I had the picture.
What Mel had told me really wasn’t news. Instinctively I had known the setup. It was easy enough to fill in the blank spots.
Marilyn K. had been Marcus’ girl and she was driving back to New York with him. The suitcase? There was only one way to add it up. The money represented the boodle which Marcus had been able to get out of Cuba. His money or the Syndicate’s money—it didn’t matter. It sure as hell wasn't Marilyn K. ’s money. But she had it.
I could see why she wanted a little time to think, as she put it. And I knew what she was thinking about. She was thinking about how she was going to manage to hang on to that money.
Yes, it was easy to figure.
They had been riding along and then the accident had taken place. Marcus was killed and there she was, alone at the side of that road, holding what was probably the best part of a half million dollars, and not knowing quite what to do. The police would find the car, find his body. And his friends would know. They would know that he had been bringing the money back and that she was with him
They would know the money was missing.
I could see why she needed a little time to gather herself. Even why she might like to have a patsy. And I was the patsy.
I slammed the door of the phone booth and I started over to the Pontiac. I walked slowly. I needed a little time myself. I needed quite a lot of time. I had a few decisions of my own to make.
You think that sort of decision is easy? You think it is simple just to reason it out? To get in a car and forget that a girl like Marilyn K. is waiting for you in a motel bedroom a few miles down the road? That several hundred thousand dollars are waiting in a bedroom a few miles down the road? Would you follow the dictates of your intelligence and drive on back to New York and ignore the fact that you would be passing up something most guys would give their lives to have?
And that was the key to the whole thing. I would be very likely giving my own life if I did take a crack at it. I think I am probably as smart as the next cookie, but I will tell you something. As I started to open the door of the con-verti le, I had already made my decision. I was going back to that motel and 1 wasn’t going to spare the horses. That’s the kind of idiot I am.
t was just about then that I became aware of the noise coming from the direction of the shabby little tourist camp outside of which I had found the telephone.
There was a sudden series of high-pitched cries followed by a crash. I swung quickly to face a row of some ten or twelve attached cabins. The sign over the screen door read CUTTER'S CABINS, and underneath it was the small shingle with the single word, OFFICE.
I was no more than fifteen yards away and as I hesitated, staring at the door which was partly opened, the sound of a scuffle reached me and then there was a second, muffled cry. Just outside the door, parked in the driveway, was a beaten up station wagon with Maryland plates. The two things which made it unusual were the red spotlights and the two-way radio antenna.
I moved toward the building. It was my day for butting into other people’s business.
I don’t know what I expected to find; perhaps a couple of young punks taking over the place, perhaps someone...
But it didn’t matter. Whoever had cried out sounded as though they needed help. It sounded like the voice of a child or a young girl. I jerked the door open and entered.
I was right on two accounts. The cry had come from a young girl and someone was trying to take over. Only it wasn’t a couple of young punks. It was a big beefy man, about six foot two and weighing a good two hundred and thirty pounds. He made a good match for the car parked in front of the place.
His violent red hair needed cutting and he could have used a shave. His face and his body had run to fat and he had a dirty, uncared-for look about him. He wore a T- shirt which was sweat stained, a dirty pair of tan slacks and a vicious greedy expression on his fat, pug- nosed face. He was grunting as he went about his work.
The little dark-haired girl he had pressed back against the desk wasn’t bothering to cry any more and she was giving him a good fight of it, pound for pound. The trouble was that she was outweighed. She stood about five feet two and dripping wet, her slender, well-formed little body wouldn’t have tipped the scales at more than a hundred and five.
A couple of deck chairs had been kicked over and a vase of flowers that must have been on the office desk had been knocked to the floor. A framed motto hung cockeyed on the wall and the floor itself was strewn with papers and what had been a desk set. A card index made confetti around the tiny room.
She had put up a good fight, but the fight was over. The only damage he showed was a scratch along one side of his face which was bleeding a little and a tom T-shirt, but from the looks of him, the shirt could have been that way for a long time. The girl, however, wasn’t doing as well.
He held both of her slender wrists in one hairy paw and his gross body I pinned her down to the scarred desk as he bent her over backwards. His free
hand was grasping the thin cotton shirt she wore and as I started across the room, he jerked and the whole front of it came away, along with a strip of fabric which must have been her brassiere. He had his face buried in her neck and
he was rapidly getting where he wanted to get. But he never made it.
I may be the careless, heroic type, but I am not a complete damned fool. I took time to pick up the ceramic flower vase from the floor as I crossed the room. I didn’t care whether the vase or his skull would shatter when I hit him.
