The Black Door

by Collin Wilcox

  But it was the walls that compelled my attention. On each wall hung mementos of violence and death: swords of every description, rifles and pistols, modern and old. Two sabers were crossed over a ceremonial German helmet; nearby hung a ragged battle flag, stained with the terrible dark brown of human blood. The top shelf of a bookcase had been arranged in a kind of improvised shrine. Above the bookcase hung a large picture of Robert Grinnel. Flanking the picture, separately framed, were three typewritten letters and a newspaper clipping. On the bookcase itself stood a photograph in a cheap gilded frame, a picture of Ferguson and young Bobby Grinnel, smiling at each other. Beside the picture lay a black armband, with the letters F.F.F. stitched on in white felt. Beside the armband lay an incongruous pair of brass knuckles. Next to the brass knuckles was a small velvet jeweler’s box, intended to contain a valuable ring. But in this box, resting in the ring-slot, was a misshapen blob of metal.

  Dimly I realized that my best chance of escaping from the room lay somewhere in the riddle of that makeshift shrine to Grinnel and the F.F.F. I moved a numbed step closer to the bookcase, by an effort of will keeping my eyes away from the man now shuffling to stand on my left, close to me. I could smell the reek of liquor and hear the harsh rattle of his breathing.

  Now we both faced the bookcase. I found myself staring at the blob of metal in the velvet box. I was about to ask, when I realized the blob was a spent bullet. I looked at the newspaper clipping, with its three-column headline.

  ASSASSIN SHOOTS AT

  RIGHT WINGER, MISSES

  The story was datelined San Diego and was almost exactly two years old. Although I was unable to concentrate on the specific words, I skimmed the sense of it. Someone had attempted to assassinate Grinnel, but had failed. Ferguson, with only brass knuckles to defend himself, had rushed the man, disarmed him, and almost killed him in the minute or so it took police to make their way through the crowd.

  I remembered the story. In the city room at San Jose, the sentiment had been all with the assassin.

  I sensed Ferguson’s greed for my approval. And I felt myself becoming calmer, even though the sensation of his presence so close was almost nauseating. Yet I forced myself to make a show of reading the three framed letters, all written under the Forward For Freedom letterhead, all addressed to Ferguson, and all signed by Robert Grinnel. The first letter was a commendation for saving Grinnel’s life. The second letter announced Ferguson’s appointment as San Francisco director of the F.F.F.

  The third was little more than a note. It stated that Grinnel’s son was coming to Bransten as a student, and had expressed an interest in associating himself with the local chapter of the F.F.F. Grinnel hoped Ferguson would show the boy every courtesy, but without undue favoritism or privilege. For a long moment I stared at the third letter. I remember thinking that it was all neatly displayed before me, everything I needed.

  Then I stepped back. Suddenly the exhibit seemed as pitiful as it was terrible. Upon the narrow bookshelf and the surrounding walls were displayed the entire substance and purpose of a human life; what remained within the man was little more than vicious, drunken delusions.

  I pointed to the bullet, then turned to face him, at the same time backing a step away.

  “Mr. Grinnel gave you that?” I asked.

  He nodded.

  “You saved his life.”

  He drew himself up in a grotesque burlesque of pride and manhood. He pointed to the first letter. “It says so right there.” He tapped at the frame, jolting it awry. Then, with something of the small boy’s entreaty: “I have a cold, you know. A bad cold. It’s better now, but yesterday it was bad. And today, even—even today, it was bad. And that’s the reason—I mean—” He paused, frowning and confused. Then with a ponderous, transparent guile, he said, “I went out this morning after breakfast and bought myself a bottle. I didn’t go to work today, see. So I—I—bought a bottle. But it’s the first one I bought in—in—” He waved a vague hand. Then, focusing on me narrowly, his eyes became suddenly hostile and suspicious. “You won’t tell Mr. Grinnel, will you?” He took a step forward. “I can’t let you do that, you know. He—they—he don’t know that I—I—”

  I backed away, yet I tried to contain my fear. I felt my only chance with him was to assert some kind of authority, constantly keeping the initiative, and keeping him off balance.

