“There’s a phone booth in the hall,” the sergeant said, and returned to his newspaper.
Conway dialed the number and, because the time had now been established and there was no longer need for haste, let it ring half a dozen times before he returned to the desk. “No answer,” he said.
The sergeant reluctantly put aside his paper and reached for a form. “Sure you want to do this now?” he asked. “Why don’t you wait till morning? She probably just drove off with somebody to have a drink.”
“She wouldn’t do that.” Conway wondered if he was playing the part of the fatuous, doting husband too convincingly. He had done everything he could to seem a ludicrous figure to the squad-car men. He did not want this pile of suet behind the desk to take him too seriously, either; on the other hand neither did he want to have to insist too much, in order to get the report on the police blotter. And it had to be there, in writing that even an assistant district attorney could read.
“She’d never do anything like that,” he repeated. “She didn’t like to drive, and she wouldn’t go off in my car with anyone else — she wouldn’t be that inconsiderate.” Careful now, don’t overdo it, he cautioned himself. “Besides we know hardly anyone out here. Who would she meet to go anywhere with?”
The sergeant rubbed his face with his hand, and Conway saw the smile he was trying to conceal — the same smile which had been on the faces of the radio-car men. The memory of the disappearance of Mrs. Yates was still green. But this grin was too obvious to be concealed — or to be ignored.
“I know what you’re thinking,” Conway said. “You’re remembering that woman who left her husband in the market and went off to a motel with that boy.” Indignation came into his voice. “Well, my wife’s not like that, and don’t go thinking she is.”
The grin disappeared. “No, no — I wasn’t thinking of that at all. Nothing like it.” He was having difficulty keeping the smile off his face; he picked up a pen and bent over the desk. “Now, where’d you say this happened?”
Conway went over the details again; there were two forms to fill out and he had to sign both of them. He started to leave as two policemen came in.
“Just be sure to let us know if she turns up,” the sergeant called after him. Conway turned and nodded his assent. The sergeant’s grin was coming back; he could hardly wait to tell his story to an audience.
Conway did not delay. He only hoped the sergeant would make it good.
Conway was careful to stay in character on the bus, and when he reached home he did not even stop for the drink he had been longing for. He went directly to work.
He put Helen’s soiled glove, which he had retrieved from the theatre, in one of the drawers of his dresser, and placed his own gloves in another drawer. The wallet he put in a metal box in his desk in which he kept his insurance policies. He turned the pocket of his coat, in which he had carried the mustache, inside out and vacuumed it.
And always, in the back of his mind, there was the problem of Helen’s gloves: the new ones, the ones she had bought today and had worn tonight. He dared not burn them: a thorough investigation might reveal that she had purchased gloves today, and he would have no way of accounting for their disappearance. He examined them carefully, under the strongest light he could find: they were not really soiled, but neither did they have that pristine quality which white gloves seem to lose the moment they are put on a hand. Here was a gamble he had to take, because he had deviated from the plan. He found some cleaning fluid, poured it in the wash basin, dunked the gloves in it, hung them up, and turned an electric fan on them, to hasten their drying.
Desperately he wanted that drink, but he refused to risk it. He made a sandwich and washed it down with a glass of milk. He longed to turn out the lights and get into bed; he had no fear of ghosts or conscience, he wanted only to relax, and forget his need for action or acting.
But it might seem strange, later, if the lights were turned off too early, and besides, there were still things to do. When, finally, the gloves were dry, he took them to the kitchen and ironed them. When he finished he was satisfied it would take an expert to determine whether they had ever been worn. He put them back in Helen’s handkerchief drawer. Now he might have that drink.
He made a highball, took it to his room, and started to undress. The drink was only half-finished when he was ready for bed. He remembered to go downstairs and turn on the porch light, and he left the hall light on. Then he closed his door, turned out the lights in his room, and got into bed to think out his program for tomorrow. But before he had even decided what time to get up, he was asleep.
Chapter five
Conway wakened slowly, dazedly, from a heavy, druglike sleep. Something in his subconscious kept jabbing him with a reminder that he must get up, but some part of his nervous system refused to let him move, to disturb the utter pleasure of this trancelike state. How long this tug of war went on, he did not know, but suddenly he was all awake, with a full realization of where he was, what had happened, and what still remained to be done. He sat up in bed and listened for a moment; for what, he did not quite know. He heard nothing but a wonderfully peaceful silence.
He called the Hollywood police station after breakfast, and was not surprised to learn that they had no report on either his wife or his car. At lunch time he decided it was simple prudence to avoid people as much as possible: no matter how well he played it, it was too easy to make a slip. He was in the clear, he knew that; discovery was possible only if he gave himself away. The fewer people he saw, the less chance of anything going wrong. He wanted to stay out of restaurants and bars, so he went to the nearest market and laid in a supply of meat and canned goods which would last him several days.
The neighbors, fortunately, were no problem: both he and Helen had retained the New Yorker’s habit of aloofness with neighbors who, because of propinquity, might conceivably impinge on one’s privacy. He barely knew by sight the people in the houses next door.
When he returned home, the house seemed cold and a little musty, although it was hot outside. After his dutiful call to the police station, he opened the windows in the living room, and the warm breezes flowed in and through the house. He got a bottle of beer and sat with his feet up on a table, and was suddenly conscious that he liked this place which had so recently been a prison. He was free and relieved of care; he had never known a feeling of such complete well-being. Perhaps, once — yes, it reminded him of that time. They had been fighting north of Rome; the outfit was relieved, sent to a rear area, and the gang got furloughs together. They’d gone to recently liberated Rome, and had rooms in a hotel, and even had baths. They had been clean and free: the grim weariness, the discipline, the fear of death which had been the most important things in life for so long were suddenly effaced. They had all felt it then: the ineffable peace, the sensation of being in a world where there was no war, no conflict, no unpleasantness even; where there were no orders to obey, no one to please or propitiate. It had been a Godsend then, for without those few blissful days they might all have cracked, as he did... This present surcease had come none too soon; he might, indeed, as Helen had predicted, have cracked again.
But not now. Not any more. He took a long pull at the beer. He was free now. He had peace. He could live, now, and work. And it was time to get to work.
He went upstairs and sat down before the typewriter. But he was hearing the ring of every telephone in the neighborhood, and between going to the stairs to be sure it was not his, and looking out the window every time it seemed a car might be stopping, he accomplished almost nothing. About five o’clock his phone did ring, and he had to rehearse his “Hello” three times before he dared lift the instrument and speak the word into the mouthpiece. But it was a wrong number, and he returned to his room nervous and let down.