Judge Me Not

Chapter Seven

Morning sun was slanting into the small window and Barbara Heddon was shaking him awake.

“Teed! Someone at the door. Wake up, Teed!”

He crawled across her, snatched his trousers off the floor, pulled them on. He shook his head hard, grinned at her. “Don’t get up. I’ll chase them away.”

“I think I better get dressed.”

The hard knocking came again, and a man’s voice called, “Open up, Morrow!”

“Coming, coming,” he bellowed angrily.

He flung the door open. The pasty cop named Harry stood there, perennial match stick in his mouth, hat shoved back. Behind him was a gaunt, hard-shouldered, rock-faced man with dull eyes and a gold tooth.

“What do you want?”

“We come with your mail, Morrow,” Harry said. “See, in the mail you get a warrant. Search warrant. And we’re taking you in for a couple questions. I’m Detective Pilcher and this here is Detective Boyd, and that guy getting out of the car with the big black case is named Broznahan and he’s from the lab. You alone?”

“There’s a lady here. A guest.”

The match slid over to the other corner of his mouth. “Now aren’t you the one! Great entertainer, aren’t you?”

“Why the search warrant?”

“We got a hot tip, Morrow. We got a hot tip that you been tipping over the Mayor’s wife up here in your camp.” He nudged Boyd. “Get the joke. Tip. Tipping?”

Broznahan had thick glasses and a thin sharp oversized nose. Teed heard a sound behind him and turned in time to get a glimpse of Barbara, clad only in the wool shirt, scurrying into the bathroom, her clothes over her arm.

Teed stopped blocking the doorway and the three men went in. “What are you after?” Teed asked.

“Oh,” said Harry Pilcher, “just a little evidence that Mrs. Carboy was here, say Monday night.”

“I thought she was killed Monday night.”

“Gee, you catch on real quick.”

“Am I supposed to be charged with murdering her?”

“Did we say that? We just want a little chat with you, that’s all. You know, sit around and chat and giggle and scratch ourselves.”

Broznahan went to work in the kitchen. With his powder and brushes and lense and camera and tape, he was a busy little man.

“Why don’t you take this delightful opportunity to put on your city suit, Morrow?” Pilcher asked.

Teed shrugged. He got his clothes from the closet and put them on in the bedroom. Barbara’s purse was still there. He took the five twenties back out of it and put them in his wallet. He was back out, completely dressed, a few seconds before Barbara came hesitantly out of the bathroom.

Both the detectives stared at her. Boyd snapped his big fingers. “Wait! Don’t tell me. Hell, you’re on Marie Gonzales’ list! I see you once in the line-up.”

“You paying for it now?” Pilcher asked Teed incredulously.

“Clever of you to figure it out, Sergeant,” Barbara said acidly to Boyd. Her face had hardened and her voice had gone thin and flat.

Boyd sauntered closer to her and fingered her breast roughly. “You know, I was wondering were those real.”

Barbara neither flinched nor moved away. “Now you know, Sergeant. So take your hand away.”

“How about a quickie, baby?” Boyd said earnestly.

“Cut it out!” Teed said, anger filling his throat.

Boyd stared at him. “Hell, your time’s up, ain’t it?” He turned back to Barbara. “Right in that room there. Come on. What’s the fee?”

“I told you...” Teed said.

“Please, Teed. I can handle this.”

There was a look of warning in Barbara’s eyes. She smiled at Boyd. “Sergeant, I like you. You’re so direct and so manly. I’ll make you a special price, just because I like you.”

“How much?” Boyd said, reaching for his wallet.

“I like you so much, it will cost you five thousand dollars.”

Boyd froze with his hand on his wallet. Then he whipped his arm around and hit her over the ear with the heel of his hand. She bounced off the wall beside the bathroom door and landed on her hands and knees.

Teed reached Boyd in one step, swinging as he stepped, swinging as Boyd turned blindly into the blow and caught Teed’s fist flush on the nose. Teed felt the cartilage and bone go under his knuckles. He chopped hard with his right, followed the reeling man back to the wall, hooked with his left to a belly that felt as hard as a board fence. Boyd doubled and as Teed moved back to measure him for the blow that would knock him down, there was a soft thud against the back of his head. It did not feel like a violent blow, but the vibration shuddered in his brain and turned his knees to water. He felt as though it were taking him forever to turn around. Barbara swept by in the range of his vision, just getting to her feet. There was a dance of steps behind him and another of those soft thuds. This time his legs folded and he went down onto his knees. He waved his arms like a man on a tightrope and got one foot under him again, came back up onto both feet, feeling as though he stood at a dizzy height.

