Heaven Ran Last

Chapter IV

The next morning the idea came to me. It didn’t come in pieces, one at a time, but suddenly it was right there in my mind, all put together, neat and perfect.

I was shaving when it hit me and I must have stood there looking at myself for a couple of minutes, with my razor in my hand and the lather drying on my face.

It looked so perfect I was afraid of it. I turned it around and around and I couldn’t see a flaw anywhere. I was so excited that my hands started shaking, because this would do it. No slip-ups and no risks. I don’t know where it came from, the idea I mean, but there it was, a perfect way to get rid of him and leave Alice and I in the clear.

I finished shaving in a hurry and dressed and went downstairs for breakfast. I went into the lobby restaurant, a cheerful room with light-wood paneling, brown linoleum on the floor and flowers on the tables.

I sat down at a table in the corner and a girl I knew, a kid named Marie, came over to get my order. She worked there as a waitress and she was a cute twist. I had taken her out a few times a long while ago.

I told her what I wanted and she went away with the order. I sat there, smoking, turning over all the angles of this idea of mine.

Marie brought my orange juice, and right then another idea clicked in my mind. I was going to need a girl when things broke. I had to have a cover-up, so no copper would connect me with Alice and get any funny ideas. Right here with my orange juice was the girl I could use.

She had started away, but I said, “Hey, wait a minute.” She came back. “What’s the matter, Johnny?”

“Can’t you say hello to an old friend? Here I am, all tired out and I don’t even get a cheery hello from an old pal.”

“You all tired out? That’s hot. It’s eleven o’clock and I’ll bet you just got up. I know guys that have been working three or four hours already this morning.”

She was smiling and so was I. “I had a bad night, Marie. I was up all night with a sick friend’s wife.”

“You haven’t changed any then.”

“Cut it out. You know I’m not that type.”

“You have changed then.”

She was kidding and she kept smiling. She was what I needed all right.

She was little, with nice slim arms and legs and a tiny waist. She had blonde hair curled close to her head and she always looked clean and fresh. There wasn’t anything bright about her — she even looked dumb in a nice way, with bright, baby-blue eyes, a snub nose and a red little mouth she kept half open most of the time. But, like most girls, she was smart about guys.

She was the kind of girl who would let you do about anything you wanted if you were going to marry her, and if she thought it would help the deal along. But if you just wanted a good time you couldn’t get near her.

That’s why I’d stopped taking her out. She hadn’t been mad about it, she knew the kind of a guy I was and she knew she wasn’t losing anything when I stopped coming around.

Now I needed her for this idea of mine, and suddenly I knew it was going to work.

“Look, honey,” I said. “How about looking the town over tonight with me?”

She smiled, an uncertain, almost cautious smile. “What’s all this? You think I’ve changed about things?”

“What things?”

“Oh, you know.” Her smile widened a little. “What’s the matter? All your other girls getting married?”

“All my girls? Thanks for the compliment, but I’m living like a monk. Well, how about it?”

She laughed a little and made a few more cracks but finally she said okay. I told her I’d pick her up at six-thirty and she said that would be fine. She was through at six and she needed a half hour to change and get cleaned up.

I made the date to pick her up at the restaurant because I didn’t want to drive out to where she lived.

She brought the rest of my food and stood around while I ate, kidding with me. I left her a half buck tip and stood up to go.

She said, “Six-thirty, right here?”

“Right here, honey.” I patted her on the shoulder and went back up to my room.

I felt wonderful. The first step of the idea was already working. I called Alice’s office and gave the operator her local number. In a few seconds she was on the phone.

“Don’t use my name,” I said. “But I’ve got to see you at noon.”

There was a little pause. Then she said, “He was pretty bad last night. I don’t know—”

“Get over here. This is important. It’s about what we talked about last night.”

“...All right.”

“Good. See you at one.”

