In a Small Motel

5

She saw Don look over her shoulders into Johnny’s eyes. He bit his lip and she realized, with complete terror, that he was actually able to consider it as a possible course of action, even as Johnny had been able to suggest it. Terror was like a veil in front of her eyes, distorting Don’s face, filming it. It was misty and only the shrewd eyes were clear. At last Don shook his head. “Too risky, Benton. Too many questions. We’ve got to make her partly responsible, so she can’t talk about it.”

“Suggestions?”

“Let me think. Damn it, let me think!”

“It’s so perfect, Ferris,” Johnny said regretfully. “Perfect, all except for Ginny and her big mouth. Stash all that money and use it a little at a time. I know where it would be safe to get rid of the new stuff.”

“Can’t you shut up!” Don yelled.

“Keep yelling and you blow the whole thing.”

“I’m sorry.”

“I’m getting an idea. We got to move fast. Knock him out while I’m thinking, Ferris.”

Don looked at Johnny sharply. “What’s the idea?”

“Do like I tell you. Then we’ll bring the car around.”

“Walk him out. That’s safer.”

“Do like I tell you, Ferris. This will work out all right.”

She saw Don turn and look at the sleeping man. She saw Don go into the small bathroom and come out at once, wrapping a hand towel around his fist. He licked his lips uneasily as he went up to the sleeping man. He hesitated.

“Go ahead,” Johnny ordered.

Don had his back to them. Ginny felt Johnny brush aside her hair with his chin and kiss the side of her neck. Both his hands were busy holding her. The callousness of it made her shudder. She tried to bite the palm of his hand, but her teeth could get no purchase on the calloused skin. She saw Don step forward and grasp the hair of the sleeping man, tilt the head back sharply and strike at the jaw with his padded fist. It was a vicious blow and she knew that the scene was implanted so deeply in her mind I that she would never forget it.

Brown did not fall. He looked shocked and dazed. He raised his hands slowly. Don Ferris drew the padded fist back again.

Johnny spun her away from him and said in a conversational voice that sounded loud in the room. “Okay, Mr. Ferris.”

Don turned slowly, releasing Brown’s thin dark hair. He took a step toward Johnny. Ginny, sidling toward the door, saw Johnny pull the stubby revolver out of his pocket, saw Don stop suddenly, midway in his second step.

She saw Don’s eyes turn toward her. His voice was thin. “Ginny! He’s decided to take all of it! Ginny!”

Johnny backed quickly so he could watch both Don and Ginny. He gave her a slow grin and he kept the revolver pointed at Don. “Kid, go phone the police in town. Talk to Tom Heron if you can.”

The towel dropped from Don’s fist to the floor. He straightened up. “Wait a second, Ginny. Okay, Johnny. I see your point. It would have been too risky. Look. He’s too far gone to even remember what the total was. So let’s do this. Grab a few bundles. Not too much. Twenty, thirty thousand. Nobody will possibly know the difference. He’s too crazy to make sense. Use your head, Johnny. And what harm would that do, Ginny? What harm? Come on!”

He reached his hands out, palms upward, half pleading.

“Come back as soon as you phone, Ginny,” Johnny said softly.

She left. She half ran down the concrete to the office. The line wasn’t in use. Tom Heron was at the station. “This is Mrs. Scott Mallory at Belle View Courts on Seventeen. Johnny Benton is holding a man here for you. He’s the one who — took all that money in Boston.”

She heard a distant startled, metallic gasp, heard Heron say, “Right out. Ten minutes.” Fifteen miles, she thought, and maybe they would make it in ten minutes.

She walked reluctantly back to the room. Events, moving so quickly, seemed to have taken her beyond the ability for logical thought. The door to the room was still open. She looked through the screen. The suitcase was on the floor now. Mr. Brown lay on the bed. He was holding a wet towel against his jaw, and his open eyes stared mildly up at the ceiling. Don stood on one foot, the other foot on the chair where Brown had sat. Johnny was lighting a cigarette. The gun was not in sight. As she went in he held the match flame and gave her a cigarette. She leaned close to take the light, looking at the flame, then glancing up at his eyes.

Don looked at her as she turned away from Johnny. Don looked familiar again, his eyes quick and humorous. “Well, it was a thought,” he said.

Ginny could not look into his eyes. She turned her back to both of them.

“What’s the matter, darling?” Don asked. His voice was easy.

She hunched her shoulders as though she were very cold. She could not answer him. The long slow minutes went by. Cars came from the south at high speed, slowed and turned in, slewing on the gravel. She was glad there were no sirens.

Don said quickly to Johnny, “Don’t think you’ve got anything, Benton. Anything you can use.”

“I don’t,” Johnny said in his deep voice. “Hell, you’re a lawyer, aren’t you?”

They had gone. The sedans and the money and Mr. Brown. And Don Ferris had gone, leaving number fifteen empty again.

She stood in the night, arms folded tightly, and she saw the floodlights of the gas station wink out. The night was much darker than before. By the time her eyes had adjusted, Johnny was coming slowly across the highway. He came up to her, tall and slow. He stood by her.

“It wasn’t a good thing to do, Ginny,” he said slowly. “I guess you know why.”

“I guess I do.”

“Ginny, once when I was a little kid and I was sick, the thermometer got dropped and it busted, and they put the mercury in a little dish. Damnedest stuffy Hold it in your hand and give it half a chance and it would run right out between your fingers. Pretty stuff, but tricky.”

“Johnny, I don’t want to—”

“You’ve got to listen to it. He’s like that. Coming up here all the time. Nothing you can really put your finger on. Then I see him looking at all that money. Looking at it in a special way. I could tell the way he was thinking. So I had to give him a little chance. Like tilting the dish and watching that mercury run. You see, I was afraid he was going to take you away from here. I wanted to give you a real good look at what I figured Ferris was, all along.”

“I... can’t ever forget the way he—”

“I know. Funny thing. I found out I’m no saint either.”

“How do you mean that?”

“For just a minute there. I don’t know. Gun in my hand and all that dough. Just had a sudden crazy feeling about grabbing it and running.”

“You wouldn’t have,” she said firmly.

“Glad you think so, kid.” His voice sounded amused.

She turned toward him.

“Johnny?”

“Yes?”

“You didn’t want him to take me away from here.”

She sensed the way he suddenly became awkward with shyness. “Yes, but I can’t say anything yet. Not so soon. It isn’t right to speak up so soon. Scotty and I, we... well, you know what I mean.”

“I know what you mean, Johnny.”

She went into the office for a moment and turned on the big sign: Belle View Courts. Vacancy. She went back out and stood beside him in the soft Georgia night, and they waited together for a night traveler, for tired headlights coming down the long straight road.