Intimate Victims (18 page)

Battle put the bread out and got ham from the refrigerator. Plangman was cracked, he thought. He spread mustard on the bread. “Yes, I’m listening.”

“I need to change myself. I’m tired of myself. Do you know I feel I can say anything to you? Anything! I don’t even care if you laugh.”

“Good!” said Battle.

“I need my chin built up, wouldn’t you say? How much money
do
you have, sir?”

He could tell by the sounds from the other room that Plangman was going through his things. He knew Plangman was trying to cover up the sounds of drawers opening by speaking in a loud voice. He poured a glass of milk and put the sandwich together.

“I don’t have much money,” he called back to Plangman. He stalled. He called in, “Whatever happened to my passport?” None of the letters he had written to Plangman contained the name Bowser or Battle; there had been no return address on them.

“Oh, I have your passport with me, sir.”

There was a claw hammer on the window sill. Battle walked across and picked it up. He stuffed it into his back trousers’ pocket, pulled down his sweater over it, then picked up the plate with the sandwich on it, and the glass of milk.

From the other room, Plangman said, “But you don’t want to go any place, do you?”

“I sort of do,” said Raymond Battle, starting into the other room.

“S
LEEPING?” HE
said.

“I can’t sleep! Ray, do you have a girl down there, is that what it’s all about?”

“No, I don’t have a girl down here. But my friend got sick all over my rug, dammit. I have a good mind to just take it to the city dump!”

“Is he gone?”

“I’m going to drive him to the bus station. I don’t want him to stay over.”

“Banjo’s been calling and calling,” she yawned. “And I’ve just hung up every time! I can’t face telling him we’re getting married. You know, he really goes for me, Ray, he …"

“Bunny, I can’t talk!”

“What’s the matter with you anyway, Ray! You don’t have to …"

“My friend is waiting,” he said, looking down at the rug, rolled and tied. “I just called to say I love you and I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“You don’t want me to wait up until you get back?”

“No, it’s too late already!”

“Don’t snap, Ray!”

“I’m sorry.”

“Thank you.”

“I’ll see you tomorrow.”

She said, “Nite! Nite!”

He shut his eyes after he hung up, and gave himself a few slow seconds to go over everything. Then he picked up Plangman’s suitcase (the passport was in it; so was all of Plangman’s identification now), and the pillow case containing Plangman’s clothes, and his own bloody clothing. There was a carton of beer in the pillow case too, which he had taken from the refrigerator. On the Hinkson, a woodsy spot north of Columbia, where the students went for beer parties, it was the custom to bury any fire, and all cans and other refuse after a party. He would empty the beer cans near the ground where he would make the grave, build a fire and burn the bloody clothing. Just another party on the Hinkson; a typical time for it too, he would get there around two-thirty. Over his arm was a clean pair of trousers, a fresh shirt, and another sweater. He might need to change his clothes again, if there was blood on him again, when he finished. He had brought up a shovel from the basement and placed it just outside the door of 702. When he was through at the Hinkson, he would drive to the bus station and check Plangman’s suitcase — get it out of the way until he was sure of how to dispose of it.

He glanced back at the room. The room was clean enough. At the last minute he had retrieved a tooth from under the chair, and he flushed it down the toilet. The hammer was washed and back in its place on the window sill. He could drag the rug down the hall and out the door and cram it into the trunk of the car. He was sure he could manage it. He would back the car to the door; the street was quiet at this hour. It was time now — and luck. Luck!

He shut the door behind him and walked out of 702, down Wentwroth and around the corner where his car was parked. It was exactly two-fifteen. He put the suitcase and the laundry bag in the back seat with his change of clothes. He would have to remember matches — oven matches from the house. Folder matches were stubborn and could go out … even in the slightest breeze — like that. Matches. He made a mental note while he unlocked the trunk of his car and moved the spare tire to the back seat. Plangman had not called his mother; that was in Battle’s favor. He wondered how long it would be before Plangman was missed. When he was missed, there would be no reason to connect Battle to the fact. They would be hunting for him in the East. In a day or two, Battle would call on Mrs. Plangman, explain that he was marrying Bunny and accepting a job abroad. He would help her make arrangements for someone to take his place at 702.

He started the car and drove up College Avenue to Stilson, down Stilson to the cross street connecting with Wentwroth. It might be months before anyone missed Plangman. He was a bad correspondent, unless he wanted something; Mrs. Plangman had complained about that often enough. He could not feel sorry for Plangman, nor any remorse. He had been victimized by Plangman for too long. Plangman had died as he had lived, trying to horn in where he didn’t fit. He was victim, now, of his victim — appropriate.

Battle backed the car into the drive at 702. He got out and went for the shovel, put it in the trunk, and lifted the lid. Then he went down the hall, pushed open his door, and saw Banjo on his knees by the rug.

