He drove slowly back the way he had come. Maybe this would be the week he would kill Whit. Then Les Ferron would disappear. Paul Parrish would marry Amy, and after a few weeks or months or years, once he got his hands on the old man's property, both real and personal, Paul Parrish, too, would disappear. A man was what he was. That was one thing that couldn't be changed.

  All of the cars were gone from the churchyard. The white frame church stood dark and deserted, its peaked steeple pointing at the moon. Ferron drove on slowly through the unlighted town, along the main street, which would lead him to the main arterial highway along the Hudson River, and the small town of Palisades Falls in which Paul Parrish maintained a room.

  He wanted a drink. He wanted a smoke. But he wouldn't dare to

  drink or smoke until he was back in his own clothes, in his own car. A muddy Buick was parked on the approach to the bridge that led across the small river on the outskirts of New Hope. As Ferron approached the bridge, young Swinton stepped out into the headlights of the wheezing Plymouth and flagged him down.

  "Don't bother to get out," he said. "I can say what I want to say in a few words."

  Ferron leaned on the rolled-down window of his car, amused. "Yes—?"

  The farmer was a worker, not a talker. Red faced in his earnestness,

  choosing his words carefully, he said, "I don't like you, Parrish. You're too good to be true. You got Amy and her father fooled. You got most everyone fooled but me. But I'm warning you right now, Parrish—"

  "Yes—?" Ferron repeated.

  Swinton gripped the metal sill with work-calloused fingers, not as

  certain of himself as he had been. "If I'm wrong, if you're really as good as you pretend to be, there's nothing I can do about it." His voice grew stronger. "But don't play high, wide, and handsome with Amy. Because if you do, I'll—"

  "You'll what?" Ferron asked flatly.

  The young farmer told him. "I'll beat your goddam head in and feed

  your rotten guts to my hogs."

  Ferron pretended to be shocked. "Tch tch. Swearing. And on the Sabbath, too."

  He let out his clutch and drove on. He was going to have trouble with Ira. He would have to keep his eyes on him. He would have to be careful to make no mistakes, at least until after he'd killed Whit and completely switched identities. Then young Swinton could go screw.

  Ferron filled his lungs full of air. No one would be able to prove anything. His fingerprints, as Les Ferron, weren't on record. He'd taken good care to see to that. He let out the pent-up air in his lungs. And if the law or young Swinton wanted to backtrack on Paul Parrish, wanted to trace him to the midwest slum in which he had been born, they would find nothing incriminating. Parrish happened to be his right name. He had a birth certificate to prove it. And at one time in a distant and youthful and impoverished past, shortly before he'd gone into the Army, and the Army did have his fingerprints on record, he'd even taught a rural school for a few months.

  This is a picture of a kitty. A kitty is a small cat. What does the kitty say? The kitty says meow.

  The twenty miles to the Falls seemed endless without a cigarette. When Ferron reached the shabby house in which he maintained a room, his landlady was still awake and waiting up for him. A plump and motherly woman in her middle sixties, she was disappointed to learn he didn't intend to stay the night, that the only reason he had returned was to load his car with a new shipment of Bibles and religious art objects before taking off for upper, rural New York.

  The old woman was concerned. "You're working too hard, Paul."

  Ferron grinned at her, white-toothed. "I have to. It can be I'll be married

  next week."

  Mrs. Harvey was pleased by the information, but saddened by the thought of losing a steady roomer who used his room so seldom. His car loaded, Ferron paid her a week's rent in advance, put the receipt in his wallet, then, still without a cigarette, drove north on the unlighted side street.

  Safely out of sight of the house, he turned east toward the river, then

  south on U. S. 9W, his battered Plymouth one in the metal stream of cars filled with sunburned weekenders returning from the myriad resorts in the Catskills and along the Hudson.

  Near the western terminus of the Bridge, with New York just across the river, he drove on the few miles to Fort Lee and into the double garage of the suburban home he'd rented for a year in advance.

  The garage door locked behind him, he realized his entire body was trembling. The strain was beginning to tell. Each trip he made to New Hope and the transition back to Les Ferron was becoming exceedingly more nerve racking. He couldn't keep up the dual role much longer. He had to kill Whit this week, next week at the latest, and let Les Ferron disappear.

  His hands shaking badly, he took a package of cigarettes from the glove compartment of the yellow Cadillac and sucked the smoke into his lungs. The harsh smoke tasted good.

  Gradually the trembling of his body ceased. The cigarette still in his mouth, he stripped off the sweaty blue suit and the cheap underwear beneath it and toweled the accumulated perspiration from his body. He looked at the stairs leading up into the house. He wished he dared to shower but he had never used the house for fear of leaving fingerprints or other telltale signs. You couldn't be too careful.

  Nude except for his socks, he opened the leather traveling case in the trunk of the Cadillac and put on fresh underwear. The silk felt good on his body. He might as well enjoy it while he could. Paul Parrish would wear cheap cotton jockey shorts and undershirts, the two for a dollar kind, even on his wedding night.

