James Chase: Like a Hole in the Head

I heard Savanto catch his breath. He started to his feet, making hissing sound through his teeth.

“How could you do such a thing!” he screamed. His voice was shaking with rage. “Goddam you! That money could have started a school for my people! It could have fed thousands of them for weeks!”

“Then why didn’t you give it to them?” I said. “You gave it to me. You gave it to me because your stinking, rotten conscience troubles you. If your peasants had the guts they would treat your money as I treat it.”

As I started towards the arm of the crane, I saw a movement out of the darkness. I stopped, my hand dropping on the handle of the knife.

“You can go down by the elevator, soldier,” Raimundo said as he moved out of the shadows. “It’s quicker and easier.”

He came into the moonlight, then he opened the french windows that led into the penthouse apartment.

I turned to Savanto.

“Screw you… and screw your peasants,” I said.

Then I walked through the luxuriously furnished room, lit by the moon.

Raimundo moved ahead of me and led me into the lobby and to the elevator.

He thumbed the button and the door slid open.

We looked at each other.

“That was a mistake, soldier,” he said. “He won’t forgive that.”

“I’m even with him,” I said. “That hurt him more than a bullet.”

Raimundo looked sadly at me, then shrugged.

“Well, you did it. So long, soldier.”

I entered the elevator cage.

“Screw you too,” I said, and thumbed the button to close the doors.

I rode down the twenty floors. As I walked across the lobby I saw two men sitting on the stairs, smoking. They didn’t move and I didn’t give a damn about them. As I walked into the hot night air, rain began to fall.

Lightning lit up the sky and thunder crashed overhead. As

I began to walk towards where I had left my car, rain poured down. I kept walking. I was quickly soaked, with rain dripping down my face, by the time I reached the Volkswagen. I got in, started the engine and headed back home: an empty home that would be lonely without Lucy, but at least a home.

I rode down the twenty floors. As I started across the lobby to the street, I saw two men sitting on the stairs, smoking : little men in dark suits, straw hats with brown flat faces and eyes like black olives. They stared at me as if they wanted to remember me again. Savanto’s button men. Savanto… the saviour of peasants!

I didn’t give a damn about them.

As I walked out into the hot night, rain began to fall. Lightlning lit up the sky and thunder crashed overhead. I kept walking to where I had left the car. I was quickly soaked. With rain dripping down my face, I reached

the Volkswagen.

I got in, started the engine and turned on the wipers. For a long moment I stared into the darkness, thinking. I was glad I had done what I had done.

I had spat in the face of an animal.

Then I shoved the gear stick forward and headed back home: an empty home that would be lonely without Lucy, but at least a home.

Extract from: Paradise City Herald

STOP PRESS

Latest

L ate this evening, Detective Tom Lepski, Paradise City Police, found the dead body of Jay Benson lying on the verandah of Mr. Benson’s lonely bungalow at Western Bay.

Mr. Benson had been shot in the head.

"This is gang murder,” Chief of Police Frank Terrell stated. “Benson had been branded with the symbol of the Red Dragon, a known organisation dealing in drugs and vice."

Jay Benson, one-time top Army marksman, had recently bought the Nick Lewis School of Shooting.

The police are trying to find Mrs. Lucy Benson who is missing.

Detective Tom Lepski told our reporter: “Benson was a nice guy. I meet his wife; she was nice too."

The End