Ed Lacy - Enter Without Desire

Driving toward the tunnel, I threw the water can away, tried to keep my thoughts clear, my mind sharp... and all I could think about was those lousy fingerprints I might have left.

A motorcycle cop passed me and I nearly blacked out. But he didn't stop and at exactly 9:32 I came out of the tunnel and headed cross-town for the 59th Street Bridge. Stopping for a red light, I got out and shoved one of the bags with my clothes under the other paper bags of garbage in a corner wire basket.

Going up Second Avenue, I passed a garbage truck, asked if it was okay to throw in some junk and one of the men said sure and it was a relief to see the bag disappear under the metal scoop, as though the truck had digested it.

I was beginning to breathe easy once more, although the idea of fingerprints kept hammering at my brain. When I stopped for a light at the entrance to the bridge, a beefy traffic cop jerked his finger at me and I nearly screamed. He took a few steps toward me, said, “Hey, wash up them plates, next chance you get, bud.”

I said yes sir and drove on, and when I got across the bridge I took out a handkerchief and dampened it with my sweat and cleaned the license plates. When I hit the parkway, I put the gas pedal down. I went past Sandyhook, cut across to the ocean—stopped for a moment to throw the baling hook into the waves—then came back toward the house, avoiding the village. It seemed to me I didn't pass anyone. It was 11:00 and most people would be at work, or still in the house.

Taking the gun, I went into our place, walking softly. Everything was quiet, Elma was still asleep. I quickly stripped, hid the gun and the wallet in my studio, climbed into bed. To my surprise, I fell into a sound sleep at once, as if I'd suddenly let myself fall off into space.

I had a nightmare.

I was back in the store, only this time everything went wrong. I saw the entire scene through a sort of web, which seemed to glow with a red neon brilliance. Then Mac was laughing at me like an idiot, suddenly yanked out a gun and poured bullets into me. The slugs didn't seem to hurt. An electric alarm shrilled through the store and as I turned to run, I found myself in the arms of a giant cop, who held me fast while Mac ripped off the mole, the padded clothing, and kept roaring with laughter. Then he pointed to the neon web and I suddenly knew what that was—a huge fingerprint. The cop began beating me over the head with his billy...

I awoke with a start: sweating badly. Elma was moaning. When I asked how she felt she said, “Very nauseous.”

“Now take it easy. Want the doctor?”

She nodded.

It was one in the afternoon: my alibi was perfect. As I dressed I suggested maybe she was just hungry, but the very mention of food made her pale. I called the doc, helped Elma with the bedpan, then went over to see if Alice was around—she seemed to have a soothing effect on Elma.

She was standing in the doorway as I came up the path. I had the gun hidden behind my back. She stared at me curiously as I came up to her.

“Lousy mosquitoes kept biting me all night,” I said, scratching myself, keeping the gun out of sight. Her face broke into a smile, “Same trouble myself, Marsh. How's Elma?”

“Not so hot. Why don't you run over for a while?” She said sure and as soon as she went over to the house, I cleaned the Luger with an improvised ramrod and patch and lighter fluid, slipped it back in Tony's drawer.

The murder seemed like something that had happened ages ago. Even the fingerprints didn't worry me; somehow I was certain I had my right hand on the gun all the time.

Back in the house, Alice was giving Elma the latest village gossip. I tried to eat but vomited. A slug of whisky stayed down, warmed my guts.

The doctor spent a long time with Elma. Alice and I sat in the kitchen and Alice said, “I'm worried, she really looks sick today.”

“Damn, she starts throwing up... that will be it.”

“The chemistry of the body is certainly an odd thing. We...”

The doc came into the kitchen, his wrinkled face worried. He said, “I gave her an injection of vitamins. Can't understand what she's worrying about. Doesn't seem afraid of birth...”

“She's worse?”

“Hard to say. Jameson, you and your wife aren't fighting over anything, are you? Even a very minor incident can upset a woman in her condition. You really want the child, don't you?”

“You don't know how much I want it!” I said, and my voice damn near broke at the thought of how much I wanted Elma to have her baby.... I'd murdered for Elma and the baby!

“Well, nothing more I can do. She must have peace of mind. And you take it easy, too. Sound a little hysterical.”

Elma seemed to grow weaker, more listless as the day wore on. It was a muggy, dreary day, and she was uncomfortable. I washed her down, changed the linen several times to cool her off. Alice and I spent every second with her, playing her favorite records, reading to her, discussing Alice's book... but Elma just lay there as though she no longer cared to live.

When the New York evening papers came on the late train, I read each line, but there wasn't any mention of the killing. It would certainly be in the Newark papers, but I couldn't get them....

Then it hit me—the stupid irony of the whole mess! The crazy joker in the deck that was our life! There wasn't any way I could tell Elma Mac was dead, without exposing myself!

Suppose she worried herself into a miscarriage, even death, before she found out about Mac? I would have become a murderer for no reason, then! It was pretty awful, sitting beside Elma, watching her suffer, and not being able to tell her the reasons for her being sick no longer existed... the baby was all hers, all ours. Yet I had to sit and watch and keep still. The doc said not to give her any more dope that day and her soft, pitiful cries drove me crazy.

I tried to tell her, beg her, to get control of herself. But she would only sob, “You're right, Marsh. It's so unfair to you... my wonderful Marsh. I am trying... really I am, but... but...” and her voice would fall off to a sob again.

The doc called and said he would stop in before he went to bed, so I knew Elma must be real sick. Alice and Tony dropped in after supper, asked me if I'd eaten. I lied that I had. I was half high, what with nibbling at the bottle all day. I went out to buy another fifth and it was a hard shock to realize that I was paying for it with his money.

There wasn't much in his wallet—a driver's license, membership card in a local merchants' association, a Legion card, a memo to pay some bills by the tenth, a couple of blank checks. I went out to the homemade incinerator back of the house, where we burned most of the garbage, spilled a can of lighter fluid over the wallet, carefully burned it.

Alice and Tony left. Elma was staring at the ceiling, without seeing anything. I sat beside her bed like a mourner. A disk jockey was knocking himself out on the radio. It was nearly nine. I'd either have to chance telling Elma— and that would probably kill her—or drive into New York in the morning and get a copy of the Newark papers... if Elma survived the night. And that would look phony, I'd never bought the Newark papers before. But I sure had to do something —murder wasn't enough, it seemed.

I lit my pipe, asked if the smoke bothered her.

“No.”

“This is your favorite brand—real aromatic.**

“Is it? I don't smell it.”

“How about a game of gin?”

“No, dear.”

“Shall I read to you?”

“No.”

The record jockey read a commercial and as the nine o'clock news came on, I tuned in another station for more music. A brittle-voice commentator said, “Now for another crime-doesn't-pay bulletin taken from real life. Today, a Newark businessman, Maxwell Morse, was shot to death in a hold-up. The unknown gunman took a life for fifty dollars in cash and a handful of jewelry....”