Talk of The Town by Charles Williams(9)

“Well, I’ll see you,” I said, and started to turn away.
“Anything I can do for you?” he asked. “Run you in to a
doc if you haven’t got a car.”
”I’m all right, thanks. I’ve just got to find Mrs. Langston.”
And get out of sight within the next five or ten minutes, I
thought, if I wanted to see tomorrow’s sunrise. I went out
the door, and looked across the road. Her station wagon was
parked in front of the office. Nothing surprised me any
more. I broke into a run, and was almost hit by a car. The
driver called me something unprintable and sped on. I ran
into the lobby and could hear her moving around in the
living-room. She turned as I shoved through the curtains.
She was still dressed exactly as she had been at dinner, and
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as far as I could see she was unharmed. She looked at my
face and gasped, and then, is if we’d been rehearsing it for a
week, she was in my arms.
“I’ve been so worried,” she said. “I’ve been looking
everywhere for you. Bill, what happened?”
“No time now,” I said. “We’ve got to get out of here. Fast.”
She grasped the urgency in my voice and asked no
questions. Running into the bedroom, she came out with her
purse and a pair of flat shoes. We hurried out. She locked
the front door. It occurred to me the back one was probably
broken open, but it didn’t seem very important.

“Where does Talley live?” I asked, as I hit the starter. “I
mean, east of town, or west?”
“West,” she said. “On the other side of the river, and then
south four or five miles.”
We’d risk it, I thought. I had no plan of any kind except to
get off the highway and out of sight, but once we were
committed we’d never get back through town or across that
bridge. In a few minutes everything was going to be closed
to us.
I whirled around and shot onto the highway, headed
towards town. And almost at the same instant I heard the
siren wailing up ahead of us. It was too late to turn now. I
kept going straight ahead, holding my breath. The Sheriff’s
car shot past us, doing sixty. He hadn’t seen us. They were
still looking for me in their cruiser.
“Watch him,” I said, opening up as much as I dared. “Is he
turning in?”
“Yes,” she said quietly. “What is it, Bill?”
They’d find their cruiser across the street, and then they’d
be looking for this station wagon. “In a few minutes,” I said.
“If we get through town.”
I went through as if I were driving on eggs. The streets
were quiet now, with not enough traffic to cover us. I felt
naked. Nobody paid any attention to us. We came onto the
bridge at River Street and I was tied in knots expecting to
hear the growl of a siren open up behind us. Nothing
happened. Breath escaped from me in a long sigh. I eased in
on the throttle and was doing fifty by the time we were
across the river. “Where do we turn?” I asked.
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“A little over a mile,” she said. “There’s a service station.”
I prayed he’d be closed, but he wasn’t. However, he was
busy waiting on a customer as we made the turn and I didn’t
think he saw us. I straightened out and hit the throttle
again. It was a gravel road running through timber and
there were no other cars in sight. I slammed on the brakes.
“Look,” I said, “you can still get out. If I’m not with you,
they can’t stop you. Go back to the highway and head east.”
“Are you in trouble?” she asked quietly.
“Serious trouble. And you will be too, if you’re caught with
me.”
“And leave you here in the dark, on foot?” she asked. “Bill,
you’re making me angry.”
“I tell you—”
“If you’re in trouble, it’s because of me. I don’t know what
you’re going to try, but I intend to help. Now, keep going, or
I’ll drive.”
“It’s a thousand-to-one shot—”
“Bill!”
I put the car in gear and hit the throttle. “Stubborn,” I
said, and grinned in the darkness. It made my face hurt.
“Have you ever been to his place?” I asked.
“No,” she said. “Just by it. This is the road that goes downriver
to the Cut where Kendall kept his boat.”
“It figures,” I said. I fought the car around a turn,
throwing gravel, just inside the ragged edge of control. “Let
me know when we’re getting near.”
”All right. I think about a half-mile before we get there we
pass a fence and a cattle-guard.”
