Waltz Into Darkness (34 page)

But
then when he was through--

It
took him some moments to work himself up to the necessary pitch of
resoluteness. Then suddenly he walked rapidly over to it, from the
far side of the cellar, where he'd withdrawn and kept his back to it
in the interim.

He
dragged the rug over, placed it even with the waiting cavity's edge.
Then, taking a restraining hold along its exposed flap, he pushed the
rounded part from him. It unrolled and emptied itself into the
trough, with no more than a sodden thump. Then he drew it up. It came
back to him again facilely unweighted. An arm flung up for a moment,
but quickly dropped back again.

He
avoided looking into it. He stepped around it to the other side,
where the mound of disinterred fill was, and, holding his face
averted, began to push and scrape that down into it with the back of
the shovel.

Then
when at last he had to look, to see how far he had progressed, the
worst was over. There was no longer any face down there to confront
him. There was just a fragmentary midsection seeming to float there
on the surface, as it were; peering through the surrounding film of
earth.

Then
that went, presently.

"And
all God's work has come to this," passed through his mind.

He
had to tramp and stamp on it, at the end, to firm it down. That part
was bad too.

He
kept it up far longer than was needful. As if to keep what lay under
from ever coming out again. He almost seemed to be doing a jig of
fear and despair, unable to quit of his own volition.

He
looked up suddenly.

She
was standing there at head of the steps watching him.

"How
did you know just when?" he panted, haggard.

"I
came down twice to see how far along you were. I went back again
without disturbing you. I thought perhaps you'd best be left alone."
She looked at him inscrutably. "I didn't think you'd be able to
go through with it to the finish. But you did, didn't you?"
Whether that was praise or not, he couldn't tell.

He
kicked the shovel out of his path, tottered up the steps toward her.

He
fell before he'd quite reached her. Or rather, let himself fall. He
lay there, extended on the step, face buried in one arm, and sobbed a
little.

She
bent over toward him. Her hand came down upon his shoulder,
consolingly.

"There,
now. It's over. It's done. There's nothing more to worry about."

"I've
killed a man," he said smotheredly. "I've killed a man. God
has forbidden that."

She
gave a curt, humorless snuff of laughter. "Soldiers in a battle
kill them by the tens and never give it a second thought. They even
give them medals for it."

She
plucked at him by the arm, until he had found his feet again, stood
beside her.

"Come,
let's get out of here."

She
stepped down there a moment to get the lamp, which he had forgotten,
bring it with her, put it out. Then she closed the door after the two
of them. She brushed her fingertips off fastidiously, against each
other; no doubt from having touched the lamp. Or perhaps--

She
put her arm comfortingly about his waist, as she rejoined him. "Come
upstairs to bed. You're worn out. It's nearly ten o'clock, did you
know that? You've been down there four full hours."

"You
mean--?" He didn't think he'd heard her aright. "Sleep here
in this same house tonight ?"

She
cast up her hand, as if at the nonsense of such a qualm. "It's
late. What trains are there any more? And even if there were, people
don't bolt out suddenly in the middle of the night. That would give
them something to--"

"But
knowing, as we do, Bonny. Knowing all the time, you and I both,
what lies-"

"Don't
be childish. Just put it from your mind. It's all the way down in the
cellar. We're-all the way up in the bedroom."

She
tugged at him until she got him to climb beside her.

"You're
like a little boy who's afraid of the dark," she mocked.

He
said nothing more.

In
the lamplit bedroom he watched her covertly, while apathetically,
with numbed motions, drawing off his own things. There was no
difference to be detected in the bustling routine with which she
prepared herself for retirement, from any other night. Again certain
under-layers of garments billowed up over her head in as much armless
commotion as ever. Again the petticoats dropped to the floor and she
stepped aside from them, one after the other. Again her unbound hair
was trapped first on the inside of her high-collar flannel gown, then
freed and brought to the outside, with a little backward shake. Every
move was normal, unforced.

She
even sat to the mirror and stroked her hair with the brush.

He
lay back and closed his eyes, with a weazened sickish feeling.

They
didn't say goodnight to one another. She perhaps thought he was
already asleep, or was a little offended at his excess of morality.
He was glad of that, at least. Glad she didn't try to kiss him. He
had a curious sensation for a moment or two, that if she had tried,
he would have, involuntarily, reared up, run for the window, and
hurled himself through it.

She
turned their bedside lamp and the room dimmed indigo.

He
lay there motionless, as rigid, as extended, as what he had put into
the trough down below in the cellar awhile ago.

Not
only couldn't he sleep, he was afraid to sleep. He wouldn't have let
himself if he could have. He was fearful of meeting the man he had
just slain, should he drift across the border.

She
too was sleepless, however, in spite of all her insouciance. He heard
her turning about a number of times. Presently, she gave a
foreshortened sigh of impatience. Then he heard the bed frame jar
slightly as she propped herself up on her arm.

He
could somehow tell, in another moment, that she was leaning over
toward him. The direction of her breath, perhaps, coming toward him.

Her
silken whisper reached him.

"Awake,
Lou ?"

He
kept his eyes closed.