If I expected the big man to suddenly relax and drop neatly at my feet, I was inforashock. Hedid, however, pay me the compliment of recognizing a new force in the room and he relaxed his hold on the girl. He straightened up, shaking his head and rapidly blinking his eyes. He turned slowly around. He grunted, but it was a new sort of grunt, inspired by shock and surprise rather than by sex. He grunted again. He had quite a repertoire of grunts. The last one was inspired by anger.
His little red eyes became pinpoints and his flabby mouth opened to show a set of broken teeth. He stuck out a bull-dog chin and moved an arm as big around as a piano leg, pushing the girl aside.
He led with his right, which was a mistake, and I landed my own right full to that bull-dog chin. It bothered him, but it didn’t do what it was supposed to do. He kept right on coming in and I knew that if he ever got his hands on me I was gone. But I know something about boxing and I hit him twice more and his nose started to bleed.
That was when he decided boxing wasn’t his forte.
The blackjack came out of his back pocket and he got my left arm at the wrist, on the first swing. It didn’t break it, but it put it out of working order.
He wasn’t satisfied with the handicap. He swung again. He might not have known a great deal about boxing, but he knew how to use a blackjack. I backed toward the door realizing that in just about one more half minute,
I d be lying on the floor with my head split open.
But he was clever. He circled me, cutting off escape.
The girl had spunk. She picked up a heavy brass wastebasket and swinging it, clouted him on the side of the head. But it wasn’t going to help.
He had his hand on my throat and his knee in my groin and had backed me to the wall. I saw the blackjack going back for a full swing and there was nothing at all I could do. He was too close for me to use my right. It was then that voice came from the doorway. A thin, high, slightly effeminate voice which pronounced the words sharp and clear. I didn’t have much confidence in the
V°‘AllbUt 1 Sh°Uld HaVe' Rstopped bmcold-
right, Battle, the voice said. “That will be enough. Drop your
weapon.”
I felt the hand on my throat tighten for a second and then it relaxed. His other hand, the one with the blackjack, slowly fell to his side. He turned slowly, faring at the little man who stood in the doorway, his mouth opening and his jaw dropping. He looked, very suddenly, like a whipped dog.
‘ ‘Deputy sheriffs don’t beat up their prisoners—not in my county, ’ ’ the voice said, and Battle moved aside and I could see the man who was speaking.
He was about five feet one inch tall, thin as a toothpick. He didn’t look more than twenty-six or -seven and he was dressed in a neat blue serge suit, a white shirt and conservative tie. He was as immaculate as his voice. He looked prissy and smug, but I was never happier in my life to see someone and I wasn’t going to be critical.
“Was this man causing you trouble, Miss Cutter?” the little man asked.
I thought at first he was talking about the big redhead, but he wasn’t. He was talking about me. “You are to arrest troublemakers, Battle,” hewenton before anyone else could speak. “Arrest them, not beat them up.”
The girl cut in before I could say a word.
“Martin,” she said, “I have asked you to keep your ape away from me. He came here again and he was the one who was making trouble. This other one—”
But she didn’t get to finish.
The little man stepped into the room and he moved so fast I barely saw it happen. His arm shot out and his hand slapped the redheaded man across the face, back and forth, a half dozen times. He hit as hard as he could and I was surprised to see the big man stagger under the blows. For a lightweight, Martin carried a lot of muscle.
“You were told to stay away from here, ” he said, and his voice was more vicious than his hand. “There won't be any more warnings. Understand? No more warnings.”
He shoved past the other man and went to the girl, who was making an attempt to cover herself with her torn shirt.
"I am sorry, Sarah,” he said. “It won’t happen again. You may be sure of that.”
“You should keep your animal chained,” she said, her young voice furious. Her hazel eyes were blazing and she was shaking, but I don’t know whether it was anger or the reaction to what had happened. It wasn’t fear. She was no more afraid of the little man than she had been of the one called Battle.
“ If an assistant district attorney can’t protect—’ ’ she started, but he quickly interrupted her.
“I am sorry,” he said. "I promise, Miss Cutter, that he will stay away from nowon.”
He sounded as afraid of her as the big man had been afraid of him. I didn’t get it at all.
“Who is he?” he asked, nodding his head toward me.
"He heard me cry out and he came in and tried to help me,” the girl said. “I guess he was stopping to get a room.”
She turned and looked at me, making a small smile, and the little man stared at me. His eyes were cold and curious. He was waiting for me to say something.
