Have a Change of Scene

Three

The following morning, on my way to the office, I called in on a hardware store and bought a pick-axe handle. I took it to the office and put it by the side of my desk, out of sight, but where I could get it with one swift movement. I had an idea I might need it.

Jenny came bustling in around 10.00, the usual yellow forms clutched in her hand and wearing the drab grey dress. I found it hard to recognise the same woman I had taken out to dinner last night.

She thanked me again for the dinner, asked if I had slept well, to which I said I had slept fine: a lie, of course, as I had hardly slept at all. She peered at what I was doing and from the expression on her face I could tell she was surprised I was only at letter C. She wasn’t to know that Spooky had ruined the work I had done, and I wasn’t going to tell her. Then she took off.

I thumped the typewriter and kept my ears cocked.

Around 11.00 Spooky arrived with seven of his buddies, so silently that, in spite of listening all the time, in spite of expecting him, I was taken unawares.

If he hadn’t been a sadistic showoff he would have had me cold. Probably he felt completely secure with seven of his hulking buddies behind him.

He stood before my desk and looked gloatingly at me: his tiny eyes red buttons of vicious hate.

Slowly, he began to undo his belt.

‘This, Cheapie, is the payoff...’

But by this time I had absorbed the shock of seeing him and I acted.

Had he walked in, his belt swinging, he would have nailed me, but he wanted to see me cringe.

I stood up, kicked away my chair, grabbed the pick-axe handle and hit him all in one swift movement.

I didn’t give a goddamn if I killed him. I hit him with all the strength of my two arms and with all the weight of my body. My viciousness matched his.

The pick-axe handle caught him on the side of his face. Two of his front teeth flew out and landed on my desk. Blood spurted from his nose. His jaw went slack and hung. He fell, his eyes rolling back and he lay in a crumpled, smelly heap on the floor.

I didn’t even pause to look at him. I came around the desk like a rampaging bull, the bloodstained pick-axe handle flaying.

His seven buddies scattered into the passage. I hit out right and left. I was demented with vicious rage. They ran, falling over each other to get down the stairs. I went after them, hammering their cowering backs to the second landing.

Then I paused while they continued pounding down the next flight, like the frightened rats they were.

Faces appeared at doorways. People gaped at me as I went up the stairs and back into the office.

I hated to touch him, but I wanted him out of here. I grabbed hold of his filthy, greasy hair and dragged his unconscious body along the passage and to the stairs. Then I booted him and he rolled over and over to land with a crash on the lower landing. He lay there, blood running from his nose: as broken as anyone could be broken.

I returned to the office, put the pick-axe handle in one of the closets, then called the cop house.

I asked for the Desk Sergeant.

‘This is Carr... remember me? Fifteen hundred bucks?’ I listened to his heavy breathing while be absorbed this information.

‘What’s on your mind this time?’ he finally asked.

‘Spooky looked in,’ I said. ‘He wanted to alter the shape of my face with his nail-studded belt. I had to get a little rough with him. I suggest you send an ambulance... he seems in urgent need of care and attention,’ and I hung up.

For a few moments I sat still, taking stock of myself. I looked at my hands, lying on the blotter. There was no shake. I felt completely relaxed as if I had had a good round of golf, and this puzzled me. The whole violent affair had taken two minutes. I had done something that, three weeks ago, even less, I would have thought impossible. I had faced eight thugs, maimed one and had driven the others away. And now it was over I felt no sense of shock. All I wanted was a cigarette which I lit. Then, knowing Jenny would be along in an hour or so I got some cleaning rags from the closet and cleaned up Spooky’s blood. As I was dropping the rags into the trash basket I heard an ambulance siren.

I didn’t bother to go out into the passage. I sat at my typewriter and continued to work on the card index.

After a while two cops came in.

‘What’s going on?’ one of them asked. ‘What’s all this about?’

Both of them were grinning and looked happy.

‘Spooky came here, got rough, so I got rough,’ I said.

