Mike Shayne Mystery Magazine, Vol. 34, No. 5, April 1974

Blue Moon by Gil Brewer

No woman was going to cheat on him and live to laugh about it. He just wanted to catch them — and prove that she was a liar.

I came across the vacant lot toward the back of the house. We were out of town a way, and I always thought it might prevent things from happening. It hadn’t. I jumped the fence, and walked through the garden toward the rear door, making it as quiet as I could. I left my lunch bucket beside the porch, and carefully opened the door.

Billy bounced at me from across the kitchen. “Daddy! I got a muff-whump.”

“Fine,” I said, trying to see into the other room. There was no sign of him. I hadn’t heard him run. So maybe they were planning to meet later.

“See, Daddy?” Billy said. He held up a couple strings with a dirty piece of wood attached to the ends.

“Where’s Mommy?”

Billy grinned slyly. The kid was getting to be exactly like her. She probably gave him lessons. She’d be more likely to give Ginny lessons. But she would see that Billy kept his mouth shut. Billy was four and a half, and Ginny was six.

“Where is she?”

Billy pointed toward the living room, and began doddling the strings and the piece of wood up and down.

I went in there.

The radio was playing “Blue Moon,” with Sinatra singing the way he did.

“Hi!”

She leaped up from the couch like she’d been pricked. Her eyes were all round and muzzy. I wondered if she’d been out with him, maybe making the rounds. I wouldn’t put it past her. She had on pants and a long white jacket. That sweetheart of a face registered surprise.

“What’re you doing here?” she asked quickly.

I went over and turned off “Blue Moon.” It was our tune. An oldie, but loaded with nostalgia. I had loved her very much, and she had loved me. It had been something back then.

I said, “I took the day off. Didn’t feel so hot.”

“But, Richard. You’ll be docked. We need that money.”

“Yeah.”

I wanted to ask her where she was hiding him. You’ve got to understand, I wouldn’t put anything past her. She was always whacky. I’d used to think that whackiness was cute. And she looked so good.

I mean, you’d never guess she played it the way she did. Once I saw him waiting on the corner, right when I went to work. It was before I knew. After I caught on, they worked it like ghosts. He would appear and vanish fast.

Once I nearly caught her. He’d just left by the side door. I’d heard him running, and her face was all red, her eyes kind of wild and hot.

Right now she’d been working a jig-saw puzzle on the card table. She was a great one for jig-saw puzzles.

She moved around the table. Then she kind of glanced toward the bedroom door. Just a flick of those eyes. She looked a little guilty.

I started for the bedroom.

“Richard? I think you should go back to work. We can’t afford to have you take days off.”

I didn’t pay her any attention. I went on into the bedroom, and looked around. It was quiet, and smelled of sleep. The bed wasn’t made yet. The Venetian blinds were drawn, but a finger of yellow Florida sunlight touched the floor. It looked okay, and there was no sign of him.

I stepped around the big cedar chest, and went to the closet. Just clothes, that was all. But anger seeped through me. I knew he’d been here already this morning. It was nearly noon. I stared at the bed.

How could she? With the kids, and all.

Sure. She probably sent the kids out. Cripes. A kind of cold madness was all through me. I was sick with it. Because she would do this to me, after all I’d done for her, and everything. How I had loved her. Well, maybe that was gone.

I stood by the cedar chest and thought about it.

She came in the bedroom doorway, and stood there, looking at me, one hip shot out, the way she’d do it. Her eyes were all big and muzzy and baby-like. Innocent eyes. That was it. Innocent. Cripes.

“Why did you come home?”

“I was just beat. That laundry knocks me out, Beverly. You stand there sorting clothes all day, you’d know how it is. Cripes.”

“Don’t say that. I don’t like it. Ginny will start saying it again. She imitates, you know that. You’re her father.”

“Cripes, cripes, cripes!” I couldn’t even swear in my own home, if you called it swearing.

I wanted to ask her where he was. Then you could see she was satisfied about something. She was like a computer feeding statistics. She was content. He’d got away somehow, that was it. She was safe.

“What’re you going to do?” she asked.

“Nothing.” Then I caught on. She would be meeting him someplace, that was it. They had-a plan. I was in the way. And it went all through me, like knives, and dirty garbage. How could she do this? Well, she could, and did.

She could do anything, and stand right there and look clean and innocent. They were ghosts, that’s what. Nobody could catch them.

Last night she’d been nervous as hell, too. It told me something. It showed me she was waiting for today. They had something planned.

I went over to the bureau and opened the top left hand drawer, and looked in at it. It lay there so neat, with a dull sheen. A pre World War I German Luger, nine millimeter. It was loaded, and it waited with a kind of steely patience. My hand inadvertently moved toward it. I slammed the drawer.

The front doorbell rang. I heard one of the kids run like crazy, yelling, “I get it, Mommy!”

I went out there, making it fast. Of course, he wouldn’t come to the door like that.

Ginny had the door open. Two men stood there. A plumpish, red-faced one, in a blue suit, and a thin, lantern-jawed guy wearing a light tan jacket.

“Mr. Hudson?” They were cops, it was plain.

“Yeah.”

“Is Mrs. Hudson in?”

“Sure.”

“Could we see her a minute?”

I went back and motioned to Beverly. She came out of the bedroom and stood by the door.

The lantern-jawed guy gave me the eye, then lifted his brows at Beverly.

“What is it?” she asked with that way of hers.

I stood there.

The lantern-jawed guy’s face was slightly red.

“What do you want?” Beverly asked.

“Well, all right,” the lantern-jawed one said. “I’ve got to ask, and I don’t like embarrassing you, that’s all.”

