Nothing In Her Way by Charles Williams(9)

Nothing in Her Way — 181
Pain was still pounding at my skull, but my mind was
clearing a little so I could think. We had to keep our
heads. If we let the sounds on the other side of the door
push us over the edge and started going wild, we’d all
be dead. She would break after a while and tell them
where the money was, but maybe Brock wasn’t
interested primarily in the money alone. You could see
he got his fun in other ways.
I moved shakily to the window and looked out. It was
totally dark now, and fog pressed in on the building like
saturated gauze. Nine floors down the street lamp was
faintly visible, while below and to the left the neon sign
over the cocktail lounge was a diffused and watery
splash of orange. I reached for the light switch and cut
it and looked again. Beyond me to the left one of the
big casement windows in the living room was partly
open. The drapes were drawn but a little light escaped
to seep futilely into the fog and lose itself. I strained my
eyes downward and could just faintly see what I was
looking for, a narrow ledge perhaps five inches wide
running across the front of the building just below the
windows.

Nothing In Her Way by Charles Williams(8)

“Nice try,” he said, with something like approval in
the sharp gray eyes. “But to get on—I’ll be as brief as
possible. To put it in four words, Reichert, the jig is up.
My uncle, as you’ve probably already guessed, is a Mr.
Howard C. Goodwin, of Wyecross. It might interest you
to know that he suffered a nervous breakdown as a
result of that expensive bit of hocus-pocus you and your
friends sold him. Incidentally, it was a brilliant piece of
work, and I believe you’d have got away with it entirely
except for the thing that so often happens when a
number of persons—some of them with police records—
are involved. Around three weeks ago Mr. Wolford
Charles fell afoul of the police in Florida on an old
charge, and in the course of the investigation he let
drop a few revelations concerning this particular bit of
moonshine.”
I couldn’t say anything. I couldn’t even move. I
wanted to get up and run, but my legs wouldn’t work.
Charlie had been caught, and because she had beaten
him and the double cross and taken all the money, he’d
spilled it to get revenge. All I could do was sit there and
listen while this remorselessly efficient machine
dictated the bill of indictment.

Nothing In Her Way by Charles Williams(7)

Nothing in Her Way — 125
Fourteen
We didn’t get up until late, and around noon she went
out. She was enchanting in a whole new spring outfit,
smart and very lovely from nylons to short-veiled hat,
and when she came to kiss me she left a hint of
fragrance that lingered in the apartment after she was
gone.
“I’m off to betray you, darling,” she said.
I prowled irritably around the apartment. Was he
going for it, or was he just going for her? She was
convinced he was rising to the bait, but just how sure
were we as to what he considered the bait? Maybe, as
far as he was concerned, she was it. Lachlan had money
already. He didn’t chase girls to get money; he used
money to chase girls. And what if Bolton had tipped him
off, as he’d threatened, and he was laughing about the
whole thing, playing along with us while the police

Nothing In Her Way by Charles Williams(6)

I could see that routine was out. As she’d said, they’d
known they were sold as soon as they took a look at the
car. I had to try something else.
“Cathy?” I asked in surprise. “How would I know?”
“Oh, I see. She’s not with you?” he murmured
politely.
“No,” I said. “I went off and left her in El Paso. She’s
lucky I didn’t strangle her. Leaving me there in
Wyecross to get away the best way I could.”
“Two down,” he said boredly. “Now, if you’re sure
you’re finished with that one, we’ll get on with it. You
left Reno together just a week ago, if that’s any help to
you, so where is she?”
He had me. He knew all the answers. I lit a cigarette
to stall for time. “You don’t think I’m going to tell you,
do you?”
“I don’t know for sure, but I think so. As a matter of
fact, you probably won’t have to. If you’ll just tell her
you saw me and give her a message, she’ll probably call
me.”
“She won’t,” I said. “But let’s have the message.”
“Tell her if I don’t get my share of that money, I’m
going to call Lachlan.”
He had us. He had us right over the barrel. One word
to Lachlan and the whole thing would blow up and drift
away in a cloud of smoke before it even got started. I
sat there looking at the wreckage of all our plans with a
sort of numb helplessness, and it was a long minute
before the full implication of it hit me.

