“DAVE?” HELEN QUERIED TENTATIVELY.
He rolled over on the bed and stared up at her, surprised to see her awake so early. “What is it?”
“I had a dream, Dave. I dreamed my mother came to live with us.”
“No!” He rolled back, burying his head in the pillow. “Go back to sleep and dream me up some fast cash. No dogs or cats or mothers.”
“I can’t help what I dream, Dave.”
“You used to be good, Helen. You used to be damn good. I think you’re losing your touch.”
He was sorry he’d said it, because he saw at once that she was too upset to return to bed. He watched her move aimlessly about the dingy bedroom, searching for her cigarettes, then curl up in the chair by the window and stare at the dawn coming up over Hudson Street. For a moment, seeing her there with her knees up under her chin, he considered making love to her. But then the desire passed, and he closed his eyes against the brightening square of window.
He’d been with Helen Reston for two years or better, ever since they met during an all-night poker game in Kansas City. She was not the best looking girl he had ever known, and certainly not the most intelligent, but she had one gift that was invaluable to a man like Dave Krown. She had a fantastic imagination, and she always remembered her dreams. He’d realized it the very first night they spent together, back in Kansas City, when she had awakened next to him in the morning. “I dreamed you robbed the poker game,” she’d said, as if it was the most natural thing in the world. “Isn’t that crazy?”
“Not so crazy,” he’d said, thinking about it. He had been a big loser and was just about at the end of his wits. That night, he had purchased a second-hand gun, the blue steel revolver he still used, and had gone back to the game with one of Helen’s nylon stockings over his face. They had left Kansas City the next morning seven hundred dollars richer.
Dave needed someone like Helen, someone to come up with ideas, even if they were the stuff of dreams. He was a man utterly without morals or fear, a man to whom brute force and the blue steel revolver under his arm had become the only religion he practiced in a world that rewarded violence with the passing fame of stark headlines and television cameras. With her ideas and his certain skill, they made a team.
The two years had passed like two months, under the sun at Miami Beach, across the continent by jet to California, then to New York, at dog tracks and horse races and poker games. Always where the action was, always where there was a sucker to be rolled or a bankroll to be hijacked. Once before, when Helen’s dreams had started running to dogs and cats, he had parked them in a little motel on the Illinois state line and had gone off to hold up a gas station. The thing had been a disaster from start to finish. He’d gotten five dollars for his trouble and been forced to shoot the over-zealous attendant in the bargain. It was the only time he’d been driven to violence in his career, and he brooded about it for weeks afterward as they fled blindly across the country. He never heard if the youth lived or died, though the wound had been serious.
New York had been their last stop, where Helen dreamt of a robbery at the jewelers’ exchange after three days of wandering with Dave up and down the side streets of Manhattan. He had pulled it off pretty well, and it wasn’t her fault that a fluke of scheduling had made the haul next to worthless.
They’d been living up the Hudson, in the medium-sized city of Seneca, since before Christmas—conserving their money, biding their time, and waiting for the dreams to come again. Some nights Helen worked as a waitress at a nearby lunch counter, and Dave had been doing occasional jobs of auto repair at a garage. It kept them in eating money until their luck changed.
Now, as she sat by the window, Helen asked, “Dave?”
“Huh?”
“Think we’ll get to Miami this winter?”
“Not unless we can scrape up some money. The old car would never make it down there with those tires.”
“I guess my dreams haven’t been so good, honey.” She was always aware of her failings, and conscious of the fact that he somehow held her responsible for their plight.
“That’s all right.” He sat up on the rumpled bed. “I’ve been thinking maybe we should settle down anyway. Give up this business and get a couple of honest jobs. You know, we’d probably make just as much in a year’s time, without half the worry.”
She came over to him. “I like to hear you say that, Dave. I like to think maybe someday I’ll be dreaming about babies and a house in the suburbs instead of holdups and stuff.”
“Got a cigarette?”
“Sure. Before breakfast?”
“I feel like one.” She lit it for him and he inhaled deeply. “But we need one more job, Helen. One more big job so we can head south and start a new life.”