‘Yeah... we’ve seen him. Come on, buddy, the Sarg wants to talk to you.’

As they drove me to the cop house they told me the latest ball scores they had heard over the radio. For cops, they were more than friendly.

I walked up to the Desk Sergeant, who was rolling his pencil, but this time, his heart didn’t seem to be in it.

He squinted at me with his pig eyes, sniffed, scratched under his right armpit, then said, ‘Let’s have it. What happened?’

‘I told you over the telephone, Sergeant,’ I said. ‘Spooky arrived with seven of his pals. He threatened me. I threw him out and his pals took off. That’s it.’

He studied me, pushed his cap to the back of his head and released a snorting grunt.

‘Just got the medical report,’ he said. ‘The punk has a bust jaw, a bust snout, eight teeth missing and he’s lucky to be alive.’ He peered at me. ‘What did you hit him with — a brick?’

‘In his hurry to leave, he fell down the stairs,’ I said woodenly.

He nodded.

‘Sort of fell over his feet, huh?’

‘Sort of.’

A long pause, then I said, ‘Have you seen his belt? It has sharpened nails. He was proposing to whip my face with it.’

He nodded again while he continued to regard me.

‘Should we cry over him, Sergeant?’ I went on. ‘If you think I should, I could send him some flowers... if you think I should.’

He began rolling his pencil again.

‘He could make a complaint... assault. We would have to investigate.’

‘Suppose we wait until he does?’

Again the pig eyes examined me, then he stopped rolling his pencil.

‘Yeah... that’s an idea.’ He looked past me and surveyed the empty charge room. For some reason or other no one at this moment was in trouble and we were alone. He leaned forward and said in his husky voice, ‘Every officer in this town has been wanting to do what you did to that sonofabitch.’ His raw beef of a face split into a wide, friendly grin. ‘But watch it, Mr. Carr. Spooky is like the elephant: he won’t forget.’

‘I have work to do,’ I said, still keeping my face wooden, but feeling an inward surge of triumph. ‘Can I get back to it?’

‘Oh, sure.’ He sat back and now his eyes were thoughtful. ‘A taxi driver reported he saw a motorbike go up in flames last night. Spooky’s bike. Would you know anything about it?’

‘Should I?’

He nodded.

‘That’s the correct answer, but don’t lean on it, Mr. Carr. We have to keep law and order in this town.’

‘When you can spare a minute, Sergeant,’ I said, ‘you might mention that to Spooky.’

We looked at each other and then I left.

When I got back to the office I found Jenny there. Of course she had heard all about it. This was something I couldn’t hope to keep quiet. She was white and shaking.

‘You could have killed him!’ she exclaimed. ‘What did you do to him?’

‘He got rough. I got rough.’ I went around the desk and sat down. ‘He had it coming. I’ve seen the police. They are as happy as kids at a party. So let’s forget Spooky.’

‘No!’ Anger I hadn’t expected ever to see jumped into her eyes. ‘You think you’re a hero, don’t you? You’re not! I know you destroyed his motorbike! You’ve broken his nose and his jaw! You’re as brutal and as vicious as he is! I can’t have you here! You’re spoiling everything I’m trying to do! I want you to go.’

I stared at her.

‘You’ll be telling me next you’re going to the hospital to hold his hand.’

‘There is no need to make a cheap remark. I want you to go!’

I began to get angry, but I controlled my temper.

‘Look, Jenny, you must face facts. Thugs like Spooky have to be treated like the animals they are,’ I said. ‘Suppose I had sat still and let him whip the flesh off my face with his belt. Would that have put me right with you?’

‘You nearly killed him! Don’t talk to me! Get up and go!’

‘Okay.’ I got to my feet and walked around the desk. ‘I’ll be at the hotel for a few more days.’ I reached the door, paused and looked at her. ‘Jenny, the trouble with nice people is they are seldom realistic. Spooky is a savage animal. Okay... go ahead and hold his hand if that’s the way you feel. Everyone is entitled to their way of thinking, but be careful. There is no animal yet born more dangerous and more savage than Spooky.’

