I Want to Go Home

by Frances Lockridge

  He looked up at the clock, shook his head, picked up a telephone. “Anything on the 6 P.M. Pennsylvania today for New York?” he said, without interest, into the telephone. “Yeah,” he said. “Today.” He waited and said, again, “Yeah, sure.”

  “Diagram’s gone down,” he said. “Maybe you can fix it up on the train with the conductor. You want a ticket?”

  She had her purse out, for answer; she was writing a second signature on a traveler’s check. The man took the check, turned it over, compared signatures. He was maddeningly slow. She looked at the clock and was a little relieved. If the train went at six, she still had almost ten minutes.

  “First class?” the agent said, and she nodded; she nodded excitedly, quickly, trying to hurry him on. He did not seem to hurry, but she still had seven minutes when he gave her a ticket which read “St. Louis, Mo. to New York, N.Y.” And when she asked where the train was he waved away to the right. She started that way and saw a sign “To Trains” and almost ran toward it, out through doors, into a big, smoky area, crowded, cluttered with little groups of people and deposits of luggage. She saw a sign “The St. Louisan” and above it “6:00 P.m.” Under the name of the train there was a row of city names, and the one at the bottom was “New York.”

  She hurried, and still had five minutes. Time seemed to be waiting for her, at last. She was almost at the gate when someone called her. “Jane! Hey—Jane!” She had turned, compelled by her name, before she could stop herself. The tall, rather good-looking man with the almost colorless hair who had watched her, negligently, at the bus terminal was behind her. He was not negligent now. His face had lighted with recognition, he was eager to reach her. It appeared he was delighted to see her, and already people were looking at them, sharing this tiny drama, smiling in sympathy with this lovers’ meeting.

  Jane said, “No!” and started to run, but he was up with her before she had run at all.

  “Darling!” he said. “Jane!” He took her arm, and smiled down at her. His smile was wide and happy—and triumphant.

  “Let me go,” she said. “Let me go!” She tried to wrench away.

  His face changed. The smile faded from it, the delight went out of it. The people who were watching watched this, and they seemed to Jane to be moving closer, leaning toward this drama.

  “Don’t say that, darling,” he said. “Please, Jane. Please!” There was entreaty in his voice—in his raised voice. He was playing to the audience, he was including it.

  “I don’t know you,” she said. “You’re—I don’t know him! I don’t!” This last was to those around them. She looked desperately at the nearest faces. There were half a dozen people listening, some obviously, some with obvious pretense of seeing nothing, hearing nothing.

  “Jane,” he said, and he lowered his voice just enough. He was a man avoiding a scene, reminding her that they were making a scene. He looked at her, it seemed carefully, and then there was a very odd expression on his face. “Jane,” he said. “What’s the matter?” There was anxiety in his tone. “You know me, Jane.” It was a statement, made as if he were fighting against an unreasonable fear. “Jane—I’m your husband, Jane. I’m Bob.” He shook her a little. “You mustn’t do this, dear,” he said. “You mustn’t say things like that.” He looked around at the listeners, seemed for the first time fully conscious of them, seemed embarrassed. “People are listening,” he said. “Come, dear.” He began to pull her away from the train gate.

  “No!” she said. “Don’t let him—no!” She struggled in his grasp, which was inflexible.

  One of two men standing nearest looked uncertain. She could see the uncertainty in his face.

  So could the man who called himself “Bob.” He smiled, unhappily, directing his smile to the man. He shook his head just perceptibly, as if Jane were not to see the shaking head; he spoke in a low tone, for the man only.

  “My wife’s upset,” he said. “I’m afraid—” He let that hang, artfully. “We just lost our baby,” he said. “She’s been—been seeing a doctor in St. Louis.” There was a special emphasis on the word “doctor,” implying a careful avoidance of some more descriptive word. “She—she was going to meet me at his office but I’m afraid—” He did not say what he was afraid of; he implied that it was unnecessary to say.

  The uncertainty left the face of the man, and he nodded. He understood.

