The Murderer Vine (23 page)

He would puzzle his head about it. He would probably connect it with the most unusual thing that had happened recently, and that would be my appearance looking for watermelons. But he would also know that I’m a nice Canadian and a friend of the sheriff’s: wasn’t I down the night before at the Catfish Club lapping it up with the boys?

Since he was so stubborn, he’d hate to tell anyone about it. But after a day or so he’d give up and tell the sheriff. Wasn’t it the sheriff who arranged for the murders and the burial? So off to the sheriff he’d go.

The sheriff would be smarter. He would most likely think it unlikely that I was involved. The sheriff in turn would kick it around for a couple days. He’d try out his conjure man theory. But since there were several in the county, and since they all kept themselves well-behaved — except maybe Old Man Mose, who had hosted the three boys — he’d be sort of paralyzed.

That Old Man Mose would do such a thing he’d find most unreasonable. People in subjection their whole lives don’t suddenly go around looking for trouble. So he’d drop that line of approach.

But it would trouble him. He’d kick it around a few days, hating to take it upward to A.B.C. People hate to pass bad news to a superior. The superior gets mad at the news, and some of the anger rubs off on the poor guy who brings them gloomy messages.

And sooner or later he’d go to A.B.C. And A.B.C. himself would order a quiet little check on me. It was simple common sense. He probably would use those two nice ol’ country boys who’d been kicked out of Thailand for excess enthusiasm. They’d report there
was
a Harold Wilson at McGill, all right. If they weren’t too careful.

I might be marked okay. So they’d look elsewhere, probably backtracking on Old Man Mose.

But by then — and that would take about two weeks — I’d be four or five days out of the country, buried so deep they’d never find me.

It looked good. The whole situation looked good.

And the juju would shake them up. I’d like that. When things get turbulent, the bottom gets stirred up. Things come up. I’d make sure to hang around the boys as soon as I got back from New York. Sometimes a watched pot boils.

I took one last look at my work. It didn’t look like anything a nice Canadian fellow might do. But I had no time to lounge around and admire my work. I ran through the pine woods. I came out of the underbrush bordering the road just as Kirby rounded the curve a hundred yards ahead. I got in fast and crouched down in the back.

We took back roads all the way to Jackson. We came to the airport by 8
A.M.
I parked next to the terminal and changed in the car to some clean clothes, packed the camera equipment in my suitcase, since I didn’t want anyone noticing that I had a very good camera which could take very good pictures I might not have any right taking.

I bought a ticket on the 8:40 plane to New York via Atlanta. I sat drinking coffee in the airport restaurant with Kirby till it was time to board.

When the announcement came, she kissed me goodbye. “Shall I go home an’ make moan about the awful expense of the trip?” she asked. “An’ how you have to go all the way back to New York to get that damn thing fixed so you can go on with your project?”

“Good idea.”

“To hear is to obey.”

“You’ll cry, then.”

“Oh, I’ll cry.”

It was time to board. I lugged on a perfectly good tape recorder. I could see her behind the big plate-glass window. She dug her fists in her eyes pretending to cry. With my forefingers I drew lines from the corners of my eyes downward.

She laughed and waved.

FASTEN SEAT BELTS.
I did and leaned back, relaxed. For the first time in years I had someone who did the right thing at the right time. I could leave her in that dangerous town and go away with full confidence in her ability to handle anything that might come up.

And although I don’t like flying, I found myself whistling as the jet gathered speed for the takeoff. The man on my left glared at me. Tough luck, buddy.

At
10 A.M.
I was ringing Farr’s bell. I rang it five times. No answer. I held my finger on it until he spoke on the intercom.

“Go away,” he said. “Or drop dead. Notice you have two alternatives.”

“Dunne.”

“Oh, the box Brownie man. Come up.”

Upstairs there was someone in his bed. The sheet was pulled over her head, thus revealing her gold-painted toes. He noticed my gaze.

“Last night we thought it was funny,” he said. “You know last nights. Your life is full of last nights.”

“Not lately.” I gave him the three rolls.

“How’d you make out, you think?”

I pointed to the toes.

He leaned over and tugged them. “Out,” he said.

