A Treasury of Stories (Collection of novelettes and short stories)

I The Crime — and the Events Leading Up to It

He didn’t premeditate it, and yet, he told himself afterward, it all turned out better than if he had. Much better. He might have done all the wrong things, he told himself. Picked the wrong place, the wrong time, the wrong weapon. Too much careful planning ahead might have made him nervous, as it had many another. In the effort to remember not to forget something, he might have forgotten something else. How often that had happened!

This way, there was nothing to forget — because there had been nothing to remember in the first place. He just walked through the whole thing “cold,” for the first time, without having had any rehearsal. And everything just seemed to fall into place — the right place, by itself. These hair-split timetables are very hard to stick to. Impromptu, the way he did it, the time element doesn’t become important. You can’t trip over a loose thirty seconds and fall flat on your face when there aren’t a loose thirty seconds to trip over.

The situation itself was old and trite. One of the oldest, one of the tritest. Not to him, of course, and not to her — it never is to those involved. It’s always new, first-time new.

To begin with, he was single, and had no troubles whatsoever to deal with. He had a car, he had a job, he had health, and he had good looks. But mainly, he had freedom. If he came home at ten o’clock or if he came at two, if he had one drink or if he had a few, there was no one but himself to keep score.

He was the personification of the male spirit, that restless roving spirit that can only get into trouble because it didn’t have any trouble to start with, that had no other way to go but — from lack of trouble into a mess of trouble.

And so we find him one star-spiked May evening, in a $95 suit, with $75 in his wallet, with a new convertible waiting outside to take him in any direction he wanted to go, and with a girl named Corinne in his arms — a very pretty Corinne too, dexterously dancing and spinning around together, breaking apart, coming together again, and above all (a favorite step of theirs) making an overhead loop of their two hands so that she could walk through it, turn, then go back through it again. All in excellent time and in excellent rhythm to the tune of The Night They Invented Champagne, played by an excellent band.

Beautiful to watch, but what a fatal dance that was, because — it was their first together. They should have turned and fled from each other in opposite directions.

Instead they went out to the car. She patted it admiringly as he beamed, proudly possessive as only a young male car-owner can be. Then they drove to where she lived, sat a while and watched the stars, and kissed and kissed, and watched the stars... and that was it.

Another night, another dance, same car, same stars, same kisses — or same lips, anyway. She got out to go in. He got out to keep her from going in. Then they both got in the car again and went to a motel... And that was it again.

After some time had gone by she asked him about marriage. But she didn’t get much of an answer. He liked it the way it was. She hadn’t asked him soon enough, or in the right order of things. So, afraid that she would lose him altogether, and preferring to have him this way rather than no way at all, she didn’t ask him again.

It was a peaceful, comfortable existence. It was definitely not sordid she was not a sordid girl. She was no different, in effect, from any other girl on her street who had stepped out and married. Only she had stepped out and not married. He was the first man she had ever loved, and it stopped there. The only thing was, she had left freedom of action, freedom of choice, entirely in his hands — which was a tactical error of the worst sort in the never-ending war between the sexes. She was a very poor soldier, for a woman. They were not actually living together. They were keeping company, one might say, on a permanent basis.

At any rate, one night when he called to take her out, she complained of not feeling well. In fact, it was easy to see she wasn’t shamming, and noticing that she was alternately shivering and burning up he sent for a doctor and remained there while the doctor examined her. (She spoke of him as her fiance whenever it became necessary in front of a third person.) It was nothing serious — merely an attack of the flu, but she had to go to bed.

He would not — to give him some credit — have walked out on her then and there; but she was feeling so miserable that for her part she wished he would leave her alone. So, noticing this, he kissed her — a mere peck — and left.

His original intention — at least, from the door to the car — was to go to his own apartment and make the best of an unexpected solitary evening. But the stars were at their dirty work again, and his wrist watch didn’t help either (9:48); he was 28 and didn’t have the flu, so—

Her name was Allie.

And she wasn’t going to be like Corinne — he found that out right from the start. She could enjoy the stars, sure, and she could kiss, sure, but she’d take up both those occupations on his time, as his officially credited fiance or his lawfully wedded wife — not on her own time, as a free-lance, if you get the distinction.

And her sense of timing was much better, too. He came out three or four kisses short the first meeting. So he wanted to see her again, to try to make up the shortage. But she always knew just when to stop. He was still a couple short the second meeting, so that made him want to see her a third time. By then he was so hopelessly in hock to her that his only chance of clearing up the debt was to marry her, and try to work it out on a lifetime payment plan.

She was a five-star general in the battle of the sexes. And it must have been inborn, because she’d never heard a shot fired until she met him.

At first he managed to sandwich the two of them in together. He saw Allie a couple of nights in the week, saw Corinne a couple of others. In fact, he would have liked to continue his three-way-stretch arrangement indefinitely; the difficulty, however, lay not with them but with himself. Soon more and more nights with Corinne reminded him of the night she’d had the flu: the stars above and the wrist watch were there, but not Corinne’s stars any more and not Corinne’s time. A waste of Allie’s time, instead.

