Waltz Into Darkness (11 page)

Durand
said, "May I present Mr. Simms to you, my dear? A good friend of
mine."

Mr.
Simms said with a gallant inclination, "I am inclined to doubt
that, or you would not have delayed this for so long."

She
cast her eyes fetchingly at him, certainly not in flirtation, for
that would have been discreditable to Durand, but at least in a sort
of beguiling playfulness.

"I
am surprised," she said, and allowed that to stand alone, the
better to make her point with what followed.

"How
so?" Simms asked uncertainly.

She
gave the compliment to Durand, to be passed on by him, instead of
directly, face to face. "I had thought until now all bank
managers were old and rather forbidding looking."

Mr.
Simms' vest buttons had never had a greater strain put upon them, not
even after Sunday meals.

She
said next, looking about her with ingenuous interest, "I have
never been in a bank before. What a superb marble floor."

"We
are rather proud of that," Mr. Simms conceded.

They
entered the office. They seated themselves, Mr. Simms seeing to her
chair himself.

They
chatted for several moments on a purely social plane, business still
having the grace to conceal itself behind a preliminary screen of
sociability, even where men alone were involved. (Always providing
they were of an equal level.) To come too bluntly to the point
without a little pleasant garnishing first was considered bad
mannered. But year by year the garnishing was growing less.

At
last Durand remarked, "Well, we mustn't take too much of Mr.
Simms' time, I know he's a busy man."

The
point had now arrived.

"In
what way can I be of service to you?" Simms inquired.

"I
should like to arrange," said Durand, "for my wife to have
full use of my account here, along with myself."

"Oh,
really," she murmured disclaimingly, upping one hand. "He
insists--"

"Quite
simple," said Simms. "We merely change the account from a
single one, as it now stands, to a joint account, to be participated
in by both." He sought out papers on his desk, selected two.
"And to do that all I have to do is ask you both for your
signatures, just once each. You on this authorization form. And you,
my dear, on this blank form card, just as a record of your signature,
so that it will be known to us and we may honor it."

Durand
was already signing, forehead inclined.

Simms
edged forward another paper tentatively, asked him: "Did you
wish this on both accounts, the savings as well as the checking, or
merely the one?"

"It
may as well be both alike, and have done with it, while we're about
it," Durand answered unhesitatingly. He wasn't a grudging
gift-giver, and any other answer, it seemed to him, would have been
an ungracious one.

"Lou,"
she protested, but he silenced her with his hand.

Simms
was already offering her the inked pen for her convenience. She
hesitated, which at least robbed the act of seemingly undue
precipitation. "How shall I sign? Do I use my own Christian
name, or--?"

"Perhaps
your full marriage name might be best. 'Mrs. Louis Durand.' And then
you'll remember to repeat that exactly each time you draw a check."

"I
shall try," she said obediently.

He
blotted solicitously for her.

"Is
that all ?" she asked, wide-eyed.

"That's
quite all there is to it, my dear."

"Oh,
that wasn't so bad, was it ?" She looked about her in delighted
relief, almost like a child who has been dreading a visit to the
dentist only to find nothing painful has befallen her.

The
two men exchanged a look of condescending masculine superiority, in
the face of such inexperience. Their instincts made them like women
to be that way.

Simms
saw them off from the door of his office with an amount of protocol
equal to that with which he had greeted them.

Again
the bustle floated in such airy elegance above that workaday bank
floor as bustle never had before. Save this same one on its way in.
Again the sentimental calflike eyes of cooped-up clerks and tellers
and accountants rose from their work to follow her in escapist
longings, and an unheard sigh of romantic dejection seemed to go up
from all of them alike. It was like the sheen of a rainbow trailing
its way through a murky bog, presently to fade out. But while it
passed, it was a lovely thing.

"He
was nice, wasn't he ?" she confided to Durand.

"Not
a bad sort," he agreed with more masculine restraint.

"May
I ask him to dinner ?" she suggested deferentially.

He
turned and called back, "Mrs. Durand would like you to dine with
us soon. I'll send you a note."

Simms
bowed elaborately, from where he stood, with unconcealed
gratification.

He
stood for several moments after they had gone out into the street,
thoughtfully cajoling his own whiskers and envying Durand for having
such a paragon of a wife.

16

The
letter was on his desk when he returned to the office from his
noonday meal. It must have come in late, therefore, been delayed
somehow in delivery, for the rest of his mail for that day had
already been on hand awaiting his attention when he first came in at
nine.

It
was already well on toward three by now. The noonday meal of a
typical New Orleans businessman, then, was no hurried snack snatched
on the run, there then back again. It was a leisurely affair with due
regard for the amenities. He went to his favorite restaurant. He
seated himself in state. He ordered with care and amplitude. Friends
and acquaintances were greeted, or often joined him at table.
Business was discussed, sometimes even transacted. He lingered over
his coffee, his cigar, his brandy. Finally, in his own good time,
refreshed, restored, ready for the second half of the day's efforts,
he went back to his place of work. It was a process that consumed
anywhere from two to three hours.