  I turned back to the bookshelf, pointing to the picture of himself and Bobby.

  “Have you been able to work with Bobby, and make him a little more manly?”

  He threw out his chest in another burlesque of boastful pride.

  “Bobby and me, we—we get along all right. He’s still got a lot to learn, but he’s all right. Don’t worry about Bobby. He’s—he’s all right.”

  “Do you see much of Bobby?”

  “Sure I do. Once or twice a week I see him. Maybe more. I see him at meetings and—and other times.” Then his eyes became suspicious. “Why?” There was an ominous stillness in the question.

  Realizing that I must peremptorily ignore the question, yet almost speechless with apprehension, I gestured to the picture, cleared my throat, and finally said, “I was just curious, that’s all. You look so—so friendly.”

  Turning from his shrine to the Grinnels, and now hearing my own words come easier, I said, “How many members do you have in the local chapter?” I tried to snap out the question in the voice of command, hopefully to sharpen the illusion of myself as a Grinnel courier.

  His small, dull eyes continued to stare at me with a kind of befuddled menace. I knew I had to jolt him out of his suspicions, before they became solidified in his mind, however dimly. I’d made a mistake asking about Bobby. I had to make him forget it.

  “Is your chapter active?” I pressed.

  Now he was frowning; I wasn’t sure whether it was the questions that bothered him, or his gathering suspicions. I glanced at the door. Then I remembered the lock and the chain.

  When my eyes returned to Ferguson, I saw that his expression had momentarily cleared of suspicion. He shrugged loosely.

  “It depends on the—you know—the occasion. What we’re doing. Sometimes, for meetings, we get something like twenty, or so. But for rallies, or protest marches, or picketing, we get—” He paused. Incredibly, it seemed as if the effect of the alcohol was lessened when he spoke of the F.F.F. He was becoming more decisive. “We get two hundred, or more, for the events. Against the United Nations, you know, we turned out two hundred and ten for picketing.”

  I nodded, feigning approval. I turned toward a frayed, lumpy armchair, removing a soiled shirt from the arm before I sat down. I gestured for him to sit opposite me in a straight-backed chair. It worked. Obviously a little resentful, yet dutifully, he slumped obediently into the chair.

  He was frowning at me, trying to focus, concerned, perhaps, that he was about to be put through his F.F.F catechism by a member of the inner group. As I looked at him, I tried to imagine how a man so physically repulsive and apparently so stupid could rise to leadership in any political group, no matter how far out on the fringes. Himmler had been a chicken farmer, and Hess a psychopath, but so was Hitler. Grinnel was a different matter.

  I saw Ferguson beginning to grow restive, moving his eyes from side to side and licking at his lips. I guessed the reason.

  “If you want to have another drink,” I said, “go ahead. I’m not here officially—not really.”

  His first reaction was a laborious suspicion, as if I were trying to trap him into a transgression. But, quickly, his need for liquor rationalized his fears. He rose unsteadily to his feet.

  “Can I—would you like one?” he asked thickly. “It’s bourbon.”

  “All right,” I answered. “Thanks. With water, please,” I added, keeping my voice clipped in command.

  I watched him as he went into the small, squalid kitchen. I saw him take down the bottle and pour the two drinks. The bottle was almost empty. He’d had almost a fifth of bourbon du
ring the day, probably without anything to eat.

  As he came back, holding the two glasses with exaggerated care, I tried to imagine him sober, dressed in a business suit, presiding at a chapter meeting of the F.F.F. I watched him slump in the opposite chair and begin drinking the strong highball in thirsty gulps. He was paying no attention to me. He’d been without a drink for perhaps ten minutes. Nothing else mattered.

  As I sipped at my own drink, watching him, I realized that I was no longer frightened of him. He’d sat in the chair, as I’d told him to do, and he’d mixed a drink, as I told him to do. There was no reason why he shouldn’t begin talking, as I’d tell him to do. The problem was where to begin. I decided that, first, I must reinforce my role as a courier and his superior.