Finally there were no more nights with Corinne — just one last station-break and the program went off the air.

“You’ve lost interest in me. I’m not blind. I’ve noticed it for some time now.”

“That’s the chance you have to take,” he told her, “when you’re in love.”

“But why did it happen to you?” she wanted to know, “and not to me? Shouldn’t we both come out even?”

“You don’t come out even in love,” he told her. “Someone always has to come out behind.” And then he added, “I’ll call you up some night.” Which is the way some men say goodbye to a woman.

She’ll find somebody else, he thought; she was easy for me, she’ll be easy for the next one. And he shrugged her off.

But there are three things in this world you can’t shrug off: death, taxes — and a girl who loves you.

Now they were in the homestretch, Allie and he. Now when they looped their hands above their heads on the dance floor, her engagement diamond blazed toward the lights, proclaiming, “This is mine. Hands off.” Not to jewel thieves, but to stealers of men.

Now all the tribal customs were brought to bear — everything the world insists shall surround the lawful mating of a man and a woman. The meetings with the relatives from far-off places; the luncheons, dinners, parties, showers; the choosing of a trousseau; the finding of their first home; even the purchase of the furniture that was to go into it.

Now the date was set, the license applied for, the church reserved, the flowers and the caterers and the champagne arranged for. Now even the blood tests were taken, and they were both declared pure. All that remained was the marrying and the honeymoon.

Now the boys got together and gave him his bachelor party, his last night to howl. And the howls were something to hear. Three separate times around town they were arrested en masse, and twice the arresting officers not only released them but even accompanied them for a short part of the way, and the third time wished them well and urged them only to “keep it down, boys.” Then finally the last two survivors, the die-hards whose pledge had been to see him safely home, had him at his door, and after much fumbling with keys, and draping of arms across shoulders, and swaying and tottering, they thrust him inside, closed the door, and left him.

And suddenly he was sober, stone-cold, ice-cold sober, and the whole party had been a waste of liquor — at least, for him.

Corinne was sitting there. Waiting for him.

“You took so long to get back,” she complained mildly. “I knew you still lived here, but I thought you’d never get back.”

“Had a little party,” he said. He was starkly sober, but his tongue hadn’t yet quite caught up with the rest of him. A warning bell started ringing: I wonder if she knows, I wonder if she knows.

“I’m not criticizing,” she went on. “You’re free to go out with your pals — free every night in the week. It’s only natural, so what’s the harm?”

The warning bell stopped suddenly. There was silence. She doesn’t know, he told himself, and she’s not going to know from me.

Business of fooling around with a cigarette, so he’d use up time and wouldn’t have to say too much to her. Maybe she’d go away.

“I know it’s late,” she said.

He looked at the wrist watch that had played such a double-crossing part in their little story. Meaning, it is late.

She doesn’t want to start over again, does she? For Pete’s sake, not that! Love is a one-way street.

“Aren’t you working?” he asked. “Don’t you have to get up early in the morning?”

“I haven’t been working since last week,” she said. Then, understandingly, “You’re tired; I know.”

“Aren’t you?”

“Yes, but I do have to talk to you about something. I’ve got to. It’s very important.”

Now he knew, more or less. There were only two things a girl could possibly want from a man, in all the world, in all this life: love or money. And since love was out, that left only money. Another thing told him: she was much too tractable, noticeably taking pains not to antagonize or ruffle him in any way.

“Won’t it keep till tomorrow?” he said by way of acquiescence. “I’m beat Completely beat. I’ll come over to see you tomorrow.”

“But will you?” she asked, frowning, but still with that air of not wanting to push him, not wanting to crowd him.

“Aw, for the love of Mike, Cor,” he said impatiently, “when did you ever know me to break my word to you?”

It was true. He never had — not in the little things.

She had to accept that — it was the best she could get

“I’ve moved since the last time I saw you,” she said, and gave him the new address.

“All right, I’ll be there, Allie,” he promised. He was almost nudging the door inch by inch right in her face, anxious to get rid of her.

For a moment he lost an inch or two. “Allie?” she said. “Who’s Allie?”

“That’s Al,” he said quickly. “Fellow I go around with — with him tonight I’m so used to saying his name every five minutes or so.”

He finally got the door shut and went “Whew!” — from the shoelaces up. Money, he said, that’s all it is — she wants money. That hint about not working. All right, I’ll give her some. Wind the thing up that way. She was entitled to something after all, he supposed.

He took five hundred out of his savings account the next day, during his lunch hour. The nick it made wasn’t too bad. There was still plenty to cover the honeymoon expenses and the first few months of married life. And he was making a good salary.

Then right in front of the bank, coming out, he met Dime; Allie’s brother. Dune glanced up at the bank facade, then at him, and said, “Look, if you could use a little extra — I know how it is at a time like this, I went through the mill myself three years ago.”

