Уильям Макгиверн: The Darkest Hour

After a few minutes he turned and started slowly back to his house, to the black-shawled old women and the gloom that permeated every room. But it had to be faced.

The priest had gone, one of the women told him as he hung up his overcoat. He would be back tonight.

“That’s good,” Amato said. He looked at the woman until she bobbed her head at him and retreated toward the kitchen. Then, sighing heavily, he picked up the phone and gave the operator a number.

Connors sounded sleepy and irritable, but his manner changed instantly when he recognized Amato’s voice.

“I just turned in,” he said. “It was quite a long night.”

“I’m going to make a hero out of you,” Amato said, staring down the dark hallway to the kitchen. “You’re going to solve that old Donaldson killing all by yourself. You’ll have the evidence and you’ll make the pinch tonight. You’ll like being a hero, won’t you?”

Connors’ laugh was strained. “It’s a role I play pretty well. What’s the rest of it, Nick?”

“The guy you arrest don’t like it,” Amato said quietly. “He puts up a fight, breaks for it maybe. And you got to shoot him.”

“Nick, there’s been too much of it lately,” Connors said, his voice rising nervously. “A month from now would be—”

“Shut up! You’re going to be a hero or you’re going to be in jail.” Amato rubbed his forehead. He was jumping now, without time to think. It happened to the smartest guys. They jumped for safety and landed in trouble. But there wasn’t time to think.

“Sure, Nick,” Connors said hastily. “I’ll handle it, you know that. I only thought the timing was awkward.”

“The timing is right,” Amato said.

“Okay. Who is it?”

“Joe Lye,” Amato said, and put the receiver carefully back in place.

It was eight o’clock that night when Retnick rang the bell of his wife’s apartment. He had spent the day in his room trying fruitlessly to find a solution to his problem. It was a moral problem, he had decided irritably, one his Jesuit teachers would have had a field day examining. Take what you want and pay the price! That had made sense to him. But he was beginning to realize that it wasn’t as simple as that. If you couldn’t pay the price, then what? It wasn’t a clean exchange; you didn’t make the payment and put an end to it...

He heard her light footsteps. Then she opened the door and looked up at him uncertainly. She wore a white silk blouse with black slacks, and her hair was brushed smoothly back from her face. He noticed that she carried two freshly ironed blouses over her arm.

“You didn’t say when you were leaving,” he said. “I... I wanted to say good-by.”

“I’m taking a flight at ten,” she said. “I was just packing. I’m glad you could stop by.”

“You’re busy, I guess.”

“No, I’m practically through.”

Retnick entered the room and turned his hat around awkwardly in his hands. There were no easy words. Everything seemed to come out with an effort. “You go ahead and finish packing,” he said. “Take your time.”

“All right, I won’t be long.”

When the door closed behind her Retnick looked around at the familiar furniture and pictures. She hadn’t changed things. His big chair was in the same place, and his pipe rack was still on the table. She’d added a new picture or two, and a bookcase had been built in beside the fireplace. That was about all.

He sat down on a large ottoman without removing his overcoat and rubbed a hand across his forehead. Something was wrong with him, he knew.

When she opened the door he stood quickly.

“Please sit down,” she said. “Would you like a cup of coffee?”

“No, I’m fine.”

“How about a drink?”

“Never mind.”

She sat down on the sofa, tucking her feet beneath her, and lit a cigarette. For a moment or two they were silent, and then Retnick said heavily, “Do you have to go tonight? I mean is there any need to rush?”

“No, not particularly. But I’d like to get settled down a bit before I start work.”

“Sure,” he said pointlessly. She was a million miles from him, he realized, cool and distant, unmoved by his presence. There was no fear or anxiety in her eyes, no tentative appeal in her manner. She wasn’t unhappy in a positive way, she was simply impassive; he knew he didn’t touch her any more.

“I want to talk to you,” he said, turning and looking into the fireplace. “Will you listen a minute?”

“Of course, Steve.”

“Put off your trip,” he said. “Stay here until I finish the job I’ve got to do.”

“What would be the point of that?”

“I don’t know,” he said wearily. “Maybe there’s no point to it. But it might make things different. With me anyway. Maybe I could see things in a different light. That’s all I’m asking you to take a chance on.”

“It’s a pretty slim chance, I’m afraid.”

“Maybe it is. But it’s the only one I can offer you.”

“I’m sorry, Steve,” she said.

He looked at her then, jarred by the almost casual tone of her voice. “You won’t do it?” he said.

“There wouldn’t be any point to it,” she said, glancing up at him. “I might as well be honest, Steve. You — you’ve turned into something — well, it doesn’t matter. Maybe you were that kind of a man all the time. I don’t know.” She shrugged lightly. “You think I had a fine roistering time of it while you were away. But for the record they were five miserable years. I was scared most of the time. Scared because I couldn’t understand the cruel and stupid pride that made you refuse to let me help you. Did you stop to wonder what that did to me?” She shook her head as he started to speak. “It’s not worth arguing about. But I’d like to finish this, please. You told me to get a divorce, you refused to see me, and then you behaved like a madman because there was someone else while you were gone.” She smiled sadly. “And my big affair, my great sin! He sang at the club for a while. He was a gentle young man who drank too much and could have written a big book about loneliness. It lasted a month. And that was enough to convince me you were worth waiting for, even if it took fifty years instead of five. I regretted it, I made what amends I could, and I settled down to wait. That’s how I put in my five-year stretch, with an occasional dinner with the Ragonis, or a drink with Lieutenant Neville. I might as well have been in jail, too.”

If she was angry or bitter, Retnick thought, it would be different. But she seemed disinterested and slightly weary.

“You didn’t care about my pride or peace of mind,” she went on, studying him thoughtfully with her wide gray eyes. “That’s what I couldn’t understand. But now I believe you don’t care about anybody. You want to kill the men who framed you. And some day you will. You’ll be the final judge on that score. Just as you’re the final judge on my morals. You’re the final arbiter on all behavior, all questions of right and wrong. What you say goes! Well, it doesn’t go with me, Steve. I can think of nothing less pleasing than living with you and wondering what suspicions were cropping up in your mind and what action you were planning to take. You—”

“All right,” he said, rubbing a hand over his forehead. “I get the general idea.”

The phone in the bedroom began to ring and she turned away from him quickly.

“Just a minute,” he said. “This man, the singer.” He hesitated, frowning. “Did he love you?”

“Why do you ask that?”

“I don’t know. Never mind.”

She looked at him and he saw that her lips were trembling; his question had pierced her cool indifference. The phone rang again and she said, “Excuse me,” in a small, unsteady voice.