The Black Lizard Big Book of Black Mask Stories (Vintage Crime/Black Lizard Original)

by Unknown

  I said, “Good-by, Rhea, my darling. You will never be really gone from me, never really gone. We will always be together in the keeping of our secrets—but good-by, good-by forever, my sweet. We will miss you so much, so terribly much—both of us.”

  As I watched them rolling your casket into the great furnace, Rhea, I heard sobbing from your friends and neighbors who were present, and I saw tears glimmering in the eyes of our lovely daughter.

  Bitter with deepest grief, our Darlene stood at my side, saying her own silent farewells to you, her mother. I could hardly look away from her and back to your coffin because Darlene, only eighteen, looked so very much like you, Rhea. It was almost as if you were not gone at all.

  You would have been pleased to see how many attended your funeral, Rhea. Among the crowd in the chapel was one mourner you would have noticed especially. A man. A young man, very handsome—much handsomer than I ever was, Rhea, and very different also in his debonair manner, expensive suit and man-about-town reputation. Can you guess who? Of course, Bruce Dallas.

  He was there to see the final flames consume you. I’m sure that most of the other mourners wondered why Bruce Dallas should turn up at the funeral services for Mrs. John Long. Most of them hadn’t even heard that the late Mrs. Long knew him. They seemed so unlike each other—he the smooth-operator type; and she, apparently, just a homebody … the quiet little wife of a salesman of religious books.

  He was looking a little worried, Rhea, and a little surly, too, almost as if it was not his own choice to be present. And he was not alone. The man with him was named Jennings, a police detective. Possibly Bruce Dallas had been forced by Jennings to attend the funeral services of Mrs. Long—but no one knew for what reason.

  No one but me, Rhea.

  The attendants gently closed the massive double door of the furnace—they shut you in, Rhea, while an organ played and a soloist softly sang your favorite hymn.

  Then we began to hear, behind the melody, the rumble of the growing fires inside the thick refractory walls. You attained your long-cherished dream of burning.

  For the mourners, and for Darlene and me as well, the services soon ended, although the muted thunder of the consuming flames continued to fulfill your wish.

  Bruce Dallas, closely accompanied by the detective named Jennings, was one of the earliest to leave. As the others quietly dispersed, I could tell from their faces that they felt I had given you a very nice funeral—one done in a proper manner, showing the grief of a bereaved husband over the untimely loss of the wife he had loved.

  I could also tell from their faces, Rhea—to my great gratification—that not one of these mourning friends and neighbors had the faintest suspicion that I had murdered you.

  First inside the chapel, then outside on the marble steps, I went through the wearing process of saying good-by to all the mourners and thanking them for their friendly solicitude. Not dreaming that I had actually killed you, they saw me as the same upright and thoroughly proper man they had always known—a fairly successful salesman of religious books who had suffered a bitter loss and been left the lonely responsibility of his pretty eighteen-year-old daughter.

  While I was still shaking hands with my well-wishing friends, Darlene came to me.

  “The Fraziers want to drive me back home with them,” she said, naming our nearest neighbors. “You won’t mind, will you, Johnny?”

  It startled me, Rhea. Not the fact that Darlene preferred to end this ordeal as soon as possible. The poor child was taking your death very hard. No, I was struck a small blow of dismay because Darlene had never before called me “Johnny.” This was the first time she had ever called me anything other than Father.

  This wasn’t, of course, the place to rebuke her, particularly because she was so tired by the strain that she seemed hardly aware of what she was doing.

  Somehow this grievous experience made her resemble you even more than before, Rhea. Her lovely oval face was pale, with vivid red touches on her cheeks; her full lips were parted a little, as if with an indefinable hunger, and there was a mist in her blue eyes—the same mist I used to see deep in your own lovely eyes, my sweet.

  Only eighteen! You were so young-looking when you died that you might have passed for your daughter’s older sister, and on this unforgettably sad occasion Darlene seemed more like you than ever before.

  “You won’t mind, will you, Johnny?” she had said.

