Go Home, Stranger

  He turned his head and looked swiftly behind, him, out across the channel. The boat was still there. It was a desperate gamble, but if he stayed where he was he had no chance at all. He was on the point of land where the channel made its bend, and the man was behind him. There was nothing left but the water.

  Again, in that brief and chilling second in which he considered his chances, he was conscious of the thing that had bothered him about the boat. And this time he knew what it was—the boat was rocking.

  Now that he understood, he heard the slup, slup of small waves coming in against the bank. In this absolutely breathless calm? There was nothing to cause even a ripple on the water.

  But there was no time to think about it. He slid backward and eased down the bank into the water, feeling his skin draw up tight as he expected the bullet to come crashing into him every second. There was no telling where the man was now. Just before he went under completely, he took a big breath and turned to mark the exact position of the boat.

  He swam straight out, trying to stay far enough off the bottom not to stir the mud and give himself away to the man on the shore. If he missed the boat, he would have to try to make the other side before one of them could get here with their boat. They must have one up above somewhere. He’d have to surface to get his breath, but if he did it fast enough he might succeed. It would take a lightening fast shot to line up a rifle and squeeze off the trigger in that brief second. Getting out on the other side without being killed, however, would be something else.

  He turned on his side and opened his eyes. He kicked ahead three more strokes and swung his face, searching, feeling a terrible urgency now. His breath was almost gone. Then he saw the skiff, ten feet over to his left. He kicked again, and was under it.

  Easy—take it easy, he thought, his lungs bursting. It would do no good to come up on the far side. The man up the bayou would be able to see him. And he couldn’t bump it, make it move suddenly. He had his fingertips up, brushing the bottom. With agonizing care he felt his way along until he found what he sought. His fingers were out of the water, but still under the boat.

  With no one aboard, it rode high forward, the prow and some two feet of sloping flat bottom rising a little above the surface. With the tips of his fingers he caught the thin strip of wood running lengthwise under the center of the floor planking and slowly pulled up until his nose was against the bottom in the air space between boat and surface. He took two deep breaths, almost sobbing in the relief to his lungs. Then a small wave slapped water into his nostrils, making them sting. He choked, but remained silent.

  Neither of them could see him here. They would have to be down on the exact level of the water to see this far back under the overhang of the prow. But how long could he fool them? They would know he had gone back into the water.

  The boat was rocking very gently now. The mysterious disturbance on the water was dying out, the surface returning to its waxed and glaring calm. And now for the first time, when he had an instant in which to consider it, he knew what had caused it. Those explosions had been set off on the water, or under it—that was obvious. Somewhere farther up the bayou probably around the next bend. But why? A demolition job on something blocking the channel? The hell, he thought; this wasn’t a navigable waterway. Nobody ever used it.

  He choked again, and pushed his nose a little farther out of the water. It was increasingly difficult to hold his position here, painfully clenching the tips, of his fingers on the narrow batten. He tentatively lowered his feet. Maybe he could touch bottom. … He felt nothing.

  He wasn’t going to be able to remain here much longer. There had been no further shot, and he wondered whether the man along the bank had given up the chase. There was another possibility, he thought. Maybe they knew where he was and were only keeping him pinned down until they finished whatever they were doing. He felt a curious but impotent anger at not being able to find out what it was. Charges of explosive were sometimes set off like that to raise the body when someone had been lost in a river or lake. Sure, he thought bitterly, and with a goon squad standing guard with high-powered rifles?

  It was maddening. If he could make it to the other side and lose himself in the timber he might be able to flank them and get a look at the bayou beyond the next bend. Whatever it was had happened right in that area. He was sure of it now. He turned his head slightly to the side so one eye was above water, and critically lined up the nearest point on the other shore. He could make it. He had to. Somehow, he had to know what was up there. Swinging back so his nose was above water again, he inhaled deeply, and swam down and away from the boat.

  He had reckoned without the drag of his clothing and shoes, but that did not become apparent until too late. It was easy at first. He kicked and pulled steadily, warning himself not to hurry or to think of the man back there with the rifle. Then he swam head on into an underwater snag, which confused him momentarily and threw him disastrously off his stroke. He had to surface for air. His head came out and he gulped raggedly. He heard no shot as he pulled himself down again. But the man, if he were still there, hadn’t been expecting him. The next time he’d be ready.

  The shoes were growing heavier; they were like anchors on his feet. With every kick they dragged and sank a little more. He had been near to drowning twice in his life, and he knew the sensation, the unreasoning fear of water that begins to blot out everything and ends in blind and threshing panic. He fought it off grimly. The shore couldn’t be far now. He had to breathe again. His head came clear at last, with a terrible effort, and he gasped. He floundered helplessly on the surface for a moment before he could force himself to submerge again, and this time he heard the bullet’s whupp! and its lethal snarl as it went on.

