Masters Of Noir Vol Ii Part 14

I kicked the knife away. "It's all over," I told Grace. "Take it easy."

But she had no intention of fainting. "Shall I call the police?"

"If you please."

It took almost an hour to set them straight on the story. When they finally released us, I took Grace's arm and led her out to the elevator.

"Have I earned a fee?"

"You certainly have," she said emphatically.

"Okay. I'm taking you home to collect."

I felt pretty good. I didn't even get mad when I found a cop downstairs writing out a parking ticket for my Buick.

I merely asked him to hurry.

SOMEBODY'S GOING TO DIE by TALMAGE POWELL

I'm afraid to go home tonight.

I'll go, of course. To a modern, lovely house on Coquina Beach overlooking the Gulf of Mexico. The beach is not the habitat of paupers.

A singularly beautiful and devoted woman waits for me there. Doreen. My wife.

We are ringleaders in a smart c.o.c.ktail set. We get special service whenever we go into a beach restaurant. Everything has worked perfectly. No one on the beach suspects how we came into our money.

To an outsider I might well be a person to envy. Yet I would give five years of my life if I could escape going home tonight.

Doreen was unaware of the jam I was in when we went on that hunting trip together six months back. We had been married only a few weeks at the time, after getting acquainted during a business trip I took to Atlanta.

She was still pretty much of a stranger to me, and she was such an intense person I didn't know how she would take the news.

We'd had a wonderful time on the trip. Few women would have taken the dark, tangled swamp, the south Georgia heat as Doreen had. Snakes, alligators, they didn't faze her. Neither had the panther.

We were in Okeefanokee hunting deer. I'd struck the panther's spoor in late afternoon. I'd wanted Doreen to turn back, but she'd looked at me strangely.

"Enos," she said, "I never suspected you'd be afraid of anything. You're big, ugly, direct, blunt, hardheaded, cruel-or is that only a front?" She finished with a short laugh, but there was a seriousness beneath her words.

"I'm not afraid for myself," I said.

"Then never be afraid for me," she said excitedly. "Come on, Enos, I want to see you get this cat."

I jumped the cat twenty minutes later. As it came out of a clump of palmetto and saw gra.s.s I put a 30-30 slug in her. My aim was a trifle high. The panther screamed, pinwheeled in the air, and came at me, a crazed ma.s.s of fury and hatred.

Doreen stood her ground and waited for me to shoot the cat. When the beast lay still and p.r.o.ne, it was I who had to wipe sweat from my face.

Doreen walked to the cat slowly. Blood on the animal's hide was already beginning to draw flies and gnats.

"See, Enos," Doreen said, "some of it is still pumping out of her, the hot, red life. Wasn't she beautiful in death?"

I shivered. "Yeah," I said. "Yeah. Let's get back to camp."

We returned to camp and Doreen cooked our supper. Rabbit on a wooden spit and sourdough biscuits.

When we had eaten, we retired to our tent behind mosquito netting. Around us the swamp was coming to life. Its music was a symphony with tones ranging from the shrill of crickets to the ba.s.so of the frogs. The swamp rustled and sighed and screamed occasionally.

Doreen slipped into my arms. "You were wonderful with the cat today, Enos."

Thinking of it, her breath quickened and I could feel her heart beating against me.

"I've shot 'em before," I said.

She pulled my chin around with her thumb and forefinger. "I don't interest you a bit at the moment, Enos," she stated. "What's bothering you?"

"A business detail. Nothing for you to worry about."

"I'm your wife," she said. "Tell me."

"All right," I said looking directly into her eyes. They were large and dark. In the dim light of the lantern her pupils were dilated and as black as the glossy midnight color of her hair.

"I'm in trouble," I added after a moment. "Serious trouble. I might even be yanked into prison."

"Why?"

"I've taken some money that doesn't belong to me."

"From whom?"

"Sam Fickens."

"Your business partner," she said.

"That's right. You know we've been spending at a heavy clip, Doreen. The house was costly. A good buy, you don't find many old colonials on an estate any more. But costly."

"You're sorry, Enos?"

"I'm not sorry for a thing," I said. "Except that money ran short. Sam and I had this deal with the Birmingham company coming up. My share would cover the shortage. But the deal blew up. And Sam discovered the shortage the day before you and I left on this trip. He told me to go ahead and take the trip-and use it to figure out whether I want to make him sole owner of the company or spend a few years in prison."

