Build My Gallows High (13 page)

‘Anywhere.’

’Because you don’t believe me.’

‘Don’t talk.’

‘My conscience hurts me not at all,’ Red said. ‘Someday it may, though I doubt it. The man I killed asked for it, deserved it. The one I’m blaming helped build my gallows high. One day you’ll look at me and all the things I’ve done will haunt us.’

Again one hand found his lips and again he took the soft hand away.

‘Love’s easy to kill,’ Red said.

‘Not mine.’

‘I’m not going to take you with me,’ Red said, ‘I’m going to leave you with it. A month. Two. Then I’ll send for you and I’ll want you to come even though I know it will be wrong. I’m taking no chance. You are.’

‘I know the answer now.’

‘It’s the night,’ Red said, ‘and the hills around us.’

‘I’m going with you tonight.’

Red shook his head.’You’re going to listen and then you’re going to wait. So shabby, Ann. My soul. Cut from such shoddy goods. Faded and patched and shabby.’

‘I like shabby souls,’ Ann whispered and put her head against his chest.

He kissed her hair. He said, ‘I’m going to Acapulco because that’s where it all started and maybe after I’ve been there a little while I won’t ask you to follow me. There was a girl. Crossing a sidewalk into a cafe and into my life —’

‘I don’t want to hear it.’

‘You must. I won’t play God. I’m too old and tired and beat up around the edges to be omnipotent. I knew she had shot a man and I knew she was a thief and I didn’t care—’

She pressed her head tight against him and felt his strong arms around her. She was listening to him but not wanting to and not caring what he said. Across the creek Jim Caldwell crouched in the grass and the murmur of the creek was not loud enough to drown out Red Bailey’s deep voice. Presently Caldwell began inching away, making no sound, moving on hands and knees through the soft wet grass. If Red heard him he was too deep in the past to care.

Fifty yards. A hundred. Then Caldwell stood up and, still cautious, crossed the pasture to the fence, clambered through and, bending low, made his way to the car.

Where was his anger? Where was his hatred? He leaned on the wheel staring into the darkness. Within reach of his hand was a bit of metal and rubber that would bring men with guns to the creek. But he did not reach for it. ‘I won’t play God,’ Red Bailey had said. Well, neither could he. Maybe she’d follow Red Bailey. He wasn’t going to stop her. And if she did and if things didn’t work out he would be waiting. Not because he was noble but because he was a goddamned fool.

He put his head on his arms and squeezed his eyes tight. He sat up, started the motor and drove slowly back to town.

Tom Douglas watched him come into the circle of light on the porch and through the open door.

‘May as well go home,’ Caldwell said, fumbling in his pocket for a match. ‘The red son of a bitch fooled me. He didn’t show up.’

‘Too bad,’ Tom Douglas said.

Dawn was still a long way off but the thin rind of the moon had finally found enough strength to get over the mountains. Now you could see the lake and the sketchy hills. Red drove carefully, fighting sleep, fighting the weariness that numbed his mind. He was not happy though he should have been. Ann had heard him through and Ann had said that nothing mattered. She’d wait and when he sent for her she’d follow him—the past no secret now, the web they had spun for him soon swept away. Freedom of a sort. Would it work? If not, a bright moment or two. And that’s about all you were entitled to—more than most men had. ‘Send for me soon,’ Ann had said. ‘So very soon, darling.’

His eyes closed a moment. He slapped himself awake, pulled the car back to the road, and turned the wind wing so the cold air poured through. He was on the lake road now, rounding Emerald Bay. A mile more, then the turn. Maybe Whit had changed his mind. Maybe Whit would be waiting for him with a gun. He hoped not. Seeing the opening in the tree wall he turned up the graveled drive.

The iron gates were open. Wide open. He stopped and switched off the lights. He was thoroughly awake now. One hand sought the gun in his pocket. Warily he walked through, looking all around him and up at the lighted windows. No gate-keeper. No sound but the wind in the trees and the crunch of gravel underfoot.

Because there was so much at stake Red knew what fear was, as he followed the winding drive to stop under the porte-cochere and looked through an open door into the hall.

An open door. An empty hallway. Why? On the hill above, the trees rubbed shoulders and whispered to each other. He wanted to turn away and climb up to them, away from the emptiness and the silence. He took his gun from his pocket and looked at it. He thought, this isn’t going to do me any good. They’ll be waiting for me inside and that will be it. Then he stepped through the open door, to be stopped, not by a bullet, but by Joe Stefanos’ body sprawled at the foot of the staircase. The little Greek had been shot through the head.

All wrong, he thought. Joe shouldn’t be dead. Joe should be waiting in the living room with a gun in his fist.

But there he was, as dead as Lloyd Eels, as dead as Meta Carson. Life even caught up with guys like Joe Stefanos.

And to guys like Whit Sterling—which didn’t surprise him. He had expected, when he saw the open door, to find Sterling’s body kicking around somewhere. He found it. It lay face down in front of the fireplace in the big room that looked out on the lake and death wasn’t kind enough to give Whit Sterling dignity. A messy lump of flesh—and what would the Treasury Department care now?

Well, build the gallows higher. You couldn’t frame a dead man and you couldn’t make deals with a dead man. The web was spun more intricately, more perfectly than ever.

Standing above the body of the man who could have given him freedom, Red knew the spinner of that web.

Mumsie gave up her dream reluctantly—her eyes closed against the unwelcome light, shivering a little, yet not awake enough to cover her lovely body.