“Good.” We came around another turn and there was
nothing but darkness and trees. We sped on, meeting no
one. In another few minutes the fence flashed past and I
heard the cattle-guard clatter beneath the tires. I slowed
abruptly, watching the sides of the road. In less than a
hundred yards I found a place I could get off. A faint pair of
ruts went off to the left, winding through the trees. I
followed them until they disappeared, and kept going,
picking my way between the trunks and around clumps of
underbrush. The ground was dry and firm. When we were at
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least a quarter mile from the road I stopped. I cut the
ignition and headlights. It was immensely silent and black
all around us, as if we were alone on a whole continent that
hadn’t even been discovered yet. When I turned, it was
impossible to see her beside me. I put out a hand and my
fingers brushed her cheek. She came towards me, and then I
was holding her very tightly and whispering against her ear.
I was scared,” I said. “I was scared stiff.”
“So was I,” she replied. “What happened, Bill?”
“I’m batting one-thousand,” I said. “First I was boobytrapped
by a hillbilly who thinks intelligible English is a
dialect. And now I’ve been clobbered by a small-town school
teacher.”
“What do they want you for?”
“Rape,” I said simply.
She cried out. “How did she do it?”
I told her the whole thing. “I walked right into it. She even
set it up so I’d get there in a cab, to have the driver’s story
to back her up. Then she stalled just long enough to make it
look right. Was it a man or woman that called you?”
“A man. He said you’d been in a fight and were badly
beaten up, and Calhoun had arrested you. I went to the jail
and the hospital—”
I sighed. “He gets monotonous. But they had help on their
telephone circuit this time. Let’s try Frankie, that guy I
bumped into. Who’s he?”
“Frankie Crossman. He runs Pearl Talley’s junk yard, out
in the west end of town.”
”You’re doing fine. Frankie’s in. He’s another one who’s
mouse-trapped me. He started the fight so that acid-thrower
could get away.”
“But how did they turn things over in the living-room that
way?”
“One of them went over and broke in the rear as soon as
they saw you drive away. You see, it had to look as if
something terrible had happened to you, without anything’s
actually happening—anything, that is, that might start
Redfield wondering afterwards if maybe I had been tricked
into coming there. Your being gone temporarily had nothing
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to do with it; I just got a few drinks under my belt, started
thinking about the way she looked without her clothes on,
and went charging over there like a rutting moose-”
“Incidentally, how does she look without her clothes on?
And how would you know?”
I told her about it, and added, “You see, she’d already laid
the groundwork for it. Trying to remember me. I was the
Peeping Tom.”
“What can we do?”
“I don’t know yet,” I said. “Up till now it’s been a case of
one minute at a time. My only chance is to get out of the
State, and Redfield knows it. I could turn myself in, hire a
good lawyer, and fight extradition until the Sheriff gets
back. But he’s not going to let me get out. The highways are
all blocked right now.”
“You think he’s gone bad?”
“It’s anybody’s guess,” I said. “It’s been digging him for
too long. He’s got enough of it now to see the truth, if he
wants it, but I don’t think he will. He’s been burying his
integrity a little at a time to hang onto her, and that
probably makes it easier to go all the way in the end.”
“Why did you want to come here, near Talley’s place?”
“A hunch. A very long shot I think I’ve got him tabbed
now, and there’s a chance we might even be able to prove
it.”
“What do you mean?”
I lit cigarettes for us. Nobody could see us here. “Talley is
the boy who was making those filthy phone calls, almost
beyond a doubt. He hired the acid job. I think he was there
the night your husband was killed. And I’m pretty sure he
was the one who tried to get me.” I told her about that.
“Oh, God,” she said.
“The telephone seems to be his favorite weapon, next to
acid and shotguns. I kept picking up little leads that seemed
to point to him, but I couldn’t believe them because the man
we were looking for spoke something that at least resembled
English. I didn’t know until tonight that Talley could speak
anything but hawg-lawg-and-dawg—”
“He’s a wonderful mimic”
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I know. Tell me everything you can about him.”
