Hamilton, Donald - Novel 02 (6 page)

 
          
“Mother
detests her,” Ann Nicholson said. “She only puts up with her because she saved
my life. I tried to kill myself, you know.”

 
          
Emmett
glanced at her quickly. She sounded almost proud of it. It seemed to him that
the whole room had suddenly become a little colder, and that the girl had
suddenly moved far away from him. She was a case again, no longer a person. The
stout woman put their coffee in front of them.

 
          
“I
think I’ll have two eggs after all,” Ann Nicholson said, looking up to smile as
pleasantly at the woman as if she had never heard of suicide. “Sunny side up,
please.”

 
          
When
they came out they could feel the heat of the sun although the air was still
quite cool. The boy at the filling station had finished with the car. Ann
Nicholson paid him and got behind the wheel.

 
          
“If
you want to sleep…” she said to Emmett.

 
          
“I
think I’ll smoke a pipe first,” he said. He winced as, trying to find reverse,
she clashed the gears noisily. Then they were on the highway again.

 
          
“I’m
going to have to buy some things when the stores open,” Ann Nicholson said. “I
had to clean my teeth with my handkerchief.”

 
          
Emmett
said, “You can probably get a toothbrush but you won’t get much else. It’s
Sunday.”

 
          
“Oh,
that’s right.”

 
          
He
packed his pipe carefully, lit it and dropped the match into the ashtray above
the dashboard. Relaxing on the base of his spine, sunk down as far as possible
on the slick leather seat, he watched the girl’s face with a remote sleepy
bitterness. She made him uncomfortable. Not only did it make him uncomfortable
to wonder how far she was from being normal, and to think of the things she had
suffered that set her apart from ordinary people like himself, but also she
aroused in him the somewhat resentful envy mixed with respect that he had felt,
before, in the presence of the uniforms with the rows of ribbons. He remembered
the newspaper clipping and, studying her face, tried to imagine her, in sweater
and skirt, perhaps, or disguised as a boy, although it was difficult to see how
the fragile face could be made to look like a boy’s face even with the hair cut
short, slipping down darkened alleys with, at the end, always a large German sentry
silhouetted against the light of the street; or crouching in the bushes in the
rain while the lightning flashes showed the patrols searching for her; or
standing by the window of a shabby room, her profile clear against the sunlight
outside as she drew back the curtains minutely to look down at the street where
a man in a trench coat, obviously a heavy, stood ostentatiously reading a
newspaper. Because it always turned out
Hollywood
when you tried to imagine it. You knew it
had not been like that, but you had no idea of how it really had been. When
they said “underground” and “Gestapo” it came out Warner Brothers, passed by
the state board of censors.

 
          
She
cranked down the window beside her and the wind pushed at her soft light hair.

 
          
“What
did they tell you about me, Mr. Emmett?”

 
          
He
said carefully, “They said you’d had a pretty rugged time of it in
France
. Undergrounds and Gestapo and stuff. They
said that after you came back you’d shown an aversion to society for a while
and that you’d apparently forgotten some things the doctor thought you ought to
want to remember…”

 
          
She
said quickly, “Why? Why should I have to remember something like that? I
remember quite enough of it to know I don’t want to know the rest!” Then she
smiled. “I’m sorry. I’ve got so I go defensive about it quite automatically. Of
course I want to remember.”

 
          
“They
said something about a man named Kissel,” Emmett said.

 
          
“Oh,”
she said. “Yes. I thought they’d probably guessed.”

 
          
“I’m
not supposed to be telling you this,” Emmett said. “It’s supposed to be
entirely your own idea.”

 
          
She
laughed. “What did they say about Dr. Kissel?” she asked after a pause.

 
          
“That
he was teaching at some college near
Denver
. That you think he knows what happened to
you during the time you’ve forgotten about. That you’re afraid of trying to
remember until somebody tells you that it isn’t going to hurt. It sounds a
little screwy to me.”

 
          
She
threw him a quick glance. “Oh, it does, Mr. Emmett?” she said, rather stiffly.

 
          
“Well,”
he said. “I can see you wanting, and I can see you not wanting, but this
half-ass business, if you’ll pardon the expression, kind of puzzles me.”

 
          
She
asked, “And what do you know about amnesia, Mr. Emmett?”

 
          
Her
tone of voice annoyed him. He was tired and sleepy and the situation
embarrassed him, and he did not give a damn what he said.

 
          
“That
it’s generally faked,” he said.

