He glanced at the list, knowing the names he would find there. His closest friends. His only friends. The men he had gone through the war with. B Company of the 165th Field Artillery had plodded across Africa, climbed through Sicily, slogged the length of the Italian boot, and these six had been together, miraculously, through it all. And they had learned the dependence of each one on all the others.
They would come through, all right. Conway knew them. Although they were scattered now and he had not seen any of them for two years, they kept in frequent touch by mail, and, if anything, the bond between them seemed stronger than ever. They’d come across. Even though all were married and most had children, and they were just beginning to get on their feet, with mortgaged houses, payments on cars, hospital and obstetricians’ and pediatricians’ bills, they wouldn’t let him down. He knew them. And they were scattered around the country; they wouldn’t check with each other, at least until afterward.
Oh, the letters would get results. They’d deprive their wives and children to help a pal out of a jam. All I have to do, Conway reflected, is to steal the money from those women and kids, hand it over to Helen, and be free... free to shoot myself.
Some of his shocked incredulity showed in his face, and Helen was amused.
“Don’t like the idea, h’m? Well, unless you’ve got a better one, that’s what you’re going to do. Or else.”
Her confidence, her good humor, bothered him more than anything else. She was so awfully sure of herself.
“Or else what?”
There was no humor now, but the confidence was even more blatant.
“Or else this. If you haven’t written those letters by noon tomorrow, I’m going to go to work on you. And I mean really go to work. I’m going to drive you out of this house or drive you crazy, or both. There’ll be such rows that the neighbors will be calling the police — or I will. But I won’t let them arrest you. I’ll be your ever-loving wife and ask them to put you in the psychiatric ward. And I’ll tell them why.”
Bull’s-eye. A direct hit.
“And then, when I’ve really given you a working over, whether you’re in a padded cell or have decided to run for it, I’ll write your pals, and what a sob story they’ll get from me. I might be able to get even more out of ’em than you could. And don’t try to write them and beat me to the punch, because anything you say now will only make it more convincing when I write — if I have to.”
Conway sat down. He had no breath and the blood was pounding in his head. She was crucifying him, he realized, in the one way she could. And she knew she could.
“All this I’m telling you is just the persuader,” she went on. “I don’t want to have to do it that way. It’ll take time and be a lot of trouble, and I might not get as much out of them as you can. But don’t think I won’t do it if I have to.”
The pounding in his head was lessening. He could think, after a fashion, and he hoped he could speak. But he dared not get up from the chair.
“Don’t try to bluff me, and don’t try to scare me.” His voice sounded steadier than he had expected. “I’ve been all right for over four years. I’ve been perfectly well.” He realized that his voice was rising, and went on more calmly. “You know it as well as I do, so don’t think you’re going to scare me with that line of talk. I don’t scare that easily.”
“No?” She leaned toward him, and he could hardly focus on the finger she pointed. “Look at yourself. You’re sweating like a horse. Your voice is croaking. And you’re so weak in the knees you can’t even stand up.”
She moved away and he no longer had to concentrate on that finger that so frightened and fascinated him, reminding him of some dread, forgotten thing in the past.
She lit a cigarette and looked at him through the lazily curling smoke. “Why do you think I’ve started all these rows the last couple of months?” she said. “Because I wanted to see how sure you were of yourself. And I found out. No matter what I said or did, you kept calm and controlled. All you wanted to do was to get away, to avoid a row — because you were scared. You’ve taken things from me no man in the world would take — no man, that is, who was in his right mind — and sure of it.”
Somehow he got to his feet and moved toward the door.
“Let me out of here,” he said, and realized that only a whisper came out. “I think I’m going to be sick.”
She moved to the door and opened it.
“Just one thing more.” She stopped him with her hand. “You said a little while ago that I knew how much we had in the bank. Well, I do, but I don’t think you do, so I’ll tell you. There’s exactly one dollar; I drew out the rest this afternoon. So don’t get any ideas about taking a powder and not coming back. You wouldn’t get very far.” She dropped her hand and he started out woodenly. “Remember, noon tomorrow.”
Chapter two
Conway was not even sure that he would be able to drive, but somehow he started the car, got it out of the garage, and headed down the street. He stopped at the first bar he saw, went in, and sat in the far corner of the last booth.
By the time he finished his second drink he had stopped shaking and was able to think with some degree of clarity. And the more clearly he saw things, the worse they became. Not that he doubted his sanity — now. But he was afraid of what might happen.
Conway had gone through the war until two days before it ended. Then something gave way. The men called it shell shock, and the doctors called it combat fatigue, but in any language it was a crack-up. It got him back to a hospital in the States in a hurry, and before he was discharged, six months later, the doctor had given him the final word.
“You’re okay,” he had said. “You’re okay now, and you’ll continue to be. Just don’t worry. Don’t worry, don’t let things get you down. Don’t let yourself get too excited, or fly off the handle, or get in a rage. That’s good advice for anybody — reduces the danger of ulcers, among other things. But it’s especially good for you, after what you’ve been through.”
His outfit had been kept in Germany, and he was released from the hospital just two days before they were processed out through Fort Dix. They knew what had happened to him, but it was not mentioned in the course of the three-day reunion and celebration they staged in New York. They had been through too much together for anyone to be blamed for cracking; they had all been on the verge of it at one time or another.
But — they knew.
He had told Helen about it before they were married, and she had dismissed it as of no importance; it had never been brought up since. He had almost forgotten it himself until recently — until, he realized, a couple of months ago, when he had begun to fear the increasingly frequent battles with Helen. The psychiatrist’s words had come back to him, and he had made a conscious effort to restrain himself, as he became aware of his growing tension and insecurity. But he had not known that Helen knew that, nor that she was doing it for just that reason.
He tried to look at the thing from every angle. He would not write those letters: that he couldn’t do, no matter what happened. But if he didn’t, he dared not stay on with her: he knew she would carry out her threat, and he was honestly afraid to face it. He could think of no work he could get; he had no references, had had no job since the army. And he felt sure that Helen would find him in a very short time. He was afraid of what the feeling of being a fugitive might do to him: the chance of being hauled up on charges of desertion, non-support; the threat of being committed to a psychiatric ward. He had a car, but it was registered in both their names; he couldn’t sell it, and if he went off in it, she’d have a warrant out before morning.