The strip of beach was lonely and desolate. Harry slowed the car. “Pretty good, isn't it?” he said huskily. “Let's stop here and have a swim.”
“My costume's right at the bottom of the suitcase,” Glorie said.
“Why worry about a costume? Who's here to see you except me.”
He swung the car into the shade of a palmetto tree and pulled up.
“Come on; let’s swim.”
She got out of the car and walked away towards the sea, leaving a trail of footprints behind her.
For a long moment Harry sat watching her, his heart pounding.
He had a strange feeling that they were suddenly the only two people left on earth. The long sweep of the beach, the dense forest at their backs, the blue sky, the hot sun and the silence told him this was the place. There could never be any place more lonely than this.
His hand reached behind him and his fingers closed over the handle of the wrench. He opened the car door. This was it, he told himself. She was standing with her back to him, looking towards the sea. The breeze moulded her dress around her so he could see the roundness of her hips and her long legs.
The beach stretched away for miles and was completely empty of life. The hot sun had turned the sea into a bronze, shimmering mirror.
He left the car, feeling the hot sand through the thin soles of his shoes. Even if she screamed there would be no one to hear her. He pulled the wrench from his hip pocket and began to walk slowly towards her. She remained motionless, her back to him, her hand shielding her eyes as she looked at the sea that came inshore in little waves, running up the dry sand and then receding, leaving the sand dark and wet.
He kept the wrench behind him as he came up to her. His heart was pounding and his mouth was dry. There was no one to stop him now. He had to do it. There was no way out for him unless he silenced her.
When he was within a few yards of her, she turned and looked at him. The expression in her eyes brought him to a standstill as if he had walked into a brick wall. He could see at once that she knew what he was going to do. The fearless contempt in her eyes paralysed him. He could only stand motionless, staring at her, his face white and glistening in the hot sunlight. For a long moment, they faced each other, then she said quietly, “What are you waiting for?”
He willed himself to hit her, but he was unable to do it. If she had screamed, run, thrown up her arms, he would have hit her, but this motionless lack of fear held him rigid.
“Go on,” she said. “I knew you were going to do it. Well, do it. I don't care.”
“You shouldn't have threatened me,” he said, his voice a harsh whisper. “You asked for it and now you're going to get it.”
He was holding the wrench so she could see it.
“Is that what you're going to use?” she said calmly. “Is that what you were hiding in the car pocket?”
He was confounded by her complete lack of fear and by her quiet, calm tone. He could only stand, facing her, while he tried to force himself to strike her.
“You were crazy to think you could dictate to me,” he said hoarsely. “You're in my way. Do you imagine I'd ever knuckle under to your orders? Joan and I plan to get married. When her old man dies, she'll come into all his money. He's worth millions. Do you think I'd let you stand in the way of such a chance? It's your life or my future!”
He wanted her to run, to show fear so he could strike. This stillness of hers, this cold, unfrightened stare demoralized him.
Borg, who had driven down the beach road and had hidden his car in the wood, watched this scene from behind a clump of palmetto trees. In the hot silence and stillness, every word they said came clearly to him.
“I'm going to kill you,” Harry said, taking a step nearer, hoping she would give ground. “Why don't you run? Why don't you try to save yourself? I'm going to kill you!”
“I'm not stopping you,” she said, not moving nor taking her eyes from his. “I knew you would do this. Yet it was difficult to believe you could be so wicked. Did you really imagine I believed those lies about sharing the money or marrying me? You were so obviously lying. When you tried to get me into the forest, I knew what was going on in your hateful mind. You thought the buzzards would hide your crime, didn't you? Well, now you have me alone. There is no one to see what you do, so why don't you go ahead and kill me?”
He didn't move, sweat ran down his face and he was shaking.
“I’ll tell you why,” she went on, her voice harsh with scorn. “You're a coward. I found that out as soon as your own precious life was in danger, but even then I was fool enough to go on loving you, even when I knew you were yellow and rotten. It was only when you threw me over for that chit of a girl that at last I realized what a weak fool I'd been. You haven't even the nerve to finish what you've begun. I'm not afraid of you! Go on, hit me! I dare you to, you miserable coward!'
Harry half lifted the wrench, then, with a furious gesture, he threw it violently from him. It sailed through the air and landed within a few yards of where Borg was standing.
“Yes, you've beaten me!” he said, his breath coming in great heaving gasps. “I haven't the nerve to finish it. Okay, I'll marry you. I'll do what you say, but I'll hate you for the rest of my days!”
“I wouldn't marry you now if you were the last man left alive!” Glorie cried, her voice suddenly shrill. “I must have been out of my mind ever to have loved you! To think that after all I have done for you, all the risks I've taken and the love I have given you, you could be so wickedly evil as to plan to kill me. If you hadn't been such a rotten coward you would have killed me. I'd be dead now if I had shown any fear of you. Get out of my sight! I never want to see you again! I wouldn't marry you or touch your rotten money if you went' down on your knees and begged me to. I never intended to take the money. I wanted to see how far you would go to hang on to it, and I know now. Go back to your blonde woman and marry her. I don't envy her having you. Get away from me, the sight of you makes me sick!”