Bing! another two hundred and fifty from Dune, smack in his palm. His face didn’t even change color. After all, they were both going to be in the same family, weren’t they?

First, he thought, I’ll put two fifty of my own back. Then he thought, why be a rat — let her have it all, it’s only money. So she was coming out pretty good for a last year’s leftover crush; she had no kick coming. She’ll fall all over my neck, he thought complacently. But no fooling around tonight; I’m going to unwind her arms and give them back to her.

The bungalow was ’way out at the end of nowhere — dim in the growing darkness. Even the road in front of it wasn’t paved yet, just surfaced with some kind of black stuff. But there were going to be other bungalows — he could just make out the skeleton frames of some of them already starting up in a straight line past hers, getting thinner as they went along, until there were only foundations, then just a bulldozer.

She had it fixed up real pretty, the way women like to do, even women with broken hearts. Chintz curtains fluttering out the windows, like vermilion lips coaxing to be kissed.

She didn’t even give him a chance to get onto the porch and ring the bell. She was waiting there for him. She had on a little apron to match the curtains. Last year’s love, playing house all by herself.

“I wasn’t sure you were really coming.”

He raised his brows. “Did I ever break my word to you?” “No,” she said. “Not your word. Only—”

She had cocktails frosting in a shaker.

“You used to like martinis best,” she said.

“I don’t like martinis any more,” he said, — and let that sink in.

She traced a finger on the frosting of the shaker and made a little track, shiny as a mirror. “I’ve got to talk to you.”

“We don’t have to,” he said. “This talks better than anything. This talks best.” He’d taken the money out and laid it down.

“What’s that for?” she said, her face suddenly white with shock and insult and hurt

“Well, if you don’t know why, don’t ask me.”

She sat in a chair for a few moments getting over it — or, it would be more correct to say, getting familiar with it. She had a slow temper. Until this moment, as a matter of fact, he hadn’t known she had any temper at all.

Then she got up, and her face was unlike any face he’d ever seen her wear before. She flung the words point-blank at him.

“You don’t have to do this to me! You don’t have to do this!”

“Then what else is there?” In all honesty he couldn’t understand her outrage. He’d lost her train of thought, and the situation was becoming an irritant.

“What else is there? You have to stand by me, that’s what else there is! I can’t go it alone!”

Now his voice went up, almost into a wail of incomprehension. “Stand by you! What does that mean?”

She took her open hand and slammed it down on the table, so hard that the ice in the shaker went tlink! “I’m going to have your baby, that’s what that means!”

The shock was dizzying. He had to reach out and hold on to something for a moment “How do I—?”

“There never was another man in my life, that’s how you know.” And he did know.

“All right,” he said.

“All right what?”

“I’ll take care of everything. Hospital and—”

Now finally she screamed piercingly at him in her passion and torment, and she wasn’t the kind to scream. “Hospital? I don’t want a hospital, I want a husband!”

The second shock, on top of the first, completely unbalanced him. The rest was just physical reflex, not mental reaction at all.

She said only one thing more in her life. In her entire life. “You’re going to marry me, do you understand? You’re going to marry me!”

The object was suddenly in his hand, as though it had jumped into his hand of its own accord. He hadn’t seen it before, hadn’t even known it was in the room.

She died at almost the very first blow. But he kept striking on and on and on, to the point of frenzy, to the point of mama, to the point of sheer hallucination. And then she was gone, and it was over. And the thing that a hundred other men, a thousand other men, had done, and that he’d thought he’d never do — now he’d done it too. And the thing he’d read about a hundred times, a thousand times, now he wasn’t reading about it, he was living it. And he liked it much better the other way.

He looked at the object he was still holding, and he realized he actually didn’t know what it was even now. What could have been more unpremeditated than that? Some sort of long curving blade, razor-keen. Then at last he identified it — more by hearsay than by actual recognition. A Samurai sword, souvenir of the long-ago war with Japan. He remembered now she had once mentioned she had a brother who had served in the Pacific theater — only to come back and die in a car crash not long after. Many men had brought these back with them at the time.

He let go, and it dropped with a muffled thud.

After a while he located the bracket she had driven into the wall. It must have been hanging up there. When he went over to it he found, on the floor underneath, the severed cord it had hung by and the empty scabbard. His subconscious mind must have recognized it for a weapon, for he had no recollection whatever of snatching it down, and yet he must have, in the blinding red explosion that had burst in his brain and ended in murder.

In the beginning he was very mechanical, as the glaze of shock that coated him all over slowly thawed and loosened. He tipped the cocktail shaker into one of the two glasses and drank. He even ate one of the two olives she’d had ready at the bottoms of the two glasses. Not calloused. His instinct told him he needed it, if he wanted to try to live. And he wanted to try to live very badly. Even more so now that he’d looked at death this close with his own eyes. Then he poured a second one, but let it stand. Then he emptied what remained in the shaker down the sink.

