James Chase - I Would Rather Stay Poor

‘We’re suppose to be getting married,’ he said and smiled at her. ‘Remember?’

‘I wouldn’t marry you if you were the last man left on earth! You are to go! I mean that! I won’t have you in my house!’

He thought for a moment, watching her, then he shrugged.

‘All right. I’ll leave at the end of the week. What are you going to tell Iris, the old people and Alice? Or would you rather I tell them that I have discovered you are an alcoholic and I now don’t fancy marrying you?’

She turned white and put down the glass of whisky.

‘You’re not to tell them that! It isn’t true!’ she said in a rasping voice.

‘Of course it is! You’re half drunk now. It’ll be interesting to see Alice’s face. She admires you. It’ll be interesting too to hear what the major and Miss Pearson have to say when they learn you are an uncontrolled boozer. But what should be amusing is to hear what Iris has to say.’ He leaned forward and suddenly snarled at her. ‘Get out of my sight. You sicken me!’

Kit turned and went into her room, closing the door and locking it.

When he heard the lock turn, his fleshy face became hideous. He looked like a savage, his face convulsed with rage. Suddenly he spat on the carpet and clenching his fists, he began to pound them on his knees.

He sat there for over an hour. When his rage finally wore itself out and his mind began to function again, he became like a trapped animal. He couldn’t see any way out of this impasse. His immediate reaction was to murder Kit, but he quickly realised killing her wouldn’t help him lay his hands on the payroll. Without her, his foolproof plan became impossible.

Exhausted by the murderous rage that had gripped him, unable to find a solution to the problem, he stripped off his clothes and got into bed. He lay in the darkness, his mind seething, trying to decide what to do.

Finally, around one o’clock in the morning he fell asleep. He had no idea how long he slept but he woke suddenly aware his heart was thumping. He hadn’t awakened like this since his combat days. Then he had developed an acute animal sense of self preservation that had served him well. There had been times when he had been sleeping in his fox-hole, his rifle gripped in his hands, and had come awake as he had now come awake, in time to spot a Jap crawling towards him out of the jungle.

The faint light of the moon came through the curtains. He could just make out the outlines of the armchair and the big closet facing him. Why had he woken like this? He was about to switch on the bedside light when he heard a sound that made him stiffen.

Someone was in the room!

By listening intently, he was able to hear rapid, uneven breathing.

He remained motionless. His eyes stared into the darkness. Then gradually he was able to make out a shadowy figure standing at the foot of his bed. His powerful muscles became tense, but he didn’t move.

As he continued to stare, the figure became recognisable. Kit, in her nightdress, was looking towards where he lay.

‘Dave…’

Calvin slowly lifted his head.

‘Dave… please…’

She moved around the bed and sat beside him. He lay motionless, trying to see her hands, trying to see if she had a weapon or not.

‘Dave…’

‘What is it?’

He could feel she was trembling and he could smell whisky on her breath.

‘I’ll go through with it,’ she said. ‘You’re right. I can’t face living here for the rest of my days. I’ve got to have money. I’ll do it with you, but please be kind to me… please be kind to me.’

He jerked back the blanket and sheet and caught hold of her, pulling her down beside him. Her whisky-laden breath fanned his face as she twined her arms around his thick muscular shoulders.

She was crying and very drunk.

‘I’ll do it. I’ll do whatever you say,’ she moaned, ‘but don’t tell them about me… please promise not to tell them. I can’t help it… I’m so ashamed of myself.’

His expression of contempt and disgust hidden by the darkness, Calvin forced his hands to caress her.

‘Well, that’s it,’ the sheriff said as the armoured truck drove off into the darkness. ‘You two are working late tonight, aren’t you?’

‘We’ll be here until seven,’ Calvin said.

‘You’ll be okay,’ the sheriff said. ‘If anyone knocks on the door, sound the alarm buzzer in your office. I’ll come over or I’ll send Ken. Don’t open the door when you are leaving before you turn the lights out. You know about that?’

‘Sure,’ Calvin said.

‘Then I guess I’ll be getting along.’ The sheriff tipped his hat to Alice who was standing by Calvin. ‘Good night, Miss Craig. Good night, Mr. Calvin.’

He walked away down the path, followed by Travers and Calvin shut and locked the bank doors.

He was aware that his big, fleshy hands were damp with sweat and his muscles ached with the fatigue of three almost sleepless nights.

‘Well, let’s get on with it,’ he said to Alice. ‘The sooner we start, the sooner we finish.’

‘Yes, Mr. Calvin.’

He watched her walk to her stool and hoist herself onto it. The lights from her shaded desk lamp reflected on her glasses. He stood for a long moment staring at her, realising that in less than half an hour, she would be dead and he would be responsible. He took out his handkerchief, wiped his hands, then went into his office and closed the door.

He sat down and with unsteady hands, he lit a cigarette.

The past three days had taken a toll of him. He was still not sure if Kit could be relied on. Each night after he had returned from the bank, he had found her drunk. She had been in a weepy, sexually excited state that had nauseated him, but it was essential to keep her in this mood and he had played along with her: hating her, but realising if she was to play her part, he had to jolly her along somehow.

As he sat smoking, he began to talk silently to himself.

‘This woman is neurotic and dangerous, I’ve got to use her, but once I have the money, what am I going to do about her? I have to have her now to impersonate Alice. I still have to have her to provide a reasonable excuse as to why we are both leaving town and more important still, why I am resigning from the bank. Without the money from the sale of the house, the Federal agents will wonder how I could afford to resign. Now wait a minute… let me think about this. Do I really need her for that? Suppose, after she has impersonated Alice, I get rid of her? Suppose someone offered me a good job, and as I’m getting nowhere in the bank, I decide to make a change. That would be an acceptable reason for resigning, but what if they check? I can’t risk a bluff… someone will have to offer me a good job… but who?’

He sat for some minutes, his mind busy.

‘Marvin Godwin… he owes me plenty. I was going to use him anyway in the original plan. His gambling joint at Las Vegas is a perfect cover for me to appear to make money. He’d fix it, but he would guess something was up… that doesn’t matter. If the Federal agents keep track of me… and they might… I could prove through Godwin that I had won a lot of money. As soon as they lost interest in me, I could leave Las Vegas and drop out of sight. Working in this way, I won’t need Kit once she has impersonated Alice. From the start of this thing, I had an idea I would have two murders on my hands. It could be the safest and easiest way out — to get rid of her. It wouldn’t be all that difficult. She takes a bath every night. I have only to go into the bathroom while she is in there and hit her over the head and then drown her. I would fix it I would be working on my car while she was taking her bath. I could slip upstairs without anyone seeing me, kill her and then return to the garage. She would be found by Flo in the morning. They’d think she was drunk, hit her head on the taps and then drowned. With her out of the way, I would have all the money and my freedom.’