A Treasury of Stories (Collection of novelettes and short stories)

“That was taken care of,” he said, “she had an accident.” I could tell by the tone of his voice that it must have been really an accident, that he hadn’t had anything to do with it, but I fixed that. I gave a loud boisterous laugh as though he’d meant it in a different way. “You think of everything!” I said, and switched the thing off.

It was a risky thing to say, but he wasn’t noticing, let me get away with it. “What’s funny about it?” he droned sleepily.

The phone rang all of a sudden. It was for him. They wanted him at the club on account of a raid was coming up. He’d left word where they could reach him. Just when I wanted him out of the way, too. Who said there was no Santa Claus?

“See you tomorrow night, Angel Face.”

He grabbed his hat, grabbed a kiss, and breezed.

It was getting light out, and I was all in. Some night’s work. And all on one record. I let the cord that had done all the dirty work slip out of my hand. I looked at it and shook my head and thought, “That poor slob.” I guess I was too tired by then, myself, to feel joyful about it. Maybe that was why I didn’t.

When I opened my eyes, the record was still on the turntable. You’d think the first thing I’d do would be to take a look under the lid and make sure. But I didn’t go near it for a long time, and when I finally did I didn’t feel much like crowing. I stood there holding it in my hand. Such a fragile thing! All I had to do was just let it fall, just let it slip out of my fingers and — goodbye. I thought of Jackie, then I put it down and ran to the phone as if I was scared of my life. Ran isn’t the word — flew. I got Westman at his office, told him I had what he needed.

“Swell, bring it down,” he tried to tell me.

“I can’t, you’d better come up and get it! Quick, right now! Jump in a cab, don’t give me time to think it over. Hurry, will you, hurry, before I—”

He came all right. He stripped off a pillowcase and slipped the record in that. “I’ll get Albany on the wire,” he promised. “I’ll have a stay of execution for you before the day’s over!” Then he wanted to know: “What’re you looking so down in the mouth about? Is this a time for—”

“Go on, Westman,” I said, “don’t stand here chinning, get that thing out of my sight.”

After awhile I went back to the phone again and called Tommy Vaillant. “Tom,” I said, “how quickly can you blow town?”

“Why, in five minutes if I have to,” he said. “Why? What’s up?”

“You better see that you do then. I just got a hot tip — they’re going to reopen the Pascal case.”

“Where do I figure?” he asked. “I’m in the clear.”

“Take my advice and don’t hang around arguing about it. Goodbye, Tom,” I sobbed. “Can you beat an extradition rap?”

“With one hand tied behind my back. What’re you crying about?” he asked.

“I–I sort of liked you, Tom,” I said, and I hung up.

This morning when I opened my eyes Jackie was sitting up on one elbow looking at me in a worried sort of way. “Oh, my head,” I groaned. “Never again!”

“Angel Face,” he said, “promise me you won’t take any more nightcaps.”

“Why?”

“You talk in your sleep, you say such funny things. You say it was you killed Bernice Pascal that time.”

I gave him a starry look and smiled. Then he smiled back.

“Angel Face,” he said.

He always calls me that. Always says I haven’t a thing inside my head, but that the outside is a honey.

The Body Upstairs

I

I got home that night about 6:15. “Have a hard day?” the wife wanted to know as I pitched my hat at the chandelier. “Supper’s ready.”

“With you as soon as I polish off the body,” I said. I went in the bathroom, stripped and hopped into the tub.

Halfway through, I stopped and looked around me. Either I was cockeyed or there was something the matter with the soap. It was Healthglo and it was red, like it always is, but the color seemed to be running from it. Apparently it was dyeing the water a pale pinkish shade all around me. Very pretty but not my type of bath.

All of a sudden something hit my shoulder and made me look up. I let out a yip. The whole ceiling over me was sopping wet. The stain kept spreading around the edges and a single drop at a time would come to a head right in the middle of it, very slowly, and then drop off. There must be a man-sized leak in the bathroom above, I thought, and what a leak — a young cloudburst to make it come all the way through like that! But that wasn’t what was peculiar about it. If it had been only a leak it would have been the plumber’s business and not mine. This was a pink leak! It was water mixed with something else. It was even changing the color of my bathwater little by little as it dripped into it. What that something else was I hated to think but I Had a rough idea.

I jumped into my pants and shirt, wet the way I was, and came tearing out of there. I nearly knocked my wife down getting to the door. “It’s the Frasers,” I said. “Something’s happened up there!”

“Oh, that poor woman!” I heard her say in back of me.

“You keep out of the bathroom for awhile,” I grunted.