“In these stories on the TV it’s always the last job when the cops catch them.”
“That’s on TV. I know when to quit while I’m ahead. Anyway, think about it, huh? Think about it and maybe something’ll come to you.”
“Yeah.”
They didn’t work that day. Instead, they strolled through the frosty afternoon along the banks of the river, and though the Hudson was no Mississippi, it did bring back memories of their early days together. They stopped at a nearby firehouse to get new license plates for the car, and later, as the city darkened for night, he took her out for a lobster dinner at a restaurant that charged more than they could really afford.
“We’ll just relax,” he said later, back in the room, “and see what tomorrow brings.” The money was running low, and it had been a bit of an added shock to discover that the New York State license plates on his second-hand car were due for replacement.
But he slept well, and didn’t awaken until nearly dawn, when he was aware of Helen padding about the room in her bare feet. “I had a dream,” she said, seeing his open eye watching her. “I dreamed I was back home at mother’s, cleaning the rug, and the vacuum cleaner turned into a snake, and then the snake turned into a lobster and it pinched my foot.”
“That’s no dream,” he mumbled into his pillow. “That’s an upset stomach. Go back to bed.”
When he awoke again the sun was already high in the morning sky, and he knew it was late. Helen was stretched out on her back next to him, still asleep, half uncovered by the milky sheet. But when he turned over she awakened quickly and sat up, rubbing her eyes. “What time is it, Dave?”
“After ten.”
“I had a dream.”
“I know. About the lobster.”
“No, another one. Just now, I think.”
There was something in her voice that excited him. “Tell me about it.”
She arranged herself cross-legged on the bed. “Well, remember the line at the firehouse waiting to get license plates yesterday? Remember all those guys plunking down their fifteen or twenty bucks or more for their plates?”
“Sure. What about it?”
“Dave, they have to get them by the end of this week. That firehouse is going to be taking in a lot of money the next few days.” She paused for breath. “I dreamed about it. I dreamed you turned in a false alarm, and when all the firemen were gone you just walked in and held up those two foolish women who sell the license plates.”
He was silent for a moment when she’d finished, silent just thinking about it. Then his face slowly relaxed into a sort of grin. “You got some imagination, Helen,” he told her at last. “You’re the only gal I ever knew who could make millions while you’re sleeping.”
“You think it’ll work, Dave?”
“Of course it’ll work. And I’ll see you get a new dress out of it. Or better still, a good winter coat.” He’d been noticing the shabbiness of her old green one.
“When, Dave?” she asked, her eyes sparkling with growing excitement, as they always did. “When will you try it?”
“Tonight’s as good as any,” he told her. And he went to the closet and took the blue steel revolver from its hiding place.
At exactly ten minutes to nine, Helen telephoned a report of a fire from a booth at the nearby drug store. Dave was waiting in the shadows across from the firehouse, watching as the massive red engines went shrilling off into the bleak winter night. When they were out of sight, leaving only the dying echo of their sirens like a scent to be followed, he walked quickly across the street, hoping there was no last-minute straggler buying his plates.
But the two women were alone, counting out the money into neat banded stacks as their day neared its end. The younger of them, a handsome brunette with deep, pale eyes, looked up as he entered. “Our last customer,” she said.
He raised the wool scarf over his mouth and nose, and showed them the gun with his other hand. “I’m taking the money,” he said, making it simple
The older woman started to rise. “Oh, no!” she gasped, and then fell back onto the padded metal chair.
He took a paper bag from his overcoat pocket. “In here. All of it. Skip the silver.”
The brunette held the bag open, sliding the bills in with professional ease. When she had finished, she said, “You won’t get away with this.”
“I’ll take my chances.” The bag was brimming with bills, and he wished he had brought a larger one. He backed slowly from the building, keeping the gun pointed in their general direction. “Just sit there and you won’t get hurt, ladies.”
Somewhere in the distance he heard the slow clanging of a bell, and he knew the first of the engines was on its way back from the false alarm. He closed the door behind him and broke into a trot, letting the woolen scarf flap away from his face.
Beneath his arm, the soft weight of the money felt good.
