Charles Williams: Go Home, Stranger

He coldly assayed their chances as he pulled his way around the end of the car. The man probably hadn’t seen them. The first stab of light had hit a little farther up the canal and had started sweeping toward them just as he went under. Could he make it to the bridge before he had to surface? He was around the car now, kicking along the bottom. But which way was the bridge? When he lost contact with the car all sense of direction was gone.

His lungs were beginning to sting again. Any second now he had to come up. Then he felt grass stems raking along his face, and the slimy stems of pads. If the light’s over here; he thought, we’re dead. He’ll see them moving. The bottom shelved upward against his shoulder, and he felt his face break out into the air. He was against one of the banks of the canal.

He opened his eyes, and through the tangled screen of grass about his face he could see the light. It was playing steadily on the upturned running gear of the car, and it was coming from this same side of the canal. The man was standing some fifteen yards away in the tall reeds along the bank.

Reno lay on his left side, completely submerged except for the upper part of his face, with Mrs. Conway in his arms in front of him. He wondered desperately if there was still any hope.

Moving with infinite caution, so as not to disturb the surface of the water, he slid a hand upward and touched the fingers against her throat. He could feel the pulse. It was pitifully weak and faltering, but her heart was beating. She was dying of oxygen starvation, but her life could still be saved. If only they could get out of the water! He stared at the light with an implacable hatred. He thought of Mac, and of Vickie, and of Mrs. Conway now, and wanted to stand up and charge straight into that beam of light and get his hands on the man who held it.

Yeah, straight into the meat-chopper, he thought coldly, getting hold of himself. That flashlight was being held along the underside of a rifle barrel, and He would be dead before he could sit up. He jerked his eyes a little, without moving his head. The light was moving now. It swept slowly along the opposite bank of the canal, searching every inch of the vegetation. It went beyond, out of range of his eyes as he held his face rigidly still. It would be probing the dark recesses under the bridge behind them. Then it would come back, along this side.

It was full on them. He was staring straight into the blinding intensity of it, not moving, not daring even to close his eyelids or breathe, his fingers still against the throat and the weakening pulse of the woman in his arm. It was all the staring eyes in the world suddenly concentrated into one, probing into him, literally burning him out of hiding. An age seemed to pass while he waited for the sound of the shot, knowing he would never hear it if it came. Then suddenly the light was gone.

It jerked around and the rifle cracked, all at once. It was the car that drew it. Reno watched,, fascinated. It was turning. The wheels swung up and over and the whole thing sank out of sight as it settled into the deeper water in the middle of the canal. Two or three big air bubbles came up and burst on the surface and a few drops of gasoline spread a sheen of expanding color. The light remained fixed for what seemed like an eternity as the man watched the surface. Reno heard him laugh softly.

Then he was going away. He was pushing through the reeds and cattails, swinging the light ahead of him. Reno waited, fighting down the yearning to go after him. There’ll be another time, he thought coldly. He made himself lie still. In another minute he heard the sound of the man’s stepping into a boat and the popping roar of an outboard motor. He was headed away from them.

Reno pushed himself up and rose unsteadily from the water, listening to the dying sound of the boat. This is one time, pal, he thought, when you should have checked your figures.

Five

He never did know how long he fought for her life there on the canal bank in the darkness. Water ran out of her clothes and mosquitoes buzzed about her face in ravenous swarms. He crouched astride her as she lay with her face slightly downhill and went on alternately pushing in against her ribs and letting them swell outward, hoping in an agony of suspense for some sign of life.

It might have been three minutes, or it might have been twenty, before he felt her quiver and heard a shuddering intake of breath as she caught the rhythm of it and her lungs began functioning again. She retched, and was sick.

In a moment she was able to sit up very weakly in his arms, and he picked her up and hurried back to the car. He put her in the front seat and climbed in behind the wheel. Their sodden clothing leaked onto the floor mat and the upholstery. He seesawed savagely back and forth across the road, turning around; then he was gunning the car in second gear to pick up speed back the way they had come. I don’t even know whether she’s been shot, he thought. But it wouldn’t do any good to waste time trying to find out. The thing to do was to get her to a doctor.

He found one, in a combined office and residence, as they were coming into the outskirts of the city. Lifting her out, he carried her across the lawn and punched imperiously at the bell. Shoving past the startled physician, who had been interrupted at dinner, he put her down on the table in the consultation room.

“Wreck,” he said shortly. “She went into a canal with her car.”

She was trying to sit up now. “I’m all right,” she said shakily. She was very pale, and the dark hair was plastered wetly about her face.

Reno gently shoved her back. “Take it easy,” he said. “You’ve had enough.” Then he looked down at the leaking ruin of his clothing and the cut on his arm, which was dripping onto the rug. “Which way’s the bathroom?”

The reaction began to catch up with him and he was weak and trembling. It had been too long now since he had slept, and he was going on nerve alone. He took off his clothes and wrung the water out of them into the bathtub, and wrapped a towel around the cut on his arm. In a few minutes the doctor knocked on the door and handed him a terry-cloth robe and a small glass of whisky.

“You can come out in a minute and I’ll fix that arm of yours,” he said. “You’re probably hurt worse than she is.”

“How is she?” Reno asked, feeling the sudden release from tension. There’d been no gunshot wound.

“A little weak. Some shock, of course. She had a bad blow on the head, but no concussion, apparently. She’ll be all right.”

“Is she able, to travel?”

“Possibly, but I wouldn’t advise it. Does she have to? Tonight?”

“Yeah,” Reno said laconically. “Tonight.”

He downed the whisky with a gulp and went out into the front hall to the telephone. He called the railroad station, found there was a westbound train in a little over two hours, and tried to reserve a bedroom. There was none available, but he managed to get a roomette. Then he dialed the hotel.

“Hello,” he said. “Mrs. Conway, in Room Twelve-o-six, has had an accident. Car went in the canal. And she has to catch a train in two hours. So listen. Make out her bill, send a boy up to get her luggage, and shoot him out here in a cab with it. Just a minute and I’ll give you the address.” He called in to the physician, and repeated it over the telephone. “And rush it, will you?”

He went back into the office. She was sitting up with a sheet wrapped around her. Her face was deathly white and he could see she had been crying. The doctor took three stitches in his arm and bandaged it, and after Reno had explained about the clothes coming from the hotel, he went back into the dining room to finish his dinner.

As soon as he was out the door she looked up and whispered shakily, “I’ll never be able to thank you.”