Detour (15 page)

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.