Boyd came toward him, both big fists held low, chin on chest, blood patterning the white shirt. His eyes were squinted almost shut.

“Now, don’t mark him! Don’t mark him!” a far-off voice yelled.

Boyd hit him under the heart. It was like being hit with a slow sledge. Boyd had swung from close to the floor and the blow lifted both Teed’s feet off the floor. He sat on the end of his spine, rolled back and tried to kick feebly at Boyd’s knees.

Boyd picked him up and swung toward the wall. Teed flailed with arms that felt as light and ineffectual as those long balloons sold at circuses. Boyd moved in close to him and tucked a massive shoulder under Teed’s chin. And with his fists, with slow measured fury, he began to tear Teed’s middle apart. He snorted with each blow. Teed could no longer lift his arms. They dangled loosely and his head bobbled on Boyd’s shoulder. He tried to grin across the room that seemed full of red mist. Barbara, her face too white, stood flat against the wall. Harry Pilcher stood tapping his palm with a leather sap, his lips pulled back from his teeth. Broznahan stood transfixed, jar in one hand, brush in the other, the light catching his glasses so that his eyes were invisible.

Teed wanted to tell them that Boyd was going to kill him if they didn’t stop him. His teeth chattered insanely as his head bobbed on the thick shoulder. Boyd grunted with each blow, twisting his heavy body to get the back muscles into each blow, moving in a slow, almost sexual rhythm. Broznahan, Barbara and Pilcher receded until they were tiny figures, almost too far away to see, and then the red mist drifted across them at the very moment that Boyd’s blows stopped hurting entirely.

He came to on the Indian blanket on the living-room bed. In the moment of regaining consciousness, his knees came up hard, as high as he could draw them. It eased the pain in his middle.

Barbara sat beside him. She wiped the sweat from his face with the cool damp washcloth.

“Where — are they?”

“Pilcher is in the bathroom cleaning Boyd up, darling.”

“Could have — taken him. Sapped me, though. Couldn’t...”

“It was my fault, darling. My fault. I should have known better than get wise with Boyd.”

“He won’t — try to force you to...”

She smiled without humor. “Not unless he wants to start talking soprano.”

“Shouldn’t — talk hard that way. Jesus, I hurt. Can’t get my knees down.”

“Don’t try yet. The last thing he did was back up fast and kick you before you could fall.”

“Get — even sometime.”

“Don’t think about it now.”

“You — leave. Take my car. Leave it... City Hall lot.”

“I’ll stay with you and see that you’re all right.”

“Please... important. Tell Armando Rogale. Lawyer. That’ll keep them — from working me over too much. Here’s keys.”

She took the keys, concealed them in her hand. She kissed him lightly on the forehead. “Good-by, Teed. And thanks.”

She walked quickly and quietly out. He listened and heard the Ford start, heard her give it the gun. He grinned at Pilcher as the man came running angrily out of the bathroom.

“She’s used to better — company, Pilcher.”

Pilcher walked over to the bed. “Oh, how I love them wise! How I love them with a nice big fat chip on the shoulder! Morrow, you’re going to be so goddamned eager to tell us you killed Mrs. Carboy that you won’t be able to get the words out fast enough.”

“And you’ll be wondering — how an ex-cop finds a job.”

“Hell, boy! I forgot you’re a reformer. I was just thinking of you as a murderer. Forgive me, huh?”

By the time they were ready to leave, Teed could stand up, but he couldn’t straighten up. And he couldn’t walk without support. He knew, from their attitude, that they hadn’t found a thing. Broznahan seemed disgruntled.

With Boyd on one side and Pilcher on the other, they walked him out to the car. He had to take one step at a time, and he walked like an old man, unable to lift his heels clear of the ground. They put him in the back seat with a grim, silent Boyd, who held a wet folded towel against his nose.