It seemed hopeless. There seemed no place to begin. The room was daubed with her, as though a house painter had taken a bucket of her blood, dipped his paint brush in it, then splashed it this way and that way and every which way all over the walls. He was splattered himself, but fortunately he was wearing a dark suit and it didn’t show up much; and that part of the job could wait until later.

The first thing to do was to get her out of here. All the little things of hers... He went to her closet and found a number of opaque plastic garment bags — even more than he needed, in fact... and finally he zippered them up securely and let them lean there a moment.

Then he went out to his car, opened the trunk compartment, and made room. He went around to the front seat, got the evening newspaper that he remembered having left there, and papered the entire trunk with it, to prevent any errant stains or smears. It was so incredibly unpeopled out here that he didn’t even have to be furtive about it. Just an occasional precautionary look around him.

Then he went in again, brought out the garment bags, put them in the trunk, and locked it He stepped back into the bungalow to put out the lights, took her key with him so he’d be able to get back in again, got in his car, and drove off.

And as far as that part went, that was all. There was nothing more to it.

He drove steadily for some hours. And strangely enough, at a rather slow pace, almost a desultory glide. He could do that because, again strangely enough, he felt no panic whatever. Even his fear was not acute or urgent. It would be untrue to say that he felt no fear at all; but it was distant and objective, rather than imminent and personal — more on the level of ordinary prudence and caution. And this must have been because it had all come up so suddenly, and blown over so suddenly, that his nerves hadn’t had time to be subjected to a long, fraying strain. They were the nerves of an almost normal person, not of a man who had just taken another person’s life.

He even stopped once, left the car, and bought a fresh pack of cigarettes at a place he saw was still open. He even stayed there for a few moments, parked in front of it, smoking, then finally slithered on again.

At last his driving stopped being directionless, took on purpose, as he finally made up his mind about a destination. There was. very little noticeable change in it, and he still didn’t hurry. He simply made fewer haphazard turns and roundabouts, and perhaps stepped it up another five miles per hour.

Even with a target, he still continued driving for several more hours. The metropolitan section was now left far behind. On the final lap he was purring steadily along a road that paralleled a railroad right-of-way. An occasional pair of lights would blink past him going the other way. There was nothing for anyone else to see or recall — just a relaxed silhouette behind the wheel, with a red coal near its lips, and tooling by. Although a good, wide road, it was not a main artery of traffic.

More than half the night had now gone by, but he still drove on. This had to be done, and when a thing has to be done, it should be done right, no matter how much time it takes.

At last, as he neared the outskirts of a large-sized town, the railroad tracks broadened into numerous sidings, and these blossomed finally into strings of stagnant freight cars of assorted lengths, some only two or three coupled together, others almost endless chains.

He came to a halt finally by the side of the road, took out a flashlight, and left the car. He disappeared into one of the dark lanes between the freight cars, an occasional soft crunch of gravel the only indication of his movements. He was gone for some time, taking his time in this as in everything else. Almost like a shopper shopping for something that exactly suits him, and refusing to be satisfied with anything else.

When he came back to his car there was very little more to it He went out to the middle of the road, stood there first looking up one way, then down the other. When he was sure there were no lights approaching even in the remotest distance, he stepped over to his car, moving deftly and quickly but still by no means frightenedly, opened the trunk, and took out the garment bags. He propped them for a moment against the car while he took the precaution of closing the trunk, so that it might not attract attention in case anyone should drive by while he was gone.

Then, half supporting and half trailing the garment bags, he disappeared into the lane of his choice between the parallels of freight cars — the one that led to the freight car he had found with its door left unfastened. There was the sound of the slide grating open, then in a few moments the sound of it grating closed again. And that was all.

When he came back to the car he was alone, unburdened.

The drive back was as uneventful as the drive out. If he had been of a cynical nature, he might have been tempted to ask: What’s there to a murder? What’s there to worry about?

In due course he came back to the point where the route that led out to her bungalow diverged from the route that would eventually bring him to his own apartment. He didn’t even hesitate. He took the road home. He was taking a gamble of a sort, and yet it wasn’t as great a gamble as it appeared; he felt now that the longer odds were in his favor, and besides, there was nothing more he could do in her bungalow at this time. She had told him she had stopped working. There was a good chance no one would go there to seek her out during the course of the next day or two. And if someone should, there was an even better chance they would not force entry into the bungalow.

So he decided to go home, leave the bloodstained room the way it was for the time being, and not return until after he’d had a chance to make the necessary preparations for cleaning it up.

He set his alarm for nine, and slept the three hours remaining until then. Which is three hours more sleep than the average murderer can usually get on the first night following his crime.

When he awoke it was Saturday morning, and without even breakfasting he went to a paint store completely across town from where he lived and explained to the clerk that his so-and-so of a landlord wouldn’t paint for him; so he was going to do the job himself and be damned to him.

