The Kill-Off (12 page)

“Uh-huh. Because he’s cautious, ultra-conservative. Ralph wouldn’t bet that the sun comes up in the east unless he got a thousand-to-one odds. He’d take no chance except for something big. He—no, now, wait a minute! Let’s take a good look at Ralph. He’s been odd-jobbing around this town for more than twenty years. Working around people who are hip-deep in dough—who are almost disappointed if they don’t get chiseled. But did Ralph ever clip one of ’em? Did he ever pad a bill, or walk off with a few tools or steal gasoline and oil, or pull any of the stunts that a guy in his place ordinarily would? Huh-uh. Never. In all those years, he—”

“Oh, yes, he did!” I said. “He most certainly did! How do you think he got that car, pray tell?”

“Not by killing anyone. Not by running any real risk at all. In all those years, he pulls just one perfectly safe bit of chiseling—and he collects a high-priced car!” Kossy shook his head slowly, giving me that mean, narrow-eyed grin. “Who are you kidding, sister? You know goddamned well Ralph wouldn’t kill you for this estate. If you really thought he would, you’d just sign it over to him.”

“Why, I would not!” I said. “There’d be nothing to stop him then. It would be just like throwing him in that girl’s arms!”

“Well?” he shrugged. “What choice you got? What choice has Ralph got? How you going to get by if he stays here?”

“Why, we’ll get by just fine!” I said. “We’ll—uh—”

“Yeah? How will you? Out with it, goddammit!”

“Well, we’ll—You leave me alone!” I said. “You stop it! You’re j-just as mean and hateful as—as—” And I broke down and began to cry. Undignified as it was, and as much as I despise weepy women.

That’s probably how that girl holds onto Ralph—by crying all over him. Making him feel sorry for her. Ralph is so good-hearted, you know. He hates to see anyone unhappy, and he just won’t let them be. And they just about can’t be when he’s around. He’s so much fun, so sweet and funny at the same time, and—

At least, he was—the mean, selfish thing! Why, even this morning, he was carrying on pretty much as he used to. And it was just pretense, of course, but I almost forgot that it was, and…and it was nice.

“Come on, Luane,” Kossy said. “Let’s have it.”

“I c-can’t!” I said. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. You leave me alone, you mean hateful thing, you!”

“Look, Luane—” He put his hand on my shoulder, and I shook it off. “Don’t you see it, honey? Don’t you see that you can’t hold Ralph in a trap without being in it yourself? Of course, you do. That’s why you’re so frightened, as you have every right to be. Let him go, Luane. Let him out of that corner you’ve got him in. If you don’t…”

“K-Kossy,” I said. “Kossy, d-darling…you don’t really think he would, do you? Y-you said you didn’t—couldn’t see him k-killing—”

“God!” He slapped his forehead. “Oh, God! I—Look. Tell me what it is, what you’re squeezing Ralph with. I have to know, don’t you understand that?”

“I k-know…I mean, I
can’t!
” I said. “There isn’t anything, and—don’t you dare say there is! Don’t you dare tell anyone there’s something—that I’m—”

He sighed and stood up. He said something about my being his client, God help him, whatever that meant: probably that it wouldn’t be ethical for him to say anything. Not that that would stop him, of course. He’s always talking, saying mean things about me. I haven’t said anything half as mean about him as he has about me. Every time he leaves here, he goes around laughing and telling people how old and ugly I look.

Anyway, he certainly doesn’t know anything. He’s always contradicting himself, saying one thing one minute and something else the next.

First he tells me that Ralph won’t kill me, and then he says he will. He says that Ralph won’t, but that there’s plenty of others who might. And if
that
doesn’t prove he’s crazy, what would? Kill me—a bunch of cowardly, lying, lowdown sneaks like they are! They don’t have the nerve. They have no reason to. I’ve never done anything to harm them.

I’ve never harmed anyone, Ralph least of all, but now…

NOW!

…Ralph? Is it Ralph on the stairs?

But why won’t he answer me? What can he gain by not answering? Why is he doing it—if it is he, if he is going to—this way?

