Hamilton, Donald - Novel 02 (15 page)

 
          
The
man put his hat on his head and went out. Mr. Nicholson came slowly forward to
stand above Emmett. Seen from the chair, he was a rather impressive figure in
spite of his lack of height; his military carriage even overcame the handicap
of the rumpled seersucker suit and the wilted collar. “Where is my daughter,
Emmett?” he asked.

 
          
“I
don’t know,” Emmett said.

 
          
“I
can’t afford a scandal right now,” the gray-haired man said. “There’s some talk
of a congressional investigation of some of our war contracts. As far as I know
we’re in the clear, but picture to yourself what the papers would make of it if
they learned that my daughter… Not as much the murder as the other thing.”

 
          
“I
still don’t know where she is, Mr. Nicholson,” Emmett said. “I’m sorry.”

 
          
“If
she gets in touch with you, let me know.”

 
          
“All
right, Mr. Nicholson,” Emmett said. There did not seem to be any point in
arguing with a man who was certain you were going to obey him. He got to his
feet, saw that he was not wanted here any longer, and started for the door.

 
          
“Emmett.”

 
          
He
stopped and looked around.

 
          
“It’s
ten thousand dollars,” Mr. Nicholson said, “if you do. If you don’t, you’ll
never hold another professional job again. That’s a promise.”

 
          
As
he went out, Emmett reflected that he seemed to have heard approximately the
same threat once before, in
Boyne
.

 
          
Out
on the street again, he found that the thunderhead in the west had reached the
zenith, and as he walked away from the hotel the sun went behind it, leaving
the air suddenly a little chilly. It gave him a peculiar feeling to wonder if
some body would be following him. He walked into a drugstore and got change for
a dollar and entered a phone booth. “
Summit
seven two one,” he said. “Ring four.”

 
          
As
he waited, he discovered that he was shaking.

 
          
“Speak
up, man,” a distant female voice said abruptly in his ear. “I can’t hear a word
you’re saying.”

 
          
“…
John Emmett,” he said. “Ee, double-em, ee, double-tee.”

 
          
“Oh,
it’s you,” the voice said. “It’s about time you called. How are your brothers?
Howard? And the one that was always tinkering with the car? Dave?”

 
          
“It
was Howie that used to work on the car, Mrs. Pruitt,” he said automatically.
There was a silence, and he realized that he had passed a test.

 
          
“Your
wife’s here, young man,” the sharp voice said. “A lot of people have been
asking for her. You’d better come get her. She’s going to starve in that cabin
if she doesn’t unlock the door long enough for me to give her something to eat.”

 
          
He
saw the station wagon waiting in the darkness as the bus rolled up to the
false-front building that was Summit’s hotel and post office; the town
otherwise consisting of two general stores, three saloons, and two churches.
The saloons were lighted, as was the hotel; the stores and churches, dark. As
Emmett got out he heard the clanking of a steam shovel in the bed of the creek
that passed through the center of town. It surprised him that they were still
working at it, after almost ten years. You’d have thought they’d have sieved
all the silver out of that creek by now, he reflected.

 
          
“You’re
Mister Emmett, I reckon,” a man’s voice said. He turned and shook hands with a
small compact figure wearing boots, jeans, a blue shirt, and a finger-marked
Stetson. By the light from the bus and the hotel he could see that the man’s
face was brown and middle-aged. “Mack,” the man said. “Pete Mack. It confuses
some people.”

 
          
The
bus pulled away, leaving them standing beside Emmett’s piled luggage. Pete Mack
spat out the dust it had kicked into his face and grabbed the bags; Emmett
followed him with camera and fishing-rod case, feeling awkward and a little
lost. He could feel the mountains all around him in the darkness, and his lungs
were aware of the altitude.

 
          
“Still
digging up that creek, I see,” he said in a conscious attempt to establish
himself as an old-timer, as the station wagon bounced across the wooden bridge.

 
          
Pete
Mack spat through the window beside him. “Young fellow just started it up
again. Veteran. Expected to make a fortune by Christmas.” After a moment he
added, “Last Christmas.”

