Scenarios - A Collection of Nameless Detective Stories (37 page)

That floppy headshake again. He still wasn't making eye contact.

"Why'd you come here tonight? This particular place?"

"I needed gas . . ."

"Chalfont said he followed you for twenty miles. There must be an open service station closer to your house than this one. Late at night, rainy—why drive this far?"

Headshake.

"Has to be you didn't realize you were almost out of gas until you got on the road," I said. "Too distracted, maybe. Other things on your mind. Like something that happened tonight at your house, something you were afraid Chalfont might have seen if he'd been spying through windows."

I opened the Buick's back door. Seat and floor were both empty. Around to the rear, then, where I slid one of his keys into the trunk lock.

"No!" Barlow came stumbling back there, pawed at me, tried to push me away. I shouldered him aside instead, got the key turned and the trunk lid up.

The body stuffed inside was wrapped in a plastic sheet.

One pale arm lay exposed, the fingers bent and hooked. I pulled some of the sheet away, just enough for a brief look at the dead woman's face. Mottled, the tongue protruding and blackened. Strangled.

"Noreen Chalfont," I said. "Where were you taking her, Barlow? Some remote spot in the mountains for burial?"

He made a keening, hurt-animal sound. "Oh God, I didn't mean to kill her . . . we had an argument about the money and I lost my head, I didn't know what I was doing . . . I didn't mean to kill her . . ."

His legs quit supporting him; he sat down hard on the pavement with legs splayed out and head down. He didn't move after that, except for the heaving of his chest. His face was wetter than ever, a mingling now of sweat and drizzle and tears.

I looked over at the misted store window.
That poor bastard in there
, I thought.
He wanted to make his wife pay for what she did, but he'll go to pieces when he finds out Barlow did the job for him.

I closed the trunk lid and stood there in the cold, waiting for the law.

Sometimes it happens like this, too.

You're in the wrong place at the wrong time, and still things work out all right. For some of the people involved, anyway.

Shamus Award—winning author Bill
Pronzini
is the author of many mystery novels of true distinction, including
Blue Lonesome
and
A Wasteland of Strangers
among them. His "Nameless Detective" novels, popular now for more than three decades, are really chapters in the life of a working-class private investigator who lives in the spiritual epicenter of modern-day San Francisco, where Bill makes his home with his long-time partner, fellow mystery author Marcia Muller.

Additional copyright information:

All stories reprinted by permission of the author.

"It's a Lousy World," copyright © 1968 by H.S.D. Publications, Inc. First published in Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine, August 1968.

"The Pulp Connection," copyright © 1979 by the
PronziniMuller
Family Trust. First published in Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine as "The Private Eye Who Collected Pulps," February 1979.

"Dead Man's Slough," copyright © 1980 by Davis Publications, Inc. First published in Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine, May 1980.

"The Ghosts of Ragged-Ass Gulch," copyright © 1982,1984 by the
Pronzini
-Muller Family Trust. First published in the English language in
Scenarios.

"Cat's-Paw," copyright © 1983 by the
Pronzini
-Muller Family Trust. First published as a limited edition chapbook by Waves Press.

"Skeleton Rattle Your
Mouldy
Leg," copyright © 1984 by the
Pronzini
-Muller Family Trust. First published in
The Eyes Have It.

"Incident in a Neighborhood Tavern," copyright © 1988 by the
Pronzini
-Muller Family Trust. First published in An Eye for Justice.

"Stakeout," copyright © 1990 by the
Pronzini
-Muller Family Trust. First published in
Justice for Hire.

"La
Bellezza
delle
Bellezze
,"
copyright © 1991 by the
PronziniMuller
Family Trust. First published in
Invitation to Murder.

"Souls Burning," copyright © 1991 by the
Pronzini
-Muller Family Trust. First published in
Dark Crimes.

"Bomb Scare," copyright © 1995 by the
Pronzini
-Muller
Family Trust. First published in Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine,
December 1995.

"The Big Bite," copyright © 2000 by the
Pronzini
-Muller Family Trust. First published in
The Shamus Game.

"Season of Sharing," copyright © 2001 by the
Pronzini
-Muller Family Trust. First published as a limited edition pamphlet by
Crippen
&
Landru
.

"Wrong Place, Wrong Time," copyright © 2002 by the
Pronzini
-Muller Family Trust. First published in
Most Wanted.