I suppose you’d say he was the local character,” she
began. “There’s always a new Pearl Talley story going the
rounds. He deliberately acts like a simple-minded hillbilly or
some sort of low-comedy clown—why, I don’t know, because
it never fools anybody any more. Actually, I don’t think he
has much education, but he has a mind as sharp as a razor.
Nobody’s ever beaten him in a business deal. He buys, sells,
and trades real estate all the time, as a speculator, but he’ll
spend three hours maneuvering and haggling the same way
to trade somebody out of a fountain pen.
“He came here from Georgia about eight years ago, as I
understand. With nothing but a ramshackle old truck loaded
with some scrubby calves he wanted to trade or sell. I told
you, I think, what he owns now—that big junk yard, a halfinterest
in the movie theater, and three or four farms that he
runs cattle on, and a lot of highway frontage.
“He lives on this place and has relatives living on the
others. Kinfolks, as he says. Nobody knows how many he
has, or where they come from, or where they go to, or even
whether he pays them anything. He’s not married, so there
are usually one or two over here with him, along with
whatever ratty girl he’s living with at the moment. I don’t
think I’ve ever seen him with a woman that didn’t look like
the dregs of something, and usually they’re young enough to
be juvenile delinquents, and probably are. I suppose a
psychiatrist would say he was afraid of women, or hated
them, and didn’t want one around he couldn’t degrade.”
“He apparently does all his business in bars, but they say
he drinks very little himself. Somebody once told me his
house is even a little like a honky-tonk, with a coke machine
and a jukebox. I understand they can play the jukebox with
slugs, but everybody has to put real dimes in if they want
cokes. On the other hand, though, they say he’ll bring in a
bunch of moonshine every now and then, absolutely free,
and get them all drunk. Not convivially drunk, but fallingdown
drunk, animal drunk. While he stays sober, of course,
and watches them make beasts of themselves Ugh! You’ve
no doubt gathered I don’t like him.”
“Probably with good reason,” I said. I think he was trying
to drive you insane or wreck your health, simply to buy your
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motel at a reasonable figure. No doubt it was perfectly
logical from his point of view.
She was aghast. “But, good Lord, Bill, would he try to kill
you just for that?”
I don’t know,” I said. “But I’m hoping it was for something
else. Do you know whether he’s ever been arrested? For a
felony, I mean?”
“Not that I ever heard of. Why?”
“It’s just a hunch so far. I may be able to tell a little more
about it when I get to a phone.”
“Where on earth,” she asked incredulously, “do you expect
to find a telephone out here?”
“Why, I thought we’d use Pearl’s,” I said.
“But—”
“It strikes me we’ve been shoved around by these
telephoning guys about long enough. What do you say we
change our tactics and go on the offensive? We’ve got
nothing to lose now; any direction from here is up.”
“I’m with you.”
“Put on your walking shoes,” I said. “Let’s go.”
* * *
It was a two-story house in a setting of big oaks some two
hundred yards back from the road. One lighted window
showed in front, on the right. The yard of packed bare earth
was unfenced. I took her arm, and we moved silently around
to the side, studying the place. There was a lighted window
here, too. Probably the same room, I thought. I kept my eyes
averted from the light to retain night vision. Fifty yards or so
behind the house was a large shadow that presumably was a
barn. There was only one car, a Ford sedan from the shape
of it. It was parked under a tree to the right of the front
porch.
I left her by the tree. Placing my lips against her ear, I
whispered, “Wait here. Don’t come in till I call you.”
She nodded.
I slipped over towards the lighted window at the side of
the house. As I approached it, phonograph music welled up
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inside and I heard shoes against a wooden floor. I peered
through the dirty screen, careful not to get too near.
It was a long room, extending from the front of the house
almost all the way to the rear, harshly lit by two big
overhead bulbs. Directly across from me, an overblown and
vapid-looking blonde girl of eighteen or nineteen was lying
on a sofa reading a book and glancing now and then towards
the two people who were presumably dancing just outside
my line of vision. She was wearing a pair of brief shorts and
an inadequate halter that did their best but didn’t have a
chance against all that overflowing girlishness. She was
barefoot, but wore a gold chain around each ankle, and a
yellow gold wrist-watch. Beside the sofa was a flimsy card
table stacked with magazines and more books. I couldn’t see
the rear of the room, or anything off to my left at all.