 
          
Emmett
glanced back at the great futile mounds of bluish clay illuminated by the
lights of the shovel in the ravaged stream-bed bordered by cottonwoods. It
seemed to him they were so obviously symbolical as to be merely silly. Then it
occurred to him that he had no very strong position from which to criticize the
other man; his own reasons for coming up here were not exactly brilliant. He
held onto the door handle as the station wagon, in low, started up a dirt track
that went up the mountainside at an angle that seemed to approach close to
forty-five degrees.

 
          
“Is
Johnny Parsons still around?” he asked. “Tall, redheaded guy… He taught my
brother Dave how to use a rope.”

 
          
“Johnny
lost a leg in the war,” the man behind the wheel said. “He’s got a job in a
garage in
Colorado
Springs
.”

 
          
“Dave
got killed,” Emmett said. “In
North Africa
.”

 
          
“That’s
tough,” Pete Mack said.

 
          
Mrs.
Pruitt was on the porch when they arrived; a bulky woman in a clean print dress
with a wide brimmed Stetson squashed down over her short gray hair.

 
          
“Leave
his duffle in the car, Pete,” she said “… come on in here, young feller,” she
said to Emmett.

 
          
Emmett
was aware that the compact figure of the driver followed them onto the porch.
Glancing back he saw the man waiting idly against a porch pillar, lighting a
cigarette. He followed the woman into the house. It was getting close to
midnight
and all the guests had, apparently, retired
to their cabins; the large rustic living room was empty, illuminated by the
glow of the fireplace and by one small table lamp with a figured paper shade.
Mrs. Pruitt turned on the ceiling fixture and threw her hat on the piano. She
walked to the fireplace and studied the well-preserved snarling bear’s head
above the mantel. Presently she reached up and patted the long-dead animal on
the nose, turning to face Emmett.

 
          
“How
are the other boys?” she asked.

 
          
“Dead,”
he said.

 
          
She
glanced at him sharply, but her voice was easy when she spoke. “Well, that’s
the way it goes, I reckon. In the war, eh?” Her voice did not require an
answer. She walked to the sideboard and brought out a bottle of whisky and two
shot glasses which she filled carefully, to the brim; then after corking the
bottle with a sharp blow from the heel of her hand, she gave Emmett one of the
small glasses and took up the other. “They were good boys,” she said. “When you
wrote me, I remembered the three of you kids and that pile of junk you called a
car. Gave you a cabin for old times’ sake, Mister Emmett. There were six on the
list ahead of you. That’s the kind of business we’re doing these days.” She
held up her glass, looked through it at the light, and emptied it in a single
swallow. Emmett managed to imitate her without choking. The woman’s pale blue
eyes regarded him narrowly. “You’re a hell of a bridegroom, Sonny.”

 
          
Emmett
did not say anything.

 
          
Mrs.
Pruitt said, “When she came driving in here all breathless in her nice new suit
with a brand new suitcase and a shiny wedding ring I didn’t need for anybody to
draw me a picture. I was glad to help out; I believe in young folks getting
married. She was of an age to know her own mind. I didn’t see where her old man
had any business messing with it; that’s why I lied to him… But leaving a nice
young lady like that waiting for you a night and a day! And then standing
chewing the fat with an old character like myself, like you had all the time in
the world!” She turned and picked a jangling key ring off the mantelpiece,
selected a key, and held it out. “Cabin eight, Mister Emmett. You can let
yourself in easy and surprise her.”

 
          
Emmett
took the keys and started for the door. He was aware when the woman moved
behind him.

 
          
“Who
the hell do you think you’re kidding, Sonny?”

 
          
He
stopped. He heard her footsteps come up behind him. Her hand took the keys away
from him. He saw that Pete Mack had come into the side door. There was a large
caliber Colt revolver thrust into the waistband of the small man’s jeans. “Come
on,” Mrs. Pruitt said, giving Emmett a little push. “Now that you’re here I’m
going to find out if it’s you that’s scaring that child to death. Do you think
I can’t tell the difference between a nervous bride and a young girl that’s
frightened near to wetting her underpants?”

 
          
He
could see the lake to the left as they came out, cold and metallic in the dark.
There was a soft cushion of dust and pine needles over the hard clay of the
yard. There were small pine trees all around. Pete Mack lounged along beside
them, smoking his cigarette leisurely, his hand never straying near the gun at
his waist. It seemed to Emmett that he had seen too many unfired guns in one
day. If he saw another one, he thought, he might find himself doing something
reckless just to learn if it would go off.

