Маргарет Миллар - Vanish in an Instant

“Nothing.”

“He ain’t one of those insurance fellows?”

“How should I know?”

“Just think,” the woman said bitterly. “Just think, if your father’d stayed home tonight where he belongs . But no. Not him . He had to go and...”

“Oh, for heck’s sake, Mom, stop crabbing.”

The woman’s lips continued moving, but no one heard what she said because she’d closed the window again.

Meecham asked the boy, “Anyone hurt in the accident?”

“One of the women was riding up front and got her head bumped on the windshield. Nothing much.”

“Where are the people now?”

“They’re waiting for the car at my Dad’s place, about five hundred yards up the road. We got a garage and a hamburger stand.”

“Good. I’ll drop in.”

The boy resumed his shoveling and Meecham began walking back to the car.

The woman had opened the window of the truck again. “I bet it was one of those insurance fellows.”

“It don’t matter anyway.”

“It’s after eight. I missed Guest Star. Your father knows Wednesday’s the best night. And here I sit, in the middle of a snowstorm when I could be...”

The snow gradually covered her voice as it covers cat tracks.

The Hamburger stand was one large room built onto the front of an old brick farmhouse. It was equipped with three oilcloth-covered tables, a dozen chairs and a long wooden counter. At one end of the counter, facing the door, there was a small television set on a crude homemade shelf attached to the wall. A boxing match was on the screen showing two boxers, bodies close and heads together in a clinch. They looked as though they were sobbing on each other’s shoulders.

A waitress was languidly drying a pile of cups and saucers, her eyes glued to the screen.

Hearst sat at the counter alone. There was a sandwich and a cup of coffee in front of him, but he was too absorbed in the boxers to eat or drink. His face, like that of the waitress, had a curious stupor, as if they were both drugged by the motions on the screen. He didn’t turn his head, or even blink when the door opened and Meecham and Barkeley came in.

There was no sign of either Virginia or her mother.

“One of them’s getting all bloody,” the waitress said, apparently to Hearst though she didn’t look at him. “Why can’t we get something more cheerful, I’d like to know.”

“Leave it on,” Hearst said. “It’s not real anyway.”

Barkeley and Meecham sat down at the counter. The waitress didn’t notice, or pretended not to.

“It looks real,” she said.

“The whole thing’s phony, like wrestling. For blood they use ketchup.”

“Is that a fact?”

“Sure it is. I know one of the head guys at the biggest station in Detroit.”

“I bet.”

“Sure I do.”

“Well, I’d just as soon have blood running down my face as ketchup. I hate the smell of ketchup, reminds me of every joint I ever worked in.” She wheeled around suddenly and said to Meecham, “We don’t have menus, just what’s written on the mirror up there.”

Hearst turned at the same instant, and recognized Meecham.

“Hello, Hearst,” Meecham said.

Hearst’s expression of apathy didn’t change. He never did anything right and he never expected to do anything right, so his failures were no surprise to him. He cleared his throat. “I didn’t know anyone was looking for me. I...”

“Where’s Mrs. Hamilton?”

“In the washroom. The girl’s in there too. Washing up, I guess.” He looked at Barkeley as if he thought Barkeley was a policeman. “I didn’t hurt the car much. Maybe the headlights are bust, but it wasn’t my fault. I went into a skid.”

“You were born in a skid,” Meecham said, “and never got out of it.”

Ignoring the remark, Hearst continued to address Barkeley with earnest righteousness in the manner of a petty crook caught in a misdemeanor on his way to commit a felony. “I didn’t steal the car. She hired me to drive out to the Coast. I got the contract right here in my pocket. It’s all written down. What’s written down is legal, isn’t that right, Mr. Meecham?”

“Let’s see it.”

The “contract” was a piece of paper torn from a scratch pad. The signature was Mrs. Hamilton’s, but the rest of it had obviously been written by Hearst himself in an awkward hand, so heavy in places that the ink was blotched and the paper torn by the pen. “I, the undersigned, on this December thirteen, 1950, agree to hire Jameson Ralph Hearst as chauffer for my new Frazer and to retain his services for a period of two years at a salary of $150.00 per monthly plus full maintenance (room and board). Signed, Rachel Mills Hamilton.”

Hearst watched Meecham as he read it. “That’s legal, isn’t it? I made up the words myself but it’s legal.”

“You did a great job.” Meecham folded the paper and put it in his own pocket.

“Hey, give it back. That’s my contract. I need it. When I get to California...”

“You’re never getting to California.”

Hearst looked a little sick. “I am. Some day I am. Some day I’ll...”

“All right, some day,” Meecham said. All Hearst’s days were some days , he thought. There was no definite tomorrow or week after next, just a shady avenue of some days.

Virginia came out of the washroom followed by her mother. There was a bluish lump on the right side of Virginia’s forehead and the skin around her right eye was slightly darkened. Her hair was smooth, her face powdered and her lips freshly rouged. She looked as tidy and lifeless as a corpse primped for the funeral service. When she saw Barkeley she turned immediately, and brushing past her mother she went back into the washroom and closed the door.

Mrs. Hamilton continued walking toward the three men at the counter, unsteadily, and listing slightly, as if she’d just gotten off a boat and couldn’t adjust to the stability of land.

She wore a dark beaver coat that looked like one of Virginia’s coats; it reached to her ears at the top, and to her snowboots at the hemline. She was clasping the ill-fitting coat around her with both hands, as if its thick heavy fur was a new skin that held her body together.

She was smiling, but the smile, like the coat, seemed to belong to someone else.

“Well, Paul. I... didn’t expect to see you here.”

“I guess not,” Barkeley said.

“I hardly know what to — to say. I mean...”

“Are you all right?”

“C-certainly I’m all right. I’m just fine.”

“You don’t look it,” Barkeley said sharply. “I’m driving you home right away, all three of you.”

“Not me, you aren’t,” Hearst said.

“You, too.”

“No, sir. I got this far, I’m not going back. I told Emmy she’d never see me again. You think I’m going to walk in that door and let her think I’m a sap? No, sir. I’m staying here. I got a legal contract. ”

Mrs. Hamilton turned to him. “Mr. Hearst, please. You must realize that we can’t go on with our trip right now. Perhaps... perhaps later. Some other day.”

“I got this far. I don’t want to go back.” He wiped the sweat off his forehead with his coat sleeve. It left a damp dingy stain on the glossy blue serge. “I don’t want to walk in that front door and face her like I was a sap that couldn’t get along without her.”

“We all have to go back,” Mrs. Hamilton said gently, as if she was addressing an animal that couldn’t understand words, only the tone in which the words were spoken. “I’ll go and get Virginia.”

“No, I will,” Barkeley said. “You sit down and take it easy. Meecham, see that she drinks a glass of milk.”