V. ALEXANDER ROTH

IF there is any worse spot than for a man to find himself a slave to a woman's whims I'd like to know about it. What makes it so tough is you never can be sure what a woman will do. At one moment she's calm and everything is velvet; then, in a flash, it all explodes sky-high and she's got it in for you. And when she's got it in for you, brother, look out. There are never any halfway measures. A woman loves or she hates. Pity and all the feelings in between she never even heard of.

Now you men won't believe this. You were brought up by your mothers to kiss the ladies' hands, to watch your language in their company, to be gentle with them and to realize and appreciate how noble and soft and superior they are.

You were taught from the cradle that men are the hard ones, the roughnecks; and maybe sometimes you wonder why in God's name women have anything to do with us, why they condescend to marry us, to live with us, much less to give in to us.

I used to wonder myself. But that was before all this happened. I can see now that like the lions and the spiders and the snakes, the female human is more vicious than the male. That must be the reason why nobody likes women on juries. If Christ Himself was being tried again, with Liebowitz defending Him, you'd never know what verdict a jury of women would return. Yes, all women are dangerous—and this Vera was no exception. No siree, I should say she wasn't. Vera was like a frozen stick of dynamite; you never knew when she was going to blow.

If a person could believe her, here was a dame who'd touched bottom, who'd been batted around for five or six years from one job to another until she was groggy. She'd been a movie usher in Pittsburgh, a shoe-worker in Binghamton, a cashier in Trenton and God knows what else. She'd washed dishes, scrubbed floors, picked pockets, rolled cigars; she'd lived with cops, clerks, floor-walkers, and every brand of visiting Elk imaginable. Also, she'd kept Haskell's bed warm from Shreveport to El Paso. She'd reached the stage where she hated men and when I say hated, I mean hated—almost as much as she hated women. That little girl was just a bundle of hate.

But she wasn't going to turn me in. “It won't do me any good, having you pinched,” she said. “The cops are no friends of mine. If there was a reward... but there isn't.”

“Gee, thanks, Vera.”

She laughed, like the Romans must have laughed when they saw some poor Carthaginian slob being mangled by a dozen lions. “Oh, don't thank me yet, brother. I'm not done with you by a long shot. Let's see that wallet.”

I handed it over and she helped herself to the wad of bills. It broke my heart to see my newly acquired fortune disappear into the top of her stocking, but I didn't holler murder. She had me by that well-known place. If only she'd keep her trap buttoned up she was welcome to the money.

“Is that all Haskell had?”

“Isn't it enough?”

“I thought he had more.”

“Not that I know of. You can search me if you think I'm holding out on you.”

“Well, maybe I will at that. He told me he was going to bet three thousand dollars on Paradisaical in the fourth at Belmont.”

“He must've been stringing you. He meant three hundred.”

“Maybe.”

“Sure, three hundred; or three bucks. He was a piece of cheese. Big blowhard.”

“Listen, mister. Don't try to tell me anything about Charlie Haskell. I knew him better than you did.”

“Yeah? Then you know he smoked the weed. That explains his three grand bet.”

“I'm not so sure he didn't have that three grand. Why should I believe you? You've got all the earmarks of a cheap crook.”

“Now wait a minute—” Yes, she had me. But it went against the grain, having a woman of that caliber tell me the score.

“Shut up. You're a cheap crook and you killed him. For two cents I'd change my mind and turn you in. I don't like you.”

She didn't a appear to be bluffing and I was frightened. Those eyes of hers were cold. She wasn't playing poker.

“All right, all right. Don't get sore, Vera.”

“I'm not sore. But just remember who's boss around here. If you shut up and don't give me any arguments you have nothing to worry about. If you act wise... well, mister, you'll pop into the can so fast it'll make your ears sing. ”

“I'm not arguing, Vera.”

“See that you don't. Crooked as you look, I'd hate to see a fellow young as you wind up sniffing that perfume Arizona hands out free to murderers.”

“I'm not a murderer.”

She gave me one of those sandpapery laughs of hers.

“Of course you're not. Haskell knocked his own head off.”

“He fell. That's how it happened. Just like I told you.”

“And then he made you a present of his belongings. ”

“Aw, I explained why I had to—”

“Oh, skip it,” she cut in on me. “It doesn't make any difference one way or another. I'm not a mourner. I liked Haskell even less than I like you.”

“Yeah. I saw what you did to him.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“Those scratches.”

“Oh, sure. I scratched him.”

“I'll say you did.”

“Well, you give a guy an inch.”

 

We were coming into Pasadena by that time and the traffic was so heavy I had to concentrate on my driving. It was a pretty town, all right; but I wasn't enjoying it. I was experiencing a feeling I hadn't had in almost twenty years: that leaden sensation I got when I was smoking a cigar in the bathroom and my father walked in.

“Pull in to the curb in front of that drug store,” Vera commanded. “I want to get a pint.”

I pulled in.

“No, park the car and come in with me.”

“This is a Bus Stop, Vera. You run in. Then if a cop comes I can move.”

“Nothing doing. You're coming in, too. From now on you and I are the Siamese Twins. Drive around the corner if you think we'll get a tag.”

I shrugged. It was too hot to argue. “Have it your own way. But I don't get the point.”

Vera got sarcastic. “The point is I don't want you to get lost.”

“I'm not going to beat it, if that's what you're afraid of.”

“I'll say you're not. I want the dough we're going to make on this car.”

