Small Felonies - Fifty Mystery Short Stories (8 page)

"He didn't take all the gasoline for the jeep."

"He had enough."

March whimpered, "Why, Flake? Why'd he do it?"

"Why the hell you think he did it?"

"Those deposits we found are rich, the ore samples proved that—sure. But there's more than enough for all of us."

"Brennan's got the fever. He wants it all."

"But he was our friend, our partner!"

"Forget about him," Flake said. "We'll worry about Brennan when we get out of this desert."

March began to laugh. "That's a good one, by God. That's rich."

"What's the matter with you?"

"When we get out of this desert, you said. When. Oh, that's a funny one—"

Flake slapped him. March grew silent, his dusty fingers moving like reddish spiders on the surfaces of the canteen.

"You're around my neck like a goddamn albatross," Flake said.

"You haven't let up for three days now. I don't know why I don't leave you and go on alone."

"No, Flake, please . . ."

"Get up, then."

"I can't. I can't move."

Flake caught March by the shoulders and lifted him to his feet. March stood there swaying. Flake began shuffling forward again, pulling March along by one arm. The reddish sand burned beneath their booted feet. Stillness, heat, nothing moving, hidden eyes watching them, waiting. Time passed, but they were in a state of timelessness.

"Flake."

"What is it now?"

"Can't we rest?"

Flake shaded his eyes to look skyward. The sun was falling now, shot through with blood-colored streaks; it had the look of a maniac's eye.

"It'll be dark in a few hours," he said. "We'll rest then."

To ease the pressure of its weight against his spine, Flake adjusted the canvas knapsack of dry foodstuff. March seemed to want to cry, watching him, but there was no moisture left in him for tears. He stumbled after Flake.

They had covered another quarter of a mile when Flake came to a sudden standstill. "There's something out there," he said.

"I don't see anything."

"There," Flake said, pointing.

"What is it?"

"I don't know. We're too far away.

They moved closer, eyes straining against swollen, peeling lids. "Flake!" March cried. "Oh Jesus, Flake, it's the jeep!"

Flake began to run, stumbling, falling once in his haste. The jeep lay on its side near a shallow dry wash choked with mesquite and smoke trees. Three of its tires had blown out, the windshield was shattered, and its body was dented and scored in a dozen places.

Flake staggered up to it and looked inside, looked around it and down into the dry wash. There was no sign of Brennan, no sign of the four canteens Brennan had taken from their camp in the Red Hills.

March came lurching up. "Brennan?"

"Gone."

"On foot, like us?"

"Yeah."

"What happened? How'd he wreck the jeep?"

"Blowout, probably. He lost control and rolled it over."

"Can we fix it? Make it run?"

"No."

"Why not? Christ, Flake!"

"Radiator's busted, three tires blown, engine and steering probably screwed up too. How far you think we'd get even if we could get it started?"

"Radiator," March said. "Flake, the
radiator
. . ."

"I already checked. If there was any water left after the smash-up, Brennan got it."

March made another whimpering sound. He sank to his knees, hugging himself, and began the rocking motion again. "Get up," Flake said.

"It's no good, we're going to die of thirst—"

"You son of a bitch, get up! Brennan's out there somewhere with the canteens. Maybe we can find him."

"How? He could be anywhere . . ."

"Maybe he was banged up in the crash, too. If he's hurt he couldn't have gotten far. We might still catch him."

"He's had three days on us, Flake. This must have happened the first day out."

Flake said nothing. He turned away from the jeep and followed the rim of the dry wash to the west. March remained kneeling on the ground, watching him, until Flake was almost out of sight; then he got to his feet and began to lurch spindle-legged after him.

I
t was almost dusk when Flake found the first canteen.

He had been following a trail that had become visible not far from the wrecked jeep. At that point there had been broken clumps of mesquite, other signs to indicate Brennan was hurt and crawling more than he was walking. The trail led through the arroyo where it hooked sharply to the south, then continued into the sun-baked wastes due west—toward the town of Sandoval, the starting point of their mining expedition two months ago.

The canteen lay in the shadow of a clump of rabbit brush. Flake picked it up, shook it. Empty. He glanced over his shoulder, saw March a hundred yards away shambling like a drunk, and then struck out again at a quickened pace.

Five minutes later he found the second canteen, empty, and his urgency grew and soared. He summoned reserves of strength and plunged onward in a loose trot.

He had gone less than a hundred and fifty yards when he saw the third canteen—and then, some distance beyond it, the vulture. The bird had glided down through the graying sky, was about to settle near something in the shade of a natural stone bridge. Flake ran faster, waving his arms, shouting hoarsely. The vulture slapped the air with its heavy wings and lifted off again. But it stayed nearby, circling slowly, as Flake reached the motionless figure beneath the bridge and dropped down beside it.

Brennan was still alive, but by the look of him and by the faint irregularity of his pulse he wouldn't be alive for long. His right leg was twisted at a grotesque angle. As badly hurt as he was, he had managed to crawl the better part of a mile in three days.

The fourth canteen was gripped in Brennan's fingers. Flake pried it loose, upended it over his mouth. Empty. He cast it away and shook Brennan savagely by the shoulders, but the bastard had already gone into a coma. Flake released him, worked the straps on the knapsack on Brennan's back. Inside were the ore samples and nothing else.

Flake struggled to his feet when he heard March approaching, but he didn't turn. He kept staring down at Brennan from between the blistered slits of his eyes.

