Strictly For Cash (19 page)

"What is it?" Out of the corner of my eye I could see his white and brown shoes and his gaudy yellow socks. I hurriedly looked away.

"We have to trust each other, Johnny," she said, as still as a statue. "Don't lose your nerve and run away. You might be tempted, but don't do it. If you did I couldn't cover this up. I must have your help. So don't run away."

"I'm not going to run away."

"You might be tempted. A nine-hours' start is tempting, but if you did bolt I'd have to tell Hame it was you who killed him, and Hame would believe it."

"I'm not going to run away," I said, and my voice was a croak.

All I could think of was that her fingers, stained with his blood, were touching the back of my neck. I wanted to shove her away from me, but I didn't because I knew she was as dangerous as a rattlesnake, and there was nothing to stop her going to Hame and pinning the murder on me. So I kissed her, and the touch of her hot, yielding lips made me feel sick, and the sight of him lying there with his head wrapped in the towel made me feel even sicker.

"I'll be waiting for you," she said, her face against mine. "Keep your nerve, Johnny. It's going to be all right."

Then I was outside, with the hot afternoon sun on my face and nine hours of hell in front of me. I had a frantic urge to run and keep running until I'd put miles between me and that cabin where she was keeping watch over his dead body, but I knew I wasn't going to run away because she had me in a trap from which, as far as I could see, there was no way out.

II

The bar-room with its sun awnings and lavish fitments, its mahogany, horseshoe-shaped bar, and its pink-tinted mirrors was empty when I walked stiff-legged across its expanse of parquet flooring. The square-shaped clock above the rows of bottles told me it was twentyfive minutes past three: not the hour to start drinking, but that wasn't going to stop me. If I didn't get a drink inside me quick I'd flip my lid.

The barman appeared from behind a jazz-patterned curtain and looked at me with polite enquiry. He was a tall, thin bird with a high, bald dome, shaggy eyebrows and a long, beaky nose. His white coat was as clean as soap and water could make it, and as stiff with starch as a bishop watching a muscle dance.

"Yes, Mr. Ricca?"

I wasn't expecting to be recognized, and I flinched.

"Scotch," I said. My voice sounded like a gramophone record with a crack in it. "Set up the bottle."

"Yes, Mr. Ricca."

He reached up to a shelf and took down a bottle still wrapped in tissue paper. His long, bony fingers ripped off the paper, and he put the bottle in front of me.

"Four Roses, sir," he said, "or would you prefer Lord Calvert?"

I picked up the bottle and poured myself a slug. My hand was shaking and I slopped the stuff on the polished counter, I felt him watching me.

"Get the hell out of here," I said.

"Yes, Mr. Ricca."

He went away behind the jazz-patterned curtain.

I knew I shouldn't have snarled at him, but I wanted that drink so badly I couldn't control myself, and I knew I couldn't have carried the glass to my mouth with him there to watch the unsteady journey.

And it was unsteady. I slopped most of it, but I got the rest down. I poured myself another slug. I hoisted that one without spilling a drop, and the tight horror that was coiled up inside me began to loosen up.

I lit a cigarette, and dragged down smoke, staring at the face of the clock just above my head. Eight and a half hours! What in hell was I going to do with myself all that time?

I poured another slug. The back of my throat was burning, but I didn't care. It had to be Scotch or I'd dive off the deep end. I kept thinking of the black Buick out there below the terrace, and how easy it would be to get in it and get out of here. In that car I'd be miles away with an eight-hour start.

I drank the Scotch and dragged down more smoke. I was feeling steadier now; not so scared. My nerves weren't jumping; maybe fluttering, but not jumping any more, and the Scotch was hot, comforting and good. I reached for the bottle again when from behind the curtain a telephone bell began to ring. The shrill sound made me jump, and I nearly knocked the bottle on to the floor.

I heard the barman say, "He's not in the bar, miss. No, I haven't seen him since lunch-time. He looked in around one o'clock, but I haven't seen him since."