“Almost nine thousand dollars,” Helen said as she finished counting it. “Who’d have thought there would be that much?”
“It was there, just waiting for me,” he told her. “The thing went off like clockwork.”
“Do we head south now, Dave? For that new life?”
“We sure do! But not for a week or so. Somebody might get suspicious if we blew town right away. Look—we cool it for about a week, then drive down to New York and trade in this car on something that will get us to Florida. After that, we’re in the park.” He took four twenties from the stack. “Here. Get yourself that new coat, but nothing too flashy, understand. No fur or anything.”
She clutched at the bills with a grateful smile. “We still make a good team, Dave.”
He was reading a newspaper account of the robbery when she returned the following evening with the new coat, a fuzzy red thing with black speckles that matched her hair. “That’s not supposed to be flashy?” he asked with a laugh.
“It didn’t cost much, honey. Only seventy dollars. You like it?”
“I like it.”
“Dave, why did I buy a new winter coat if we’re goin’ to Florida next week?”
“You need one, don’t you? Maybe we won’t be spending our lives down there.”
“You’re not going to give it up, are you?”
He sighed and reached for a cigarette. “This one went so smooth, doll.”
“Don’t call me that.”
“All right. But be sensible, Helen. You don’t quit when you’re ahead.”
“No! You wait till you’re lying with your face in the gutter and some cop’s bullets in your back! Then you’ll decide to quit!”
“All right, calm down.” He slipped into his fleece-lined jacket. “I’m going out for a walk.”
“So they can find you easier?”
“We agreed to stay here a week, didn’t we? So how is it going to seem if I never show up at the garage? I’ll just look in on them, and I’ll be back in an hour or so. Here.” He gave her another twenty. “Think nice thoughts while I’m gone.”
“Sure. I’ll have myself a dream or two about a castle in Spain.”
Outside, a January wind had come up, cutting through Dave’s jacket like a knife and driving him quickly to the shelter of a nearby bar. He ordered a beer, although he could have afforded whiskey, and carried it, foaming, to a damp cigarette-scarred table because he didn’t like to stand at bars.
He had been sitting alone for only a moment when a vaguely familiar woman with dark hair and pale eyes entered the place, and headed unhesitatingly for his table. “You’re Dave Krown, aren’t you?” she asked in a low voice he barely heard.
“I guess I am. You look familiar.”
“May I sit down?”
“Sure.” He half rose to pull out the opposite chair for her. But the first beginnings of something like fear were building within his stomach.
“I’m surprised you don’t remember me. You robbed me of nine thousand dollars just last night.”
He kept his hand steady on the beer, hoping his face didn’t reflect the sudden emotion that shot through him. “I guess you must have the wrong guy. I don’t know what you mean.”
She glanced around to make sure no one was within earshot. “Look, you can drop the act. I’m not going to yell for the police—not right now, anyway. I recognized you, even with the scarf over your face. I remember faces, and I remembered yours. I remembered you had been in for your plate the night before, and I remembered you had an odd name. I looked through the forms I had turned in, and I found yours. Dave Krown, with address. I was waiting outside, wondering what to do next, when I saw you come in here.”
She had fixed him with the intenseness of her deep pale eyes, and the fascination of it was enough to keep him from running. She was serious, and she had no intention of calling the police. Maybe she was just a girl out after kicks. Well, he’d see that she got them. “What’s your name?” he asked suddenly.
“Susan Brogare,” she answered.
“What do you want?”
“Just to know you, to know what kind of a man you are.”
“Come on,” Dave said, suddenly deciding on a course of action. He led her through the beaded curtains at the rear of the room, into a dim dining area of high-partitioned booths. In one booth a couple was kissing, leaving their beer untouched.
“Why back here?” she asked.
“It’s better for talking.” He slid into the booth opposite her. “You’re not afraid of me, are you?”
The pale eyes blinked. “You probably should know that I’ve left a very detailed letter with a friend at the office. In it I give your name, address, and description, as well as the license number and description of your car. I identify you as the holdup man, and I say that I’m going to confront you with the fact. I end up by saying that you’ll be responsible for my death if I’m killed.” She paused for breath and then hurried on. “That letter goes to the police if I die or disappear for more than a day.”
