Mike Shayne Mystery Magazine, Vol. 46, No. 11, November 1982

I went to the end of the hall, opened a window, and flew the direct route home.

The Important Thing in Life by Patty Matthews

Ronnie wasn’t a bad kid. He was just desperate, so he’d have to rob his own mother!

* * *

“It’s $10.00, Ronnie, and you’d better pay up, if you know what’s good for you!”

Ziggy’s heavy, mean-eyed face was twisted into a sinister frown, and Ronnie knew that the bigger boy meant what he said.

Ronnie swallowed past the sudden lump in his throat, and tried to ignore the meaty fist pulling the material of his shirt.

“Sure,” he said. “Sure, Ziggy. I told you I’ll have the money. I will, I promise, this evening, just like I told you.”

Ziggy pushed the smaller youth away, at the same time releasing his hold on his shirt. Ronnie swayed and stumbled, trying to keep his balance.

“You’d better have it, kid, or it will be the last time you welch on a bet!”

Ronnie watched Ziggy’s broad back receding down the alley. He felt weak and sick to his stomach. He kept thinking of Dick Thomas; of what had happened to him when he couldn’t pay up. The thought nauseated him.

He jammed his hands into his pockets, and headed for home. There was only one thing to do. He would have to hit his old lady’s purse again, although he hated to do it.

It wasn’t that he had any compuction against stealing from his mother, but it had only been a week since the last time, and he was afraid that she would get suspicious. The old bag would have probably caught on long ago, except that she was so busy with that stupid club of hers, that she never knew what was going down around the house.

He glanced at his watch, 2:15 pm; he had better hurry. She was due to go to some crazy protest or something at 3:00 pm. He had heard her talking to some other old broad on the phone.

He quickened his stride, and began experiencing a surge of elation. It was going to be all right. Ronnie, the super-stud, was going to score again. It was going to be all right.

Carolyn Bonner looked at herself in the slightly dusty vanity mirror, and decided that for a forty-four year old woman... well, forty six — she didn’t look- too bad. It was a shame that she had waited so long to find herself, to know herself. She could just cry, when she thought of the years she had wasted; years that she could never get back.

She brushed her hair down and over her shoulders. Her husband, Martin, had intimated that she was too old to wear her hair down.

“Chauvinist’ ” She spat out the word, and smiled at the pleasure it gave her. Who was he, anyway? Who was any man to decide at what age she, or any woman, should wear their hair up or down? After all, the important thing in life was to be your own person, make your own decisions, do your own thing.

Bra-less, she turned to examine her figure in the mirror, sucking in her stomach and pulling her shoulders back; attempting to ignore the nagging thought that in her normal stance her abdomen would bulge and her breasts sag.

As she reached for her eyebrow pencil, she saw her husband reflected in the mirror. God! what a dull man. She couldn’t think why she had stayed with him all these years.

He hesitated in the doorway, then moved toward her. “Carolyn?”

She gave a delicate shudder of distaste. Even his voice was apologetic. “What is it?” she asked crossly.

“Are you going out again?” Catching her eye in the glass, he hurried on. “I mean, you’ve been out almost every night this week. I thought you might be staying home tonight; maybe fix dinner for me and the boy?”

Carolyn gave an exasperated sigh, put down the eyebrow pencil, and turned toward him. “Martin, I told you about tonight. It’s very important that we all be there. We need a show of strength. Tonight is really going to mean something, Martin.”

She turned back to the mirror. “I bought some frozen dinners. They’re in the fridge.”

She had mentally dismissed him, but he still stood nervously behind her, twisting his hands. She tried to ignore him. She thought about tonight, and what was going to happen. Excitement welled in her. This would really show them. After tonight, her group would no longer be considered just a bunch of “silly women.”

And they had done it alone. No man had helped them. Lilly Morgan had been in the army, and Denise Harper worked in an electrical shop. Together they had put together the bomb, in Denise’s garage. And she, Carolyn Bonner, because she was president of the group, she had been chosen to carry it. It was a great honor, but she felt that she deserved it.

Right now the bomb was hidden on the top shelf of her closet. Carolyn smiled at her reflection. There was a lot of power in that bomb. A lot of power.

She looked up, and saw that Martin was still standing there. Anger replaced her feeling of exaltation. “Martin, I’ve told you, I’m in a hurry. If you have something else to say, well say it, and let me get dressed.”