An Eye for an Eye (9 page)

He watched the men. Twice he thought he saw Al Guthrie. But the face was wrong.

He returned to the bar. When the bartender spoke to him he did not order another drink. He said, “Do you know a man, about six feet tall, light wavy hair—”

The bartender didn’t even let him finish. “What are you, a bill collector?”

“No, I’m a lawyer. I only want—”

“This ain’t no information desk. You want another drink or don’t you?”

Ben looked at him. The bartender had a dark jowly face, set hard and unfriendly. “I only asked if you knew him,” Ben said.

“I only know my own business,” the bartender said. “That’s how I keep my health and make a living. What’ll it be, mac? The same again?”

Ben hesitated. Then he said, “No, thank you.” He went out onto the street. He was angry. The man might have given him a decent, honest answer. Perhaps Al Guthrie did come into the bar and the bartender knew it and wouldn’t say so.

Ben did not see what he could do about it. He couldn’t force the man to answer.

But somebody else might be more co-operative.

He started to walk slowly along Trumbull Avenue. The food markets and the stores were all closed now. The state liquor store was still open. He went into it and asked the clerk if he knew a man who looked like Al Guthrie. The clerk smiled and shook his head. This was a busy store, he said. They got a lot of business from the mills and the roundhouse as well as the neighborhood. He saw so many men. He supposed a dozen a day came in that could fit Ben’s verbal description.

Ben tried the two drugstores. In one the elderly druggist peered at him suspiciously as though he thought Ben was contemplating a holdup. In the other, which was bigger and more modern, a busty girl behind the cigarette counter told him she certainly couldn’t remember every fellow that came in. When he tried to press the question the manager came up, listened politely, politely told Ben that he did not remember anybody of that description, and politely ushered him to the door.

They didn’t care, of course. They didn’t understand how vital it was for him to find Al Guthrie and they thought he was drunk or crazy, a crackpot trying to make trouble for somebody, and they wanted no part of it. He couldn’t blame them. But it was cruel. Because he couldn’t tell whether they were telling the truth or not. Every one of them might remember Guthrie perfectly well and just not want to say so. In their position he would feel the same way.

There was another bar, the Tip-Top, and he was cold. He went into it.

The bartender was a small bitter-faced man with a bald head. He was laughing and talking with four men at the end of the bar but he froze up when Ben came. The men turned to glance at him too. Their hands were big and powerful, stained black around the nails and the creases of the knuckles.

Ben got a drink and sat down with it in the booth, and watched.

He stayed there for an hour or so, and then he got restless and moved on. He did not ask the bartender about Guthrie before he left. The man was already eying him too sharply. He caught a glimpse of his own face in the back-bar mirror and he didn’t wonder. He looked like hell. He looked like the pictures you see in the news magazines of people who have been dug out from under things after a week without food or water.

He thought perhaps he ought to get something to eat. The drinks were hitting him too hard. He did not want to get drunk. He wanted to stay around for a while on the chance, the million-to-one chance. Guthrie had always hung out in the neighborhood bars. He knew that from Lorene. There was just a chance. Guthrie, too, must be under a strain. He must want sometimes to get away from the unnaturalness, the constant accusation of Carolyn’s presence. He must have some way of immobilizing her while he went out for food, so he could do it when he went for a drink.

There was just a chance.

Ben found a place where they served food as well as liquor. It was run by a Polish couple and it was clean and quiet. He ate and asked about Al Guthrie. For the first time Ben was sure of the answer. The woman was pleasant but she just didn’t know. Ben believed her. This wasn’t the kind of a place Guthrie would pick anyway.

He moved on among the louder, rougher bars. Harry’s Place, the Blue Bell, the Right Spot, Red ’n Del’s, Philbert’s. And back to the Happy Hour and the Tip-Top.

It was well on in the evening now and the joints were crowded, not as heavily as on a Saturday night but enough to keep them lively. Ben sat with his drinks and watched. He watched the doors, and every time he saw a tall man he hunched forward and every time he saw a tall light-haired man he half rose. But every time it was somebody else.

He began to be obsessed by the thought that while he was in one bar Al Guthrie might be in another one. This worked on him so that he couldn’t sit still for very long. The bars seemed very hot to him now, dinning with voices and jukebox noise. The cold outside air felt good. He would walk slowly in it between bars and then he would think of Al Guthrie maybe standing with his foot on the rail in the next place, or the one after, and he would begin to hurry.

