Wild (10 page)

I
FELT BEAT.

I was groggy and my head ached. It was badly swollen in spots, and the spots were sore to the touch. When I looked out of my eyes, it was as if I wore dark blinders at the edges. There was that tired feeling of car upholstery and dust, mingled with perfume and a lingering odor of cognac. My feet burned. I wasn’t hungry, but if I didn’t get some coffee down quick, I would probably just sit here for the rest of the week.

I got out of the car and walked across the lawn, picked up the newspaper, and came back. I lit a cigarette, creaked in under the steering wheel, rolled the rubber band off the paper and snapped it out into the grass. The cigarette tasted like the odor of sunburned seaweed.

At the bottom of the first page, a headline caught my eye. A new body had been found. Barton Yonkers’ bank-robbing buddy. He was very, very dead.

The remainder of the yarn dealt with the warden’s apologies to the press for not stating how Yonkers made good his escape past bars, guards, and walls. Until plans could be made to prevent any similar future escape, this information would be withheld.

I refolded the paper, tossed it out on the lawn, started the car, and drove away from there. By now the city department, and the sheriff’s department, were both concerned with my whereabouts. Doubtless every on-duty cruiser had been ordered to skip drive-in coffee breaks and be on the lookout. Vagas was wise to Ivor Hendrix being my possible tie-in. Hoagy Stills had jeopardized his job for me.

I felt a sudden sense of guilt over not trying to locate Ivor Hendrix earlier.

I drove through morning overhang to my apartment. Crossing Fourth Street, I saw a police car headed in the opposite direction. I took the bayside road toward Bahama Shores. The sun was coming up hot and yellow over Tampa Bay.

If one of them hadn’t moved to look at his wrist watch so his elbow jutted past the apartment house entrance, I would have driven by and they would have spotted me. It was Steifer’s elbow, in the light-colored sports jacket. Still on duty, he would be in a rage.

I made a U-turn, parked on the shoulder beside some cabbage palms, and watched. There were three uniformed cops, Steifer, and Vagas. Probably two more upstairs, and maybe another on the rear fire escape.

I left, stopped at a grocery store with a small lunch counter. After two phone calls, I located
The Carol
, Elk Crafford’s boat, at the Calcutta Shores Yacht Club. I drank two cups of coffee, ate a packaged ham sandwich that tasted as if it belonged between the leaves of an old family Bible, and drove away.

I booted the car south, avoiding cruiser routes, and stopped to waste time and have another cup of coffee in White City. I found myself staring at a phone booth with a feeling of stupidity.

I put through a long distance call to Mrs. Elizabeth Haskins, in Orlando. There was a short wait. It was getting on toward nine o’clock. Finally the operator called back with my party.

“Mrs. Elizabeth Haskins?”

“Ye
-us?”

I told her my name, and said I was a friend of Carl’s. “Just got into town, and remembered him mentioning your name. Wondered if you could tell me where they live? I’d like to visit them.”

She gave me the Pine Park trailer address in a thick, giggly, Southern voice, full of fried yams, hammocks and honeysuckle.

“How is Carl?” I said.

“Oh, land. I haven’t laid sight on Carl in some time. It must be—well, a long, long while.”

“And Ivor? Still as pretty as ever?”

“Ivor? Oh, you mean his wife? My, my—I ‘clare, I’ve never even
met
the girl. Pretty, you say? My, my—I ‘clare. Do tell me about—oh, but you haven’t seen them in a spell, either? I don’t know what’s getting into me. What did you say your name was?”

“That’s all right, Mrs. Haskins. Thanks a lot.”

“You just might …”

“Yeah. That’s what I figure. G’by.”

I walked away. I felt a little crazy. As if somebody had bored slowly into my head with an awl, or chopped it with an adz, or whatever they use to work on old hard skulls with.

Nearly a month in Orlando with Carl’s aunt.

I
T WAS
a long green Florida morning. Tampa Bay was a valley of diamonds. I drove to Calcutta Shores and argued my way past the white linen suit with the black-billed cap at the entrance gate, then tooled my bruised Stude warily into the parking area among the Continentals, Cads, and Imperials. There was no sign of copper. I saw nothing of the Crafford pink Cad.