She lowered the book and said to one of the dancers,
“Trudy, you ha’n ought to be rubbin’ T.J. up like that. Pearl
woul’n like it.” She spoke like somebody with a mouthful of
soap.
“Oh, shut up, La Verne,” a girl’s voice said. “And for
Christ’s sake, go put some clothes on. I get so sick of looking
at that sloppy—”
Just then the dancers shuffled into view. I stared. One of
them was that dark, hard slat of a girl Talley had been using
for a memo pad that first day I saw him. But it was the man
who caught my eye. He was the one who’d got away from
me there in the bar when Frankie started the fight.
I slipped around in front and stepped up on the porch. The
screen door swung open noiselessly and I was in a hall that
was unlighted except for the illumination from the open door
at the right. I stepped through it and looked swiftly around.
There were only the three of them, and it was the craziest
room I had ever seen.
An interior decorator, locked in it for an hour, would
probably have gone foaming mad. Beyond the sofa was a
coke machine. On top of it was a stock saddle, lying on its
side. There was a jukebox against the outer wall, blushing in
pastel colors and supplying the dance music, and at the far
end of the room a bed made up with a patchwork quilt and
old-fashioned bolster. In the corner across from it was a
pinball machine. Directly opposite me was a small safe, and
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in the corner next to it an old roll-top desk covered with
papers. There was a telephone on the desk, and on the floor
beside it was a small electric fan. There were no rugs, and
nothing on the unpainted plank walls except perhaps a
dozen pinups torn from magazines.
The dancers sprang apart. T.J. was a lank six-footer with
an angular, sun-reddened face and pale eyes. It was a good
description Georgia had given. Trudy didn’t look any more
attractive than the first time I’d seen her. The black eyes
were hard, and the thin, dark face expressed a sort of wiseguy
contempt for everything. La Verne merely looked at me
as if she weren’t sure the situation was serious enough to
call for a change of expression.
T.J. said harshly. “Whata you want?”
“You, for one thing,” I said.
Trudy made a noise with her lips, and laughed. She had all
the charm of a strangulated hernia. “Take the bastard, TJ.”
He pulled his knife, clicked it open, and advanced on me in
a sort of prancing walk, feinting with the blade. I took the
sap from my pocket and hit him across the muscles of the
forearm. The knife fell to the floor. I kicked it under the sofa,
where La Verne had become carried away with the
excitement to the point of sitting up. Trudy shrilled
something obscene and tried to rush past me, towards the
desk. I tossed her back and she bounced against the jukebox
before she fell to the floor with a display of stringy legs. T.J.
was holding his arm. I sliced the sap across the other one,
caught him by the neck and the back of his pants and threw
him into the wall. Then I remembered the way that room
had looked and picked him up and bounced him against it
again.
The gun was in one of the top drawers of the desk. It was
a .45 automatic. I dropped it in my left coat pocket and
walked over towards La Verne.
“What’s your name?” I asked.
She drew up her big thighs and hugged them, with her
chin resting on her knees. It made her look completely
naked. She regarded me with what I took to be concern, but
might have been merely interest. “You ain’t goin’ to rape
me, are you?”
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“Not tonight,” I said. “Maybe I can work you in tomorrow
if I get a cancellation. So Pearl phoned you the good news?”
“Huh? Oh, sure, he told us about it.”
“Name?” I asked again.
“La Verne Talley,” she said. “I’m his second cousin.”
“What times does he usually get back from town?”
“Oh, not never before one or two o’clock.”
Trudy lashed out at her. “Shut up, you stupid punching
bag!”
“What’s her name?” I asked.
“Trudy Hewlett. She ain’t no kin.”
I turned and looked at Trudy. “Gertrude Hewlett. Gertrude
Haines. You people never learn, do you?”