The man in the paint store was sympathetic. “What color you want?” he asked.

“What color would you advise?”

“What color is it now?”

He picked it out with positive accuracy on a color chart the man showed him.

“Well, your best bet to cover that would be either a medium green or a medium brown,” the clerk said. “Otherwise the color on now is going to show through and you’d have to give it two coats.

He thought of the color of dried blood and promptly selected the brown — a sort of light cinnamon with a reddish overtone. Then he bought a like shade of glossy paint for the woodwork, a ladder, and the requisite brushes and mixing fluids. Then he went to a clothing store — not a haberdashery but the sort of outlet that sells work clothes — and purchased a pair of overalls, and added a pair of gauntlets so that he wouldn’t get any paint under his fingernails. Such a thing could be the devil to pay.

Then he went back to where he’d killed her.

It was only just past mid-morning when he got there. This time he drove off the unpaved roadway, detoured around to the back of the bungalow, and parked directly behind it in such a way that the house itself hid his car.

There was really no need for this precaution. Being Saturday, the neighborhood was empty — no workmen, no residents; but he felt better taking every possible safeguard, even against an unlikely prowler.

Then on foot he circled around to the front and examined the porch before unloading anything from his car. It was just as he had left it. There was every evidence that his gamble had paid off, that no one had come near the bungalow since it had happened. From a remark she had dropped at his place when they were setting up what had turned out to be the murder appointment, he knew she had no telephone. She was on the waiting list but they hadn’t got to her yet. From their old days together he remembered she had never been much of a newspaper reader, so it was extremely improbable she would have regular delivery service, especially in this deserted section. As for milk, there were no signs of that either; she must have brought home a carton from the grocery store whenever she needed it. Finally, the mail slot opened directly into the house itself, so there was no way of telling from the outside whether the mail had been picked up by its recipient or not

There wasn’t a single thing that wasn’t in his favor. He almost marveled at it himself.

He gave another precautionary look around, then opened up the front door with her key, and went in.

For a moment — and for the first time — his heart almost failed him. It looked even worse than he’d remembered from the night before. Maybe he’d been too taken up with removing her to give it due notice. There was only one wall that was completely sterile. Two more were in bad-to-middling shape. But the fourth was practically marbleized, it had such veins and skeins twining all over it. It resembled nothing so much as a great upright slab of white-and-brown marble.

He could see what had caused the marbleized effect. It wasn’t that the blood had spurted of its own accord: it was the strokes of the Samurai sword that had splashed it like that — all over everything.

It was too big a job; he felt he could never swing it.

And then he reminded himself: you got rid of her body, didn’t you? If you did that, you can do this too.

He then did another of those incongruous things that he kept doing all the way through. He picked up the shaker from the night before, got out the gin and the vermouth, and made himself two more martinis. He left out the olives though.

Feeling more confident now, he changed to his work clothes. He even took off his shoes and remained in his socks. Paint spots on shoes could be just as hard to remove and just as incriminating as paint underneath fingernails.

When he began the new paint job he realized that he didn’t have to be too finicky about it — they couldn’t arrest you just because your painting wasn’t up to major league standards. The daubing went as fast as a speed-cop’s motorcycle on the way with a ticket. Almost before he knew it, he had all four sides done, including the one that hadn’t needed it. The latter he threw in by way of artistic flourish. The room would have looked queer with three walls one color and the fourth another.

The ladder folded, the buckets out of the way, the overalls and gauntlets stripped off, he stood in the center of the room and took a comprehensive look at his handiwork — and drew a deep sigh. Not only of relief, but somewhat of cocksure pride.

It might not have been the best paint job that had ever been done, but it guaranteed one thing: the walls were bloodless; the damning stains were completely covered up.

The furniture, of course, was going to be a different matter. Fortunately, it wasn’t outsized, the room itself being fairly small. He rolled up the rug and stood it in a comer, just inside the front door.

This part of the program, he knew, would be less arduous than the walls, but it was also going to be a good deal more risky. It necessitated arson.

He slipped out and made a tour of inspection of the skeleton bungalows that sprouted past hers, giving the interior of each one a quick glance.

The first three were too close to hers for his purpose — the inference might be a little too easy to draw. The one at the opposite end was nothing but a gouged-out foundation and poured concrete. The next-to-the-last already had its two-by-fours up, but no flooring or roofing. The next one in had enough wooden construction — plus a lot of shavings — to be ideal: it was like starting a fire in an empty lathe-basket.

Three trips were necessary. He carried the rolled rug, the removable cushions from settee and chair, a small end-table, a parchment lampshade, and whatever else had been stained beyond hope of cover-up, to the unfinished bungalow. He didn’t forget to include the suit he had worn the night before. He made a pyre of these, topped it off with the paint-impregnated overalls, gauntlets, and brushes, and poured on the highly-inflammable residue from the paint cans.