Another linen suit skipped up to me, courtsied, and toothed brightly about free gin and dandy-fine morning pick-me-up coconut milk and brandy at the “fabulously fascinating” inside bar.

“No thanks,” I said. “Just finished breakfast.”

That brought an understanding wink. Was I a new member of the club? No, I wasn’t. I had been invited to partake of their luxurious layout by Mr. Elk Crafford.

The linen suit flew away.

I hid the car behind a cluster of bamboo and walked down the sloped lawn.

Glittering golden masts and sails like folded napkins tilted and tipped in rhythmic counterpoint beyond the calculated carpet of trained grass and white sea wall. Slim, varnished piers, like well manicured fingers, lay in the water between rows of colorful boats; blues, greens, reds, yellows, brass and high-varnished mahogany.

Darkly tanned men and women moved with a kind of nervous earnestness among tables and beach chairs. They grinned a lot. Most of them held drinks in their hands. It was never too early.

A pretty, dark-haired girl with a coffee tan, wearing a cream swimsuit, ran up the slope. She had a sleek body, gorgeous legs, golden toenails.

“Excuse me,” I said as she veered past.

She paused, raised her eyebrows, said, “Hmm-m-m?” and smiled at me. Her fingernails were golden, too, but her lips were red.

“Wonder if you know the
Carol?”

“Oh?” She turned and looked down at the boats, then aimed her blue gaze at me. “You mean Elk’s tub.” She gave a crystal laugh, then said, “Over there, darling.” She held her right hand close to her breast and bent her forefinger into a hook, pointing. “See?”

“Afraid not.”

She moved closer with a quick glance and put her left arm around me and placed her soft right arm against my cheek, lining her finger up so I could take aim.

“You need a shave,” she said. Her voice was like brandy at midnight. “Now, right there, darling. Second pier. Just past Duane’s Chris-Craft. Got it now?”

I saw the
Carol
. The girl did not move her arm. Finally she did, watching me soberly.

I said, “Maybe you’ll let me buy you a drink after a while—sometime.” I gestured vaguely.

She smiled. Somewhere a star went out. “Sorry, darling. It’s quite impossible. I’m all taken up.” She turned and ran off along the slope.

I watched her. She was having trouble with her swimsuit. It only took me a minute to learn how to walk again.

• • •

The pier echoed under my feet. I passed a small, trim outboard, tied to the pier, red paint blazing in bright sunlight. Beyond the sun, the sky was a mountain range of bloated black cloud.

The
Carol
was tied bow in. Her stern was anchored diagonally out from the pier’s end. A narrow gangplank was secured to the bow, moving faintly in a swell. I heard Ivor Hendrix talking from the cabin.

There was fright in her voice.

A float, loaded with piled fish net and two large barrels, swung at anchor beside the schooner. I jumped from the pier, landed on the float, knelt beside the pile of reeking net. The boat’s shadow covered me.

“No,” Ivor Hendrix said. “I don’t want to.” She paused for some time. I realized she was speaking over the telephone. Wires led to the
Carol
from a pier-box on a pole. Her tone was close to strident. “Never mind, I tell you—no.

I knelt there. I rubbed a numb spot on my forehead. The story of my life: picking up murder’s refuse, like dried, bloody feathers fluttering through bright sunlight.

She said, “Vine tree?” and her voice lowered with a sly tinge. “Yes, that’s all right, then. Certainly. You know me better than that. Yes, all right.”

I knelt there, hidden by the barrels and the fish net, waiting. Who else was aboard with her? Elk?

I heard her hang up. Silence.

I waited.

I thought I heard her moan, very softly.

I stared into the water over the side of the float. A large, crazy-eyed fish surfaced, took one long look at me, bubbled, and dove flashing for home.

I
CAME ABOARD
like a cat in the night. There was no sound from below.

The companionway hatch was hooked open. The
Carol
rode the swell, creaking. She was varnished, cared for, her brass glinting. An empty whisky bottle chinked back and forth in the center of rolled hawser. A gull leaned and necked and billed on a loosely swinging boom.

“Who’s that?”