It was then that Battle interrupted. He had time to collect himself and do a little thinking.
"I was here trying to check the registrations, Mr. Fleming, ” he said. “That’s my duty an’ I’m supposed to do it. This girl wouldn’t let me see 'em and I was tryin' to and this guy come in and hit me over the head with that flower pot.”
The girl swung around, her eyes blazing.
“Flower vase,” she said. “And you are lying. When this man came in you were trying to—”
But Fleming cut it short.
“You are both a liar and a fool, Battle,” he said, his thin voice like the edge of a razor. “And I have told you to stay away from here. Understand? Stay away. As for you,” he swung back to me, "it isn’t a good idea to strike an officer of the law. If you want a room, just check in and let it go at that. I assume that was what you were here for?”
I don’t know why I did it, but I guess I was still in a fog. But before I had a chance to really think, I spoke.
“I want a room,” I said.
The look of gratitude the girl gave me almost made up for the sudden sense of stupidity which overcame me the moment the words left my mouth.
He nodded his small head and again turned to the other man.
“As for you, ’ ’ he said, "it might be a good idea to listen to your radio once in a while. I have been trying to get you for the last half hour. There’s been a bad accident up the road several miles. A dead man in a Cadillac in that culvert just before you come to Kilski’s broiler farm. Now get on up there. We don t want the state police taking this one over. I’ll be along and I want you there. Don’t let anyone touch anything until I arrive.”
The redhead edged out of the door and the little man again turned to the girl. Miss Cutter, ’ he said, “I am very sorry that Battle—”
But she wasn t having any of his apologies.
You should keep him chained,' ’ she said. “ I have enough troubles without your pet gorilla coming around here and making more. Some day he’s going
Please, he said. I have told you. He won’t be back. If there was any damage—” his eyes went around the room.
“The damage is personal—to my feelings,” she said. She leaned down and picked up a registration book from the floor. “You can sign right here,” she continued, ignoring him and smiling at me. “Cabin with private bath is five dollars a day.”
I signed, aware of the little man staring into my back. He started to speak again, but once more the girl cut his words short.
“You better get up and see to your dead man,” she said icily, and then added, “before your ape steals his wrist watch.”
I thought that would get him but it didn’t. He just turned and walked out, closing the door behind himself.
“That will be five dollars and you may pay now if you will,” shesaid. “Take cabin six. And thanks for coming in. The Lord knows I can use the business.
She had crossed the tiny office and taken a jacket from a hook on the wall and slipped into it.
“I hope he didn’t hurt you,” she said. “Is your wrist—”
"It isn’t in the best shape in the world,” I said, moving my fingers painfully, “but at least it isn’t broken. Are you all right? Is there anything—”
“I’m all right,” she said. “And you don’t have to worry—he won’t be back. Martin Fleming will see to that. ’ ’ She was starting to pick up some of the junk which had been scattered to the floor. “As though I don’t have enough trouble making a go of this place since Dad died,” shesaid, halfspeaking to herself and shaking her head and beginning to look mad. She looked up at me again.
“If you don’t like number six,” she said, “you can have one of the others. They are all empty.”
“Number six will do fine,” I said. “I just want to wash up a little and then I will be going out for a while. I’ll be back later to catch a little sleep. ”
I started for the door, but her voice stopped me.
“You have forgotten your key, ” she said. And then, with a certain hesitancy, “I want to thank you. Thank you first for trying to stop Battle and thank you secondly for taking a room which I don’t believe you need at all. I need the five dollars but I don’t need charity. And even if you did want the room, I think I should advise you to be on your way. Battle isn't the sort to forget what happened. And he carries weight in this county.”
She started to hand me back the five-dollar bill.
‘If he will make trouble for me,” I said, “how about you?”
She smiled without humor.
Fleming will keep him away from me from now on,” she said, her voice filled with irony. “This time he went too far.”
I began to get the picture. The assistant D. A. was in love with her and Bat-
tie was his boy. I thought it quite possible that Fleming had put Battle up to bothering her in the first place so that he might time his arrival so as to appear to be a knight in shining armor. I dropped the key back on the desk and took the five dollars from her. I had her pretty well figured. She was running the place herself and having a tough time of it, but she wasn’t asking for, or accepting, favors.
She must have been reading my mind.
“Martin Fleming wants to marry me,” she said. "He doesn’t think I can make a go of the cabins, now that Dad is gone. He wants to take care of me.”
"And you?”
“I can take care of myself,” she said.
