasp. Then she recovered, and her voice was calm when she spoke again. “I mean, your career comes first, darling. You know that. You shouldn’t think of me. Think of your job.”

  “Well,” he said, enjoying all this, “I’m not sure—”

  “I’ve got a dreary headache anyway, darling. Why not stay in town? We’ll have the weekend together—”

  He let her talk him into it. After she rang off, he called his usual hotel and made his usual reservation for eleven-thirty. He went back to work, left the office at five-thirty, signed the register downstairs, and left the building. He had a quick bite at a lunch counter and was back at his desk at six o’clock, after signing the book again on the way in.

  At a quarter to seven he left the building again, this time failing to sign himself out. He took a cab to his apartment and was inside it by ten minutes after seven. At precisely seven-thirty there was a knock on his door. He answered it, and she stared at him as he dragged her inside. She couldn’t figure it out; her face contorted.

  “I’m going to kill you, Carolyn,” he said, and showed her the knife. She died slowly, and noisily. Her cries would have brought out the National Guard anywhere else in the country, but they were in New York now, and New Yorkers never concern themselves with the shrieks of dying women.

  He took the few clothes that did not belong to Baker, scooped up Carolyn’s purse, and got out of the apartment. From a pay phone on Sheridan Square he called the air terminal and made a reservation. Then he taxied back to the office and slipped inside, again without writing his name in the register.

  At eleven-fifteen he left the office, went to his hotel and slept much more soundly than he had expected. He went to the office in the morning and had his secretary put in three calls to New Hope. No one answered.

  That was Friday. He took his usual train home, rang his bell a few times, used his key, called Carolyn’s name several times, then made himself a drink. After half an hour he called the next door neighbor and asked her if she knew where his wife was. She didn’t. After another three hours he called the police.

  Sunday a local policeman came around to see him. Evidently Carolyn had had her fingerprints taken once, maybe when she’d held a civil service job before they were married. The New York police had found the body Saturday evening, and it had taken them a little less than twenty-four hours to run a check on the prints and trace Carolyn to New Hope.

  “I hoped I wouldn’t have to tell you this,” the policeman said. “When you reported your wife missing, we talked to some of the neighbors. It looks as though she was—uh—stepping out on you, Mr. Jordan. I’m afraid it had been going on for some time. There were men she met in New York. Does the name Roy Baker mean anything to you?”

  “No. Was he—”

  “I’m afraid he was one of the men she was seeing, Mr. Jordan. I’m afraid he killed her, sir.”

  Howard’s reactions combined hurt and loss and bewilderment in proper proportion. He almost broke down when they had him view the body but managed to hold himself together stoically. He learned from the New York police that Roy Baker was a Village type, evidently some sort of irresponsible artist. Baker had made a reservation on a plane shortly after killing Carolyn but hadn’t picked up his ticket, evidently realizing that the police would be able to trace him. He’d no doubt take a plane under another name, but they were certain they would catch up with him before too long.

  “He cleared out in a rush,” the policeman said. “Left his clothes, never got to empty out his bank account. A guy like this, he’s going to turn up in a certain kind of place. The Village, North Beach in Frisco, maybe New Orleans. He’ll be back in the Village within a year, I’ll bet on it, and when he does we’ll pick him up.”

  For form’s sake, the New York police checked Jordan’s whereabouts at the time of the murder, and they found that he’d been at his office until eleven-fifteen, except for a half hour when he’d had a sandwich around the corner, and that he had spent the rest of the night at the hotel where he always stayed when he worked late.

  That, incredibly, was all there was to it.

  After a suitable interval, Howard put the New Hope house on the market and sold it almost immediately at a better price than he had thought possible. He moved to town, stayed at his alibi hotel while he checked the papers for a Village apartment.

  He was in a cab, heading downtown for a look at a three-room apartment on Horatio Street, before he realized suddenly that he could not possibly live in the Village, not now. He was known there as Roy Baker, and if he went there he would be identified as Roy Baker and arrested as Roy Baker, and that would be the end of it.

  “Better turn around,” he told the cabdriver. “Take me back to the hotel. I changed my mind.”

  He spent another two weeks in the hotel, trying to think things through, looking for a safe way to live Roy Baker’s life again. If there was an answer, he couldn’t find it. The casual life of the Village had to stay out of bounds.

  He took an apartment uptown on the East Side. It was quite expensive but he found it cold and charmless. He took to spending his free evenings at midtown nightclubs, where he drank a little too much and spent a great deal of money to see poor floor shows. He didn’t get out often, though, because he seemed to be working late more frequently now. It was harder and harder to get everything done on time. On top of that, his work had lost its sharpness; he had to go over blocks of copy again and again to get them right.

  Revelation came slowly, painfully. He began to see just what he had done to himself.

  In Roy Baker, he had found the one perfect life for himself. The Christopher Street apartment, the false identity, the new world of new friends and different clothes and words and customs, had been a world he took to with ease because it was the perfect world for him. The mechanics of preserving this dual identity, the taut fabric of lies that clothed it, the childlike delight in pure secrecy, had added a sharp element of excitement to it all. He had enjoyed being Roy Baker; more, he had enjoyed being Howard Jordan playing at being Roy Baker. The double life suited him so perfectly that he had felt no great need to divorce Carolyn.

