She stood there leaning against me, holding the gun with both hands pressed hard against her body. She was racked with panting sobs. I reached around her body and put my hand on the gun.
She spun around as if it took that to make her realize I was-there. Her eyes widened and her body sagged against me. She let go of the gun. It was a heavy clumsy weapon, a Webley double-action hammerless. The barrel was warm. I held her with one arm, dropped the gun in my pocket, and looked past her head at him. Nobody said anything.
Then he opened his eyes and that weary smile played on his lips. "Nobody hurt," he muttered. "Just a wild shot into the ceiling."
I felt her go stiff. Then she pulled away. Her eyes were focused and clear.! let her go.
"Roger," she said in a voice not much more than a sick whisper, "did it have to be that?"
He stared owlishly, licked his lip and said nothing. She went and leaned against the dressing table. Her hand moved mechanically and threw the hair back from her face. She shuddered once from head to foot, shaking her head from side to side. "Roger," she whispered again. "Poor Roger. Poor miserable Roger."
He was staring straight up at the ceiling now. "I had a nightmare," he said slowly. "Somebody with a knife was leaning over the bed. I don't know who. Looked a little like Candy. Couldn't of been Candy."
"Of course not, darling," she said softly. She left the dressing table and sat down on the side of the bed. She put her hand out and began to stroke his forehead. "Candy has gone to bed long ago. And why would Candy have a knife?"
"He's a Mex. They all have knives," Roger said in the same remote impersonal voice. "They like knives. And he doesn't like me."
"Nobody likes you," I said brutally.
She turned her head swiftly. "Please-please don't talk like that. He didn't knew. He had a dream-"
"Where was the gun?" I growled, watching her, not paying any attention to him.
"Night table. In the drawer." He turned his head and met my stare. There hadn't been any gun in the drawer, and he knew I knew it. The pills had been in there and some odds -and ends, but no gun.
"Or under the pillow," he added. "I'm vague about it. I shot once-" he lifted a heavy hand and pointed-"up there."
I looked up. There seemed to be a hole in the ceiling plaster all right. I went where I could look up at it. Yes. The kind of hole a bullet might make. From that gun it would go on through, into the attic. I went back dose to the bed and stood looking down at him, giving him the hard eye.
"Nuts. You meant to kill yourself. You didn't have any nightmare. You were swimming in a sea of self-pity. You didn't have any gun in the drawer or under your pillow either. You got up and got the gun and got back into bed and there you were all ready to wipe out the whole messy business. But I don't think you had the nerve. You fired a shot not meant to hit anything. And your wife came running-that's what you wanted. Just pity and sympathy, pal. Nothing else. Even the struggle was mostly fake. She couldn't take a gun away from you if you didn't want her to."
"I'm sick," he said. "But you could be right. Does it matter?"
"It matters like this. They'd put you in the psycho ward, and believe me, the people who run that place are about as sympathetic as Georgia chain-gang guards."
Eileen stood up suddenly. "That's enough," she said sharply. "He is sick, and you know it."
"He wants to be sick. I'm just reminding him of what it would cost him."
"This is not the time to tell him."
"Go on back to your room."
Her blue eyes flashed. "How dare you-"
"Go on back to your room. Unless you want me to call the police. These things are supposed to be reported."
He almost grinned. "Yeah, call the police," he said, "like you did on Terry Lennox."
I didn't pay any attention to that. I was still watching her. She looked exhausted now, and frail, and very beautiful. The moment of flashing anger was gone. I put a hand out and touched her arm. "It's all right," I said. "He won't do it again. Go back to bed."
She gave him a long look and went out of the room. When the open door was empty of her I sat down on the side of the bed where she had been sitting.
"More pills?"
"No thanks. It doesn't matter whether I sleep. I feel a lot better."
"Did I hit right about that shot? It was just a crazy bit of acting?"
"More or less." He turned his head away. "I guess I was lightheaded."
"Nobody can stop you from killing yourself, if you really want to. I realize that. So do you."
"Yes." He was still looking away. "Did you do what I asked you-that stuff in the typewriter?"
"Uh huh. I'm surprised you remember. It's pretty crazy writing. Funny thing, it's dearly typed."
"I can always do that-drunk or sober-up to a point anyway."
"Don't worry about Candy," I said. "You're wrong about his not liking you. And I was wrong to say nobody did. I was trying to jar Eileen, make her mad."
"Why?"
"She pulled one faint already tonight."
He shook his head slightly. "Eileen never faints."
"Then it was a phony."
He didn't like that either.
"What did you mean-a good man died for you?" I asked.
He frowned, thinking about it. "Just rubbish. I told you I had a dream-"
"I'm talking about that gaff you typed out."
He looked at me now, turning his head on the pillow as if it had enormous weight. "Another dream."
"I'll try again. What's Candy got on you?"
"Shove it, Jack," he said, and dosed his eyes.
I got up and dosed the door. "You can't run forever, Wade. Candy could be a blackmailer, sure. Easy. He could even be nice about it-like you and lift your dough at the same time. What is it-a woman?"
"You believe that fool, Loring," he said with his eyes closed.
"Not exactly. What about the sister-the one that's dead?"
It was a wild pitch in a sense but it happened to split the plate. His eyes snapped wide open. A bubble of saliva showed on his lips.
"Is that-why you're here?" he asked slowly, and in a whispering voice.
"You know better. I was invited. You invited me."
His head rolled back and forth on the pillow. In spite of the seconal he was eaten up by his nerves. His face was covered with sweat.
"I'm not the first loving husband who has been an adulterer. Leave me alone, damn you. Leave me alone."
I went into the bathroom and got a face towel and wiped his face off. I grinned at him sneeringly. I was the heel to end all heels. Wait until the man is down, then kick him and kick him again. He's weak. He can't resist or kick back.
"One of these days we'll get together on it," I said.
"I'm not crazy," he said.
"You just hope you're not crazy."
"I've been living in hell."
"Oh sure. That's obvious. The interesting point is why. Here-take this." I had another seconal out of the night table and another glass of water. He got up on one elbow and grabbed for the glass and missed it by a good four inches. I put it in his hand. He managed to drink and swallow his pill. Then he lay back flat and deflated, his face drained of emotion. His nose had that pinched look. He could almost have been a dead man. He wasn't throwing anybody down any stairs tonight. Most likely not any night.