Strange Embrace, page 15
She took a step toward him. “I’m going to walk to you,” she told him. “You’re in a corner. You can’t get away. I’m going to walk in on you and I’m going to kill you, Johnny Lane.”
She said it as casually as if she were telling him the time of day. She took another step—she was no more than six feet away, now. The light from the ceiling glinted off the blade of the razor. It hypnotized him the way a snake hypnotizes a bird.
“So you’ll kill me,” he heard himself saying. “Then what will you do?”
“It won’t matter to you. You’ll be dead.”
“What’ll you do, Jan?”
“Run,” she said. “Get dressed and get out and run like hell. Just run.”
“They’ll catch you, Jan.”
“Maybe not.”
“They’ll catch you. And they’ll kill you. One more murder isn’t going to help any.”
“Won’t hurt me, either. They can only kill me once. I might as well hang for three sheep as for two.”
“Is that why you killed Tracy?” One more stall, Johnny thought. He bunched his muscles.
She studied him. “I killed Tracy to throw them off the trail,” she said. “You figured it out neatly enough. No, I didn’t make love to him first, Johnny. He wanted me. God, how he wanted me! A pass a day, day in and day out. So I went up to his goddamned penthouse and offered him my fair white body. He was positively drooling. We took off our clothes and got into bed and I looked at that rotten, superior smile of his and I cut his damned throat and watched him die.”
She took another step toward Johnny.
No time to get ready. Only time to act, only time to move swiftly and efficiently.
He fell away from her, reaching at the same time for the lamp. His fingers closed around the base of it and he heaved it as hard as he could, throwing straight for her face. He let himself fall backward, then hit the wall with one hand and pushed off from it, coming at her right behind the lamp.
The lamp staggered her. She almost lost her footing but she did not let go of the razor. He saw it coming at him in a downward arc as he pulled into her. Then he felt it bite into his side as the two of them sprawled to the floor. He had landed on top of her. He heard the air whoosh out of her lungs and he saw her jaw go slack. He got up. She got up.
The razor stayed on the floor.
She looked much younger without the razor. She looked younger and weaker and very unfortunate. His eyes scanned her naked body, her empty face. He tried to see her as an object of sexual desire, as something of love. Or as something to hate or fear.
He could see her only as a broken woman, to be pitied. He glanced from her to the blade on the floor. It was no longer a murder weapon. It was a toy, the latest addition to the prop inventory. It was silly to think that two persons had been killed with such a toy.
He looked at her again. Her mouth worked for a minute before any words came out.
“Just for the record, Johnny,” she said quietly, “you’re lousy in bed.”
He had heard that one before. He thought back to Sondra, Sondra Barr with the violet eyes and the lovely red-gold hair.
“Real lousy,” insisted Jan.
“That’s because I’m not a girl,” Johnny said.
His answer surprised her. And hers surprised him. “Aren’t you going to hit me, Johnny?”
He shook his head. Was this what she expected of men? That in the last analysis they would beat her? No wonder she preferred girls.
“Then what are you going to do?”
“I’m going to take you to a cop named Haig,” he announced, “and you’re going to tell him just how you murdered two people.”
Chapter 16
* * *
She sat next to Johnny in the back seat of the taxi to Police Headquarters. The razor and the strop were in his pocket. He did not say a word during the ride. Neither did she.
He told the desk sergeant he was going in to see Haig. The cop started to give him directions.
“I know the way,” Johnny told him. “I’ve been here often enough. And don’t tell him I’m coming. It’s a surprise.”
It was a surprise. It was not a pleasant surprise, judging by the look on Haig’s face. To be perfectly accurate, Johnny thought, you could only say that Haig turned purple. Literally. His face was the color of grape juice.
“That’s right,” Johnny insisted. “I’ve caught your killer for you.”
“Once a night oughta be enough,” the big cop said. “You wanta spend a week in jail, Johnny?”
He laughed. “This is Jan Vernon, Sam.”
“We’ve met. Listen, Johnny—”
“Miss Vernon is a beautiful woman,” he went on. “Also an accomplished actress.”
“Dammit, Johnny—”
He glanced at Jan. “Also a murderess,” he went on. “She killed Elaine James and Carter Tracy. She tried to kill me but she failed, which explains my presence.”
If Haig’s face had not already turned purple, it would have then. He started to yell at Johnny, then changed his mind and turned to Jan.
“You want to press charges for criminal slander?” he said. “You got a witness. And this bastard’s rich. You’d get a nice settlement out of the deal.”
Johnny shook his head. “She won’t sue me, Sam. She’ll give you a confession instead. I’ve got the razor in my pocket, the one she used on both of them. You’d better get a stenographer in here for a statement. Jan feels talkative.”
Haig started to say something. Then, evidently, he noticed the look in Jan Vernon’s eyes for the first time.
So he did not say anything.
Nobody did, not for a second or two. Then Jan cleared her throat.
“He’s telling the truth,” Jan said. “You’d better get that steno. I’ll tell you all about it.”
“If you’re looking for an apology,” Haig said, “I’ve got news for you. You can go straight to hell.”