“Jesus, Ray, what’s going on around here? There’s blood leaking out of this thing! I just came over because I was worried about Bunny and the kids. Bunny hung up when I called and I was worried. Ray, what the hell’s going on?” His face was very white. He stood up and faced Battle, trembling. “I put my car away, and then I got to thinking, and I walked back this way, came down the hall to your place and the door was …"

Raymond Battle walked over to him. “I wish you hadn’t come,” he said, “but here you are.” He looked at Banjo’s white frightened face, and saw in those weak and shallow features the undoing of all his plans. “Here you are,” he said grimly, “and as you say, there’s blood leaking out.”

“What’s up, Ray?” Banjo said in a small voice, so insignificant-sounding you wouldn’t think that it even counted at all in the scheme of things, but there you were. “Where’s Bun …"

Banjo fell across the rug containing Harvey Plangman, at the impact of Raymond Battle’s angry fist, hard on his jaw.

• • •

He went directly to the car, shut the trunk lid, and started the motor. By five a.m. he had reached St. Louis.

He pulled into a parking lot near the train station. From the suitcase in the back seat, he removed Robert Bowser’s passport and Harvey Plangman’s wallet. He stuck them in his trousers pocket with his own wallet. The rest he left, and he left the key in the ignition.

He accepted the ticket from the man attending the parking lot. His attitude was one of resignation and resolve. It was a case of simple survival now, no embellishments, no time for plans, no wish to dream, regret, wonder, or hesitate. He walked across to the train station, and into the men’s. He paid a dime for a private washroom. Inside, he opened Plangman s wallet, took out fifteen fifty-dollar bills, ten twenties, and five tens. He stuffed them into his trousers. He glanced through the rest of the wallet. There were the same photographs, the letter from Gertrude, a book of matches from a place called Allgauer’s, in Chicago, and a folded piece of paper. He unfolded the paper and read it.

There was a check mark after Hansel Planor and one after Heath P. Langman.

Under that list was a heading: Vocabulary.

Then three notations at the bottom:

Battle ripped up the note and dropped it into the empty wire disposal basket beside the sink. He tossed the wallet on top.

The basket then contained all that was left of Harvey Plangman. Battle looked around for some paper towels to cover the pathetic remainders. The towels were cloth, on a roller. He tore off some toilet tissue from the container and let it fall on Plangman’s things. Rest In Peace.

He straightened the collar of his shirt and smoothed down his sweater, brushed off his trousers with his hand. Then he combed his hair and wiped a smudge off his chin with his thumb. The eastbound trains for New York left at the south side of the station; he had checked that upon entering. From the wad of bills in his wallet, he took two tens and a five, and put them in a separate pocket, so there would be no chance of the money spilling out when he bought his ticket. He looked at his reflection once more in the mirror, took a deep breath, and turned to leave. As he pushed out the door, a large man in a heavy blue coat, carrying a suitcase, pushed in. They bumped heads.

“Oh, I’m sorry!” the man said, “I didn’t know that …”

Battle felt the sharp edge of pain in his eyelid. He rubbed his eye with his fingers in a quick, automatic, unthinking gesture, and the pain went. He blinked.

“My lens!” he said.

“What? Are you leaving or aren’t you?” said the man.

“I’m not. I …” Battle closed the eye he could not see out of, and stood holding the door, squinting down at the floor.

“What’s the matter?”

“My lens!” Battle snapped. “You pushed me and I lost my lens!”

“I didn’t push you. I pushed the door and you were coming out of it.”

Battle got down on his knees, holding the door with his hand. With the palm of his other hand, he felt the floor. The man dropped his suitcase and Battle glared up at him, shouting, “Pick that up! Can’t you see I’ve lost something!”

The man pushed it away with his foot, it scraped along the floor and Battle imagined his lens being ground under it. “Damn you!” Battle said. “Pick it up!”

A third man came over. “What’s the matter?”

“Get back!” said Battle. “I’ve lost my lens. You could be stepping on it right this minute.”

The third man held the door. “What’s a lens?”

The man in the blue coat said, “That’s what I’d like to know.” He picked up his suitcase and went off to another wash booth.

Battle said to the third man, “It’s a contact lens. It fell out of my eye.” He was on all fours now, feeling his way. He said, “I can’t see without it. It’s very important.”

“Here,” said the man. He bent over and handed Battle a small pocket flashlight. “How big is the thing?”

“Very tiny. It’s right around here someplace, but it could have fallen back inside.”

The man stuck a pencil in the door hinge. “I’ll help you,” he said. “I’ll look in here.”

“Careful,” Battle warned him. “Watch where you step.”

The man was behind him, searching near the sink.

“It’s very tiny,” Battle cautioned him again.

“Did you just leave here? Were you coming out just now?”

“Yes, and that fellow was coming in. We bumped heads and he knocked it out of position. It’s right around here.”

“The woman just emptied these things,” the man said. He was jiggling the wire disposal basket with his hand. “Did you throw this stuff in here?”

Battle stopped feeling the floor. He looked up at the man.

“Did you just throw this stuff in here?” the man said again. He reached down and picked up the wallet. “Empty,” he said. “Empty of money but the identification’s here.”

Battle mumbled. “It’s an old wallet.”

“You just threw it out with all of your girlfriends’ pictures in it?”

“It’s none of your business,” said Battle. “Yes, it is,” the man said. “You better get up on your feet.”