  “Do you conduct all the chapter meetings yourself?” I asked abruptly.

  He looked up from the drink as if he’d forgotten my presence. He wiped at his chin. “What?”

  “I said, do you conduct all the meetings yourself?”

  His eyes became fixed and laboriously calculating upon mine, as if he were trying to remember whether I was his, friend or his enemy. Finally he began to shake his head.

  “My name’s only on the door,” he said, “and Mr. Pate’s. But we’re only there for the work. The others, the dabblers, they’re the ones that run the meetings, and talk, and have parties, and write the pamphlets. But when it comes to the real work, that’s when they need me. They just talk. I do the real work.”

  “What real work is that?”

  He gave me a long look of exaggerated appraisal, and then abruptly returned to his drink.

  “The real work, that’s all. The picketing and the—the real work.”

  “Did you get the job as director because of that?” I pointed to the bookcase, with its blob of misshapen metal.

  He nodded. “Mr. Grinnel, he never forgets something like that. I saved his life. If it hadn’t been for me, there would’ve been a second shot. But I—I—” He gulped at the drink, now almost drained. My own drink tasted harsh and nauseous.

  “How’d you get into the F.F.F.?” I asked.

  He finished the drink and mumbled, “It’s the only thing that ever meant anything to me, that’s how.”

  “How long’ve you been a member?”

  He frowned, staring down at his empty glass. Then his body seemed to slowly slacken, as if the last drink had drained his strength. I wondered whether he’d pass out before I got the information I’d come for, or whether I’d ever get it. Watching him slumping almost comatose in his angular, uncomfortable chair, it seemed incredible that I’d been so fearful of him minutes before.

  I decided to go back to the attempted assassination, hoping for a reaction.

  “How did you happen to get the assassin?” I asked. “Were you in the crowd when it happened?”

  For a long moment I didn’t think he’d heard me; he sat as before, perfectly inert. Just as I was about to put the question to him again, he began to mumble. “In my whole life, you know, Mr. Grinnel was—is—the only person that’s ever meant anything to me. I’m forty-five years old, you know—forty-five.” He began to shake his head sadly. Watching him, I wished he were sitting in a more comfortable chair to ease his flow of words. But I didn’t dare disturb him. He was slipping into a drunk’s maudlin meanderings. I knew I could only wait silently, and hope. His empty glass slipped from his fingers and rolled across the threadbare carpet. For a moment I thought he was asleep. His head was sunk deep on his chest; I couldn’t see his eyes.

  Then, suddenly, he was speaking again. “My father was an evangelist, you know. Did I ever tell you that?”

  Again, I dared not answer. I hardly dared to disturb the air with my own breathing. Who did he think I was? What should I do? How should I—?

  Abruptly, he said:

  “He was an evangelist, and my mother was a drunk. She—she drank. My old man, he spent all his time hollering at my mother, telling her how worthless she was, and how worthless me and my brother was, because she was so—so worthless. Then she died. I was only twelve, you know, when she died. But my father, he—he—” the drunken head began to slowly, dumbly shake—“he was an evangelist, you know, a crumby, crooked evangelist. He—he—” A sob burbled suddenly, a single, racking sob.

  “I know,” I said softly. “I know.”

  The head jerked up. Wide, surprised eyes stared at me.

  “How d’you know?” Suddenly belligerent, he struggled to sit upright in the chair. “How the hell do you know anything about it? Who are you, anyhow? Who the hell’re—?”

  “Mr. Grinnel told me,” I said quietly, surprised to hear my own voice steady. “That’s how I know.”

  For a long moment his small, hostile eyes stared at me. Then his gaze wandered off, uncertainly. He nodded. “Tha—Tha’s right. You—you—” He began mumbling incoherently.

  “You were talking about your father,” I prompted.

  “My father.” He pronounced the word as if it were an obscenity. “He started drinking almost right after my mother died. Almost a week after. He spent all his life hollering at her for drinking. But then he—he—” The head with its coarse, matted black hair began to shake with hopeless monotony.

  “Your brother,” I said softly. “What about your brother?”