“I wanna stay.”

“Out, honey.”

“I’ll make coffee and cover my tiny ears with my paws, I promise.”

“Oh, Jesus,” I muttered.

Farr became insistent. It finally got up, dressed, and went downstairs sulking. It wasn’t the same one I had seen there last time.

“How come you always get the same type?” I asked.

“You know any normal female who wants to spend her life with her mouth half open, licking her lips so they’ll photograph with highlights?”

“Nope.”

“So don’t ask.”

“The brain that’s attached to that body isn’t very smart.”

“It breathes,” he said, “leaving the mind unconfused. Enough for me. All I want. Want me to develop these right away?”

“Yep.”

“Will you make some coffee?”

“Yeah. I’ll cover my tiny mouth while I do it.”

I made coffee. I sat at the kitchen table drinking and staring at the white walls. I stood up and moved along sipping it. Like most bachelors, he had a quart of milk which had turned sour, like mine always did.

I looked at the beautiful twelve-by-fifteen shot he had made a few years ago of a dark forest in winter with a white mist settling down over it. That was my favorite. The other one I liked was the shot next to it — a little girl into whose hands someone had just placed a baby fox. I smiled at her astounded, ecstatic expression.

When he opened the door of the darkroom, I jumped.

“Well?”

“Not as perfect as I would have made them. But good.”

I let out a sigh.

“Can they be enlarged okay?”

He nodded. I asked him to pick out the best.

“How soon?”

“Twenty minutes,” he said.

He went back in again. I phoned the unlisted number Parrish had given me.

“I’m back.”

“How soon can you be here?”

“Where are you?”

“28 Battery Place.” That was near the southern tip of Manhattan.

“An hour from now.”

“I’ll give orders.”

“One second. My name’s Nelson.”

“Nelson. Right.”

The time to begin laying a smoke screen was now. He hung up.

I drank two more cups of coffee. I looked through Farr’s magazines. I memorized the two photographs on the wall I liked best. The chances were very good that I would never see them again.

He came out with the enlargements.

“A little grainy,” he said, “but seeing the available light you had to put up with, damn good.”

“What do I owe you?”

“For making me chase that furry thing out of my bed, a couple drinks.”

“Right. Thanks.”

“If you see that nudnick having hot chocolate in the luncheonette downstairs, tell her to come back, will you? It takes her about thirty-five minutes to heat up the top of her spinal cord for the day.”

“Her what?”

“The top of her spinal cord. You aren’t listening carefully, Joe. Not like you. She doesn’t have a brain, unlike higher-developed animals like you and me.”

I said goodbye, went down two flights, and went right back up. I said, “I’ve never been here, you haven’t seen me for a couple of months, and as far as that girl is concerned, make up some sort of a plausible lie if she asks about me. Okay?”

“Okay.”

I paused.

“Okay, Joe. I said okay.”

“Yeah, I know.” I hung around a moment; although Farr didn’t know it, it was goodbye forever. I couldn’t let him know. So I finally said, “Well, Bryan, thanks.”

She was sitting in the luncheonette. I went in and jerked my thumb upward.

“Oooo,” she said. “I had three hot chocolates and then I found I didn’t have any money!”

“Surprise.”

“Yes. So can you please loan me sixty cents?”

Such a pathetic little con.

She misunderstood my look.

“Like I’m short.”

Yeah, baby. Short on everything. I gave the counterman a dollar bill. He gave me the change. I shoved the forty cents back. As I turned to go, I saw her pull the coins across the counter. I lifted her hand, shoved the coins back to the counterman, took her elbow, and escorted her outside. I pointed up to Farr’s studio.

“Doncha ever talk?”

The less she knew about me or my voice, the better. The more untypical a description of me she might give, the happier I would be.

She started to say something, but I had just caught the eye of a cruising hackie. He pulled over. I got in. She started to say something again, but I had closed the door. I wasn’t going to give a destination that she might hear.

She poked her head in.

“Say, listen — ” she began. I pushed her head gently and rolled up the window. The hackie watched all this with interest. She began talking through the glass, but I said, “Let’s go.”

“Where to, Jack?”