He passed the cop on the beat twice at difference places. The man remembered him. Ben was afraid he was going to stop him and demand to know what he was doing. Sooner or later, Ben thought, he was sure to.

The store fronts glittered, showing tawdry furniture and cheap clothes. Engines hooted and shrilled far off in the yards, arguing companionably about the right of way. The air was sharp with the smell of coal smoke. And Carolyn was somewhere along one of these streets, behind one of these locked doors, these shaded windows. Maybe.

He didn’t
know
that Guthrie was in South Flat. He didn’t know anything at all.

He went in and out of the bars, and watched. And his head felt hot and strange and his eyes burned. “Are you looking for somebody, mister?” The bald bitter-faced man was bending over his table, swabbing it with a damp rag.

“Well,” said Ben, “yes. I was hoping—a friend of mine, maybe you know him.” He launched eagerly into his description of Al Guthrie.

The bitter-faced man said, “You couldn’t prove it by me. But I’d appreciate it if you’d go look for him somewheres else.”

“Why? I’m just sitting here. I’m paying for my drinks.”

The bitter-faced man said quietly, “You’re primed for trouble, mister. I don’t want any.”

“Are you throwing me out?”

“That comes later. Now I’m asking you. Polite like.”

Ben’s fists clenched. Rage came up in his throat and choked him. The bitter-faced man stepped back, looking mean and wary. Ben opened his mouth to say something, and could not. He got up from the booth and stamped out, knocking people aside with his shoulders.

“What’s eating him?” asked one of the men at the bar.

The bitter-faced man shook his head. “Crazy as a hoot owl,” he said. “I wouldn’t want to be this big blond guy when he finds him.”

“What big blond guy?”

“One he’s looking for. I dunno. Could be a couple of fellows come in here. I’m taking no chances.” He made an expressive gesture and went back behind the bar.

Ben walked, shaking with anger, to the Right Spot. He had never been asked to leave a place before, particularly not a crummy bar. It was an incredible experience. The sidewalk felt gritty and uncertain under his feet. It was late. There wasn’t too much time left before closing. They had to let him stay at least that long before he had to go dragging home knowing that there was only one more thing to do. And to do it you would have to kill Kratich first. And you would have to do to Lorene much the same thing that Guthrie had done to Carolyn.

He went into the Right Spot. It was more crowded than when he had left it. He stood at the end of the bar and the bartender said, “You again?”

Ben said, “Bourbon and water.” He did not look at the bartender. He was looking along the row of men standing at the bar, laughing, talking, blowing smoke. The smoke smarted his eyes. He moved out a little so he could see into the booths.

He saw Al Guthrie.

He wore a gray windbreaker and his hair was pale and curly in the dim light. He sat in a booth against the back wall, his head and shoulder turned away as he spoke to a woman on the other side of the table. There was another man in the booth, and another woman. They were laughing out loud at something Al Guthrie was saying.

Ben began to move down the length of the room.

Somebody caught at him and said, “Hey!” Ben tore away. “Let me go,” he said. “I’ve got to get at him.” He plunged toward the booth at the back. Several hands were holding him now. Feet thumped. Voices rose. Somebody, the bartender, was cursing. One of the women in the booth looked up, startled. Then the other one. Ben fought the restraining hands. He reached out and caught the gray windbreaker and said, “Where is Carolyn? Where’s my wife?”

The blond man surged up out of the booth. He was big and fairly drunk. He knocked Ben’s hands away. “Get your goddamn paws off,” he said. “You crazy or something? How do I know where the hell your goddamn wife is.”

Ben stared at him, shaking his head a little, blinking. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I beg your pardon. I thought you were someone else.”

“Well, that’s just fine,” said the blond man. He lifted his fist. “I oughta—”

“Take it easy, Sam,” the bartender said. “Let’s not have any trouble.” He spoke to the men who were holding Ben by the arms. “Get that creep outa here.”

Ben did not resist. Suddenly he felt very sick. He let them hustle him down a back corridor and out into the alley. The icy air hit him like a blow.