  Frowning slightly, I answered, “Of course, Darlene, run right along. I’ll join you in a few minutes.”

  She went down to the Fraziers’ car. When I had nodded my farewell to the last mourner, I turned back into the chapel. It was deserted now, except for the crematory director, who was prowling among the chairs looking for lost articles.

  He discreetly tip-toed out, leaving me entirely alone. There was no hush in this chapel, no reverent silence. The dull roar of the hellish flames continued inside the great furnace.

  I had come to say a final farewell to you, Rhea. A moment that might bring tears easily to another new widower’s eyes, but it’s possible that, instead, there was a hard shine in mine as I said to you silently, “Again good-by, Rhea, my good and faithful wife—as people think. You’re finally being in fact the bright flame you always yearned to be. It will help you to keep our secrets together, my lovely. Good-by again. And may you go on burning longer than you expected—in hell.”

  Night was settling when I drove back along Rendezvous Road. I don’t need to remind you, Rhea, darling, how that road looks when you’re driving it after dark with something better and cozier than just your thoughts for company.

  Turning then toward our little home on Laurel Street, I found myself retracing the same course that I had taken every day for years when coming home from the office. In this same car, alone like this, I came exactly this same way every day, with expectations far different from today’s. In pleasantest anticipation, I used to know just what would happen.

  I would leave the car in the garage and turn to the kitchen door for your greeting. You had your graceful, playful little way of popping out and piping, “Welcome home, Johnny!” Fresh and crisp in a bright flowered dress, you would throw your arms around my neck and kiss me full on the lips. You always seemed as happy to have me back home as if I’d been away for weeks rather than hours. Every time it was the same delightful routine. But today?

  I was driving home in exactly the same way as always before, Rhea, but today you wouldn’t greet me at the kitchen door with your lively, laughing embrace. Today you were back there in the crematory, a bright, hot flame in the furnace.

  I missed you sorely as I turned the car into the driveway, Rhea. I almost wished I hadn’t killed you—but only almost. You had destroyed all the goodness in yourself until only ugly sin was left. You deserved all the punishment I gave you, my little evil one. But before then my homecomings had been so pleasant—I felt a pang, thinking there would never be any more of them.

  No more glad little greeting of “Welcome home, Johnny!” Your arms no more around me, your lips no more on mine. No more Rhea at all.

  It had been such a trying day, seeing you cremated, my darling—I was utterly unprepared for the jolt that hit me next.

  As I reached for the knob of the kitchen door it sprang open. Your voice—your voice, Rhea!—sang out in your old gay way, “Welcome home, Johnny!” Even more unnerving, Rhea, you actually appeared there before me—Rhea herself, alive, her eyes sparkling, her lips a happy smile. Rhea wearing her favorite flowered frock! You, Rhea!

  Impossible? Yes, because you were back there in the crematory furnace, being devoured in the storming flames. Yet you were here with me, crying out my name. Calling to me as you always did.

  A man doesn’t easily admit having been unmanly, Rhea. It isn’t easy for me to confess I fainted on the spot. But I did. Already overstrained, now suddenly overwhelmed, I simply dropped into a pit of blackness.

  When the blackness swirled slowly out of my mind, I felt
someone tugging at me. It was Darlene, asking breathlessly, “What happened, are you all right?” She helped me up to my knees, then into a chair at the kitchen table. I was still dizzy.

  All I could say, when I found my voice, was, “Yes, what—what did happen, Darlene? Did you see?”

  Darlene said, “I was in the living room, just sitting there, so tired, waiting for you to come home. Just as you came in the back door, you let out a hoarse kind of cry. I heard you fall. When I got to you, you were down on the floor in a dead faint. That’s all I can tell you about it.”

  I looked hard at her—at her pretty face so much like yours, Rhea. She was still pale, except for the vivid spots on her cheeks. She was wearing the same black dress she had worn at the funeral—a simple dress snugly fitting a perfect figure. A figure the exact image of yours, Rhea.