  “It isn’t true,” Jane said. “I tell you—he’s not my husband. I never saw him.” Her voice implored belief. “I’m not crazy,” she said. “None of it’s true.”

  The man who held her arm shook his head again, sorrowfully, pityingly. He began to pull her away from the gate. The man who had seemed doubtful turned away, carefully excluded himself.

  The man was strong and pulled her along. People looked at them curiously, uneasily. But most of those nearest had seen the man who called himself Bob explaining to the other man, had seen the explanation accepted. And those who had not, saw that those nearer than they did not intervene, and so, although they watched, and some of them seemed to feel a kind of guilt, they too did nothing.

  They were nearing the doors leading back into the main waiting room, and the clock showed two minutes of six and then the big hand jumped. And then, with all her strength, Jane fought to free herself. The man was taken off balance for an instant, and in that instant she reached with her right leg, caught the back of her ankle on his ankle and pulled back desperately. He stumbled and, as he stumbled, his grasp weakened—for an instant relaxed entirely. And then she was free—and then she was running. She was running frantically toward the gate and she was crying out, “Wait! Wait!” and all the people seemed to be looking at her with blank faces.

  The man called, “Jane!” and started to follow her, and she ran harder and reached the gate just as it was closing. She pulled at it, with her hands, forced it back a little, felt its pressure on her body, and was through. She was running down along the train, then, and again she was crying, “Wait!” to a uniformed trainman who stood beside the train with one hand lifted.

  The train had begun to move when she reached the man, and he pushed her in front of him toward the steps of a moving car and half lifted her up them. In the vestibule she grasped a rail of some sort and stood trembling, looking back. The trainman closed a door in the floor with a thudding sound, and then pulled the vertical door closed.

  She found a seat when she was not trembling so much and thought, for a long time, over and over, only—I got away, I got away. For a long time there was no room for any other thought. I got away. I’m on a train again!

  After what was, perhaps, half an hour, she asked a trainman where the Pullmans were, and then, after another rather long time, had the courage to walk through the swaying train toward the Pullmans. She found the Pullman conductor, she negotiated, she got another bedroom. It was very like the one she had had on the Chief.

  But all the while she did this, even while she washed up, powdered, tried to get lipstick straight, her mind was numb. It was as if somebody else had talked to the conductor, to the porter, in her behalf. Even fear was lost in a kind of numbness; she did one thing after another—took off her coat and her blouse, pulled down the basin and ran water into it, washed herself, rubbed in cream and powdered, dressed again—without ever thinking except of what she was, at that given instant, actually doing. Taking off the jacket was a thing to do. Taking off the blouse was a thing to do. Washing her face was a thing to do, and then her arms and shoulders. These things were separate, self-contained, not part of a series which would be implied by the phrase “washing up.” But her hands trembled so that she had to try again and again before she could get lipstick properly curved to curving lips.

  She sat down then, making herself small in a corner of the seat, and for a time she did nothing, and thought nothing. Then she rang for the porter and told him she was ill, and asked if he could bring her a drink. He brought it and she drank, and then, after another time, she called him again and sent him for
a waiter. She ordered dinner and, when it came, ate it, but, five minutes after the waiter had removed the tray, she could not remember what she had eaten.

  After another longish time—after they had stopped in and pulled out of a big city—the porter buzzed and, when she unlocked the door and opened it and, identifying him, opened it wider, asked if he could make up her berth. She stood in the aisle, as she had the night before—could it possibly be only the night before?—listening to the sound of his work and when he had finished she went back into the room and, still mechanically, undressed and got into the berth. She lay on her back, looking up at the underside of the upper berth, holding her arms tight at her sides. And then the numbness went, suddenly, and fear came back and her whole body began to tremble. She could not stop the shaking.

  It was during that time, she realized afterward, that her unreasoning fear, the all-pervading dread which had ridden with her for so many miles, reached its climax. She was not afraid in that same way again, not through any of the rest of it.