“Are you some kind of a nut or something?” he asked, baffled now by this strange woman. “Look, lady, if…”
“I said my name was Susan.”
“Look, Susan, if you think I’m some sort of criminal, you should call the police. If not, just let me alone.” He didn’t know if the part about the letter was true or not, but the cool brazenness of her approach made him willing to bet that it was.
“I’m sorry if I frightened you. Would you buy me a drink?”
“Sure. Beer?”
She shook her head slightly. “Vodka martini.”
While he was getting the drinks he considered the obvious solution—leave her sitting there, and be ten miles away with Helen before she caught on. But that was just the point. He wouldn’t be more than ten miles away before she had the police on his tail. He could lure her to the apartment and tie her up (or kill her?) but there still was the problem of the letter. Dave was not a man to spend the rest of his life hiding in alleys.
So he carried the drinks back to the booth as if the whole thing were the most natural situation in the world. Just a girl and a guy on a date. “Are you married?” he asked, because another thought had just crossed his mind. He’d read about women like that.
“I was. For a bit over a year. My husband was killed in a plane crash.” She played with her drink. “I know what you’re thinking—maybe I’m lonely. And I guess maybe I am. You’re the most exciting thing that’s happened to me in two years.”
By the dim indirect lighting of the back room, she might have been on either side of thirty. He guessed the far side, closer to his own age. She was about the same size and coloring as Helen, but there was a world of difference between them. “Isn’t it usually exciting on your job?” he asked, just making conversation while he continued to size her up.
“At the Motor Vehicle Bureau? Are you kidding? A job’s a job.”
“So now that you’ve met me, you’re looking for more excitement. Is that it?”
“I told you, I just wanted to see what sort of man you were. I’ve known lots of people, but never an armed robber. And the way you went about it was quite experienced. The police are properly baffled.”
“Thanks. But I’m still not admitting anything.” He had read somewhere about miniature tape recorders hidden in women’s purses.
“Are you going to run away now?”
“Maybe.”
“Alone, or with a girl?”
“There’s a girl,” he admitted, thinking this might discourage her seeming advances.
“Do you love her?”
“How do I answer that? I’ve lived with her for two years now.”
“I suppose she’s waiting across the street.”
“Yes.”
Presently they ordered another drink, and the talk drifted almost imperceptibly to their past lives. He found himself (fantastically) listening to her account of college days with all the interest of a fellow on a first date, and it was only with an effort that he managed to pull himself back to the fuzzy reality of the situation.
It was almost midnight when he returned to the apartment, and he did not mention the encounter to Helen, though his exact reasons for not doing so were unclear even to himself. She was already in bed, not yet asleep, and as he entered she said, “I called the garage. You weren’t there.”
“I stopped for a drink and got talking to a guy.”
Helen seemed to accept the explanation. She rolled over on her wrinkled pillow and said, “I was afraid the police had picked you up.”
“Not a chance.”
“We’ve got to get out of it, Dave. I can’t take the worrying any more. I think that’s why the dreams are coming harder.”
“That last one was a beauty. Come up with a few more like that one.”
“What about Florida, Dave?”
“I’m remembering.”
“I hope you are.”
The following night he met Susan Brogare again in the dim room behind the bar. This time they left quite early and drove out along the river in her car, because he feared that Helen might discover them at the bar.
“You’re a strange woman,” he told Susan once, while they parked by the river watching fat white snowflakes drift aimlessly down from the darkened sky.
“I just want to get something out of life, that’s all.”
“By blackmailing me into making love to you?”
“I’m not blackmailing you. You’re free to leave any time you want.”
“But you know I won’t,” he said quietly, wondering in that moment where it was all going to end.
They never spoke of the holdup after that first night; not directly, though it often intruded onto the fringes of their thought and conversation. He learned more about this strange girl with the pale eyes than he had ever known about Helen, and found himself at the same time telling her things he had never spoken of to another person.
By the end of their third night together, he knew he was going to leave Helen.