  I gazed at Darlene’s image in the mirror, chilled through, and asked softly, “Darlene—are you sure that what you told me is what actually happened?”

  She smiled a little and answered, “Aren’t you sure? You couldn’t be fooled by a thing like that—could you, Johnny?”

  CHAPTER TWO

  SHE-DEVIL’S DAUGHTER

  After that I began watching Darlene closely, Rhea—with fear in my heart—the dread that had haunted me for years, that our lovely daughter had inherited the evilness of her mother.

  You see, Rhea, I could not let myself be deluded into believing that you had supernaturally paid me a visit after death. I knew that could not be so. I was quite confident that you were destroyed as you deserved. Nor could I be such a fool as to imagine your ghost had begun to haunt me. So it came down to this, Rhea—either my senses had tricked me overwhelmingly—or I had reason to watch Darlene.

  Watch Darlene! Isn’t it odd, Rhea? Do you remember the time, right after we met, when it was my task to keep a watchful eye on you?

  I find myself smiling at this romantic little reminiscence, Rhea. Our meeting was quite a romantic incident, you know. A meeting between a young book peddler and a young girl who was already losing her prettiness and her health, and her job as well, on a merry-go-round of sin—a kid skidding downhill fast. As you confessed yourself afterward, Rhea, you would have soon wound up in the gutter or in the river if I hadn’t saved you from yourself.

  That day I had gone down to the old Bijou Theatre. A squalid den, that place. A burlesque showhouse—catering to men’s worst instincts.

  When I went near that sinkhole, however, it was for reasons of business and high principle. Oddly, the burlesque people, especially the strippers, whom I usually saw in their dressing rooms between numbers, were ready buyers of the religious books I sold. Perhaps they never read the books but only bought them to salve their aching consciences. I liked to feel, though, that by going down into that vile valley of iniquity and leaving The Word among those misled people, I was doing good missionary work.

  Just as I lifted my hand to the stage door, it opened. A girl was pushed out bodily, actually into my arms. Instinctively I held you. That was the first time we saw each other, Rhea—and your first glimpse of sweet salvation.

  You huddled close to me, wearing almost nothing. You clung to me, Rhea, for the simple reason that you were almost unable to stand by yourself. You gave me a taunting smile. You were intoxicated—really staggering drunk. You had come to the theatre in that condition and had tried to get ready for the show, along with the other bare-skinned chorus “ponies.” The stage manager, fed up because you had done it too often before, had chosen this moment to fire you out—straight into my arms.

  Snarling after you, the stage manager said, “Don’t bother holding her up, Reverend.” They liked to call me that—“Reverend”—because I took my books seriously, and I really considered it a compliment. “Let the no-good little tramp fall on her face right now. It’ll save time. She’s hell-bent on wheels, and the sooner she hits bottom the less trouble she’ll cause.”

  You clung to me, your lovely young body starting to shake with sobs, your eyes full of teary pleading. In them I saw goodness, Rhea. Reeking with liquor though you were, I told myself there was womanly sweetness in you waiting only to be brought out. I knew then, at that moment, that I must do everything in my power to save you from the evil into which you had fallen.

  So romantic, wasn’t it, Rhea, the way I hustled you into my car, then brought you your clothes from that filthy dressing room, and how I stood on the sidewalk to guard you from ogling passersby while you dressed yourself as best you could? Then I brought you hot, black coffee and gently forced you to drink it. Next came a decent meal in a good restaurant.

  You were actually past the verge of alcoholism already, Rhea. Your pretty face was already developing haggard lines and sags—but in you I saw goodness. At least I believed I saw it and knew I must devote myself wholeheartedly to your salvation. And best of all you really wanted to be saved.

  “I’ve been a crazy-fool kid,” you confessed. “All because of a guy I fell for too hard. Until I met him, I’d never taken a single drink. He taught me to like the stuff, and then I went overboard trying to keep up with him.”

  “That man should be jailed, except that jail is too good for him,” I said. “What’s his name?”

