Джеймс Чейз - Safer Dead [= Dead Ringer]

The cabin that housed the renting office stood in the middle of the lot. It was in darkness. I had Juan’s gun in my hand now. Looking back I saw the car park was alight from the following car’s headlamps.

I paused long enough to try the office door, but it was locked. There was no time to fool around. We had to get under cover. We had only seconds to do it in.

I heard someone running down the cinder path towards us. I bolted with Lydia across the grass towards a row of dark cabins. One of them had a ‘vacant’ sign hanging on the front door handle. I let go of Lydia’s hand, jumped up the two steps, took off the sign, stepped off the stoop, caught her hand again and pulled her around to the back of the cabin. I tossed the sign into the darkness.

‘We’ll get in here,’ I panted.

One of the back windows was unlatched. I got my fingers under the window frame and pushed the window up. Then I put one arm around Lydia’s waist, the other under her knees and swung her through the window. I climbed in after her, shut and latched the window.

‘They’ll find us here,’ she said. ‘They’ll trap us.’

‘Maybe they won’t,’ I said, crouching by the window while I looked into the darkness.

She came near me. I could hear her quick, light breathing. I didn’t see anyone. I didn’t hear anything.

‘Stay here while I see if there’s a telephone,’ I said.

I groped my way across the room, found a door, opened it and stepped into darkness. I scratched a match alight. Down a passage, on the left was a door. Flicking the match out, I turned the handle and moved into what appeared to be a sitting-room. Crossing to the window I looked out, keeping to one side.

Right in the middle of the neatly cut lawn I saw the dim outline of Borg. His wide shoulders and squat body were unmistakable. His back was turned to the cabin. The faint light of a cloud-covered moon reflected on the steel barrel of a gun he held in his hand.

I pulled the curtains across the windows, struck another match and spotted a telephone standing on a table near the window.

I went over to it, lifted the receiver and dialled emergency.

The operator sounded eager to be of service.

‘Give me the Welden police,’ I said.

I waited in the darkness, my shirt sticking to my back, my heart thumping while I listened to the clicking on the line.

A voice growled, ‘Welden police headquarters.’

‘Captain Creed there?’

‘No, he isn’t. Who’s calling?’

‘Give me Sergeant Scaife.’

‘Hold a moment.’

More clicking rapped against my ear, then Scaife’s voice said, ‘Scaife talking.’

‘This is Sladen. I’m in a motel at Glyne Beach. A couple of gunmen are looking for me and I want help. What can you do?’

‘I’ll fix it,’ he said briskly. ‘I’ve a prowl car in that district. It’ll be over to you in ten minutes.’

‘Hey! Make it faster than that. These guys mean business.’

‘I’ll fix it,’ he said and rung off.

I groped my way back to the other room. Lydia was standing against the wall by the window, looking out into the darkness.

‘The police are on their way,’ I told her. ‘They’ll be here any moment. Seen anyone out there?’

‘No.’

I could feel her trembling.

We waited, side by side, watching and listening. Suddenly her hand closed over my wrist. Her flesh felt cold.

‘Did you hear something?’ she whispered.

I listened, holding my breath.

Somewhere in the cabin a board creaked. In the silence it sounded loud and startling.

Lydia shivered, and her grip tightened.

‘Take it easy,’ I said, my lips close to her face. ‘Move as quietly as you can,’ and I led her across the room to the door. I stood her against the wall so that if the door opened she would be behind it.

Another board creaked outside, then I heard the door down the passage open.

‘They’re here,’ Lydia gasped.

‘Leave it to me,’ I said, not feeling anything like as confident as I sounded.

A soft scraping noise outside in the passage set my heart thumping. Then I heard the door handle creak as a hand closed over it. Stepping in front of Lydia, my finger on the trigger of the gun, I waited.

The door swung open, pinning us behind it. Lydia’s fingers were digging into my wrist. I hoped feverishly she wouldn’t panic and start to scream.

Through the crack between the door and the door jamb I caught sight of a squat, wide-shouldered shadow. For some moments Borg stood in the doorway, peering into the dark room, then he took two steps forward that brought him into the room.

I was tense and waiting. I heard him cross to the window. His next move must be to look behind the door, and then it would be a question of who would shoot the faster. I wasn’t going to wait for that moment. The advantage was too much on his side.

I pulled my wrist from Lydia’s grip, slid past her and out from behind the shelter of the door.

Borg had opened the window and was leaning forward to peer into the darkness.

With my heart in my mouth, I rushed him.

He was jerking back and turning as I reached him. I had the gun by its barrel and I struck at his head. He was badly placed, startled and off balance, but he did manage to shift his head enough to avoid absorbing most of the blow. The gun butt scraped down the side of his face, dazing him. His gun dropped out of his hand as he lurched into me, his great arms instinctively closing around mine. It was like being caught in the hug of a bear. I tried to shove him off, but I might just as well have shoved against the Empire State building. He was half a foot shorter than I was, and he used that advantage to drive the top of his head, that felt like a slab of concrete, under my jaw.

The impact was like being hit with a rock and I felt my knees buckle. He tried the same dodge again, but this time I managed to get my jaw out of the way. I hooked my heel around the back of his leg and heaved forward. He lost balance, and we went to the floor with a crash that nearly brought in the roof of the cabin.

It was my luck I fell on top of him. The jolt sent my gun out of my hand and away into the darkness. The fall broke his hold. I was scrambling to my feet when a fist whistled out of the darkness and caught me on my bicep. He could punch like a professional and the force of the blow sent me down.

Grunting he came at me. I swung up a foot, got it in the middle of his barrel of a chest, grabbed one of his arms and heaved. He went over me like a heaved sack of coal and crashed against the wall.

I got to my feet, grabbed up a chair and slammed it down on his head as he got up on hands and knees. He flattened out, heaved up again and caught me under the knees before I could hit him again.

I took a toss that beat most of the breath out of me, and he was on top of me by the time I got my head clear. I shoved my open hand into his face, holding him back, but I took a chopping blow on the side of my neck that turned me sick. I shoved him away and as he scrambled towards me again, I kicked him in the chest.

He rolled over on his back, but he could take any amount of that kind of stuff. He was getting to his feet as my hand closed around the leg of the bedside table. His head was outlined against the window, and it made a nice target. I hit him on the exact top of his head with the table which flew to pieces under the impact.

He flattened out and stayed out.

Panting, I bent over him, turned him on his back to make sure he wasn’t foxing. I felt as if I had been snarled up with a bulldozer. I looked across the room for Lydia, but I couldn’t see her.

‘Lydia!’

She didn’t answer.

I fumbled my way across to the electric light switch and turned the light on.