‘I won’t listen to you!’ Her voice rose. ‘My uncle made a mistake sending you here! You are quite unsuitable for welfare work! You can’t nor ever will realise that people do react to kindness! I’ve worked here for two years and you have been here ten days. You...’

So then I let my temper have a free hand.

‘Wait!’ The snap in my voice startled her and cut her short. ‘What have you done with your kindness in two years? People don’t appreciate kindness! All they want from you is a meal ticket or a handout. They would accept a handout if you threw it at them! All these women who come pestering you are scroungers. Are you sure they aren’t laughing at you? This sector of yours has been terrorised by Spooky for years. Even the police couldn’t handle him. Well, I’ve handled him and maybe you’ll find I’ve done more for this sector of your town in ten days than you have done in two years!’

‘Go away!’

I saw I had hurt her, but I didn’t care. I had done something no one had had the guts to do in this miserable town: I had fixed Spooky Jinx and had fixed him good.

I left her and walked back to the Bendix Hotel.

On the way I became aware people didn’t edge away from me: some of them even smiled at me. News travels fast. A cop, resting his feet on the edge of the kerb, gave me a friendly wink.

I had suddenly become popular in Luceville, but I didn’t feel ten feet tall: Jenny had spoilt my triumph. I just couldn’t see how she could be so stupid.

I wondered what I was going to do. Maybe, in a day or so she would have cooled off and we could get together again. Paradise City seemed a long way off. I didn’t want to go back there — anyway just yet.

I found I was hungry so I went to Luigi’s restaurant. The two old waiters beamed on me. On my first visit they had ignored me. A fat, elderly man with food stains on his suit came over as I was eating. He said his name was Herb Lessing.

‘I run the Drug store around the corner. I wanted you to know I think you did a fine job, Mr. Carr. That bastard had it coming. Now, maybe I can rest at night.’ He paused, breathed over me, then added, ‘I reckon you’ve done a real service to this town.’

I wondered what Jenny would have said had she heard this. I nodded, thanked him and went on eating. He regarded me with open admiration and then returned to his table.

After lunch and because I couldn’t face the hotel and had nothing to do, I went to a movie. It didn’t hold me as I kept thinking of Jenny.

I walked back to the hotel, taking my time and went up to my room.

You’re as brutal and as vicious as he is!

I lit a cigarette, then laid on the bed and thought about what she had said.

I finally decided she could be right. Something must have happened to me. I recalled the demented rage that had seized hold of me as I had hit Spooky and then had turned on his buddies. Admittedly I had been provoked, but I knew, three months ago, I would never have acted like this. Was this demented outburst of rage due to the crash? Had one of my mental cogs been jogged out of place? Should I consult Dr. Melish? Then I decided I couldn’t be bothered. For the first time, since I had lost Judy, I felt an overpowering urge for a woman.

What the hell was happening to me? I asked myself. Maybe it would be an idea to visit the local whorehouse — in a town like Luceville, there must be a whorehouse. The reception clerk would know.

I looked at my watch: the time was 18.15. As I swung off the bed, I told myself I would have a woman, have a good dinner at the Plaza and then let tomorrow take care of itself.

As I was leaving the room the telephone bell rang. I didn’t know as I picked up the receiver this was to alter my whole way of life.

‘Mr. Carr? This is O’Halloran. Desk Sergeant, city police.’

I recognised the husky, worn-out voice.

‘Yes, Sergeant?’

‘Been trying to find you, then remembered you’re checked in at the Bendix.’

‘Yes?’ I was now very alert, all thoughts of having a woman gone, and I felt my belly muscles tighten. ‘Something wrong?’

‘Yeah... you could say that.’ He snorted, then went on, ‘Miss Baxter fell down stairs. She’s hospitalised.’

