Square in the Middle

by William Campbell Gault

  I took a warm shower and tried to drive them all from my mind. I drove them all away except Carol and the kids.

  I stopped crying before I fell asleep.

  eight

  Jackie’s freckled face was in my dreams, and Lynn’s pensive smile and Carol’s glare. And Miss Padbury screamed at me, calling me a usurer and an adulterer. Rita danced, with fans, and Janis Paige cried and Max hit a ball that sailed dead for the pin, all the way.

  And then I saw the Ford station wagon go over the edge of the cliff and I heard Sue shrieking and I wakened to a quiet room. I was wringing wet with perspiration and my heart thumped. My stomach growled and nausea moved through me.

  I took another shower and drank some water. I washed out my pyjamas and hung them on a towel rack to dry. From the next room came quiet voices and then a giggle.

  Jim Gulliver of Gulliver-Schuman; what in God’s name was I doing here?

  I put on a T-shirt and a clean pair of shorts and crawled back between the blankets, seeking warmth. I thought of Carol and desire crept into me, and I tried not to think of Carol. I thought of Sue and I thought of Lynn.

  Why should I pair them? Why should I think of them together?

  Well, young Jim was a self-reliant kind of kid. Sue was more vulnerable. Sue was like Lynn in that. I thought of Sue sitting around a bar, a grown-up Sue being picked up in a bar, and forced my mind back to Carol.

  Carol was no rabbit. Carol read a lot and was active in the P.T.A. and was a den mother and had worked like a demon in the Palisades for Eisenhower.

  And behind a closed bedroom door, Carol was all wife and all woman. I had no cause for complaint on that score. Well, what the hell was I doing here, then?

  Just because a local Audrey Hepburn stared pensively into a martini, Jim Gulliver of Gulliver-Schuman had nightmares in a motel. What a 22-carat square was Jim Gulliver of Gulliver-Schuman.

  If I got out of this with my skin, I’d take Max’s advice. I’d spend a hundred dollars next time the big urge hit me.

  Slow up, I told myself. Calm down. Lynn is no tramp, and you know it. Don’t be so stinking superior, Forty Percent Gulliver.

  So, Lynn was no tramp. That still didn’t make her problems mine. My trouble is that I can’t be a casual friend; I have to be all friend or nothing. Rita had called it right, I was a bleeder.

  A bleeder in the loan business didn’t make sense, not at our interest level. And it was only rationalizing to argue that if we didn’t do it to the suckers, the big boys in Beverly Hills would do it to them — and worse. That’s one of Max’s arguments.

  If I didn’t like the loan business, I should get out of it. If I didn’t like California, Iowa was waiting. And if I didn’t like marriage, divorce was the solution. To hell with this introspection; I had better decide what I wanted and work for that.

  Sleep came again, and this time there were no dreams.

  I took my time in the morning, shaving slowly and carefully, twice over. At the Boston Beanery, I had ham and eggs and toast, and I ate them slowly while I read the Times. I had two cups of coffee, being very deliberate about it all.

  According to the Times, there were no new developments in the death of Tom Edlinger. My love-nest alibi wasn’t mentioned in the Times; my name never came into today’s coverage of the story.

  There might have been some “new and sensational developments” in the Star; I didn’t intend to spend the dime to find out.

  Miss Padbury tried to make her welcoming smile warm, this morning, but it looked strained. She said quietly, “You’ve lost that Colonel Dean deal, I understand?”

  I nodded. “Is Mr. Schuman here yet?”

  “No, Mr. Gulliver. Shall I send him in when he comes?”

  “If you will, please.” I went into my office.

  Very routine, all this, and faintly stuffy. But I was trying to get back to Jim Gulliver of Gulliver-Schuman, a familiar area where I could work with some hope of success.

  Max came in about twenty minutes later. He was strangely subdued.

  “Something’s wrong?” I asked him.

  “I phoned you last night, Jim. Carol told me you’d left the house.”

  “That’s right.”

  “Does that mean she didn’t believe your story?”

  I shook my head.

  Max sighed. “It means you had to be noble and truthful.”