To lure me out there? Maybe I shouldn’t go. But if I don’t…

It must be someone else. It simply wouldn’t make sense for Ralph to do it this way. As for someone else, why would they—he—she…?

They’re afraid, unsure? They haven’t made up their mind? They’re waiting to see what I do? They’re trying to lure me out of the room—like Ralph would, is, might?

If I only knew, I might save myself. If I knew who it was—before the person becomes sure—I might save myself.

If…If I go out. If I don’t go out.

Save me, I prayed. Just let me save myself. That’s all I want. It’s all I’ve ever wanted. And that’s certainly not very much to ask, is it?

I went out.

I saw who it was.

A
lthough I am but of a humble station in life, I come from a proud old southern family, which was directly descended from that proud old southern warrior, Robert E. Lee, and we lived in a proud southern village which shall here be Nameless. Then, when I was but a slip of a girl, I loved unwisely and not too well, and my proud old father drove me out into the storm one bitter night. So, I went to a large city where I stumbled anew into a new pitfall. I mean, I didn’t do anything wrong, really. Never again did I repeat my first and only fatal mistake. But there was this place I worked in where you could hustle drinks and where if you could sing a little or dance or something like that, you could keep whatever the customers gave you. And one night an orchestra leader entered its portals, and I innocently agreed to accompany him to his room. I didn’t have the slightest idea of what evil designs he wanted. I simply went because I felt sorry for him, and I had to send some money back to my invalid mother and my two brothers, and—

Oh, I did not! I’m making all of this up.

I don’t have any mother or brothers or any family except my father, and if he has anything to be proud of I don’t know what it is. The last time I heard he was in jail again for bootlegging back in our home town.

He had a little two-by-four restaurant. I used to serve drinks to the customers, and two or three times when it was someone I liked real well and I simply had to have something to wear or go naked, I let them you-know. I finally picked up a dose from one of them. Pa said that as long as I got it, I could figure out how to get rid of it. So I stole ten dollars he had hidden, and went to a place near Fort Worth.

I couldn’t get a restaurant job, which was the only kind of work I knew, since I couldn’t get a health certificate. And I couldn’t get that, of course, until I got over the dose. So practically flat broke as I was—without even money enough for a room—it looked like I was really in a pickle.

I said it
looked
that way. Because actually, I guess, it was lucky I didn’t have room money. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have gone into that cheap little burlesque house just to rest a while and try to think.

There were four chorus girls in the line. Pretty old girls, it looked like. I didn’t think they could sing half as good as I could, and the dancing they did was mostly just wiggling and shaking. I watched and listened to them a while. Finally, I got up enough nerve to go to the manager and ask him for a job.

He took me into his office. I sang and wiggled for him, and he said I was okay, but he didn’t have a job open right then. Then, he winked and asked me how about it—you know—and said there was a fast ten bucks in it for me. I told him, I couldn’t. He offered me twenty, and I told him no again. And I told him why, because it would be a dirty trick on him. He was awfully appreciative. He said most girls in my position would have taken the money, and not given a damn whether they dosed some poor son-of-a-bitch. (Those are his own words and I’m only repeating them because I want to tell the whole truth and not leave out anything. Not a bit more than I have to. I don’t use that kind of language myself.)

He appreciated my telling him so much that he gave me a job after all. He had to fire another girl to do it, and naturally I was sorry for that. But she was really too old to be working, anyway. I told her so, when she started cursing me out. And she didn’t have much to say after that.

I started seeing a doctor right away—as soon as I got a paycheck. He got me cleared up fast, and things were pretty nice from then on. For quite a while. All the men who came to the show—you hardly ever saw a woman—liked me. They’d start clapping and whistling and calling for me, even while the other girls were doing their numbers. Then, when I went on stage they wouldn’t let me go. They were really crazy about me, even if it doesn’t sound nice for me to say so, and I couldn’t begin to tell you how many of them tried to date me up. If I’d been willing to you-know for money like some of the other girls did, I could have made all kinds. I wouldn’t have had to just barely skimp by like I was doing, because that manager could really squeeze a quarter until the eagle screamed. But, anyway, I didn’t do it. Not even once, as much as I was tempted.

