Charles Williams - Go Home, Stranger

At last, in desperation, he put through a call to Carstairs’ residence in San Francisco. “Dick,” he said, “this is Pete again.”

“Sure, Pete,” Carstairs replied. “Anything new?”

“A little,” Reno said. He told briefly what had happened to Mrs. Conway and added that he had finally read Mac’s reports. “The answer to this thing is down around that Bayou somewhere. But look. What I called about—I’m grabbing at straws. Mac found out something after he wrote that last report. He learned who the guy really was. And you gathered up his gear here at the hotel. There wasn’t anything in it that would give us a lead? No unfinished report? No notes of any kind?”

“No,” Carstairs said regretfully. “There wasn’t a thing, Pete.” Then he added, as an afterthought, “There was a letter that came the other day, forwarded out here by the hotel. But it didn’t have anything to do with Conway.”

Reno frowned. “A letter, you say? From where?”

“Oh, from some friend of Mac’s in the FBI. Came after he was killed, and the hotel sent it on out here with the rest of his things. But as I say, it wasn’t about Conway. Some other guy entirely.”

Reno was gripping the telephone with sudden tenseness and leaning forward. “Who?”he barked. “What was his name?”

“As I remember, it was some joker named Counsel. Yes, that was it. Robert Counsel.”

Reno exhaled slowly. “All right, Dick,” he said softly. “Read it to me. I don’t care if you have to walk down to your office in your bare feet and pajamas to get it, but read it to me. Slowly, so I can write it down.”

“It’s right here at home, in Mac’s gear. You think Counsel was—?”

“Dick, will you read that letter?”

It took several minutes, writing it down in longhand. When he had hung up he read it over again.

Dear Irish:

Always glad to hear from an old classmate. This is all I’ve been able to dig up since your phone call this afternoon, but I think it’ll answer your questions. I just happen to have a friend who’s a major over at the Pentagon, and he was able to get at the joker’s service record.

Robert Counsel was a rare one, from the looks of it. Inducted as a private in 1942, though he had the educational background for a commission if he’d wanted it. Refused OCS also, so guess he meant it. Made sergeant, and was busted back to private for insubordination. General snottiness, the major said, judging from the record. Served in North Africa, then in Italy, and was still in Italy after the war ended. Had points enough to go home, but didn’t seem to care whether he did or not. Court-martialed in 1946 for black-market operations with stolen Army supplies. Sent to military prison Stateside and was released in 1951. Dropped out of sight and nothing on him since. No criminal record or arrests for anything in civil life, as far as I can find in our records.

Odd thing about the case was the fact that they knew definitely that he’d got away with thousands of dollars worth of cigarettes and medical supplies, but never did find any of it or any money. He hadn’t sent any money out of Italy that they could discover and apparently hadn’t spent more than the usual GI quota in entertaining the local belles, nothing at all on liquor because he didn’t drink. He had lived in Italy before the war, however, and spoke the language fluently, so probably had good connections. Good crooked connections, that is.

Nor did they ever catch anybody else involved in the shenanigan. He probably wasn’t working alone, but they never did find the others, and he wouldn’t talk. The general impression seemed to be that he was bored with the trial, and considered the officers of the court his social inferiors. Snooty; or did I say that?

Any time I can help you with an easy one like that, just let me know.

As ever,

CHUCK

There was a postscript. Reno studied it for a long time and shook his head. It didn’t seem possible, but the more you learned about the mysterious Conway, the less you understood.

“P. S. They discovered he had a room in town. But when they searched it, all they found was a vacuum pump, the kind you use in physics or chemistry lab in college. When you figure out what he was doing with that, drop me a line, will you?”

Reno sat on the side of the bed and looked at the cigarette in his hands. I’m headed in the right direction, he thought, but I’ll be nuts before I get there. Mac was killed because he was looking for Conway. Mrs. Conway was almost killed, apparently for the same reason. And if you accepted all the evidence and agreed that Conway and Counsel were the same man, what did you have? You had a dilettante GI with overtones of larceny, and a vacuum pump, and a trailer hitch, and a boat that had disappeared. You also had his showing up back in Italy a year after he was released from military prison, and something he read in the Waynesport paper . . .

I’ve got to get some sleep, he thought. A few more hours of this and I’ll be running down the street foaming at the mouth.

* * *

The next morning he felt refreshed, with his mind clear again, and he knew what he had to do. He bought a secondhand car with out-of-state license plates and checked out of the hotel, giving San Francisco as a forwarding address. Then he bought some fishing tackle, picking it up in secondhand stores and pawnshops so it wouldn’t be glaringly new.

Then he went to see Vickie.

She came into the little room with the detective and sat down across from him at the table as she had done before. There were shadows under her eyes, and he knew how desperately she was fighting for composure. Strain, he thought bitterly; nobody could stand it forever.

“What’s new, Pete?” she asked, trying very hard to smile. She took a long puff on the cigarette he gave her.

He leaned forward and spoke rapidly, keeping his voice down. “Conway. He gets riper every time you look at him.” He told her about reading Mac’s reports, but omitted any mention of the murder attempt on Mrs. Conway. Vickie had enough on her mind without worrying about him.

“You think he might be the one who—”

“I don’t know,” he said grimly. “Not yet. But the whole deal is rotten, and I’m going to find out what it was. And the place to find out is Counsel Bayou. I’m going down there, but I’m not taking a brass band or wearing a sandwich board. I’ll keep in touch with you through Gage. So don’t let any of those damn reporters find out who I am or where I am, and don’t talk to anybody.”

“It’s dangerous, isn’t it?” she said. —He shook his head. “No. It’s just that I wouldn’t find out anything.”

“No,” she said, her voice going thin and tight. “You can’t lie to me, Pete. And I can’t let you do it. He’s already killed M-Mac.” She had been holding her face together with an intense and concentrated effort, but now it all gave way at once and she broke. She put her head down on her arms and her body shook with crying.

He waited helplessly until she had recovered. When she looked up at him at last with her eyes full of tears he patted her hand and said, “Don’t worry about me, Vick. I’ve hunted a lot in that kind of country, and I know the ground rules. You just hang on a little while longer, and we’ll have it made.”

* * *

“Counselor,” the sign said, its twisted tubes of red and blue glass blank and unlighted in the sun. A glaring shell driveway led off the road to the left to swing up before the wide veranda of what had obviously been a residence at one time, a large house with the columned stateliness of another era. An expanse of lawn was now a parking area, completely empty at this time of the afternoon.

Reno slowed, going past on the highway. This was where it was, he thought. He was pulled off here at the side of the road with the car and boat trailer, just looking at the place, when the girl went by and saw him. Maybe he was waiting for somebody, or maybe, if he really was Counsel, he was looking at the house he used to live in turned into a joint with two tons of neon out in front. He glanced around at the drowsy late-summer afternoon, the dark wall of moss-hung oaks on both sides of the highway beyond the inn, and the steel bridge up ahead shimmering in the sun, appraising the somnolent peacefulness of it. And, on the other hand, he reflected, maybe his name was just what he said it was and he was only running out on his wife like a thousand other men and I’ve got rocks in my head.