“I think you can. And I wish you luck. ”
She was back straightening out the office as I left.
The thought of Sarah Cutter and her personal problems quickly faded from my mind as I got back into the Pontiac and headed for the Whispering Willows. It had been an unpleasant interlude, but it was over and done with and I had more important things to think about. I had Marilyn K. and a suitcase full of money to think about.
And I had reached a decision.
I would stop at the motel, but I wanted to put as many miles as I could between that dead man up the road, crouched down behind the wheel of his wrecked Caddie, and myself. I would pick up the girl and her suitcase—and also my own suitcase which I had left at the tourist camp—and we would get out of Maryland as fast as we could. It would be dangerous enough to be with her, but it would be doubly dangerous to be anywhere in this neighborhood.
The boys from New York would be on their way down in no time at all; even without them, I wanted nothing to do with Martin Fleming’s private territory. I would be having troubles enough without him and his stooge, Battle.
An hour later I realized I could have saved myself considerable mental and emotional energy if I hadn’t bothered making decisions. The decisions which were to vitally effect my immediate future were already made. They were made by the girl who was waiting for me at Whispering Willows and her decisions were a lot stronger and a lot more binding than any I might formulate.
Marilyn K. knew exactly what she planned to do and she also knew what she wanted me to do. It wasn’t that she was stronger than I am or any more stubborn; it was merely that she was a hell of a lot more persuasive. And she was endowed with exactly the proper weapons and the right ammunition to win all her points.
I parked the Pontiac in the driveway and walked down the path which led to the lobby of the motel. There was no one at the desk when I passed on my way to the rooms we had checked into.
I keyed the door open, walked through the living room of the suite and carefully opened the door of the bedroom. I didn’t want to alarm her if she was still sleeping.
I was wasting my time being quiet about it.
One of the prettiest pictures in the world is a really beautiful girl sitting cross-legged on a double bed, her hair rumpled and down over one eye, dressed in nothing but a brassiere and panties and with her stockings rolled down just below her knees. It is especially fetching if the girl happens to be smiling when she looks up at you.
There is only one thing which can improve this picture and Marilyn K. had managed it.
She was sitting there counting money.
The smile, which was a seemingly impossible blend of childish delight, wickedness and invitation, turned into a tingling laugh.
“Three hundred and thirty-five thousand dollars,” she said. “And I called Suzy.”
I didn’t say anything. I just stood there in the doorway with my mouth open.
"Where did you go?” she asked. “I missed you.”
I made it all the way into the room.
“Phone call,” I said. “You were sleeping.”
The words were automatic; my mind was on other things. My mind was on the staggering pile of greenbacks. My mind was on the small, slender, beautifully formed body of the girl who sat there with her tiny hands still leafing them. The money lost out to the girl, which merely goes to prove that whereas money may be the root of all evil, it sure as hell isn’t the root of all desire.
“Give me the suitcase, Sam,” she said, “and I'll put it back. While I am doing it, you can make me a drink. A small one. ”
I had a little trouble taking my eyes away from her long enough to pick up the bag from where she had dropped it on the floor.
“I’ll make us both a drink,” I stuttered. “And get that stuff put away. We have to get out of here. ”
I found it hard to be convincing. If there was one thing in the world I didn’t want to do at that moment, it was to leave that particular room. But some lingering fragment of common sense remained and my words were making more sense than my intentions.
‘We have to get as far away from here as soon as we can.” I said. “The police have found Marcus,” I added. “The story will be on the wires any minute now, if it already isn’t. So put that money away and get into your clothes. We’re moving.”
She didn’t say anything and I turned away to pour the drinks. There was still a little ice left in the bucket and I made them straight, on the rocks. I needed a strong drink. My hand was shaking a little and it could have been from the blow which Battle had struck on my wrist or it could have been something else, but in any case I spilled the first drink and had to spend a few extra moments wiping up the mess and repouring. By the time I had turned back, ready to hand her the drink, I expected she would be dressing.
But she hadn’t moved.
“I told you I called Suzy,” she said, her mouth petulant. “We can’t leave until Suzy comes. Suzy said she couldn’t start before noon.”
For a second I forgot she was a hundred and ten pounds of sheer, unadulterated sex, that she was sitting cross-legged on a double bed almost naked and that she wanted to stay on that bed.
"Listen, kid,” I said, walking over and handing her the drink. “Idon’tthink you understand. Marcus has been found. The police will identify him and the second they do, you can bet the story will get out. It will probably make the radio newscasts. It will be heard in New York. There will be people coming down here. I don’t have to draw a diagram, do I, baby?”