They drove him into town, drove him to a precinct station in West Deron, took his tie, belt, shoelaces, pocket articles and led him back to a ten-by-ten cell containing two iron bunks, a wall faucet, a pail, a tin cup and a toilet without a seat. He eased himself down onto the bunk and then lay in the only comfortable position he could find, on his side with his knees drawn up. He was almost asleep from exhaustion when Pilcher and a stranger came in. The stranger was in uniform pants and shirt sleeves. His corded forearms were covered with a pelt of red hair.

“He’s real stubborn, Harry?” the stranger asked.

“He doesn’t know we’re trying to help him, Mose. Just hold him for me.”

Mose handled Teed with the same ease with which Teed would have handled a child. He swung him out of the bunk, forced him down onto his knees, facing the bunk. Mose sat on the bunk with Teed’s wrists imprisoned in red hands that were like vises.

“Turn it up, Georgie!” Pilcher shouted. A radio began to blast music so loudly that it sounded like a sound truck was right outside the cell.

When the blow fell, the scream tore itself out of Teed’s throat before he could think to stop it. He turned his head. Pilcher stood spread-legged behind him, grinning and swinging a regulation billy by the thong. “Little kidney massage, boy. If I’m careful there won’t be any permanent damage. But sometimes I get careless.”

The second blow chopped into the opposite side and this time Teed suppressed the scream.

Mose grinned at him. “Don’t make it tough on yourself, friend.”

Teed let his muscles go slack. Then suddenly he snapped both wrists up, against Mose’s thumbs. The instant his hands were free, he lunged forward and drove his right fist into Mose’s face. The blow was feeble, glancing, but oddly satisfying. He kicked backward and his heel hit something soft. His laceless shoe fell off. They grabbed him again and the third blow drove him down into darkness.

They shook him awake. It was dark. The single cell light was a small bulb behind steel mesh in the cell ceiling. He struck out at them.

“Hey, easy!” Armando said. Teed wanted to roll over onto his face and weep with relief. “Come on. Get hold of my arm.”

“We better take him to my house,” Powell Dennison said. Teed hadn’t recognized him in the gloom.

“Wait a second, before we get him on his feet,” Armando said. “Teed, here’s your stuff from the desk. Powell, get the belt in his pants. I’ll fix up his shoes.”

Teed licked dry lips. “I didn’t tell them anything.”

“So we hear,” Armando said. “How many times they work you over?”

“I don’t remember which parts were real and which parts were just dreams.”

“You wore out some stalwart officers of the department, Teed. You even converted Pilcher. Leighton told me that Pilcher refused to touch you again. He said he wasn’t going to get in any mess where you had to kill somebody before they’d talk.”

“Are you taking me out of here?”

“Dennison went bail. The charge is assaulting an officer in the performance of his duties.”

“He was trying to...”

“Save your strength. I had a talk with the girl.” Armando slipped an arm under his. “Come on, fella.”

Every step was torture. Every breath he took was like so many knives being forced between his ribs. He leaned heavily on the two of them, the morose turnkey following along behind.

They went slowly up three stairs and the turnkey opened a barred door. He pulled it shut after they went through. There was a short hallway that opened into a large room. Several cops were standing around Pilcher was there, chewing his match. Leighton stood by the doorway to the street. Everyone watched him.

Pilcher said distinctly, “These crazy guys. Always falling down a flight of stairs or something. Feel better, Morrow?”

Teed stopped walking. He pulled his arms away from Armando and Powell. He pulled himself erect and the effort dizzied him. Then, planting one foot slowly in front of the other, he walked steadily and slowly and unsupported over toward Pilcher. Pilcher took a step backward, then thought better of it. His eyes were wary.

Teed stopped in front of Pilcher. “You,” Teed said softly, “are a sadistic sonofabitch.”

“Now, look!”

“You’re a poor policeman and a poor human being.”

“I don’t have to take that!”

“Then hit me again, Pilcher. If you don’t like the words, hit me again.”

Pilcher looked at the cops, who were watching silently. He laughed nervously. “What are you going to do with a guy like that?” He turned away, walked quickly through an opposite doorway.

Armando caught Teed before he fell, and they got him out to the car. Teed sat in the back seat. After two blocks he began to cry, sobbing aloud.

“Easy, boy,” Armando said.

He stopped before they reached the Dennison house. Jake and Marcia stood wide-eyed and silent in the hall as they brought him in and started up the stairs with him.

“Phone Dr. Schaeffer, Marcia, please,” Powell said.

