naked bulb over my head, and at first I could see nothing beyond the unit itself.
My eyes began to get used to the dimness. Something else was down there on the cement next to the furnace. Something dark and shapeless …A pale oval seemed to swell and float up toward me.
“Donna!” I croaked. “My good God, it’s Donna!”
I half fell down the stone steps and lifted the lifeless body into my arms. Getting back up those steps and along the hall to the nearest bedroom is something I would never remember.
And then she was on the bed and I was staring down at her. My heart seemed to leap once and shudder to a full stop, and a wordless cry tore at my throat.
The girl on the bed was Helen Wainhope!
IX
I once heard it said that a man’s life is made up of many small deaths, the least of them being the final one. I stood there looking at the dead woman, remembering the charred ruins of another body beside a twisted heap of blackened metal, and in that moment a part of me stumbled and fell and whimpered and died.
The telephone was there, waiting. I looked at it for a long time. Then I took a slow uneven breath and shook my head to clear it and picked up the receiver.
“Put it down, Clay.”
I turned slowly. He was standing in the doorway, holding a gun down low, his round face drawn and haggard.
I said, “You killed her, you son of a bitch.”
He wet his lips nervously. “Put it down, Clay. I can’t let you call the police.”
It didn’t matter. Not really. Nothing mattered anymore except that he was standing where I could reach him. I let the receiver drop back into place. “Like something left in the oven too long,” I said. “That’s how I have to remember her.”
I started toward him. Not fast. I was in no hurry. The longer it lasted, the more I would like it.
He brought the gun up sharply. “Don’t make me shoot you. Stay right there. Please, Clay.”
I stopped. It took more than I had to walk into the muzzle of a gun. You have to be crazy, I guess, and I wasn’t that crazy.
He began to talk, his tongue racing, the words spilling out. “I didn’t kill Donna, Clay. It was an accident. You’ve got to believe that, Clay! I liked her; I always liked Donna. You know that.”
I could feel my lips twisting into a crooked line. “Sure. You always liked Donna. You always liked me, too. Put down the gun, Dave.”
He wasn’t listening. A muscle twitched high up on his left cheek. “You’ve got to understand how it happened, Clay. It was quick like a nightmare. I want you to know about it, to understand that I didn’t intend …”
There was a gun in my pocket. I thought of it and I nodded. “I’m listening, Dave.”
His eyes flicked to the body on the bed, then back to me. They were tired eyes, a little wild, the whites bloodshot. “Not in here,” he said. He moved to one side. “Go into the living room. Ahead of me. Don’t do anything… foolish.”
I went past him and on along the hall. He was close behind me, but not close enough. In the silence I could hear him breathing.
I sat down on a sponge-rubber chair without arms. I said, “I’d like a cigarette, Dave. You know, to steady my nerves. I’m very nervous right now. You know how it is. I’ll just put my hand in my pocket and take one out. Will that be all right with you?”
He said, “Go ahead,” not caring, not even really listening.
Very slowly I let my hand slide into the side pocket of my coat. His gun went on pointing at me. The muzzle looked as big as the Second Street tunnel. My fingers brushed against the grip of the .38. A knuckle touched the trigger guard and the chill feel was like an electric shock. His gun went on staring at me.
My hand came out again. Empty. I breathed a shallow breath and took a cigarette and my matches from behind my display handkerchief. My forehead was wet. Whatever heroes had, I didn’t have it. I struck a match and lit the cigarette and blew out a long plume of smoke. My hand wasn’t shaking as much as I had expected.
“Tell me about it,” I said.
He perched on the edge of the couch across from me, a little round man in a painful blue suit, white shirt, gray tie, and brown pointed shoes. He had never been one to go in for casual dress like everyone else in Southern California. Lamplight glistened along his scalp below the receding hairline and the muscle in his cheek twanged spasmodically.
“You knew Helen,” he said in a kind of faraway voice. “She was a wonderful woman. We were married twelve years, Clay. I must have been crazy. But I’m not making much sense, am I?” He tried to smile but it broke on him.
I blew out some more smoke and said nothing. He looked at the gun as though he had never seen it before, but he kept on pointing it at me.
“About eight months ago,” he continued, “I made some bad investments with my own money. I tried to get it back by other investments, this time with Donna’s money. It was very foolish of me. I lost that, too.”
He shook his head with slow regret. “It was quite a large sum, Clay. But I wasn’t greatly worried. Things would break right before long and I could put it back. And then Helen found out about it…
“She loved me, Clay. But she wouldn’t stand for my dipping into Donna’s money. She said unless I made good the shortage immediately she would tell Donna. If anything like that got out it would ruin me. I promised I would do it within two or three weeks.”
He stopped there and the room was silent. A breeze came in at the open window and rustled the drapes.
“Then,” David Wainhope said, “something else happened, something that ruined everything. This isn’t easy for me to say, but…well, I was having an …affair with my secretary. Miss Kemper. A lovely girl. You met her.”
“Yes,” I said. “I met her.”
“I thought we were being very—well, careful. But Helen is — was a smart woman, Clay. She suspected something and she hired a private detective. I had no idea, of course …
“Today, Helen called me at the office. I was alone; Miss Kemper was at lunch. Helen seemed very upset; she told me to get home immediately if I knew what was good for me. That’s the way she put it: ‘if you know what’s good for you’!”
I said, “Uh
“Naturally, I went home at once. When I got here, Donna was just getting out of her car in front. Helen’s convertible was also in the driveway, so I put my car in the garage and came into the living room. I was terribly upset, feeling that Helen was going to tell Donna about the money.
“They were standing over there, in front of the fireplace. Helen was furious; I had never seen her quite so furious before. She told me she was going to tell Donna everything. I pleaded with her not to. Donna, of course, didn’t know what was going on.
“Helen told her about the shortage, Clay. Right there in front of me. Donna took it better than I’d hoped. She said she would have to get someone else to look after her affairs but that she didn’t intend to press charges against me. That was when Helen really lost her temper.
“She said she was going to sue me for divorce and name Miss Kemper; that she had hired a private detective and he had given her a report that same morning. She started to tell me all the things the detective had told her. Right in front of Donna. I shouted for her to stop but she went right on. I couldn’t stand it, Clay. I picked up the poker and I hit her. Just once, on the head. I didn’t know what I was doing. It — it was like a reflex. She died on the floor at my feet.”
I said, “What am I supposed to do — feel sorry for you?”
He looked at me woodenly. I might as well have spoken to the wall. “Donna was terribly frightened. I think she screamed, then she turned and ran out of the house. I heard her car start before I realized she would tell them I killed Helen.
“I ran out, shouting for her to wait, to listen to me. But she was already turning into the road. My car was in