‘Guy?’ she asked.

Lack of an answer didn’t bother her. She stretched, opened her eyes and saw Red Bailey standing by the bed.

‘The window was open,’ Red said.

She drew the sheet around her and sat up, not serene now, knowing what fear was.

‘Don’t yell,’ Red said, ‘it won’t do you any good.’

‘You shouldn’t be here,’ she said foolishly.

‘I walked knee-deep in blood to get here,’ Red said. ’Joe’s blood and Whit Sterling’s blood. An abattoir, Mumsie.’

She wet her lips. She shivered and pulled the sheet tighter.

‘Dig deep, Mumsie. Find horror and put it in your eyes.’

‘Red—’

‘I’m going to Acapulco,’ Red said. ‘Remember, Mumsie—the cliffs and the sky and the buzzards wheeling over. I’ll watch them wheel. I’ll watch their shadows on the rocks.’

‘Let me alone,’ she whimpered.

‘Don’t you want to go with me?’

‘Go away’

‘You ran from death once.’

‘I didn’t—’

‘Where is it?’ His voice grew sharp.

‘Make sense. Red.’ She tried to find tears for him.

‘Don’t. You’ve lost your touch. Where is it?’ He bent over her, dug his fingers in her shoulder.

‘Guy—’

‘Not Guy’ ‘He’ll come soon.’

‘Let him. I’ll hand him a gun and I’ll say, ”Kill her because I can’t. God knows why, but I can’t.”’ His fingers dug deeper. ’Where?’

‘Don’t.’ Her sudden glance betrayed her.

He thrust her down and moved around the bed to the closet. Shoved far back in the corner was a small traveling case. He picked it up, came back into the room and, seeing the look on her face, he smiled. ’Finally you’re afraid,’ he said.

‘Put it down.’

‘You weren’t afraid when through the window you watched Joe kill Whit Sterling. You weren’t afraid when you slipped through an open door. That little hand steady—so very steady. Was Joe surprised, Mumsie?’

’Put that down,’ she yelled.

‘You forget. It belongs to me.’ He put the bag on the bed, opened it, took out a packet of bills from the dozens packed carefully inside, tossed it to her. ‘Your cut for collecting from Whit,’ he said.

The money lay on the pillow near the headboard. Her hand reached for it. But her fingers didn’t close over the neat little packet. Instead her hand went under the pillow and he saw the flash of metal. He felt himself pushed backward as the bullet hit him in the chest. Then he was on her and he had the gun.

He watched her crawl across the bed to where the open case was. Very slowly he went over and pried her fingers loose. As he put the case under his left arm he saw blood staining his white shirt. Behind him the door opened and turning he saw Guy.

‘Come in and close the door,’ Red said, it’s all right. I’m the one got shot.’

Guy looked at the gun in Red’s hand and he looked at the woman on the bed. He came in and closed the door.

‘Such a greedy little bitch,’ Red said, ‘I’m afraid she’s going to give you a bad time of it.’

Mumsie wasn’t looking at Guy. Mumsie wasn’t listening. She was staring at the little case tucked under Red’s arm and slowly she swung off the bed and started across the room.

‘No. You can’t have it,’ Mumsie said dully.

‘See how greedy?’ Red said as he pushed her away.

Guy started toward him, but stopped because Red was motioning with his gun.

‘You’ll be happier if you let the cops have her, Guy. An empty bed is better than a coffin.’

‘What in hell are you talking about?’ Guy cried.

‘She killed Joe Stefanos.’

Guy went to her, shook her. ‘You didn’t go to Reno. You lied.’

‘No. She didn’t go to Reno. She went with Joe to Tahoe. Joe shot Whit and she shot Joe and then she ran off with my money.’

‘Goddamn you!’ Guy cried. ‘Oh, goddamn you!’

‘Goodbye,’ Red said. ‘Don’t be too bitter. We were trying to pin a murder on her.’ He opened the door, closed it carefully behind him and walked slowly down the hall to the stairs. Save for the paunchy man called Mac the hall was empty. Mac stood at the foot of the steps frowning up at him and because Red had a gun he didn’t let out a yell.

So many stairs. Red thought, as he went slowly down—so many for a man as tired as he was. Mustn’t drop the little bag. He and Ann needed what was in it. Mustn’t let anyone stop him. Mac was right in front of him now.

‘Go on,’ Red said. ‘Go through the front door.’

Mac wasn’t looking at him. Mac was looking past him up the stairs at Guy on the landing.

‘Go on. Never mind about Guy,’ Red told him.

But Mac didn’t move so Red went past him to the open door, across the veranda and down the steps.

He stumbled as he crossed the graveled drive and the case slid from under his arm. He looked down at it. Then he knew there was no use picking it up. It wasn’t going to do him any good. Nothing was going to do him any good. This was it and maybe that was how it should be. Maybe? No question about it. Jack Fisher dead and Lloyd Eels dead and Meta Carson dead and who was there to tell the cops he didn’t kill them all? Anyway, a lot of guys who deserved to die were corpses. Anyway, the web now held Guy Parker and a woman named Mumsie McGonigle. He hoped Ann wouldn’t mind too much.

The sky flamed about the mountain wall where clouds were piled. He’d miss those hills, he thought. He’d miss those clouds.
Look up once more. Up. Up.

He didn’t hear the gun when Guy shot him because he was dead.