1944 - Just the Way It Is (13 page)

There was a quick movement, two heavy thuds as someone moved forward and a man caught his breath sharply. The sound came from the right and not in front of Duke. This upset his calculations and although he swivelled round fast, his finger tightening on the trigger, a heavy boot whistled out of the darkness and caught him on the top of his head.

He felt his fingers relaxing on the gun and his body began to slide back, then another violent kick caught him on the side of his head and a light exploded before his eyes.

THIRTEEN

S
chultz, grinning broadly, waddled out of his dressing room. He went over to the mirror and adjusted his necktie. Behind him, in the mirror he could see Lorelli lying in bed. She was smoking, a breakfast tray across her knees.

‘My pigeon,’ he said, without turning round, ‘that’s a disgusting habit. You should never smoke and eat at the same time. There’s a time and place for everything.’

‘Oh, let me be,’ she said, irritably.

He patted his hair with the brush carefully, observed the effect, then turned. ‘I’m glad you had the sense to come back,’ he said, abruptly. ‘Very glad.’

She buttered some toast without looking up. ‘I must have been crazy,’ she said. ‘He’d’ve been nicer to me than you.’

‘I wonder why you did come back?’ He stood over her, his mouth smiling, but his eyes were granite question marks.

She shrugged, nibbling at the toast and staring out of the window indifferently. ‘You’re a habit, I suppose,’ she said. ‘Where are you going now?’

‘You didn’t tell him anything?’

‘I don’t talk,’ she said, shortly. ‘You were mad with me last night, so I let you cool off. I never intended to stay.’

He wasn’t convinced, but he couldn’t waste any more time. He had things to do. ‘You’d better not go out for a day or so, my pigeon; not until I’ve seen Duke. He may be difficult. Joe will be around.’

Lorelli poured coffee into her cup. ‘All right,’ she said. ‘I’ve nowhere to go.’

Schultz smiled at her, but his eyes were still watchful. ‘I don’t want Joe in here. He’s very young. We don’t want him getting ideas, do we?’

‘I wish you’d stop talking about Joe,’ Lorelli snapped. ‘What do you think I am? He’s no use to me.’

‘I wonder,’ Schultz pulled at his underlip, ‘I think sometimes he might be.’

‘I can’t help what you think,’ Lorelli replied crossly. ‘He hasn’t a dime and besides he’s only a kid.’

Schultz nodded. ‘That ought to set my mind at rest, but it doesn’t,’ he said, ‘Joe’s killed two men. Did you know that?’

Lorelli’s eyes opened. This was news to her. ‘Killed two men?’ she repeated. ‘Well, that’s nice. That’s like you to leave me with a thug for protection.’

‘Don’t be silly. Joe’s very good protection.’ Schultz looked out of the window. ‘Well, I must go. The garden looks nice, doesn’t it? Perhaps I’ll get back early. I’d like an hour or so in the garden.’ He moved towards her, but she raised a book that was lying on the bed.

‘No,’ she said. ‘That’s out. I’ve had enough of your sloppy kisses.’

‘I was forgetting,’ the hooded eyes half closed, ‘I suppose you really mean that?’

‘I mean it all right,’ Lorelli said.

‘Well, so long as it’s out with everyone else,’ Schultz said, his voice suddenly harsh.

‘You don’t have to worry about my love life. I’ll sublimate with Krafft-Ebing.’

He hesitated, then with an effort, he smiled again. ‘Well, I mustn’t waste time. I’ll see you tonight.’

‘Goodbye now,’ she said, and half turned in the bed, so that she could watch every move he made. As he reached the door, she said, ‘Paul. . .’

He looked back sharply. There was a note in her voice that brought him up short. ‘Yes?’

‘Harry Duke said that he found you putting a rope round my neck . . .’

Schultz laughed. He began to wobble with mirth, slapping his great thighs and shaking his head. ‘The sly dog. He said that? You can see his game, my pigeon? He wants to drive a wedge between us.’

Lorelli’s face remained cold and suspicious. ‘So he was just telling a story?’

‘Harry’s a great kidder. I like that guy. He gets in the way, of course, and he’ll have to go, but he’s fun. Especially his stories.’ The hard little eyes shifted over her face, trying to read what was going on in her mind.

‘I’d stand you beating me,’ Lorelli said, ‘I’d stand having glasses thrown at me, but I don’t like murder . . . especially my murder. If I thought you’d tried that, I’d cut your lights out, Paul.’