 
          
“Here
we are, number eight,” the woman beside him said, stopping. He saw the outlines
of the fawn-colored convertible parked beside the dark cottage. Mrs. Pruitt
climbed the steps and looked down at him, saying, “I’ve been leaving the child
alone since she seemed to want it, but it’s time she got some food in her
belly, anyway.”

 
          
Something
clattered to the floor beyond the door; the key had been in the lock, Emmett
realized. Mrs. Pruitt had forced it out with her own key. The woman hesitated,
then knocked.

 
          
“Mrs.
Emmett,” she said. “Mrs. Emmett…”

 
          
“Her
name is Nicholson,” Emmett said.

 
          
Mrs.
Pruitt glanced at him testily. She did not knock again, but after a moment
turned the key in the lock and tried the door. It started open; she held it,
beckoning to Emmett.

 
          
“All
right, Sonny,” she said. “I want to see what she does when she sees you. The
light switch is to the right as you go in.”

 
          
Emmett
mounted to the stoop beside her, pushed the door open, and went inside. It
seemed to him that he had been through all this before, in the hotel in
Boyne
. There was no light at all in the room;
apparently she had the shades drawn at all the windows. The cabin smelled of
pine logs, of fear, and of death. He knew what he was going to find, and he did
not want to find it. There was not a sound of movement and the beating of his
own heart filled the darkness. He groped for the light switch, found it before
he had expected to, and the burst of light was like an explosion.

 
          
She
was crouched on the bed like an animal, her weight on her knees and hands. She
was wearing slacks and a brightly checkered wool shirt; one tail of it had
pulled out in front and one sleeve was rolled higher than the other. Her face
showed little furrows from the pillow as if she had been sleeping on top of the
bed in her clothes, waking to hear the key in the lock. Behind the tousled veil
of her hair her eyes caught the light queerly, looking quite mad.

 
          
“Hello,
Mr. Emmett,” she whispered.

 
          
“Hello,”
he said.

 
          
She
pushed herself off the bed to stand up, facing him. The tail of her red and
white shirt hung down over her stomach. Her slacks were damply creased and
wrinkled from being slept in, so that the neat knife-edged crease sewn into the
brown gabardine looked unreal and fraudulent.

 
          
“I
tried
Sheepshead
Lake
…” She pushed the wild hair back from her
face. “… and
Dogleg
Lake
, and
Hogshead
Lake
. I had a simply dreadful time trying to
remember—”

 
          
Her
eyes pleaded with him to help her talk. He caught the glint of the cheap
wedding ring on her hand, and said, “Hello, Mrs. Emmett.”

 
          
“I
hope you don’t mind.” She glanced down and slipped off the ring and dropped it.
She watched it helplessly as it rolled away across the floor. “I couldn’t think
of… I knew it would look like… I didn’t want people to think… I…”

 
          
Her
mouth was still talking, but she had used up all the rational sounds inside
her; there was nothing left but fear and madness. Her lips moved but nothing
came except a mindless little whimper. He caught her as she swayed, and she
clung to him, her fingers digging fiercely into his biceps.

 
          
“He…”

 
          
“What?”
Emmett asked, holding her.

 
          
“He
said… he said, take this, it’ll make you sleep. It was just one pill. He said,
t-take it like a good girl, you’ll feel better in the morning, Miss Nicholson…”

 
          
“Who?”

 
          
“Dr.
K-Kauf—” She pressed her face against him. He could feel her tremble with the
effort of retaining the shred of control that still remained to her. “Kaufman,”
she gasped.

 
          
“He
came to the hotel?”

 
          
She
nodded mutely without raising her head.

 
          
He
pushed the damp hair back from her temple. “When?”

 
          
“About
three hours…”

 
          
“After
I left?”

 
          
She
nodded again. “And… and in the m-morning I’d tried to kill my—” She swallowed. “—myself
again!”

 
          
“Why
didn’t you tell somebody?”

 
          
The
gray eyes were looking up at him with a dreadful emptiness. “Would
you
… have believed me? You d-don’t even
quite believe me now.”