“Barney . . .”
“Let me finish, please. I’ve got to tell you this. I see you everywhere I turn. I lie awake at night seeing you. I pass women on the street that are tall, or have eyes almost that same . . .” gray, I thought, “. . . sea-mist shade of gray, or a little gesture of the hand, or a line somewhere, or one random fragment of grace that reminds me of you, and then you’re all around me. It’s so terribly real I could almost reach out and touch you. Do you know what that’s like, or how long you can stand it?”
I glanced up at her then. I was in, all right. You could see it in the hushed and tremulous expression and the softness of the eyes as she studied my face. From here on it was only a mopping-up operation.
“I love you, Jewel,” I said. I kissed her, and her arms went up about my neck, clinging fiercely. I kissed the closed eyelids, and moved my lips across her cheek to whisper in her ear, “Darling, darling. Oh, darling. . . .”
“But, Barney, we’ve got to take time to think. This is all so fast.”
“There’s nothing to think about. We’re going away this afternoon. Look. We’ll go to Florida. We can both get divorces there, and we’ll be married. I’ve got some money of my own, and I’ll get a job. You’ll be out of that swamp, where you can wear decent clothes, and be around people.”
She stirred a little in my arms. “All right, Barney. I know it’s wrong, but I guess I can’t help it either. I’ll go with you anywhere.”
You’re wonderful.”
“Do you want me to meet you in Sanport? I could take the bus.”
“No,” I said. “I don’t want to be away from you that long. We’ll go together. We’ll go back to town and I’ll cash a check, and put my stuff in the car.”
She pushed a little away from me and glanced up. “But I’ll have to pack. . . .”
“I don’t want you to take anything. I want to buy you everything new. And choose it all myself.”
“But there are some pieces of jewelry my mother gave me. And pictures. Things I’ve got to take.”
I thought swiftly. She probably wouldn’t leave without the usual flotsam and sentimental rubbish women always clung to with such mulish perversity. At least, not without an argument that would take longer than going after them.
“You’re sure he’s up the lake?” I asked. “There’s no use having a nasty scene or maybe a fight.”
She nodded. “He’s fishing with some man. It’ll only take me a few minutes to pack what I want to take. Do you want me to meet you here?”
“I’ll go with you,” I said.
“You don’t have to.”
“From now on,” I said, “you go nowhere without me, you tawny-haired angel.” At least, not till we got out of this country. “And, besides, we could leave your car there.”
“All right,” she said.
She drove fast. I stayed close behind her. We met no one at all on the road, but after we made the turn-off and were down in the bottom almost to the camp we had to pull over for a car that was coming out. There was a man in it alone, and he wore a long-visored fishing cap. I frowned, not caring much for it. But she should know whether or not that was the man he was guiding, and she continued on. I followed.
We came around the last bend and into the clearing. It was quiet and deserted except for a late model Ford parked near the cabins. She stopped, and I turned around so I’d be headed out toward the highway.
When we got out I nodded toward the Ford. “Is that his car? The man he’s fishing with?”
She looked doubtful. “I’m not sure. There were two different men, and one of them went out alone. I don’t remember which was which.”
“Well, we’re here. Let’s get started.”
We walked over to the lunch-room. It was open, except for the screen door.
“I locked up when I left,” she said.
Well, it couldn’t be helped. If we ran into him, it was going to be a lot more awkward on account of my being with her, but that was the way it bounced. I had to be sure she hadn’t talked to anybody. I opened the screen and we went in. The room was empty. He could be in back, I thought, but presumably he would have heard us by this time and come out. She hesitated, and I knew she didn’t like the idea of going in to see, but I couldn’t help her there. It was bad enough this way, but if he came in and found the two of us in their bedroom the whole thing was apt to turn hairy in large quantities.
He didn’t strike me at all as the well-we-might-as-well-be-civilized type.
“It’s so quiet,” she said.
I’d noticed that, and usually liked more noise myself. I was about to say something when the screen door opened quietly behind us and he came in. God alone knew where he’d been. Under the best of circumstances his face wasn’t anything you’d need in your dreams unless you wanted to grate a coconut, but now there was a frozen savagery about it I didn’t like at all.
He didn’t say anything. He leaned against the door jamb and looked dangerous. He was good at it.
She was behind me. “I’m leaving, George,” she said.
Nothing moved except his lips. “You figure you’ll be better off with glamor-boy here?
“I’m going away,” she said. “That’s the only thing that matters, isn’t it?”
“Get a place with a back door,” he said. “So you can both keep in practice.”
“Look, Nunn,” I broke in. “There hasn’t been . . .”
“Shut up,” he said. I’ll get to you in a minute.”
“Go pack your bag,” I told her. “You’ve told him you’re leaving. That’s all that’s necessary.”
She turned and went through the doorway behind the counter. He started to come toward me. I was blocking his way at the opening between the counter and showcase.
“She’s afraid of you,” I said. “Stay out of there and leave her alone.”
I could see he didn’t have a gun. He wore nothing except a pair of dungarees and a sweaty T-shirt. He looked like something carved out of knotty wood.
“You forget whose place this is?” he asked.
“No,” I said. “But why don’t you stop acting like an idiot. All she’s doing is leaving. It happens every day.”
“Yeah. It does with you around, sport.”
He made no move to swing at me, or go past. Instead he stepped down the counter and leaned over it. When he straightened he had a hunting knife in his hand. It had a thin and wicked blade about eight inches long.
He started back toward me. “You want to see what a man looks like standing in his own guts?”
He meant it. He wasn’t the bluffing kind. I backed up a step. There was nothing under the counter or in the showcase I could hold him off with. I didn’t like it at all any more. About one more step backward and I’d be in that hallway on the other side of the door, and in the close quarters there I was going to have knife in me somewhere no matter what I did.
Then something slid past my side, just under my right arm. It was a .45 automatic. I grabbed it from her hand and leveled it at him. Instead of stopping, he lunged at me, and I knew the chamber wasn’t armed. It was his gun, of course, and if she had armed it we’d have heard her. There wasn’t time. I swung it at the side of his head and was lucky enough to connect. He fell into me like a bum tackle, rolled off, and fell to the floor. She cried out behind me.
“Get back,” I snapped at her.
Instead, she came on past me, stepped over his legs, and went around the counter. She sat down on one of the stools and put her face down in her arms. She was just weak and sick.