  “Dallas,” you said. “Bruce Dallas. There’s no use trying to punish him, because I went along with him willingly enough. Anyway, he’s left town now—went to Chicago where the pickings are richer. The worst part is the tough time I’m having, trying to get over him. Maybe I never will. I’ve drunk more and more just trying to get him burned out of me. I hate it—what drink does to me. Please tell me how I can quit.”

  “I’ll do better than tell you,” I said, putting my hand over yours. “I’m going to be right there at your side, leading you every step of the way along the path of rightness. That’s the goal for both of us—to make you the good woman you can be.”

  But it was not easy, Rhea, was it? We both struggled—you against the yearnings of temptation, I to give you the strength you needed to resist. There were little slips and relapses, but we both knew the long effort would win out. That was when I watched you, Rhea, to make sure you wouldn’t weaken, even to the small extent of sneaking a single drink—because we both knew that that one taste, if you ever took it, would send you skidding straight toward hell again.

  But we did it. My moral strength kept you good. Your health returned. You became sweeter and lovelier than ever. Indeed, Rhea, you were an angel on earth to me.

  Our happiness was complete when we were married. When we moved into our little home on Laurel Street—the same home where you were later to meet such a sudden and tragic death—all the evil in your past was left far behind you. None of our friends and neighbors there dreamed you had once been an all-but-lost soul—a little alcoholic burlesque girl. You and I almost forgot it too in our simple blissfulness—you were so beautifully changed and purified, a model wife and mother.

  It even made no difference at all, to judge from your visible reactions, when we later heard the news that Bruce Dallas had come back to this city, richer, smoother, an even hotter operator than before.

  When Darlene was born, in the first year of our marriage, I had stopped watching over you for a possible relapse into sin. It had become unnecessary, your salvation was so complete. Now and then I would feel a twinge of fear that the seeds of evil might be lying dormant in you, and might come out in some moment of stress.

  At times too I wondered whether certain tendencies to evil had passed from you to your daughter.…

  Alone in our living room, I was casting about in my mind for an explanation of that incident at the kitchen door. Darlene had gone upstairs. I became aware of busy noises as she moved about. Puzzled, I went up the stairs and found her, not in her own room, Rhea, but in yours.

  Darlene had gone into your room, Rhea, directly next to my own, with the connecting bath in between. She had seated herself at your vanity mirror and was quietly applying lacquer to her fingernails. She paused to g
aze at me—looking so much like you, Rhea, that I felt my nerves squirming in my flesh.

  “What are you doing, Darlene? Have you forgotten I’ve never permitted you to use paint on your nails? You’re still too young.”

  She gazed at me with another of those new, quiet smiles. She had never smiled just that way before. Something in Darlene was changing. She seemed more knowing; she had grown a little bolder. There was an audacity, almost a challenging shine in her eyes as she answered:

  “Perhaps you haven’t noticed, Johnny, how much older I really am now.”

  She went on smiling and quietly applying the enamel to her nails, taking it from the bottle left on your vanity. She left me feeling strangely helpless. What could I do about it, Rhea? Darlene was quietly defying me and really there was no way I could force her to stop.

  Moreover it was true, as she had just reminded me, that she was, somehow, suddenly grown up—too grown up.

  “I really am older than you seem to realize, Johnny,” she said softly.

  In a shaken but stern attempt at discipline I retorted, “That’s another thing, Darlene—your calling me Johnny. You never did that before this afternoon. Please don’t do it any more. It doesn’t show the proper respectful attitude which a daughter should feel toward her father.”

  “But I liked so much the way Mother called you Johnny,” Darlene answered. “I thought that if I called you Johnny in the same nice way, it would help to make it seem that Mother isn’t really gone.”

  “But she is gone,” I said flatly. “She’s gone never to come back. I will always love the memory of her, Darlene, and of course you are very dear to me, too, but in quite a different way.… That blue dress you have on is another thing—it’s one of your mother’s. You shouldn’t have touched it, at least not so soon. And what do you mean by coming into her room like this? It should be kept closed out of proper respect—”