“That's O.K. by me. But what then? After we sell it can I go?”

“After we sell it we'll see.”

I parked the Buick two blocks away and we walked back to the pharmacy together. Vera bought two pints of Ten High, a carton of Chesties and a pair of sun-glasses. She also got some cosmetics—cold creams, vanishing creams, tissue creams and that sort of truck. The bill came to more than seven bucks. When I asked her to buy me a pair of sun-glasses too, she squawked.

“But I broke the pair I had and I can't see to drive without them, Vera,” I said. “Jeeze, what's a pair of fifteen cent glasses to you?”

“You're a pest,” she snapped. “Here.”

I forgot to say thanks on purpose. Half an hour later we rolled down the Los Feliz hill to Western Avenue, then drove along Hollywood Boulevard to Vine.

There I recognized places Sue had written me about: Tip's, The Brown Derby, The Coco Tree, Eddy Cantor's, the Broadway, the hock shop off Selma, the Plaza Hotel. Down the Boulevard a neon sign kept spelling: ALL ROADS LEAD TO HOLLYWOOD—AND THE PAUSE THAT REFRESHES—DRINK COCA COLA. What a joke. That sign should have read: ALL ROADS LEAD TO HOLLYWOOD—AND THE COUNTY JAIL—DRINK POISON. When I got to thinking about all that had happened to me on the way, things I hadn't planned in my itinerary, I began to wonder if it was worth it. Two month's of hell-hitching rides, going without meals, sitting in a cell, becoming involved in a death, and now at the mercy of a female tramp—for what? I was just coming to the conclusion that men are mere debris in the gale Fate whips up, and that when they make future plans they are fools. My own case is a corking example. Was it Shakespeare, Robert Burns or Ralph Waldo Emerson who wrote, “The best laid plans of mice and men often go blooey”? Well, whoever it was said a mouthful.

“Anyway, I'm here,” I said aloud.

“You mean 'we', don't you?” commented Vera, than she started to laugh.

Ha, ha. It was very funny.

 

I soon found out Vera wasn't kidding about that Siamese Twins crack, for we rented a small apartment on Afton Place as Mr. and Mrs. Charles Haskell. When I objected to this, she explained that it was on account of the car. A dealer might smell a mouse if he called and found out we were using another name, and it was important that the business be transacted strictly according to Holy.

The place only had one bedroom, so it was yours truly for the couch. I took one of the pillows from the bed, a blanket and a sheet. I wasn't exactly sleepy, but I thought I'd catch a nap while Vera was in the shower. I don't know how long I dozed, but when I opened my eyes again I was stiff and sore and I let loose some choice profanity before I noticed Vera standing beside the couch, grinning down at me.

“That couch isn't so hot, is it, Roth?”

“The Spanish had worse. Only they had spikes in theirs. And they called them racks, not davenports. ”

“I feel sorry for you,” she said sarcastically.

“Say, why don't you take off your clothes when you go to bed? Or is it a habit you got into in jail?”

“Go to hell,” I said.

Then I noticed she had on Haskell's woolly bathrobe. “It's tough Haskell wasn't a woman,” I observed, “so you could use what's in the suit-case.”

“Oh, I've decided to let you keep that stuff—except the suits. They ought to bring a sawbuck apiece in a hock shop. I just came out to tell you I'm finished with the shower, if you want to use it.”

“Thanks. ”

“Your towel is the one with the blue border.”

I took a pair of Haskell's pyjamas into the bathroom with me and stayed under the shower a long time. When I finally came back into the living-room Vera was sitting on the couch smoking a cigarette and sipping a drink. She had taken off Haskell's robe. All she was wearing was a pair of his silk pyjamas with the sleeves rolled up.

“Have a drink?”

“Aren't you afraid I'll take you up on it?”

“If I didn't want to give you a drink I wouldn't have offered it. Why be a sore-head, Ross? You got yourself into this thing. I didn't. You should be grateful I'm not turning you in. Why, if I wasn't regular, you'd be in the pen this minute being photographed and finger-printed and pushed around by the dicks. So cheer up. Get rid of that long puss. Or is your conscience bothering you?”

“No, it isn't,” I replied hotly.

“Fine. That's the spirit. He's dead and no moaning around will bring him back. I never could understand this worrying about something that was over and done with.”

“Listen, Vera. For the last time, I didn't kill him.”

“All right. If it'll make you sociable, you didn't kill him. Have a drink.”

I let her pour me a whisky, the first one for me in three or four months. Then she gave me another. In a couple of hours we killed the two pints. The liquor didn't make me feel any better, but I began to see Vera was right. She hadn't gotten me into this thing. She just happened along to top it off. However, I wasn't to blame either. When I crooked my thumb I was only asking for a lift; I had neither the desire nor the intention to steal the man's car, his clothes, his money and his identity. Those things had all been shoved down me, like castor oil. Like a prize chump, all I'd figured on was three thousand miles of highway separating me from Hollywood and Sue. I didn't count on someone kicking off just at the moment it would look the worst.

Yes, I was feeling sorry for myself—why not? I was getting a raw deal all around. If I had asked for trouble by knocking Mr. Haskell over the head, there would have been no complaints; but who had I ever harmed? All I asked of life was to be left alone, to be allowed to go about my business playing my fiddle.