Then he drained gas from his car, using a receptacle he’d brought from the bungalow, leaving just enough in the tank to get him home, and liberally doused it not only on the mount itself but on the wood around it.

He turned his car around, facing in the direction he was to go, killed the engine, and sat waiting, looking all around him. Finally he started the engine again, very softly, like a newborn kitten purring, picked up a furled newspaper, took a lighter out of his pocket, clicked it twice to make sure it was in working order, got out of the car, leaving the door open in readiness, and went inside the unfinished house.

He came out again at a run — this was the first time since he’d killed her that he moved fast — jumped in the car and started off with a surge. He only closed the door after he was careening along, foot tight to the floor. This part of the operation, if no other, was split-second schedule, and not a stray moment could be spared.

For as long as the place remained in sight behind him he could see no sign of flickering flame, of incipient fire. After that — who was around to care?

He got out in front of his own door, locked the car, tossed his keys jauntily up into air and caught them deftly in the same hand.

Upstairs, he sprawled out in a chair, legs wide apart, and let out a great sigh of completion, of finality.

“Now let them say I’ve killed her.” Then, sensibly, he amended it to: “Now let them prove I killed her.”

II The Detection — and How They Proved It

They did neither the one nor the other. They started very circumspectly, very offhandedly, in a very minor key — as those things often happen.

A ring at the doorbell.

Two men were standing there.

“Are you—?”

“Yes, I’m—?”

“Like to ask you a few questions. Mind if we come in?”

“Come in if you want. I have no objections. Why should I?”

“Do you know a Corinne Matthews?”

“I did at one time.” “When was the last time you saw her?”

“What is this — June, isn’t it? Either later February or early

March. I’m not sure which.”

“Not since then?”

“You asked me a minute ago and I told you. If I’d seen her since then, I’d say so.”

“Not since then. That’s your statement?”

“My statement, right”

“Any objection to coming downtown with us? We’d like to question you in further detail.”

“You re the police. When you ask people to come downtown with you, they come downtown with you. No objection.”

They came back again that evening. He went down again the next day. Then back again, down again. Then—

Down again for good.

Held on suspicion of murder.

A back room. Many different rooms, but a back room in particular.

“I suppose now you’re going to beat the hell out of me.”

No, we’re not going to beat the hell out of you — never do. Besides, we’re too sure of you; we don’t want anything to backfire. Juries are funny sometimes. No, we’re going to treat you with, kid gloves. In fact, you’re even going to wear kid shorts when you squat down in the old Easy Chair.”

“Is that what I’m going to do,” he asked wryly, “for something I didn’t do?”

“Save it,” he was advised. “Save it for when you need it, and you’re going to need it plenty.”

All through the long weary day identification followed identification.

Is this the man who bought a pack of cigarettes from you, and handed you in payment a dollar bill with the print of a bloody thumb on one side and a print of a bloody forefinger on the other?”

“That’s him. I thought it was an advertising gag at first, the prints were both so clear. Like for one of them horror movies, where they stencil bloody footprints on the sidewalk m front of the heater, to pull the customers inside. I couldn’t help looking at him while he was pocketing his change. I didn’t call him on it because I could tell the bill wasn’t queer, and he acted so natural, so nonchalant. I even saw him sitting out there smoking for a while afterwards. Yes sir, that’s him all right!”

“I don’t deny it”

“Is this the man who bought a can of Number Two russet-brown paint from you? And gloss. And brushes. And a folding stepladder.”

“That’s him.”

“I don’t deny it.”

“Is this the man who bought a pair of overalls from you? And a pair of work gloves?”

“That’s him.”

“I don’t deny it.”

Room cleared of identifying witnesses.

“Then you took the materials you’ve just confessed you bought and went to work on the living room at One Eighty-two.”

“That I don’t admit.”

“You deny you repainted that room? Why, it’s the identical shade and grade of paint you bought from this paint store!”

“I didn’t say I denied it. What I said was, I don’t admit it.” “What does that mean?”

“Prove I painted there. Prove I didn’t paint somewhere else.”

They knew they couldn’t. So did he.

“Show us where you painted somewhere else, then.”

“No, sir. No, sir. That’s up to you, not up to me. I didn’t say I painted somewhere else. I didn’t say I didn’t pour it down a sewer. I didn’t say I didn’t give it away as a present to a friend of mine. I didn’t say I didn’t leave it standing around some place for a minute and someone stole it from me.”

The two detectives turned their backs on him for a minute. One smote himself on the top of the head and murmured to his companion, “Oh, this man! He’s got a pretzel for a tongue.”

The plastic garment bags and their hideous contents were finally located. Perhaps all the way across the country in some siding or railroad yard in Duluth or Kansas City or Abilene. They didn’t tell him that outright, in so many words, or exactly where, but he could sense it by the subtle turn their questioning took.