I felt my heart beat slow.

‘Is she badly hurt?’

‘Well, nothing serious, but bad.’ He paused to snort again, then went on, ‘Broken wrist, broken ankle, fractured collarbone... quite a fall.’

‘Where is she?’

‘City hospital. Thought you should know.’

‘Thanks,’ I said.

I heard a sound that puzzled me. Could he be rolling his pencil?

‘There was a trip wire at the head of the stairs,’ he said. ‘Off the record, I figure it was meant for you, but she fell over it.’

A smouldering fire of rage began inside me.

‘Is that right?’ I said and I hung up.

For a long moment I stared bleakly at the opposite wall. The trip wire was meant for me. With all her cockeyed ideas of kindness, Jenny had taken a fall that could have killed her.

I called the reception clerk, and asked him to connect me with the city hospital. When I got through, I asked if I could see Miss Baxter. Some nurse said not until tomorrow. Miss Baxter was under sedation. I thanked her and hung up.

It was getting dark now and the shadows were closing in. I walked from the hotel to Jenny’s office and climbed the six flights of stairs. The rage inside me grew and grew. I still had the key I had forgotten to give her when I had walked out. I unlocked the door, turned on the light, went to the closet and took out the pick-axe handle. I laid it down by the side of my desk, out of sight. All the other one-room offices in the building were closed: no lights showed except the light from my window. I hoped this would entice Spooky’s buddies to come up and take care of me. It was a bait I longed for them to take so I could get amongst them and do them damage, but they didn’t come.

I sat there, waiting until 23.30, then carrying the pick-axe handle, I shut the office and walked down to the street. I found a taxi and told the driver to take me to 10th Street.

When we arrived, I paid him off and waited until he had driven away. I walked down the street, which, at this hour, was deserted although the striptease clubs, and the cafés were doing business. I arrived outside Sam’s Cafe. Parked in a neat row were seven gleaming Honda motorcycles. The noise erupting from the café was deafening. Holding the pick-axe handle under my arm, ready for action, I took off the caps of the bikes. Then I turned the bikes on their sides so the gas spilled out.

A girl in a mini skirt and a boy with beads around his neck came out of the café. They stopped to stare at what I was doing.

‘Hi!’ The boy said weakly. ‘Leave those bikes alone!’

I ignored him. Stepping away, I lit a cigarette.

The girl let out a scream like the bleat of a sheep. The boy bolted into the café.

I moved back, then flicked the lighted cigarette into the pool of gasoline.

There was a bang, a blinding flash and then flames. The heat forced me to retreat across the road to the far sidewalk.

Seven youths in their dirty yellow shirts and their cat’s fur pants came spilling out of the café, but the heat brought them to a standstill. I watched. None of them had the guts to pull even one of the bikes out of the now roaring furnace. They just stood there, watching the Hondas, which were probably their only love, melt in the flames.

I waited, both hands gripping the pick-axe handle, willing them to come at me so I could smash them, but they didn’t. Like the stupid stinking sheep that they were, they stood, watching the destruction of the toys that had made them feel like men, and did nothing about it.

After five minutes I got bored and walked away.

Although Jenny in her bed of pain didn’t know it, I felt I had made the score even.

I slept dreamlessly until 08.10 when the telephone bell woke me.

I picked up the receiver.

‘Mr. Carr... there’s a police officer asking for you,’ the reception clerk said, reproach in his voice.

‘I’ll be down,’ I said. ‘Ask him to wait.’

I didn’t hurry. I shaved and showered and put on one of my expensive sports shirts and a pair of whipcord slacks, then I went down in the creaky elevator.

Sergeant O’Halloran, massive, in shirt sleeves with his cap at the back of his head, filled one of the bamboo chairs. He was smoking a cigar and reading the local newspaper.

I went over and sat by his side.

‘Morning, Sergeant,’ I said. ‘Have a coffee with me?’

He put down his newspaper and, folding it carefully, placed it on the floors.