Her voice sounded as if somebody had a knife-tip at her belly. I waited.

“Who’s there?”

Still on cat feet, like Chicago’s fog, I neared the companionway. I stood so my shadow wouldn’t fall below.

I could hear her breathing and peeked below. She stood three feet from the end of the steps, leaning across a bunk. She was looking out a port, one hand with the fingers clenched beside her cheek.

I grabbed the ledge atop the companionway, swung in, and dropped two feet from her. She was alone.

She whirled, slapped both hands to her face, and started to scream. She recognized me. She moved back and sat down on the bunk.

“Who was on the phone?” I said.

“Thank God, it’s you.”

“Who was on the phone?”

“Elk—my sister’s husband. He wondered if I was all right. I was telling him I had to leave here.”

She still wore the sheath dress of the night before. It was rust-colored. She had on a pair of tan pumps. Her hair was brushed to a coppery sheen, thick and rich. She did not look hung over. She did look scared. Her eyes kept roving toward the port through which, beyond the pier, you could see the green slope of lawn, with the men and women strolling, drinking.

There was a bunk opposite hers. I sat on it and stared at her, hearing the morning silence. Her fingers betrayed her nervousness. I looked at her face, the faintly slanted eyes, the sad, frightened mouth, and some of my irritation vanished.

I said, “I just talked with Elizabeth Haskins.”

“You did?”

I nodded. “She said she’s never met you.”

She lifted one hand slowly and covered her lips with the tips of her fingers. She shook her head, and said, “I’m sorry.” She lowered the hand. “I know what you must think. I forgot to say anything about that. I’d told her to tell anyone who called that she’d never met me, that I’d never been there. It was because of Vince.” She hesitated. “And I think it was a little because of Carl, too. I was afraid—I’m still more frightened now.” She moved her head slowly from side to side. “I’m terribly sorry—I should have told you.”

“Forget it.”

“I can call her, now,” she said. “You can talk with her, with me right here. She’ll explain.”

“Never mind. How come you’re scared now? What’s happened?”

The telephone was on a sunken bookshelf at the foot of the bunk she sat on. She looked at the telephone.

“Somebody called—here. Just before I talked with Elk. It was a man. He said he was helping Carl, that Carl was in a jam, and that I knew it. He said he was coming to get me, to take me to Carl. He said Carl was fed up with what I was doing—he was going to put a stop to it, once and for all.” She paused. “He was frightening.”

“How.”

“The way he talked.”

“What’d he say Carl wanted you for?”

She stood up quickly with her hands clasped together and said in a small, tense voice that was close to hysteria, “I don’t know,” and sat down again.

“How would they know you’re here?”

“I don’t know that, either. He said it wouldn’t do any good to try and hide any more.”

She looked trapped and fearful.

“That all the man said?”

She nodded rapidly.

“You didn’t talk with Carl? No idea where he is?”

She shook her head.

“Why did you come here with Elk?”

“I asked him to take me someplace. I was going to have him take me to the motel. Then, I don’t know, it frightened me—I asked him if I could stay here on the
Carol
, for the night. He didn’t ask any questions. He left me here. I slept here—I felt safer here.” She stared at her hands, moved her thumbs around, then looked up at me. “I didn’t want to stay in that house. She said a lot of awful things.”

“I can imagine.”

“I’m sorry about last night. It’s—I can’t explain why I did what I did. I drank too much. Then it seemed as if the only right thing to do was go see Vince, because he’d asked to see me. And then—”

“Then what?”

“You know what. You were there.”

“You remember what you said when you were lying on the bed?”

She nodded. “I don’t feel wrong about what I said, then.”

“Have you heard anything from Carl?”

“No.” She paused. “Only what I told you.”

“Where did Elk go after he left you last night?”

“I have no idea. He only stayed a few minutes. I don’t know where he went.”

“He didn’t go home.”

“No? How—oh.”

“How, oh, what?”

“Nothing.”

“I was staked out across the street,” I lied. “Waiting for you to come back.”

“Did you go to my motel?”

“That’s not—” I stopped talking. She was looking past my shoulder as she spoke.

“There’s a policeman out there.”