  He chose a pastel green silk sports shirt and a hand-painted yellow tie, then put on the pants to the natural color shantung suit for which he'd paid two hundred dollars. His expensive platinum wrist watch, a pair of black and white sport shoes, and a broad-brimmed planter's Panama followed.

  Ferron could feel his face change with his clothes. The smugness left his lips. They felt fuller than they had. His lean jaw jutted familiarly. His blue eyes narrowed. His broad shoulders straightened to their full width.

  He stopped being frightened and was amused. Water on them all. This

  same time next year he'd be in Bogota or Rio or Buenos Aires, after a very pleasant few weeks or months with Amy. With a quarter of a million dollars in his pocket. Even thinking of the black-haired girl excited him. Amy would be the first virgin he had ever known.

  The date of his departure would depend entirely on how hot Les Ferron was, and how long it took Paul Parrish to con old man Wayne.

  Ferron folded the blue suit neatly and put it with the underclothes he'd discarded into a battered paper suitcase on the back seat of the ancient Plymouth. Then he locked the Plymouth securely and backed the yellow Cadillac out of the garage. He locked the garage behind him and drove rapidly back to the great bridge linking both banks of the Hudson.

  It was good to be back in New York. He enjoyed the rush of traffic

  and the lights and the people. Even at two o'clock in the morning, on a Monday morning to boot, there were more people on the streets and walks than passed through New Hope in ten years.

  Ferron debated driving directly to his own apartment, then decided to spend the rest of the night with Lydia. He stopped at a bar where he was known and drank two double ryes and picked up a fifth to take with him.

  With whiskey roaring through his head, he felt almost normal again. He drove south on Riverside Drive, turned east on 82nd Street and handed the doorman of Lydia's apartment hotel the keys to the yellow Cadillac. "I won't want it until morning, John."

  The doorman palmed the five-dollar bill Ferron had wrapped around his key case and touched the brim of his cap. "Yes, sir, Mr. Ferron."

  Ferron swaggered across the walk, took the elevator to the eighth

  floor and rapped loudly on Lydia's door.

  "Who is it?" she wanted to know.

  "Who do you think?" Ferron asked.

  The red-haired girl opened the door, fastening the sash of a white

  negligee. Her eyes were sullen with sleep and slightly puffed, as if she had been crying. "You can keep right on going, Les," she told him. "I don't want anything more to do with you." Her sullen eyes searched his face. "You've been with some other woman. I can tell it by your eyes."

  Ferron slapped her out of his way. "Don't give me that crap." He closed and locked the door behind him, then set the fifth of rye on the coffee table. "Go get some ice and two glasses."

  It was as hot in New York as it had been in New Hope. There was a still, breathless quality to the air in the apartment. Ferron took off his coat and loosened the knot in his tie. When he looked up, the red-haired girl was still standing in front of the bridge lamp. She had been sleeping in the altogether and, standing as she was, the sheer white negligee revealed almost as much as it concealed.

  Lydia's eyes continued sullen. "I shouldn't," she said, "After you stood me up Friday night, and then again last night, I swore I'd never even speak to you again."

  Ferron continued to stare at her, imagining she was Amy. His mouth felt suddenly dry. The pound of his pulse filled his ears.

  The red-haired girl made up her mind. "Well, I'll have one drink with you, but that's all."

  She started for the kitchenette. Ferron caught her by the shoulder and spun her back into his arms, his big, capable hands caressing her brutally, savagely. "To hell with the rye. It can wait."

  The red-haired girl screamed in pain. "Stop, Les. Please. You're hurting me. What do you want?"

  Ferron picked her up in his arms and carried her toward the open bedroom door. "Don't give me that. You know what I want."

  Chapter Three

  THE QUACKING OF DUCKS awakened Ferron. For a moment he was startled. He thought, what the hell? Then he remembered the lagoon just across Central Park West. At this time of year the lagoons and ponds in Central Park were always filled with ducks. Considering what he intended to do, perhaps it was a good omen.

  Morning was as hot as night had been. The big, blond man lay still for long minutes after he'd awakened, enjoying the oscillating fan as it rippled the mat of crisp yellow hair on his chest. He had a head, but not too bad a one. He felt for the bottle of rye he'd set beside the bed. It was empty. It didn't matter. There was nothing wrong with him that a cup of coffee wouldn't cure.

  He glanced at the sleeping girl beside him and debated prodding her awake, but felt too replete to move. It was a shame that Lydia didn't have a lot of money. When they weren't fighting, they got along just fine. The little fool loved him. There was nothing she wouldn't do, or hadn't done, for him. For all the scenes she made, he could, in her mind, do nothing wrong except make love to other women.

  He yawned prodigiously and Lydia opened one eye. She stretched like a contented kitten, then snuggled closer to him and laid a small hand on his chest.

  "Good morning, honey."