“You,” said the bartender, and shook him, “can you stand up?”

Ben said he could.

“Okay. If you can stand you can walk. Walk on out of here, understand? And don’t come back. If I see you in my place again I’ll call a cop.”

Ben nodded. He started to walk. They watched him until they were sure he would keep going. Then they went back inside.

Ben continued along the alley. The feeling of sickness diminished and was replaced by shame and a dreadful helplessness. She’s close by, he thought, I know she is, but I can’t find her. I can’t find Guthrie. I’m no good, no good. I can’t do anything.

He reached a corner by a blank dirty brick wall and some dim memory told him that he ought to turn back to the main street here to find his car, but for a long time he just stayed leaning against the wall with his head bent down and his shoulders slumped, feeling night and blackness on him, emptiness and cold.

After a while he moved on. He found his car and drove away in it. When he reached the end of Trumbull Avenue he had a choice of two routes. One he would take if he were going directly home, and the other if he were going to Lorene’s.

He took the second one.

It was twelve minutes before eleven on Monday night.

At twenty minutes to twelve the radio in Ernie MacGrath’s car spoke his unit number. The police broadcaster said, “Your boy Forbes is at 2496 Catalpa Street, apartment D-3. A Vernon Kratich just phoned in a complaint. Car 14 is on its way. They’ll hold him for you.”

Ernie started the car. Bill Drumm, who had been sleeping, lifted his head, grunted, said, “Back to the redhead, huh?” and sat up, straightening his tie. The night-calmed roads and streets whirled by.

Ernie pulled up behind the radio car at the curb in front of the apartment house and went up with Bill to D-3. A uniformed officer stood in front of the door. Most of the doors in the hall had people standing in front of them, curious people called from their beds or their late television to see what was going on. There were considerable buzzing and whispering when Ernie and Bill stopped and spoke to the cop and then went into the apartment.

Mary Catherine Brewer, in robe and pajamas, sat in the far corner, watching with alert and angry interest. Lorene Guthrie, dressed up in another one of those numbers that didn’t miss a chance to show off how nicely she was built, was huddled up in the corner of the sofa. Her eyes were big and her face was reddened and blotchy with tears. She looked, Ernie thought, soft enough to put your hand through. Vernon Kratich was on his feet, and he did not look soft. He looked like dark Slavic rock. He was walking up and down smoking a cigarette and his shoulders were hunched like a fighter’s.

Ben Forbes sat in the one armchair. There was something familiar about the way he sat, about his expression and the pallor of his face. Ernie thought a minute, and then he placed it. He had seen the combination before in accident cases. It was the appearance of shock.

Everybody looked at Ernie when he came in. Even Ben turned his head and gave him a remote glazed stare. Ernie spoke to the cop who was standing inside the room. Then he said:

“All right, let’s hear it.”

Kratich said grimly, “This man is insane. I warned him if he didn’t stop bothering Lorene I’d have him arrested.”

Ben Forbes stared at nothing and did not move.

“Can you tell me exactly what he did? From the beginning.”

Lorene burst out half hysterically, “He was waiting for me. The minute we came in he—”

“Wait a minute,” said Mary Catherine. Her voice was sharp, as though she had stood just about enough foolishness from everybody. “He said from the beginning.” She looked at Ernie. “I was in bed. Suddenly there was this knocking on the door. I thought maybe it was Lorene. She was out with Vern here, and I didn’t know, maybe she’d forgotten her key. So I opened the door and he—Mr. Forbes—just pushed his way in. He said he had to see Lorene and I told him she wasn’t here. He said he’d wait. He sat down and I couldn’t get rid of him. He was drunk, but he was acting funny, too.”

“How do you mean, funny?”

“Crazy. All bottled up and ready to blow. I was scared. I was just going to call the police when Vern and Lorene came in.”

“Then what?”

“He jumped at me,” Lorene said. “There isn’t any other word for it. He said there was something I had to do for him. He said I owed it to him and he was going to make me do it. And then of course Vern got sore and told him—”

“I told him to get the hell out,” Kratich said. “And he told me to keep out of it.” He looked at Ben with cold hard eyes. “Then he started in on Lorene again, some crazy stuff about it was a matter of life and death and she had to help him. She went all to pieces with fright and I took a couple of swings at him.”