‘I’m on duty in half an hour,’ he said in his husky worn-out voice, ‘but I thought I’d drop by. Never mind the coffee.’ He stared at me with his pig eyes that were ice cold and diamond hard. ‘There was a hell of a fire on 10th Street last night.’

‘Is that right?’ I stared back at him. ‘I haven’t seen the papers yet.’

‘Seven valuable motorbikes were destroyed.’

‘Someone put in a complaint?’

He crossed one thick leg over the other.

‘Not yet, but they could.’

‘Then of course you will have to investigate.’

He leaned forward and there was a touch of red in his pig eyes.

‘I’m getting worried about you, Carr. You are the coldest, most ruthless sonofabitch that has arrived in this town. Off the record, I’m telling you something: you pull one more trick like this and you’re in trouble. You nearly set the whole goddamn street on fire. It’s got to stop.’

I wasn’t intimidated.

‘Produce your witnesses, Sergeant, and I will then accept trouble, but not before. I’m not admitting anything, but it seems to me the police in this town can’t cope with bastards like Spooky Jinx and his kind, so I don’t see why you should set up a bleat when someone does.’ I got to my feet. ‘If you want a cup of coffee, join me. I do.’

He sat there, turning his half-smoked cigar around in his thick fingers as he stared at me.

‘I’m telling you... lay off. Just one more trick from you and you’re in the tank. You’re lucky I dig for Miss Baxter. She’s doing a swell job in this town. Maybe you think you’re levelling the score, but enough’s enough. I went along with what you did with Spooky. He had it coming, but this job last night I don’t dig for.’ He heaved himself to his feet and faced me. ‘I’m getting a feeling about you. I’m getting the idea you could be more tricky than this gang of stupid bastard kids. If I’m right, then you could be heading for trouble.’

‘You said that before,’ I said politely. ‘Did you say this was off the record?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Then still off the record, Sergeant, go get screwed.’

I walked across the dreary lobby into the even more dreary breakfast room. I drank a cup of bad coffee, smoked and read the local rag. The picture of the seven moronic looking youths, wet-eyed and mourning their vanished Hondas, gave me a feeling of intense satisfaction.

Around 10.00 I left the hotel and walked to the only florist in the town. I bought a bunch of red roses, then walked to the city hospital. On the way, I met people who smiled at me and I smiled back.

Eventually, after a long wait, I arrived at Jenny’s bedside. She was looking pale and her long hair was done in plaits and lay either side of her shoulders.

A nurse fussed around with a vase for the flowers and then went away. While she was fussing I looked down at Jenny, feeling ten feet tall. She wasn’t to know that I had evened the score. I had not only fixed Spooky but I had now dismounted his seven moronic buddies: dismounting them, destroying their Hondas was, to them, having their genitals cut off.

‘Hi, Jenny, how goes it?’ I asked.

She smiled ruefully.

‘I didn’t expect to see you. After the way I talked to you I thought we were through.’

I pulled up a chair and sat down.

‘You don’t get rid of me that easily. Forget it. How do you feel?’

‘I can’t forget it. I’m sorry I said you didn’t know kindness. I was angry, and I guess some women, when they are angry, say things they don’t always mean. Thank you for the roses... they’re lovely.’

I wondered what she would think when she heard about the seven destroyed Hondas.

‘Forget it,’ I said. ‘You haven’t told me how you feel.’

She made a little grimace.

‘Oh, all right. The doctor says I’ll be around again in three or four weeks.’

‘They fixed that trip wire for me. I’m sorry you had to walk into it.’

There was a long pause as we looked at each other.

‘Larry... if you feel you can, you could be helpful,’ she said. ‘You don’t have to worry about the office: that’s been taken care of. The City Hall has sent a replacement, but there is a special case... would you handle it for me?’

A special case.

I should have told her I was through with this welfare racket. I should have told her the racket was strictly for suckers, but my destiny nudged me.