Johnny looked out of the window. They were still in Haig’s office, and night had given away to dawn. Jan’s statement had been dictated, typed and signed. Jan had been led off and locked up. Soon, Johnny thought, he would go home. And sleep for thirty-six hours. At the very least.
“So you came up with the killer,” Haig chided. “But you did it back-asswards, Johnny boy. You should have come straight to me, Johnny. What would you have lost that way?”
“A case,” Johnny said.
“Huh?”
“The evidence against that girl wasn’t enough to stuff a thimble with it. Nothing could have been proved until she cracked.”
“We would have broken her.”
“Sure—if you hammered away long enough. But be reasonable, Sam. What would you have done if I had come in here tonight—last night, whenever the hell it was. What would you have done if I had handed it to you? No evidence, no proof. Just an idea.”
“We would have picked her up.”
“Be honest for a minute, Sam. Drop the Dragnet routine. You would have thrown me out on my ear.”
“Well, after the bit with Buell . . .”
“That’s what I mean. Even if you went through the motions, you never would have dragged it out of her. I managed to. So why yell at me? I handed you a killer, didn’t I?”
Haig looked at his desk. Then the desk grew boring, and he turned to look through the window. That was no better. Finally he looked at Johnny.
“If I produced a play,” he said carefully, “and—”
“That’ll be the day.”
“Listen to me,” Haig said. “Hear me out. Let’s say I produce a play. Let’s say the critics like it. Let’s say the audience likes it. Let’s say it runs for three years and the movies buy it for a quarter of a million dollars.”
“All right—let’s say it.”
“Let’s,” Haig agreed. “Now wouldn’t you be madder than hell?”
It was seven in the morning when Johnny got home. Ito, of course, was still awake. Or had just awakened. No matter what time it was, you could always be certain of two things. The sun had not yet set on the British Empire, and Ito was awake.
“Jan did it,” Johnny said. “Someday I’ll explain the whole thing. But not now.”
Ito nodded.
Johnny said pleasantly, “I am going to sleep. No calls, no telegrams, no anything. I am going to sleep. I shall slumber for thirty-six hours. Maybe longer.”
He was wrong, of course. No human being sleeps for thirty-six hours, unless he had just finished fighting a losing battle with a tsetse fly. It is impossible to sleep for thirty-six hours, and Johnny didn’t.
He woke up after twenty-nine.
At which point he tried to fall asleep again. And failed.
Ito wisely said nothing until after breakfast and coffee and the first cigarette of the morning.
“There were quite a few phone calls,” he said then. “The newspapers, mostly.”
“What did you tell them?”
“To go to hell in a handbasket,” quoted Ito inscrutably. “Was that the right thing to say?”
“Better to go to hell,” remarked Johnny, “on wheels. Any other calls?”
“One from Ernest Buell. He wants you to call him. He says that, although you are a son of a female dog, so is everyone else in show business, including himself. He still wants to direct A Touch of Squalor if and when you manage to reassemble a cast. He realizes that it will not be easy to replace a murderess and her two victims, but that he’d love to help, and you should call him.”
“I will,” Johnny said. “Any others?”
“The author of A Touch of Squalor. He wants to know what’s going to happen to his play.”
“He’s not the only one. Anybody else?”
Ito thought for a moment. “One more,” he said. “That young bearded Zen. The hand-clapper.”
“Lennie? Yeah, I thought he’d call. He wants me to give him a job. I’ll have to find something for him to do.”
“He doesn’t want a job.”
“You sure?”
Ito nodded positively. “Matter of fact, he wanted to make an appointment with you. A business appointment.”
“Of course. You see, I told him I’d get him some sort of job in the theater. The production end of things. Something to do so he can learn the business—”
But Ito was shaking his head. “He said to tell you that he read the story in the newspapers. He said that the theater seems a little too risky. ‘A cat only lives once, he might as well live as long as he can.’ I think those were the words he used.”
“Then,” Johnny asked, puzzled, “what in hell does he want from me?”
“He said he wants to sell you some life insurance,” Ito explained. “He said nobody else would do you such a favor. Because, he said, you’re a terrible risk.”
* * *
About the Author
* * *
Lawrence Block has been writing award-winning mystery and suspense fiction for half a century. His newest book, a sequel to his greatly successful Hopper anthology In Sunlight or in Shadow, is Alive in Shape and Color, a 17-story anthology with each story illustrated by a great painting; authors include Lee Child, Joyce Carol Oates, Michael Connelly, Joe Lansdale, Jeffery Deaver and David Morrell. His most recent novel, pitched by his Hollywood agent as “James M. Cain on Viagra,” is The Girl with the Deep Blue Eyes. Other recent works of fiction include The Burglar Who Counted The Spoons, featuring Bernie Rhodenbarr; Keller’s Fedora, featuring philatelist and assassin Keller; and A Drop Of The Hard Stuff, featuring Matthew Scudder, brilliantly embodied by Liam Neeson in the 2014 film, A Walk Among The Tombstones. Several of his other books have also been filmed, although not terribly well. He’s well known for his books for writers, including the classic Telling Lies For Fun & Profit and Write For Your Life, and has recently published a collection of his writings about the mystery genre and its practitioners, The Crime Of Our Lives. In addition to prose works, he has written episodic television (Tilt!) and the Wong Kar-wai film, My Blueberry Nights. He is a modest and humble fellow, although you would never guess as much from this biographical note.