  Instead, he had killed her—and killed Roy Baker in the bargain, erased him very neatly, put him out of the picture for all time.

  Howard bought a pair of Levi’s, a turtleneck sweater, a pair of white tennis sneakers. He kept these clothes in the closet of his Sutton Place apartment, and now and then when he spent a solitary evening there he dressed in his Roy Baker costume and sat on the floor drinking California wine straight from the jug. He wished he were playing chess in the back room of a coffeehouse, or arguing art and religion in a Village bar, or listening to a blues guitar at a loft party.

  He could dress up all he wanted in his Roy Baker costume, but it wouldn’t work. He could drink wine and play guitar music on his stereo, but that wouldn’t work, either. He could buy women, but he couldn’t walk them home from Village parties and make love to them in third-floor walk-ups.

  He had to be Howard Jordan.

  Carolyn or no Carolyn, married or single, New Hope split-level or Sutton Place apartment, one central fact remained unchanged. He simply did not like being Howard Jordan.

  RIDE A WHITE HORSE

  ANDY HART STARED UNBELIEVINGLY at the door of Whitey’s Tavern. The door was closed and padlocked, and the bar was unlighted. He checked his watch and noted that it was almost 7:30. Whitey should have opened hours ago.

  Andy turned and strode to the candy store on the corner. He was a small man, but his rapid walk made up for his short legs. He walked as he did everything else—precisely, with no wasted motion.

  “Hey,” he asked the man behind the counter, “how come Whitey didn’t open up yet?”

  “He’s closed down for the next two weeks. Got caught serving minors.” Andy thanked him and left.

  The news was disturbing. It didn’t annoy him tremendously, but it did break up a long-established routine. Ever since
he had started working as a bookkeeper at Murrow’s Department Store, eleven years ago, he had been in the habit of eating a solitary meal at the Five Star Diner and drinking a few beers at Whitey’s. He had just finished dinner, and now he found himself with no place to go.

  Standing on the street corner, staring at the front of the empty bar, he had a vague sensation that he was missing something. Here he was, thirty-seven years old, and there was nowhere in the city for him to go. He had no family, and his only friends were his drinking companions at Whitey’s. He could go back to his room, but there he would have only the four walls for company. He momentarily envied the married men who worked in his department. It might be nice to have a wife and kids to come home to.

  The thought passed as quickly as it had come. After all, there was no reason to be brokenhearted over a closed bar. There was undoubtedly another bar in the neighborhood where the beer was as good and the people as friendly. He glanced around and noticed a bar directly across the street.

  There was a large neon sign over the doorway, with the outline of a horse and the words “White Horse Cafe.” The door was a bright red, and music from a jukebox wafted through it.

  Andy hesitated. There was a bar, all right. He had passed it many times in the past, but had never thought to enter it. It seemed a little flashy to him, a little bit too high-tone. But tonight, he decided, he’d see how it was on the inside. A change of pace wouldn’t hurt him at all.

  He crossed the street and entered. A half-dozen men were seated at the bar, and several couples occupied booths on the side. The jukebox was playing a song which he had heard before, but he couldn’t remember the title. He walked to the rear, hung his coat on a peg, and took the end seat.

  He ordered a beer and sat nursing it. He studied his reflection in the mirror. His looks were average—neatly combed brown hair, brown eyes, and a prominent chin. His smile was pleasant, but he didn’t smile too often. He was, all in all, a pretty average guy.

  The time passed slowly. Andy finished his beer and ordered another, and then another. Some of the people left the bar and others entered, but he saw no one he recognized. He was beginning to regret coming to the White Horse. The beer was fine and the music was nice enough, but he had no more company than the four walls of his room provided.

  Then, while he was drinking his fourth beer, the door opened and she entered. He saw her at once. He had glanced to the door every time it opened in the hope of seeing an acquaintance, and each time he had turned back to his glass. This time, however, he couldn’t turn his eyes away from her.

  She was tall, very pretty, with long blond hair that fell to her shoulders. She took off her coat and hung it up and Andy could see that she was more than just pretty. Her skirt clung to her hips and hugged her thighs, and her breasts threatened to break through the tight film of her sweater. Andy couldn’t stop looking at her. He knew that he was staring, but he couldn’t help himself. She was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen.

  He was surprised when she walked over and sat down on the stool beside him. Actually, it was natural enough. There were only two other empty stools at the bar. But to Andy it seemed like the rarest of coincidences.

  He was glad that she was sitting next to him but at the same time he was embarrassed. He felt a desire for her which was stronger than anything he had experienced in years. He had neither needed nor wanted a woman in a long while, but now he felt an instantaneous physical craving for her.

  The girl ordered a sidecar and sipped at it, and Andy forced himself to drink his beer. He wanted desperately to start a conversation with her but couldn’t think of a way to begin. He waited, listening to the music, until she finished her drink.

  “Miss,” he said nervously, “could I buy you another?”

  She turned and looked at him for a long moment, and he felt himself flush. “Yes,” she said at last. “Thank you.”

