Francis Nevins - Night and Fear

I said, “I forgot to bring it down with me.”

He said, “Hello? Hello? Oh, I thought I heard us being cut off.”

The click that he heard had been me cracking my positive open. Did you ever get nauseated from smelling gunpowder? I hadn’t fired it in months, ages, that’s why it needed cleaning so bad. The smell came up like a breath of hell into my nostrils. One chamber was empty. I always kept it fully loaded.

“All right, Kelcey,” I said, “All right, Kelcey.” The receiver landed back in its forked support like a hundred-pound weight, dragging down my hand with it.

I got up and went over to the water-filter and drank a cupful of water. I needed it bad.

I opened the door and said, “Tell Jordan I’m ready for those truckmen now.” I went back and sat down behind my desk and picked up a report upside-down, as the men were brought in.

One of them was a big stocky guy, the other, his helper, was a little bit of a squirt. They were both half-scared, half-pleased at being the center of interest like this. Jordan came in with them, of course. The thought in my mind was: “I’ve got to get him out of here. If this is — what I’m afraid it’s going to be, I can’t take it in front of him.”

Jordan saw the reversed report, but he must have thought I was just using it as a screen to overawe them. He looked surprised, like he wondered why I should bother, with small potatoes like these guys.

The first couple of questions brought out that the shrimp had been down in the cellar of the house the whole time, it was the other guy who had been up by the control-lever of the truck. That gave me my out. I said, “Take this other guy out, I don’t need him,” and motioned Jordan to the door. Then, “Wait’ll I send for you.” He went out.

I said, “Did you hear anything like a shot?”

“No, boss.”

“What house was this you were unloading in front of?”

“Fifteen.”

Same side of the street, five houses down. “While you were there, did you see anyone come out of any of the houses to your left, toward Roanoke Boulevard? You know — in a hurry, running, excited, anything like that?”

“No sir, I was too busy tipping and adjusting my truck.”

I had no business being so glad. I loved that dirty mug standing there before me, for saying that. Fine captain of detectives. But they must have had some information for us, otherwise Jordan wouldn’t have brought them in. “Well, what did you see?”

“A girl comes hustling along the sidewalk. I didn’t see her come out of no house, but she did come from that direction...”

A girl. I thought: don’t let him say he got a good look at her.

“A cripple, like. You know, game-legged. Went down lower on one side than the other, every step she took...”

The heel. He didn’t know what caused the unevenness, attributed it to deformity.

“She was in a hurry, came hustling along, hobbling like that, and looking back behind her every minute...”

“Would you know her again if you saw her?” I asked, afraid to hear his answer. “Now answer me truthfully. Here, have a cigarette.” Stalling, fighting for a minute more of grace for myself. I passed him a package I kept on the desk for visitors. My hand shook so, in offering it, that I had to pivot my elbow on the desktop to steady it. My other hand was gripping the cloth of my trouser-leg tight, in a bunched-up knot.

“I couldn’t see her face,” he said. “It was dark, y’know, under them trees along there.”

The papers in front of me rippled a little, so I must have blown out my breath without knowing it.

“It was the way she was hustling along on that game leg attracted me attention, and the way she kep’ looking behind her. She didn’t see the truck until she nearly run into it; we were blocking the sidewalk, y’know. But imagine anyone not seeing a truck in front of ’em! I said, ‘Watch it, lady,’ so she cut across to the other side of the street.”

“Was she young or old?”

“Just a chicken. Not more than eighteen. I couldn’t see her face, but her shape was young, if y’know what I mean.”

I pulled the knife out of my heart, to make room for him to stick in a few more. “Could you gimme an idea of what she was wearing?”

“On her head one of them round skating-caps, like boys wear.” I could see it so well, back there on our hall-table, carelessly thrown down. “And then a leather coat, like a — whaddye-call them things, lumber-jacket, only fancier, for a girl.” I could feel the cool crispness of it against me again, like when she bent over me to kiss me...

“Damn,” I said, deep inside of me.

“Then a minute later” — his voice went on, somewhere outside my private hell — “a guy in a car came cruising along, slow and easy. I guess he was trying to pick her up or follow her home or something. He just stayed back behind her, though, about half a block behind her. Funny to be out on the make after a girl with a game leg. I guess that’s why she was in such a hurry and kep’ looking back...”

He was dead wrong about that, but I grabbed at it like a drowning man does a straw. It didn’t do me any good, but it eased him and his damnable testimony out of the picture — for the present anyway.

I said slowly, “I guess that lets her out. I guess that’s not what we’re after. She the only one you saw?”

“Only one.”

“Okay, that’ll be all.” But then as he moved toward the door, “Did you tell the guy that brought you in about this girl? What she was wearing, and all like that?” I felt lower than the boards on the floor.

“Not about what she was wearing, no, they didn’t ask me. I just told them about seeing her go by.”

“Well, keep what you just told me to yourself, you understand? Don’t talk about it to anyone, you understand?”

“Yes sir,” he said, feeling he’d gotten in wrong in some way.

“Now, see that you don’t forget that,” I added belligerently. “Gimme your name and address. All right, you can go now. And don’t forget what I told you.”

“Anything?” Jordan wanted to know when I sent for him again.

“No, false alarm. He saw some flapper trying to dodge a pick-up artist, that’s all it was.” I passed a hand limply across my brow. “I’m going home now. I feel rotten.”

“You look kind of worn out,” he admitted.

“Not so young as the rest of you guys. Check up on the neighbors first thing in the morning, find out what kind of a reputation he had, who his callers were. We can’t really get under way until I have a chance to question Mrs. Trinker, and hear what she can tell us. Holmes, give her movements a going-over, find out if she really was at Mapledale all day yesterday and today. G’night. Call me if anything pops between now and morning.”

I trudged wearily out into the street, calling myself a liar, a hypocrite, and a traitor.

I was shivering standing there in the pool of light waiting by the bus-stop. Just a man with his life and hopes all smashed. I let the one for my own street go by, I took the one behind it, that went past Starrett Avenue.

Jogging along on it, on the top deck in the dark. I kept thinking: I’ve got to shield her, got to cover her. It’s not the murder-rap, the trial. It’s the implication of her being mixed-up with him. Acquitted or guilty, either way she’s finished, she’ll never live it down. I m not going to let her be dragged through the sewer. I’d rather put a bullet through her with my own hand. I’ve got to protect. got to cover her.

And it wasn’t as easy to decide as it sounds. Do you think duty, loyalty to the men over you, the trust of the men under you, don’t mean anything after twenty years?

I staggered off the bus at Starrett Avenue and went back to the Trinker house. The cop was lurking there in the shadows under the trees, keeping an eye on it.