A. Fair - The Bigger They Come

I stared at him, letting my eyes get big and my jaw sag. ‘For God’s sake,’ I said. ‘Do you mean they tried to cash my check at the First National?’

‘Why not? That’s the bank it was given on.’

‘No it wasn’t,’ I said. ‘That check was issued on the Bank of Commerce.’

He showed me the check, marked with the telltale ‘NSF’ in red ink. I said, ‘Well, then, I drew the eighteen hundred out of the Bank of Commerce.’

‘Why all the talk about the Bank of Commerce?’

‘Because I have an account there.’

‘The hell you do.’

‘Yes.’

‘You don’t have anything to prove it.’

‘I was going to take a long night ride,’ I said. ‘I didn’t want to have my checkbooks on me. I put them in an envelope and addressed them to myself at General Delivery. You can go down there and find them if you don’t believe it.’

The officer and the deputy district attorney exchanged glances.

‘You mean this wasn’t a flimflam?’ the deputy district attorney asked.

‘Of course not. I will admit that I drew a sight draft on H. C. Helmingford. There isn’t any such man. I was going to beat it, into Los Angeles and take up that sight draft as H. C. Helmingford. But I didn’t defraud anyone with that sight draft. I simply put it in for collection.’

‘What the hell were you trying to do?’

‘Build up a banking credit,’ I said. ‘I wanted the bank to think I was important. There’s no law against that.’

‘But you gave the automobile company this check, and then drew out all of your balance except two hundred dollars.’

‘No I didn’t. That was on the other bank ― or I sure as hell thought it was.’

The deputy district attorney rang up the Bank of Commerce. ‘Has Peter B. Smith got an account there?’ he asked.

He held the phone and waited a minute. Then I heard the receiver make noise in his ear. He deliberated for a minute, and said, ‘I’ll call you back in a few minutes.’

He said, ‘Write your name.’

I wrote Peter B. Smith.

He said, ‘Write an order to the post office asking them to deliver to me any mail that’s addressed to you and held at General Delivery.’

I wrote the order.

‘Wait here,’ the deputy said.

I waited in the office for an hour. When they came back, the man who had sold me the car was with them. ‘Hello, Smith,’ he said.

‘Hello.’

‘You caused us a hell of a lot of trouble.’

‘You caused yourself a hell of a lot of trouble,’ I said. ‘My God, you might have known it was all a mistake. Why didn’t you get in touch with me? If I’d been a crook, you don’t think I’d have left two hundred dollars in the bank, do you? I’d have taken it all.’

‘Well, what were we supposed to think tinder the circumstances?’

‘How did I know what you were going to think?’

‘Look here,’ he said. ‘You want that car. It’s a good buy. We want the money for it.’

‘You,’ I told him, ‘are going to get slapped in the face with a suit for false arrest and defamation of character.’

‘Nuts,’ the deputy district attorney said. ‘You can’t pull that stuff, and you know it. Maybe you made a mistake, but it was your mistake, not theirs.’

‘Go ahead,’ I said. ‘Stick up for your taxpayers. I’ll import a lawyer. I’ll get someone to come in from Los Angeles.’

He laughed.

‘Well, from Phoenix,’ I said.

They exchanged glances.

‘Look here,’ the automobile man said. ‘This has been a mistake all around. It was your mistake. You drew your money out of the wrong bank, or gave us the check on the wrong bank. I don’t know which.’

‘I got mixed up,’ I admitted.

‘All right. You’ve had an unfortunate experience, and so have we. The governor wouldn’t issue extradition papers until we guaranteed to pay all expenses. That cost us money. Tell you what we’ll do, Smith. You give us a check for sixteen hundred and seventy-two dollars on the Bank of Commerce, and we’ll shake hands and forget it. What do you say?’

I said, ‘I’ll give you the check on the Bank of Commerce because I always pay my bills. I’m sorry that mistake was made. But you had no right jumping at hasty conclusions and running to the police. That’s going to cost you money.’

The deputy district attorney said, ‘You can’t get anywhere with the lawsuit, Smith. As a matter of fact, you’re technically guilty. If the automobile people wanted to, they could go ahead and prosecute you.’

‘Let them prosecute,’ I said. ‘Every day I’m in jail is going to cost them a lot of money.’

The sheriff entered the conversation. ‘Look here, boys. This has been a mistake. Now let’s get together and do the right thing.’

I said, ‘I wanted the car. I still want the car. I think it’s a good car. I’ll give him sixteen hundred and seventy-two dollars for it. I made a mistake and drew on the wrong account. That’s all.’

‘And you’ll let the rest of it go?’ the sheriff asked.

‘I didn’t say that.’

The deputy district attorney said to the automobile man, ‘Don’t do a damn thing until you get a written release from him.’

‘All right,’ I surrendered, ‘draw up the written release, and pass the cigars.’

The deputy district attorney typed out the release. I read it carefully. All charges against me were dropped. I agreed not to make any claims against the automobile people, and gave them a complete release of any cause of action I might have against them growing out of the arrest. I said to the deputy district attorney, ‘I want you and the sheriff to sign it.’

‘Why?’

‘Because,’ I said, ‘I don’t know much about the procedure here, and I don’t want to waive my rights and then have something else happen. This just says the automobile people withdraw their charges. How do I know but what you might have a grand jury file against me?’

‘Baloney,’ the deputy district attorney said.

‘All right, if it’s baloney go ahead and sign. If you don’t, I don’t.’

Everybody signed. I folded the agreement and put it in my pocket. The deputy district attorney gave me a blank check on the Bank of Commerce, and made it out for the price of the automobile. We all shook hands. The automobile man went back to his office. The deputy sheriff said, ‘God, it was hot coming across that desert!’

I got up and started pacing the floor, scowling.

The sheriff looked at me and said, ‘What’s the matter, Smith?’

I said, ‘I’ve got something on my mind.’

There was silence in the room. The two officers and the deputy district attorney were watching me with speculative eyes as I paced the floor.

‘What is it?’ the sheriff asked. ‘Maybe we can help you.’

‘I killed a man,’ I said.

You could have heard a pin drop.

The deputy district attorney broke the silence. ‘What was it you did, Smith?’ he asked.

‘Killed a man,’ I said, ‘and my name isn’t Smith. It’s Lam, Donald Lam.’

‘Say,’ the sheriff said, ‘you’re too full of tricks to suit me.’

‘It isn’t a trick,’ I said. ‘I came here to take the name of Smith and begin all over again. It wasn’t an alias. I just wanted to start life all over, but I guess you can’t do that not when you have a man’s soul on your conscience.’

‘Who did you kill?’ the sheriff asked.

‘A man by the name of Morgan Birks. You may have read about him. I killed the guy.’

I saw glances fly around the table the way a ball team snaps the ball around the infield in between plays. The sheriff said in a kindly tone, ‘Maybe it would make you feel better if you told us all about it, Lam. How did it happen?’