I stubbed out my cigarette. The muscles in my face had stiffened until they hurt.

"Yeah, if I see him," the barman went on, "I'll tell him."

They were looking for Reisner already! I had to do something. She had said my job was to keep them away from the cabin. If they began looking for him ..."

"Hey! You!"

The barman pushed aside the curtain and came out. His eyes went to the bottle. I could see him counting the number of slugs I had had.

"Yes, Mr. Ricca?"

"Who was that on the phone?"

"Miss Doering, Mr. Reisner's secretary. She has an urgent call for him. Would you know where he is, sir?"

I knew where he was all right. Just to hear his name brought up a picture of him, lying on his back, his face smashed in and his right eye cut in half.

I wanted to pour another slug, but I was scared he'd see my hand shaking. Without looking at him I said as casually as I could, "He's with Mrs. Wertham, but they're busy. They're more than busy, they're not to be disturbed."

I felt, rather than saw, him stiffen. He had got beyond the bees and flowers stuff. He knew what I meant.

"Better tell Miss Doering," I went on. "Nothing is as important as what they are doing right now."

"Yes, Mr. Ricca."

The shocked, cold tone in his voice told me I'd driven it a shade too far into the ground. He went back behind the curtain.

I nearly knocked the bottle over again in my haste to fill my glass.

I heard him say, "Mr. Ricca is in the bar. He says Mr. Reisner is with Mrs. Wertham, and they are not to be disturbed. That's right. It doesn't matter how important it is."

I wiped the sweat off my face and hands with my handkerchief. Well, I'd played it: a little rough, perhaps, but I'd played it.

The Scotch was hitting me now. I felt a little drunk. Regretfully I put the cork back in the bottle. I couldn't risk getting plastered. She had said I was to go out and show myself. That's what I had to do.

I walked out of the bar and on to the terrace. It was hot out there. Below stood the Buick. All I had to do ... I dragged my eyes away from it and walked along the terrace, down the steps, not thinking where I was going, but aware of the need to get away from the car and the temptation to bolt.

A sudden noise brought me to a standstill: a deep-chested, guttural sound that seemed to shake the ground, and which ended in a coughing grunt.

For a moment that sound had me going, then I realized it was the roar of a lion. I was heading towards the zoo, and that transfixed me. The vision of throwing Reisner's dead body into the pit floated into my mind, and I felt my knees give under me.

I looked back over my shoulder. The Buick still stood there in the sunshine. What was I waiting for ? I had to get out of here. I had seven hours and fifty minutes start. In that car I could be four hundred miles away before they even began to look for me.

All right, I was plastered, and I was scared. The roar of the lion, reminding me what I had to do at midnight, stampeded me. I turned and walked to the car, got in, trod on the starter and slipped the gear stick into second. I took a quick look over my shoulder. No one shouted at me. No one tried to stop me. The car moved away smoothly, gathering speed as I changed in top. I drove along the wide carriage-way, thinking in another minute or so I'd be out on the highway where I could tread on the gas and go.

Ahead of me I could see the massive gates. They were closed, and the two uniformed guards were standing in front of them, their hands on their hips. I touched the horn button, slowed down, waiting for them to open up, but they didn't. They just stood, watching me, their faces expressionless under the hard peaks of their black caps.

I pulled up.

"What do you expect me to do - drive through those goddamn things ?"

I didn't recognize my voice. It sounded as harsh as a file on rusty iron.

One of the guards sauntered up to me: a tough-looking bird with close-set eyes and a nose that spread over his face, as if someone had given him the heel some time in his life.

"Sorry, Mr. Ricca," he said. "But I gotta message for you."

I looked at him, my hands gripping the steering-wheel until the muscles in my arms ached.

"What is it?"

"Mrs. Wertham said if you come this way we were to turn you back. She and Mr. Reisner want to see you."

I knew I could take him. He was leaning forward, wide open for a hook to the jaw. My eyes shifted to his companion. He was standing away to my left, his hand on the butt of a gun he carried in a holster at his hip. He looked ready to go into action.