Thus
it was midafternoon before, returning to his desk, he found the
letter there lying on his blotting-pad.

Twice
he started to open it, and twice was interrupted. He took it up,
finally, and prepared to spare it a moment of his full attention.

The
postmark was St. Louis again. Whether spurred by that or not, he
recognized the handwriting, from the time before. From her sister
again.

But
this time there could be no mistake. It was addressed to him
directly. Intentionally so. "Louis Durand, Esq." To be
delivered here, at his place of business.

He
slit it along the top with a letter opener and plucked it out of its
covering, puzzled. He swung himself sideward in his chair and gave it
his attention.

If
dried ink on paper can be said to scream, it screamed up at him.

Mr.
Durand!

I can stand this no longer! I demand that you give me an

explanation!
I demand that you give me word of my sister without

delay!

I am writing to you direct as a last resource. If you do not

inform
me immediately of my sister's whereabouts, satisfy me that

she
is safe and sound, and have her communicate with me herself at

once
to confirm this, and to enlighten me as to the cause of this

strange
silence, I shall go to the police and seek redress of them.

I have in my hand a letter, in answer to the one I last sent

her,
purporting to be from her, and signed by her name. It is not

from
my sister. It is written by someone else. It is in the

handwriting
of a stranger,--an unknown person--

17

How
long he sat and stared at it he did not know. Time lost its meaning.
Reading over and over the same words. "The handwriting of an
unknown person. Of an unknown person. An unknown person." Until
they became like a whirring buzz saw slashing his brain in two.

Then
suddenly hypnosis ended, panic began. He flung himself out of his
swivel-backed chair, so that it fell over behind him with a loud
clatter. He crushed the letter into his pocket, in such stabbing
haste as if it were living fire and burned his fingers at touch.

He
ran for the door, forgetting his hat. Then ran back for it, then ran
for the door a second time. In it he collided with his office boy,
drawn to the entryway just then by the sound the chair had made. He
flung him almost bodily aside, gripping him by both shoulders at
once; fled on, calling back "Tell Jardine to take over, I've
gone home for the day!"

In
the street, he slashed his upraised arm every which way at once,
before, behind him, sideward, like a man combatting unseen gnats,
hoping to draw a coach out of the surrounding emptiness. And when at
last he had, after a moment that seemed an hour of agonized waiting,
he had run along beside it, was in before it had stopped; standing
upright in the middle of it like a latter-day charioteer, leaning
over the driver's shoulder in the crazed intensity of giving him the
address.

"St.
Louis Street, and quickly! I must get there without delay!"

The
wheel spokes blurred into solid disks of motion, New Orleans' streets
began to stream backward around him, quivering, like scenes pictured
on running water.

He
struck his own flank, as if he were the horse. "Quicker,
coachman! Will you never get there ?"

"We're
practically flying now, sir. We apt to run down somebody."

"Then
run down somebody and be damned! Only get me there!"

He
jumped from the carriage as he had entered it, slapped coins from his
backward-reaching palm into the driver's forward-reaching one, ran
for his own door as if he meant to hurl himself bodily against it and
crash it down.

Aunt
Sarah opened it with surprising immediacy. She must have been right
there in the front hall, on the other side of it.

"Is
she in ?" he flung into her face. "Is she here in the house
?"

"Who
?" She drew back, frightened by the violence of the question.
But then answered it, for it could refer to only one person. "Miss
Julia? She been gone all afternoon. She tole me she going shopping.
she be back in no time. That was 'bout one o'clock, I reckon. She
ain't come back since."

"My
God!" he intoned dismally. "I was afraid of that. Damn that
letter for not coming an hour earlier!"

Then
he saw that a young girl was huddled there waiting on a backless seat
against the wall. Frugally dressed, a large boxed parcel held in her
lap. She was shrinking timidly back, her wan face coloring painfully
as a result of the recent expletive he had used.

"Who's
this ?" he demanded, lowering his voice.

"Young
lady from the dressmaker's, sent over to have Miss Julia try on a
dress they making for her. She say she tole her to be here at three.
She been waiting a couple hours now."

Then
she didn't intend to remain away today, in the ordinary course of
events, flashed through his mind. And her doing so now proves-- "When
was this appointment made?" he challenged the girl, causing her
to cower still further.

"Some--some
days ago," she faltered. "I believe last week, sir."

He
ran up the stairs full tilt, oblivious of appearances, hearing behind
him Aunt Sarah's tactful whisper, "You better go now, honey.
Some kind of trouble coming up; you call back some other day."

He
stood there in their bedroom, breathing hard from the violence of his
ascent but otherwise immobile for a moment, looking about in mute
helplessness. His eye fell on the trunk. The trunk that had never
been opened. Draped deceptively, but he knew it now, since that
Sunday, for what it was. He wrenched off the slip cover, and the
initials came to view again. "J.R.," in paint the color of
fresh blood.

He
turned, bolted out again, ran down the stairs once more. Only part of
the way this time, stopping halfway to the bottom.