There must be something wrong with the world. Isn't there any justice, any God? Or is He just a sadistic puppeteer, parked on a throne out of sight, amusing Himself by jerking the wrong strings? Clear it up for me, someone. Here I was, facing a death penalty, liable to wind up in a station house at any minute, when I hadn't done anything anyone else wouldn't have done. I wasn't to blame. Something or someone might be; but not me, and not Haskell, and not Vera.

However, the realization that Vera was not to blame didn't make me like her more. She was the type of woman I have always despised: the kind who knows all the answers and who makes no bones about being hard-boiled. Even though I know just how women are underneath, I still prefer them to have that phony sweetness in their manner. You know, Sadie Thompson pulling a Ramona. She looked pretty cute in those big pyjamas, and now she was all fixed up with the junk she'd bought in Pasadena; yet, somehow, she didn't seem to be feminine. I guess her truck-drivers vocabulary ruined the illusion.

“We're out of liquor, Roth.”

“Yeah.”

“Too bad. I felt like getting tight tonight.”

“Well, I think you succeeded.”

“Am I tight?”

“As a prima donna's corset.”

“That's nice. I wanted to get tight.”

“Why? What have you to get tight about?”

“Oh, I don't know. Things.”

“Nuts. You should have my worries.”

“If I had your worries, I'd stay sober.”

“Yeah. Maybe you're right.”

“I'm always right.”

“Sure.”

“I don't like the way you say that, mister.”

“Well, there's a lot of things I don't like.”

“I know. But life is ball game. You have to take a swing at whatever comes along before you wake up and find you're struck out.”

“I bet you read that somewhere.”

Vera frowned an instant and then decided not to get angry.

“That's the trouble with you, Roth. All you do is bellyache, instead of taking it easy and trying to make the best of things. Why, you're lucky just to be alive! Suppose Haskell had opened that door? You'd be playing a harp now. Think of that.”

“You think of it. I'm tired of thinking.”

“There's plenty of people dying this minute that would give anything to trade places with you. I know what I'm talking about.”

“I'm not so sure. At least they know they're done for. They don't have to sweat blood wondering if they are.”

“Your philosophy stinks, mister. We all know we're going to die some day. It's only a question of when. But what got us off on this, anyway? We'll be discussing politics next.”

“Or spiritualism. Where did you hide the butts?”

“On the table, sucker.”

We bored each other with conversation for about an hour longer, every five minutes one of us wishing we had another pint or a radio or something to read. Then, when we finally ran out of chatter, I suggested the hay. “I know it's only nine o'clock. But we want to get up early and make the rounds of used-car lots.”

“No hurry about that. We've got all the time in the world.”

“Yeah, maybe you have. But if you think I want to stay cooped up in this place any longer than I have to, you're batty.”

“It's not a bad place. You'd pay plenty for diggings like this in New York.”

“I wouldn't care if it was the Ritz.”

As I said that, I was looking out the window. Somewhere out in the night was Cheremoya Avenue. I didn't have any idea if it was north, south, east or west. I knew it was at the foot of some mountains, that was all. Well, wherever it was, Sue was there sleeping, not dreaming I was nearby. I could see her in her bed, the covers tucked up under her chin and wrapped around her knees the way she liked. If it was a double bed, I really pitied her room-mate. I remembered all the colds I'd caught, waking up in mid-winter without a blanket. Of course when you're in love you don't mind those things. I would gladly have come down with pneumonia before disturbing her.

Vera suddenly had a fit of coughing and I turned away from the window sadly. Her face was red as a beet and she signaled me frantically to get her a drink of water. The spell lasted a full five minutes and when it was done she lay back on the couch, exhausted.

“That lousy liquor,” she explained.

“That's a mean cough. You ought to do something about it.”

“Oh, I'll be all right.”

“That's what Camille said before they patted her with a spade.”

“Who?”

“Oh, nobody you know.”

“Anyway, wouldn't it be a break for you if I did kick off? You'd be free—and with all that dough and the car.”

“I don't want to see anybody die.”

“Not even me?”

“Especially not you. One guy died on me. If you did—well, that's all I need.”

Vera looked at me closely for a minute. “You don't like me, do you, Roth?”

“Oh, it's not that, Vera,” I said, deciding it was better to keep her in a good mood than to tell the truth. “I just hate being a prisoner. When I want to go someplace, I want to go.”

“So do I. But we can't always do what we want to do. I'd like to lay my hands on a million. Is that why you're so grouchy?”

“Sure.” Better not mention Sue, I cautioned myself. The less Vera knew about me, the less chance she'd have of finding me if I copped a sneak. “That's enough to make anyone feel bad. ”

“Well, I'm a good sport. It's still early. If you want us to go out for awhile, how about a movie?”

“I don't feel that bad.”

She shrugged her shoulders indifferently. “Have it your own way. God, it's stuffy in here. Open that window.”

“It is open.”

“I must be tight.”

And here she got to her feet and began pacing the floor. I watched her in admiration. I couldn't help it. She was one of the most graceful women I'd ever seen. Bare-footed and wearing those silk pyjamas that outlined her wiry body, she was like some pantheress, caged and nervous. As she walked, the jacket of Haskell's pyjamas, which she had wrapped around herself, fell open. I turned my head away, but not before I caught a flash of her torso, jutting ribs, small breasts, navel and the rest. She must have been aware of it, but she took her time covering up.

“Hey, what goes on?” I said.

“Does it bother you, Boy Scout?”