She looked at me with a hurt expression.
“They won’t know where I am, ” she said. “Anyway they won’t even be sure I was with him.”
“They’ll guess, ” I said. "They’ll guess about you and they’ll damn soon find out about the money. So forget about Suzy. Suzy can’t help you. No one is going to help you—so long as you have that suitcase.”
“ButSuzy will help,” she said, frowning. “Anyway, I promised her I would wait here.”
“So leave her a message.”
But even as I said it, I realized that would be impossible. Any message which reached Suzy could be traced. Mentally I damned this Suzy. I didn’t want any sisters butting in, in any case. And I didn’t want to hang around waiting for sure trouble. I looked at my watch. It was just half past eleven.
“Listen,” I said, “I don’t know why you feel you have to have your sister, butifyousayyoudoit’sO.K. with me. But we can't wait around here for her and we can’t leave any messages for her. You said she was leaving at noon. Call her back then and get her before she does leave. Tell her—well, tell her to go to Baltimore. Check into a hotel under a phony name and we will contact her. ”
For a moment she looked doubtful and then once more she looked up at me and smiled, nodding. She started to reach for the telephone.
Not from here,” I said quickly. “That goes through a switchboard in the office. There s a phone booth at a little tourist place called Cutter’s Cabins, about three or four miles down the road, toward the bridge. We’ll leave and you can make the call from there.”
She could move when she wanted to. Even before I was through speaking, she was off the bed and had grabbed her clothes from the chair where she had tossed them.
"I’ll go and you stay here and get washed up. It will make you feel better,” she said. “I can take your car—”
“But we both might just as well—” I began.
“No,” she said. “You stay and wait. After all, if I can’t get Suzy, we will both have to wait here. If I do reach her in time, well, I’ll come right back. You get washed up and be ready to leave.”
She had a quick mind and she saw the sudden look I gave to the suitcase which held the money. She made a face and laughed.
“I’ll leave the money with you while I am gone, Sam,” she said. “You can trust me.”
I was ashamed of what I had been thinking. That's probably why I wasn’t thinking quite straight.
She had got into her clothes quicker than a strip-teaser could get out of them and she stepped over in front of me and looked up into my face and then stood on her toes and quickly kissed me on the lips.
“Let me have the keys to the car, Sam,” shesaid. “I won’t be more than fifteen minutes. You said about four miles down the road?”
I nodded and handed her the keys.
“Makeitfast, kid,” Isaid. “I’ll be ready by the time you get back.”
She kissed me again and my arms started to go around her slender waist, but she dodged away with the dexterity of a ballet dancer and a second later she was closing the door behind her. She had my keys in her hand and her heavy leather pocketbook slung from a strap over her shoulder.
I am normally not a sneaky type and I don’t usually read other people’s mail or poke through their private possessions, but within two minutes from the time she had left the room, I wasn’t in the bathroom washing up. I was looking into an open suitcase and making a rapid mental calculation.
She would have made a darned good bank teller. My estimate was that three hundred and thirty-five thousand dollars would just about hit it on the head.
For a moment I was just slightly bewildered that she would have taken off as she did, even for fifteen minutes, and trust me with that much money. And then, of course, it occurred to me that although I might have the money, she had my car.
And anyway, she was no fool. She knew that I would be a damned sight more interested in the money with her, than I would be without her.
I just prayed that she would get hold of her Suzy quickly and return.
The Whispering Willows was beginning to whisper things I didn’t want to hear.
I began to worry the moment she left the room. It occurred to me, after what seemed like an endless wait, that she might have decided to get in my car and just keep on going. Perhaps she had come to her senses, had realized the danger of attempting to keep Marcus’ money.
But I didn’t entertain that thought for very long. I had only known her a very short time, but I felt that I knew her well enough to realize she had no intention of abandoning more than a quarter of a million dollars. She would be back all right.
The next thought I had was that perhaps it wasn’t Sister Suzy she had gone out to telephone to. There was a sister Suzy all right; of that I had made sure when I had called Mel in New York. But this obsession about getting her down to Maryland? There was something very odd about it. Very odd indeed.
Speculation was futile. I had no way of figuring what was in her mind, no way of knowing what she planned. I was having enough difficulty straightening out what was in my own mind. But at least, without her disturbing personal presence, I was beginning to think a little more clearly. I knew exactly what I would say and what I would do the moment she returned. No more uncertainty for me.
