Girl on a Slay Ride (7 page)

M
ALLORY
found Graef and Blalock seated on boulders near the circle of stones. Thoms was not in sight, but Mallory could hear the ax ringing faintly from the timber to the west.

Blalock did not appear to have moved since he reached the meadow. He sat hunched in his overcoat and he still wore his hat pulled low to shield his face. A mixture of pity and revulsion washed over Mallory. Then he looked toward Graef. He felt a sudden surge of hatred.

Mallory said tartly, “If you want a fire, those ashes will have to be cleaned out.”

“It’ll be done,” Graef said. “You tend to your own chores.”

Mallory turned away. He located the grub box and set it up. He dropped the top half of the cover down, making a table of it. He put the gasoline stove on the table, filled the tank and lit one burner. He carried the coffeepot to the creek and filled it with water.

When he returned to the campsite and set the water on the stove, Graef asked, “What are you cooking?”

“Coffee,” Mallory said shortly.

“Good. I like a man who knows when he’s licked.”

“I don’t give a damn if you like me or not,” Mallory said. He turned from the stove. “When the water boils, throw in a handful of coffee and turn off the heat. I’m going to get some sleep.”

Blalock lifted his head and stared toward the tent.

He lowered his chin back to his chest. He appeared to be asleep again.

Mallory walked away and into the tent.

Denise was stretched on top of the sleeping bag Mallory had fixed. The air in the tent was hot and close and she lay nude except for a thin negligee. He could hear her breathing slowly and steadily.

He unrolled the other bag and lay down. He kicked off his shoes and rolled onto his back. He flung one arm over his eyes and tried to sleep.

He could smell Denise’s perfume. He thought of her as she had been last night, and he felt his irritation at her dissolving. His mouth grew dry and he tried to moisten it with saliva. The dryness crept into his throat, making it ache.

Denise stirred. She said softly, “Cliff?”

“What?”

“I’ve been a bit of a bitch, haven’t I?” Her voice was no longer tart with anger, but soft and sensuous again.

He said, “Yes.”

She said, “Graef frightens me. But not as much as Rick. Can’t you understand that, Cliff?”

“I’m trying,” he said.

One slender leg slid over to his sleeping bag and pressed lightly against him. Mallory stayed quiet.

She whispered, “Don’t be angry with me, Cliff darling.”

“I’m not angry,” he said.

Her voice rose to a murmur. Her head was toward his and very close. He could feel the whisper of her breath against his cheek. “I couldn’t stand your being angry. Not up here—with them. I’d be so alone.”

“I told you I wasn’t angry,” Mallory said harshly.

He felt her hand touch the top button of his shirt. She slipped it free. Her fingers moved on, undoing the remaining buttons. Her hands touched his skin. They were hot and moist. She lifted them and ran her nails lightly through the mat of hair on his chest.

He remained motionless. He felt her weight shift. Her hand slid up behind his neck. She whispered, “I’m so afraid, Cliff. Make me forget that I’m afraid. Please, darling.”

Mallory took his arm from across his eyes. He rolled his head. She was staring at him. Her eyes were huge and dark. He saw no fear there, only the same desire he had seen last night.

She parted her lips and moistened them with the tip of her tongue.

Mallory reached out and pulled her roughly to him. He mashed his mouth over hers. He felt the quick, eager response from her. He rolled to his knees and caught her negligee in his hands. He ripped it away from her body. He threw it away and cupped his fingers over her breasts.

She murmured, “Ah, darling.”

Mallory bent his head. She cried out. He whispered hoarsely, “Be quiet. Do you want them to hear?”

“I can’t be quiet when you do that to me!” she moaned.

“Then I’ll stop,” Mallory said.

“No, darling. No! No!” Her voice had dropped to a whisper.

Mallory rolled away and pulled off the remainder of his clothes. He turned back and sank his fingers into her flesh. She came to him and he took her savagely.

Her voice came drowsily, from far away. “Darling, I want you to promise me something.”

“I know,” Mallory said. “You want me to stop fighting Graef.”

“Yes. Let me try my way,” she said.

He pulled himself back from the warm edge of sleep. “The same way you just worked on me? With your body?”

She said with soft bitterness, “What other weapons have I got, Cliff?”

“It won’t do you any good,” Mallory said. “Not with Graef.”

“I have to try,” she said. “I just wanted you to know what I’ll be doing. I don’t want you getting angry with me again.”

He said, “You made love to me because you wanted me to protect you. Now you’re going to try the same thing on Graef so he’ll go easy on you.”

“I didn’t make love to you so you’d protect me, darling. I wanted you. I can’t help wanting you. Believe me.”