I remember one time when I just about had to have a new pair of shoes, and I saw an absolutely darling pair in a window, marked down from twenty-three ninety-nine to fourteen ninety-eight. It was such a wonderful bargain, I just didn’t see how I could pass it up. I felt like I’d die if I didn’t have those shoes! And while I was standing there a man who came to the show all the time came along, and offered to buy them for me. But I turned him down. I hesitated a moment first, but I did.

My real name is Agnes Tuttle, but I changed it when I went to work at the show. I was going to make it something kind of unusual, like Dolores du Bois. But the other girls had given themselves fancy names—Fanchon Rose, and Charlotte Montclair and so on—so I decided to make mine simple. It seemed best to, you know. It stood out more. And if I’d had the same sort of name as those other girls, people might have thought I was cheap and shoddy, too.

I’d been at the show about six months when the police raided it and closed it down. The manager got a big fine, and had to leave town. The girls went back to doing what they had been doing, which was you know what. I hardly knew what to do.

I felt it would be kind of a step down to take a waitress job. There’s nothing wrong with being a waitress, of course. But it doesn’t pay much, and it’s darned hard work. And in view of my experience, I felt that I simply ought to and had to have something better. I was like that then; awfully ambitious, I mean. Willing to do almost anything to be a big-name singer or something like that. Now, I feel just about the opposite. In the first place, I know I’m not much good as a singer and never will be, like Rags McGuire says. In the second place, I just don’t care. All I want now is just to be with Ralph, forever and always—and by golly, I
will
be!—and…

But I’ll tell you about that later.

I didn’t have money to travel on, and there weren’t any jobs like I wanted in Fort Worth. Oh, there were a few, of course, but I couldn’t get them. All the talent for them was hired through New York agencies, so I didn’t stand a chance, even if I’d had the training and the presence and the clothes. I guess I was pretty awful, then. And I don’t just mean my voice. I tried to wear nice things without being flashy, and I tried to be careful about makeup and using good English. But trying isn’t enough when you don’t have money to work with, and you’re not sure of what you’re trying for.

I guess I couldn’t really blame Rags for thinking I was something that I wasn’t.

I was working in a beer garden at the time I met him. It wasn’t a very nice place, and it wasn’t a real job. I just hung out there, like several other girls did. I got to keep any money a customer gave me for drinking with him, and I also got a commission on what he bought. Then, a few times a night I’d sing a number. And the orchestra and I divided the change that the customers tossed up on the bandstand.

Well, Rags dropped into the place one night, and a waitress tipped me off that he was a big spender. So, after I’d done a number, I went over to his table. I didn’t know who he was—just about the greatest jazz musician of all time. I just thought, you know, that if he was going to throw money around, he might as well throw some my way. And I thought he looked awfully interesting, too.

Well. I guess I did just about everything wrong that I could. I just botched everything up, not only that night but the next day when he gave me a singing try-out, and offered me a contract. I—I just don’t know! I still squirm inside when I think about it. But I know I didn’t act that way just because of the money. I wanted to get ahead, of course, but mostly I wanted to please him. I thought I was doing what he wanted me to do, and he seemed so terribly unhappy I felt that I should. But…

He had no use for me from then on. From then on, I was just dirt to him. He wouldn’t let me explain or try to straighten things out. I was just dirt, and he was going to keep it that way.

I tried to excuse him. I told myself that if I’d had a family like his, and the same terrible thing happened to mine that happened to his—though he won’t admit it did—why, I might be pretty hard to get along with, too. But, well, you can’t keep excusing people forever. If they’re simply determined to despise you, you just have to let them. And all you can do about it is to despise them back.

Rags has just done one nice thing for me in all the months I’ve worked for him. That was when we came here, and he introduced me to Ralph. He didn’t mean to be nice, of course. He meant it as a mean joke on me—telling me that Ralph was a very wealthy man and so on. But that was one time Mr. Rags got fooled. Ralph told me the truth about himself that very first night, and I told him the truth about myself. And instead of being mad and disappointed with each other, like Rags thought we would, we fell in love.

