James Chase - I Would Rather Stay Poor

‘I can make soup. Want me to prove it? What have you got?’

She opened the refrigerator.

‘Beef bones, vegetables, cream and flour. Anything else you need?’

‘Do fine.’

‘Well, all right, then you make the soup. I’ll run up and change. I won’t be a minute.’

She tossed him an apron and then went out of the kitchen. He watched her go: his blue eyes taking in the shape of her body. When she had gone, he stood for a moment, his smile fixed, then he turned his attention to making the soup.

When she returned, wearing her black and scarlet dress, he was already well advanced with the soup. She collected the table-ware and went into the dining-room to set the table. By the time she had returned, he had prepared the vegetables and had set the pressure cooker on the stove. He took the kidneys from the refrigerator and was skinning them expertly.

‘Where did you learn to cook?’ she asked, moving to his side.

‘It sounds corny,’ he said, intent on what he was doing and not looking up, ‘but my mother taught me. She said if ever I fell in love with a girl who couldn’t cook, it would be a good idea for me to know how. It so happened I did just that thing. She couldn’t cook, so I did.’ He looked up suddenly, his blue eyes staring at her. ‘It didn’t save the marriage. I guess my mother was just kidding herself the way most mothers do.’

Kit lifted her hair off her shoulders with an unconscious, graceful movement.

‘So what happened?’

‘Oh, the usual thing: we begged to differ and we got a divorce.’

‘I suppose I was luckier. I didn’t have to get a divorce. My husband died. It’s a mess, isn’t it when people marry and then stop loving each other?’

‘Yes… it’s a mess.’ Calvin scooped up the chopped kidneys and put them in a saucepan. ‘Have you any brandy?’

‘Yes… it isn’t much good.’

‘It doesn’t matter. Let me have it. I’ll cook these in a brandy sauce. They’ll make the major’s single hair curl.’

She went to the store cupboard and took out a half-filed bottle of brandy.

He moved to the table towards the brandy and that brought him close to her. She didn’t move out of his way and it seemed to him the most natural thing in the world to reach for her. His thick fingers dug into the flesh of her back as he pulled her to him. She didn’t resist. His mouth came down on hers. They stood for a long moment, straining against each other, then she jerked away. They stood looking at each other: her eyes were dark with desire. As he reached for her again, she moved away, holding up her hand.

‘This isn’t exactly the way to get dinner, is it?’ she said unsteadily. ‘Are you doing the kidneys or am I?’

He drew in a long, deep breath, then he managed a crooked smile.

‘I’ll do them,’ he said and picked up the bottle of brandy. ‘You’re damned attractive, but you would know that for sure.’ He put a knob of butter in the saucepan and set the saucepan on the stove. ‘I’m surprised you’ve buried yourself in this dead hole. Just why did you do it?’

She rested her hips against the kitchen table and folded her arms across her breasts.

‘I made a mistake. The house was very cheap. I didn’t have much money…’ She shrugged her shoulders. ‘Money! Ever since I was a kid I’ve wanted money. I’ve been waiting and waiting for money now for over twenty years.’

He moved the kidneys around in the saucepan with a wooden spoon.

‘Yeah… that makes two of us. I want money, too,’ he said. ‘There are people who inherit money and then don’t know how to use it. There are people who even make money but still don’t know how to use it, but there are also people like you and me who don’t have it but would know how to use it. Tough, isn’t it?’

‘Then there are people who have the chance of getting a lot of money but are scared of taking risks,’ Kit said quietly. ‘There are people like myself who never have the chance, but wouldn’t be scared of any risk providing the money is big enough.’

Calvin looked sharply at her, his blue eves suddenly alert.

‘Risks? What kind of risks?’

‘Any kind of risk,’ she said and smiled. ‘For instance, if I were in your position as manager of a bank, I know I would be awfully tempted to steal all the money you must handle.’

He studied her, feeling a surge of excitement go through him.

‘You would be making a very serious mistake,’ he said. ‘To take money from a bank is easy enough if you are employed by the bank, but getting away with the money is another thing. That, let me tell you, is nearly impossible. What’s the good of stealing the money if you’re caught and can’t spend it?’

‘Yes… but if you happen to be clever and you think long enough about it, there must be some way that would be safe.’

He poured some of the brandy into the saucepan, then set fire to it. As the flames shot up, he turned off the gas.

‘We’re about ready,’ he said. ‘Will you serve the soup?’

It wasn’t until after nine o’clock when the old people and Alice were watching the television and while Kit was washing up that Calvin came into the kitchen again. He picked up a cloth and began to wipe the dishes.

‘You should have a washing-up machine,’ he said. ‘You need one here.’

‘There are lots of things I need,’ she returned without looking at him. ‘Most of all I need money.’

They worked in silence for several minutes, then she said, ‘That payroll… three hundred thousand dollars! What a sum of money to own!’

Plate in hand, tense, he stared at her.

‘What do you know about the payroll?’

‘Only what everyone else in Pittsville knows about it. It arrives every Thursday evening and is lodged in the bank, then it is taken to four factories on Friday morning and the lucky people get their money.’ She pulled the stopper out and let the water drain out of the sink. ‘Like a lot of people, every Thursday night, I dream of that money and imagine what my life would be like if it belonged to me.’

‘Have you ever imagined what it would be like to be locked up in a cell for fifteen years?’ Calvin asked quietly.

She took off her apron and hung it up.

‘Yes, I’ve even thought about that.’ She stretched, arching her breasts at him. She yawned. ‘I’m tired. Thank you for helping me. I’m off to bed… good night.’

He watched her leave, then he wandered into the empty lounge. He lit a cigarette, sat down and glanced through a magazine without seeing anything he was looking at. In the room down the passage came the sound of gunfire, then hard metallic voices. There was a gangster movie being shown on television; both Miss Pearson and Major Hardy were gangster movie addicts. He sat staring blankly at the magazine for twenty minutes or so, then getting to his feet, he went up the stairs and to his room.

No light showed under Kit’s door. He brushed his teeth, undressed and put on his pyjamas. Then he moved silently to the communicating door. He had no doubt that now the door would be unlocked.

He had thought she might be easy and his instinct had proved right. A woman didn’t surrender to a kiss as she had done unless she was ready to go the whole way.

With a heavily beating heart, his thick fingers closed around the door handle. He turned it gently and pushed. It came as a shock when the door didn’t yield. It was still locked.

He moved back, staring at the door. His blue eyes gleamed viciously, but only for a moment, then he shrugged and got into bed. He turned off the light.

He lay in the darkness, his mind busy.

So she wasn’t to be had all that easily, he said to himself. Well, never mind, all my life I have had to wait. What I don’t get today, I’ll get tomorrow.