  “I just couldn’t lie to her, Max. How are things going in the Dean war?”

  Max shrugged. “I can’t fight him directly, Jim. If we bought an option on that property, he could see to it that Devon’s lost their interest in it. But we’ll make a dollar, just the same.”

  “How?”

  “By buying up the surrounding property, including those two small houses on the corner. That’s going to be very valuable, when Devon’s decide to build there.”

  I managed a smile. “You’re sharp, Max. I’m glad I’m working with you instead of against you.”

  “Oh, to hell with that,” he said impatiently. “What about Carol? That’s our big problem, Jim.”

  “I tried,” I said. “I didn’t make it.”

  “Damn it, you didn’t try. You didn’t even lie. Why not, Jim? I’ve heard you lie before; wasn’t this worth lying for?”

  “That’s what Carol asked,” I said.

  “Of course she did. Women just don’t want to know about those things, man. They know what we are. How can they live with us without knowing? But they don’t want it worded, so they can’t dream around it. They only want to face the small realities, Jim.”

  “One infidelity in twelve years of marriage is a small reality,” I argued.

  “No, Jim. No, no, no. One admitted infidelity brings up the ghosts of a million not admitted. God, man, her whole life depends on your loyalty. She’s built her home around that.”

  I smiled at him. “Max, you’re all worked up. You haven’t called me ‘baby’ once. Where’s your light touch?”

  He looked at me coldly. “About a family, about a wife like Carol, I can get worked up. And you should be able to, too, Jim.”

  “Not unless it would help,” I said, “and with Carol, it won’t help.”

  “I’ll have Adele phone her,” he suggested. “Adele will sell her on you. Adele thinks you’re very special.”

  “If Adele wants to, of course, Max. But what happened is really between Carol and me.”

  For a moment, his face stiffened. Then he said quietly, “Adele wants to. I’ve got to get back to the Dean war, Jim.” He went to the doorway and paused. “And don’t hang around here unless you think it’s important. Business is slow, anyway.”

  I had planned to stay in the office, insulated by tedium, steadied by the familiar. But Max was right; with business as slow as it was, there was no point in my staying here.

  Just as I was on the point of leaving, Miss Padbury came in to tell me a Mr. Wallace wanted an interview.

  “Max will take him,” I said.

  She frowned. “Mr. Wallace says he is a particular friend of yours, Mr. Gulliver. He specifically requested you.”

  “A friend …? I don’t know any Mr. Wallace. Well, send him in.”

  I knew him when he came through the door. It was the trade-paper editor who had been at the party.

  He was a man in his forties, trim and fairly tall and exuding a false air of prosperity.

  What he wanted was a second mortgage on his home. It was carrying a fifteen-thousand first trust deed. It was only a two and den with a bath and a half; he was overmortgaged already.

  “Just a little quick money, Jim,” he said genially. “I’m prepared to bleed for it.”

  “How much quick money, George?”

  “Five thousand,” he said.

  “I’d have to see the house.” I said. “You see, George, we don’t own the money we lend. We get it from other agencies and individuals. On a risk this — well, apparently speculative, we’d have to find a lender who likes this kind of loan. That requires s
ome work on our part, convincing a man like that, and we judge our commission accordingly.”

  His geniality faded only a little. “Hey, Jim, this isn’t some refugee from the Corn Belt you’re talking to. This is old George Wallace, your drinking companion. You don’t have to butter it up for me; I know how you boys operate.”

  I waited a few seconds before saying, “I’m surprised you came to me, George, if you knew that.”

  “You’re no worse than the rest of them, and better than most of them,” he said. “And then I had a hope that maybe, me being a friend … Well, business is business, I suppose, isn’t it?”

  “Business is business, George,” I agreed. And said to myself, I should know the names of my friends.

  He shrugged. “All right, Jim. Will you look at the place this morning? It’s an Edlinger-designed house.”

  I promised I would, and he left. Another butterfly with problems. All the butterflies seemed to have problems. I went to the outer office and told Miss Padbury to get a credit report on George Wallace.