“Sure,” Mallory said emptily.

He felt her hands clutch his arm. He kept his eyes closed, his head turned away from her.

She said, “You make it sound so horrible. And I just want to help.”

“Then you shouldn’t have told me,” Mallory said. “I feel like a pimp.”

She rolled over and he felt the pressure of her naked body to his. Her skin was hot and moist from the heat in the tent.

He said, “All right. Do what you want. I guess I can stand it if you can.”

“I can stand almost anything if they’ll let us alone after you help them find the money.”

Mallory said, “Let’s worry about it later. Go to sleep.”

“You aren’t angry any more, darling?”

“No. Now shut up.”

“All right,” she said. She reached her hand across his body and cradled him gently. “Do you mind? It makes me feel better.”

“I don’t mind,” Mallory said. He was surprised to find himself falling asleep.

M
ALLORY
awoke to find Denise gone from the tent. He dressed quickly and went outside. The sun had gone below the rim of the rock wall and the meadow was filling wtih deep shadows.

He washed his face in the creek. He took a long, deep drink to get rid of the dryness in his throat. He dried his face on his shirttail and started toward the center of the camp.

Thoms was stacking a huge pile of wood outside the circle of stones. Blalock apparently hadn’t changed his position. He still slumped on the rock, his face hidden in the upturned collar of his overcoat.

Denise was sitting very close to Graef. She had changed into a pair of skin-tight slacks and a tight jersey blouse. Mallory could tell from their smooth lines that she wore nothing beneath them.

She had a cup of coffee in her hands. As Mallory came up, she turned and smiled briefly. She sipped at her coffee and looked again at Graef.

Mallory poured himself a cup of coffee. It had been reheated and was dark and heavy and bitter. He drank some while he watched Denise work on Graef.

She wore a wide-eyed expression as if everything Graef said was of vital importance. Now and then she’d touch his leg and nod her head. Mallory could see the amusement on Graef’s features. He felt sorry for Denise.

Graef said, “Come on up to the fire, Mallory. It will be the first one Nick ever made.” Mallory’s briefcase was beside him; he touched it and laughed.

Mallory ignored the briefcase. He said, “Thoms won’t have anything until he cleans out the ashes.”

Graef said, “Nick, the camp boss has spoken.”

Thoms looked sullen. “I did my share. If Mallory wants the fireplace cleaned out, let him clean it.”

“Mallory’s going to do the cooking,” Graef said.

Mallory sipped his bitter coffee. He squatted on one heel and lit a cigarette. He watched Thoms.

Thoms said, “What’s the matter with Blalock doing something?” He picked up Mallory’s folding camp shovel, straightened the blade, and rammed the point down into the accumulated ashes of dead fires.

“That’s a good idea,” Graef said. “Blalock, you clean out the fireplace.”

Blalock stayed on his boulder. He did not lift his chin from his chest. Thoms stood in front of him, pushing his lower lip in and out with his teeth.

He said, “Come on. Let’s not make it tough on ourselves.”

Blalock lifted his head. Mallory could see the milky emptiness of his blue eyes. Blalock was somewhere else, he thought. He seemed aware of Thoms only as a voice; there was no understanding on his acne-scarred face.

Thoms reached out and slapped him across the cheek with his fingertips. Blalock rocked back but made no noise.

“Clean that fireplace!”

Graef sat without moving. Mallory noticed that his eyes had the unblinking quality of a snake’s.

Blalock still did not get up. Thoms began to slap him, open-handed, first on one cheek and then on the other. He worked slowly. With each slap Blalock’s head made a full half-turn. His cheeks began to flush red. His loose, thick lips worked in and out, but he made no sound whatsoever.

“Leave him alone,” Mallory said. “Can’t you see he doesn’t even know where he is right now?”

He got up and moved toward Thoms. He stopped as Denise reached out and touched his leg in a gesture of warning. Mallory glanced down at her. She shook her head.

He said, “I’ll try to remember,” and turned aside.

Denise stood up and carried her stool a little distance from Graef. She said, “Come here, Cliff.”

Thoms continued his slow, rhythmic slapping of Blalock’s face. Graef said, “That’s right, Mallory. Stop trying to be so noble. Do as the lady says.”

Mallory stared at him. Graef was holding his gun in his hand again. He said, “I’m a very good shot. I can put a bullet in your leg just where it will hurt but won’t keep you from doing your job.”

Mallory went back to his former position. Denise moved her stool there. He noticed that she had placed it so she would face away from Blalock and Thoms. He squatted, looking in the same direction. But looking away did not shut out the sounds of Thoms’ hand as it hit Blalock’s fat cheeks.

