Brett Halliday - Mike Shayne's Torrid Twelve

He offered her his handkerchief. She held it to her face and from behind its folds he thought he heard her murmur: “You could have been there to drive me. You could have cared where I went, what I did.”

At that instant he saw it lying on the ground. It was black and smoking, and it looked like a piece of charred bone. But he knew it was a part of him.

She saw it at the same time, must have recognized it the very instant he did, for they reached for it together. They struggled for it, but he fought the hardest, moved by a dreadful fear that he might lose a part of himself forever. Afterward, Tessie, too, went in the well.

Sometimes in the long days that followed it seemed to him that he was almost whole again. The newly found parts seemed to move deep into his being, to shift, to fill the void. But on this day, looking down into the well, he knew that he had been deceiving himself.

He was not complete, but quite unfinished, like a cake without an icing. One more, he thought —I must find the last one. The crowning, the finishing touch.

“Alfred!” His mother’s voice climbed over the hill, and echoed in the depths of the well, stirring perhaps the quiet ones at the bottom.

He went to her quickly, full of hope. She was standing on the porch, his mother — old and straight but without the power.

He came quietly. A car stood gleaming in the driveway. Someone was standing with his mother on the porch, talking to her. A familiar stranger — a woman small and rounded. Her hair shone like a copper cap and her face was pale and delicate. He wondered where he had seen her before, stopped at the side of the house to ponder.

Suddenly he heard his mother speak. “He’s much better. Much, much better.”

The other woman answered. Her voice was high, almost sharp, but there was restraint in it, too. “You were right then, even though I quarreled with you about it. I thought I could help him. I thought I was the only one who could help him.”

His mother said, “I didn’t really help. I don’t think anyone could. But Alfred himself and the peace, the solitude — yes, that was what did it. I must admit I was very worried for a while. He had some strange, almost terrifying obsessions. But they passed. Thank God, they passed.”

Footsteps came across the porch and he ducked back. “Where is he? Hadn’t you better call again?”

His mother raised her voice. “Alfred! Alfred!”

He made no reply, but he thought they must surely hear the wild beating of his heart.

“How are you feeling, my dear?” His mother’s voice was gentle.

The woman sighed. “All right. I’m tough, Mother Grunner.”

They waited again.

“Come in the house, Louise. He goes for long walks every morning, but he should be along any moment now.”

Louise. Yes, Louise. That was her name. He knew now.

She had paused and was speaking again. “You said he had strange obsessions. What were they?”

His mother hesitated. “I don’t know that they’re important. They’ve passed—”

The shrill voice sharpened. “What were they?”

His mother sighed. “The dolls. He wanted dolls. He gave them names, took them on walks, even talked to them. I didn’t know how to refuse him, so I brought them for him.”

“Are you sure he was just pretending? Is it possible that he thought of the dolls as—”

His mother made her voice crisp. “I didn’t think at all. I just gave them to him. He named them Angela, and Susan, and Lucille, I think, and — oh, yes, the last one was Tessie.”

The reply was whispered. “Angela. Susan. Lucille. Teresa. Those were names we considered.”

He shrank back against the clapboards.

“Don’t try to figure it out, Louise. Whatever their purpose, the dolls must have helped. He managed to lose them all — to forget them. And now he’s well.”

“I hope so,” the young woman said. “After all, it isn’t as though he were the only man who has ever had to live with tragedy. And he forgot,” her voice sank, “that I had to live with it, too.”

He saw it, the last missing piece, multicolored and beautiful. It blew around the house and he followed it. It fell at her feet.

“Louise,” he said and came forward. “Louise, my darling. I’m so glad to see you. You’ll never know how glad.”

She smiled with her scarlet mouth and her dark blue eyes made him think of the black water in a deep, cool well.

It’s a hot night. We got nothing to do, so we hang around the corner. But that’s nowhere.

Some more of the boys show on the scene. Nothing’s happening yet.

A squad car cruises slow around the corner. The flat-foots give us a bad look. We look back at them the same, and they go on their way.

I’m set to drift off when Elmo pops up with two other studs. Elmo’s President of the mob, the boss cat.

He’s not too big, but a rough stud when the chips is down. Mostly he don’t say too much, but his punch is deadly.

Stovepipe and Fandango is kind of new in the gang. Both on the punky side — I don’t like either. Stovepipe got a mouth bigger than his head. Fandango’s ain’t no smaller.

“What’s happening?” Elmo says to me.

“Nothing. The clock stopped.”

“I saw the P. D. car up the street.”

“Them cops is just taking the air, Elmo.”

We’re still talking when this boiler screeches up and stops on a dime. Out pops Cooch and walks toward us.

The car busts away. Cooch greets us. He got on a red china-collar shirt loud enough to blind you. This boy is always well-pressed. He’s our War Counselor, but things is quiet. We got nothing special on with no other cliques.

“Where you come from, Cooch?” Elmo asks.

“No place. Me and Digger was just riding around.”

“In whose car?”

“Damned if I know. Digger took a liking to it, so he borrowed it for the night.”

“You should have stayed with him.”

“Why?”

“Cause there’s no excitement here.”

“I already had mine driving with Digger. That’s a two-headed maniac for speed. He’s going to end up dead and wrapped around a lamp-post.”

That brings a laugh, but it’s the truth. The talk goes on about Digger. When that’s finished, we’re back where we started with nothing to do.

Everybody’s kind of quiet. I’m bored, so I say, “Who’s got any ideas for fun?”

“Let’s get some chicks and go down to the clubhouse,” Stovepipe suggests.

“Hell, there ain’t no chicks around. Behind that, it’s too hot to breathe in that funky old cellar,” I tell him.

“Best is on the roof,” Elmo says.

That’s it. Everybody’s for the idea, so we hit for Elmo’s house and go on up to the roof. It’s fine up there. Kind of dark and nice.

We lay around and light up. My lips is feeling dry. A cool drink is in order. “Elmo, you like beer?” I say.

“Hey, you got some stacked away?”

“Nay, but I know where some lonely bottles is to be had.”

“You want to haul and get them?”

“I’m kind of lazy tonight,” I say, and I nod to Stovepipe and Fandango. That’s the cue. Old Elmo picks it up.

“You two studs got a job,” he says to Stovepipe and Fandango.

They both pop on me, and I get on my feet ready to bust heads.

“You hear what the President says,” I tell them. “You’re elected. Don’t do what he says, and I’ll throw both of you headfirst off this damn roof.”

They ain’t talking now, cause they’re scared. They just look at me uneasy like.

“Okay,” Elmo says, “where’s the beer?”

“Back of Rivera’s grocery. I saw them bottles from the roof today.”