Джеймс Чейз - The Way the Cookie Crumbles

‘You know something?’ he said, one evening when the two men were in Ticky’s apartment. It had been a Thursday, Algir remembered, Ticky’s night off. They had been drinking pretty steadily and by now, Ticky was very drunk. His face was flushed, his eyes glassy and sweat beads sparkled on his forehead. ‘I couldn’t imagine how I could hit back at these rich sons of bitches. To get even with them, I had to have as much money as they had... more money. I couldn’t see how I could ever get the money until I went to Mrs. Forrester’s place. What chance had I? I am a misshapen dwarf against a grinning, sneering community of rich bastards who treat me like a jester with their contempt and their stinking jokes. Then one night I went to this old cow’s place and it happened! Now, I’m no longer on my own. I can talk things over with this guy and he’s a lot smarter than I am. You’ve no idea how smart he is.’

Algir, slightly drunk, had stared at the dwarf.

‘What do you mean? Who’s this guy then?’

Edris looked sly. He puffed out his cheeks and fanned his heated face with his stumpy hand.

‘I don’t know who he is. I’ve never seen him, but I hear him. He’s right here,’ and Edris tapped his massive forehead. ‘He talks to me, Phil. It was he who dreamed up this plan. He told me what to do. He, not me.’

Algir didn’t like any of this. He thought Ticky was either crazy or else he was kidding. Either way, Algir didn’t like it.

‘Who’s this Mrs. Forrester?’

‘She’s a table-rapper. Every Thursday evening she holds a séance. Ten people turn up. They each give her a dollar. That’s all she has to live on. I went along one Thursday for the kicks. I hadn’t anything better to do. So I went along and paid my dollar.’ His face now had a dreamy expression. ‘The best and most profitable dollar I’ve ever spent.’

‘What happened then?’ Algir asked, helping himself to Ticky’s whisky.

‘We all sat around an enormous table with a dim red light in the centre. There was some hymn playing on a beat-up record player. We had our hands on the table, our fingers touching. The old girl went off into a trance and then people began asking questions. It was all pretty crummy. They wanted to know about their goddamn relations who were dead. The table moved once for ‘yes’ and twice for ‘no’. Strictly for the kids. If I hadn’t paid my dollar, I would have cleared off. Anyway, my turn came around, and I asked if I was going to make big money pretty soon. Everyone around the table seemed shocked. According to them, you didn’t ask questions like that. Even the goddamn table went into a sulk. It didn’t move. The old girl had some kind of a fit. She fell off her chair. People got up and crowded around her. I was fed up with the whole crummy thing. I went out into the hall to collect my hat. I was putting it on when I heard a man’s voice, as distinctly as I hear your voice, saying, ‘Ticky, you’re going to make big money, but you’ll have to be patient. It may take years, but you’ll get it.’ I was surprised because I couldn’t see anyone in the hall. There was no one in the hall. I thought I had imagined the voice, but when I got home, it started talking to me again, and this time I knew it was real.’ Ticky broke off and squinted at Algir. ‘You think I’m nuts, don’t you?’

‘I think you’re drunk,’ Algir said.

Since then, Ticky had never mentioned the voice again, but Algir was sure the dwarf imagined he still heard it. It worried Algir, but there was nothing he could do about it. A mosquito buzzing suddenly in Algir’s ear disturbed his thoughts. He was lifting his hand to swat the insect when he saw Norena. She was coming silently down the track, like a ghost, her big frightened eyes moving from right to left, from left to right.

Tense, Algir remained motionless, watching her, his suntanned hands turning into fists.

She must have felt she was no longer alone because she stopped abruptly, her hands going to her face. She stared down the track towards the pampas grass, catching her breath in a frightened sob.

Algir could see the panic rising in her face. She was about to turn and run back to the sea as he lifted himself up on his haunches and sprang out of the bush towards her. At the sight of him, she gave a wailing scream of terror. She tried to run, but he grabbed her arm, jerking her against him. He had imagined she would have been easy to handle. He had tremendous confidence in his immense strength, but he found he could scarcely hold her.

Desperate with terror, she kicked, clawed and bit. She didn’t scream anymore. They fought silently and horribly. He kept hitting her across her nose and mouth. Her face now was a mask of blood. She was weakening. Grinning savagely, his breath coming in laboured gasps, he shifted his right hand to her throat, his fingers sinking into her windpipe. As if she realized this was her end, she seemed to go mad. Jerking and twisting in violent convulsions, she nearly broke his hold, but he managed to hang on. He fell forward, bringing her down with him and now he was on top of her, flattening her and his left hand joined his right.

She was still struggling, but life was draining out of her. He increased the pressure on her throat. Her long legs began to thrash, then her heels drummed in the sand. It was her final, feeble effort. Then abruptly she went limp. Her eyes rolled back in the sightless stare of death.

Shuddering, Algir got to his feet. A trickle of blood ran down the side of his neck where she had clawed him. His heart was thumping so violently, he felt suffocated. Unsteadily, he moved away and sat down abruptly, his back against a tree. He remained still, his head in his hands for some minutes.

Well, it was done, he thought, fear like a cold coil inside him. If he had known it was going to be like that, he wouldn’t have done it. He wouldn’t have repeated those last awful moments for all the money in the world. He looked at his strap watch. The time was 08.40 hours. He was behind schedule. With an effort, he got to his feet and walked to where he had left the Buick. He stopped by the car, listening and looking down the dirt road. Only the sound of the sea and the plaintive cries of the gulls came to him. He reached into the glove compartment, took out half a bottle of whisky and gulped down a stiff drink. Then he unlocked the trunk of the car and leaving it half-open, he returned to where he had left the dead girl.

Without looking at her tortured face, he caught hold of her and slung her over his shoulder. She was heavy, and he staggered a little as he walked back to the car. He bundled her into the trunk and closed it. Then getting into the car, he reversed it up the dirt road until he came to the turnaround.

He pulled up, set the brake, got out of the car and opened the trunk. He took out an old Army trenching tool he had picked up in a Miami store. Then he got the girl over his shoulder and carrying the tool in his hand, he walked across the sand to the nearest high sand dune. He dropped her at the foot of the dune, then straightened to look along the miles of deserted beach. Satisfied he was alone, he knelt beside the girl’s body and began to undress her. This task sickened him, but it had to be done.

Ticky had said, ‘Get all her clothes. They’ll have the College laundry marks on them. We can’t take a chance.’

He had trouble getting her girdle off. He cursed softly, sweat blinding him, as he wrestled with it. Finally, he got it off. Now she was naked. Around her bruised, swollen throat she wore a gold cross on a thin gold chain. He couldn’t leave that on her. He hated touching it. He had been brought up as a Catholic and although nothing of his religion had stuck, the cross reminded him of the church he had gone to as a kid with its blaze of candles, the smell of incense and the throb of the organ.