Blalock said suddenly in his high-pitched voice, “Please!”

Mallory swung around. Blalock was walking toward the fireplace. His hat had fallen off. His scarred face was red from Thoms’ fingers; his loose lips wobbled grotesquely and saliva ran from their corners.

He picked up a shovel and began to dig at the ashes. He flung them about wtihout pattern, so that most of them dropped back into the firepit.

Thoms said, “Stop horsing around.”

Mallory cut in, “I’ll do it.”

Graef smiled, “Mallory’s conscience is at work. Now he wishes that he cleaned the fireplace in the first place.”

Mallory ignored him. He took the shovel from Blalock and in a few minutes had the ashes scooped into a small heap outside the stones.

Graef said, “Can you build a fire, Nick?”

“I didn’t bring my fire starter,” Thoms said. He was breathing heavily. Blalock had returned to his boulder. Every now and then Thoms would look at him and then wipe his hands on his trousers. Mallory wondered if Thoms really enjoyed working for Graef.

“Try using needles and some dry chips,” Graef said. “Mallory, you start dinner.”

Thoms gathered some needles and carried them to the fireplace. Mallory stood back beside Denise, watching Thoms’ clumsy efforts. It was some compensation for his hatred of the man. And it diminished his hatred. Seeing Thoms sweat over building a simple thing like a campfire made Mallory feel rather superior to him, and it is hard to hate somebody to whom you feel superior.

Thoms piled chips and the thin slivers of wood Mallory had cut onto the needles. He used his cigarette lighter and set the small pile afire. As soon as the flames began to spread, he made a crisscross of dry wood on top of them. He piled on a dozen pieces.

Mallory said, “You’ll burn us all out of here. That’s enough wood to last all evening.”

“I like a big, hot fire,” Graef said.

“You can get closer to a small fire,” Mallory told him. He pulled some of the wood off the top of the fire and tossed it back on the pile. “What do you want, a signaling system?”

Graef said mockingly, “A good point, Mallory.”

Mallory lighted the three burners on the gasoline stove and started to get the meal ready. He put beans and water on to heat and fried some strips of thick bacon.

It was growing dark quickly now and the moon had not yet risen. The light from the fire was all Mallory had to see by. He glanced up and noticed that Graef was poking into the coals with a thin stick. Mallory moved so that his back was to Graef.

He worked quickly, pushing cans of tuna, beans and packages of dehydrated food into a sack. He found a package of cheese and another of coffee. He dropped them into the sack. He located a box of crackers by feel and squeezed that in on top. He slipped some silverware alongside the packages, wedging the pieces between the sack and the food so they wouldn’t rattle.

He put the sack into the big kettle, and said, “I’ll get some water to heat up for the dishes.” He carried the kettle to the creek. Kneeling at a spot close to the front of the tent, he dipped the kettle into the creek and rocked back on his heels. He glanced toward the fire. Graef was looking at him. Mallory got up. He lifted the kettle with his left hand and the sack with his right, holding the sack close to his leg so that Graef could not see its outlines. He started back toward the fire, walking so that he would pass within a foot of the tent flap. Graef glanced away.

Mallory lifted his right arm and threw the sack of food into the tent. He heard it land softly on the end of the sleeping bags. He walked slowly to keep the water from slopping. And then he saw that Denise was watching him closely.

She had the food on plates when he returned. He set the water in the kettle on one of the burners to heat, took his plate, and squatted down near her stool.

Graef ate delicately but quickly.

He said, “That was very good, Mallory. Does a fifty-cent hash-house meal always taste this way in the mountains?”

“It depends on the company,” Mallory said. He got up and collected the plates and dropped them into the now-heated water in the big kettle.

Graef said to Thoms, “Bring Blalock closer, Nick. I want to talk to him.”

Thoms lifted Blalock from the boulder by his arm. Blalock walked unprotestingly into the firelight. Graef got up. “Take this chair,” he said with mock courtesy.

Blalock sat down. Graef said, “Now let’s talk about the money.”

“It’s mine. Not yours,” Blalock said.

“We freed you,” Graef said. “The money wouldn’t have done you any good in an asylum.”

“I didn’t ask you to help me.”

Mallory noticed that Blalock’s eyes were clear. His voice had taken on some animation. He sat up straighter than he had before and there was a caged defensiveness about his expression.

“We got you out,” Graef said. “So we have a share coming.”

“You’ll take more than a share,” Blalock said thinly. “You’ll take it all and kill me.”