 
          
The
car slowed abruptly as her foot released the accelerator; then picked up speed
again. After a long time, without looking at him, she asked, her voice almost
harsh:

 
          
“Did
Dr. Kaufman tell you to say that?”

 
          
“No,”
Emmett said. “No, it’s entirely my own idea and I apologize.”

 
          
“Oh,
don’t apologize,” she said. “Please go on.”

 
          
He
was suddenly a little frightened.

 
          
“No,”
he said. “Really, I’m sorry. I’m always offensive when I’m sleepy.”

 
          
She
said, “No, please tell me about amnesia, Mr. Emmett. I’m really quite
interested.”

 
          
He
flushed at the sarcasm in her voice. “All right,” he said angrily. “Apart from
the kind where the hero gets bopped on the head with a blunt instrument, there
are two kinds of amnesia, both discovered by the eminent psychiatroanalyst, Dr.
Emmettstein. In the first the wife gets tired of having her husband read Li’l
Abner aloud to her over the breakfast table and cuts his throat with the ham
slicer and explains to the jury that suddenly everything went black. She can’t
remember a thing. We call this, in the profession, legal, or courtroom amnesia.
In the second kind, the husband gets tired of his wife’s nagging and cleans out
the bank account, picks up a blonde, and goes on a binge. A week or so later he
wakes up with a head, alone and broke. Suddenly the wife and kids look kind of
good to him, but he’s going to have a hell of a time explaining that blonde. He
trots into the nearest police station and says he found himself standing on the
corner of
Main Street
and Elm and can’t for the life of him recall how he got there or where
he’s been. This is known as domestic amnesia.”

 
          
He
pulled at his pipe and felt the vibration of the car against the back of his
head where it leaned against the metal of the door. He was afraid to look at
the girl. He had let his resentment carry him into depths he knew nothing
about. If her mind were really ill his skepticism could easily bring on some
reaction he would be quite incapable of coping with, not being a psychiatrist.

 
          
“That’s
very interesting,” her voice said softly. “You should have a consultation with
Dr. Kaufman about my case.” She went on before he could speak, “Then you think
there is no such thing as genuine amnesia?”

 
          
“Hell,
no,” he said. “I know there is. I’m just blowing off steam. Forget it.”

 
          
“Don’t
be polite,” she said. Her voice held an edge of anger.

 
          
He
glanced at her and said, his anger answering hers, “Well, damn it, nothing ever
went black for me when I wanted it to. And if it did, I wouldn’t expect to come
out of it with somebody’s name, address, and telephone number.”

 
          
She
kicked the car out of gear and braked to a halt at the side of the road. A
truck swerved past, its horn blaring. She glanced at it, startled, as it went
on to the west, then turned to face Emmett.

 
          
“Does
it occur to you that you’re being rather cruel, Mr. Emmett?”

 
          
He
took his pipe from his mouth and looked at it with distaste. He did not say
anything.

 
          
“Why
do you dislike me?” she asked.

 
          
He
looked up. “I don’t,” he said quickly. “I think you’re probably a fine girl,
Miss Nicholson. But God damn it…!” He rubbed his eyes. He had a headache now. “Oh,
forget it,” he said. “Please forget the whole thing.”

 
          
“What
were you going to say?”

 
          
He
turned to her. “Listen,” he said angrily, “I spent the whole damn war and a
couple of years more being respectful and sympathetic to guys who kind of
looked down at me because…”

 
          
“I
see.”

 
          
“…
So then I think I’m getting away from it,” he said savagely, “and I pick up a
girl on the
Lincoln Highway
, and damn if she doesn’t turn out to be a
lousy heroine.”

 
          
He
knew that his face was quite red, and he could not make himself look at her. He
cranked down the window beside him, knocked the hot ashes out of his pipe into
his hand, and pitched them out before they could burn him. He heard the girl
begin to laugh, looked up, and found himself grinning wryly.

 
          
“I
think you’d better climb in back and get some sleep,” Ann Nicholson said.

 
          
He
woke up abruptly as the car lurched and came to a halt, the tires grinding in
the gravel at the side of the road. It was hot in the cramped rear seat; he was
stiff and his left arm was asleep. He heard the siren whine past, dying.

 
          
“My
God,” he said, sitting up to rub his numb hand. “Don’t tell me you were
speeding!”

 
          
Ann
Nicholson turned a white frightened face toward him. “I don’t think so. I’m
sure I slowed down to twenty-five in the town…”

 
          
Emmett
sighed. “Well. It’s never any use arguing with them.”

