Detective Fiction Weekly. Vol. 104, No. 4, August 22, 1936

It was a crazy thing to say, but maybe not a crazy thing to say to a crazy man. “All right,” he nodded coolly. But he wouldn’t let go of the back of my neck, where one of his hands had the skin gathered tight, the way you pick up a kitten. Only a kitten doesn’t feel pain.

With his free hand he filled a glass from the pitcher standing on the sideboard, thrust it into my hand. I put my lips to it. The water wouldn’t go down. It flushed the back of my mouth, came spilling out again.

He dashed the glass from my hand; it hit the tabletop and smashed into curved pieces, that rocked there without falling off. The radio was still going; a girl was singing “My Heart Goes Pitter Patter.” That was the last thing I was aware of. His other hand came up in a curve and met the first one, thumb to thumb — my neck was in between. Then at last the first scream came, the scream that couldn’t help me; my whole life seemed to go into it. The second one, that came right after it, couldn’t get past any more, his fingers held it in. Nothing could get past after that, not even air...

Chapter VIII Trail’s End Related by Dokes

It was late when I got back, after checking up on him at the hotel barbershop, and also checking with the phone company to make sure the phone had been put in and my note to her had been delivered. At the former place I’d found out just about what I’d expected to. The barber recognized him from my description. He’d only been able to shave one side of his face. He’d closed his eyes and kept shrinking from the razor. Then the next thing the barber knew, he’d jumped up, torn the apron off, slapped down some change, and lit out like a crazy man.

I asked at the desk if there’d been any messages for me. There’d been a call, the operator told me, but no name was left. I tensed right away; Betty was the only person down here that knew me. “Man’s voice or woman’s?” A woman’s. “How long ago?” Not very long ago, twenty minutes or half-an-hour. “She didn’t say anything, anything at all?” I pleaded.

Yes, she had, but not to the operator. The operator had heard her whisper “Ritchie, Ritchie,” to herself. She remembered that.

I gave her Betty’s new number. “Call this quick!” I stood, trembling.

She stopped trying finally. “I keep getting a busy signal—”

“Have the central operator cut in, can’t you?”

Next time she turned around she looked frightened herself. “The line’s not in use, the receiver’s been left off the hook, that’s what it is — they’re going to notify the police.”

“I’m the police,” I told her, and I ran out of there for all I was worth.

The taxi had picked up a motorcycle cop within five minutes, the way it was going. I flashed my badge through the window, motioned him on with a sweep of my arm. A minute later a second one had cut in behind him. The machine couldn’t take me through the sand, when it finally bogged down I had to stumble the rest of the way on foot, the two cops behind me. The house showed up black against the white sand, but one of the windows showed a light. One of the cops went around to the back. Myself and the other one took the front door, went up to it and listened. A blurred radio was audible somewhere toward the back. And then suddenly a scream topped the radio. That wasn’t blurred, it came through clear as a knife.

I fired six times into the lock. It busted to smithereens and a hot piece jumped up and opened my cheek. I kicked the door in. What was left of the lock stayed fastened to the frame. “Stick out here,” I grunted to the cop, “I’ll go it alone.”

I went stumbling down the black hall and came up against another door. Along with the music, somebody was having a coughing-fit in there and floor-boards were creaking. I pitched at the door and it held. I funneled my hands and roared: “Betty! Draw blood! Cut yourself, make yourself bleed!”

Then I went at it again, like something trying to kill itself. I nearly did, at that. It didn’t open, it ripped out and went down flat, with me on top of it like a surf-board-rider. I was stunned for a minute, couldn’t see anything.

Then when I did, I saw all that mattered, all I’ll ever want to see till the day I die. She was standing upright. She was alone. She was alive. My chin dropped down again, gratefully.

Another door, at the upper end of the room, was standing open and there were frenzied, receding footsteps coming from beyond it. Footsteps that scuffed into the wall and toppled chairs over. I went after them. They were easy to follow, I didn’t have time for light-switches. Through a bathroom, then into the blackness of the room behind. Window-glass suddenly exploded in a shattering crash, and a square of gray light showed up. And in it the silhouette of a head and shoulders, rising and dipping over the ledge.

“Stay where you are!” I bellowed, and I heard the hammer of my gun click twice, uselessly, and then the window-opening was blank.