  He had to get back, to the surface and its life-giving air. Terror was beginning to drive him up. Better to let the man try with his gun than to strangle here in this endless murky water. His arms and legs were growing weaker and trying to curl inward against him with the cramps of utter exhaustion. He struggled, biting his teeth together savagely to keep from gasping as his feet settled lower and lower. Then he felt his arms and face plow into brush. He felt nothing except the insubstantial and terrifying rake of limbs, and when he tried to raise his head there was something across his neck. He was trapped. He gulped, strangled, and began to black out.

  In the dark mist of dying he felt himself threshing futilely against entangling brush and against the endless water. Somehow there was the noise of a gun mixed up in it, and splashing, and strange soft arms about his throat, and a voice pleading.

  “Don’t fall. Please, please, please, don’t fall!”

  Chapter Twelve

  SOMEHOW HIS FEET WERE under him. He had no strength, and lunged forward and fell, choking on the water he had swallowed. He felt hands tugging at him, and heard the same imploring voice at his ear, urging him on. He was up again, clawing at the bank. Something came out of nowhere and slammed into the damp soil, exploding it in a shower all about him. Then he was over the bank. He stumbled and fell again, dimly conscious that somebody else was at his side and falling with him.

  He lay for a moment, his shoulders heaving as he sobbed for breath. He opened his eyes and the wildness and the dark mist were going away. His face was against cloth and warmth, and when he turned his head wonderingly he was looking into frightened and anxious brown eyes very close to his own. She had fallen on her side, with his head held against her.

  “Are you all right?” she gasped.

  He turned and stared incredulously in the other direction. The far shore was invisible beyond the screen, of foliage protecting them, but he could see projecting out into the water the old windfall in which he had been entangled. Patricia Lasater had gone out there and pulled him free while the man shot at them.

  He sat up and tried to get to his feet. He was still too weak, and his legs were rubbery.

  “Are you sure you’re all right?” she asked again.

  “Yes,” he said.
“You haven’t got a gun, have you?” He was vaguely conscious that this was a stupid question to ask.

  “No.” She stood up. Her white blouse and the brief shorts were soaked and there was a scratch on one of her legs just above the knee. She caught his arm as he stood up. “This way,” she said breathlessly, pointing down the channel. “Run. I heard a boat—up there.”

  The roaring was going out of his head now and he was beginning to think again. He knew what she meant. The other man had crossed over and would be coming down this side with his rifle.

  She ran swiftly, and at first he had difficulty keeping up. In a moment he began to get his breath back and came up alongside her, helping her with a hand on her arm. Now and then he looked back over his shoulder as they raced through the timber.

  She began to tire. She stumbled once and would have fallen, but he caught her. They stopped at last and sank to the ground in a mass of ferns while they sobbed for breath.

  “It’s—not much farther,” she gasped.

  “What?”

  “My boat. Just below—the bend.”

  “The motor on it?”

  She nodded, too winded to speak again. Reno came up to his knees and swiftly searched the forest behind them. There was no movement. A jay sat on a limb above them and scolded raucously. Stool pigeon, he thought grimly. Time to move.

  “Can you make it now?” he asked gently.

  She merely nodded, and started pulling herself up. He helped her. The bend of the bayou was off to their left, then behind them as they approached the channel below it. She ran ahead now, searching for the boat.

  It was well hidden, tied up under overhanging limbs. “Get in,” he commanded. “And lie down. I’ll handle the motor.”

  She started to protest, but after a glance at his face she obeyed. He took one last look behind them, untied the anchor rope, swung the bow outward, and climbed on the stern! It’d better catch the first time, he thought. They’ll hear it.

  The motor coughed. He pulled again; it caught this time and lifted its popping roar above the stillness. They slid out into the channel, turned sharply, and began to gather speed. He pulled the throttle wide, his back feeling icy. They were out in the open now, sitting ducks if either of the men had made it as far as the bend. Seconds dragged by and there was no shot. They rounded the next bend in the channel and he breathed again, the tension running out of him.

  She sat up in the middle seat, facing him, and ran an unsteady hand through her dark curls. Noticing how the blouse was plastered against her, she attempted to pull it away, faintly embarrassed. She had mud on one cheek and on her chin, and traces of bayou scum on her forearms. Reno looked briefly at her and then at the channel ahead, wondering when he had seen a girl as mussed—or as beautiful in spite of it. Neither of them said anything. The motor made too much noise.

  A mile of twisting waterway fled astern, and then another. They were beyond the last fork now, almost back to the main arm of the bayou and the camp. They were safe. Abruptly, he cut the motor and let the boat drift to a stop in the shade near overhanging trees along the bank. He caught a limb and held it. The bayou stretched out deserted and quiet ahead of them.

  She looked at him questioningly.

  “We’re all right now,” he said. “There’s something I have to tell you.”

  “What is that?”

  “Thanks.”

  “You’re quite welcome.”

  He shook his head. “I wasn’t trying to be funny. I’m just not very good with words.”

  She looked gravely at his face and then away. “Anyone would have done it.”

  “Under fire? Those weren’t blanks they were shooting.”

  “Yes. I know. But I tried not to think about them.”

  After they made this kid, he thought, they threw away the plans and broke up the molds. Even with swamp on her face she looks like something you’d run into in a dream, and she’s got a system about being shot at. Keep busy and don’t think about it.