If she wanted me to play along with her, she was going to have to do it my way. She was going to listen to reason. I’d risk my neck for her but I wasn't going to stack the deck against myself.
The wind had tossed her chestnut hair and her azure eyes had apparently absorbed the cerulean blue of the spring skies and when she opened the door and again entered the room, she looked more than ever like a seventeen-year-old schoolgirl. She was smiling that secret smile—she always seemed to be smiling when she wasn’t pouting—and the moment she came in she crossed over and again stood on her toes and lifted her face and kissed me.
I should have known by this time what it meant.
Suzy wasn’t there,” she said. “I couldn’t reach her. We’ll just have to wait.”
I took her by the arms, careful not to bruise her soft flesh, and picked her up and carried her over and sat her on the edge of the bed. She started to say something, but I put my hand over her soft lips.
You are going to sit right there and listen,” I began.
The lips puckered and she kissed the palm of my hand, and then the lips opened and her tongue, hot as a flame, licked me like a cat would lick me. I almost stopped talking, but I didn’t.
I said, “Listen. We are not going to wait for Suzy. We are not going to wait for anyone at all. Understand? We are leaving. Right now.”
“But, Sam,” she said, moving her mouth away from my hand.
“No buts, baby,” I said. “You listen. We don’t have any more time to play games. Understand? No games. Marcus is dead. This money here belonged to him, or rather, it belonged to the boys higher up. You want the money and maybe you are entitled to it and maybe you are not. I don’t care. If you want it, and you think it should go to you, I’ll help you take it. Although I’ll tell you this, sweetheart, I think you are crazy to try to get away with it.”
“You think I am stealing it,” she said. It wasn't a question.
“I don’t care,” I said.
She shook her head and the pout was back.
“You listen to me, Sam,” she said. “I have a right to the money. You seem to know about Marcus, so you probably have heard about me. You probably have ideas about me—me and Marcus. Well, I don’t care what you think. That money is mine. I gave a lot to Marcus. Gave him everything. And that money isn’t half of what he promised me in return. But now he’s dead. Once that is known, I’m through. Understand? Through.”
“Don’t be stupid,” I said. “You still have your voice. Still have your rep. Why you and your sister can go on now and—”
“You are naive,” she said, her voice suddenly angry. “I guess you just don’t understand. It was Marcus—Marcus and his connections—which put Suzy and me across. He owned the record company which made our platters. He owned the distributors which released them. He had the connections with the juke box boys who played them. Sure, we were going places and if he hadn’t killed himself, we would have made it. But now he’s dead. His connections don’t care about me and Suzy. And his wife, who will get his record business, hates us. Once the newspapers get hold of the story about his death, I’m washed up. Do you think any legitimate outfit wants to take on the ex-mistress of a racketeer? Do you think—”
She stopped suddenly and for the first time since I had met her, I realized she had spoken in complete sincerity. Sincerity and bitterness.
“Marcus owes me that money,” she said, “and I mean to keep it. If you want to help me, I’ll share it with you. That is, of course,” she added, hesitating, “I’ll share it with you and Suzy. Suzy has to have her share.”
“And what makes you think that sister Suzy will go along?” I began, but again she interrupted me.
“Suzy always handles things,” she said. "And Suzy will do what I ask her to do. Suzy loves me.”
“And so we just wait here for Suzy?”
“We wait.”
I stepped back. It was an effort, but I stepped back and I leaned down and picked up the suitcase.
"And you insist on keeping this money?”
“Yes,” she said.
“And waiting for Suzy right here?”
“Yes.”
"All right, baby,” I said. “I have told you what I think. Now I will tell you what I am going to do. I am going to take this suitcase and go out and get into the car. If you want to come with me, come right now and get out of this trap. I’ll go along with you and I’ll do everything I can to see that you make a clean getaway—with the money. If you don’t—”
“If I don’t?”
“I’ll still take the money. And I’ll turn it over to the nearest cop I can find.”
For a moment she stared at me, neither anger nor fear nor surprise on her lovely, childlike face.
“You wouldn’t, Sam,” she said.
“I would, baby.”
I didn’t think she was going to go along with it. I didn’t think she really believed me. I don’t even know myself if I was telling the truth. But she didn't give me the chance to find out.
The smile was suddenly back—a little pathetic and making her look like a slightly recalcitrant and slightly hurt child. She shrugged, started to get to her feet.
"All right, Sam,” she said. “All right, honey. You’re the boss.”
I couldn’t help the surge of masculine pride.
“Then let’s get with it.” I lifted the suitcase from the floor and moved over to pick up my own bag.