The scorn in her voice was like a whiplash. Harry started to say something, but she screamed at him: “Get out of my sight! Go away and hide, you stinking coward! Don't let me ever see you again!”
He turned and walked unsteadily back to the car. Without quite knowing what he was doing, he got into the car, started the engine and drove back the way he had come. He drove until he reached the wall of clamshells, then he stopped because he could drive no further. He was shaking, and his breath came in hard, sobbing gasps. He sat holding on to the driving wheel, his eyes shut, hearing the scorn in her voice and realizing just how rotten he was.
After he had walked away, Glorie sank down on the sand and hid her face in her hands .she heard the car engine start up, but she didn’t look round or move. She too was shaking, but she was thankful it was over, thankful to be rid of him. She didn't care that she had a two-mile walk back to the highway before she could beg a lift The way he had treated her had stiffened her fibre and for the first time in ten years she felt free and she didn't care what became of her. She didn't care either that he had gone off with her suitcase. The relief to be rid of him was so great, she found herself crying with happiness.
She didn't see nor hear Borg as he came silently across the strip of golden sand In his gloved right hand he held the wrench that Harry had thrown away.
It was only when his gross black shadow fell across her that she realized she wasn't alone. She looked up, her body stiffening and her blood congealing. She had a momentary glimpse of his fat, savage face and his descending hand that held the wrench. She opened her mouth to scream, but before the sound could rise in her throat a terrifying bright light flashed before her eyes, and her life disintegrated into death.
chapter seven
I
It was only when the rays of the sun came through the car window, unpleasantly hot against his face, that Harry stirred himself. He had no idea how long he had been sitting in the car, and now he wondered what Glorie was doing. He couldn’t lea
ve her in this lonely spot, he told himself, that was at least two miles from the highway, and yet he hesitated to go back after the way she had screamed at him.
With a hand that was still unsteady, he lit a cigarette. Then he turned to look through the rear window to see if there was any sign of her, and his eyes fell on her suitcase, lying on the back of the seat. That decided him. He couldn't go off with her things, nor could he leave the heavy suitcase by the road for her to lug to the highway.
He started the car, and after some trouble, for the road was narrow, he turned and drove slowly down the road until he reached the open beach.
By now the mid-morning sun was violently hot, and it beat down on him as he got out of the car and walked beyond the palmetto trees on to the soft sand.
He paused, frowning, as he looked across the stretch of beach.
He could see Glorie: she was lying on her side, apparently asleep or resting. He wondered why she had remained out there in the heat of the sun instead of seeking shelter in the shade.
From the palmetto thicket, Borg watched him, his fat face expressionless, his hand resting on the butt of his gun that he carried strapped under his armpit.
“Glorie!” Harry called, not wanting to go over to her and startle her. “Glorie!”
But she didn't move nor did she appear to hear him. With growing uneasiness he started across the beach towards her.
“Glorie!” he called again, and then he came to an abrupt stop.
The crimson stain on the sand by her head sent a cold chill creeping over him.
For a long moment he stood motionless, then very slowly he moved forward until he was within a few feet of her. Then he saw the injuries to her head, her fixed grimace of terror, her half-open, sightless eyes, and he knew without touching her that she was dead.
The cigarette he was holding slipped out of his fingers and dropped in the sand. He couldn't believe what he was seeing. It came into his mind that he had done this thing himself, and it took him some seconds to gain enough control to reassure himself that he hadn't. She couldn't possibly have given herself such injuries, he thought, and he looked to right and left, his body going clammy with fear.
The great stretch of beach was empty. His eyes went to the long, thick belt of wood. Was someone hiding in there? Had someone been watching him and her as they had quarrelled?
He looked for the extra set of footprints in the sand. There were his; there were hers, but there were no other footprints.
He wasn't to know that Borg had stepped back into his own prints as he had retreated to the wood, and had smoothed over each print with his fat, dirty hand as he stepped from it. He had had plenty of time, and he had made a good job of it. He had left no trace of his coming nor of his going.
The empty, unmarked sand that stretched back to the wood convinced Harry that no one had come down to her. Had something fallen from the sky and hit her? But he could see no missile of any description near her, only her handbag that lay by her side.
He wiped his sweating face, keeping his eyes from her still, injured body. If anyone should come down to the beach now, he thought, they would imagine he had killed her. Fear gripped him. Even if no one saw him, and the body was found, the police would suspect him before anyone.
They would have reason to suspect him. It was possible that someone had heard their quarrel in the cabin. He remembered that Glorie had warned him he had been shouting. Then there was the truck driver who had seen them standing by the road and had asked the way to the Denbridge service station. He would remember them and tell the police. If they found her body, he was sunk!
Again he looked towards the wood, and Borg, guessing his intentions, moved silently away to where he had hidden his car. Harry felt he couldn't leave without making sure no one was in the wood. He turned and began to walk slowly back the way he had come. He had only taken a few steps when he heard a car engine start up.
