The Erection Set (38 page)

“You didn't invite him up?”

“Let me play the johns my way. He wants to be the aggressor.”

I took my hamburger when it came and doused it with ketchup. “I may be wrong.”

“You aren't wrong. I know the signs. I told you, I had it happen to me before.” She looked at me a few long seconds, the cloud still there veiling her feelings. “I thought I could handle this when I took you up on the deal. Now I'm not so sure.”

“Why?”

“Dog ... if this were just a badger game ...”

“It isn't,” I said.

“Your games are all for keeps,” she told me softly. “Like last night.”

“Last night?” I took a big bite out of the hamburger and watched her.

“Don't be so damn cool, Dog.”

“See me in jail, Rose?”

“Maybe they haven't caught you yet.”

“Let's wait until it happens.”

I saw her eyes go past my head and she nodded. “Could be it's about to.”

But I had seen Bennie Sachs in the mirror I was facing and was all ready for him when he walked up and gave a curt nod to both of us. I stood up, still chewing and offered to buy him coffee.

He said No, glanced at Rose, then back to me and said, “Can I see you alone, Mr. Kelly?”

I put the rest of the hamburger down, wiped my mouth and nodded. “Sure. Where?”

“They got a back room here.”

“Let's go.”

“You first. He pointed toward a door in the far comer. “Over there.” He kept his hand close to the police special on his hip and followed me through the door into a storeroom, then into a smelly toilet reeking of filth and stagnating water on the floor.

“Now what?” I asked him.

“Let's see that rod of yours.”

I handed him the .45. He smelled it, checked the action, snapped out the clip then slammed it back in again. “Stand against the wall,” he said.

I shrugged and did what he told me. Bennie kept me in sight while he took the lid off the tank of the bowl. The water was low so he held down the float until it was brimful, then raised my .45 over one corner at an angle and fired. The damn blast nearly wrecked our eardrums and the burst of spray drenched us both. He let down the cocked hammer with his thumb, pushed the flushing lever and when the tank had emptied, spilling its guts out all over the floor because the drain was clogged, reached down and picked up the spent slug from the bottom barely getting his fingers wet.

“Neat,” I said.

“Consider yourself getting VIP status,” he told me.

“If you'd have asked I would have given you the piece to check out without all the fuss.”

“I like it better this way.”

“Suit yourself.”

“Mr. Kelly...”

“I know. Don't leave town. Incidentally, if you want my car ...”

“We've already impounded it. I called a cab to take you home.”

“Very efficient.”

“You should know cops.”

“That I do, my friend. Have my car delivered when you're done with it.”

“I will.” His look was one of total inspection. “I have a feeling you're a quick thinker, Mr. Kelly.”

“Sometimes you have to be,” I said.

He handed my .45 back, nodded again and this time he walked out ahead of me. He nodded to Rose too and I heard the door close behind him when I sat down to finish my hamburger. Rose couldn't finish hers at all. Her lower lip was trembling and she had to lock her fingers together to keep them from shaking.

I said, “Come on, kid, he was showing me a gun trick. All sound and no fury.”

My tone was so complacent that she let out a nervous little giggle. It had all been so casual that she couldn't see an angle to hook her fears on and she finally unwound her fingers and waved her hands at me with a disgusted grimace. “Someday, Dog, I hope you'll tell me what this is all about.”

“Someday,” I said. “When do you see our boy again?”

“Tonight. He said he may call, so I did make an impression.”

“Okay, the setup stays as is. You know how to reach me.”

“Don't worry.”

“I never worry when pros are involved. It's the amateurs who give you trouble.”

“Thanks a lot.”

“My pleasure. Give me a few minutes before you leave.” I tossed a five-dollar bill on the table and got up.

Outside it was clouding up again and you could smell a mist in the air. A taxi stood by the curb, the engine turning over slowly. I got in, told him to take me to the Barrin plant where they were setting up the picture, had him wait in the parking lot with a twenty as a retainer and got out to find Lee.

The Fruits of Labor set was a self-contained community that looked like a hill of ants. Everything was in motion, but the seeming confusion was, in reality, controlled movement, totally organized, well planned and producing results.

I found Lee beside the wardrobe truck talking to a pair of reporters, let him finish, then said, “How's it going?”

He jumped when I spoke, faked a smile and ran his fingers through his hair. “Good. Fine. At least they got plenty to write about.” His eyes crawled into mine when he made the last statement. I looked at him, knowing he had to ask it. “Dog ... that business last night ...” he let his words dwindle off.

I simply nodded.

“Why the hell did I bother asking you?”

“You kill or be killed, buddy. You should remember that from the old days.”

“These aren't the old days. Shit.”

“Forget it. They're checking me out now.”

“Then what the hell are you doing here!

“I'll come up smelling like roses.”

“Dog...”