“It doesn't bother me. But remember where you are. Aren't you afraid...?”

“Of you? Don't be silly. All you can do is rape me.”

All I could do was rape her. Nice talk. The more I was with her, the more the woman disgusted me. It wasn't that she was ugly or anything; it was just her attitude.

“I was thinking of the neighbors. They'll be calling the cops the first thing you know. This isn't Minsky's.”

“I'm going to bed. Good night, Roth. Don't try to sneak off during the night, because it won't do you any good. You can't get that chain off the door without making a lot of noise and I'm a light sleeper. Anyway, if I find you gone I'll notify the cops and they'll pick you up on a general alarm.”

“Don't worry. I know when I'm in a spot.”

“And I've got the car keys, too.”

“O.K. Why not take all the pants out of the bag and stuff them under the pillow while you're at it?”

“Good idea.”

And, believe it or not, that's exactly what she did. “Well, good night.” She went to the bedroom door and paused with her hand on the knob. “I hope you won't be too uncomfortable on the couch.”

“Don't lose any sleep over it, will you, Vera?”

“You... you don't have to sleep on that couch, if you don't want to.”

Something told me that was coming. Well, to hell with her. She could make me stay put in the apartment. She could make me give her all my dough. She could make me peddle a hot car for her. But there was one thing she couldn't make me do.

“That's all right. I like the couch.” I saw her stiffen a little. Then she walked into the bedroom without another word. “Good night, Vera,” I called after her.

 

Later on that night I got to thinking about Sue again, and how I missed her and how much I loved her. The moonlight streamed in through the open window like golden fingers slipping into black gloves. All the objects in the room took on a fairylike quality. They flashed with reflected light. The evening noises blended together into an unearthly music which stimulated me and made the blood course through my veins at a maddening pace. Before my eyes I beheld a vision: an amber body writhing in the dimness, beautiful and frightening at the same time, the personification of Venus, of Bacchus, of unutterable fleshly delights. The sound of drums commenced to pound and pulse in my ears, growing louder until it drowned out everything else. Faster beat the drums, my heart keeping time. I felt feverish, drugged by the pitch, the timbre, the sheer savagery of it all. Taut and tense like the carrying notes of a violin, my senses sprang into being and overwhelmed me....

Isn't that some description? I got it out of a book. But here's something I didn't get out of a book: I wanted Sue so much that night, I went into the bedroom and had Vera. There's reality for you. Go out and roll in it.

 

If this were a movie, I would fall in love with Vera, marry her and make a decent woman of her. Or else she'd make some supreme Class A sacrifice for me and die, leaving me free to marry Sue. She would experience a complete and totally unwarranted change of heart, wipe out her sins by a dramatic death, pleasing me, the Hays office and the morons in the mezzanine. Sue and I would bawl a little over her grave, make some crack about there is good in all of us and fade out. But this isn't a movie, and Vera, unfortunately, was just as lousy in the morning as she'd been the night before.

Sorry.

You know, it would be a great thing if our lives could be arranged like a movie plot. M.G.M. does a much better job of running humanity than God. On the screen the good people always come out all right in the end. The hero winds up with the girl, a fine position paying forty-nine thousand dollars a week and a medal for bravery into the bargain. No matter how black things look for him in the second reel, before the trap is sprung or the switch is pulled a pardon arrives from the Governor or new evidence is brought in.

And in a movie, if the hero decides to become a doctor, he becomes a doctor, not a grocer or dentist. If he decides to go to Frisco, he goes to Frisco. He doesn't wind up in Miami or New Orleans or in jail. Things are plotted in straight lines. There are never any unexpected happenings which change everything about the hero but his underwear.

Whether people's hopes are the result of pictures or pictures are based on hopes, I can't say. However, in real life, things rarely happen so conveniently. The trap is sprung, and it is a week, a month or a year before the authorities find out a man is innocent.

Anyway, people still hope, no matter how many times they see Right unrewarded. And I was no exception. I was still praying to my own private gods that within a short time all would be straightened out satisfactorily. For that reason I woke Vera early and made such a racket getting dressed that she couldn't go back to sleep.

“The dealers will still be there in an hour,” she grumbled.

“What time is it, anyway?”

I looked at Haskell's watch which Vera had laid on the dresser. “Almost eight-thirty. Let's get going.”

“Almost eight-thirty! The middle of the night!”

After breakfasting on some of the canned goods Haskell had in the rumble, we drove around town trying to interest someone in the car. From the first, Hollywood appealed to me. Everything looked so clean in the sunlight. I decided at once that those stories about people starving to death were exaggerations. The things that went hand in hand with misery—the ugly brownstones; the slum sections, the squalor were absent out here. Palm trees lined the curbs, not the traditional New York City garbage cans. Besides, the people all looked so healthy and tanned.

The first dealer we approached owned a lot on Santa Monica Boulevard, near La Brea. He was one of those hail-fellow-well-met kind, a hand shaker and a back-slapper. I don't like back-slappers and I didn't like him. Generally the guy who slaps you on the back has a knife in his paw. Nevertheless, I was pleasant to him and laughed at all his stale gags. When you're on a business deal that's what you've got to do. He looked the car over carefully, had his mechanic drive it around the block, and then made us an offer of $650.

Six hundred and fifty bucks—what a comedian! I laughed in his face. “Rock-bottom is eight hundred,” I told him.

“Eight-fifty,” interrupted Vera, shooting me a wicked look. “Eight-fifty or no sale.”