“Do you know what today is?” Helen asked him in bed the next morning.
“Sunday, isn’t it?”
“But it’s Groundhog Day too! And the sun is shining. What does that mean?”
He rolled over and tried to go back to sleep, but it was useless. “All right,” he said finally, “I’m awake. And the sun is shining.”
“Dave?”
“What now?”
“When are we going to Florida?”
He was silent for a long time as he puttered about the bedroom in his bare feet and pajamas. Finally he said, “I’ve been meaning to talk to you about that, Helen.”
“About what?”
“Florida and all. I’ve been thinking maybe it’s time we split up. You know, went our own ways for a while.” He saw the expression on her face and hurried on. “I’d give you your cut from the job, of course. I’d even give you an extra thousand just to get settled.”
Her face was frozen into a pale mask. “Two years, Dave? Is this all I get after two years?”
“Just for a while, that’s all. Maybe we could get together again in six months or so.”
“You’d leave me, just like that?”
“Don’t make it sound like something—dirty. We’ve had two good years together.”
“Where do you think you’d be without me, Dave? Without my dreams?”
“Maybe I’ve got to find out. At least you’ve got those dreams. They’re always with you.”
She looked away suddenly. “Dreaming is a pretty lonely thing when there’s nobody to tell them to.”
“You’ll find somebody.”
“No I won’t.” She seemed suddenly decided. “Dave, I won’t let you leave me like this. I won’t let you.”
He fumbled for a pack of cigarettes and wondered why the thing was suddenly being so difficult. For two years of wanderings, she had been nothing but a woman, a paid companion who ate with him and slept with him and remembered her dreams. He had always been the boss of the situation, always knowing in the back of his mind that the day of their parting would sometime come. He had needed her, but only because there was no one else for him to need.
“What will you do about it?” he asked, suddenly angered at her resistance.
“I think I’d turn you in to the police before I’d let you go, Dave. I really mean it.”
And he could see by her eyes that she did.
The next two nights were difficult ones for Dave. He was still meeting Susan Brogare secretly, but there was a feeling about the thing that made him think of a water-soaked log being pulled slowly into the vortex of a whirlpool. He knew now that this girl—this woman—would accompany him anywhere, to Florida or the moon. And he knew, just as certainly, that Helen Reston would not simply pack up and leave. He was involved, deeply involved, with two women, and both of them had the knowledge to destroy him.
But he’d known, almost from their first meeting, that the strangeness of Susan would attract and entrap him. She was fascinating and mysterious, with a sense of reckless adventure that matched his own. And it was to Susan that he brought his problem on that fifth night. “I can’t shake her,” he said. “She’s threatening to tell the police.”
But the dark-haired girl only looked at him through half-closed eyes, and blew smoke from her nose like some dragon of old. “You ought to be able to think of something,” she said quietly, and he wondered what she might have been implying. Neither of them dared to put the thought into words, but that night in bed, Dave Krown dreamed about the service station attendant he had shot back in Illinois.
The next day Helen was calmed down a bit, and, for the first time, made no mention of their long-delayed journey to Florida. She left for work early, and he didn’t see her the rest of the day. He began to feel good, so good that he even ventured a stroll past the firehouse for the first time since the holdup. An unusual February warmth was in the air, and a few of the firemen sat outside talking and waiting, as firemen do. Dave nodded to them as he went by.
And later that night, in his car, he told Susan, “She’s better today.”
“Do you think she’ll let you go?”
“Well… no.”
“Then something has to be done.”
“We could just leave.”
“And have her tell the police?”
“She would be implicating herself if she did,” he argued, but he knew deep within himself that such a possibility would not deter Helen. In the two years they’d traveled together, he’d come to know the streak of unreasoning vengeance that slept just beneath the surface of her personality. She was not always the simple, stupid girl she seemed.
Susan stubbed out her cigarette. “I want you, Dave. All my life I’ve had the things I really wanted taken away from me. I knew I wanted you from that first moment in the firehouse, and I’m not going to lose you.”
“You won’t,” he said. “I’ll think of something.”
