Death's Sweet Song (7 page)

“You haven't changed,” she said huskily.

“It's been a long time.”

“Only a week.”

“Do you know how long a week can be?”

“Yes, I know.””

That ripe mouth didn't slip away this time as I kissed her. I felt her nails digging into my shoulders again, into my arms. “You're strong, aren't you, Joe? Hard and strong.”

“Yes.”

“I believe it. I've thought about you, Joe. Your arms like leather rope. I like men with arms like that.”

“You've got some points too that I've thought about.”

Her arms went around my neck and pulled tight. The words came through her teeth. “There's no future in this, Joe. You know that, don't you?”

“We'll talk about that later.”

“There won't be any later. Tomorrow I'll be gone. Besides, there's Karl.”

“You said you didn't love him.”

“That has nothing to do with it.”

I had the feeling that she didn't like what was happening, but she was unable to stop it, just as I was unable to stop it. A handful of iron gets caught in an electrical field and jumps to the magnet. The iron has nothing to say about it.

Outside, an impatient horn blared out, and I knew it was somebody at the station wanting gas or oil. Then Sheldon called, “Hooper, you've got a customer.”

I had forgotten about Sheldon, the station, and everything else. Sheldon hit the steps, but before he got the door open Paula was out of my arms. She threw herself on the bed and lay there like a marble statue, as white and unmoving as marble statue, that red mouth of hers partly open.

She lay there on her back, her arms and legs forming a white letter X on the bed, her eyes closed. For just a moment I remembered some paintings that I had seen once. They were nudes, painted by some Italian with a name I couldn't pronounce. The nude women all looked alike and they were all painted orange; their bodies, their faces, every thing was orange but the hair, and they were the nakedest women I ever saw.

Sheldon was in the room now, standing there by the door. I looked at him but couldn't tell what he was thinking.

“I think you've got a customer,” he said again.

“Yes. I heard.”

I'd have to wait until Ike relieved me at the station before I could hit him with the robbery business. Anyway, I needed to calm down a little. I got out of there.

I went back to the station, took care of the customer, and tried to keep my feet on the ground until Ike came. I didn't hear any noise from the Number 2 cabin, so I figured Sheldon hadn't noticed anything out of the way. I didn't give a damn whether he had or not.

Maybe fifteen minutes had passed when Sheldon backed the Buick out of the carport and headed toward town. That meant he was going to make his contact with Manley and get their plans jelled.

Sheldon had been gone almost an hour when the telephone rang.

“Hooper?”

“Yes.” I didn't recognize the voice at first.

“This is Karl Sheldon. Would you give my wife a message for me?”

“Sure, Mr. Sheldon.”

“Just tell her that some important business has come up and our plans have been changed. Please ask her to get everything packed and I'll be back as soon as possible.”

“You're checking out, Mr. Sheldon?”

“That's right. Sorry if we've inconvenienced you, Hooper, but of course we'll pay the usual rental fee.”

“I see.”

I didn't see worth a damn. But something had gone wrong. Something had exploded right in my face and I didn't know what it was. All I could think of was that I had to talk to Paula and talk fast before her husband of back. Maybe, between the two of us, we could straighten the thing out.

Then Ike Abrams drove up in that jalopy of his, and I was never so glad to see anybody in my life. I turned the station over to Ike, then went to my own cabin, as I always did. When I saw that Ike was busy in front of the station I went over to the Sheldon's cabin.

Paula was still on the bed, but she came off it the minute I stepped through the door.

“Something's wrong,” I said. “Your husband just called and said for you to get packed.”

“What?”

“That's all he said. He's checking out as soon as he gets back and he wants you to get packed. Do you know what it means?”

Something happened to that beautiful face of hers; it wasn't so beautiful now. “Yes,” she said, almost hissed. “I know what it means. It means he's backed out on the factory job.”

“Why would he do a thing like that?”

“Because everything has to be perfect. If everything isn't absolutely perfect, he won't touch it.”

“I still don't get it,” I said.

I had never seen anger just like hers. It was almost as though she could turn it off and on by throwing a switch. Now she switched it off, sat on the edge of the bed, and put her hand to her forehead. “I really can't blame him so much. He spent five years in a cell for making a mistake once, and he doesn't want to make any more. Probably Bunt Manley couldn't get the information he wanted, so he called it off.”

“Just like that he'd turn thumbs down on thirty thousand dollars?”

“It's more than thirty thousand dollars—it's his life.”

I remembered what Paula had said about how much it had cost to get her husband a parole. “It's the string-pullers you're worried about, isn't it? What happens to your husband if they don't get paid?”

“They always get paid, one way or another.”

“How much time does he have?”

She looked up. “It ran out a week ago. Karl thinks he can outrun them, but I know better.”

It would suit me fine to let the string-pullers take cafe of Sheldon in their own way, but I needed him myself. That safe had to have an expert's attention, and Sheldon was the only expert I knew.

“This is important to you, isn't it?” I said.

I am convinced that she could read my mind. “No, Joe.

Not you!”

“What's the matter with me? Am I made of old china? Do I go to pieces when I'm dropped? You say you're not in love with your husband—that's good enough for me. Maybe you'll tell me someday why you're so concerned about him, but that isn't important now. If I get your husband off the hook by convincing him that this job can be brought off, with my help, would you drop him?” “For you, Joe?” “For me.”

For one long moment she said nothing. Then, without looking at me, she said, “You wouldn't like it, Joe. I would want things that you couldn't give me.”

“Don't believe it. All I need is a little time.” “You wouldn't like my world,” she said. “You wouldn't like me, either, after you got to know me.”

