After crossing the porch on hands and knees, I fitted the key into the lock and turned it. Then I went back for Eleanor. I placed her to one side of the door, back against the house where a tearing bullet from within couldn’t touch her, and then twisted the knob. Nothing happened. The house was in darkness.
Stale air mingled with cigarette smoke met my nostrils. Fresh cigarette smoke.
The smoker would be sitting across the room, facing me, waiting for me to come in. He wouldn’t fire while I stood there because the sound would carry in the night air. He would wait until I had entered and closed the door behind me.
I whispered to Eleanor, “Stay here. I’ll be back after you.”
Dropping to my knees I went through the door at a crawl. I was across the sill and feeling about for a chair when Eleanor did the damndest thing.
She walked upright through the opening behind me, fumbled for a light switch, clicked it on, and said, “I’ve just got to sit down!”
I sat down, too, right where I was on the floor.
Eleanor slumped into the chair I had been feeling around for. She reached out with one wan hand and pushed the door shut. Then she seemed to just collapse.
The Judge was sitting across the room in the spot where I had imagined he would be. He was smoking, smiling, playing with a gun. His eyes twinkled.
He said to Eleanor, “Take the gentleman’s item, baby.”
Eleanor reached over with obvious effort and took it out of my hand. I was too dumbfounded to resist her.
The Judge reminded her, “He has a shoulder holster, baby. Look in that.”
She complied, but it was empty.
From my position at her feet I stared up into her pale face. A flood of unpleasant bits of newborn knowledge rushed into my half-baked skull, sweeping in with the awful rush of backwater across a bottom-land. Hindsight is a wonderful, futile thing!
Consider for instance Eleanor’s amazing story of her escape. How we had swallowed it, hook, line, sinker and pole.
The Judge was such a rotten shot that he had only nicked her shoulder. We had swallowed it. She had escaped down the back stairway, driven part way to Boone, transferred to a bus, walked from the bus terminal to my office, all that in broad daylight with a fresh wound. We had swallowed it. She had practically jumped at the suggestion to bring her along with us, in spite of her weakened condition, in spite of the certain danger had she been on the level. We swallowed it without a suspicion.
And only a few minutes ago, in the car, she had said she wasn’t worried about deportation... not now.
I turned on her, bitterly. “You damned little cheat. You
The Judge answered for her. He showed no trace of anxiety at her condition, no worry at her being twenty-four hours late. He didn’t seem to care a damn.
“She was shot. That was necessary. Eleanor understands that. Eleanor is going to be repaid for her trouble.”
He shouldn’t have said that. But he did. And no sooner was it out of his mouth than something sharp connected in that just mentioned half-baked skull I own. If there had been a maze of wires and relays in me, like a mechanical man, the Judge would have heard a relay click all the way across the room. At his words the relay clicked, a circuit closed, and all the electrical knowledge in that mythical maze of wires focused down to a fine point. The fine point was behind the bridge of my nose, and my nose itched.
Eleanor was marked for death.
She wasn’t keen enough to realize it, to see ahead and discover where her part in the plan was leading her. A long-range plan of clever duplicity, equaled only by that earlier duplicity that had erased Harry Evans by remote control.
Eleanor’s eyes were glassy.
“You stupid, damn fool!” I bit out at her. “If you had the brains of a brass monkey you’d realize what you’ve done. You’re going to be repaid, all right. Yes indeed, paid the same way Leonore was paid when her usefulness was ended.”
The Judge butted in. “You’re annoying the lady, son.” Not his words, but the quiet undertone conveyed the warning; a warning Eleanor didn’t catch.
She just stared at me. I looked again. She wasn’t staring. Her eyes had turned completely glassy and the pupils were vanishing. I got to my knees.
Eleanor gritted between tight teeth: “I’m going to be sick...”
The Judge ordered sharply, “Go in the bathroom.”
She tried to get up. She put out a hand on the chair arm for a prop, but couldn’t make it. I got to my feet and moved towards her.
“Easy, son!” Dunkles snarled at me. He was on his feet, gun pointing at my midriff.
“Easy yourself. Can’t you see she’s sick!”
I don’t know why I felt sympathy for her. I should be hating her guts and hoping she fell out of the chair and banged her punkinhead on the floor. But I didn’t feel that way at all. I guess I’m chicken-hearted about women.
“Where’s the bathroom?” I asked the Judge.