Helen was quiet that night, preoccupied. And the following day was much the same. She puttered about the apartment for a time, and once asked him if he had decided what to do. He replied that they would be moving on soon, and left it at that. But he found himself watching her when her back was turned, watching and nurturing the growing hatred within him.
“Dave,” she said to him suddenly, “I’m tired of sitting around this apartment alone every night. I want you to take me out to dinner.”
“Dinner? When?”
“Tomorrow night. And at some nice place out in the country. The Willow Grove, maybe.”
“I don’t even know if they’re open in the winter.”
“They’re open.”
“O.K. We’ll see.”
He told Susan that night, explaining his commitment for the following evening. They were at a little neighborhood bar on the far side of town, a place she had introduced him to a few nights before. She was impatient, constantly lighting cigarettes and stubbing them out only half-smoked.
“You’ve got to do something, Dave. I can’t stand this town any longer.”
“Just be patient, will you? We’ve hardly known each other a week.”
“I’ve known you for a lifetime,” she said, and lit another cigarette.
After a time a thought crossed his mind, and he asked her, “Did you ever destroy that letter? The one you left in the office?” It was the first time he had referred to it since she’d told him about it.
“I’ll bring it along when we leave this town,” she told him. “Don’t worry.”
“I’m not.”
She rested her hand on his. “Dave—if it has to be done, please do it. For me.”
He knew what she meant, and somehow the cold calculation of her voice did not surprise him. He was in so deep already that nothing surprised him any longer.
When he awakened in the morning, one sandy eyeball pressed against the wrinkled white of the sheet, he saw that Helen was already up. She was standing at the window smoking a cigarette, and he could see at once that she was upset.
“What’s the trouble?” he asked.
“I had a dream, Dave. A terrible dream!”
He propped himself up on an elbow, looked around for his cigarettes, and then decided he didn’t need one. “Tell me about it.”
“I don’t know how to—it was so awful! We were—we were at a bar someplace. Up in the mountains, I think. Just the two of us. After a while I went to the ladies’ room, and when I came out you were gone, just gone! You had left me there, all by myself! I was frantic and I ran outside. A car came from somewhere and hit me. That’s when I woke up, just as the car hit me.”
“Crazy dream,” he said.
“It was awful.”
“Well, forget about it now.”
She had put down the cigarette and was twisting her hands together. “Dave—”
“What?”
“Dave, it was you driving the car.”
“Helen, pull yourself together. It was only a dream.”
He showered, shaved, and dressed in silence, trying to keep his hands from shaking, trying not to think about the black shape forming, growing, in his mind. It was a full hour before he could bring himself to ask her about their plans for the evening. “Still want to go out to dinner?”
“Of course. I’m counting on it.”
“Good,” he said. “I think it will help us both.”
Neither of them mentioned the dream again. There was no need.
The Willow Grove was, in the off-season, a dark and almost deserted place that stood by itself next to a seldom-traveled country road. The willows, that had given the place its name in some far distant past, were almost gone now, felled by blight and age and an ever-expanding parking lot. Dave imagined that the summer customers on a Saturday night would crowd the walls to bursting, but in February there were only a few tables of scattered diners, and a dimness of illumination that unintentionally directed the eye to the glowing cigarette machine that was the brightest single spot in view.
Dave had parked far back in the nearly deserted lot, and inside he led Helen to a table a bit out of the way. They chatted through dinner with a rapport that was almost like the old days, though he was not completely unaware of the occasional strain between them.
“The food is always good here,” he said once, when the conversation threatened to lag.
“We’ve only been here once before.”
“Still, it’s good. Want another drink?”
“I guess not. What time is it?”
“A little before nine. Why? Got a late date?” He said it with a chuckle, but she did seem edgy about something. She had kept her coat over her shoulders, the new red one with the black speckles that matched her hair, but he thought still that he detected a shiver. “Are you getting a cold?”
“I don’t think so, honey. I’m just nervous, I guess. I’d like to get out of here, head south.”
“Then you couldn’t wear the coat.”
“No kidding, Dave, when are we going?”
“I don’t know.”
“Are you still thinking of leaving me?”
“Let’s talk about it on the way home,” he said, postponing the conversation.