She cursed me.
“And this one?” I continued, nodding to T.J. “What’s his
name, and his kin rank, and what does he do when he’s not
throwing acid?”
“T.J. Minor,” she replied. “He’s a first cousin. He gen’ly
sharecrops, but he had a little trouble up in Georgia and had
to leave. Me an’ him’s engaged. We’re goin’ to run the motel
for Pearl—”
Trudy tried to reach her, the tendons standing out in her
neck as she screamed, “You dim-witted cow, shut up!”
I shoved her back and faced the big girl again. “That’s a
lovely watch you’ve got there. Is it the one Pearl gave you?”
She held out her wrist and gazed at it fondly. “No, Frankie
give it to me. . . . Oh, it was before me an’ T.J. got engaged.”
“Pearl didn’t give you one?”
She shook her head at me as if I weren’t very bright.
“Pearl? He ain’t about to give no watch. He says what the
hell, it don’t cost you nothin’. He give Trudy one, but I
reckon that was for something else.”
“Yes,” I said. “I guess it was.”
I had to subdue the raging Trudy again. I pushed her
harder, and she sat on the floor beside the jukebox.
“All right, La Verne,” I said, “where do you sleep?
Upstairs?”
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“Umh-umh,” she replied. “But like I said, TJ.—” She broke
off and appraised me thoughtfully. “Hmmm.”
“No,” I said, “what I meant was you’d better go up to your
room and go to sleep. Things are going to get a little rough
around here, and you’ll be safer out of the way.”
Talk of The Town— 182
16
The jukebox had stopped its plaintive moaning. The room
was silent, and very hot under the naked lights. I could hear
La Verne going up the stairs to her room. Trudy sat staring
at me like some wild animal, while T.J. stirred and pushed
his shoulders against the wall, trying to sit up.
I went over to the desk, picked up the little fan, and
plugged it in. As I’d already known it would, it ran with a
rough whirring sound just like the one in the phone booth at
Ollie’s bar. Emery dust in the bearings, I thought. I
unplugged it and tossed it back on the floor.
“What time is it?” I asked Trudy. She spat at me.
I called Georgia and she hurried in. She looked anxiously
at me, and then at the others, and I saw the quick
recognition in her eyes as they came to T.J.
“I want you to meet some very charming people,” I said.
“That’s the acid artist, of course. And the hard, gem-like
flame is Trudy Hewlett. She’s the girl who phoned me how
to get out to that old barn.”
“I think I feel a little sick,” she whispered.
“Oh, don’t be hasty or intolerant,” I told her. “He gave her
a nice wrist-watch.”
“Bill, don’t—”
“You kill me,” Trudy said. “You really do. Squares!”
“Is there anything we can do?” Georgia asked.
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“Why not call the cops?” Trudy asked. “That’d be a shrewd
move.” She was beginning to regain some of her confidence
now. After all, squares never did anything to you, and when
they couldn’t call the police they were helpless.
“We’ve got a chance,” I said. “It’s still not much, but it’s
better than it was. You wait outside, and if a car turns in,
warn me and then get out of sight. I’m ready to use that
phone now, but we haven’t got much time left.”
She went out. I perched on the corner of the desk, took
Redfield’s gun from my pocket, and showed it to them.
“You’re just about to learn how it gets when squares are
pushed too far. If either of you makes a move, you’ll be gutshot
before you get off the floor.”
T.J. said nothing. Trudy made her lip noise again, but
stayed where she was. I looked up Calhoun’s home number,
breathed a prayer he’d be there, and dialed. The phone
rang, and then again. I’d just about given up hope when he
picked it up. “Calhoun.”
“This is Chatham—”
He interrupted. “Listen. I don’t know where you’re calling
from, and I don’t want to know. But if you’re not out of this
County yet, get out!”
“I didn’t do it. You know that.”
“I don’t think you did, but that’s not the point. Don’t you
know what’ll happen if they bring you in? He’s half out of his
mind. I’ve tried to get through to him; it’s impossible. I just
asked him to calm down a little and he almost hit me in the
face with a gun.”
