She broke in on him, her voice shrill and rasping. “You’re lying. You’re going to make me go back to him. You’re going to use me to catch him.”
Packer gave her a look as though she ought to be ashamed of herself. “Now, Mrs. Guthrie, you know that’s out of the question.”
But she wasn’t ashamed, not at all.
“Then why are you making me stay here?” she screamed at him, and Vern put his hand on her shoulder and told her to quiet down.
Packer said, “A woman’s life may depend on your being available at a moment’s notice. You will not be exposed to any danger, but you are the vital element in this case and we may need your help desperately. I’m sure you won’t hesitate to give it.”
Vern’s hand tightened on her shoulder and Vern said, “Of course she’ll do anything she can. She’s badly upset, that’s all, and didn’t think what she was saying.”
“That’s good,” said Packer. “She could be held as a material witness, but we wouldn’t want to have to do that.”
He had gone away then and she had cried out at Vern, “Why did you do that? Why didn’t you make them understand that I have to go away?”
“Because,” he said in a funny quiet voice she had never heard him use before, “I know when you think it over you won’t want to go.” And the look on his face was so dark and hard that she didn’t dare say anything more and went back up to bed when he told her to.
But she couldn’t sleep. She wouldn’t ever be able to sleep as long as she was here in Woodley with Al looking for her, waiting every second for him to break in and get her. And that man Packer, he’d be back and make her do something terrible.
I can’t stand it, she thought. I can’t stand it!
She jumped up and tore off the flowered robe and began to dress in great haste.
A few minutes later somebody knocked on the door and she gave a cry of fright. But it was only Vern.
“I thought I heard you moving around,” he said.
He came in and shut the door. She was sitting in front of the old-fashioned dressing table and yanking a comb through her tangled hair, not caring how it pulled.
“So you’re still determined to go,” he said.
She began to cry, with her fists doubled up on the marble top of the dressing table. “I don’t understand you, Vern, I just don’t. I thought you loved me.”
“I do, Lorene.”
“Then why do you want Al to kill me?”
He sighed and put his hands on her shoulders, looking at her in the mirror. “Don’t you trust me at all?”
She knew she ought to say yes, but she could only whisper, “I’ve got to get away from here.”
He shook his head. “You heard what Chief Packer said and you know it’s true. You can’t run away.”
“They want me to go back to him,” she said. “It isn’t fair.”
“Oh, for God’s sake,” he said impatiently. “You’re not a child any longer. Stop acting like one.”
He let go of her and moved around her so that she had to turn to face him. He had that dark solid look again.
“You’ve been sitting here letting your imagination run away with you. Nobody’s going to hurt you and nobody’s going to make you do anything dangerous. But you’ve got to stay and do whatever is needed. Stop thinking about yourself for a minute and think about that poor woman Guthrie’s got hold of. She’s the one that’s in trouble.”
Again she did not quite dare to dispute him. Something in his face and his eyes frightened her, in a different way from Al. She wasn’t afraid at all that he would hit her, but some instinct warned her that there was a kind of strength in him better not aroused.
So she hung her head and said, “All right, Vern.”
He smiled. “That’s my girl.” He went to the night stand and shook a couple of pills out of the box that was there and poured a glass of water and brought them to her. “You’re just hysterical, that’s all. Take these now and get some sleep. I’ll call you when supper’s ready.”
He stood over her while she put the pills in her mouth and drank the water. Then he made her lie down on the bed and he tucked the comforter around her. He smoothed the hair back from her forehead.
“Poor Lorene,” he said. “Such a little baby after all. But I love you. I won’t let anything happen to you.”
He bent and kissed her. Then he went out and closed the door.
As soon as he was gone Lorene spat out the pills from under her tongue, where she had held them. She lay curled on the bed, watching with hot dry eyes as the gray windows dimmed slowly with the approach of night. Her breathing was quick and shallow and her body flinched at every sound in the street, every rattle of a wind-blown branch against the wall, every creak and footfall in the house.
After a long while, when it was quite dark, Vern came back and rapped softly on the door but she didn’t answer. She shut her eyes and lay motionless. She heard him open the door and call her name. A strong rich smell of cooking came through the open door, but it didn’t make her feel hungry. It only made her stomach turn. Vern decided she was asleep and went away.