  She told me, “Your attorney phoned. He wants you to call him back.”

  Earl’s voice was hoarse and he sounded like he had the sniffles. “Carol wants a divorce, Jim. She phoned me an hour ago.”

  I sat there for a moment without speaking. Shock was the first reaction, and then an unreasonable indignation. I waited for it to pass.

  Earl said, “Jim, are you still there …?”

  “I’m here, Earl. It’s — I can’t …”

  He coughed. “If I try to talk her out of it, she’ll just go to another attorney. I could stall her, though, Jim. I could take my time about starting the action. That would give you time to bring her to her senses.”

  “That seems — to be about the best idea, Earl.”

  “All right, then. That end I can handle. But Jim, you’d better handle your end with more sense than you showed yesterday. Carol tells me you admitted the infidelity. Why, Jim?”

  “Damn it,” I said, “everybody asks me that. What’s so despicable about the truth?”

  “There are times, Jim, when to lie is the charitable, the decent thing to do. Yesterday was one of those times.”

  I said evenly, “I never learned to lie about the big things, Earl. Perhaps I should have gone to law school.”

  Silence from the other end.

  I said, “All right, Earl. I’m sorry. I apologize.”

  “Okay, Jim. I’ll stall her. And you try to talk to her. And keep your damned nose clean.”

  “Right, Earl. Thanks.” I hung up.

  Half an hour ago, I’d been ready to leave the office, and I was ready again now. I stood up.

  And Miss Padbury came to the doorway and said, “Mr. Chopko is here, Mr. Gulliver.”

  “Send him in,” I said, and I sat down again.

  He came in and closed the door behind him. He stood there a moment, looking worried.

  “Well …?” I asked.

  He came over to sit in my customer’s chair. “Not so well. I’ve just come from the West Side Station, Mr. Gulliver. Dyke’s building a case.”

  “What’s ‘not well’ about that? The sooner the murderer is found, the better for all of us.”

  “Not for you, Mr. Gulliver. He’s shaping the murder to fit you.”

  I stared at Chopko and the image of him wavered in my vision. I asked, “Do you mean he’s — trying to frame me?”

  “It’s not quite that raw. He seems to think you fit the crime the best. Should I give you the picture?”

  I nodded.

  “Well, to begin with, there was a smear of soot and a sprinkle of blood on that lemon-colored chair. Do you remember the chair?”

  I shook my head. “I only saw the room from the inside when I identified Tom’s body. I didn’t see much but the body.”

  “Well, anyway,” Chopko went on, “that indicates that Edlinger was sitting down, facing his killer, when the first blow was struck. The poker glanced off his forehead and smeared the chair with soot. That would indicate they knew each other, and Edlinger didn’t expect the attack.”

  “Not to me,” I said, “but I’m not a policeman.”

  “Wait, there’s more.” Chopko shifted in his chair. “Edlinger had been smoking a cigarette. It fell from his hands and burned a spot on the rug in front of the chair. He must have had enough strength, though, to get out of his chair and try to fight his killer. There’s some evidence of a struggle.”

  “I still don’t see how any of that fits me,” I said.

  Chopko’s gaze was steady, impersonal. “There’s more. There was a packet of matches on the floor, too, as though Edlinger had just lighted the cigarette, and was handing the matches back when he was hit. The matches were farther away from the chair than the cigarette.”

  “That’s reaching,” I said. “That’s as ridiculous as Sherlock Holmes.”

  “Maybe. Killings have been reconstructed on less. There was pocket lint snagged in the matchbook, and it didn’t match the pocket lint from Edlinger’s clothes. Which strengthens Dyke’s belief that Edlinger had borrowed the matches that night, or morning, rather, in that room and was returning them to his visitor.”

  I took a deep breath. “Which also strengthens his story that Edlinger knew the killer. Did Dyke admit all this to you?”

  Chopko shook his head. “I have friends at that station, but Dyke isn’t one of them.”

  “And now,” I said, “I can expect Sergeant Dyke to want to examine the lint in my pockets? Or maybe the matches had my fingerprints on them?”

