A Hell of a Woman (Crime Masterworks) (9 page)

I took six bills, thirty dollars, from a packet of fives and stuffed them into my waliet. That would give me a good day at the store, and keep this unappreciative character, Staples, who was always giving me a hard time, from giving me a hard time.

I dropped the rest of the pack back into the satchel, and started to fasten the catch. And I was a happy man, dear reader. I had won out in the unequal struggle, with every son-of-a-bitch in the country, even my own father, giving me a bad time. I had forged onward and upward against unequal odds, my lips bloody but unbowed. And from now on it would be me and Mona and all this dough, living a dream life in some sunny clime-Mexico or Canada or somewhere- the rest of the goddamned world could go to hell.

But though I seldom complain, you have doubtless read between the lines and you know that I am one hard luck bastard. So, now, right as I stood on the doorstep of Dreams Come True, my whole world crumpled beneath me. I had all this dough and I had Mona-or I soon would have her-and then I looked up, and (TO BE CONTINUED).

… She was in her nightgown. She was all prettied up like! hadn't seen her since! don't know when; and she wasn't more than a dozen feet away. Standing in the entrance to the little hall that led back to the bedroom.

Smiling at me, but sort of watchful. Kind of smile-frowning.

Joyce.

My wife.

I let it drop casually-the lid, I mean-and locked it. I said, "What the heii are you doing here?"

"I-" Her eyes fiashed, but she held onto the smile-"I still had my key, Dolly."

"So you had a key," I said. "So suppose you had a nickel. You got to make a telephone call with it?"

"Please, Dolly. Don't make it any harder for me than it is."

"And you never made anything hard for me, did you?" I said. "You didn't do your goddamned best to wreck this house before you left. You didn't screw up every goddamned stitch of clothes! had. You didn't-"

"I know. I'm sorry, Doily. But I've thought things over, and if you'll just listen to me-"

"Listen, hell," I said. "Listening to dames like you is what's put me where I am today." And then I shrugged and said, "All right, spili it. I'm iistening."

I'd decided I'd better. Because maybe she had seen that dough, and anyway this was no time to get into a brawl. I had to live nice and quiet for the next few weeks. My nerves wouldn't take anything else, and anything else-anything that might draw attention to me-just wasn't safe.

She hesitated, iooking at me, a little suspicious I guess of the sudden change. I said, "Well, come on. Give. Sit down and I'll get us a drink."

"I don't think I want a drink." She shook her head. "You've been drinking quite a bit, haven't you, Dolly? There's all kinds of bottles around and it looks like you slept in the bed with your shoes on. And-"

I was staring at her. Not saying anything, just staring. She cut off with the nagging fast, stretched her smile.

"Just listen to me, will you? I'm not back in the house an hour, and already I'm-you get us a drink, honey. Please."

I got a bottle out of the cupboard, and a couple of glasses. I came back into the living room; and she was sitting in the same chair Pete had sat in. And, well, it gave me an awfully funny feeiing.

I poured the drinks and handed her one. My hands shook, and I patted the lounge at my side. "Why so unsociable? Why not sit over here?"

"We-el. You really want me to?"

"What the hell? Sure."

"Well-" She sat down on the lounge kind of crossways to me. "Well, here I am."

"Yeah," I said. "There you are, all right."

"I-I guess it would be too much to hope… I guess I shouldn't ask if you're glad to see me."

I let myself frown a little; thoughtful, you know. I took a sip of my drink, lighted a cigarette and passed her one.

"Well, it's kind of a funny deal," I said. "A guy's wife wrecks damned near everything he has, and then she takes off for a week-almost a week-and he thinks it's all over. He doesn't know where the hell she's been, what she's been doing with herself. She shows back up without any warning, and for all he knows-"

"I've been in Kansas City, Doily. I'd started back to Houston; I was going to get my old job back-"

"Where'd you get the money?"

"From the owner of the club. I called him collect after I left here that night, and he wired me two hundred to get back on."

"Oh."

"No, Dolly. Please don't act like that, honey. You know I wouldn't-couldn't. You know there's never been anyone but you."

"I didn't say anything," I said. "So you stopped off in K.C., huh?"

"Yes, I had a four-hour layover there between trains, and then Iwas going on. But… " She paused a moment, iooking down into her glass. "I don't know quite how to put it, honey. Maybe it was getting off by myself for a while, being able to stand outside of things and look at them. I could see the whole picture that way, Dolly, the good and the bad, and it began to look a lot different to me. I began to wonder why things had turned out as they had. I wasn't sure that I should come back, but I felt that I should at least think about it. So… so that's what I did. I took a room in Kansas City, and I really thought. For the first time in months, I suppose. It was quiet and peaceful, and there wasn't something to get me upset the minute I-"

"Like me, for example?"

"I've been more to blame than you, Doily. Entirely to blame, I guess. I was responsible for the way I acted."

"Well," I said, "I'm not throwing anything up to you, understand, but as long as you mention the subject yourself I -. – " I turned and looked at her, feeling the blood push up into my face. "What the hell you mean, you were responsible?"

"Please, honey. I'm here to help you. I love you and I'm your wife, and it's a wife's place to stick by her husband"

I poured myself another drink, the neck of the bottle rattling against the glass. I threw it down at a gulp, and it calmed me down a little bit, but only on the outside. It didn't change the way I felt.

"You think I'm crazy, is that it?" I said. "Well, it wouldn't be any goddamned wonder if I was. I've been knocking myself out for people almost from the time I began to walk, and all I got for it was a royal screwing. It's like it was a plot, almost. The whoie goddamned world sitting up nights to figure out how to give me a hard time. Every bastard and son-of-a-bitch in the world working together to-to-"

I stopped. It was all true, by God, but somehow saying it out loud, saying it just then, it didn't sound so good.