“The way I feel about you has nothing to do with liking you. I just have to have you. As for this world of yours, all I ask is that it be different from the one I've known all my life.”

I moved in front of her, lifted her chin, and made her look at me. “You've been in my brain ever since I first saw you. After that night in my cabin I started cutting myself away from Creston and everything connected with it.”

She smiled faintly. “You're a convincing man, Joe.” “It's a deal?”

She nodded. “It's a deal, as you say. Now tell me how you're going to convince Karl.”

That was when we heard the Buick outside. It pulled into the carport beside the cabin and I said, “I won't have to tell you. You can see for yourself.”

Sheldon was surprised to find me there with his wife, but not too much surprised. He said, “Well, Hooper...” then stepped over to the table and put down a brief case and some papers. Maybe he was used to walking into situations like this. He eased into a chair at the table and Paula lay across the bed, her eyes alive, her body, tense.

Sheldon said, “Did you want to see me about something, Hooper?”

“Yes.”

“Well, out with it.”

The way he said it did something to me. A spring snapped. The words came out like pistol shots. “All right Sheldon, here it is. It has to do with you and me and an ex-convict named Bunt Manley. It has to do with a box factory and a thirty-thousand-dollar payroll. Does any of that ring a bell?”

He was surprised this time and showed it.

“I'm afraid I don't know what you're talking about.”

I was impatient now and wanted to get it over with. “Look,” I said, coming toward him. “I know what you and Manley are planning to do. It would scare hell out of you to know how close I came to telling the police. But I didn't. I got to thinking.”

I let it hang, watching Sheldon's face. One second it was red with rage, and then it was gray. Paula sat up on the bed, her mouth half open, looking as though she were going to laugh.

She didn't laugh. After a moment she lay back on her elbows and stared at me, not making a move, not even blinking.

Sheldon's anger was pretty thin when he said, “I think you're crazy, Hooper. I still don't know what you're talking about.”

“Goddamnit! I haven't thought this thing out just for the sake of argument. Get that through your head, will you? I came here to talk business.”

He'd had a pretty bad shock, but he was quick to regain his poise. He began putting things together, slowly at first, and then it came with a rush, like a summer storm, and he had the whole picture.

He looked at me and a suggestion of a sneer began to form at the corners of his mouth.

“You punks,” he said hoarsely. “You all think you can ride luck, nothing but luck, to the very top, but you never think of the long fall down. Eavesdropping must be very interesting, Hooper. You must hear some interesting things in these cabins, even some profitable things, maybe, although I doubt that you have the brains or imagination to bring them off.”

I almost hit him. He was big and in good condition, but I could have taken him. But I didn't. I snapped a steel trap on my temper and held it.

I said, “I think we should talk business.”

“With a punk like you, Hooper?” He looked as though he might laugh, but didn't. Instead, he dropped back into his chair and sat there looking at me, shaking his head.

I said, “There's thirty thousand dollars in that factory, Sheldon. That's ten thousand a man, not bad for about an hour's work.”

I could see that he wasn't going for it. He wasn't the kind to let himself be pushed into a thing he didn't like. My ground was falling out from under me.

Then I noticed the papers that Sheldon had put on the table, and I could see, what they were. There was a detailed diagram of the factory layout, streets and highway, and there were other sketches that I took to be diagrams of the office interior and warehouse. I took a step forward and scooped up a fistful of the papers. When I straightened up I was looking into the muzzle of a .38.

It was a Police Special. Most of the bluing had been worn off around the muzzle and the front sight had been filed off even with the barrel. In Sheldon's brown hand it looked businesslike and deadly.

“Those papers,” he said, holding out his free hand.

“You've already talked to Manley, haven't you?” I said. “You didn't like the way he laid it out, so you called off the job.”

I studied that pistol for one long second, then handed him the papers.

“You punks,” he said again. “I don't know anyone named Manley. I don't know anything about a box factory. I'm just a tourist who made the mistake of spending the night in this rat trap of yours—and after these papers are burned, you can't prove I'm anything else. Besides, I don't think you'll holler cop, Hooper. You'd have a bit of explaining to do yourself.”

He smiled.

The robbery
 
couldn't
 
be called off! My whole future was built on this one thing, this one night. Without its support, all my tomorrows would come crashing down.

“Look.” I hardly recognized the voice as my own. Sheldon still had that pistol in his hand, but I ignored it now. “Look,” I said again, and stepped right in front of him, right in front of the muzzle of that gun, “look at these sketches.” I grabbed them from his hand, scattered them out on the table. Then, with one sweep, I brushed them all on the floor. “I told you I was here to talk business,” I said. Get me some paper and a pencil, and I'll prove it.”

For one long moment he did nothing. I could see a thousand things going on behind his eyes, like lemons and plums and bells whirling past the windows of a slot machine. Paula still lay back on her elbows, staring with a kind of dumb fascination.

Then, at last, things stopped happening behind Sheldon's eyes. I heard the soft sound of breath whistling between his teeth. There was a little click as he switched the safety on that .38, then he slipped the pistol into his waistband and said, “Get it for him, Paula. Pencil and paper.”

Paula got up lazily, almost bored now that the moment of tenseness was over. She got several sheets of note paper and a fountain pen out of one of the suitcases and brought them over to the table. Sheldon didn't say a thing. He just waited. I picked up the pen and went to work.

I had the inside of that office and warehouse and garage down perfectly. I had stepped them off, I even had the approximate dimensions. I put it all on paper and shoved it over for Sheldon to look at.