I turned and glanced through the port. Beyond the pier, a police cruiser had parked by the edge of the green lawn. The morning was gray now, the sun was gone. Two harness cops were talking with the man on the lawn. They had obviously traced Crafford through Hendrix’s name, made a routine check at the Calcutta Shores Yacht Club, and discovered my car. It would be that simple.

I turned back to Ivor Hendrix, quickly explained the situation. “If they get me now, I’m finished in this town,” I told her. “Done. I won’t stand a chance because I can’t come up with anything yet. I don’t know any answers. They’re ready to finish me off. If they get you, I won’t be able to help you. Christ knows how long they’ll hold you, what you’ll have to go through. I’m not sure how they operate here. I have an idea, and it’s not good. It’s up to you. I’ve got to run for it—somehow. Will you chance it with me?”

For a moment she couldn’t speak. I knew I’d have to do the best I could, try to find out anything else I could, and lay the whole mess on Haddock’s desk, and hope for the best. There was no other way.

She would have to come with me.

“There’s an outboard a few feet down the pier,” I said. “We might stand a chance. They’re looking for me, not you. If we walk quietly—and together—we might make it.”

“I don’t want to stay here. I’m frightened sick of Carl.”

I shoved her ahead of me. We came out on the deck. One of the harness bulls was standing by the clubhouse door. They still weren’t wise to the
Carol
. Another cruiser turned into the parking area. They had the bit on the radio already. Then I saw the girl in the cream-colored swimsuit walking slowly across the lawn toward the cops. She would spill fast.

We came off the gangplank and down to the pier. I felt Ivor Hendrix stiffen.

“My purse,” she said. “I’ve got to go back. I forgot it.”

“There’s no time.”

“I want it.”

She twisted free and ran up the gangplank, the tight skirt of the sheath dress snagging in the hollows of her knees, her firm round hips undulant. I shot a look over at the lawn. The cops still weren’t coming this way. I could feel my heart rock. I went back aboard the
Carol
, taking the gangplank in two strides. She had vanished through the companionway.

The sky was dirty. A slow wind came in across Tampa Bay, like the hot breath of an eager woman. I started toward the companionway. My foot kicked something that rang on the deck. It was a small brass key, glinting against the mahogany. I reached for it, then pocketed it fast just as Ivor Hendrix came into view again, the white cylindrical purse swinging in her hand.

We made the pier and walked slowly. One of the cops stood looking our way, his arms folded, rocking on his heels. He couldn’t make out who we were at this distance.

The girl in the cream-colored suit paused as another cop called to her, moved toward her, talking.

I said, “Easy, now. We’ve got to make that red outboard. Jump for it. Make it look as normal as possible. I’ll unhook the line. Get up in the bow.”

She didn’t speak. We reached the boat. She jumped, landed rocking wildly. Water splashed over the sides.

“Hey, there!” one of the cops called. He walked slowly toward the pier. The cop talking with the girl, turned, gave a yell and ran toward the sea wall.

“Sit tight,” I said.

I snagged the line, whipped it free, and leaped into the boat. If the motor didn’t catch, we were sunk. The sound of that motor would be my excuse later on.

I shoved away from the pier, grabbed the starting rope. I tried to make it all look as ordinary as possible. Very likely it looked like two people trying to escape the police. I whipped the starting rope. The motor coughed twice.

“Hey!” a cop called.

The motor caught, roared violently. I shoved the throttle hard over. The motor blasted into the graying day.

The two cops ran toward the pier. Ivor Hendrix was facing me, clutching the sides with white-knuckled hands, the white purse pinned between her bare knees.

The boat lay on its side as I turned and picked up speed. We walloped the water of the bay, clearing the pier, running close in against the side of the
Carol
. I glanced back. They were running along the pier, waving. One of them had drawn his gun. He wouldn’t use it. They would never be certain I’d heard them call.

In no time at all every beach entrance would be watched. They’d have the Coast Guard ‘copter out looking for this red outboard.

I felt trapped now. I had to come up with something, and fast. Otherwise, they would eventually find me, and whatever plans I’d had for this town would go up the flue like thin black soot. My chance to locate Hendrix was gone. Whoever was coming for Ivor could have led me to her husband. I’d been unable to take that route.

