David Goodis: Five Noir Novels of the 1940s and '50s (Library of America)

by David Goodis

  And so the blond man, no longer to be considered a policeman, had come back alone and had placed the police car so he could not be seen. He had watched the parked Chevrolet. He had seen them coming from the mansion with their haul. He had watched the Chevrolet as it went into first gear. Maybe he had followed them without using his headlights. That maybe didn’t last long. In Harbin’s brain it became an emphatic yes. He remembered having examined the rear-view mirror and not seeing any headlights.

  Without headlights, this blond man had followed the Chevrolet to the Spot. He had watched them entering the Spot with their haul. That was for certain and another thing for certain was the fact that he had gone back to the police station and reported nothing.

  Harbin realized it was necessary to check on that, check with himself, his own conception of how certain people react to certain situations. The aquamarine eyes had seen the luxurious mansion, the token of great wealth, had decided it would be a big haul, had waited calmly for the report to come in. When the report came in, when the house sergeant put it down in the book, and the fact that it amounted to around a hundred thousand dollars in emeralds, the man aimed his eyes and his body and his brain at the hundred thousand dollars.

  And now it was all quite clear to Harbin and he could see the rest of it as though he sat at a table and looked at tangible things set neatly before him. He saw the man walking around and thinking it over, deciding to play it carefully and with accuracy. A policeman would have gone after the burglars, but this man was a policeman only when he wore a uniform and moved in the company of other policemen. This man was a rather special sort of operator, loyal only to himself and what he wanted. And what he wanted was the emeralds. This man realized the emeralds were in the shabby Kensington house and the only way to get them out and into his own hands was by using another brain. The other brain was a woman named Della.

  The man had made contact with Della. They must have taken turns, keeping their eyes on the Spot, the legs that walked out of the Spot and then returned and walked out again. They must have decided on a time, the initial forward move. And Della had seen him entering the restaurant that night, and that was it, that was the arrangement she needed. If that hadn’t worked, she would have tried something else. But that had worked. It had worked beautifully. It had kept on working until now, but now it was all over.

  Harbin saw a thick finger pointing at him. The barber was smiling, inviting him to the chair. He climbed into the chair and the barber gave him a shave and then a haircut and after that a shampoo and scalp massage and then went back to the face and put pink cream on the face and worked it in with the thick fingers and followed with a sunlamp treatment. A folded towel kept the light out of Harbin’s eyes. In the black under the folded towel he could see the Spot, he could see their faces, the three in the organization when it ought to be four in the organization. He was in a great hurry to get back to the Spot.

  The barber took the folded towel from Harbin’s eyes and pushed a button that then lifted the chair electrically to sitting position. Harbin got off the chair and saw Della standing near the door.

  They left the barber shop and walked back to the car. They drove out of Lancaster and pulled onto the road going back to the hill. Della worked the radio and got some light-opera music. She pushed the car at medium speed, sat there behind the wheel with a relaxed smile on her face as she listened to the music. Without looking at Harbin she was communicating with him and once she reached out and let her fingers go into the hair at the back of his head. She gave his hair a little pull.

  He poked around in his brain and wondered if it was possible to figure her out. He thought of her kisses. In his lifetime he had been kissed by enough women and had experienced a sufficient variety of kisses to know when there was real meaning in a kiss. Her kisses had the real meaning, and not only the fire, but the genuine material beyond the fire. If it hadn’t been genuine he would have sensed it when it happened. This woman had immense feeling for him and he knew clearly it was far above ordinary craving and it was something that couldn’t be put on like a mask is put on. It was pure in itself and it was entirely devoid of pretense or embroidery.

  It was the true feeling that made the entire business a quaking paradox, because the one side of Della was drawn to him, melted into him, and the other side of Della was out to louse him up. Even now, knowing of her purpose, knowing she was out to get the emeralds, fully aware of her scheme, seeing the situation as a sort of arena with her on one side and himself on the other, he felt the magnetic pull, he realized his desire for Della, the depth of the desire and the knowledge it was permanent desire. He knew he wanted Della more than he had ever wanted anything. This was a solid problem, this woman, a thing he had to deal with, a trouble he had to blast apart. Because it was a threat, and since it aimed at the emeralds, it had to aim at the Spot. And the Spot was the organization. The Spot was Dohmer and Baylock and Gladden. And there, right there, the quiver went through him, the edge of the knife sliced everything else away. This thing was aiming at Gladden.

  Not knowing it, he had his eyes dulled and heavy with guilt. There was hammering in the guilt and it sent the heaviness through his veins. Every thread in his body became a wire drawn tight. Gladden needed him and he had deserted Gladden. Here he was, sitting at the very side of this thing that aimed a threat at Gladden. For days he had been with this thing, away from Gladden. Gladden needed him and if he wasn’t there it would be the end of her. This woman sitting beside him was an element that he must quickly erase.

  He glanced around at the hills, the woods beyond the hills. There were some narrow hills going to left and right of the concrete highway, and he said, “Let’s try some new scenery.”

  She gave him a look. “Where?”

