The Kidnapper (9 page)

I had quite a time getting Mary to put in that stuff about how it happened.

“Shirley Mae will tell them it wasn’t a blue Ford,” she said. “And she saw Specs—she knows he isn’t bald or old like you said.”

I calmed her down. “That all helps to get them confused,” I told her. “And the more confused they are, the better.”

Then I put her letter in an envelope and had her address it to the Warrens. I put an airmail stamp on it. After that I got a sheet of paper and stuck two bits to it with Scotch tape. I took her letter and the paper and put it in another big envelope, to go to this box number in New Orleans where they mail stuff out again for you. I had the ad clipping in my pocket.

“Let me see, now,” I said. “If this goes out tonight it should get to New Orleans on Monday morning. They mail it right back, airmail, and the Warrens’ll have it Tuesday afternoon or Wednesday morning at the latest.”

“But you can’t mail it tonight!”

“Why not?” I asked. “There’s a box right down at the crossroads. I saw it when I came in.”

“You wouldn’t leave me here alone with Shirley Mae, I couldn’t bear it.”

“Shirley Mae’s asleep in the back seat. I’ll just take her with me. Only be gone ten or fifteen minutes.”

“Steve, let me come with you. I’m scared to be alone.”

I took her by the shoulders. “Listen to me, Mary. You and I been through a lot of things together already, and one thing I’ve noticed. You’re not chicken. That’s why I go for you. So don’t spoil it now. In the first place, nothing’s going to happen while I’m gone. And I don’t want to risk the kid seeing you—I’m just thinking of how to protect you.”

“You’re sure it won’t take long?”

“Positive. You just sit tight, read one of those magazines I brought you till I get back. The house’ll be locked.”

I walked over to the door. “Maybe I’ll bring you back a surprise,” I said. “So don’t worry if I’m gone a few minutes longer.”

She nodded. I went out and locked the door behind me.

Then I went into the garage.

All of a sudden it had come to me, what I could do about the kid. It had come to me fast, and I knew I had to do it, fast.

Reading up on all these cases in the library had helped. One of the big mistakes I noticed all along was what they did with the bodies, most of them. Like burying them out in the woods, or under cement, or just tossing them in the lake or something. Sooner or later the cops always find them, and there’s always clues. That’s how kidnapers get caught.

The worst part about finding the body is that then they know for sure the kid is dead, and the heat is really turned on. Everybody goes crazy: parents, police, the FBI, and the whole damn country. The way the papers play it up, you’d think kids weren’t getting killed every day by reckless drivers and stuff. Anyhow, they start a real manhunt then, and that makes it tough. If they find the body.

But if they don’t find it, there’s always some hope left. And they’re a little more careful what they say or do.

That would help, if I could get rid of the kid so they wouldn’t run across her.

If I did it now, Mary wouldn’t see her, and that would help, too. Sooner or later she was going to have to know, but I could handle her. Just so she never saw the kid. I knew how sick it had made me, and I could just imagine what it would do to Mary.

So I was glad I’d thought of a way. And right now was my chance, if I could find what I was looking for.

I went out to the garage, closed the door, and I found it.

A twenty-gallon oil drum, sitting in the corner.

I pried the lid off. It was on tight, and that was good. The drum was dry and empty, in good shape. I kicked the sides in, dented it up all I could without folding it.

Then I went around to the back seat of the car.

It was awful, getting her into that drum. The drum was big enough, but her arms and legs wouldn’t fit. And I had to do it. I had to do it, and I did it.

By the time I finished I was sweating, my clothes were wringing wet, and my hands shook so I could scarcely jam the lid back on. I looked around until I found a wrecking bar and I pounded the lid tight shut, bending the edges.

Then I put the drum in the back seat and drove off. I hoped Mary wouldn’t notice how long I took before I got the car out, or hear the pounding. But it couldn’t be helped.

Nothing could be helped now, and I had to keep going. I had to keep going the right way, all the way. If I stopped, they’d catch up to me. And that meant the rope.

I drove ninety to the crossroads, parked next to the box and dropped off the letter.