 
          
He
stopped. A tall man had got out of the black Ford sedan that had come to rest
ahead. The man looked as if he had been thin ten years ago, and as if the
weight he had put on since had not had time to distribute itself about his
body; it was all in the lower chest and belly. He still had a thin man’s long
legs and narrow shoulders. He was wearing a dark suit without a vest, a striped
white shirt and a bow tie. When his coat swung open you could see the star
pinned on the shirt. You could also see the cartridge belt constricting the
abdomen, the lower part of the holster showing below the coat; but the holster
was empty. The man had his gun in his hand. A lanky, sandy-haired boy in jeans
and a blue shirt got out of the Ford on the far side and started walking
gingerly around it. He held a sawed-off double-barreled shotgun across his body
and looked quite nervous.

 
          
A
car, approaching from the east, slowed and then, slamming into second and
swinging wide into the far lane, screamed past with a whine of tortured gears,
accelerating to hell out of there; it swerved crazily to avoid a large trailer
truck. The truck rolled past with the hiss of released airbrakes.

 
          
The
tall man made a motion with his gun. Emmett cleared his throat, pushed the seat
forward and, opening the door, climbed out. The tall man jerked the gun again
and Emmett raised his hands. The gun was a .44 or .45 Smith and Wesson with a
six-inch barrel, he found himself noticing distantly. His brother Dave had had
one like it for a while, trading it later to another guy for a .32 hammerless
and a radio that did not work. The bluing was worn off the tall man’s gun at
both sides of the muzzle, the top of the front sight, and the ribs of the
cylinder, from being carried in the holster. The muzzle looked big enough to
stick a forefinger into.

 
          
“What’s
the matter, officer?” Emmett asked. The words sounded silly, in the face of the
gun, but his voice was fairly good, he thought, considering the circumstances.

 
          
“Who
the hell are you?” the tall man demanded.

 
          
Emmett
told him.

 
          
“What
are you doing in that car?”

 
          
Emmett
told him.

 
          
“Oh,
a hitch-hiker,” the tall man said contemptuously.

 
          
The
sun was very bright. There was a ditch on either side of the road, and beyond
each ditch a barbed wire fence. Emmett had a vision of himself fleeing crazily,
hanging up in the barbed wire, feeling the bullets go into him as he struggled
to get free.

 
          
The
boy with the shotgun stood between the cars, his weapon uneasily trained on the
convertible.

 
          
“Keep
those hands up,” the tall man said sharply to Emmett. “Tell the girl to get out
here.”

 
          
Emmett
turned slowly. “You’d better come here, Miss Nicholson.”

 
          
“Nicholson,
eh?” The tall man spat. “Bud, go around and check that license again.”

 
          
He
waited unmoving in the sunshine for his order to be obeyed. He had a long face,
wide at the cheekbones and narrow at the chin and forehead. There were more
freckles on the face than Emmett could remember seeing on a human face before.
He had a long, rubbery, thin-lipped mouth, and small, very blue eyes, set close
together on each side of a large curved nose.

 
          
“Six-one-o-two-six-one,”
the boy said. “
Illinois
.”

 
          
Ann
Nicholson got out of the car. Emmett heard her footsteps come to him and felt
her hand take his arm. The hand was trembling.

 
          
The
tall man looked at her. “Your name’s Ann Nicholson?”

 
          
“A…”
The word did not come out; all the self-possession she had showed with Emmett
earlier in the morning was gone. She was quite terrified. She tried again. “…
Yes.”

 
          
“We
had a call from the
Chicago
police,” the tall man said. “Girl wearing light gabardine suit, light
hat, blonde, about five-four, a hundred and fifteen pounds, driving tan Mercury
convertible, Illinois license six-one-o-two-six-one. Name of Nicholson. That’s
you, isn’t it?”

 
          
“Yes.
But…”

 
          
“Take
a look in the car, Bud.”

 
          
Emmett
heard the boy climb into the car. He cleared his throat. “What’s the trouble?”

 
          
“She’s
wanted as a material witness in a murder case, Mister.”

 
          
Emmett
felt the girl’s fingers dig into his arm. He turned his head slowly to look at
her. Her face looked hollow and ugly with fright.

 
          
“Do
you know anything about it?” he asked.

 
          
She
shook her head convulsively.

 
          
“Nothing
in the car, Sheriff Patman,” the boy’s voice said. “She’s got a roll of bills
in her purse and there’s a camera in the glove compartment, but no weapons,
saving a jack handle.”

 
          
The
sheriff holstered his weapon and came forward. Emmett stood quite still and
felt the big freckled hands pat him, turn him around, and take out his wallet.