  “He’s checking your clothes right now,” Chopko said. “The manager of that motel phoned him to tell him you had registered there, and he found out which suit you were wearing that night from one of the guests at the party.”

  “No fingerprints, then?”

  Chopko’s voice was tight. “No fingerprints. Just your firm name, Gulliver-Schuman, printed on the front of the folder.”

  It was quiet in the room. I could hear the tackety-tack of Miss Padbury’s typewriter. I could hear Max arguing on the phone in his office.

  “My matches,” I said. “It could be my lint. And that proves something? It was a party; how many people ask you for a match at a party?”

  “You tell me, Mr. Gulliver,” Chopko answered. “How many asked you that night — and didn’t return the packet?”

  I closed my eyes, searching my memory. “One person did. I remember that. He even made a crack about how much interest I’d charge him for firm matches.”

  “One person? Which one?”

  “I’m trying to think. I can’t remember.”

  “But you said ‘he.’ You remember that it was a man?”

  “I …” I shook my head. “I couldn’t even swear to that. I was — seriously drunk, Mr. Chopko.”

  “Do you remember if you got the matches back?”

  I shook my head again. “But wait — later, after they’d all left, I woke up and lighted a cigarette for … I lighted a cigarette with a match, and I think I got them from my jacket pocket.”

  “Do you only carry one packet of matches?”

  “No — usually more. They’re — advertising matches.”

  Chopko looked thoughtfully at me. “Well, Mr. Gulliver, there’s Dyke’s case. I’m surprised he’s not here now.”

  “And have you learned anything else?” I asked.

  “Nothing of importance. The married ones have each other for their alibis and Miss Teller has that test pilot and you have Miss Bedloe and the other three went on to another party where they have all kinds of witnesses.”

  “The other three I don’t even remember,” I said. “That shows you what condition I was in. God, though, I should remember who I gave those matches to.”

  “That you should,” Chopko agreed. “As for the credit ratings; only that test pilot is what you might call halfway solvent.”

  I didn’t say anything.

  “Which about winds up the job,” Chopko said. “Should
I bill the firm or you personally?”

  “Stay with it,” I said. “You’re not through. I like the way you work, Mike.”

  “I’ve nothing much left to work on, Mr. Gulliver. One thing — do you think there’s a possibility you might have gone over to Edlinger’s during the time you were blanked out?”

  I shook my head. “No chance. I didn’t blank out in the sense of a memory loss. I went to sleep; I was immobile.”

  “As far as you know. But you can’t remember about the matches.”

  “Who can? Do you remember all the people you’ve given matches to?”

  He didn’t answer, staring at my desktop.

  I asked quietly, “Do you think I’m guilty, Mike? Is that why you don’t want to continue on the job?”

  He looked at me squarely. “It’s not that. But I like to give service for the money and I’ve exhausted most of my sources of information.”

  “If your conscience bothers you, consider that you’ve warned me, but stay with it. And another thing, I would have had to borrow Lynn — Miss Bedloe’s car to go over to Edlinger’s. Mine was here on the lot all night.”

  He nodded. “That’s right.” He stood up. “You try and remember who you gave those matches to.” He smiled slightly. “And if Dyke gets under your skin, don’t blow up. Play it cool; phone your lawyer.”

  He went out and I thought of phoning Earl, but decided there was no reason to, yet. Max came in and I told him about the Wallace request for a loan.

  Max frowned, “That gent who runs the Dairy Journal?”

  “Some trade paper, I know. I don’t know which one.”

  “If it’s the same one, he owes everybody in town. I’ll go over and look at his igloo. But none of our available money, Jim. It’s all going into that Pico deal.”

  I told him about the matchbook business and I told him about Carol.

  When I’d finished, he was standing over at the window, looking down at the traffic. He didn’t turn around as he said, “Oh God, Jim, you’re really in a mess, aren’t you?”

  I got ready to leave again. “I asked for it. If you need seven thousand, Max, Miss Padbury has that much and she’s been begging me for a cinch.”

  He turned around. “To hell with her. Jim, why don’t you and I and Adele go over to see Carol?”