That was the dealer's turn to laugh. He said that on second thought he couldn't give more than $625. Business was lousy, taxes unbelievable, overhead enormous. He went into a long song and dance about it. When he got done I told him in plain language where he could stick the $650, much less the $625.

“Is that a nice way to talk?” protested the dealer. “I've been doing business here for many years and my prices are fair. Why, I could name you...”

“Never mind naming anything. I'm not going to take an oriental jazzing from you or anyone else.”

“And don't start telling us how you started in somebody's backyard,” chipped in Vera.

“We're not interested. You second-hand car dealers are all alike. You sit in your shacks with your fingers crossed, waiting for a sucker to come along.” She paused and ran a hand over a fender, admiring the paint-job. “You can have the car for $825. Take it or leave it.”

I gave her the high-sign to keep out of it. “$775 and its yours. But not a cent less.”

Than came the haggling. The dealer came up to $700, Vera came down to $790 and I began plugging seven and a half. We deadlocked there.

“Before I let it go for seven hundred, I'll wreck it and collect the insurance,” stormed my sweet little wife.

The man got sore at that, and I can't say I blame him. “All right, forget it. I don't do business that way.”

“Suit's me! Come on. Let's get out of this clip-joint.” I let her lead me away a little. She was very upset and began to cough. I had to take her into the office for a drink of water. When she came out of the spell, she was white as a sheet. “Look, Vera,” I said. “Take it easy. You're going to gum the works. Let me handle this thing alone and I'll chisel every dollar possible. Sit down here and read the newspaper. If we go away now we'll only have to try some other guy.”

Vera was very angry but she realized I was right. She told me in no uncertain terms what the dealer could take for himself and snatched up the newspaper. I stayed with her for a minute before going back.

“Your wife has quite a temper,” observed the dealer.

“Yeah well to get down to business, you know damned well that car books for plenty. I'm no greenhorn. I want at least $750.”

“Seven is tops, Mr. Haskell. My mechanic says she's pumping oil. Needs rings too, a valve job, a new head gasket and a general tune-up. That costs dough.”

“But you've got a honey of a radio in there. Don't forget that.”

“I'll give you $700.”

“$740.”

“$700.”

We argued about thirty minutes longer, me building up, he tearing down. We went over every detail of the bus from stem to stern. I made him get down on his hands and knees to inspect the new rubber; I slapped him in the face with the special spot and foglights; I switched on the radio; I made him feel the swell leather upholstery; and before I got done I had the guy believing the buggy was a Rolls. When we were both completely worn out, we hit a compromise—his price, $700. We shook hands and he was just pulling out his blanks for the Motor Vehicle Department when Vera came out of the office.

“No sale,” she said. “I've changed my mind.”

“What!”

“I've decide we'd better keep the car, “she smiled. Come along, Charlie. I'll explain it to you later.”

Disgust showed all over the dealer's face. “Well, I'll be...” he began.

The smile faded from Vera's eyes and they hardened into that flinty glaze I had learn to fear. “Shut your mouth,” she snapped at him. “I guess I can keep my own car if I want to.”

“But Vera,” I protested, “what the...?”

“You shut up, too. Come on.”

I went along with her, not daring to cross her. That would have been a sucker play. God knows what she might let slip if we battled it out in public.

Driving home she sat quietly, refusing to answer my questions. However, when we arrived at the apartment, she showed me the newspaper she had been reading while I fought it out for second place with the dealer. A certain article provided interesting reading, especially since it was about me.

 

MAN'S BODY FOUND IN DITCH NEAR LOCKHART BY TELEPHONE LINESMEN

Police Suspect Foul Play

August 17th (AP) Yuma. Police here reported today the discovery of the body of a young man in a ravine bordering U.S. 70, approximately seven miles west of Lockhart Arizona. Telephone linesmen Paul Oak and G. Travell, who were repairing in the vicinity, were attracted to the remains by the abundance of buzzards continually alighting in the one spot. Descending the pole upon which they were perched, they made their way to the bottom of the ditch and stumbled over the remains, half covered with brush.

Calling the nearest State Police barracks, the linesmen then stood guard over the body until the authorities arrived from town. The body was that of a man of thirty to thirty-five, shabbily dressed. Marks on his forehead led the police to suspect he had been clubbed to death, or perhaps hurled from a speeding automobile.

Identification, the investigators admit, will be difficult, due to the condition of the body. However, near the corpse searchers found a suit-case containing a soiled change of clothing and papers identifying the owner as one Alexander Roth. Police are busy checking this for possible clues.

No valuables were found. This is the fourth case of apparent homicide to be unsolved in the neighborhood, which is a desolate expanse of uninhabited wilderness and {Continued on page 32)

 

I tightened up as I continued to read. I wasn't accustomed to seeing my name in the paper. While the article was in the second section and squeezed in among a lot of cooking recipes, I had the feeling that now I was a public figure—too damned public to suit me.

I wondered if any of my old friends back in New York were reading about me and maybe saying what a shame it was I died so young.

And Sue... Holy Smokes! If Sue ran across that piece she would think I'd been murdered, too! I had to see her soon and let her know it was all a mistake. It would be cruel not to.

“Well,” I said, looking up at Vera after I finishing the article for the third time. “I still don't savvy why you changed you mind about selling car. Seven hundred bucks is seven hundred bucks.”