She sat there watching me, clutching the sides of the boat, her hair gusting in snarls around her pale face, her skirt twisted up across the smooth white thighs.

We approached a narrow finger of land. I cut in around that. Through trees, I saw a road. A police cruiser tore along the road, siren wailing, headed toward Maximo Point. I cut in close to shore. The car vanished. The motor was still wide open.

Out here we were vulnerable. We raced violently past fishing piers now. Suddenly the shoreline changed to jungle. I saw the opening of a mangrove-clotted bayou. I swung in there.

Choppy water changed to grass, and we vaulted snags and roared under a bridge. I slowed the motor, staying well in to shore. Another cruiser flashed across the bayou bridge.

We were on the south side of town. The shoreline changed, and I saw homes set back among trees; the jungle landscape turned to cared-for lawn.

I veered the boat toward a vacant lot, ran it aground. Ivor Hendrix cried out, flipped backward, and sprawled off the seat. Her long legs flashed awry. She righted herself, and we leaped over the side together, landing on silty ground. Fiddler crabs scrambled in rustling waves for their burrowlike homes.

It had been a long time since I’d lived in this town. I remembered this area as pure jungle. It had changed. I didn’t know exactly where we were. We ran up across somebody’s front lawn and reached a pink cement road.

“We’ll have to find a phone,” I said.

She breathed heavily, her face sheened with perspiration. The auburn hair was darker at the temples, thickly snarled. I knew people along the bayou would report the red outboard, because the police would probably be airing this on TV.

I said, “We’ll use a phone in somebody’s home. I’ll get a cab and take you someplace. Another motel—that’ll give me a little time, anyhow.”

We approached a long low white house with a Volkswagon sitting in the gravel drive. I thought of stealing the car. It wouldn’t turn the trick.

I rang the bell on the front porch. Ivor Hendrix did quick things to her hair and brushed with finicky strokes at dirt on her skirt.

I experienced a brief moment of dark futility, like being shot at from point-blank range. Then I was all right.

A middle-aged man carrying a newspaper, wearing khaki walking shorts, horn-rimmed glasses, and smoking a pipe, answered the door.

“Could we use your phone?” I said. “Car broke down. I was going to walk to a garage, but there doesn’t seem….”

“No garage around here,” he said. “Sure. Come in.”

We went inside. Ivor Hendrix was as nervous as a cat. She bumped into the corner of a table, gasped, and the man looked at her. He showed me the phone and stood there, banging the newspaper against his leg, blowing smoke.

I called a cab. They said they would be right out. We started for the door. Her eyes were like broken glass.

“Why don’t you wait here?”

“Thanks. We’ll wait outside.”

We went out and crossed the drive and moved down to the curb. We stood under the fragrant shade of a camphor tree, and she leaned back against the trunk, avoiding my eyes, gripping the white purse with both hands, her teeth nibbling her lower lip.

“I keep thinking of Vince,” she said. “I can’t seem to forget how he looked, lying there. I keep thinking everything’s my fault. I can’t get it out of my head. I tried to be a good wife to Carl—it didn’t work. What could have happened to him? What’s he trying to do? Where is he?”

“Money changes people,” I said. “Four hundred thousand dollars is a lot of money. That’s what’s behind all this. The rest doesn’t matter. Everything else was just a kind of fuse. It’s curious, though, how things happen to people who are ripe for it.”

Her eyes widened. “How do you mean that?”

I shrugged. “Everybody I’ve run into on this thing has been sitting on a keg of emotional dynamite.”

“Me, too?”

“You, too. Everybody has his own little world. What he forgets is that sometimes his world has windows. Others like to look in and watch.”

“You think the Laketown robbery really has something to do with this?”

“I know it,” I said. “The trouble is, that’s about all I do know. Vince Gamba was trying to tell me he thought he knew where money was buried. What money? The four hundred thousand dollars? All I can figure is, whoever had it doesn’t have it any more. Somebody else has it, and maybe has buried it. But why would they kill him—unless it was so he wouldn’t talk. Maybe he talked first. Maybe the money isn’t buried any more. Maybe it was never buried. Who knows?”