"Flake! You found Brennan!"

"Yeah, I found him."

"Is he dead?"

"Almost."

"What about water? Is there—?"

"No. Not a drop."

"Oh God, Flake!"

"Shut up and let me think."

"That's it, we're finished, there's no hope now . . ."

"Goddamn you, quit your whining."

"We're going to end up like him," March said. "We're going to die, Flake, die of thirst—"

Flake backhanded him viciously, knocked him to his knees. "No, we're not," he said. "Do you hear me? We're not."

"We are, we are, we are . . ."

"We're
not
going to die," Flake said.

T
hey came out of the desert four days later—burnt, shriveled, caked head to foot with red dust like human figures molded from soft stone.

Their appearance and the subsequent story of their ordeal caused considerable excitement in Sandoval, much more so than the rich ore samples in Flake's knapsack. They received the best of care. They were celebrities as well as rich men; they had survived the plains of hell, and that set them apart, in the eyes of the people of Sandoval, from ordinary mortals.

It took more than a week before their burns and infirmities healed enough so that they could resume normal activity. In all that time March was strangely uncommunicative. At first the doctors had been afraid that he might have to be committed to an asylum; his eyes glittered and he made sounds deep in his throat that were not human sounds. But then he began to get better, even if he still didn't have much to say. Flake thought that March would be his old self again in time. When you were a rich man, all your problems were solved in time.

Flake spent his first full day out of bed renting them a fancy hacienda and organizing mining operations on their claim in the Red Hills. That night, when he returned to their temporary quarters, he found March sitting in the darkened kitchen. He told him all about the arrangements. March didn't seem interested. Shrugging, Flake got down a bottle of tequila and poured himself a drink.

Behind him, March said, "I've been thinking, Flake."

"Good for you. What about?"

"About Brennan."

Flake licked the back of his hand, salted it, licked off the salt, and drank the shot of tequila. "You'd better forget about Brennan," he said.

"I can't forget about him," March said. His eyes were bright. "What do you suppose people would say if we told them the whole story? Everything that happened out there in the desert."

"Don't be a damned fool."

March smiled. "We were thirsty, weren't we? So thirsty."

"That's right. And we did what we had to do to survive."

"Yes," March said. "We did what we had to do."

He stood up slowly and lifted a folded square of linen from the table. Under it was a long, thin carving knife. March picked up the knife and held it in his hand. Sweat shone on his skin; his eyes glittered now like bits of phosphorous. He took a step toward Flake.

Flake felt sudden fear. He opened his mouth to tell March to put the knife down, to ask him what the hell he thought he was doing. But the words caught in his throat.

"You know what we are, Flake? You know what we—what
I
—became out there the night we cut Brennan open and drained his blood into those four big canteens?"

Flake knew, then, and he tried desperately to run—too late. March tripped him and knocked him down and straddled him, the knife held high.

"I'm still thirsty," March said.

I
had put Katchaturian's Masquerade Suite on the stereo and was pouring myself a tulip glass of port when the doorbell rang at a few minutes past seven.

Reluctantly I crossed to the foyer, asking myself why it was that whenever a man plans a relaxing evening at home alone, he is invariably beset by interruptions of one kind or another. Sighing, I opened the door.

The man standing on the porch was tall and thin, with eyebrows so thick they formed an almost solid black bar across his forehead. He wore a navy blue business suit and a dark tie; his narrow mouth was turned into a smile that did not reach eyes as slick as polished black stones. He reminded me of an undertaker.

He said, "Mr. Thorpe? Mr. Emmett Thorpe?"

"Yes?"

"A pleasure, sir, a distinct pleasure." He proffered his hand. "My name is Buchanan, Ian Buchanan."

His grip was cool and moist. I took my own hand away quickly. "What can I do for you, Mr. Buchanan?"

"A business matter, sir."

"Oh," I said. "Well, I'm sorry, but I never discuss business except at my office. Perhaps if you—"

"This is a matter of no little import, Mr. Thorpe, no little import."

"Yes?"

"Oh, very much so."

"Concerning what?"

"Lysander Pharmaceuticals."

"I gathered that much," I said. "Precisely why are you here, Mr. Buchanan?"

His smile widened. "May I come in? It's a bit chilly out here—decidedly nippy, in fact."

"I see no reason to let you into my house until you state the nature of your business," I said. I was beginning to grow irritated.

"I don't blame you for that. No, no, not at all. It pays to be careful these days, eh? Well, Mr. Thorpe, to put it quite simply, I am here to blackmail you."

I stared at him. "What did you say?"

"I think you heard me, sir. Now may I come in?"

I hesitated for a moment, and then stood aside wordlessly. We went into the living room. The Masquerade Suite was in its closing segments now; Buchanan paused to listen. "Ah, Katchaturian," he said. "A genius, sir, a monumental talent. Perhaps one day he will be given his due as one of the great composers."

I said nothing, standing with my hands closed into fists. My chest felt constricted, my mouth dry and coppery.

When the music ended, Buchanan seated himself in one of the overstuffed chairs and took in the contents of the room in a sweeping glance: the heavy mahogany-and-leather furniture, the fieldstone fireplace flanked by staggered shelves of good, well-thumbed books, the stereo components built into the paneled wall opposite. "A most impressive room, Mr. Thorpe, most impressive indeed," he said appreciatively. "I must compliment you on your taste."

"Suppose you get to the point, Buchanan."

"And the point is blackmail, eh?"