“Embarrass me?”

The plump one nodded. “D’you know an Albert Griner?”

I stood there. That was his name.

Beverly was plenty flustered. Her face was red, her neck red, her hands twining in front.

“No,” she said. “I don’t know any Albert Griner. Why should I?”

Smooth. She was suddenly like ice.

“Mrs. Hudson. I’m sorry, believe me. But we saw some letters at Albert Griner’s place. They had your name on them.”

She stood there.

“Mr. Griner didn’t show up for work today. His mother hasn’t seen him since yesterday noon. She’s worried. He’s just vanished. He’s nowhere.”

“Get out,” she said coldly, but fast.

“Mrs. Hudson,” the plump one said. “You’d better level with us. This is Sergeant Whitted. And I’m Roy Hasseker. We’re from police headquarters.”

She glanced at me and you could see it was all gone inside her. She gave up.

“I haven’t seen him.”

“Not at all? Not even yesterday?”

“Not even yesterday.”

“You’re positive?”

“I’m absolutely sure.”

“Well, thanks, Mrs. Hudson. We’ll be in touch.”

She closed the door and leaned against it and watched me. Her lips had a white ring around them.

“So his name is Albert Griner?” I said.

“Richard. I was going to tell you everything. Today. You’ve got to believe that. Listen, it’s all over. Did you know?”

“Yeah.”

“I might know you’d know.” She stepped up to me, trying to smile. “It’s all over, Richard. I don’t know what happened to me. I... I couldn’t control myself. Now it’s out in the open.” Her chin bunched up. “You’ve got to believe me. He just kept coming here, and everything. I couldn’t make him leave me alone. I was crazy, Richard — just crazy.” Tears squeezed in her eyes.

Billy and Ginny stood there, watching. Billy had his muff-whump, jiggling it. Ginny said something very softly, but I couldn’t say what.

“I’m supposed to believe you were going to tell me?” I said.

“You’ve got to believe that, Richard.” She was nervous as a cat. “You’ve simply got to. He wouldn’t take no for an answer. He just kept coming.”

“Where were you planning to meet him, Beverly?”

She came on loud. “Don’t say that. It’s not true. It’s all over. I want you, Richard — just you — and Ginny and Billy. I want us to be a happy family. I made a mistake. You’ve got to forgive me, Richard. You’ve got to!”

I’m telling you, it was like fire inside me. I couldn’t control it. I hated her guts. I hated her so hard, I was all wild. She could stand there and look at me and lie. It was all through her, the lie. You could see it.

“I want us to be happy,” she said. She spoke quickly, now. “You’ve got to believe me. I want you, I love you. I’d do anything for you. We’ve got to preserve our marriage.”

“Quit it. I’ll bust out laughing.”

Her eyes were wet now. She stepped close. “Please, Richard. I didn’t know what to do. I was afraid—” She put one hand on my arm. I threw it off with a jerk. I stared at her and this cold feeling went through me.

“Richard—”

“Bitch.”

“Don’t call me that, not in front of the children.”

She wrung her hands, standing there. Her eyes were plenty worried. She kept trying to say something, her lips moving, but she just swallowed and didn’t speak. Then she got it out. “I was weak, Richard. But it’s all over. He’s not coming back. I’ll never see him again. Forgive me.” She came toward me.

I gave her a swat that jarred her. I hardly knew what I was doing. I just knew I never wanted to see her again, and that I had to do something or go mad. It was inside me like a cold steel bar.

“Run to the kitchen and play,” I told the kids.

“Please, Richard.”

I started for the bedroom. Oh, I’d seen him close up one time, in a bar. He had curly black hair, and a pug nose. And he grinned all the time; a self-satisfied grin, as though he got everything he wanted.

“Richard. Listen to me!”

I didn’t even speak. I went over to the bureau, and took the Luger out of the drawer. I looked at her, there in the doorway.

“I’m sorry, Beverly. But you did this to the wrong guy, see? I couldn’t live with you now. Knowing you’ll probably meet him somewhere tomorrow.”

She yelled it. “I’ll never see him again! I love you.” The words tumbled across one another. “Richard, you’ve got to believe me!”

“Good-by, Beverly.”

I shot her in the stomach. The gun made a hell of a noise. I shot her again. She just stood there, and another slug caught her in the throat. Then she fell down.

The kids came running. They looked at me.

“What’s a matter with Mommy?”

“She caught a bad cold,” I said, standing there, numb with it.

“Mommy,” Ginny said, squatting down by her. “Mommy.”

Billy said, “Daddy says she caught a cold.”

“That’s right,” I said.

I heard footsteps running outside, approaching the house. I went over to the window and saw the two of them, the plump one and the lantern-jawed one coming up on the porch.

Then I was wilder than ever. I had killed her. I knew that. But they weren’t going to catch me.

The doorbell rang.

I threw the gun into the closet and barked at the kids, “Head for the kitchen. Beat it. Get out of here.”

They ran off.

I went over to the cedar chest. I would get inside there. It was plenty big. Beverly’s mother had given it to her. An heirloom. She had never been able to fill it.

I was out of my mind. I’d killed her, and I was glad, but I was crazy with it.

I opened the cedar chest.

Well, he lay there, with that pug nose, and that curly black hair, staring up at nothing. He wasn’t grinning. You could see the stab wounds in his chest, ruining his white Nehru shirt. Albert Griner. She had killed him.

I stood there.

They walked into the bedroom and looked at me. The lantern-jawed one came over and touched my arm.

“Mr. Hudson?”

I just stood there, staring-down at him. She had been telling the truth.