He asked to be permitted to stop and rest at the landing. Jake squeezed by them and went on up the stairs. A bedroom light clicked on. Teed could not see the bed, but he could see it in his mind. Deep and soft and white and eternal.

After a few moments he felt as though he could make it the rest of the way. The bed lamp glowed on the white pillows. Jake had turned the bed down and she stood silently in the shadows. Her father said a low word to her and she left. Armando and Powell helped him undress.

The doctor seemed to arrive almost immediately. He was a brisk man with a military mustache. Armando and Powell stood back in the shadows as the doctor prodded softly, expertly. “Hurt? Now breathe. Again. This hurt?”

“Should he go to a hospital, Doctor?” Powell asked in the soft voice used in a room of the sick.

“I... don’t think so. Who — what happened to this man?”

“Would you be willing to testify that he was beaten?” Armando asked.

“I’m quite busy. Testimony means appearing in court. Delays.”

“Would you sign a statement?”

The doctor was silent for a long moment. “Really, it’s hard to be certain about a thing like this.”

“What damage is there?”

“I wouldn’t care to say just yet. I’ll want samples. Urine, stool. There’ll be some bleeding. Superficial kidney damage, I would say. Of course, a severe fall would...”

“A fall where he bounced a few dozen times?” Armando asked acidly.

Schaeffer straightened his shoulders. “I am fresh out of lances, sir, and I have no quarrel with windmills. I’ve seen this sort of work before. My work is to heal.”

“And never stick your neck out,” Armando said.

“Please, Mr. Rogale,” Powell Dennison said.

Alcohol was a touch of coolness on Teed’s arm. The needle was a point of fire in the cool patch. “I’ll stop by in the morning,” Schaeffer said. “He’ll sleep until then. I’ll decide in the morning whether we should take him in for X-rays. There’s no definite rib fracture. Maybe a crack or two. This man has a very powerful body. I suspect he may snap back quite rapidly.”

The doctor left. Powell went down with him. Teed heard their low vices on the stairs and in the lower hallway.

Armando said, “I think you’ll stay sick quite a while, Teed. So sick they can’t haul you in again.”

“If they started on me again I... I don’t know.”

“You’ve made a friend, Teed. Herb Leighton. Sorry I couldn’t get you out quicker. They hadn’t booked you. Said at headquarters you weren’t in custody. Leighton had a job finding out which precinct you were in.”

Armando’s voice went on and became a buzzing sound that made no sense. Teed hauled himself back up out of the enclosing darkness. His speech sounded drunken. “I missed that last part, Armando.”

“I said that the Heddon woman was a little unpopular with the boys right now. They didn’t like the way she ran out. So she’s laying low for a while. I found her a place. If they try to bring that assault charge to trial, she’s willing to testify in your behalf. What the hell did you do to her? Give her religion? She must know that if she sticks her neck out for you, they’ll give her a train ride to Dannemora.”

“Don’t... let her do it,” Teed said. His voice sounded as though it were echoing through a tunnel.

“Hey, boy. Those ginches are expendable. She takes her own risks.”

Teed could hold his eyelids open no longer. He was vaguely conscious of the light going out, of soft footsteps, of the closing of the room door. The pain of each breath lost sharpness. It was no longer pain. It was a deep blue light that glowed with each inhalation. It was apart from him.

Chairs were drawn close to the bed. They all sat there, their knees touching the bed, all their shoulders touching. They all sat in the dark and watched him under the blue light. Each time the light glowed, he could see their faces, the shadowed eyes.

“Who is this man?” they chanted softly. “Who is this man who was once a boy?”

Voice of his father, “He is my son. He was my son.”

Voice of the sister long dead, “My brother.”

Voice of the lovely Ronnie, “My lover. Father of the bastard child which, because of two hundred dollars and ten degrading minutes, was never born.”

And voice of Felice, coldly, “He is my murderer. So I am closer than the others.” Chant of the black-haired daughter, “He is my soul.” Incantation of Powell, “He is the son I might have had.”

Whispered voice of Barbara, “He is my shame.”

And back in the echoing caverns of his mind, in the trackless paths which lead to no open space, Teed Morrow raised his head and screamed until the neck cords stood like cables. “Who am I?” he screamed. And the answer was a shot that made no sound, send him tumbling over and over, down and down into darkness, between walls of slate.