She waited until she was sure he was downstairs again and in the dining room with the rest of the family and probably the policeman too. Then she tiptoed across the room and got her coat from the closet and put it on. She put her shoes in the pockets, one on each side with the heels sticking out. She picked up her handbag and crept from the room to the back stairs and down them to the door that led into the kitchen, listening all the way for anyone moving around below.
The door was not quite closed. She peered through the crack. The kitchen was empty, and through the open swing door of the dining room she could hear people talking, busy with their dinner.
If she was real quiet she could sneak across the kitchen and out the back without anyone seeing or hearing her.
She pushed the door open and stepped out across the linoleum light and fast in her stocking feet. Her heart was beating so hard she thought she would faint, but she reached the back door and opened that with only a small clicking noise and darted through it onto the porch, and it was dark and she was free and she could run and run away from Woodley, away from Al and death and terror.
The rain had turned to a fitful snow. She climbed in shaky haste down the long flight of back steps, feeling the treads icy-cold under her feet. At the bottom of the steps she stopped to put her shoes on. The snow was making a light rustling noise as it fell in the dry leaves that still clung on the branches. She did not hear anything else, standing with her head bent and one hand holding the stair rail, tugging the tight pumps over her wet stockings and thinking about buses and trains to other cities, Cleveland or Columbus or Cincinnati, anyplace so long as Al didn’t know where it was. But when she started to go away from the house a man was standing in front of her on the path.
God help me, she thought, it’s Al.
All the strength went out of her. Her knees gave. She opened her mouth to scream but nothing came out except a sigh.
The man stepped close and caught her.
In the shaft of light from the kitchen window she saw that it was Vern, hatless and wearing a dark overcoat, with snow-flakes in his hair and on his shoulders.
He picked her up and carried her back up the steps and into the house. Mama Kratich, wide and short and not smiling now. Papa Kratich with the high cheekbones and the bright black eyes and the yellow-gray mustache. Nick, a taller, older Vern. The policeman, middle-aged and angry-looking. They were all standing in the kitchen by the dining-room door.
Vern said, “Go back to your dinner. It’s all right.”
He carried her into the hall and put her down. “You can walk the rest of the way,” he said. He pointed with his chin up the stairs. “Go on.”
She looked at him, sucking her breath in big sobs. Then she turned and began to climb the steps, hanging on to the rail. Vern came behind her. When they were back in the bedroom he shut the door. “Sit down,” he said, and she sat down. “I don’t want any more tears, so you can stop that before you start it. Now you listen to me.”
He stood over her in a certain way, and she listened.
“After this is over you can go as far away from here as you want to. But until then you’re going to stay. Is that perfectly clear to you?”
She sobbed. “You shouldn’t be mad at me, Vern. I’m scared.”
“You’re going to get over being scared. Frankly, Lorene, you make me sick. Just because you’ve had some rough breaks you seem to think you can pull that bawl-baby act and get out of everything you don’t want to do. Not this time. You heard what Packer said about holding you as a material witness. If you try to get away from here again I’ll call him and let him do it.”
He went to the door and fingered the key. “Am I going to have to lock you in?”
“No,” she said. “No, Vern.” She got up out of the chair and went toward him, tremulous and alarmed. “Vern, you’re not—You still love me, don’t you? You still want to marry me.”
He looked at her for a long moment. “I’ll let you know,” he said, “after this is over.”
He went out and left her there.
Lorene huddled on the bed and put her hands over her head as though to hide it from the world. Oh, God, she thought, if only I was little again, if only I didn’t have to be grown-up and all naked and alone. Mama, she whimpered silently into the rumpled sheet. Oh, Mama, Mama!
At five minutes to nine the telephone rang in Ben Forbes’ house.
Ernie, who had been half asleep, sprang bolt upright. Ben stood up more slowly, his face drained of color. He looked at Packer.
“Go ahead,” said Packer. “Answer it.” He went into the bedroom where the tape recorder was already running and put on a set of headphones. There was no reason to give Ben any last-minute warnings or advice. He had had them all. Now it was up to him.