“Yes, I know,” she replied, lighting a cigarette and smiling one of her poisonous smiles. “But seven million bucks, that's something else.”

“Seven million!”

“Right the first time. Six naughts.”

Was I right about her being wacky? Seven million dollars.

“Lady,” I said, “maybe you've got the wrong idea. You own a Buick, not the factory. ”

“Just turn the page.”

I stared at her blankly.

“Go on. Turn it.”

I did as she asked and instantly I knew what was up. The next page was the Society News, and while the printing was no larger than in the rest of the paper, the name Haskell leaped out and hit me between the eyes.

 

HASKELL NEAR DEATH

MILLIONAIRE EXPORTER IN CEDARS OF LEBANON, VICTIM OF PNEUMONIA

August 9th. Charles J. Haskell, noted sports enthusiast and president of the Wilmington and San Pedro Exports, Inc., lies close to death after a three weeks siege of bronchial pneumonia. Doctors have little hope of recovery...

 

I didn't have to read any more.

“I won't do it,” I said.

“You will!”

“Damned if I will. Think I'm crazy?”

“You'll do it, all right.”

“It's impossible, I tell you. No one could get away with an act like that. They'd be wise to me in a minute.”

“Don't be yellow. You look enough like him. No kidding, you almost had me fooled for a while.”

“Oh, Vera. Don't you think a father would know his own son? And there must be other relatives—the girl for instance. She'd find out.”

“The father won't have to know you. We'll wait until he gives up the ghost. He's an old geezer. He won't pull through. And as far as the girl's concerned: she hasn't seen you in fifteen years or more. She couldn't have been older than eight or nine when you left. Now look, it's not as tough as it sounds. You've got all kinds of identification—the car, letters, his licenses...”

“I couldn't get away with it.”

“The old boy has scads of dough. Look in the paper, here. Personal fortune assessed at over fifteen million! He'll leave plenty, I tell you.”

“He may have cut off his son. How do we know? Nope, it's out, Vera. I won't have anything to do with it.”

Seeing how determined I was, she began to play upon my sympathy. She told me all about herself and her past, little incidents that were touching, if they were true: how all her life she had been given the dirty end of the stick; how she had to slave for whatever she received, and how she had always been pushed around like an animal. Then, to top it off, an M.D. had pronounced her death sentence.

“Why do you think I was heading out west for?” she asked bitterly. “Because I want to break into movies and become Gertie Glamour? I'll tell you why, if you want to know. I'm out here for my health, that's why. The sawbones in Kansas City said I wouldn't last a year if I didn't get out to the right kind of climate. And even if I did, he said he couldn't promise much. Yes, that's right. My lungs. They're like Swiss cheese.”

“Gee, that's too bad, Vera.”

“Oh, I'm not crying about it. But you can bet your life I'm going to live before I croak. I'm going to have all those things they dangle before you in the movies, diamonds and fur coats and breakfasts in bed. I'm going to be just as stuck-up as the rest of them.”

“But—”

“No, don't interrupt me, Roth. For the first time in my life I see a clear way to the big money; and you're going to help me, like it or not. I'm going to ride down Broadway in a Duesenberg, then across to East 100th Street. That's where I was born, Roth. Ever been over in that section? It's tough as hell there. A stranger takes a chance of getting his block knocked off if he walks through there at night. Well, there's a tenement on that street that I'm going to buy, see? I'm going to pay cash for it and put the landlord out on his heine, the way he put my mother out on hers. I'm going to...”

I let her rave on but her spiel didn't move me a bit. The more I considered her idea, the more ridiculous and impossible it looked. The chances seemed to grow longer, like Jack's beanstalk. Besides, there was Sue to think about. She was the soul of honesty, and even if I did get away with it, I'd be all washed up with her.

“I'm sorry, Vera. I'll do anything within reason. But not that. So forget it—or get yourself another stooge.”

“You sap!” she yelled at me. “You'll be fixed for life as Charles Haskell. You can take your inheritance and go away. No more worrying about the rent. No more sweating and scheming and chiseling and wondering where your next meal's coming from. Think of that, Roth. ”

“I can earn my own living.”

“Living? Do you call what you're doing living?”

I resented that remark. I wanted to tell her what a fine musician I was, how once I had brought down a high-school auditorium with a Brahms Concerto. I controlled myself, though. She'd never believe it. She'd only give me the horse-laugh.

“I get along,” I said sullenly.

“I'll tell you what I'll do. I'll even split fifty-fifty with you.” Darned big of her! She said that last as if she was making some big sacrifice. Sure. She was. The sacrifice was me. It wouldn't be any skin off her back if I was caught pulling the stunt. God bless her generosity—but nuts. “No. And that's final.”

“We'll wait until we read that the old man's dead. Then you show up—as if you read in New York that he was sick.”

“What if he doesn't die?” I didn't really care whether he died or not—because nothing she could say or do would make me go into a thing like that—but I was trying to punch holes in her brainstorm.

“He's sure to die. I know he will. Something tells me.” Something told me, too. Those Haskells were always dying at the wrong time.

But as much as I insisted I was not going to have any part of it, Vera was taking it for granted I would. She didn't talk a great deal about it after her one outbreak, but I could tell her mind was not on her cards when we played casino that afternoon. She missed lots of moves and I beat her easily. Not only that, I noticed that she kept looking at Haskell's watch every few minutes. I was aware that she was just trying to kill time between newspaper editions.