  She slept, for one thing. Thinking she would never cease shaking, thinking she would never sleep, she lay quiet and then she slept. When she awakened, the train was standing in a station and at first she could not remember where she was, or why she was lying there in a motionless train. When she did realize, she found that the fear was different. It was there, but it was not the same fear. She had, somehow while she was asleep, reached a new acceptance of what was happening, and with that the formless fears—the most fearful of fears—crept away.

  She was, for reasons she could probably work out, being followed and—it was hard to find the right phrase—“pushed around” by a number of people working together. She had thought part of this out on the road, walking, before weariness and the endlessness of the road had pushed it from her mind. Now it was much clearer, more tangible. There were a good many people, working presumably under some direction, who were trying to push her around. Specifically, so far as there was any evidence, they were trying to keep her from doing what she planned at the time she wanted to do it. They were trying to keep her from getting home when she had planned. They had partially succeeded. She should have been approaching New York at this moment, not leaving Pittsburgh. But, partially, they had failed. So she was behind her schedule, but she was still ahead of theirs. She was supposed to be delayed in Ash Fork, and she had not been. She was supposed to miss this train out of St. Louis and, probably, wait until morning for another. She had not missed it.

  She got out of the berth and began to dress, still working it out. Her mind was working very clearly, she thought.

  She was supposed to be later than she was, and so she might expect them to keep on trying to make her late. The next effort, probably, would be made when she reached New York. That was still more than eight hours away. She could think about that later. Meanwhile she would try to think out what their purpose was—why they were spending time and effort and, presumably, money to keep her from keeping schedule on her homeward flight. Spending money, she thought, and stood for a moment in front of the mirror, with her hands raised to her hair, fixed by the thought of money.

  Aunt Susan had money, a great deal of money. She had more than anyone else whose life touched Jane’s closely. But it was difficult to think of any reason Aunt Susan could have for wanting to delay her grand-niece’s homecoming. If she didn’t want me, she’d just have said so, Jane thought. Cross Aunt Susan off for the moment; cross her off as instigator. But—leave her money in. How much money there was, Jane did not know. But there was a good deal—a million, two million. Once, long ago, Jane was to have got most of it. But then there had been the quarrel, and now Jane didn’t know.

  She finished dressing, went out of the room and toward the diner, smiling at the porter and nodding good morning to him. And I don’t care, Jane thought; I really don’t care. Of course, to be honest, she thought then—going into the next car—it’s because I have enough anyway, from father. And I can always work. But a lot of people never have enough, she added, going along the corridor of the car.

  And, she thought (going through the vestibules, into the next car) there’s no good pretending I wouldn’t just as soon have whatever it is. Millions. Anybody would rather have a lot. Maybe, if Aunt Susan and I make up, and if she’s taken me out of her will, she’ll put me back. Maybe—

  She stopped in the narrow corridor because the thought which this prompted so filled her mind that she forgot to walk.

  Maybe that was it. Maybe somebody didn’t want her to make it up with Aunt Susan, and be put back in Aunt Susan’s will. Maybe that was what it was all about. But how delay—

  Maybe Aunt Susan’s sick, she thought. Maybe she’s—dying. Maybe they want to keep me away until she’s dead!

  As she thought that, a picture of Aunt Susan came into her mind—of Aunt Susan’s quick, small body; of her sharp, wise black eyes. It was a picture with years piled around it; with all that “home” meant piled around it. No! she thought. Please no. That’s what I’m going to. That’s the life of what I’m going to. Don’t take it away! Then she moved along the corridor, walking several steps very quickly, as if she could hurry toward home, get to it before Aunt Susan wasn’t there—before “home” wasn’t there.

  The sense that she must hurry, that there was no time, was acute in her mind only for an hour or so, through breakfast, until she was in her room again. Then it became merely a background, a sub-consciousness. In that form, it remained for the rest of the time. It guided her mind, shaped her actions. I have to hurry. I have to hurry. I have to get home.