Coffee came, and an after-dinner drink. Finally, Helen excused herself while he motioned for the check. He watched her go off in the direction of the ladies’ room, and sat for some moments wondering whether he could really go through with it. Then, almost reluctantly, he rose from the table and started for the door. It was just five minutes after nine, by the clock in the checkroom.
Outside, his breath white against the night air, he climbed behind the wheel of the car and started the motor. He turned the car a bit, into position, aiming it down the driveway like a torpedo.
He waited, the motor purring, ready for a touch of his foot on the pedal. Waited for Helen to come running out.
As in the dream.
But then perhaps all of life was but a dream, and Dave Krown, sitting in the dark, was only a vision conjured up by nightmare. Perhaps all this would pass, as it had the night he’d shot the man in the gas station, halfway across the country.
Had he ever died, finally? Don’t we all die, finally?
Helen, Helen… forgive me.
And there she was, running out of the doorway, her new red coat bundled against the cold, black hair barely visible over the fuzzy collar. His foot went down and the car shot ahead.
Forgive me, Helen.
He closed his eyes at the last instant, feeling rather than seeing the thud and crunch of metal against flesh.
“It was an accident,” he kept saying over and over. “I didn’t see her. It was an accident!”
Someone had covered the body with a tablecloth from inside, and far in the distance he could hear the beginnings of an approaching siren. One of the bartenders stepped forward through the sparse crowd of onlookers. “He’s right. I saw the whole thing through the window. This dame came tearing out and ran right out in front of him. He couldn’t have stopped for her.”
One or two others mumbled in agreement, and Dave began to relax for the first time. He still averted his eyes from the sprawled, broken body, though, even after the first police car pulled into the parking lot.
“She dead?” the officer asked, reaching for the clipboard he kept on the dash.
“She’s dead.”
“Anybody here know her?” he asked, his voice reflecting the professional’s only half-concealed boredom with death.
“I knew her,” Dave started to reply. “Her name was Helen…”
He stopped, the words frozen in his throat like a lump of suddenly congealed sweat. There in the doorway, not twenty feet away, stood Helen Reston. There was a slight smile playing about her lips, and of course she wasn’t wearing her coat.
“This the woman you know?” the officer asked, lifting the tablecloth and turning the head for a better view in the sparse lighting of the parking lot.
Dave didn’t answer. He knew without looking that the dead woman at his feet had become, fantastically, not Helen, but his Susan.
“Driver’s license in her purse says her name is Susan Brogare. Looks like she worked at the Motor Vehicle Bureau. She the one you knew?” the officer queried.
“I knew her,” Dave answered mechanically.
“Well, you’ll have to come along with me for questioning. Just routine, you know.”
He nodded, then asked, “Can I speak to a friend over there for a moment?”
“Sure. I got all the time in the world.”
Dave pushed his way through the people and walked over to Helen in the doorway. “What did you do? God help us, what did you do?”
The smile, if it was a smile, still played about her lips. “I called her, told her I had to see her. I said I knew all about you two and had reached a decision. She met me in the ladies’ room at nine o’clock. I told her she could have you, told her you were waiting in the parking lot to take her away. I even gave her the coat, because I said you wanted her to have it. She ran out there to meet you.”
“But—but you knew I’d be waiting to—”
“I knew, Dave.”
“There never was a dream, was there? You made it all up. You knew just what I would do.”
“I’ve always known what you would do, Dave. And there have never been any dreams, not really.”
“No dreams,” he repeated, not understanding. Understanding only that this woman before him had depths of which he had never dreamed—depths of wisdom, and hate.
“You’ll get off,” she said. “It was an accident.”
“Sure.” But he was remembering the letter, the damning letter, Susan had written on that day so long ago, a week ago. The letter that would send him to the electric chair.
“I couldn’t let you go, Dave. I couldn’t.”
“How did you know about her?”
“I said I didn’t dream, Dave. I never have. But you talk in your sleep. You’ve talked in your sleep every night for two years.”
Behind him, like a voice from a dream, the police officer said, “Come on, mister. We’d better get going.”