Nothing In Her Way by Charles Williams(5)

“It wasn’t too hard to guess what they were up to,”
she said. “When I came back from Houston I had an
idea they were speeding things up a little. I called the
hotel at Ludley Friday morning, and then called
Houston. And when Charlie wasn’t at either place I
knew our laughing boys had their shoes in their hands
and were headed for the door. I tried to call you, but
you were out. It was too late by then to pick you up, of
course, but with luck I might get them before they
could get away from El Paso. Of course, I could have
just gone to them and demanded our share, but since
Nothing in Her Way — 83
they wanted to play winner-take-all—” She smiled
coldly. “Well, they asked for it,” I said.
She turned to face me. “It’s history now, Mike. We’ve
got other things to think about.”
She was always one jump ahead of me. “Such as?” I
asked.
“Lachlan. The big one.”
“Oh,” I said. “But not right now.”
“Why?”
“Right at the moment I’m too happy to hate even
Lachlan. Wait here a minute.” I got out of the car. In
the bar that’s never more than two doors from

Nothing In Her Way by Charles Williams(4)

Mrs. Goodwin called me the next morning around
seven-thirty. Would I come over and just talk to
Goodwin? He’d been up all night, waiting for a call from
Nothing in Her Way — 63
Caffery, and there hadn’t been any. Maybe I could help
her calm him down before he collapsed.
I went over in a hurry, knowing Charlie’d be there at
eight. Goodwin was on the telephone again, haggard
and hollow-eyed. He had the hotel at Ludley, but
Caffery had checked out. He put the phone back in its
cradle, let out a long, hopeless sigh, and put his head
down in his hands. He was whipped.
I was looking out the window when the mudspattered
car drove up in front of the house. I saw
Charlie get out, and put my hand on Goodwin’s
shoulder. “Say, is this your man?” I nodded toward the
street.
He came alive as if I’d prodded him with a highvoltage
cable. “Hell, yes,” he said excitedly, springing
up. “But you’ll have to get out of sight. We don’t want
to make him any more suspicious than he is now. I’ll
tell you. Go up there at the head of the stairs.”
I made it just as the doorbell rang. By peeking around
the corner of the landing, I could see them. Charlie was
wearing khaki pants and boots and a leather jacket
with mud on it, and he looked as if he hadn’t shaved for
three days or slept a week. His eyes were red, and
there were lines of weariness around his mouth.
Charlie was a perfectionist.

Nothing In Her Way by Charles Williams(3)

I set him down at the end of one of the work cars. We
were in shadow now, and I looked around again to be
sure no one had seen me. The moonlit plain was empty
except for Donnelly’s car. As I bent down to roll him
under the coupling between two cars he groaned and
tried to sit up.
“What the hell?” he mumbled. Then he looked up.
“Hey, you—”
“Remember me?” I asked, and swung. He didn’t see
the hand.
I massaged my hand and felt it for broken bones, then
got down and rolled him between the rails. I crawled
over the coupling and dragged him out on the other
side. We were between the trains now, in deep shadow.
Remembering the brakie, I squatted down on the
ballast and looked for the lantern. It was far up near
the front end.
I left him lying there and moved along the cars,
looking for an empty. The third boxcar had a door open.
I walked back and got him, letting his feet drag. The
floor of the car was chest high, and I was getting tired
now. I finally got him high enough and rolled him in. I
took a long breath and leaned against the door for a
moment, completely winded.

Nothing In Her Way by Charles Williams(2)

Lachlan was the junior member of the firm, both in
years and in seniority. He had been in residence on that
job in Central America, in charge, with a second in
command by the name of Goodwin. Of course, Dunbar
and my father had been there a dozen times or more,
but you can’t see everything, especially when you trust
the man who’s doing the job. And when the dam folded
up like water-soaked cardboard, they flew in in a
chartered plane. Police were waiting for them at the
airport.
Lachlan hadn’t sold any of the reinforcing steel. That
would have been too easy to spot. But with Goodwin in
charge of the concrete work, government inspectors for
sale, and native labor who didn’t know a mix

Nothing In Her Way by Charles Williams(1)

One
He looked as if he'd got lost from a conducted tour of
something.
I didn’t pay much attention to him when he came in,
except in the general way you notice there’s somebody
standing next to you in a bar. Unless it develops he’s
dead, or he has fingers growing on his ears, or he tips
your drink over, you probably never see him. He did it
that way, in a manner of speaking. I tipped his drink
over.
I wasn’t in any mood for an opening bid about the
weather. The track had gone from sloppy to heavy
during the afternoon and outside the rain was still
crying into the neon glow of Royal Street. It’d be soup
tomorrow, and unless you tabbed something going to
the post with an outboard motor you’d do just as well
sticking a pin in the program or betting horses with
pretty names. I’d dropped two hundred in the eighth
race when Berber Prince, a beautiful overlay at four to
one, just failed to last by a nose. I was feeling low.
It was one of those dim places, with a black mirror
behind the bar, and while it was doing a good business,
I hadn’t known it was that crowded. I’d just put my
drink down and was reaching for a cigarette when I felt
my elbow bump gently against something, and then I
heard the glass break as it went over the bar. I looked
Nothing in Her Way — 2