Schultz’s parrot-like mouth fell open. Her unexpected viciousness startled him. ‘Now don’t get excited, my precious,’ he said. ‘Don’t you believe anything Harry Duke tells you. Besides, I wouldn’t kill you with a rope.’ He moved towards her, smiling, his round eyes like black marbles. ‘If I was going to kill you, I’d poison you. I’d see that it’d take a long time. You’d waste away and lose all that pretty fat and you’d die ugly enough to turn the stomach of the mortician.’

Lorelli sat up in bed. ‘Get out!’ she said, fiercely. ‘I don’t want to hear your beastly talk. Get out!’

He was immediately in an excellent humour. He saw that at last he had frightened her. It occurred to him that it might be amusing to poison her. She would die very ungracefully.

‘I’m a great kidder, too,’ he said. ‘So you mustn’t believe what I or Harry Duke have to say about violent death.’ He waved his fat hand and went out of the room.

Lorelli sank back on the pillows feeling a little sick. Poison was just the kind of trick a heel like Schultz would think up. He could slip it in her food any time he felt like it. Her hand touched her throat uneasily. Had he put the rope round her neck? She wouldn’t have stayed in the house one second if she thought that he had really done so.

She heard him drive away and slipping out of bed, she ran over to the window and watched the big black car disappear down the street.

It was going to be another hot day. The sun penetrated the thin silk of her gaily coloured pyjamas and looking down into the street, she felt irritated that she had to stay indoors.

She wandered back to her bed, a sulky expression in her eyes. At the back of her mind the poison threat still lingered. It was an unpleasant and unnerving thought.

She slid her small feet into slippers and reached for a wrap. She didn’t want to stay in bed all day. It was too hot and besides, she felt restless. She wanted action of some kind.

Lighting a cigarette, she went once more to the window and leaning against the wall, she watched the line of cars moving towards Bentonville.

As she stood there, her mind half on the street and half on vague shadowy thoughts of Schultz, the door opened and Joe came in.

Like Lorelli, Joe didn’t have any other name. Schultz specialized in finding orphans, people without attachments, or waifs who came from nowhere and could return to nowhere when he had finished with them.

Joe was young in years but old in experience. As far as he could remember he was either eighteen or nineteen years of age. He didn’t know when he had a birthday. That kind of thing never interested him. Even when he was a child living in a charitable institute, he had kept to himself. He had run away from the institute when he felt that he could look after himself.

Schultz had found him a year later and had given him a job as his chauffeur. He had repaid Schultz in many ways and although Schultz was never quite sure whether to trust him or not, he was glad to have the boy around the house.

Joe was slight, small-boned and thin. He always wore the same dirty flannel trousers and soft leather jerkin that zipped down the front. He wore a black and white cloth scarf round his neck and his thick black hair looked like a piece of sealskin draped over his head. It was short, and very thick. Joe cut it himself, hacking off pieces so that it was always uneven and ragged.

His small boned face was pale. His best features were his eyes. They were large and dark with thick eyelashes.

He stood in the doorway, looking at Lorelli with expressionless eyes, then he came into the room, quietly closing the door with his heel.

Lorelli glanced over her shoulder and then turned back to the window.

Joe wandered over to the dressing table and began to fiddle with her cosmetics. He picked up each jar, unscrewed the top and sniffed, then he put the top on again, returned the jar to the place where he had found it and picked up another.

Lorelli said, ‘Fatty was talking about you and me.’

‘I know,’ Joe said, sniffing at a cut-glass scent bottle. The perfume pleased him and he tilted the bottle so that a drop touched his fingers. He put the stopper back and then rubbed the scent on the palms of his hands, cupping them, he covered his nose and mouth and breathed in deeply.

Lorelli turned from the window and lay on the bed again. ‘He’s beginning to scare me,’ she said.

Joe laughed. It was a flat, mirthless noise, the nearest he ever came to showing that he was amused. ‘Him?’ he said, and laughed again.

‘Harry Duke told me he caught Paul putting a rope round my neck. Do you think he was going to kill me?’

Joe picked up Lorelli’s scissors and began to trim the hair over his ears. ‘Don’t you?’ he asked, casually.

‘Paul says Duke’s lying.’

Joe went on snipping his hair. ‘I wonder what he’d’ve done with your body?’ he asked, suddenly.

‘Don’t, Joe!’ Lorelli shivered.

He glanced across at her. When she saw the glow in his eyes, she relaxed. ‘I’m scared, Joe,’ she said.

‘What else did he say?’ He put the scissors down.