“Just let me pour one more drink,” she said.
“Sure, baby,” Isaid. I could afford to be generous. I’d just proven who was the stronger.
I had to drop the suitcase with the money to the floor while I leaned over to latch my own Gladstone. I had my back to her and I could hear the gurgle of the liquor as she poured from the bottle of Scotch.
We’ll each have a drink,” she said.
“Sure,” I said.
I could hear her step toward me.
Here s yours, Sam,” she said.
And then it hit me.
I guess I must have known, at the last split second, what she was going to o, because I remember thinking I hope to God the bottle breaks, otherwise 1
won t have a head left
I didn’t have time for any more idle thoughts. I was too busy observing a galaxy of northern lights and discovering a whole new private world of constellations. First the lights and the stars and then the sense of my head leaving my shoulders and then just nothing.
I was either loaded with luck or else she was an expert, because the bottle didn’t break and it didn’t fracture my skull. It just knocked me out cold as a neglected mackerel.
I don’t know exactly at what moment the realization came to me that I was still alive. I only know that when it did, for the next several minutes, I was sorry. It seemed that someone was slowly beating my brains out with a baseball bat while an evil confederate was tearing my eyeballs from their sockets. I have had headaches before, but never one which could quite equal that one in vicious intensity.
But gradually I knew that I was living and breathing and gradually I came to understand that no one was batting my brains out—that I just had a headache to end all headaches.
I forced one eye open and then the other one and I started to move my head, but I quickly saw the silliness of that. So I just lay there, trying not to move and increase what was obviously a pain which had already reached the limits of my endurance. It took a moment to even realize where I was or what had happened.
I remembered what had happened first. But where I was came a little harder.
I thought at first that the blow had probably blinded me and that that was why everything seemed dark. But then I understood that the Venetian blinds had been drawn and the heavy drapes pulled over the windows and the lights turned out. I could, however, make out the outlines of the motel bedroom.
What confused me was that I wasn’t lying on the floor. There was a mattress under me and a sheet over me. I lifted a hand, reaching for my throbbing forehead, but the hand didn’t make it. It stopped somewhere on my chest and it was then I realized that I was stark naked. Lying on the bed, between white cotton sheets, without a stitch of clothes on my body.
I didn’t know how I had gotten there and I didn’t really care. I was too busy at the moment trying to figure out if there was anything left of my skull.
It may have been five minutes or it may have been an hour, but gradually the horrible shooting pains began to recede. Gradually I had a little room for considering something besides the agony of my aching head.
So she had conked me with the whiskey bottle. I hadn’t wanted to play it her way and she’d taken the matter in her own hands. And I had naively thought that I was going to be the one to take care of her.
If the effort hadn’t been so great I would have laughed.
Well, she was gone now and so was the money. The money I didn’t regret.
It wasn’t mine and I had never had it. But I had almost had her and in spite of the king-sized headache, I was able to regret that.
It was about then that I became aware of a movement in the room.
Someone was quietly crossing the floor, approaching the bed. Someone was probably going to finish the job she had started.
I told myself I should get up and do something about it, although for the life of me, in my present condition I couldn’t imagine what. I did the one thing which at the time seemed to make the most sense. I closed my eyes and tried to comfort myself with the thought that nothing which could happen could be more painful than that which already had.
I felt the sheet over me move.
The bedsprings sagged gently.
And then a small, soft hand lingered for a moment on my cheek and in another moment she had slid in under the sheet beside me and I could feel her soft flesh as her lithe, slender body pressed close to me.
I lay for a moment breathless, afraid to move. It was a dream I didn’t care to disturb.
I was lying sprawled on my back and she snuggled close with her head over my outstretched right arm. She moved and her lips suddenly touched my head just behind my ear. I could feel her fine gossamer hair as it caressed my cheek like a wanton spider web. She pressed a little closer and her lips moved, slowly traveling down from my ear to my neck. Her hand was across my chest and it moved slowly down my side. I could feel the hard acorn of her erect nipples as they pressed against my side.
Her body tautened and moved closer and her lips were under my chin and on my neck and then she suddenly moved and raised herself and her lips found my own.
I almost went out again and I don’t know how long we held the kiss. At last she moaned and she pulled me, turning a little away.
She had found my left hand and guided it and when she was satisfied with that, her own hands had again moved down. And then I too turned and now she was breathing as deeply as I was breathing.
I felt the blood in my veins surge and churn and the northern lights and the constellations and the unchartered stars were back, but I no longer cared about them.