  He ordered a sidecar for her and another beer for himself, and they began talking. He was amazed to discover that he was able to talk freely and easily to her, and that she in turn seemed interested in everything that he had to say. He had wanted to talk to anybody in the world, and talking to her was almost the answer to a prayer.

  He told her everything about himself—his name, his job, and the sort of life he led. She didn’t have much to say about herself. Her name was Sara Malone and she was twenty-four, but that was all she volunteered.

  From that point on the time flew by, and Andy was thankful that Whitey’s had been closed. He wanted the evening to pass more slowly. He was happy, and he dreaded returning to his empty bed in his tiny room.

  Finally she glanced at her watch, then smiled up at him. “I have to go,” she said. “It’s getting late.”

  “One more drink,” he suggested.

  “No,” she said. “We’ve had enough. Let’s go.”

  He helped her on with her coat and walked outside with her. He stood there on the sidewalk, awkwardly. “Sara,” he said, “when can I see you again?”

  She smiled, and it was a warm, easy smile. “You could come home with me. If you’d like to.”

  They walked quickly, with the blackness of the night around them like a blanket. And when they reached her apartment they kissed and they held each other. He took her, and lying there in her arms, with her firm breasts warm against his chest, he felt complete and whole again.

  When he woke up the next morning she was already awake, and he smelled food cooking. He washed and dressed, then went into the kitchen for breakfast. It was a fine breakfast, and so very much better than toast and coffee at the Five Star Diner. He had to keep looking across the table at her to make sure that he was really awake and that she was really there. He couldn’t believe what had happened, but the memory of last night was too vivid to leave room for doubt.

  They didn’t talk much during breakfast. He couldn’t talk, afraid that he might do something to spoil it all. When he finished his second cup of coffee, he stood up regretfully.

  “I have to go now,” he said. “I have to be at work by nine.”

  “When will you be home? I’ll have dinner ready.”

  “Right after work,” he said. “About five-fifteen or so. Don’t you have to work?” He remembered that she hadn’t mentioned it last night.

  “No. I have enough money for a while, so I don’t work.” She smiled. “Would you do me a favor?”

  “Of course.”

  “I checked a package at the public library yesterday and forgot to pick it up on the way out. You work across the street from the library, don’t you?”

  He nodded.

  “Here,” she said. She took a ticket from her purse and handed it to him. “Will you get it for me?”

  “Sure.” He put the ticket in his pocket and slipped on his overcoat. He walked slowly to the door, and when he turned she was in his arms suddenly, kissing him. “I love you,” he said. He walked lightly down the street, and she closed the door softly behind him.

  His work went easily and quickly that day. He was anxious for five o’clock to roll around, but the memory of last night and the promise of the coming one made the time pass. At noon he picked up her parcel at the library, a small box wrapped in brown wrapping paper. He brought it home to her that night, and she put it on the top shelf in the closet.

  Sara cooked him a good dinner, and he helped her with the dishes. They sat in the living room, listening to records, until it was time for bed. Then they made love, and he knew that he could never live without her again, that he could never sleep without her beside him.

  Days passed and the nights. Andy had never been so happy and contented in his life. He settled into a routine once again, but it was a groove rather than a rut. His life before had lacked only a woman like Sara to make it complete, and now nothing was missing.

  From time to time he thought of asking her to marry him. But, for some reason, he was afraid to. Everything was so perfect that he was hesitant to chance changing the arrangement. He let
things remain as they were.

  He knew very little about her, really. She seemed reluctant to talk about her past life. She didn’t say how she was able to afford the luxurious apartment they lived in, or what she did during the days while he was at the office. He didn’t press her. Nothing mattered, just so long as she was there for him when he arrived home.

  She had him pick up packages frequently—about twice a week or so. They were always the same type—small boxes wrapped in brown wrapping paper. Sometimes they were in a locker at the bus depot, sometimes at the library, sometimes in a safety deposit box at the bank. He wondered idly what the boxes contained, but she wouldn’t tell him, and he suspected it was some sort of medicine which she didn’t want to mention. The question nagged at him, though. It bothered persistently. He didn’t care about her earlier life, for that was beyond her now. But he wanted to know everything about her as she was now, wanted to share all of her life.

  Inevitably, one evening he brought home a package and she was not home. He sat waiting for her, the package in his lap. He stared at the package, turning it over and over in his hands, as though he were trying to burn a hole in the wrapping paper with his eyes. Five, ten minutes passed, and he couldn’t stand it any longer. He untied the string, removed the wrapping paper, and opened the box.

  The box was filled with a white powder. He looked at it, smelled it, and tasted a flake of it. It was nothing that he could recognize. He was wondering what the devil it could be when he heard a key in the lock, and he began guiltily to rewrap the package. Sara entered the room while he was still fussing with the string.

  “Andy!” she cried. “What are you doing?”

  “The package came undone,” he said lamely. “I was rewrapping it for you.”

  She looked at him accusingly. “Did you see what was inside?”

  “Yes,” he said. “What was it, Sara?”

  She took the box from him. “Never mind,” she said. “Just some powder.”