Джеймс Кейн - Mignon

“ Was talking to the lieutenant. Am talking to you.”

“What business have you with me?”

“You’ll find out. Thanks, Lieutenant Ball.”

As Ball, kind of puzzled, gave me a wary wave, I led to the DEMOCRAT desk and took my seat behind it, but then saw that Burke hadn’t moved. “Of course,” I called, “IF YOU WANT THE NAVY TO HEAR—”

He’d heard me bellow before, and came in five quick steps, pulling up a chair so he could sit close. But I kicked it out from under him. I said: “Stand when talking to me.

“Talking to you? About what?”

“Couldn’t we say a slight case of murder?”

“Are you out of your mind? Whose?”

“Lieutenant Powell’s, perhaps — whose name you got on a pass, so she could cross the river; then used his specimen signature, to forge one on the receipt, the Navy’s receipt for your cotton, as you forged the informer notes last month down in New Orleans; and then you killed him so he couldn ’ t deny it in court! ”

“Cresap, I think you’re crazy.”

“I don’t, that’s the difference — and the question is, what do we do about it? I wasn’t here, I didn’t see it, I don’t have to turn you in — it all hinges on the other people involved, the ones named in your written agreements, as to whether they’re guilty too. If not, I can’t turn you in, but I can destroy your papers, to cut you out, and them out, of every dime of the hundred-twenty thousand you thought you’d make from this crime. If they are as guilty as you are, I’m turning you all three in — you, your partner, and her . I don’t care how pretty she is, or whether you love her or not, or whether anyone does, she ’ s going to swing! ” I let that soak in as he stood there licking his lips, then went on: “So that’s what we’re doing now — going into it, to see what’s what, and who gets his neck broke. Come on, we’re paying them a call — now .”

“ ’Twill suit me very well.”

“Then fine, let’s go.”

“But I’ve a suggestion, me boy — when we’ve explained the thing to Adolphe, and to Mignon Fournet, of course, why don’t we all go to my house — after all, me papers are there. ’Tis quite a decent place I took on Second Street in the block below the market, back of Adolphe’s store — we can make ourselves comfortable there, and I’ll prove to you once and for all how mistaken you are.”

“If they agree, your house sounds fine.”

“Then ’tis settled, and let’s be off!”

It was settled — a little too much. Because I’d worked myself out on a limb and was neatly sawing it off. To own the truth, I’d come without my gun, not supposing I’d need it. And how far I was going to get, walking down the street in the company of this man I was sure had killed the lieutenant, I didn’t like to think. With the stored-up venom I’d had, I had let myself go regardless, but now I had the cold sweaty feeling of someone about to fall. However, that venom saved me, as everyone there stopped talking and turned my way, and the clerk, the same stiff-necked one who had rented the houses out, got so concerned, as my vicious whispering kept on, that he strolled to the door, stepped out, and called: “Corporal of the Guard! Corporal of the Provost Guard!”

In a moment a soldier was there, not a corporal but a private, belted for duty with sidearms, who took things in with one look and came over to Burke and me. “What’s going on here?” he wanted to know. “What seems to be the trouble?”

“Nothing,” I said. “Just a nice, sociable brawl that’s nobody’s business but ours.” But then, thinking fast, I added: “But I feel my life in some danger, going home tonight, and if you’d ask your corporal, or whoever’s in command, to provide me with an escort, I’d feel myself obliged.”

“Where do you live, sir?”

“Schmidt store, block and a half down.”

“It’s on my post. I’ll take you there myself.”

“ And me,” said Burke. “Me life’s in danger too.”

That got a laugh, for some reason, and we got a laugh and a hand when the boy formed us up, Burke and me in front, he bringing up the rear, and we marched out the door. Even Ball was laughing, but for once that day I didn’t feel like a dolt.

We were quite a noisy parade, going down the street, the guard’s heels clopping, my stick clicking, my corduroys whining, and Burke’s jackboots whispering like a deck of cards being riffled. When we got to our corner I told Burke to rouse out Mr. Landry and Mrs. Fournet while I got some stuff I’d need, and then, after thanking the guard, I went through the little gate, up the stairs to the platform, and into my flat with my key. I was no sooner in than I scrambled fast to the bedroom, clawed into the bag, and after scattering all kinds of stuff — sandwiches, clothes, and gear — I got my hooks on the gun. I dropped it in my pocket, not bothering with the harness, then went down to the street again. The guard was still on the corner, looking up at the Landry flat, where Burke was on the platform, beating on the door, and calling loudly in French. Not a sound came from inside, and no light showed. “They don’t answer,” he said peevishly.

“I bet they don’t,” I said, “after you told them not to, in that trick language you speak with them. They’ll answer me, though.”

“Hey, you! ”

That was the guard, snapping it out as I started up, and stopping me in my tracks. He called Burke down, and gave us both a bawling out, ordering us “to your billets, or you’ll spend the night in the clink.” I told Burke: “You be at my place in the morning, with them, both of them, do you hear — at nine, sharp .” Then I watched him march off in the dark, thanked the guard once again, and went back up to my flat. I bolted the door, lit a half candle that was there in an iron stick, hung up my clothes in the armoire in the bedroom, put on my nightshirt, and went to bed. As I reached for the candle to blow it out, there grinning at me from the night table was one of the china heads. I said: “My friend, for once, the joke is not on me, and you haven’t seen anything yet. Just you wait till tomorrow, and you may really have something to laugh at.”

I had slept a long time, several hours from the way I felt, then awoke all of a sudden with a prickle up my back that told me I wasn’t alone. Whether I heard anything I don’t know, but I could have, as I was so well-slept-out the slightest sound would have reached me. I stared at the dark, wondering how anyone, short of a conjure trick, could have slid those bolts on the door to get in. Then I remembered the window, the one by the cistern, that I’d opened and forgotten about. From the wall, the tongue-and-groove partition between room and hall, came a sound — the faint, trembling rub that a hand would make feeling its way along from the rear of the flat. I groped for where I’d hung the gun in its harness on the bedpost. When I had it I lay there for a moment, but at the sound of another rub began to feel like a sitting duck. I slid out, grabbed one of the pillows and shoved it under the covers in such way that it made a bulge, then took the china head and pressed it down on the other pillow. Suddenly a man was there, sleeping. I crouched down with the gun by the side of the bed, out of sight, waiting.

The rub was repeated again, still closer to the door. Then the latch clicked and the hinge spoke. The door opened by inches and a dark shadow was there. I wanted to growl “Hands up,” but made myself bite it back, to give this shadow its chance to move farther into the room, so I could jump between it and the door and cut off any retreat. I had no doubt it was Burke; if I could hold him at gun’s point, then I could go ahead without turning him in yet or starting something I couldn’t stop. I could beat on the wall between flats, get Mignon and her father over, and have my showdown at once: find out who was guilty of what. If she had connived at that pass, letting Burke bespeak it for her as a preliminary to murdering Powell, I meant to turn them all in — her no less than the others. If that seems unduly mean, all I can say is that I could still smell her spit, and she’d done nothing the day before to make me forget its aroma. But if she hadn’t known of the pass, if she’d become an unwitting accessory, then I meant to stand pat until somebody brought me the papers. When I’d stuffed them into the stove and made her touch them off with a match, then I’d feel myself hunk and be able to take a new start — hie me back to New Orleans, begin again looking for twenty-five thousand dollars, perhaps take up with Marie, if she was still speaking to me.