"Well, anyway," I said. "You've got to admit I've had plenty of hard luck."

"Of course you have, dear. So have a lot of other people."

"A lot of other people, hell! You name me just one person that's got the rooking I've got. In his work and his home life and-"

I stopped myself again.

She slid over on the lounge, put one of her hands over mine. "You do see it, don't you, honey? And now that you understand and I understand, we can stop it before-We can do something about it."

I'd do something about it, all right. She may have thought she'd had a tough time before, but she hadn't seen anything yet. I'd have her run out of here inside of a week, long before Mona and I were due to get together.

"There's… I don't want to upset you, honey, but there's something I want to ask."

"Yeah?" I said. "Well, go ahead."

"Maybe I'd better not. Not tonight. I'm sure you wouldn't-uh-"

"Come on. Spit it out."

"Well. About the money. I-_Dolly!_"

I let go of her wrist, grinned and gave it a little pat. It had been a dumb thing to do, to cut her off before she had a chance to say whatever she was going to. But I just hadn't been able to help myself.

"Scuse, piease," I said. "I guess seeing you in that nightgown I kind of lost my head. Now what about the money?"

"We-el… nothing. Do you really like the gown, honey?"

"Love it. What about the money?"

She hesitated. Then, she smiled and shook her head. "Nothing, honey. No, really, it's nothing. I was just going to say that-uh-well, I had quite a bit of money left from cashing in my ticket and all. And- uh-of course, I'll have to pay it back, but we couid use if for a while and…"

She went on smiling at me, smiling into my eyes. And, of course, she was a goddamned liar like every other woman I'd ever known. But I couldn't be sure she was lying now.

"Well," I said, "I won't say I couldn't use a little extra money."

"I'll give it to you in the morning," she said. "Be sure and remind me of it."

"Those deadbeats have really been giving me a time," I said. "The rotten bastards, you'd think they were trying to see how hard-Well, skip it. I must be beginning to sound like one long gripe."

"It's all right, darling. Don't ever be afraid to talk to me."

"Well, anyway," I said. "I caught up with a flock of 'em tonight. Pulled in a nice littie wad of dough. Ought to make Staples act half way decent toward me for a change."

"Wonderful," she said. "I'm so glad for you, honey." And it seemed to me that her smile became a lot more real; the watchfulness went out of her.

She turned down another drink. I poured one for myself, and sat sipping it, thinking; and then I happened to look at her out of the corner of my eyes. And she was looking at me the same way, her head cocked to one side.

I laughed and she laughed. I set down my drink, and pulled her over on my lap.

I kissed her. Or, I guess you could say, she kissed me. She put her hands back of my head, and pulled my face down to hers. And I thought we weren't ever coming up for air, but you don't hear me kicking. She was a lot of woman, that Joyce. She had the face and she had the build. It wasn't hard to forget, for a little while, that she was just plain no-good and never would be.

She pulled away at last and lay back, smiling up at me, wiggling and breathing pretty hard as I made with the hands.

"Mmmm," she said, half closing her eyes. "Oh, Dolly, we are going to be happy, aren't we?"

"Hell," I said. "I'm happy right now."

"Do you really like my nightgown, honey? Tell me the truth, now."

"Huh-uh," I said. "I don't like it."

"Oh? Why, honey, I spent almost one whole afternoon picking it out, and I was just sure-"

"It covers you up," I said. "I don't like anything that covers you up."

She laughed and said, "Oh, you!" and gave me a little pinch. She pulled my head down again, and whispered in my ear. "I'll tell you something, honey. It's a new kind of gown. It – -. comes off…"

Well.

Well, afterwards-after she'd gone to sleep-I got up to get a drink of water. And on the way back to the bedroom, I locked the sample case and put the key in my pocket.

I got back into bed. I turned on my side, and closed my eyes. And it was as though a guard had been taken away from a gate, or a door suddenly thrown open, letting in a hundred images that I hadn't looked at until then-that I hadn't really looked at. Letting them all rush in at me at once. The old woman and Pete. The way she'd looked, the way he'd looked. Her head swinging like a pumpkin, her body sprawled on the stairs. His face-his face and neck, the way he'd chuckled when he asked me…

I screamed. I flung myself up in bed, rocking and screaming. Because, Jesus, I hadn't wanted to do it, and I wouldn't ever have done it again. But now it was done, and there wasn't any way I could undo it. And, God, I'd be caught sure as hell. I'd just blundered my way through, and probably I'd done a hundred things that the cops could trace me on. Or if they weren't bright enough to catch up with me, Mona would probably do the job for them. She'd get scared and talk to save her own neck, and- "Jesus!" I rocked back and forth, screaming and crying. "Oh, God Almighty. My God, God, God…"

And then there was someone else saying, "My God. Oh, my God, darling… " And Joyce was holding onto me, her body rocking with mine.

"I'm s-sorry," I said. "I-I-God, I'm sorry! I didn't mean it! I'm-"

"Lie down," she said. "Lie down, and mother will hold her boy. Mother's never going to go away and leave her boy again. She's going to stay right here and hold him close like this, and nothing can hurt him then; there's nothing to be afraid of. He's with mother, and he's safe, and mother will understand whatever.. w-whatever…"

I got hold of myself, partly. I said, "I must have been having a nightmare. I-"

"There, there," she said. "It's all right. Everything's going to be all right, darling. He's going to lie down now, and.. there. There, there."

She pulled me back down. She moved her pillow up a little bit and moved mine down a littie.

"There," she said. "No, baby; around this way. Tha-at's my boy! Now, down a little, just a little more… and then closer, darling. Very close to mother…"

And she drew me close.

And slid the gown down off her shoulders.