“Downtown.”

She began to bang on the window.

He took off fast. Halfway down the block I turned around. She was still standing in the street with her hands cupped to her mouth and yelling. I waved. Women were always communicating with me through glass these days.

“Forty Wall,” I said.

When we got there, I gave him a good tip. He deserved it for the jackrabbit start.

Parrish’s office wasn’t at Forty Wall. It was at 28 Battery Place, several blocks away to the west. I got out at Forty Wall, walked into the lobby and out the side entrance. The more misdirection the better, and what cabbies didn’t know didn’t hurt me.

In five minutes I was pressing the elevator button. On the thirty-second floor I told the receptionist my new name for the day. She sent me right in. He met me at the door of his office and looked at the big manila envelope under my arm.

He held out his hand.

“Maybe you better not look,” I said. “Just give them to the dentists.”

“Let’s have them.”

I let him have the envelope. He opened it and slid the photographs onto his desk. That’s the worst part in a missing persons case — when the realization hits that all hope has to be abandoned. But Parrish took it very well.

“I’m going to get in touch with the dentists this afternoon,” he said. “I’ll have my men fly up to Syracuse and to Boston. I’ll let you know by six tonight.”

I went downstairs. Nothing to do till six. I sat on a bench in the Battery and watched the harbor traffic. I ate a hot dog. I took a ferry to the Statue of Liberty. I probably would never have the opportunity to see the lady again.

I ate another hot dog on the way back. I sat among my fellow Americans, drinking the overwatered orangeade and listening to the mothers screaming at the kids trying to climb on the railing.

I went ashore and watched a little kid at a drinking fountain squirting water at pigeons. I watched people with cameras taking pictures of each other. “Hold it,” they cried. “Smile!” The people smiled and exposed their teeth.

I got up and turned my back to the happy tourists. I looked up at the mass of tall buildings across the park. It seemed impossible that there were streets down at their bases big enough for cars and people to wriggle through. Look at the buildings, Dunne. Play with those toy building blocks awhile and get out in one piece. If you’re lucky. And if I had a decent run of luck I’d get out. Hurry back, Parrish. Let’s get this goddam waiting over with.

I bought a bag of stale popcorn. Where was the hot butter and salt they used to have when I was a kid? With the greasy butter staining the paper bag yellow? They gave me a plastic bag and cold popcorn. The hell with those improvements. I thought of those ripe mangoes waiting for me down on the Central American coast and my mouth watered. I ate the popcorn out of boredom. And then it was five to six.

I dumped out the popcorn for the pigeons and walked across the park. I was admitted immediately into his office. As soon as I saw the packet of fifty dollar bills on the desk, I knew I had the right boys.

I picked it up.

“Twenty-five thousand in fifties. I thought you’d find that denomination easier to handle.” The packet was four inches thick. I hefted it.

“Where are the bodies?”

I was prepared for that.

“I’ll let you know as soon as I come to collect the next installment.”

“You don’t trust me?”

“As far as keeping the location to yourself for a week or two more? Frankly, no.”

“I’ll keep it confidential.”

“You might. But I don’t want to imagine that you might get impatient and start off on your own. What you don’t know keeps me a little more relaxed.”

“Suppose — ”

“Suppose I get knocked off while I’m working for you?”

“Yes.”

“Give me a sheet of paper, please.”

He gave me a piece. On it I wrote,
John Cushman, 970 Madison.

“That’s my lawyer. I’ll give him the information in a sealed envelope. I’ll tell him as soon as he is convinced of my death to hand it to you. And he’ll put it in a bank vault, so there’s no point trying to get it from him.”

He looked at me. I picked up the cash and stowed it in various pockets.

Then he shrugged. “Fair enough.”

I took the elevator down.

It wasn’t fair enough at all. J. Cushman existed, and he was a lawyer, and he was at 970. I knew that because I had noticed the name on a brass plate in the lobby. But he wasn’t my lawyer.

I had no intention of getting knocked off in phase two of the operation, to use a clean word for a dirty piece of business — and I was beginning to feel a bit superstitious about assuming I might be. I had never felt that way before, but then I had never killed five people at once for money before.