‘Sure. What is it?’

‘Tomorrow, at eleven o’clock, a woman is being released from prison. I’ve been visiting her. I made her a promise.’ Jenny paused to look at me. ‘I hope you will understand, Larry, that to people in prison, a promise means a lot. I promised her I would meet her when she came out and I would drive her home. She has been in prison for four years. This will be her first experience of liberty, and I just don’t want to let her down. If I’m not there... if nobody is there, it could undo all the work I’ve done on her so would you meet her, tell her what’s happened to me and why I couldn’t keep my promise, be nice to her and take her to her home?’

Jesus! I thought, how can anyone be so simple minded! A woman who has been locked up in a tough prison for four years just had to be tougher than steel. Like all the other women who scrounged on Jenny, this woman was taking her for a ride, but because it was due to me that Jenny had a broken ankle, a broken wrist and a fractured collarbone, I decided I would go along with her.

‘That’s no problem, Jenny. Of course I’ll be there.’

I got her warm, friendly smile.

‘Thank you, Larry... you’ll be doing a real kindness.’

‘So how do I know her?’

‘She will be the only one released at eleven o’clock. She has red hair.’

‘That makes it easy. Why is she in prison... or shouldn’t I ask?’

‘No, you shouldn’t ask. It doesn’t matter, does it? She’s served her sentence...’

‘Yes. So where do I take her?’

‘She has a place off Highway 3. Her brother lives there. She’ll give you directions.’

The nurse came fussing in and said Jenny must rest. She was probably right. Jenny looked drained out.

‘Don’t worry about anything.’ I got to my feet. ‘I’ll be there at eleven o’clock. You haven’t told me her name.’

‘Rhea Morgan.’

‘Okay. I’ll see you tomorrow afternoon and tell you how it went.’

The nurse shooed me out.

As I walked away from the hospital, I realised I had most of the day ahead of me with nothing to do. Although I didn’t know it then, by tomorrow at eleven o’clock, when I met Rhea Morgan, the scene would change.

At 11.04 the grille guarding the entrance to the Women’s House of Correction swung open and Rhea Morgan walked into the pale sunshine that struggled with the smog and the cement dust.

I had been sitting in the Buick which I had had fixed, for some twenty minutes and seeing her, I nicked away my cigarette, got out of the car and went over to her.

It is difficult to give a description of this woman except to say she had thick hair, the colour of a ripe chestnut and she was tall, slim and dressed in a shabby black dustcoat, dark blue slacks and her shoes were dusty and scuffed. There are beautiful women, pretty women and attractive women, but Rhea Morgan didn’t fall into any of these categories. She was strictly Rhea Morgan. She had good features: a good figure, long legs and square shoulders. Her extraordinary deep green eyes made an impact on me. They were big eyes, and they regarded the world with suspicion, cynical amusement blatant sexuality. This was a woman who had done everything. As we regarded each other, I had a feeling she was years older in experience than I was.

‘I’m Larry Carr,’ I said. ‘Jenny is in hospital. She’s had an accident. She asked me to fill in for her.’

She regarded me. Her eyes took off my clothes and studied my naked body. This was something I had never experienced before. I reacted to her slow examination as any man would react.

‘Okay.’ She looked at the Buick. ‘Let’s get out of here. Give me a cigarette.’

She had a low, husky voice as deadpan as her green eyes.

As I offered my pack of cigarettes, I said, ‘Don’t you want to know how badly hurt Jenny is?’

‘Give me a light.’

Anger surged up in me as I lit her cigarette.

‘Did you hear what I said?’

She dragged smoke down into her lungs and expelled it, letting it drift down her thin nostrils and out of her hard mouth.

‘Is she?’

The indifference in her voice told me as nothing else could tell me what a sucker Jenny was.

‘A broken ankle, a broken wrist and a fractured collarbone,’ I said.

She took another drag at the cigarette.

‘Do we have to stick around here? I want to go home. That’s your job, isn’t it... to take me home?’