Ben put his hand on the phone. It rang for the third time, but Ben did not pick it up. He looked at Ernie.
Ernie said harshly, “Answer it.” He knew what the trouble was. Ben was afraid to hear Guthrie tell him that Carolyn was dead.
Ben hesitated a second longer and then lifted the receiver and said, “Hello? Yes, speaking.”
Ernie could hear the faint but penetrating sound of coins dropping and he thought, The bastard is calling long-distance.
Then Ben was saying in a voice as dull and steady as a rock, “Yes, I’m alone. But you weren’t supposed to call—”
Ernie listened to the one-sided conversation, watching Ben’s face become whiter and more despairing. His own guts were tied up tight and his hands were cold. He kept wanting to ask Ben what Guthrie was saying.
It was fairly easy to guess.
Ben said, “What have you done to her?”
Pause.
“I—I didn’t think you’d find out. No, I didn’t know it. I saw it was no use and gave up.”
Pause. Ben looked straight at Ernie and then said desperately, “No, I didn’t! I swear I didn’t.”
Pause.
“Yes. I’ve talked to her. She’ll see you. Yes. She wants to talk things over with you. I’ll bring her wherever you—”
But it wasn’t that easy. Ernie stood motionless, listening to Ben talk, and sweat, and try another way to talk again.
Finally there was a very long pause, to which Ben answered in a low voice, “I hear it.” And he looked at Ernie and shook his head, and Ernie made fierce ambiguous motions. Ben shut his eyes and said into the telephone, “All right, I’ll have her here.”
Now Ernie could almost hear Guthrie himself. Ben’s face hardened and a light came in his eyes. Again Ernie made motions and Ben did not say whatever it was he had been going to say. There was a click and Ben took the phone away from his ear and said, “He hung up.”
Bill Drumm, who had sat still on the other side of the room, went over and took the phone and began to check back with the operator on the call. Packer came out of the bedroom. “Find out if she listened in on any of that,” he said.
Ben said, “Did you hear?”
Packer nodded. His mouth was drawn down at the corners and eyes were full of a hot disgust. He called Ernie. “Come in here and listen to the playback.”
Ben sat down in a chair, looking very tired. “I’m not disappointed,” he said. “I never thought it would work.”
Before Ernie had got as far as the bedroom door Ben had jumped up and gone in a blind blundering rush out of the room.
Ernie hesitated and then went in to join Packer. There are some things you can’t do anything about.
The man at the tape recorder started the playback. The operator’s voice said, “Mr. Forbes? Hold on please for Sentryville. Deposit thirty cents for the first three minutes.” Ernie listened, and this time he heard what Guthrie was saying.
“You know what you did last night? You damned near got your woman killed, that’s what you did.”
“What have you done to her?”
“Nothing much, but it’s no thanks to you. You made me plenty of trouble. Thought you were pretty damn smart, didn’t you, figuring out I was in South Flat, trying to cross me up.”
“I didn’t think you’d find out.”
“Sure I found out. Everybody in the bar was talking about it. That’s your trouble, Forbes, you think everybody’s dumb but you. Okay, so you found out where I was, but I’m not there any more. Or maybe you already knew that.”
“No, I didn’t know it. I saw it was no use and gave up.”
“I don’t believe you. I think you told the cops and put them to looking for me.”
“No, I didn’t! I swear I didn’t.”
“Well, if you did you’ll be sorrier than anybody, except maybe your wife. Now what about Lorene? Or didn’t you talk to her at all?”
“Yes. Yes, I’ve talked to her. She’ll see you.”
“She will, huh?”
“Yes. She wants to talk things over with you. I’ll bring her wherever you—”
Ernie leaned closer. It was about here that things had gone wrong.
Guthrie said, in the loud overbearing tone that a stupid man mistakes for sarcasm, “That’s good. That’s real good. Now answer me one question. What made her change her mind?”
No wonder Ben had sweated, groping for an answer.
“I told you I talked to her—”
“Yeah. But what did you say? I don’t trust you, Mr. Forbes. I think you’re being smart again. I think you’re lying in your teeth.”