As for myself, I was doing plenty of heavy thinking, too. I knew Vera well enough by this time to realize she was one of the most stubborn mules in the world. If she thought an idea was good, she'd try it at any cost.

That meant I would have to prove to her it was screwy... and it wouldn't be easy. That it was dangerous and almost certain to end in disaster wouldn't bother her much. All she had to lose was me.

“Vera,” I pleaded, “don't you realize if I'm caught they'll want to know where I got the car and stuff? Then they'd have me on a murder rap.”

“If you're smart, you won't get caught.”

I hadn't counted much on that angle, so I tried another.

“And if I am, don't you realize you'll be out, too?”

She seemed more interested in that. She looked up from her hand immediately. “How will I be out?”

The bitch. I could get caught and hanged for all she cared. But let her drop a dollar and it was a catastrophe. “You'll be out the seven hundred we could have grossed on the car.”

She didn't say anything to that for a second and I began to hope. A slight frown and narrowed eyes made it clear that this bit of it had not occurred to her before. “Really, Vera,” I went on, “you'd be an awful chump to throw away all that dough on a dizzy long-shot. Let me sell the Buick tomorrow. With the money it'll bring, and with what you've already got, a clever kid like you can run it up in no time. Then we'd both be in the clear.”

“I'd be in the clear anyway.”

“Maybe, maybe. If I got caught I'd be good and sore at you, you know.”

You mean you'd squeal?” I saw her eyes begin to blaze and I knew I'd put my foot into it. “No, not squeal, exactly. I meant..”

“Never mind what you meant. Even if you did tell the cops I was in it with you, what could they do to me? They might give me the same medicine they'd give you but I'm on the way anyhow. All they would be doing would be hastening it.”

“All right. But think of the seven hundred you might lose. You'd kick yourself around the block if it got away from you.”

She paused a moment before speaking. There was a little war going on inside her. Should she pocket her winnings or parley? “I'll take the chance,” she said.

I shrugged, as if her decision made no difference to me. I didn't want to let her know that behind my mask I was furious. I felt like clipping her one and when she was on the floor taking that skinny neck in my hands and throttling her. “You're being foolish,” I remarked, keeping my voice even. “That's how people wind up behind the eight-ball. Once they get a few dollars they become greedy and want more.”

No reply to this.

“Caesar—you know, that Roman general—got his for being greedy. He wasn't satisfied and the final wind-up was he took the count.”

Still no answer. I might as well have been talking to a stone wall. But it was a good sign, I thought. Maybe what I was telling her was sinking in (I hoped).

“A couple of days ago you didn't have a dime. Why, you were so broke you couldn't have gotten into a pay-toilet. Now you've got over seven hundred bucks with seven hundred more in the offing. Take my advice and don't try for more.”

Vera's answer to that was a disgusted groan. She threw down her cards. “I'm tired of this game. Let's play Fantan.” Realizing now that she hadn't even been listening to me, I burned and got up. “Play solitaire,” I growled.

“O.K., if that's the way you feel about it.”

“That's the way I feel about it.” I flopped on the couch, yanked one of the pillows away and threw it into a far corner. It came close to knocking a picture off the wall.

“Getting sore and throwing things won't help, Roth. For Heaven's sake, I'm really doing you a favor. I help you out of a jam by keeping my mouth shut, I show you how to make yourself some soft money, and what thanks do I get?”

“Thanks?”

“Sure. Would you rather I call the cops and tell them you killed a man and stole his money?”

“I didn't kill anybody!”

“You did.”

“I didn't, God damn it, and you know it!”

“All right, then. Suppose I call the police? If you're innocent, what have you got to be scared of?”

“Call them, you bitch! Go ahead, call them! See if I care. At least they'll give me a square deal!”

“You want me to call them?”

“You heard me. But I'm warning you. If I'm pinched, I'll swear you were in on it! I'll say you helped me! If I burn for it, I'll get even with you!”

“You wouldn't dare.”

“No? Then try it and see. Call them.” All this was about half an hour before she died and the conversation, while not particularly cool, was at least pitched low. However, as the minutes passed, and more obstacles to the plan popped into my head, the air got blue. Each word coming from our lips snapped like a whip.

I reminded her that as Charles Haskell I didn't even know my mother's name, whether Dolores' birthday was in September or May, where I had attended school, the name of my best friend, whether I had an Aunt Emma or not, if I had ever owned a dog, my religious denomination, or even what the “J” in my name stood for. I also pointed out that the original Haskell bore a scar on his wrist.

“His people never saw that scar,” retorted Vera. “He told me he ran away right after putting out the kid's eye.”

“Yes,” I agreed heatedly, “but his father knew he was cut. There would have to be something on the wrist to show.”

“So what? The old man's dead—or will be, I hope, by tomorrow morning's paper. Anyway, you could cut yourself a little, couldn't you? Christ, for seven million I'd let you cut my leg off.”

“No. Turn me in, if you want, but I won't get mixed up in it. Besides, Haskell was a hop head. Maybe he wasn't the man's son at all. Maybe he dreamed all this, for all we know.”

“Well, dream it or not, you won't be dreaming when the law lay hands on you. They've got a cute gas-chamber waiting for you, Roth—and extradition to Arizona is a cinch...”

“Go on, go on. You haven't the guts to call them!”

But, folks, she did. And if it was a bluff, it was a good one; because I fell for it, and that is exactly how it happened. She went to the phone, began calling the police and I strangled her to death.