She moved around me and walked to the Buick, opened the offside door, slid in and slammed the door shut.

Cold rage gripped me. I jerked open the car door.

‘Come on out, you bitch!’ I yelled at her. ‘You can walk! I’m not a sucker like Jenny! Come on out, or I’ll drag you out!’

She took another drag at the cigarette as she eyed me.

‘I didn’t think you were. Don’t get your bowels in an uproar. I pay off. Take me home and I’ll pay the fare.’

We looked at each other. Then this sexual urge I had had the previous evening took hold of me. It was as much as I could do to restrain the urge to drag her out of the car and lay her on the dirty, cement-dusty road.

The emerald eyes were now pools of promise.

I slammed the door shut, walked around the car and got in under the steering wheel.

I drove fast down to Highway 3.

While I waited to edge the car into the fast traffic at the intersection, she said, ‘How come you got mixed up with that little dope? You seem to talk my language.’

‘Just keep your mouth shut. The more I hear from you the less I like you.’

She laughed.

‘Man! You really are my thing!’

She dropped questing fingers on my lap. I threw her hand off.

‘Shut up and stay still or you’ll walk,’ I snarled at her.

‘Okay. Give me another cigarette.’

I flicked my pack at her and started along the highway. Five minutes of fast driving brought us past the Plaza restaurant.

‘So that still exists,’ she said.

I suddenly realised this woman had been locked away for four years. This thought gave me a jolt. I eased up on the gas pedal.

‘Where do I take you?’ I asked, not looking at her.

‘A mile ahead and the first sign post to your left.’

Following her directions, a mile ahead, I swung the car off the highway and on to a dirt road.

I glanced at her from time to time. She sat away from me, smoking, staring through the windshield: in profile, her face looked as if it had been cut out of marble: as cold and as hard.

I thought of what she had said: I’ll pay for my fare. Did she mean what I thought she meant? My desire for sex sent wave after wave of hot blood through me. I couldn’t remember ever having this violent feeling before and it shook me.

‘How much further?’ I asked huskily.

‘Turn left at the end of the road and there we are,’ she said and flicked the butt of her cigarette out of the open window.

It was another mile up the road, then I turned left. A narrow lane faced me and I slowed the Buick.

Ahead of me I could see a clapboard bungalow that looked lost, broken and sordid.

‘Is this your home?’

‘That’s it.’

I pulled up and regarded the building. To me, there could be no worse place in which to live. Tangled weeds, some of them five feet high surrounded the bungalow. The fencing had gone, smothered in weeds; several oil drums, empty food cans and bits of paper lay scattered around the approach to the bungalow.

‘Come on!’ she said impatiently. ‘What are you gaping at?’

‘Is this really your home?’

She lit another cigarette.

‘My stupid punk of a father lived here. This is all he left us,’ she said. ‘Why should you care? If you don’t want to go further, I can walk the rest of the way.’

‘Us? Who is us?’

‘My brother and me.’ She opened the car door and slid out. ‘So long, Mr. Do-gooder. Thanks for the ride,’ and she started over the rough, debris strewn ground with long, quick strides.

I waited until she had reached the front door, then set the car in motion, pulled up when the road petered out and leaving the car, walked up to the bungalow.

The front door stood open. I looked into the tiny lobby. A door to my left stood open.

I heard a man say, ‘Jesus! So you’re back!’

A wave of cold, bitter frustration ran through me. I’ll pay my fare, had been a con.

I moved forward, and Rhea, hearing me, turned.

We stared at each other.

‘You want something?’ she asked.

A man appeared. He had to be her brother: tall, powerfully built with the same thick chestnut-coloured hair, a square-shaped face, green eyes. He was in something that looked like a dirty sack and soiled jeans. He would be some years younger than she: twenty-four, probably less.

‘Who’s this?’

‘I’m Larry Carr,’ I said. ‘A welfare worker.’