Battle stood. He squinted with his good eye. The man opened his coat enough to show a badge. “Turn around,” he said.

Battle turned around. He felt the hand reach in and remove the wallet of Raymond Battle — and next to that, Robert Bowser’s passport.

T
OGETHER THEY
waited at the entranceway of the train station for the squad car. The policeman was talkative, in good spirits as a result of his catch. It was getting light out now; the policeman said St. Louis was prettiest this time of morning.

“My wife and I moved into a new place, and what a view we got,” he said. “Of course we’re paying for it, a hell of a lot more than I can afford, but we like things nice. We see eye to eye on that. That’s why we don’t want kids. Can’t afford kids and nice things too.”

Battle said nothing.

“Smoke Mr. — Battle, Bowser, Plangman — take your pick. Smoke?”

Battle reached for a cigarette from the pack.

“They’ll probably taste a little strange to you. They’re Turkish Specials. I got so I like them. They’re not much more than ordinary cigarettes, and they’re something different from what everyone else smokes, you know?”

He lit Battle’s cigarette with a silver lighter shaped like a sword, with a monogram down the side.

He said, “Yep! We all wanna be different. Special. That’s where the trouble starts in life, I suppose. Take you with them lenses. I’m sorry we never found the other one. But y’know, I probably wouldn’t have picked you up tonight, if you weren’t wearing them things. What’d you wanna do, beautify yourself?”

“No,” said Battle flatly.

“Ha, ah! The gorgeous pickpocket. Ha-ah! Well, that’s the way it all starts. We wanna improve ourselves, y’know? Or maybe it’s a disguise. Maybe you’re really a big crook, head of the Mafia, or something. Ha, ah!” He sucked in on his cigarette and chuckled to himself. “No, nope,” he sighed. “I met a few of the big ones in my day. They’re another story altogether. You know they get their fingergnails manicured just like dames? Fancy this and fancy that, and some of them smell like dames. Use men’s perfume, you know? Now, me, I use a little something after I shave. Dunhill, it’s called. Come in bottles shaped like bowling pins. Costs a little more than some stuff, but it’s nice to have something that’s yours. You use it exclusively, you know? It’s exclusive.”

“Umm hmm,” said Battle. The sky was very pink now, the traces of night gone, and streaks of blue starting to stripe the pink.

The policeman said, “But these big fellows, their stuff smells like what my wife’d wear. I buy her that Chanel No. 5 that they used to give away on the old Stork Club show. That show was years ago on the television. Come from New York, and it showed Sherman Billingsley and his Stork Club, and this Chanel No. 5 my wife wears. Someday I’m going to take her to the Stork Club. Coupla drinks is all. Say we been there. I bet they charge like hell. You ever hear of the place? It’s very fancy.”

“Yes,” Battle said. “I’ve heard of the place.”

“Now, there’s where you should pick the pockets, off the people who got something in them, you know? These big fellows with their paws manicured and Chanel No. 5 behind their ears — they can afford the Stork Club and lots better. I met a few of them in my time. I never met one down on all fours in the hopper, though, ha-ah! You meet all kinds in the hopper — cannons, perverts, name it and the hopper’s got it, but not the big fellows. Like Costello. He’s getting himself shaved some fancy place when he got it, some fancy place in New York. Well, listen, I got to hand it to them. They got a way about them, you know? They know exactly what they want, and that’s what they want. Shoes, hats, ties, they know exactly what they want and it’s exclusive. They just don’t go about getting it very honestly, ha-ah!”

Battle shifted his weight from one foot to the other and sighed.

“You’re not much of a talker, are you?” the policeman said.

“No, I’m not.”

“Well, I wouldn’t be if I was in your shoes either. Say, speaking of shoes, did you see the shoes on that fellow bumped into you?”

“No, I didn’t.”

“They were those fancy space shoes, you know? I noticed that fellow the minute he came in the hopper. Very snazzy guy. I don’t want to break your heart or anything, but I was on my way out of the hopper when he came in. I stuck around because of him. It wasn’t just the shoes. It was the coat. Did you notice the coat?”

“No, I didn’t notice the coat,” Battle said. The squad car came around the corner then; two uniformed policemen were in the front seat.

“Well, here’s the old paddy wagon,” said the policeman. “Yeah, that was a coat! Kind I’d like myself.” He ground out his cigarette with his shoe. I never saw one of them coats in blue,” he said. “I suppose they cost a little more, but what the hell! It’s different. I always notice things like that. Those shoes and that coat.”

He took Battle’s arm and led him toward the squad car.

“It was a Loden coat,” he said. “I didn’t know you could get a blue Loden coat.”

One of the uniformed policemen hung his head out the window and said, “Well, now, if it isn’t St. Louis’ Aristocrat of Cops! No doubt that’s the Duke of Windsor with you, and you both want to be returned to your castles. Or would it be the Count of Everything Exclusive who’s accompanying you this fine morning?”

The policeman holding onto Battle snickered. “Ride me all you want, wise guy,” he said. “Just don’t try to bum one of my Turkish Specials offa me!”

THE END