Accidentally, though. Much as I feared and hated her, the last thing I wanted was for her to die. I was in enough trouble, liable to be suspected of a murder, without actually committing one. But when I heard her ask Information for the number of the Hollywood police station, heard her repeat it and heard her dial it, I rushed across the room and tried to get the receiver from her hand. Somehow, as we struggled for the thing, her throat got in the way. I grabbed on to it and squeezed. It was soft, much softer than I'd dreamed; because when she let the phone fall and slumped against me, I noticed the marks of my fingers, blue and deep. I let go of her then and she dropped to the floor. God, it's easy to kill a person.

 

The world is full of skeptics. I know. I'm one myself. In the Haskell business, how many of you would have believed me if I had allowed myself to be arrested and brought to trial? And now, after killing Vera without really meaning to do it, how many of you would believe it wasn't premeditated? In a jury room, every last one of you would go down shouting that she had me over a barrel and my only out was force. Accidents are accidents, mistakes are mistakes, but coincidence is baloney, no matter how you spell it.

All this became immediately clear to me in the minutes or seconds or hours that I stood over Vera's body, staring at it. I was like a kid, admiring his first bicycle—only it wasn't a bicycle and I wasn't admiring it. I was amazed and dreadfully shocked at what I saw.

The room was still, so quiet that for a time I wondered if I had suddenly gone deaf. Then, gradually, as my senses returned, sounds began to fill my ears: the rumble of a bus on Sunset Boulevard, the whine of a vacuum cleaner, the sour notes of a trumpet being practiced somewhere in the building, the blasting voice of a radio politician. All this added to my astonishment. Here I had just snuffed out a human life as easily as falling off a log and the world was going on the same as always. The sun was still shining, the birds singing, the people eating, sleeping, working, making love, spanking their children, patting their dogs. It was undeniable proof that man is unimportant in the scheme of things, that one life more or less doesn't make a hell of a difference. Yet to me, who had taken a life and whose own life hung in the balance, this was crazy. God Almighty, I thought, man is important. A few seconds ago Vera was alive. Blood ran through her veins; saliva was in her mouth; she could feel things: the tickling sensation that made her cough now and then, the pimple on the lobe of her left ear.

Now she lay still and dead. That must mean something. It must! Why, if I died... But I couldn't imagine myself dying. I couldn't imagine not being me any more.

These thoughts ran through my mind rapidly and I could barely keep myself from running to the window and shouting, “Pipe down! Shut up! Don't you realize someone died? How would you like to die, you heartless sons of bitches?”

I was hysterical—but without making a sound. My eyes clung to Vera as she lay twisted on the floor, her legs sprawled out awkwardly. Her face was flushed. Her hands, crossed on her breast with the fingers at her throat, were stiff as boards. The fingers themselves were bloodstained—which made me conscious for the first time that my wrists were aching. Looking at them, I saw that they were scratched to ribbons. Believe me, if I could have laughed, I would have. Now I was Charles Haskell to a 'T. As Vera kicked off she had added the final touch. It was only three minutes by Haskell's watch, strapped to the dead woman's wrist, that I stood there looking down at her. It seemed hours. Her hair had fallen across her face, so, thank God, I couldn't see her eyes; but her mouth was a little open, as if she had been struggling to yell “Copper!” when death came. The little whore. I wasn't sorry she was dead; just sorry it was me who killed her. After a time, my eyes reluctantly left Vera and traveled around the room. It was in disorder for we hadn't straightened up after our drinking-bout the night before. Cigarette stubs were strewn on the carpet, some of them with lipstick on them. There was a broken glass by the couch. My pyjamas lay in a corner where I'd tossed them. The telephone was still on the floor with the receiver off the hook. Something warned me that it might be a good idea to replace it. Nevertheless, I couldn't budge.

I was aware that now, since I was undoubtedly a murderer, I had better be a successful one and not get caught. What evidence there was about the place had to be destroyed—and from the looks of things there was plenty. In a book, the murderer generally tries to pin the crime on someone else, the rat. Well, I didn't have anyone I could pin it on, so that was out. What first? Finger-prints. Surely everything was lousy with them. But where to begin? Where?

I started to wipe a table before I saw the phone, and then I began wondering if fingerprints can be detected in human flesh. I was nervous. My heart was sinking so fast it hurt. I thought that if only I could compose myself and treat it like a game, maybe I'd get away with it. I'd get a sheet or a blanket first and cover Vera up....

But as soon as I made a move towards the bedroom, the full realization dawned on me. There was no way out of this. I could polish off prints for ten years but there'd always be witnesses. The landlady, for one. She could identify me. Although we rented the place early in the evening and the transaction took place in a dim room without a light and Vera had done most of the talking, she most certainly noticed me. Then too, there was the car dealer. He could identify me. After Vera's demonstration of temper he wouldn't be likely to forget us for a long while. And the police. They might have received the call Vera put through. Even now they might be tracing it.

I listened for the sound of sirens.... Yes! That was one now! And it seemed to be coming.... No, no. That wasn't a police siren. Only that damned vacuum cleaner.

My nerves were shot to pieces. While once I had remained beside a dead body, planning carefully how to avoid being accused of murdering him, this time I couldn't. This time I was guilty—knew I was guilty and felt it. Stupid or not, I couldn't help doing the thing which once before I had managed not to do.

I ran.