I hung up and put the phone back in place. It was eleven-thirty and I had some work to do so I got at it. I checked over my bets and found out I was way ahead. The favorites all ran out and that’s always good for a bookie. He naturally takes a lot of bets on the favorites, and when they don’t show, it’s money in his pocket. Not heavy dough, but it all adds up.

I put in a few calls and took a few bets by twelve-thirty. Then I took a shower because it was another one of those humid days and my shirt was stuck to my back. After that I sat around and waited for Alice.

She was on time. At one o’clock, or just a few minutes after, she knocked and I opened the door.

She had the same scared look I’d noticed the day before.

I kissed her and then I held her away from me and looked into her eyes.

“Changed your mind about anything?” I said.

“No, Johnny, I haven’t changed my mind.” She sat down in the big chair, put her head back and closed her eyes. She was wearing a blue silk dress with white shoes, and her hair looked blacker than I’d ever seen it before. She looked beautiful, but she looked tired, too.

I sat down on the arm of the chair and put my hand on her shoulder.

“Matter, baby?”

“Last night was terrible, Johnny. I didn’t get home until almost eleven-thirty. The el was a local and it seemed to take forever to get out there. He was waiting for me. He called the office about nine and didn’t get any answer. He wanted to know who I was out with and what kind of a sucker I thought he was, and all the while he was walking up and down the room and swinging his arms around like a maniac. When I finally got to bed he came in and said I was going to start acting like a wife or he’d know the reason why.”

I began to get cold and tight all over. “And you did, I suppose?”

“What else could I do? Oh, I detest him, Johnny!”

She started to cry. Her expression didn’t change at all, but the tears kept running down her cheeks, making muddy little tracks in her make-up. It was terrible to watch.

I took both of her hands and held them close to my face and kissed them. “Baby, baby, don’t cry. I know it’s hell but it’s not going to last much longer. I’ve got it all figured out now.”

She kept crying but she opened her eyes and looked at me. Even with the tears I could see they were shining a little, the way they did when she wanted something bad. She didn’t say anything, just looked at me with those shiny eyes and finally she stopped crying and waited for me to talk.

“Now, listen,” I said. “We don’t have much time and you’ve got to get all of this straight the first time. I don’t know what you were thinking when you said we had to get rid of him. If you had an idea about killing him... well, that’s out. We couldn’t get away with that in a million years. I know cops and I know how they work. When a husband is killed the first person they check is the wife. They check to see if she had any reason for killing him, and they look hard to see if she’s been cheating on him. You see, they know ninety-nine times out of a hundred if a wife is cheating on her husband, and the husband gets killed, that the wife and her boy friend are the ones who did it.

“If we did anything crazy like that, here’s what they do. They’d go over your life with a fine-tooth comb. They’d talk to every friend you’ve got, to the neighbors, to the girl who gives you permanents, to the place you buy your food. Pretty soon they’d know more about you than you do yourself. They’d know where you spent your time, what size shoes you wear, and how many spoons of sugar you use in your coffee. And while they were learning all that they’d find out about us.

“When they had all that, they’d know about my part in your life. We’ve covered up pretty well but not that good. They’d find out you went on your vacation to New York last year with me, and they’d find out about that lodge in Wisconsin where we spent those week-ends. They’d come across people who’d say, ‘Yeah, I remember her. She was with a guy,’ and they’d find desk clerks who remember what I looked like. And pretty soon they’d have me. And, baby, when they had that much on us, we’d be through. One slip, one mistake and they’d tear us apart. No two people in the world are strong enough to fight a thing like that. They’d show you a confession with my name on it, blaming you for everything. And they’d be showing me the same. They’d type the confessions and get our signatures by having us sign our names on what looked like a blank piece of paper. They’d offer you an easy deal if you’d talk and they’d do the same for me. We wouldn’t see each other. All we’d know is what we were told and pretty soon we’d split wide open.”

I stopped there and lit cigarettes for both of us.

“They couldn’t tear us apart,” she said.