  “One of these little roads.” He said it with his eyes going into her, the words nothing more than ripples on the surface.

  It worked. She nodded slowly. “All right, we’ll find a quiet place. Where we’ll have a lot of trees around us. Like a curtain.”

  They took one of the little roads, followed it up along a hillside, went up and around and down to the other side of the hill, followed the road into the woods where it became a set of tire tracks. They were going far into the woods and the path became dim. Harbin glanced over the side of the car and watched the thick high green grass sliding along, some purple sliding with the green.

  He felt the car slowing down and he said, “No, keep going.”

  “It’s wonderful here.”

  “Keep going.”

  “Put your hands on me.”

  “Wait,” he said.

  “I can’t.”

  “Please wait.”

  The woods around them was thick and up ahead it seemed to be thicker, very dark because the leaves were mobs of solid green high in the trees and holding the sun away. He knew she would say nothing now until he said something and he remained quiet while they went on through the woods. They went deeper and deeper into the woods and through an hour and through another hour, the car going very slowly because it was bumpy ground and there was considerable climbing and turning. He felt the immense yet gentle pressure of the woods and he felt the nearness of Della and for moments that choked him he was pulled away from his idea, his purpose, the thing he meant to carry out in these woods. He took hold of the moment and twisted it away from himself.

  He said, “All right. Just about here.”

  She stopped the car. She turned off the radio.

  He said, “Get rid of the lights.”

  She switched off the headlights and he opened the door on his side and stepped out of the car. Moonlight came down through the woods. Della was getting out of the car, circling it to come toward him. Her body came toward him through the moonlight. As she reached him he took her hand, he walked her away from the car, off the path, heard the sound of her breathing as he took her into the trees.

  He took her on toward the rippling sound of water. Eventually they could see the water, th
e glimmer of a brook far down below from where they stood on a high mound of wild flowers.

  He took her down to the brook and they stood there looking at the moon-glazed water, the points of rocks showing like bits of crystal against the dark. He lowered himself to the ground, felt the smooth flatness of it here on the bank, felt Della as she came against him. He sensed the approach of her lips. He drew his face away from her lips.

  “No,” he said. He said it tenderly, almost like a caress, and yet he knew it had the force of a spear going into her.

  He waited. He wanted to look at her, he wanted to see the effect, but this was only the start of what he was going to do to her, only an ounce of the full measure aiming at this thing that aimed the threatening aim in a long line going up from the emeralds to the Spot to the organization, and to Gladden. Inside himself he spoke softly to Gladden and told her he was about to make up for what he had done.

  Della was quiet for many moments. Finally she said, “What bothers you?”

  “Nothing.”

  “You don’t seem to be with me.”

  “I’m not.” He was smiling at the brook. He knew she could see the smile and he knew what it was doing to her.

  There was another long wait and then she said, “I know what this is.”

  He went on smiling at the brook.

  “You’re drifting,” she said. “I can see you drifting.”

  He shrugged. “I imagine so.”

  She stood up, had her back to him but he knew what was happening on her face. He could almost see inside her, see the tumult, the piercing shock, the agony she didn’t want him to see. She was trying to hold back but couldn’t hold back because finally it broke away and came out, bursting, hissing, her body twisting to show him her face as she said, “God damn you, you dirty son of a bitch.”

  He looked at her only for an instant, then swerved his eyes to the brook and went on smiling at it.

  “Why?” She shot it at him. “Why? Why?”

  He shrugged.

  “You tell me why,” she gasped, her voice almost cracking. “You better tell me why.”

  The smile on his face became dim but inside himself he was smiling widely because this was the way he had planned it and it was working just right. He thought of certain people who had it in for other people and went ahead and did their killing. But there was never any real benefit to be derived from killing, and the results, sooner or later, were always bad. So it was always stupid and crazy to kill, and this was so much more effective than killing. This was the worst possible thing he could do to her. It was the worst thing any man could do to any woman. It was the meanest form of torture, because he was rejecting her without qualifying the rejection, throwing her into a gully of dismay, watching her flounder and choke, her brain seething, trying to reach the reason while he held the reason just a trifle out of her reach.

  He stood up. “Guess that’s about it.”

  “You can’t,” she said. “How can you? How can you do this? It isn’t human. It’s what a devil would do. At least give a person a reason, let me know why—”

  “Why?” He made a little gesture with his arms. “Go ask the trees. They know as much about it as I do.”

  “I don’t believe that.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “You’re not sorry. If you were, you’d tell me. You’d tell me what goes on in that mind of yours. What thoughts are you having? What are you feeling?”

  “I don’t know.” He said it as though she had asked him what time it was. Then, as he began to turn away from her, “I don’t know anything about it except I just don’t want to be around you anymore. I want to get away.”

  And as he moved away, as he went up the steep rise going away from the brook and into the woods, he could hear no sound behind him other than the sound of the water against rocks. Moving steadily through the woods, seeing the car, he crossed the moonlit path far in front of the car and followed a stretch of climbing terrain to get up high enough so he could obtain a view of the main highway, and started down in that direction.