Then I climbed back in and headed up the highway. I didn’t put her up past fifty, now, because I was looking for something.

The night was dark and there wasn’t any traffic to speak of. That suited me perfect. But it made it hard to see. I had to go four or five miles before I found what I’d been hoping to find.

It was back off the highway on a little gravel road, maybe half a mile. Near the town of Richmond. Just a big old abandoned gravel pit of some kind, heaped up with stuff inside and all around. The town of Richmond dump.

I drove in, cutting my lights, and turned around so I wouldn’t have to back out. Then I got out and lugged the drum over to a pile right on the edge. I wedged it in between a rusty bedspring and some busted fenders and stuff nobody would ever come looking for. I didn’t shove it down into the pit because it might come open. Besides, I read somewheres that the best way to hide things is to leave them right out in the open, where you wouldn’t expect to find them.

The beat-up old can looked plenty natural lying there, so I left it and drove away.

Then I came back to the crossroads and stopped at the tavern there. I picked up a bottle of whiskey and a bunch of cokes. There was a big Friday night crowd at the bar and nobody paid any attention to me.

I was back and parked in the garage in twenty-seven minutes, flat.

Mary was standing at the door when I unlocked it.

“Steve, I was so worried—everything all right?”

“Perfect. I mailed it. The kid slept through it all and nobody spotted us.”

“What took you so long?”

“I had to get this.” I held up the whiskey and the bag full of coke. “I told you I’d bring a surprise. You and I are gonna forget all about worrying the rest of tonight. Get out some glasses and let’s have a party.”

We had our party.

She still wasn’t used to drinking, and it didn’t take much to get her going. The liquor loosened her up, and I kept her glass filled. She began talking about what we’d do in Florida, and after a while she got high.

That’s what I wanted to see, because she forgot her troubles then.

But I didn’t forget. Even liquor wouldn’t help me, now, and I only had a few to keep her going.

Pretty soon she was sitting on my lap and pawing me, but I kept telling her to wait awhile and I kept feeding her more drinks.

Finally she passed out and I carried her into the bedroom. That was what I wanted. I couldn’t have had anything to do with her tonight, the way I felt.

I just lay there in bed, thinking about tomorrow. I had a lot to think about, and I didn’t want to go to sleep anyway because I was afraid of what might happen if I slept.

Along about the time it was getting light outside I couldn’t keep my eyes open any longer. I dozed off, and sure enough, it happened just like I’d been afraid it would.

They’d been waiting for me all along. I was too smart for them as long as I stayed awake, but when I slept they could find me. Find me and catch me.

They came after me, then, all of them. The cops and the sheriff and the FBI men and then the prosecuting attorney and the jury. They were bad, all of them were bad. But the worst guy was the last one, the man with the rope.

Chapter Eleven

A
fter the dreams, I really slept. The first I came to was when Mary started shaking me.

“Steve, wake up! Wake up, it’s almost noon!”

I opened my eyes. She was sitting on the side of the bed. Her hair was all messed and she looked like hell.

“How do you feel?”

“My head aches.”

“Hangover. I’ll fix that. Let me get you some coffee.”

“After a while. But you better go look after Shirley Mae, first.”

I jumped out of bed. “You’re right, I forgot! I’ll take her some milk.”

“Eggs, too. And change those handkerchiefs and things. The poor little thing, I’ll bet she’s scared stiff. Let me go with you. Steve, please.”

I shook my head. “It’s tough, Mary, but we can’t take the chance. I’ll look after her. She’ll be all right.”

I went out and fried up a couple of eggs and got out some more milk.

“Here, you fix for us,” I told Mary. “I won’t be long.”

Then I went to the garage. This time I looked over the car. The back seat was clean, but I turned the light on and brushed it out. Then the front seat. I got a rag and wiped the door-handles, everything. No sense slipping up on the details now.

After that I dumped the eggs and the milk into a paint can. I’d make sure of getting rid of that later, too.

Then I sat down in the car and had a smoke. I was feeling better because I had a hunch the worst was over. Not seeing the kid helped. Once she was gone it was almost as if she’d never been there, in a way.