  She had the porter bring her a time-table. She went down the column of printed figures, figures that recorded time. Harrisburgh, Philadelphia, Trenton, Newark, time running out with each. New York. New York was listed twice, and for an instant that seemed odd; seemed unduly emphatic, even for New York. Then she saw why. Then she laid down the time table and looked out the window. They were going through mountains and there were fine things to see out the window. But she did not see them. Her blue eyes narrowed slightly, but she was not really looking at anything.

  Eight

  Captain Heimrich was not satisfied. He put together what they had picked up—picked up from a detective who ostensibly sought information about sneak thieves, from a lawyer who revealed a little more than he imagined, from certain records and from some newspaper clippings, chiefly from a gangling young man with a face which could—which did—take half a dozen shapes in half an hour. What they had picked up did not give them any foundation for action. It was profoundly unsatisfactory.

  Mrs. Susan Meredith, living, much surrounded by family, in a big square house, was eighty years old, or thereabouts. She had a considerable fortune, much of which she had herself acquired. She might have a couple of million dollars. She was old and, in recent months, ill; in recent weeks confined to her room. In the past few days she had become, rather suddenly, rather unexpectedly, acutely ill. But she was not being poisoned. She had a great deal of money, she was surrounded by relatives who would get it, she became suddenly acutely ill. But she was not being poisoned.

  Her money was to be divided among the several relatives, in proportions unknown to the police. Frederick Meredith, a step-son, would get some of it; some might go to his son, the gangling young man. A man named John Lockwood, who was a nephew, would get some; his brother, who was named Elliott, who was married, who had two children, would get some. Somebody named Jane Phillips, who was not there, who had quarreled with Mrs. Meredith, who was—what? a grand-niece?—apparently would get almost nothing. This Jane Phillips, Mrs. Jane Phillips, but a widow, was on her way east. She was getting in—Heimrich looked at his watch—she ought to be getting in about now. She would have to hurry if she wanted to see her aunt alive, if she wanted reconciliation and to get in on the money. He corrected that. There was no evidence that Jane Phillips knew she was out of the money. There was no evidence either way about that.

  It was interesting. It was unsatis
factory.

  Frederick Meredith was president of a packaging concern, apparently prosperous. Elliott Lockwood worked for the firm, and was, it could be assumed, considerably less prosperous. John Lockwood was a lawyer, largely in criminal practice. Heimrich knew about him, not at first hand, but enough. He was busy, he was good, he was a tough customer professionally. Unless signs failed, he also was prosperous. But it was doubtful whether he was prosperous in the millions. Possibly he wanted to expand; possibly Meredith wanted to expand; possibly Elliott Lockwood did not want to work in the packaging concern, and had expansion ideas of his own. Equal and opposite reaction, Heimrich thought. The old girl shrinks. Naturally.

  As a policeman, Heimrich did not like the picture. As a policeman it was not clear he could do anything about it—unless somebody else did something first.

  Captain Heimrich looked at the telephone on his desk as if he expected it to ring. It did.

  It seemed to Ray Forrest, going up the ramp in Grand Central, chafing at the slowness of the rest, trying to eel between them, that he was always having to put his money on the red, on the black, watching the wheel spin—and then not finding out where the little ball stopped. Now he had put his money on New York, but there was no way of knowing whether he had won, or was going to win.

  He had put his money down—he had put more than money down—when he had boarded the Century in Chicago, not knowing Jane was on it, whether he had missed her at the gate. That bet had not come off; it had been neither lost nor won. He had not found her, but he had found out about her. The wheel was, in a sense, still spinning. He had put his money down again when, at Toledo, he had merely sent off the long telegram to the Kansas City police, asking them to reply to the New York office of the studio. Perhaps he should have got off the Century at Toledo and got back somehow, by plane perhaps, to Kansas City. But he had stayed on the Century, betting on New York—on New York and, in a way, on Jane herself. He had bet that somehow, fighting where she had to fight, running when she could run, Jane would get to New York. He bet that she would be hard to stop.