Graef’s voice took on the patient tone of a man dealing with a stubborn child. “Last night you trusted me enough to admit I was right in guessing that this was the area where you brought the girl and the money.”

He turned to Mallory. “I guessed some time ago,” he said. “I figured it out by how far he’d flown his plane and how much gas he had left when he was caught.”

“You could figure it out but the F.B.I. couldn’t?”

“They searched this area,” Graef said. “But they weren’t clever enough to find the money. I will be.”

“Why tell me?” Mallory demanded. “I don’t give a damn.”

“I want you to know what kind of man you’re dealing with.”

“I already know,” Mallory said pointedly.

Graef turned back abruptly to Blalock. “You have one more chance.”

“It’s my money. I’m going to keep it for myself.”

Graef said, “Nick, get the equipment. Blalock is going to tell us where the money is. And he’s going to do it tonight.”

Mallory could hear the rising impatience shrilling Graef’s voice. Thoms rose and hurried to where their bedrolls were laid at the edge of the meadow. He came back quickly. Mallory saw that he was carrying a soldering iron and a pair of long-handled pliers. He laid the iron so that its tip projected above the coals of the fire. He placed the pliers over the handle of the iron to hold it steady.

Denise whispered, “Oh, no!”

Mallory said, “Now you know how far you’d get rubbing up to Graef.”

“I had to try something,” she whispered miserably. She stood up abruptly and started for the tent.

Graef said, “Don’t leave yet, Mrs. Lawton.”

“I won’t stay and watch this!” she said furiously.

“You will stay—because I say so.” He moved his head, fixing his eyes on the soldering iron in the fire.

“Leave her alone,” Mallory said. “Maybe you need me to help you, but you haven’t any use for her. So leave her alone.”

“But I do have a use for her,” Graef said. He smiled emptily at Mallory.

Then he switched his attention to Blalock. “Wouldn’t you say that Mrs. Lawton is an exceptionally beautiful woman, Blalock?”

Denise reached out blindly and put her hand on Mallory’s arm. “Cliff!” she whimpered.

Mallory was watching Blalock. The man was turning slowly toward Denise. Firelight flickered over her bold figure outlined by the skin-tight clothes she wore.

Denise put her hands over her breasts and turned her back to Blalock. Mallory squeezed her arm. He said, “Go to the tent.”

Graef said, “What about it, Blalock? You get to keep half the money and you get a bonus—you’re looking at her—if you tell me now.”

Denise hadn’t moved. She whimpered, “Cliff, help me.”

Mallory whispered to her savagely, “What’s the matter with you? You’ve got guts. You already showed that. Use them!”

She stared at him. Her face was white in the firelight.

She put a hand to her mouth and made a sick noise. She turned and ran across the meadow toward the tent.

Graef called, “Don’t try to go out the gap, Mrs. Lawton. I can see it plainly from here and I could shoot you very easily.”

She kept running. Mallory saw her stumble, right herself, and then disappear into the tent.

Mallory bent down and wrapped his fingers around the thin end of a knobby fir branch. He lashed the branch through the air, snapping it to make sure it had no rotten spots. Satisfied, he walked toward Nick Thoms.

Graef said wearily, “Stop playing boy scout, Mallory.”

Thoms was on his knees, blowing on the coals. The tip of the iron was cherry red from the bellows of his breath. He glanced at Mallory and then indifferently away.

Mallory swung the club down, knocking the pliers and the iron completely into the fire. He jumped back as Thoms grabbed for him with one long arm. Thoms missed and started to his feet.

Mallory feinted the club toward Thoms. He pulled the blow up sharply, pivoted on his toes, and flung the club at Graef.

Graef was struggling up from the boulder where he sat. He was trying to get his gun out of his pocket. He shrieked as the club hit him viciously on the forearm. Mallory followed the club. He chopped his hand against Graef’s elbow. They fell together into the trampled grass. Graef curled up like a hedgehog, protecting his face.

Mallory grabbed a handful of silver-gray hair. He pulled Graef’s head around. He was trying to get Graef’s face where he could smash it with his fist. He was excited and he could think of only one thing—to pound Graef until his sleek, smooth viciousness was whimpering pulp.

Mallory forgot Thoms until he felt Thoms’ big hands on him, and then it was too late. He was lifted and thrown aside like a stuffed toy. His breath gushed out.

Mallory crawled to his knees. Thoms was helping Graef sit up. He was making soothing sounds deep in his throat. Mallory could hear Graef’s sobbing breath.

Graef got to his feet. He pushed Thoms away and started for Mallory. His face was working. In the light from the fire, his eyes glittered like ice under a winter moon.