The sound brought him to an abrupt stop, his heart slamming against his ribs. So there had been someone! He heard the engine accelerate, and, galvanized into action, he raced across the burning sand to the head of the road. But he was too late. When he reached the road there was no sign of the car. His own car still stood at the opening of the road, but it was facing the sea, and he knew by the time he had turned it, the other car would be too far away to pursue.
Who had it been? he asked himself. Some crazy creature who had seen Glorie on her own and had attacked her? It could only have been the killer who had driven away. He wasn't likely to tell anyone he had seen him, Harry thought. He would be too scared he would implicate himself.
As he stood by the car, the hot sun beating down on him, Harry tried to calm his frightened mind, and to plan what he had best do. He could drive to Collier City and tell the police that someone had murdered Glorie, but he had no hope of the police believing him. If they arrested him and took his fingerprints he would be sunk. The safest thing he could do was to follow out his original plan. He unlocked the car boot and took out the shovel. He stripped off the brown paper, folded it and put the paper in the boot which he closed. Then he walked back to where Glorie lay.
He knew he should carry her to the wood and bury her there where she would be less likely to be found, but he couldn't bring himself to pick her up. He dug a grave within a few feet of where she lay. Digging the sand out wasn't easy, as it kept collapsing into the hole as he made it, but eventually he made a hole, big and deep enough to take her.
His shirt was black with sweat by the time he had filled in the grave, and he was gasping for breath. He smoothed the sand over with the back of the shovel, then he went down to the sea and collected a pile of seaweed, returned to the grave and scattered the seaweed over it, concealing the disturbed sand. He guessed in a day or so the action of the wind would settle the sand and no one would be able to tell that she was buried there. The danger lay in the next day if someone happened along and wondered at the disturbance of the sand.
He looked back at the footprints he and Glorie had made. He would have to get rid of them. For the next half-hour he toiled in the sun, smoothing over the footprints as he slowly worked his way back to the car. When he finally reached the car, he paused to examine the stretch of beach that lay before him.
Except for the little heap of seaweed there was no evidence that he and Glorie had been there, and for the first time since he had found Glorie's body, he felt more sure of himself.
He cleaned the shovel in the long grass and put it in the boot. Then he remembered Glorie's suitcase and he cursed. That too would have to be buried. He got out the shovel, and, carrying the suitcase into the wood, he found a soft piece of ground and dug out a hole. He buried the suitcase, then sat on the trunk of a fallen pine for a few minutes' rest.
His mind was already becoming active again. He was rid of Glorie now for good, and he hadn't her death on his conscience. He was free to return to Miami. He had his capital intact, and there was Joan, anxiously waiting for him. He'd better get away from here, he told himself. Someone might come and find him, although the danger, he felt, was now past. As he stood up, he remembered the wrench he had thrown away. He had to have that.
If it were found it might be checked for fingerprints and he was sure his prints were on it. He tried to remember where he had thrown it. He recollected flinging it away from him in his fury. He remembered it flying off somewhere towards the wood.
He walked along the edge of the wood, his eyes searching the sandy ground. He hadn't gone more than a dozen paces Wore he came upon, in the sand, the unmistakable impression of the wrench, but the wrench itself wasn't there.
He stared down at the clear cut impression, his heart thudding.
There were three odd little marks by the impression, and it was only when he bent down and placed the back of his hand alongside the marks that he realized they had been made by the knuckles of a hand that had dipped into the sand to pick up the wrench.
It occurred to him then that the killer had mur
dered Glorie with the wrench, and, in spite of the blazing heat, he turned cold. If the killer had thrown the wrench away and it was later found by the police, it would hook Harry for the killing.
For more than half an hour, he feverishly searched the wood, but he didn't find the wrench, and finally he had to give up looking for it. He tried to assure himself that the killer had hidden the wrench where no one would find it. He must get, this whole thing out of his mind, he told himself. He was now free of Glorie, he had his future to think of. He must get back to Miami and to Joan.
He drove up the road leading from the beach. When he reached the junction, he turned left and on to the main highway. Almost at once he was caught up in a ribbon of traffic, and he felt safer as he drove fast along the road back to Miami.
In his car, at the edge of the road, Borg had been waiting patiently. When he saw Harry's Buick go by, he went after him. He drove about a quarter of a mile behind the fast-moving Buick, content to let two other cars keep between his car and Harry's.
After Harry had driven some miles, he saw an oil truck coming towards him and he recognized the green-and-white markings: it was the truck driven by the man who had asked the way to the Denbridge service station. Harry cursed his bad luck to meet this driver again. He sank low in his seat, hoping the driver wouldn't recognize him, but he did. He blasted his horn and waved out of the window as he went by. Harry ignored him, increasing his speed.
If the police found Glorie's body and the murder got into the papers, the truck driver was certain to remember that he had seen Harry with Glorie, and some three hours later had seen Harry coming back without her. Harry felt a trickle of cold sweat run down his back. That kind of bad luck could put a man into the death cell, he thought.
He reached Miami around half-past four. Pulling up outside a drug store, he left the Buick, went in and put a call through to the Graynor's residence. He was told that Joan was out, but she was expected back after six. He said he would call later and went out on to the street again. Pausing by the car, he considered what his next move should be.
You've Got It Coming Page 19