All I had to think about now was the money. But in order to get the money, I had to handle Mary. That part I didn’t look forward to.

I went back to the house then. Mary had everything ready.

“How is she this morning?”

“Fine. I changed handkerchiefs. Her hands aren’t bad.”

“Did she talk? Did she ask about me?”

“No. She wanted to go home. I told her in a day or two.”

“What’re we going to do, Steve? I’m worried about her staying all that time out there.”

“Only a couple of days. It won’t hurt her.”

“Did she go?”

“What do you mean? Oh, yeah. In a can.”

“Oh, Steve, that’s awful! That poor little—”

“Drink your coffee and shut up. You’ll feel better.”

“I can’t. What if she gets sick, what if something would happen to her?”

I took a deep breath.

“All right, what if something did?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, let’s face it. Suppose the worst came to the worst and she died.”

“Steve! Don’t even talk like that!”

“I’m going to talk like that for a minute, Mary. This is important. You never know in things like this what might happen next. So let’s suppose something did happen to her.”

“I’d never forgive myself, never.”

“It would be tough, yes.” I walked around the table and put my hands on her shoulders. “But that’s not the problem, whether
you
forgive yourself or not. The problem is, nobody else is liable to forgive us whether she’s all right or whether she isn’t. Either way, if we get caught, we swing for it.”

I felt her shudder all over. “Oh, I wish we’d never started this in the first place. I shouldn’t have listened to you, I must have been crazy—”

“Think straight for a minute, will you?” I rubbed her shoulders. Looking down at her I could see the brown part at the roots of her hair. She’d washed and put on her makeup and she looked all right now, in one of the new slips I’d bought her. But I still didn’t feel like touching her—only I knew I had to. It was the only way.

I kept talking. “You weren’t crazy. You went in on this deal because you love me, remember? And because we’re going to go away together. We’re going to be rich, you and I. We’ll make out. As long as you don’t go soft on me. If you do, we’re cooked.”

“I won’t go soft on you, darling. You know that.”

I ran my hands down over her neck and shoulders. “Whatever happens, just remember there’s the two of us. That’s what we’re doing this for, that’s the big thing.”

I pulled her up out of the chair, held her facing me. My hands dug in. She looked up at me and came close.

“Which reminds me. You still owe me something for passing out last night.”

“Oh, Steve—”

“Come on,” I said. My heart was pounding, my stomach was turning over, but this was the only way. Then maybe I could tell her and she’d take it.

I made myself go ahead and grab her. Rough, the way she liked it. I kissed her so that she cut her lip, and then she closed her eyes and went limp.

Then we were in the bedroom, and I was kissing her again, and she was breathing hard.

All at once, just when I figured she was set, she opened her eyes. She stared right up at me and stopped me cold.

“Steve,” she said. “Shirley Mae—she’s dead, isn’t she?”

I was so surprised, I couldn’t think what to say. So I told her. I told her the truth, all of it.

She listened, and there was nothing in her face. Nothing. And when I finished, still nothing.

“Don’t you understand?” I whispered. “I didn’t hurt her. She did it herself. It was an accident, just one of those things that happen. Nobody’s to blame.”

She said, “What did you do with her?”

“I won’t tell you that. I took her someplace, last night. Someplace where they’ll never find her. Oh, I know how you feel, because it’s the same way with me. But it can’t be helped, now. We’ve got to go through with it.”

Maybe it was because she had no expression on her face, maybe it was on account of the blonde hair—whatever it was, she looked like a stranger, lying there. And when she spoke, she sounded like a stranger to me.

“Steve.”

“Yes, Mary.”

“Do you love me?”

I bent over, looking at the stranger. The stranger in a strange house, in a strange bed, in a world where everything was strange and unreal to me now.

“You’ve got to tell me, Steve, because it’s important. Do you love me?”

It was important, all right. I knew that. So I stared right back at her and at last I got it out.

“Yes, Mary. I love you.”

Then she smiled. She closed her eyes. She pulled my head down.

I knew it was going to be all right, then.

Chapter Twelve

“S
teve! Wake up!”