They had their corpus delicti now, but they still couldn’t pin it on him. What was holding them up, what was blocking

them, he realized with grim satisfaction, was that they couldn’t unearth a single witness who could place him at or near the freight yard he’d driven to that night — or at any other freight yard anywhere else on any other night. The car itself, after exhaustive tests and examinations, must have turned out pasteurizedly pure, antibiotically bloodless. He’d seen to that. And the garment bags had been her own to begin with.

There was nothing to trace him by.

Even the Samurai sword — which he had had the audacity to send right along with her, encased in a pair of her nylon stockings-was worthless to them. It had belonged to her, and even if it hadn’t, there was no way of checking on such a thing — as there would have been in the case of a firearm. Being a war souvenir, it was nonregisterable.

Finally, there was the total lack of an alibi. Instead of counting against him it seemed to have intensified the deadlock. From the very beginning he had offered none, laid claim to none, therefore gave them none to break down. He’d simply said he’d gone home and stayed there, and admitted from the start he couldn’t prove it. But then they couldn’t prove he’d been out to the bungalow either. Result: each canceled the other out. Stand-off. Stalemate.

As if to show that they had reached a point of desperation they finally had recourse, during several of the periods of interrogation, to stronger measures. Not violence: no blows were struck, nothing was done that might leave a mark on him afterward. Nor were any threats or promises made. It was a sort of tacit coercion, one might say. He understood it, they understood it, he understood they did, and they understood he did.

Unsuspectingly he accepted some punishingly salty food they sent out for and gave to him. Pickled or smoked herring. But not water.

A fire was made in the boiler room and the radiator in one of the basement detention rooms was turned on full blast, even though it was an oppressively hot tum-of-spring-into-summer day. Still no water.

As though this weren’t enough, an electric heater was plugged into an outlet and aimed at his straight-backed chair. He was seated in it and compelled to keep two or three heavy blankets bundled around him. In no time the floor around his feet had darkened with the slow seep of his perspiration. But still no water.

Then a tantalizingly frosted glass pitcher, brimming with crystal-clear water and studded with alluring ice cubes, was brought in and set down on a table just within arm’s reach.

But each time he reached for it he was asked a question. And while waiting for the answer, the nearest detective would, absently, draw the pitcher away — just beyond his reach — as if not being aware of what he was doing, the way a man doodles with a pencil or fiddles with a paperweight while talking to someone. When he asked openly for a drink he was told (for the record): “Help yourself. It’s right there in front of you. That’s what it’s here for.” They were very meticulous about it. Nothing could be proved afterward.

He didn’t get a drink of water. But they didn’t get the answers they wanted either. Another stalemate.

They rang in a couple of ingenious variations after that, once with cigarettes, another time by a refusal of the comfort facilities of the building. With even less result, since neither impulse was as strong as thirst.

“All we need is one drop of blood,” the detective kept warning him. “One drop of blood.”

“You won’t get it out of me.”

“We have identified the remains, to show there was a crime — somewhere. We’ve found traces of blood on articles handled by you — like the dollar bill you gave the storekeeper — to show, presumably, that you were involved in some crime — somewhere. We’ve placed you in the vicinity of the bungalow: metal bits from the overalls and remains of the paint cans and brush handles in the ashes of the fire. Now all we’ve got to do is place the crime itself there. And that will close the circuit.

“One drop of blood will do it. One single drop of blood.”

“It seems a shame that such a modest requirement can’t be met,” was his ironic comment.

And then suddenly, when least expected, he was released.

Whether there was some legal technicality involved and they were afraid of losing him altogether in the long run if they charged him too quickly; whether it was just a temporary expedient so that they could watch him all the closer — anyway, release.

One of the detectives came in, stood looking at him.

“Good morning,” he said finally to the detective, sardonically, to break the optical deadlock.

“I suppose you’d like to get out of here.”

“There are places I’ve liked better.”

The detective jerked his head. “You can go. That’s all for now. Sign a receipt and the property clerk will return your valuables.”

He didn’t stir. “Not if there are any strings attached to it.”

“What do you want, an apology or something?”

“No, I just want to know where I stand. Am I in or am I out — or what.”

“You were never actually under arrest, so what’re you beefing about?”

“Well, if I wasn’t, there sure has been something hampering my freedom. Maybe my shoelaces were tied together.”

“Just hold yourself available in case you’re needed. Don’t leave town.”

He finally walked out behind the detective, throwing an empty cigarette pack on the floor. “Was any of this in the newspapers?”

“I don’t keep a scrapbook. I wouldn’t know,” said the detective.

He picked one up, and it was, had been, and was going to be.

The first thing he did was to phone Allie. She wouldn’t come to the phone — or they wouldn’t let her. She was ill in bed, they said. That much he didn’t disbelieve, or wonder at. There was also a coldness, an iciness: he’d hurt these people badly.

He hung up. He tried again later. And then again. And still again. He wouldn’t give up. His whole happiness was at stake now.

Finally he went back to his own apartment. There was nothing left for him to do. It was already well after midnight by this time. The phone was ringing as he keyed the door open. It sounded as if it had been ringing for some time and was about to die out. He grabbed at it.

