She thought!
At six o'clock I gave Jimmie Nedry a two-hour relief. After that, I went back outside.
Sheriff Rufe Waters and his deputy, Randy Cobb, sauntered up and stood beside me at the curb.
"Good show, Joe?" Rufe said.
"Fair," I said.
"Ain't got an empty seat or two you ain't using?" said Randy.
"Sure, I have," I said, and I gave the doorman the nod. "You boys go on in."
It wasn't more than fifteen minutes before Web Clay, our county attorney, showed up with his wife; and I had to pass them in, too. And before the evening was over I must have walked in a dozen.
Hell, I don't know how people get that way. I don't know what they're thinking about. Sure, I've got empty seats. That's the only kind I can sell. What if I walked into a bank and asked 'em if they had some four-bit pieces they weren't using.
It's the same proposition.
The Literary Club brought an author here once, and I was sold a ticket so I went to hear him. He was a big gawky guy named Thomas or Thompson or something like that, and I guess he'd put a few under his belt because he sure pulled all the stops.
He spent most of his time talking about people who asked him for free books and seemed to think he ought to be tickled to death to give 'em away. He said that sarcasm was wasted on such people and that the homicide laws ought to be amended to take care of them. Well, there wasn't a person in the house that hadn't hit me for an Annie Oakley at one time or another. But do you know what? Instead of getting mad or ashamed, they sat there and clapped their hands off. They didn't seem to realize that they were the kind of people this author was talking about.
Well…
At ten-thirty, Mrs. Artie Fletcher closed her window so fast she almost took off a customer's fingers; and Harry Clinkscales tore off without even pulling the switch on the popcorn machine.
I took a look inside. Jimmie Nedry was just making one of his perfect change-overs, and his daughter Lottie, my usher, was brushing up the aisles. I went back outside again. I didn't need to worry about those two. They'd be on the job as long as there was a customer in the house, and everything would be in good shape when they left.
I went into the box office, checked the receipts, and locked them in the floor safe. Just before midnight while I was taking a last turn through the house, Jimmie's two boys came in with what was left of the display matter. They'd been on the run all day, and they were shaking and so out of breath they could hardly talk. They hurried right on home with Lottie to get supper ready before Jimmie got there.
All of a sudden it hit me that the only people who were dependable and hard working were those that didn't amount to anything. It wasn't fair, but it was that way. And I wondered why it was.
I wondered why, when there was so damned many of 'em, they didn't get together and run things themselves. And I made up my mind if they ever did get an organization-a going organization, that is- they could count me in!
12
Elizabeth woke me up early Saturday morning.
"The film truck just came, Joe," she said. "It's here."
"'Jeopardy of the Jungle'?"
"Yes. You'd better get upright away. We've got a lot to do."
I said okay, and she left the room. I didn't want to get up. I wanted to stay right there and leave everything that was going to happen a good long way in the future. And I couldn't. I couldn't because, while I didn't want to go through with it, I didn't want not to, either. That sounds crazy but it's the only way I know to put it.
Just a few days before, any little thing was enough to make me throw the brakes on. Like, for instance, passing up that hitchhiker. But now I knew nothing could stop me. I hadn't liked the scheme, but neither had I fought it. I'd just rocked along with it, getting a little more used to it every minute, and now it was doing the rocking.
I couldn't back out.
I didn't want to back out.
Coming out of the bathroom, I glanced into Elizabeth's room. A hat with a heavy veil was laying-lying-on a chair near the bed. Next to it was a little overnight bag. The hat was an old one and would never be missed in case anyone should get funny ideas and start checking up. The few odds and ends she was taking in the bag would never be missed, either.
I went downstairs, swallowed some coffee, and went out to the garage.
I'd got a travelogue, a newsreel, and a cartoon along with 'Jeopardy.' In all there were twenty-three reels of film.
"I was just thinking," I said. "Carol may not be able to get anyone. Perhaps we ought to wait until-"
"How are you going to wait?" Elizabeth asked. "You've got to go into the city."
"I don't have to," I said.
"Yes, you do, Joe. The farther you're away from things the better off it'll be. If Carol shouldn't get anyone there's no harm done. I'll straighten things up and we'll try again in a few weeks."
"But someone might look in and-"
"Don't be silly. I'll keep the door locked."
We ran the reels through the rewind to shake the water off of them. It was turned on full speed, since we weren't checking the film, and it didn't take long.
I unreeled fifteen or twenty feet of the cartoon, and Elizabeth knitted it back and forth through the other film. We shoved the pile underneath the rewind table.
I pulled the good cord loose from its connections, and hooked the motor up with the old one. I threw a few loops around it with the cartoon and pulled the rest of the reel under the table.
I stood back and looked things over.
The film was touching the bare copper of the cord in a couple of places. I shifted it back and forth until it was just right. Carol wouldn't need more than a minute. But she'd sure as hell need that.
Elizabeth was sitting on the stool. She looked even paler than usual.
"You didn't need to help with this," I said. "I could have done it."
She got up. "You're all through now? You're not going to leave that other cord on the floor are you?"
"Why not? It's the best way of getting rid of it."
"Yes," she said. And I wasn't just imagining that she was paler then.
She went out the door ahead of me. I put the padlock on it, and gave her the key.
That's the way it was. We'd done it so often in our minds that I guess it would have seemed stranger not doing it than doing it.
I went up to my room, threw a few things into my grip, and came back downstairs. Elizabeth got up from a chair in the living-room and took a step toward me. I took one toward her.
"Well, Joe?" she said.
"Well," I said. "I guess this is it. I guess we won't be seeing each other any more. That is, if Carol gets the-her party."
"She'll get her, all right," said Elizabeth. "I've never had any doubt about that."
"Well, good-by," I said. "I'll always remember you, Elizabeth."
"You'd better, Joe."
"I'll-What do you mean?"
"Twenty-five thousand dollars."
"That's what we agreed on," I said. "Where's the argument?"
I hoped she wouldn't say anything more. It's hell to want to sock your wife the last time you're seeing her.
"I want to make myself clear, Joe. If your memory should fail you there will be exceedingly unpleasant consequences."
"Hell," I said, "what do you think I am, anyway?"
"Exactly what I always did."
I walked out.
Ordinarily, if I'd wanted to go into the city I wouldn't have bothered to make excuses to anyone. I'd have just gone. But now it was different. I had to have a good reason for going, and there was only one I could think of.
I beat Jimmie Nedry to the show by about thirty minutes, and went up to the projection booth. By the time he got there I'd taken the parts cabinet off the wall and had everything in it spread out on the rewind table.