  “Look,” he said at last, “you don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to, but how did you happen to be there?”

  She studied the bottom of the boat. “Could we call it just luck?”

  He felt the sharp stab of disappointment, but waited a moment before answering. When she looked up again and their eyes met, he said, “Yes. I’ll tell you how it is, Pat. After what’s just happened, we call it anything you say.”

  “Thank you. In that case, I’ll amend it. It wasn’t all luck.”

  “No?”

  “No. I was following you.”

  “Why?”

  She answered slowly, “I was looking for something.”

  “What?”

  This time she waited a long time before replying. “I’d rather not say now, if you don’t mind. Not yet, anyway.”

  “Did you find it, whatever it was?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  She’ll tell me when she’s ready, he thought. I can’t rush her.

  “I didn’t hear your motor. Or see you.”

  “I was using the oars. And staying way back.”

  “Did you hear those explosions? Just before they shot at me the first time?”

  She nodded.

  “You have any idea at all what they were?”

  “No. It sounded like dynamite, but rather muffled.”

  “That’s right,” he said. “I’m almost certain they were set off under water. But you don’t know who could have done it? Or why?”

  “No,” she said, shaking her head in bewilderment. “I was hoping to find out, the same as you were. But apparently whoever was doing it had other ideas.”

  “It doesn’t make any sense.”

  She stared at him. “I’ve noticed that about a number of things around here.” Then she added, “But I think we’d better go on. I’d like to change clothes, and put some iodine on this scratch.”

  “Oh.” He reached back to start the motor. “I’m sorry. Does it hurt?”

  “Not much. But I’d like to attend to it.”

  When they pulled up at the float there was no one around. Shadows were lengthening now, and dark tranquil water mirrored the timber along the other shore. She stepped out and started to turn toward the path while he made the skiff fast. Then she paused.

  He looked up. The brown eyes were regarding him with a disconcerting levelness. “I almost forgot,” she said quietly. “There was something I wanted to tell you.”

  “What?”

  “That good-time floozie you were so humorous about this morning—”

  It caught him off guard. He could only stare.

  “I thought you might like to know. She turned herself in to the police today.” Swinging about, she started up the path.

  “Wait,” he called. But she was gone.

  He caught her as she was passing his cabin. “I’ve got to talk to you.”

  “Yes?” she said coolly.

  “Yes. It’s important.”

  She relented then. “All right. In about a half hour.”

  He changed into dry clothing and shaved without knowing what he did. His thoughts ran futilely after a hundred questions at once. If she had gone to the police maybe that would take the pressure off Vickie. Wouldn’t that explode their so-called motive? Couldn’t they see it? But why had she waited all these days? It was obvious she had wanted to before this. And what about the trailer? And Easter? Who was she, and what was she looking for? She’ll tell me; she’ll clear it up.

  When she came out of her cabin the short curls had been restored to their casual symmetry and to the dull gleam of polished ebony. She had changed to a white cotton dress and gilt sandals, but the smooth tanned legs were stockingless. She was fresh and sweet and very disturbing as she stepped down from the porch. She did not smile, however; the large eyes were quite serious.

  He helped her into the cat and got behind the wheel. “Would you go up past the Counselor?” she asked as they came out onto the highway. “I’d like to sho
w you something.”

  They went past it. She said nothing. A quarter mile beyond, as they neared a dirt road leading off to the right, she nodded, and he turned into it, wondering. The only thing in this direction was the ship channel, and there wouldn’t be a bridge—not on this road. In a few minutes they came to the end of it. There was only a field, off to their left, and the dark line of trees along the waterway. He stopped, and it was not until then that he saw the scars of torn limbs and trunks that disfigured a pair of huge live oaks directly ahead over the edge of the water.

  He turned and looked at her. “This was where it was?” It was as if the thing he had sensed before was now a certainty—that there was some dark link between her and that boat explosion.

  “Yes,” she said simply.

  He handed her a cigarette and lit it. She had turned a little on the seat and was facing him. “Do you want to tell me about it?” he asked.

  Instead of answering his question, she asked quietly, “Mr. McHugh was a friend of yours, wasn’t he?”

  “Yes,” he said. Something told him that everything had to be out in the open between him and this girl now and from this time onward. “He was the best friend I ever had. And Vickie Shane’s my sister.”

  She nodded. “I should have guessed it before, I suppose. This morning, when you—”

  “I’m sorry about that,” he interrupted. “But, you see, it was an act. I was fishing. I thought you might be the girl, but I still wasn’t sure.”

  “Yes. I sensed that somehow, but it hit home anyway, because I deserved it. I know it’s a little late now to tell you this, but the only thing I can say in my defense is that I had no intention at all of leaving the country until I had gone to the District Attorney and told him. But I was praying for time. I was desperate for just a few more days.”

  “You don’t have to explain,” Reno said grimly. “I know what you mean. As soon as word got out that you were connected with McHugh in any way, or even knew him, time would be something you might run out of in a hurry.”