“Darling,” Allie said in a pathetically weak voice, “I’m calling you from the phone next to my bed. They don’t know I’m doing it, or they—”

“You don’t believe what you’ve been reading about me?”

“Not if you tell me not to.”

“It was just a routine questioning. I used to know the girl a long time ago, and they grabbed at every straw that came their way.”

“We’ll have to change everything — go off quietly by ourselves. But I don’t care.”

“I’ve got to see you. Shall I come up there?”

“No,” she said tearfully. “Not yet. You’d better wait a while first. Give them a little more time.”

“But then how am I going to—?”

“I’ll dress and come out and meet you somewhere.”

“Can you make it?”

“I’m getting better every minute. Just hearing your voice, hearing you say that it was not true — that’s better than all their tranquilizers.”

“There’s a quiet little cocktail lounge called ‘For Lovers Only.’ Not noisy, not jammed. The end booth.”

Her voice was getting stronger. “We were there once, remember?”

“Wear the same dress you did that night.”

It was on all over again. “Hurry, I’m waiting for your hello-kiss.”

He pulled his shirt off so exuberantly that he split the sleeve halfway down. He didn’t care. He shook the shave-cream bomb until it nearly exploded in his hand. He went back to the phone and called a florist.

“I want an orchid sent somewhere — end booth — she’ll be wearing pale yellow. I didn’t ask you that, but what does come after the fifteen-dollar one? Then make it two fifteen-dollar ones. And on the card you just say this — ‘From a fellow to his girl.’ ”

And because he was young and in love — completely, sincerely in love, even though he’d killed someone who had once loved him the same way — he started, in his high spirits, in his release from long-sustained tension, to do a mimic Indian war dance, prancing around the room, now reared up high, now bent down low, drumming his hand against his mouth. “O-wah-o-wah!”

I beat it! he told himself, I’ve got it made. Just take it easy from here in, just talk with a small mouth — and I’m the one in a thousand who beat it!

Then someone knocked quietly on his door.

Less than an hour after going to bed, one of the detectives stirred and finally sat up again.

His wife heard him groping for his shoes to put them back on. “What’s the matter?” she asked sleepily. “You want a drink of water?”

“No,” he said. “I want a drop of blood.”

If you couldn’t find a drop of blood in the daytime how are you going to find it at night?”

He didn’t answer; he just went ahead pulling his pants on.

“Oh, God,” the poor woman moaned, “Why did I ever many a detective?”

“Oh, God,” he groaned back from the direction of the door, “what makes you think you have?”

“O-wah-o-wah!”

Someone knocked quietly on his door.

He went over to it, and it was one of them again.

He looked at the intruder ruefully — confidently but ruefully. “What, again?” he sighed.

“This time it’s for real.”

“What was it all the other times, a rehearsal without costumes?”

“Hard to convince, aren’t you? All right, I’ll make it official,” the detective said obligingly, “You’re under arrest for the murder of Corinne Matthews. Anything-you-say-may-be-held-against-you-kindly-come-with-me.”

“You did that like a professional,” he smirked, still confident.

The detective had brought a car with him. They got in it

“This is going to blow right up in your face. You know that, don’t you? I’ll sue for false arrest — I’ll sue the city for a million.”

“All right, I’ll show you.”

They drove to the bungalow that had been Corinne Matthews, and parked. They got out and went in together. They had to go through the doorway on the bias. The detective had him on handcuffs now — he wasn’t taking any chances.

The detective left it dark. He took out his flashlight and made a big dazzling cartwheel of light by holding it nozzle-close against one section of the wall.

“Take a good look,” he said.

“Why don’t you put the lights on?”

“Take a good look this way first.”

Just a newly painted, spotless wall, and at one side the light switch, tripped to OFF.

“Now look at it this way.”

He killed the flashlight, snapped up the wall switch, and the room lit up. Still just a newly painted, spotless wall, and at one side the light switch, reversed now to ON.

And on it a small blob of blood.

“That’s what I needed. And look, that’s what I got.”

The accused sat down, the accuser at the other end of the handcuffs, standing, his arm at elbow height

“How can a guy win?” the murderer whispered.

“You killed her at night, when the lights were on, when the switch was up like this, showing ON. You came back and painted in the daylight hours, when the lights were not on, when the switch was down, showing OFF. We cased this room a hundred times, for a hundred hours — but always in the daytime too, when the lights were not on, when the switch was down, showing OFF. And on the part of the switch that never showed in the daytime, the part marked ON, the way it is now, there was one drop of blood that we never found — until tonight.”

The murderer was quiet for a minute, then he said the final words — no good to hold them back any more. “Sure,” he said, “it was like that. That’s what it was like.”

His head went over, and a great huff of hot breath came surging out of him, rippling down his necktie, like the vital force, the will to resist, emptying itself.

The end of another story.

The end of another life.