The bed had found a life of its own.
The tiny hands were on my shoulders now, the nails digging into my flesh and my own two hands had at last discovered the soft natural curves below
and behind. Her mouth was wide on my own as she drew me in, moaning and wnthing.
There was no longer any headache, no longer any suitcase filled with thousands of dollars, no longer any room in a motel. There was only herself and myself, the single ecstatic unit into which we had blended. Only the rhythmic, tossing surge of our passion.
Her nails suddenly dug deep into my flesh and this time she cried out and her small white teeth bit sharply into my neck and the moment had arrived when the whole world ended.
We must have lain there, side by side, for a full ten minutes before she finally stirred and spoke.
“I am sorry I had to hit you with the bottle, Sam,” she said.
I was breathing like a wounded stag, but I managed an answer. It wasn’t bright, but I meant every word of it.
“You can hit me any time you like, baby,” I said.
She laughed and then, before I knew what she was going to do, she leaped up, tossing the sheet from the bed. I heard the pitter-patter of her steps across the room and suddenly the light went on, half blinding me.
“ I put the cork in the bottle before I hit you, ’ ’ she said, facing me coolly and serenely in all her exciting nakedness, “so it wouldn’t spill. I’ll make you a drink.”
She thought of everything.
She sat on the edge of the bed, holding her own glass as I sat up and swallowed my drink.
“You’ll be nice, won’t you, Sam, and wait for Suzy?” she said. “It is really best.”
“If you put that glass down and turn that light off,” Isaid, “I’ll wait for Suzy. I’ll wait for Marcus’ ghost or any damned thing in or out of this world you want me to wait for.”
She leaned over and patted my cheek.“ You are sweet,” she said. “And you won’t be sorry, either. You’ll like Suzy. I know you will.”
“I like you,” I said. “And that’s enough for any one man. Put down the drink. Turn out the light.”
She carefully set the glass on the floor.
“I can see, my boy,” she said, “that you are a glutton for punishment. But we’ll leave the light on. I like the light to be on.”
I started to reach for her but she moved off the bed.
“You just lie and rest for a few minutes,” she said. “We have a lot of time. Suzy won’t be here for at least another couple of hours.”
She was reaching for her clothes and I guess she saw the look on my face.
“I’ll only be a minute,” she said. “I'm going to have that bellboy find another bottle of Scotch. Suzy will want a drink when she gets here and we will, probably, be all out. But I’ll be right back. How is your head? I was careful
to hit you on the side of it so I wouldn’t really hurt you. ”
"My head is fine, ” I said. "It isn’t my head that is bothering me. It’s my—”
She laughed and tossed her clothes back on the chair. “I’ll just slip into your shirt and trousers while I send for the liquor,” she said. “It’s quicker.”
She was facing me as she stretched out her slender arms to put them into the sleeves of my shirt and I was lost in admiration at the perfection of her beautifully rounded body. Her skin was a delicate ivory, as smooth as satin and without a blemish. There wasn’t an ounce of surplus flesh on her, and yet every bone was softly concealed.
My eyes traveled down her lovely figure, lingering on the satin-smooth slopes of her breasts. I noticed, too, the odd, heart-shaped birthmark on her hip, just below the bone where the curve began.
Somehow it enhanced her loveliness. It could have been painted on by an artist to accentuate the sweetness of her curving, voluptuous thigh.
“The hell with the whiskey,” I began, but she moved quickly across the room, again doing the trick, with her hand over my lips.
“I told you, darling, that I’ll only be a minute,” she said. The hand moved down to caress me.
“You can wait for a couple of minutes, can't you, sweet?”
“I’m not sure that I can,” I said, and I really meant it.
It was more like fifteen minutes than one before she was back, holding a fresh bottle of unopened Scotch in her hand. She set it on the dresser and began to unbutton my white shirt, slipping her arms out of the sleeves.
The trousers fell to the floor and she stretched, lifting her hand to stifle a tiny yawn.
"See,” she said, “I told you I would be right back.” She moved toward the bed, her naked body gliding forward with a soft, liquid grace.
“And now, until Suzy gets here,” she said, “we won’t think about anything at all but just us.”
She was right as usual. For the next two hours, nothing in this world existed except the two of us. There was no suitcase full of money, there was no Suzy, there was no dead racketeer named Marcus. There was no problem and no future and no past. Just the wildly delicious, ecstatic, intoxicating, overpowering present.
Two hours that proved everything man has learned since Adam and Eve took a bite of that apple has been pretty much a waste of time and energy.