 
          
“John
E. Emmett,
Washington
,
D.C.
You’re a long ways from home, Mister.”

 
          
“Yes.”

 
          
“Well,
keep your nose clean and you’ll be all right.”

 
          
He
felt the wallet put into his hands. He saw the small blue eyes study Ann
Nicholson with a look that he did not like.

 
          
“Sorry,
Miss, but I can’t take any chances,” the tall man said. “Keep your hands up.”

 
          
The
big freckled hands unfastened her jacket and pulled it open. Emmett looked
away. He heard the girl gasp and told himself there was clearly nothing that he
could do about it. He wished himself far away, on a
Pullman
rolling toward
Denver
.

 
          
“Sorry,
Miss,” the sheriff’s voice said, sounding a little strained. “Get in the car.
Reckon you’d better drive, Mister. Turn around and drive slow back to town.
Bud, you follow in the lizzie.”

 
          
As
they moved toward the car, Emmett glanced at the girl beside him. She was
fastening her jacket again. There were two red spots in the whiteness of her
face, but her lips, even with the lipstick, were quite pale. She did not look
at him. The tall man got into the rear seat of the convertible. Emmett slid
behind the wheel. Ann Nicholson got in beside him and closed the door. He
turned the car around on the highway and drove at thirty-five back the way they
had come, a little surprised to find it still early enough morning that the sun
was in his eyes, going east. In the rear-view mirror he could see the Ford
following closely.

 
          
They
entered the town. It looked like any town they had been through, perhaps a
little larger than average. There were railroad tracks on one side of the
highway with the depot facing the business section.

 
          
“Turn
left at the corner,” the tall man’s voice said. “Hell, watch the stoplight,
Mister. Don’t they have stoplights in
Washington
,
D.C.
?”

 
          
The
light changed and he made the turn.

 
          
“Now
right,” the sheriff said. “Middle of the block.”

 
          
The
brick building was two stories high. Over the main door the concrete slab was
marked in sunken letters: Lane County Jail and Court House. A middle-aged woman
in a print dress walked by carrying a shopping bag as the two cars stopped.

 
          
“Get
out slow,” the sheriff ordered.

 
          
Emmett
glanced uneasily at the no-parking signs on the lamp posts along the curb, but
it seemed silly to mention them. He followed Ann Nicholson out of the car and
sensed the tall man getting out behind him. The Ford had stopped behind the
convertible.

 
          
“Run
her up in the alley, Bud,” the sheriff said, and the Ford backed away. “All
right, inside, you.”

 
          
The
sun was very bright and hot as they crossed the sidewalk. The girl stopped
before the door. She turned abruptly to face the tall man.

 
          
“Please,”
she said. “There must be some mistake. I don’t know anything about…”

 
          
Emmett
glanced at her, losing his sympathy for her in a quick flash of annoyance.
There was so clearly no point in arguing about it. All you had to do was look
at the freckled obstinate country face. The man was the law and he was going to
take them inside and call
Chicago
about them. You did not stand on a hot sidewalk and tell a hick
policeman that he was making a mistake. If he were making a mistake he would
find it out in due time in his own way. You did not tell the law that you were
only going thirty, or that you didn’t see the traffic light, or that you hadn’t
killed anybody and didn’t know anything about it.

 
          
“Come
on, Miss Nicholson,” he said, taking her arm. She pulled free without looking
at him.

 
          
“Please!”
she said to the sheriff.

 
          
The
tall man walked up between them, taking an arm of each, and moved them bodily
toward the door; then he released Emmett to turn the knob with his right hand.
Abruptly the girl tore herself loose and was running down the sidewalk.

 
          
“Damn!”
the sheriff said explosively. “Stay here, Mister, if you know what’s good for
you.”

 
          
He
ran after the girl. Emmett stood by the door, watching. There was something
ridiculous and a little indecent about a girl trying to run fast in high-heeled
pumps and the rather tight skirts they had taken to wearing. She whirled as the
man, running easily, caught up with her, and struck at him with her clenched
hands, as if pounding on a locked door. Then he had seized her, and suddenly
she was fighting him desperately with a heedless, almost animal-like ferocity,
using her nails and her teeth and her high heels. Emmett found himself walking
slowly down the bright sidewalk toward them. He could hardly breathe and he
wanted to be sick. The bitch, he thought, the stupid little bitch. In that
moment he hated the girl more than he had hated anything in his whole life—for
getting him into this, for not being fifty years old and ugly, and for making
an obscene display of herself on a public street in broad daylight.