Email: lawbloc@gmail.com
Twitter: @LawrenceBlock
Facebook: lawrence.block
Website: lawrenceblock.com
My Newsletter: I get out an email newsletter at unpredictable intervals, but rarely more often than every other week. I’ll be happy to add you to the distribution list. A blank email to lawbloc@gmail.com with “newsletter” in the subject line will get you on the list, and a click of the “Unsubscribe” link will get you off it, should you ultimately decide you’re happier without it.
The Classic Crime Library
1. After the First Death
2. Deadly Honeymoon
3. Grifter’s Game
4. The Girl with the Long Green Heart
5. The Specialists
6. The Triumph of Evil
7. Such Men Are Dangerous
8. Not Comin’ Home to You
9. Lucky at Cards
10. Killing Castro
11. A Diet of Treacle
12. You Could Call It Murder
13. Coward’s Kiss
14. Cinderella Sims
15. Passport to Peril
16. Ariel
17. Strange Embrace
18. Candy
19. Four Lives at the Crossroads
Excerpt Copyright © 2019, Lawrence Block
Candy
* * *
I thought she’d be asleep by the time I got home but she wasn’t. I didn’t find out this intriguing fact until I was inside the door. Our apartment doesn’t have a window facing out on 100th Street where the building entrance is and I hadn’t taken the time to walk around to West End Avenue and have a look at our window. Even with a light on she could have been asleep anyway.
I opened the door with my key and I saw her. She was sitting in the armchair in front of the television set but the late late show was over and done with and she was staring at a test pattern. I’m not sure what time it was but when it’s too late for the late late show it is very late indeed, from what I understand. I’m just going on guesswork, as it happens, because as far as I’m concerned television is just one of those conveniences of modern living which I am in the habit of asking the bartender to turn off.
But anyway, you get the picture. It’s late, I’m coming in quietly, and my dear wife is still up.
I said Hello because it seemed to be the most nearly logical thing to say.
She got up from the chair and turned around to look at me. Her face was perfectly composed but I could tell that the composure was about as genuine as a giveaway show. When you live with a woman for over eleven years you can tell when she’s faking. There were little lines around the corners of her mouth and the redness around her eyes didn’t come from peeling onions. She had been crying, and this made me feel like the first-class Grade-A bastard which I was. She’d been crying because of me, and it figured.
I smiled. I walked over to her and I took her in my arms and I kissed her. She was wearing a nylon nightgown with nothing on under it and she was soft and warm and irrepressibly and undeniably female, with soft short brown hair and velvety brown eyes.
But the kiss was a short one. At first she clutched at me desperately; then she straightened up and twisted away. I didn’t attempt to hold her because I knew she didn’t want me to.
It figured. When a woman lives with a man for over eleven years she can tell when he’s faking. And I was faking. And she could tell. I wanted to kiss her about as much as I wanted to kiss a pig and she knew it.
“How was she, Jeff?”
I looked away. I didn’t say anything because there wasn’t much to say.
“I don’t like her perfume, Jeff. Did you know that you reek of her perfume? I can smell it on you. You ought to take a shower or something after you—”
She broke off and for a minute or two I thought she was going to start crying again. But she grabbed hold of herself and turned around so that she was facing me. Her mouth was closed and her lips formed a thin red line. When she spoke she talked slowly, carefully, as if she was afraid she wouldn’t make it without breaking down unless she pronounced each word meticulously and took her time between words.
“Let’s sit down,” she said. “We’ve got to talk this out, Jeff. It’s no good the way it is.”
“What’s there to talk about?”
“There’s quite a bit to talk about.”
I gave a half-hearted shrug and went over to her. She sat down on the sofa and I took a seat next to her. We just sat there in perfect silence for what must have been at least three or four minutes.
“I suppose it happens all the time,” she said softly. “It always happens. You go on being a good wife day after day and finally your husband finds another girl and she’s more exciting and more beautiful and more interesting, and she’s new and different and all of a sudden he’s sleeping with her and you sit home alone and stare at the damned television. You sit home alone rubbing your knees together like a teenager because you want him so much you could scream and all the while he’s with some nameless bitch and the two of them are doing all the things you used to do and—”
“Lucy—”
“Don’t interrupt me!” Her face was drawn now and she was rummaging around with her hands the way she always did when she wanted a cigarette. I got a pack out of my shirt pocket and gave her one and took one for myself. That emptied the pack and I crumpled it up in a ball and heaved it at the wastebasket on the other side of the room. It sailed through the air, bounced off the wall and dropped into the basket.
“Two points,” I said.
She didn’t say anything.
“They tell me women live through this,” she said. Her cigarette was lit and she had taken two or three deep drags on it. She was calmer now.
“Women live through this,” she went on. “It’s supposed to happen all the time. After a man’s married so many years he gets hungry for something new and the wife goes around with her eyes shut and her mouth shut and waits for him to get tired of the new one and come back home to mama. Then things are all right again.”