We regarded each other and I began to hate him as he gave a sneering little chortle.

‘The things that go with you,’ he said to Rhea. ‘Maggots out of cheese... now a welfare worker!’

‘Oh, shut up!’ she snapped. ‘He’s a do-gooder. Any food in this stinking place?’

I looked from one to the other. They were right out of my world. My mind flashed back to Paradise City with its fat, rich old women and their dogs, Sydney, buzzing and fluttering, the clean, sexy looking kids in their way-out gear, and yet this sordid scene had a fascination for me.

‘How about having a wash?’ I said. ‘I’ll buy you both a meal.’

The man shoved Rhea aside and moved up to me.

‘You think I need a wash?’

Then I really hated him.

‘Sure you certainly do... you stink.’

Watching, Rhea laughed and moved between us.

‘He’s my thing, Fel. Leave him alone.’

Over her shoulder, the man glared at me, his green eyes glittering. I waited for his first move. I felt the urge to hit him. He might have seen this in my expression for he turned and walked across the shabby, dirty room, pushed open a door and disappeared.

‘Some homecoming,’ I said. ‘Do you want me to buy you a meal?’

She studied me. Her emerald-green eyes were jeering.

‘Man! Don’t you want it!’ she said. ‘When you have me, it’ll cost you more than a meal.’

This was a challenge and a promise and I grinned at her.

‘I’m at the Bendix Hotel... anytime,’ I said and walked out of the bungalow and to my car.

Sooner or later, I told myself, we would come together: it would be an experience worth waiting for.

I drove back to Luceville, had lunch at Luigi’s, then bought a bunch of grapes and went to the hospital.

Jenny was looking brighter. She smiled eagerly as I sat on the hard backed chair by her bedside.

‘How did it go?’ she asked, after thanking me for the grapes.

I gave her an edited version of my meeting with Rhea Morgan. I said I had met her, and driven her to her home and had left her there. I said her brother seemed tricky and hadn’t welcomed me.

But Jenny wasn’t that easy to fool. She looked searchingly at me.

‘What do you think of her, Larry?’

I shrugged.

‘Tough.’ I tried to give the impression that as far as I was concerned, Rhea meant nothing to me. ‘I told her you had an accident and I was filling in.’

She smiled her warm smile.

‘She didn’t care, did she?’

‘No... she didn’t care.’

‘You’re still not right, Larry. People do react to kindness.’

‘She doesn’t.’

‘Yes, that’s right, but a lot of people do, but of course, some don’t. She is a difficult case.’

‘You can say that again.’

A long pause as we looked at each other, then she said, ‘What are you going to do? You won’t stay on here, will you?’

‘Tell me something. You’ve been in hospital now for two days. How many visitors have you had, apart from me?’

It was a rotten thing to ask, but I wanted to know.

‘Just you, Larry. No one else,’ and again she smiled.

‘So all the old women who pester you for handouts haven’t been to see you?’

‘You’re not proving anything, Larry. You don’t understand. They are all very poor, and it is a tradition that when you go to a hospital you bring something. They haven’t anything to bring, so they stay away.’

I nodded.

‘Thanks for explaining it.’

She asked suddenly, ‘How’s your problem, Larry?’

‘Problem?’ For a brief moment I didn’t know what she meant, then I remembered I was supposed to have a problem, that I was grieving over the loss of Judy, that I had been in a car crash, that I couldn’t concentrate on my work and her uncle had advised a change of scene. For the past two days, I hadn’t even thought of this problem.

‘I think the problem is lost,’ I said.

‘I thought so.’ She regarded me. ‘Then you had better go back. This town isn’t your neck of the woods.’

I thought of Rhea.

‘I’ll stick around a little longer. Anything I can bring you tomorrow?’

‘You’re being an angel, Larry. Thank you. I’d love something to read.’

I bought a copy of Elia Kazan’s The Arrangement, and had it sent to her room. I thought this book was about her weight.