"That's okay," I said, trying to smile. "I've seen them. Get those gates open. I'm in a hurry."

The guard's cold, green eyes sneered at me.

"Then I guess they want to see you again. The call's just come through. Sorry, but orders is orders."

"Okay," I said, knowing I was licked. "I'll see what they want." I slid the gear stick into reverse.

They stood watching me as I made a U-turn. They were still watching me as I drove back to the casino.

I parked the Buick below the terrace and got out. I was trembling, and blood hammered against my temples. I might have guessed I wasn't going to out-smart her quite so easily. She thought of everything: even with Reisner bleeding on her rug, she still had time to take care of me.

I walked down towards the beach. A car sneaked up beside me, and a girl's voice said, "I'm going your way. Let's go together."

I stopped and looked at her: a cute blonde with bed in her eyes and a pert little face that knew all the answers, and the questions, too. She was in a yellow, strapless swimsuit that gripped her curves and set off a figure that'd make a mountain goat lose its foothold. On her fair, flurry head was a big picture hat of plain straw, with a rose pinned to the under-brim. She was the kind of girl I wouldn't have tangled with sober, but the kind I wanted the way I was feeling now.

I opened the off-side door of the car and got in beside her. She drove on towards the beach, her small hands patting the steering-wheel in time to the swing that was coming over the car radio, and she kept looking at me out of the corners of her eyes.

"As soon as I saw you I knew I had to know you," she said. "I like big men, arid you're the strongest, biggest man I've ever seen."

I couldn't think of anything adequate to say to that one, so I let it ride.

"What are you going to do - swim?" she asked, giving me a cute little smile that was supposed to have me on my hands and knees begging for favours.

"That's the idea. Do you swim in that outfit?"

"Don't you like it?"

"It likes you - I can see that."

She giggled.

"We can always go somewhere where I needn't wear it. Shall we?"

"It's your car," I said.

She spun the wheel at the next intersection and increased the speed.

"I know a place. We'll go there."

I sat staring through the windshield, asking myself if this was what I wanted. I didn't know. I didn't think so, but it had dropped out of the sky into my lap, and it might blunt the edges of what lay ahead of me.

"You're Johnny Ricca, aren't you?" she said as she drove the car along a narrow road lined on either side by royal palms.

"How did you know that?"

"Everyone is talking about you. You're the big-time gambler from Los Angeles. Someone said you were a gangster. I love gangsters."

"Well, that's good news. And who are you ?"

"I'm Georgia Harris Brown. Everyone knows me. My father is Gallway Harris Brown, the steel millionaire."

"Does he love gangsters too?"

She laughed.

"I never thought to ask him."

She swung the car off the road and bumped over grass, over sand and pulled up on a lonely stretch of beach, screened by blue palmettos and palm trees.

"Nice, isn't it?" she said, taking off her hat and tossing it on the back seat. She slid out of the car on to the sand. "Well, I'm going to have a swim. Coming?"

As I got out of the car I suddenly decided I wasn't going ahead with this. I shouldn't be here. I should be where I could be seen; where anyone looking for Reisner could ask me if I had seen him. I must have been crazy to have come with this blonde in the first place. If I couldn't get away from the casino, the least I could do was to try to safeguard my own neck, and I wasn't doing that by remaining in this out-of-the-way spot with this blonde who was one jump lower than an animal.

"I guess not," I said. "I've just remembered I've work to do. You wouldn't like to drive me back?"

The cute little smile went away as if wiped off by a sponge.

"I don't get it," she said, and her voice went shrill.

"Never mind: I'll walk," I said. "You go ahead and have your swim."

I knew she'd take a swing at me, and she did. I gave her the satisfaction of landing on me. It would have been easy enough to have slipped inside her flying hand, but I didn't want her to feel all that frustrated. For her size she carried a good slap. It made my cheek burn.

"So long," I said, and walked away. I didn't look back, and she didn't yell after me.