I said, “They aren’t going to get the chance. Here’s what we’re going to do. Frank suspects you of running around with some guy while he was away. He’s got a gun. He’s half out of his head. Okay, that’s number one. Here’s number two. Your boss, Lesser, has had a yen for you for a long time. All you have to do is wiggle a hip at him and he’d follow you anywhere.

“Now we’re going to make those two things do the job for us. We’ll steam Frank up even worse than he is, and we’ll steam Lesser up, too.

“Then we’ll fix it so Frank learns about Lesser and catches him with you. Do you see it? Can you guess what Frank’s going to do when he catches Lesser in a spot like that?”

Her eyes were beginning to shine with a hot light. “He’s going to go wild.”

“Right. He’s even going to do more than that. He’ll blow Lesser’s head off. Right then he’s hooked. The unwritten law won’t help him the way juries are these days. It’ll still be murder. He’ll go up for a long trip and we’ll be way out in the clear. Don’t you see how perfect it is, baby?”

She leaned her head wearily against my arm. “If you say it’s all right — it must be, Johnny.” She closed her eyes and drew a long tired breath. “I don’t care how we do it, but please make it fast. I can’t stand this much longer.”

“We can’t rush it,” I told her. “I’ve got a lot of details to work out yet, but I’ll get it done. It’s really as simple as sin, baby. It’s got to happen in your apartment. You’ve got to arrange for Lesser to see you some night. I’ll help all I can, but mainly it’s your job. I’ll be the one to figure out a way to get Frank out of the apartment, yet still bring him back in time to catch Lesser with you.”

I couldn’t see how it would miss. The perfect part was how the cops would have a clean-cut case against Frank and they wouldn’t go snooping into Alice’s life. If they didn’t look they wouldn’t find me. But I wasn’t taking any chances. I was coppering every bet, no matter how small it was. That’s why I’d made the date with the blonde for that night. I was going to see her a lot before the blow-off, so if anything did go wrong and the cops started hunting around, looking for a frame, they wouldn’t connect me with it. They wouldn’t find Johnny Ford, an unattached guy. They would find Johnny Ford, who had a steady girl — a girl he might even be getting ready to marry. That would be a cinch to keep them from connecting me with Alice.

Alice was rubbing her cheek slowly against my sleeve. She said, “What do I do first, Johnny?” Her voice was perfectly steady.

“First, work on Lesser,” I said. “Have a drink with him a couple of nights after work and give him the idea you think he’s pretty hot stuff. Hint around that you’d like him to come up some night, if it wasn’t for your husband. He’ll believe you because that’s what he wants to believe. Then, after that’s going pretty well, start working on Frank. You don’t have to do much there but give him the idea you’re afraid of something. Afraid of something he might find out. Be nice to him sometimes, real nice. Make him a swell dinner and stuff like that, then come home late the next night. See? Make him think you’re being nice just to cover up what’s going on.”

She nodded. “I can do all that. But when will I see you?”

“You’re not going to see me,” I said. “We can’t take any more chances. When I get everything else figured out I’ll call you at the office. Until then, just do what I’ve told you. After that’s all set we’ll fix things to bring them together. But remember this, baby. This isn’t a two-dollar bet we’re making. The whole bank roll is going and we aren’t going to let one thing slip. We’ve got a life-time ahead of us. We aren’t going to spend it in jail.”

She pulled my head down and kissed me on the mouth.

“I wish it was all over, Johnny. I want to be with you all the time. I hate being afraid. I hate being with him and I hate being away from you, not even knowing where you are or what you’re doing.”

“It won’t be too long, baby,” I said. “The important thing is to do this right. Just hang on tight a little while longer.”

I kissed her then and I felt her lips opening under mine, soft and warm. I drew closer to her and we stayed together that way a long while without talking. When I moved away and looked at her I could see her eyes shining.

“How soon do you have to be back at the office?”

“There’s time, Johnny. There’s time.”