“I can’t make it out of the State,” I said. “And that’s the
only thing that’d do any good.”
He sighed. “No. They’ve got everything blocked, and he’s
pretty sure you’re still here in the area. He’s called in the
Deputies from the other towns and they’re taking the whole
place apart.”
I know,” I interrupted. “But never mind. Have you had a
chance to get anything on that job I asked you about?”
“Sure. I called up there long distance, just in case you did
have something up your sleeve. The supermarket didn’t
have a burglar alarm. The one at the jewelry store was
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installed by an outfit called Electronic Enterprises, in
Orlando.”
I sighed. “And by a man named Strader.”
“God, are you sure?”
“Yes.”
“But hold it a minute. Sure, the alarm was gimmicked. But
there are plenty of pros would know how to do that.”
“There’s a lot more, but no time to go into it now,” I said.
“Give me anything else you’ve got on it.”
“Okay. They figure there were three of them, at least, and
maybe four. They hijacked the gasoline rig at a trucker stop
on the highway about ten miles from town. Police found the
driver the next morning in some bushes back of the place.
They’d started to tie him, apparently, and then discovered
they didn’t have to. They’d hit him too hard.
“This power sub-station was out in the edge of town where
the highway dropped down a little grade, on a curve.
Fenced, of course, like they all are, but it might as well have
had a silk scarf around it. They rolled the tanker right into it
and let it burn. Melted the transformers and poles and
switches like peanut brittle, had all the firemen and police in
the county there for three hours, and put out the lights in
the whole end of town where the supermarket and jewelry
store were. The gang must have had a good-sized truck of
their own, and dollies and hoists, because they just picked
up both the safes and walked off with ‘em. Burned them
open out in the country somewhere, I suppose.”
“Talley’s junk yard would have a big truck, wouldn’t it?
And heavy moving gear, and acetylene torches.”
“Sure. He’s got all that stuff.”
“How about the time and date?” I asked.
“Sub-station went just a little after midnight. November
eighth. It was almost daylight before anybody discovered the
robberies. Look, have you got any kind of proof at all?”
“No,” I said. “Not yet. But I’ve got some very interesting
people. And I’m going to have more if my luck holds.”
“Anything I can do?”
“Yes. If you will. Is Frankie Crossman married?”
”Yeah.”
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“Okay. You told him to go home after that fight, so he
should be there now. Get where you can watch his house.
He’s going to come out in a few minutes and drive off. After
he’s been gone a few minutes, knock on the door and ask for
him. Be as vague about it as you can so you won’t get in
trouble, but give his wife the impression Frankie’s wanted
for questioning in something very serious.”
“Got you.”
“Then drive out to Redfield’s house. I pulled his phone out
of the wall. He won’t be there, of course, but say you’ve
been trying to get hold of him at the office and he’s out. Give
her the message, just in case she sees him first. Say that I
called you. I wouldn’t say where I was, of course, but it was
a local call, so I’m still in the area and cut off, and I sounded
as if I’d gone crazy. I wanted you to call the F.B.I, because I
had some information in a Federal case of some kind, and
that as soon as they were here to protect me I’d come in and
surrender on the rape charge. Your opinion, of course, is
that it’s a lot of hogwash, but you think I might try again and
they can trace the call if they’ll set up a watch on your
phone. Or Redfield himself could call the nearest office of
the F.B.I, and make arrangements with them to have the call
traced if I try to get in touch with them direct.”
He whistled. “Son, I don’t know how this is going to come
out, but there’s one thing. They’ll sure as hell know you’ve
been here.”
I hope so.”
“If only there was some way I could stop Redfield!”
“You can’t. His office has jurisdiction. And he’s in charge.”
“Maybe if I did call the F.B.I—”
“I’ve got no proof. Not yet.”
“Well, good luck.”
“Thanks,” I said. “I’m going to need it.”
I hung up, and checked my watch. It was twenty past
midnight; we were going to have to work fast. T.J. and Trudy
were watching me uncertainly. I called Georgia. She hurried
in.