"Why, the dirty snake," Doreen said, not without a degree of admiration in her voice. "It's nothing short of blackmail."

"True."

"You're not going to let him get away with it, are you?"

"What can I do?"

She looked at me oddly. "You're asking me. You, a man, asking a woman?"

I colored a little. "I told you not to worry your head with it. I'll figure something out."

She lay back on her cot. I smoked a cigarette. I was lighting a second from it when she said, "Enos?"

"Yes?"

"If anything happened to Sam what would happen to the business?"

"I'd get his share. It's not an unusual partnership arrangement."

"Well, you didn't hesitate when that cat was coming after you this afternoon, did you?"

I went cold under the muggy sweat on my body. "You mean kill Sam."

"You've killed before, haven't you?"

"That was war."

"This is too. What's the difference? A stranger with a yellow skin is out to kill you in a jungle. You kill him first. Everybody says wonderful, good guy, well done. Now a man is hunting you in a jungle of sorts-and with dirty weapons. You owe it to both of us to protect yourself."

"The difference is in a little thing called the law, Doreen."

She threw back her head and laughed, raised on her elbows and sat looking at me until I glanced away.

Then she turned on her side away from me. "I really thought I'd married a man with guts, Enos." She sounded genuinely hurt, disappointed. And I'd been afraid of how she would react to the news that I'd embezzled some money.

I turned in, but I didn't sleep. I lay there listening to the swamp, aware of her an arm's length away.

Finally I said, "How would you go about it?"

"How'd you know I wasn't asleep, Enos?"

"I could tell. I asked you a question."

"Well, I'd do it with witnesses. Then I'd call the law, hand over the gun, and stand trial. That way, when you walk out of the courtroom, a free man, there can never be any kickbacks."

"Just like that, huh? I'm going to confess to a murder and get off scot free?"

She sat up and turned to face me. Her face had changed. It was as if the angles and bones had shifted to form new shadows. She laughed, soft and low.

"'Who said anything about murder, Enos? You know your people here in south Georgia. You know their code, the way they live, their outlook. Do you think a jury of such men will condemn another man for protecting the sanct.i.ty of his home?"

I wanted to tell her to stop talking right now. I didn't want to think about killing Sam. He was a hard, greedy cookie without much mercy in his makeup, but he ... Well, he had me in a corner.

He would use any weapon at hand. He'd proved that.

I'd worked hard. My part of the business was worth plenty. Sam was a swine, grabbing his chance to take it all.

It was really his fault. He was leaving me no out. He knew I wouldn't face prison.

He'd asked for it....

He wasn't in the office the day I got back to Mulberry. It was four o'clock before he came in. I heard him in the outer office talking to Miss Sims, our secretary, and then the door of our private office opened to admit him.

"h.e.l.lo, Enos. Sims said you were back."

He was a big, florid, meaty man. Meaty lips, hands, nose. His brows and hair were pale red. Sims had said he'd been out to the turpentine fields all day inspecting a new lease.

"How does the lease look?" I asked.

He gave me a smug grin. "You think the lease really concerns you, Enos?"

I studied his face. All I could see was a man gloating. "I'd hoped you'd softened your att.i.tude, Sam."

His laugh was his reply.

"You know I can make that few thousand up in a matter of weeks, Sam. We've been in business ... "

"And business is business, Enos." A sneer came into his eyes. "You should have thought of that. I needed a partner when we started this company."

"And you don't now?"

"Not a stinking crook. No, I don't need that kind of partner." He sat down behind his desk. "What'll it be, Enos? Sign the papers? Or go to jail?"

"I don't hanker to be locked up, Sam."

"No," he said acidly. "I was sure you wouldn't. You're too great a lover of life for that, too much the gladhanded popularity guy."

It struck me that he hated me, had always hated me. To him, in this case, business was going to be a pleasure.

"I'll make one last appeal, Sam ... "

"Save it. I've said all I'm going to."

"But I'll say it anyhow. You know what my portion of the company is worth. Many times the few thousand I borrowed ... "

"Stole, Enos, that's the word."

I drew in a breath while he sat and watched me and enjoyed himself.

"Well," I said. "Surely you could pay a few thousand more ... "

"You've had every dime you're going to get for your share, Enos. That's it. Now make up your mind. We either have the papers signed before noon tomorrow or I'm swearing out a warrant."