  “He’s two years older than me. And he hates me, just like my old man did. My brother, he—he beat me up at least once a week. And the older we got, the worse it got. Finally I hit him with a big stick.” Briefly he raised his head to make sure I’d heard: “I mean, a big stick. I was thirteen, and he was fifteen. And when I hit him with that stick, I heard the bone break. His arm, it broke right in two.” He was holding his arm up in front of his face. He seemed to be examining the arm, as if it were an interesting relic, separate from himself.

  “And it broke right in two,” he repeated, almost as if awed by the memory. “And then—then—” The voice trailed off.

  “And then what? What happened then?”

  “And then they sent Jimmy to the hospital. And when my old man came home from the hospital, he beat me up. The next day was Sunday, though. And I had a black eye when I took up the collection, so he never hit me again. At least, not in the face. I—” Suddenly he lurched to his feet and walked wavering into the kitchen. Almost frantically he found another glass. Then he drained the bottle into the glass, filling it a third full, without water. He staggered back into the living room, but now sat on the edge of the bed. He sat with legs spread wide and his head hanging down, staring at the glass of amber fluid he held in his large, clumsy hands. I rose and took the straight-backed chair over to the bed, sitting to face him.

  Without my prompting now, he began again to speak, as if compelled to tell it all.

  “My father and me, we lived in a shack—really a shack. My brother, he’d gone, but it wasn’t any better, because there wasn’t any money, none at all. My old man, he’d scream about salvation and hellfire up there in his pulpit, and I’d smile at the bastards with that goddam collection plate in my hand, but nothing helped. So finally, my old man died. We’d just been kicked out of a town and were bumming to another one, because by that time we had to keep moving, looking for the money. But my old man, he just laid down beside the road, and he died.” Ferguson drained the glass with a single thirsty gulp. The glass slid from his fingers onto the floor. His hands came up to support his sagging head.

  “What’d you do next?” I asked.

  “I joined the army. First I bummed and stole. Once I even robbed a guy and hit him with a club, just like I hit Jimmy. But then I joined the army.” Almost imperceptibly, his body seemed to straighten, as if recalling some ancient discipline or some small vestige of pride.

  “I was in the army right straight through, you know. Twelve years. I went all the way through Africa and the E.T.O., and I never once got hit. I killed at least fourteen krauts that I know of, and one with a trench knife and one with my bare hands. And I—”

&nb
sp; “Your bare hands?”

  His head nodded, still sunk in his hands. “I was an instructor, you know. I was a sergeant for a while. In unarmed conflict. Judo.” He pronounced the last words very distinctly, as if they summarized his life’s achievement. All his life, I thought, he’d been hitting people with the same club he’d used to break his brother’s arm.

  and one with my bare hands …

  I looked at him, deciding that I’d keep him talking about himself until he finally lay down on the bed in a drunken sleep. Then I’d get out and call Larsen. In the meantime, strangely, I wasn’t concerned for myself. It’s difficult to fear a man you pity.

  “And after the army,” I said. “What happened then?”

  “Nothing, that’s what happened. Not until I met Mr. Grinnel, and I joined the F.F.F. That was just four years ago, you know. But I—I worked hard, and I—” He sighed and suddenly toppled sideways, his torso upon the bed and his legs dangling awkwardly over the edge. But his eyes were open, watching me.

  “After I saved his life,” Ferguson said, his speech thickening, “everything turned out all right for me. Mr. Grinnel, he got me my daytime job with someone that believes in the movement. And I get paid a hundred fifty dollars a month besides, from the F.F.F. So I—I—” He yawned. His eyes began to close. I carefully watched him, determined not to move from the chair until at least ten minutes had passed beyond the time he seemed surely asleep. I glanced down at my watch. It was almost seven o’clock.

  When I looked up, his eyes were open. He was staring at me intently.

  “Who’re you again?” he asked indistinctly.

  “Drake. Stephen Drake.”

  Looking into those eyes, my fear returned with a sickening rush. I watched his body stir and tighten; I saw the fingers of one hand begin to slowly contract. Murderer’s hands.