I helped her into the kitchen and pushed her into a chair. She struggled to get up, and I pushed her down into it hard,
'Stay there!' I said. 'Goddammit, stay there! If you don't sit still, by God I'll slough you!'
'I c-can't! Mrs. W-winroy
'
'Listen to me!' I said. 'Will you listen, Ruth? Everything's going to be all right.'
'It w-won't!' She was rocking in the chair, weeping helplessly. 'Y-you don't understand. Y-you don't know how it is, She'll f-fire me, and li-just can't-I've g-got t-to
'
I slapped her across the face, two quick hard slaps with the palm of my hand and the back of it.
'Want to listen?' I drew my hand back, ready to swing at her again. 'Just tell me what you want to do. You want to listen or do I knock your head right off of your shoulders?'
'I-I'm'-she shuddered and gulped down a sob-'I'm l-listening, Carl.'
I found the whiskey bottle in the cupboard and poured out a stiff shot. I stood over her, watching her to see that she drank every last drop.
'Better, huh?' I grinned. 'Now you're going to eat something, and then you're going to lie down.'
'No!
'
'You have to be at school this afternoon? Have to? Sure, you don't, and you're not going to. Everything's jake here. No one showed for lunch but Kendall and he won't say anything. I'll talk to him and see that he doesn't.'
'Y-you don't know! Mrs. Winroy
'
'She went downtown to get some money. She'll get it if she has to take it out of Winroy's hide, and after she gets it she'll have to spend it. She won't be home for a long time. I know, get me? I know exactly what she'll do.'
'B-but'-she looked at me, curiously, a faint frown on her face-I h-have to make
'
'Make the beds. What else?'
'Well. P-pick up the rooms a little.'
'What time do you usually get out of school?'
'Four.'
'Well, today maybe you cut a class. See what I mean? If she gets home before! think she will, You're home early, and you're hard at it when she gets here. Okay?'
'But I have to-'
'I'll do it,' I said. 'And don't tell me I can't. I'm a whiz at making beds and picking up. Now, I'll fix you a little lunch and help you upstairs, and
'
'No, Carl! Just-just do the other. I'll fix my own lunch. Honest, I will. I'll do anything you say, but p-please
'
'How are you going to do it? What about your crutch?'
'I'll fix it! I've done it before. I can tighten the screws with a case knife, and there's some tape here and Please, Carl!'
I didn't argue with her. It was better to let her do a little something than to have her go hysterical again.
I gave her the crutch and a knife and the roll of tape.
There were two bedrooms downstairs, Ruth's and an unoccupied one-I didn't have to bother with them, of course. Upstairs there were four bedrooms, or, I should say, four rooms with beds in them. Because you couldn't call the place J ake slept a real bedroom. It was more like a long, narrow closet, barely big enough for a bed and a chair and a lopsided chest of drawers. I guessed it had been a closet before Pay Winroy had stopped sleeping with him.
Since he hadn't slept there the night before, there wasn't much of anything to do to it. Nothing at all, in fact. But I went in and looked around-after I'd put my gloves on.
There was a half-empty fifth of port on the chest of drawers. Six-bits a bottle stuff, In the top drawer of the chest was a small white prescription box. I rocked it a little with the tip of one finger.! studied the label. Amyt. 5 gr. NO MORE THAN ONE IN ANY SIX HOUR PERIOD.
Five-grain amytal. Goofballs. Tricky stuff. You take one, and you forget that you've done it. So you take more… A few of those in that rotgut wine, and ?
Nothing. Not good enough. He might drink too little, and you'd only tip your hand. He might toss down too much, and throw it up.
No, it wasn't good enough, but the basic idea was sound. It would have to be something like that, something that could logically happen to him because of what he was.
In the bottom drawer, there was a forty-five with a sawed-off barrel.
I looked it over, moving it with my finger tips, and saw that it was cleaned and loaded. I closed the drawer and left the room.
You didn't really have to aim that gun for close-range shooting. All you had to do was pull the trigger and let it spray. And if you happen to be cleaning it when…
Huh-uh. It was too obvious, Whenever a man's killed with something that's made for killing-well, you see what I mean. People get ideas even where there's nothing to get ideas about.
Mrs. Winroy's room looked like a cyclone had struck it; it looked like she might have tried to see how big a mess she could make. I did a particularly good job on it, and went on to Mr. Kendall's room.
Everything there was about as you'd expect it to be. Clothes all hung up. Bookcases stretching along one side of the room and halfway down another. About the only thing out of place was a book lying across the arm of an easy chair.
I picked it up after I'd finished doing the little work that had to be done, and saw that it was something called Mr. Blettsworthy on Rampole Island by H.G. Wells. I read a few paragraphs at the place where it had been left open. It was about a guy who'd been picked up by a bunch of savages, and they were holding him prisoner down in a kind of canyon. And he was pretty worried about getting to be as crummy as they were, but he was more worried about something else. Just staying alive. I only ready those few paragraphs, like I've said, but I could see how it was going to turn out. When it came to a choice of being nice and dead or crummy and alive, the guy would work overtime at being a heel.
I crossed the hall to my own room. I was just finishing it up when I heard Ruth coming up the stairs.
She looked in all the other rooms first, making sure, I guess, that I'd done them up right.
I asked her how she was feeling. She said, 'J-just fine,' and, 'C-carl, I can't tell you how much
'
'What's the use trying, then?' I grinned. 'Come on, now, and I'll help you downstairs. I want you to get some rest before Mrs. Winroy shows up.'
'But I'm all-I don't need any-'
'I think you do,' I said. 'You still look a little shaky to me.'
I took her back downstairs, making her put most of her weight on me. I made her lie down on her bed, and I sat down on the edge of it. And there wasn't anything more I could do for her, and I couldn't think of