“Who's that bunch over there?” A crowd of about forty were standing in a knot sipping coffee from cardboard cups, watching the action with studied indifference.

“Extras. All locals. They're going to pick up some exterior shots in about an hour.”

“Any trouble?”

Lee jerked a cigarette from a pack and lit it with a match that shook visibly. “Like from where?”

“Management.”

He blew the smoke into the wind and shook his head. “That McMillan character rode herd on everybody about not interfering with production in the plant. Hell, he just likes to toss his weight around, that guy. Those cousins of yours are doing their little dance for the photographers, but that's all bullshit too. You know, I wish we'd never come to this damn place.”

“Baloney. You're enjoying yourself. You're in solid.”

“I was until you showed up. Now I keep waiting to hear the Klaxon go off and I'll start heading for the bomb shelter.” He took a deep drag on the butt and flipped it off into the dirt next to the truck. “You see Sharon yet?”

“No.”

“Damn it, Dog, she's worried sick about you.”

“No reason to be.”

“Quit giving me that crap. She knows more about you than you think she does.”

“Nobody knows anything about me at all, old buddy.” This time his eyes had a funny glint in them. “You'll wake up one day. She's over in the production office if you want to see her. Your cousin Dennison turned over a room inside for us to use.”

“Casting couch?”

“These days they do it anywhere.” I turned my head and looked at him a moment. He smiled and this time it wasn't faked. “You're in love with her, aren't you?”

“Not until I tell her so myself,” I said.

“You will, Dog. Then you'll run home to your kennel for your bone. I just hope the cupboard's not bare by that time.”

“Go fuck yourself, fly-boy.”

“Sure, Mother Hubbard. Buy me a dildo.”

I walked away and didn't go in to see Sharon. I got back in the cab and told him where to go. Nobody followed us and we cruised for twenty minutes before we came to the house. It was almost done. We cruised some more, stopped and had a couple of beers and small talk before I had him drive me to see Lucy Longstreet again. Old Beth had found somebody who was willing to talk for a price and offer a piece of evidence for an even higher price. I gave her the amount plus something extra for her trouble and was about to call the deal off with Rose until I remembered that the bought stuff didn't always work out and decided to let it go ahead anyway.

I paid the driver off outside the police building because my car was still in the driveway and when I went inside Bennie Sachs gave me a courteous hello and invited me to sit down. The first thing he did was hand me my car keys.

“You sure you're done?”

“The lab's still checking dust samples. That drive around the hotel was laid down with a composite from Maine and if there are any traces at all the lab'll find it. Impossible not to. Microscopic examinations are pretty thorough.”

“All the better, Mr. Sachs. When I'm clear, I'm clear.”

“I figure you will be.”

Poker isn't my game, but I know how to keep the face. “Why?”

“We checked the rental company. They keep a record of their tire numbers. They weren't switched and the treads didn't match up either. Yours had a lot more wear on them. Same brand, though.”

“Satisfied?”

“Almost.”

“How about ballistics?”

“Not your gun, although I recognize the possibilities of a barrel switch. Not everybody carries a .45, and those barrels are easy to replace.”

“Wouldn't that be going pretty far?”

“Not when somebody's a clever thinker, Mr. Kelly.”

“Left-handed,” I said, “but I'll take it for a compliment.”

“It wasn't meant to be.”

I got up and tossed the keys in my hand. “Well, good luck.”

“Mr. Kelly ...”

“Yeah?”

“Would you surmise ... that any more trouble would be forthcoming?”

“There's always trouble, Mr. Sachs.”

“I waved “so long” and went out to the car. I got in and tried to stick the key in the lock. It didn't work until I turned it upside down.

Chet Linden wasn't taking any chances. Somehow he had switched the whole car. Now when he had me killed all his tracks were covered. It was a real rabbit drive now. All the hunters were out and armed. It didn't make a damn bit of difference who got the bunny as long as the bunny was got. The old jack had the rabies and could kill off the whole town if he wasn't destroyed.

So run, rabbit, run!

The shadows were far worse than the realities. They
LURKED.
Awful word because they really did
LURK
. They beat at you with huge clubs and forced and forced until the unbelievable pain turned a scream into a tiny whimper and why you lived at all was a mystery of life. You writhe, you drown, you run away into the black and hope they never turn the light on you at all, but somehow you know the clubs are there, upraised and ready to beat. Big, soft, sturdy clubs that take away everything you know you're going to want one day and all that is left is an inborn feeling of having been deprived and never knowing what you have been deprived of.

There was a knock on the door.

 

 

 

I said, “How do you feel?”

“Lonely. I've been doing too much thinking.”

“You're in the right place for it. I was conceived in that bed. They must have done a lot of thinking too before they decided to beget me.”

“Unlikely. You probably were an accessory after the fact.”