  On the highway, about an hour later, a truck picked him up and took him into Lancaster. He climbed into a taxi and went to the railroad station and bought a ticket to Philadelphia.

  Chapter X

  OPENING THE door, he saw only darkness. He called Baylock’s name, then he called Dohmer. A weak light came down from upstairs, and he heard their voices. He switched on a lamp, took out a handkerchief and wiped some rain from his face. He waited for them to come down the stairs.

  They came down rather slowly, looking at him as though they had never seen him before. They were both dressed, but their trousers were rumpled and he knew they had been sleeping in their clothes. They moved down into the living-room and stood close together, looking at him.

  He opened his mouth. Instead of words coming out, a lot of air and worry rushed in. He didn’t know how to begin.

  They waited for him to say something.

  Finally he said, “Where’s Gladden?”

  They let him wait. He asked it again and then Dohmer answered, “Atlantic City.”

  He put a cigarette in his mouth. “I guess I figured she’d come back here.”

  “She did come back,” Dohmer said. “We told her about you, so she went back to Atlantic City.”

  Harbin took off his wet jacket and hung it on a chair. “You talk as though she’s gone for good.”

  “You hit it,” Baylock said.

  “Don’t lie,” Harbin moved quickly toward them, caught himself and told himself to handle it another way. His voice was calm. “What happened with Gladden?”

  “We tell you she’s pulled out,” Baylock said. “She packed her things and pulled out. You want to make sure? Go to Atlantic City.” Baylock dipped a hand in his trousers pocket, took out a folded slip of paper and handed it to Harbin. “Here’s the address she gave us.” Baylock took a deep breath that had grinding in it. “Anything else you want?”

  “I want you to listen while I talk.”

  He studied their faces for a sign of trust. There was no sign. There was nothing.

  He said, “I want to come in again.”

  “You won’t come in,” Baylock told him. “You’re out. You’ll stay out.”

  “I’ll come in,” Harbin said. “I’ve got to come in because if I don’t, you stand a good chance of losing the haul and getting yourselves grabbed. Now either show some sense and listen to me or you’ll wind up in a mud puddle.”

  Baylock looked at Dohmer. “I like how he walks back in and right away he takes over.”

  “I’m not taking over,” Harbin said. “All I can do is tell you the way things are shaped. We’ve got ourselves a package of grief.” He let that come against them, waiting until it went into them, and then giving it to them. “We’re being looked at.”

  They moved in no special direction. They stared at each other and then they stared at Harbin. For a moment he was with them, he felt what they felt. He wanted to come out and put the whole thing in front of them, the thing as it had happened and the way it was. But he realized they wouldn’t accept the truth. They hadn’t accepted it the last time and they wouldn’t accept it now. He would have to slice most of it away and give them nothing more than a mouthful to chew on.

  He said, “A party’s been trailing me. It took me four days to find out. Another day to shake him. But I’ve added it up and I can see that shaking him won’t do any good. At least not for the time being. Anyway, not until we get out of here.”

  Baylock took another deep breath. “Be careful, Nat. We got a lot more brains now than the day you walked out. We been educating ourselves.” He grinned at Dohmer. “Ain’t we?”

  “Yeah,” Dohmer said. “We took it serious, what you said, Nat. We made up our minds to get smarter. Now we’re smarter and we’re not nervous like we were.”

  “Try to follow it.” Harbin was begging himself to stay away from anger, to hold on, to keep it cool. “At the mansion we had the
police. When they went away I thought for sure that was the end of them. But one of them came back. He followed us here. And now, in plain clothes, he’s been following me.”

  Baylock held onto the grin and shook his head. “No fit. When they want you, they don’t follow you. They move in and grab you.”

  “The point is,” Harbin said, “he doesn’t want me.” Harbin let some quiet come in, let it settle. “All right, if you can’t figure it out, I’ll tell you. The man stays with me but he doesn’t want me. He wants the emeralds.”

  Baylock turned and stopped, turned again, came back to where he had been standing. Dohmer lifted a hand and rubbed a long, heavy jaw. Then Baylock and Dohmer frowned at each other and that was all they could do.

  Baylock said, breathing very heavily, “Who is he? Who is this bastard?”

  “I don’t know. All I know is, the man is hungry for emeralds. He’s got his police uniform to fall back on and when it lines up like that, the only way to deal with them is stay away from them.”

  “But maybe,” Dohmer blurted, “all he wants is a cut.”

  Harbin shrugged. “They all want just a little cut. To begin with. Then they come back and say they want another little cut. Then later they’re back again.” He lit a cigarette, took several small puffs at it, blew out the smoke in one big cloud. “What we’ve got to do and do fast is get the hell out of here.”

  “Where to?” Dohmer said.

  Harbin looked at him as though it was a silly question. “You know where. Atlantic City.”

  “For God’s sake,” Dohmer groaned.

  Baylock said, “If she’s pulled out, she’s pulled out.”

  “No,” Harbin said. “We go there and pick her up.”