Ralph was so cute when he told me about himself. Just like a darling little boy. All the time he was talking I could hardly keep from taking him in my arms and squeezing him. He couldn’t make a living any more in this town, it seemed, because everyone was mad at his wife. On the other hand, he’d lived here all his life, and he wouldn’t know what to do anywhere else. Not by himself, I mean. And the idea he kind of had in mind in meeting me was—well, he got pretty mixed up at that point. But I understood him, the poor darling. He didn’t need to put it into words for me to understand, any more than he’s had to put certain other things into words.

While he was hesitating, not knowing quite how to go on, I patted him on the hand and told him to never mind. I said I was awfully glad he seemed to think so much of me because I liked him a lot, too. But maybe if he knew the truth, he’d change his opinion of me.

Well, he didn’t try to shut me up like most men would have. You know, just say to forget it and that it didn’t matter. He just nodded kind of grave and fatherly-like, and said, “Is that a fact? Well, maybe you better tell me about it, then.”

I told him. Everything there was to tell, although I may possibly have forgotten a few little things. When I finally stopped, he waited a minute, and then he told me to go on.

“G-go on?” I said. “But that’s all there is.”

“But I thought you were supposed to have done something bad,” he said. “Something that might change my mind about you.”

Well…

My eyes misted over. I could feel my face puckering up like some big old baby’s. I sat there, looking and feeling that way and not knowing what to do. And Ralph reached out and pulled my head against his chest.

“You go right ahead, honey,” he said. “You just cry all you want to.”

Well, I cried and I cried and I cried. It just seemed like I could never stop, and Ralph told me not to try. So I cried and I cried. And everything that was in me that wasn’t really me—that didn’t really belong there—was kind of washed away. And I felt all clean and nice and peaceful. And I was never as happy in my life.

Ralph…

I know I get pretty silly whenever I start talking about him, but I just can’t help it. And I just don’t care. Because however much I rave, I still don’t do him justice. He’s the handsomest thing you ever saw in your life, for one thing. A lot handsomer than most anyone in pictures—and don’t think I won’t make him try out for pictures when we get away from here! But that’s only one thing. Along with it, he’s just the nicest, kindest, understandingest—well, everything. He’s mature, and yet he’s awfully boyish. The most wonderful sweetheart a girl ever had, but kind of fatherly, too.

We saw each other every night after that. We talked about what we were going to do—kind of talking around the subject. Because it looked like there was just about only one thing we could do. And things like that, they’re not something you can very well talk about.

Yes, that mean old hen he was married to would give him a divorce, all right. Or he could just leave, like I’d suggested, and to hell with the divorce. She’d let him know that—those things—although she hadn’t said so in so many words. The trouble was she wouldn’t let him take the money that belonged to him, money he’d worked for and saved dollar by dollar. She wouldn’t even let him take half of it. She kept it under the mattress of her bed, and she made it clear to him that anyone who got it would have to kill her first.

Ralph was afraid to sue her. He had a record book of his savings, showing when and how much he put away. But that wouldn’t necessarily prove that the money was his, would it? She might have told him to keep the record for her. And, anyway, those lawsuits drag on forever, and the only ones that get anything out of ’em are the lawyers.

At first, I told Ralph to let her keep the money, the old bag! But Ralph didn’t want to do that; we’d need it ourselves to get a decent start in life. And after I thought about it a while, I wouldn’t have let him if he had wanted to.

It was his money, wasn’t it? His and mine. When something belongs to a person, they ought to have it and if someone tries to stop them
they
ought to have something.

I told Ralph that he ought to speak up to her, instead of just beating around the bush. I said that I’d be glad to talk to her myself, and if that didn’t do any good I’d slap some sense into her. But Ralph didn’t think that would be a very good idea. And I guess it wasn’t.

She’d probably put the money in the bank, and tell the police she’d been threatened. Then, if anything happened, why you know where we’d be.

I was sorry afterwards that I’d said anything like that to Ralph. Because I was perfectly willing to do what I said I would and heck of a lot more. But it might have sounded a little shocking to say so. I mean, even if I wasn’t a woman, if I was Ralph, say, and I said something like that to me, why I’d—oh, well, you know what I mean.

It was best to keep things the way they’d been, except for that once. Talking about what had to be done, but not
really
talking about it. Not actually admitting that we were talking about it.