  Ferron removed the hand. "Hi," he said coldly. "How about a pot of

  coffee?"

  Lydia sat up obediently and reached for her negligee. "Right away, sweetheart. What time do you have to meet Whit?"

  "To hell with Whit," Ferron said.

  The red-haired girl slipped her bare feet into a pair of mules and

  scuffed through the apartment to the kitchenette. Ferron lay a moment longer listening to her fill the percolator and set out cups and saucers. It was a pleasant, homey sound, if one liked homey sounds.

  He glanced at the expensive platinum watch that Lydia had given him as he padded into the bathroom to shower and shave. It was a few minutes after nine. By now the New Hope community had been up for hours. He knew. He'd spent several days at the farm and both old man Wayne and Amy had gotten up in the middle of the night to do whatever they did with the cows and chickens and other assorted livestock. Breakfast of homemade country sausage, buckwheat cakes, maple syrup, eggs and fried potatoes and hot mince pie had been served at six-thirty. Ferron shuddered at the memory. It was a hell of a prospect to contemplate after a full fifth of rye. Still, all things considered, keeping in mind the score for which he was shooting, he could put up with it for a few months. It might just be, once she was married to him, Amy wouldn't get up quite so early.

  Showered and shaved, he dressed and walked out to the kitchenette. It was bright with morning. The traffic eight floors below was a blurred, pleasant sound. Lydia had combed her hair and made up and put on a fresh negligee to replace the one he had torn. She was pathetically eager to please him, happy that he was with her. She'd even laid the morning paper beside his cup of coffee—to point out the comforts of domesticity, Ferron supposed.

  "How do you feel this morning, sweetheart?" she asked him.

  Ferron answered her with a grunt as he sipped his coffee and glanced at the first page of the paper. He had no need to ready any farther. His and Whit's luck was holding. When the thing broke it would break over the front page of every paper in New York. Ferron felt sweat start on his forehead. And their luck couldn't hold forever. One of these mornings some sap was going to get up nerve enough to go to the D.A. When he did, it would be too bad for both of them. Ferron had no illusions. The police weren't dumb, they were smart. All they needed was a starting point. And once the skein of usury and blackmail and brutality started to unravel, everything would unwind, including the Roberts affair. There would be more hell raised in Manhattan than there had been since a smart Dutch con man had swindled the trusting Indians out of Manhattan Island for a few bales of bright cloth and trinkets reputed to be worth sixty guilders.

  Ferron used his napkin to pat at the perspiration on his forehead. Waiting for the right time, hell. He was stalling. Now that he had Paul Parrish set up, he'd have to do what he had to do—soon. Whit was an egomaniac drunk with fifty percent interest. Whit thought this thing could go on forever.

  Lydia sat across from him. "What are you worried about, Les?"

  "Nothing," Ferron lied. "I'm just warm."

  The red-haired girl shook her head. "No. You're worried. You

  have been for six months." She laid her hand on his. "Look, Les—"

  Ferron looked at her over his cup of coffee. "Yes—?"

  "Why don't we go away somewhere, just you and I?"

  "Where?"

  "Anywhere."

  "On what?"

  "I've a few dollars left in the bank."

  "And when that's gone?"

  "I'll get more."

  "How?"

  Lydia was frank. "Any way I have to get it. Can't you get it through

  your head, Les, that I love you, that I'd do anything for you?"

  "Anything?" Ferron taunted her.

  Lydia continued to meet his eyes. "I've already done that. Where do you think your thousand-dollar wristwatch came from? Or the money you've been dropping at Narragansett and Jamaica, and before that at Hialeah and Oaklawn? Certainly not on the hundred and fifty dollars a week that Whit pays you, or the few crummy modeling jobs you get."

  Ferron looked at his wristwatch with new respect. He hadn't known it had cost so much. "That's right. Make me feel like a peaeye."

  Lydia's fingernails dug into the back of his hand. Her eyes filled with tears and ran over. "I'm not trying to make you feel like anything, Les. I'm just trying to make you understand how much I love you, that nothing matters to me but you." Her eyes, back of her tears, were bright. "Neither of us is any good. But together we have a chance for happiness. Why don't we take it?"

  Ferron was bored. Crying women annoyed him. "Oh, for God's sake, Lydia," he said. "We've been over this so many times."

  He pushed his cup away from him and walked into the living room. He telephoned his hotel to see if there were any phone messages for him. There were six, one from an old bag he'd swindled out of two hundred dollars and who he was trying to shake, one from Ben Howell of the modeling agency for which he worked on occasion, and three phone calls from Whit Bennett.

  Ferron considered calling Whit, but dialed the number of the modeling agency instead. He would see Whit that afternoon. If it was anything important, Whit would have done more than phone. If the D.A.'s office had stepped in, the slimy little loan shark would be waiting in his hotel lobby, bleating to everyone who listened what an honest businessman he was and how the police were all the time pushing him around.

 

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16