I think we’re in business,” I said. “But there’s no time to
talk now. See if there’s a sheet on that bed back there.”
Talk of The Town— 186
She brought it, and I began tearing it into strips. She
watched, mystified. I rolled T.J. over on the floor, and tied
his hands behind his back. The sheet was raw muslin, and
quite strong. He struggled weakly and cursed. I shoved cloth
in his mouth and made it fast with a strip tied in back of his
head. I tied Trudy’s hands, but didn’t bother to gag her. She
called me things I’d never heard before.
Hauling T.J. to his feet, I took the car keys from his
pocket, handed Georgia the sap, and jerked my head
towards Trudy. She was lying on the floor in front of the
jukebox. “If she tries to get up, slice her across the backs of
the legs just as hard as you can. Think you could do it?”
She nodded grimly. “I would love to. Believe me.”
I shoved T.J. out the door ahead of me, and took him
outside to his car. Pushing him inside on the rear seat, I tied
his legs together with some more of the sheet, and drove the
car down behind the barn where it would be out of sight.
When I went back, Trudy was still mouthing obscenities and
Georgia Langston was kneeling beside her with the
blackjack poised. I untied Trudy’s hands. Georgia looked at
me questioningly.
I grinned coldly. “Trudy’s our secretary. She’s a great
little girl on the telephone and she’s about to go to work for
us now.”
I hauled her to her feet, “You impress me,” she said. “You
really do. Scare me some more.”
“This may not be very pretty,” I said to Georgia. “You keep
an eye on the road.”
“All right,” she said quietly. “But don’t think it would
bother me.” She went out.
I took Trudy’s arm and led her over to the desk. “What a
pair of creeps,” she said, full of bright insolence.
I ignored her, looking up Frankie Crossman’s residence in
the phone book. Hoping he and his wife would be asleep, I
dialed it, and listened, holding my finger on the switch. It
went on ringing . . . four . . . five ... six. . . . Just after the
seventh ring, somebody picked it up. I pressed down at the
same instant, breaking the connection. I hung up.
“I’ll bet that was a real smart move,” Trudy said. “If I was
stupid enough to figure it out.”
Talk of The Town— 187
“You don’t have to,” I said. “You just do what I tell you. In
about two minutes, as soon as he gets back to bed, you’re
going to call him. I’ll tell you what to say.”
“Up yours,” she said.
I slapped her.
She staggered sideways and fell to one knee. When she
got up she tried to scratch me. I caught both her wrists in
my left hand and slapped her twice more, forehanded and
backhanded. I shoved and let her go. She fell backwards.
She looked up at me with the beginnings of doubt.
“You sumbitch, you’re crazy-”
“Get up, Trudy,” I said.
She climbed to her feet, watching me warily and trying to
back away. I said nothing, and merely slapped her again,
feeling a little sick at my stomach. She was about eighteen.
But it had to be done. This was the method they’d left us.
“You cut it out,” she said, sullen now instead of insolent.
“Your trouble, Trudy, is that you’ve been milking
complacent mopes all your life and never did run into a
desperate mope before. I haven’t got anything more to i
lose. Catch?”
I pulled the .38 from my pocket and cocked it.
“You wouldn’t.” She licked her lips nervously.
“We can use T.J. if you don’t want to do it. He’ll be easier
to convince, too.”
“Why?” she asked.
“Guess,” I said.
She cracked. All the brass melted at once and she began
to whimper. “What do you want me to do?”
“That’s better,” I said. I want you to call Frankie. If his
wife answers the phone, don’t say anything. I’ll ask for him
myself, because she might recognize your voice. As soon as
we get hold of him, you do the talking. Here’s what you say.”
I told her. “You got it?”
She nodded.
“All right,” I said grimly. “And remember. If you try to tip
him off, God help you. The State can’t kill me any deader
than Redfield.”
Talk of The Town— 188
I dialed the number and held the instrument so she could
speak into it and we could both hear. Crossman himself
answered.