Lorelli turned on her side, swinging one leg up and down nervously. The flash of the red silk fascinated Joe. ‘He talked about poison.’

Joe laughed again. ‘He just wanted to scare you. What’s he know about poison?’

‘He said you killed two men. Was that supposed to scare me too?’

‘Does it?’

‘No.’ Lorelli was a little angry at his indifference. ‘But, you never told me. Who were they? Why did you do it?’

‘Does it matter?’ Joe was bored with this. ‘I forget. Anyway, we’re wasting an awful lot of time.’

She knew she would get nothing out of him. ‘We’ve got all day,’ she said, crossly. ‘He won’t be back until tonight.’

‘Did he tell you that? Maybe he’s just taken a turn round the block.’

‘Don’t tell me you’re scared of him too?’

Joe laughed.

Looking at him, Lorelli felt reassured. There was no weakness in that stony white face that stared at her out of the mirror.

There was a pause, then Joe said, ‘Tell me what happened. That’s why I’m here.’

‘No other reason?’ Lorelli looked sulky.

‘Later, perhaps. But I want to know. Why did you go with Duke?’

‘Paul scared me. I didn’t know what to do. I couldn’t bring you into it. You know that. When Duke gave me the chance of going with him, I grabbed at it.’

Joe watched her. ‘I don’t know why you lie to me,’ he said, fiddling with the scent again. ‘I saw how you looked at Duke. You phoned him about Bellman. I heard you. So why lie?’

‘Oh, damn you, Joe.’ Lorelli rolled on her back.

‘Why didn’t you stay with him? You could have.’

‘It wasn’t because of you,’ she jeered. ‘I was going to, Joe. He’s a man. You know that.’

‘I know.’ Joe tried lipstick on the back of his hand. ‘I thought I’d seen the last of you. Why did you come back?’ There was no bitterness in his voice. He just stated a fact.

‘You’re a funny kid.’ Lorelli drew up her knees and hugged them against her chin. ‘Wouldn’t you have missed me?’

‘I suppose so.’ Joe didn’t sound as if he cared much. ‘I’d have got used to it. Why didn’t you stay?’

‘I was frightened. Something happened.’

Joe glanced over at her. ‘What’s the matter with you? You losing your nerve or something?’

‘He wouldn’t take me to his rooms. He took me to a friend of his. They let me have the bed and they used the other room.’ Lorelli rocked up and down on the bed, staring at the ceiling. ‘All the time I was in the room, I felt that I wasn’t alone. Have you ever felt like that?’

‘Me?’ Joe shook his head. ‘Why should I?’

‘In the end I got scared. There was a big cupboard and I felt someone was in it. I didn’t look and see. I pushed up the window and dropped into the street. I came back here.’

Joe came over and sat on the bed beside her. ‘It’s in the paper this morning,’ he said, quietly. ‘Timson was found in Cullen’s room with his throat cut.’

Lorelli unwound her arms from her knees and sat up. She clutched Joe’s arm ‘Let me see,’ she said. ‘I’m not in it, am I?’

Joe shook his head. ‘Don’t get excited,’ he said. ‘Maybe Timson was in the cupboard all the time, watching you. Maybe, he was in there cutting his throat. They say he committed suicide.’

Lorelli took his small, warm hand in hers. ‘I’m scared, Joe,’ she said. ‘I wish we could get away. I don’t like this. I don’t like Paul anymore.’

Joe pushed her back on the bed. He looked down at her. A muscle in his cheek began to twitch. ‘I’ll take care of him,’ he said, softly. He touched her throat very gently with his fingers.

She flinched staring up at him.

‘Why do you do that?’

‘I was just thinking. So he put a rope round your neck, did he?’ His small spidery fingers continued to caress her throat. ‘He shouldn’t have done that.’

The look in his eyes chilled her and she pulled herself close to him, burying her face against the soft leather of his jerkin.

Still smiling, his eyes on the opposite wall, Joe continued to caress her throat.

FOURTEEN

H
arry Duke heard someone say, ‘Maybe I’d better throw water over him.’

He opened his eyes and blinked up at Casy’s anxious face. Behind Casy was another guy. Duke couldn’t see him clearly in the dim light. He sat up slowly. ‘Don’t you throw water at me,’ he said, ‘I wash once a day and that’s quite enough.’

‘You all right, mister?’ Casy asked, a look of relief coming into his face.

‘Well, I don’t know about being all right,’ Duke said, feeling his head with gentle fingers. There was a slight swelling in his hair and another just above the bridge of his nose. He swore softly as pain darted through his head.