He
heard her get up, the rustle as she put something over her. Heard her
take up the lamp, tread softly from the room with it, unlighted. Then
outside the door, left ajar, the slowly burgeoning glow as she lit
it. Then this receded as she bore it down the stairs with her.

His
breath started to quicken. Was she leaving him? Was she about to
commit some act of disloyalty, of betrayal, in the depths of night?
Terrified, he suddenly burst the frozen mould that had encased him,
started up himself, flung something on, crept cautiously out into the
hail.

He
could see the light from below peering wanly up the stairs. He could
hear a faint sound now and again, as she moved softly about.

He
felt his way down the stairs, step by step, his breath erratic, and
rearward toward where the light was coming from. Then stepped up to
the doorway at last and confronted her.

She
was seated at the table, in the lamplight, holding a chickenjoint in
her hand and busily gnawing at it.

"I
was hungry, Lou," she said sheepishly. "I didn't have any
supper." And then, putting her hand to the vacant chair beside
her and swiveling it out invitingly, "Join me?"

47

The
gentle but insistently repeated pressure of her small hand on his
shoulder, rubbed sleep threadbare, wore it away. He started upward
spasmodically.

Then
it came back. Then he remembered. Like a waiting knife it struck and
found him.

"I'm
going to get the tickets, Lou. Lou, wake up, it's after ten. I'm
going to get the tickets. For us, at the station. I've done all the
packing, while you were lying there. I've left out your one suit,
everything else is put away--Lou, wake up, clear your eyes. Can't you
understand me? I'm going to get the tickets. What about money ?"

"Over
there," he murmured vacantly, eyes turned inward on yesterday.
"Back pocket, on the left side-"

She
had it in a moment, as though she'd already known, but only wanted
his cognizance to her taking it.

"Where
will I get them for? Where do you want us to go ?"

"I
don't know--" he said blurredly, shading his eyes. "I can't
tell you that--"

She
gave her head a little toss of impatience at his sluggishness. "I'll
go by the trains, then. Whichever one is leaving soonest, we'll
take."

She
came to him and, bending, gave him a hurried little peck of parting.
The fragrance of her violet toilet water swirled about him.

"Be
careful," he said dismally. "It may be dangerous."

"We
have time. There's no danger yet. How can there be? It's not even
known." She gave him a shrug of assurance. "If we go about
it right, there may never be danger."

The
froufrou of her skirts crossed the floor. She opened the door. She
turned there. She bent the fingers of her hand as if beckoning him to
her.

"Ta
ta," she said. "Lovey mine."

48

She
seemed to be gone the whole morning. How could it take that long just
to buy tickets for a train? he asked himself over and over again,
sweating agony. How? How? Even if you bought them twice over, three
times over?

He
was pacing endlessly back and forth, holding tightly clasped between
his two hands, as if afraid to lose it, a cup of the coffee she had
left for him warming on the stove. But the plume of steam that had at
first, with a sort of rippling sluggishness, traced his course behind
him on the air, had long since thinned and vanished. He took a
hurried swallow every so often, but dipping his mouth nervously down
into the cup, held low as it was, rather than raising it to his lips.
He wasn't aware of its taste, or of its degree of warmth, or even
what it was.

She
wasn't coming back, that was it. She'd abandoned him, boarded a train
by herself, left him to meet the consequences of his own act as best
he might. Sweat would start out anew at the thought, sweat that hurt
like blood, though it was only the dew of fear. Then he would
remember that she had, intentionally awakened him before leaving,
that she would have carefully avoided that above all had desertion
been her purpose, and he'd breathe again and his misgivings would
abate somewhat. Only to return again presently, stronger than ever,
as if on a wicked punishing spiral.

He
was in the midst of this inner turmoil, when suddenly, on the
outside, crisis confronted him, and he was alone to face it.

There
was a knocking at the door that he knew could not possibly be hers,
and when he peered from one of the sideward frontal windows, cloaking
his face with the edge of the drape, there was a coach and coachman
standing waiting empty out before the house for someone.

The
rapping came again. And when he drew nearer, through the inside of
the house, and stole a frightened look out from mid-hall toward the
glass curtain veiling the upper part of the door, there were the
filmy shadowed busts of a man and a woman imprinted on it, standing
waiting on the threshold.

Side
by side, in chiaroscuro; the cone of a man's tophat, the slanting
line of a woman's bonnet brim.

The
knocking repeated itself, and seemed to trap his voice into issuing
forth, against every intent of his own to use it. "Who's there
?" Too late he tried to stem it, to recall it, but it was
already gone.

"Dollard,"
a man's voice answered, deeply resonant.

He
didn't know the name, couldn't identify it.

Unmanned,
he quailed there.

The
voice came again. "May I speak with you a minute, Mr. Durand ?"

So
the voice knew him at least. It was no mistake, it was he that was
wanted.

He
would have been incapable of further movement, even after having
revealed himself, had they let him be.

But
his name came again. "Mr. Durand." And then the knocking,
puzzled now and questioning. And then his name again. "Mr.
Durand. Hello! Mr. Durand ?"