It had got light outside, and by the time we’d finished our cakes and coffee it was light inside too, light enough to blow out the kerosene lamp, which I did. We washed up the tin plates and the skillet and went into the living room, and it looked like a long day, waiting and waiting for Banty and wondering all the time where he was and what he was doing and how long he would be, and it was made longer and worse by having started so early, and by the problem of what to do with Felicia Gotlot.
I decided not to tie her up again until night, unless she tried something tricky that made it necessary, and I told her this, and she said thanks, she appreciated it. Sarcasm.
“Remember I’ve got this .38 in my pocket,” I said.
“I remember.”
“Don’t think I won’t use it if you make me.”
“Would you?”
She found some old magazines and began to leaf through them, and I smoked and watched her for a while. Then I thought I’d have another cup of coffee, and went after it, and she said she’d have another cup too, and so I brought it. I sat down and began to drink my coffee, and she drank hers, but she kept looking at me over her cup with this odd expression.
“What are you looking at?” I asked.
“You,” she said.
“Well, cut it out.”
“Why?”
“I don’t like it.”
“Do you know what I was thinking? I was thinking about what you might have been like as a kid in these hills.”
“I was dirty and ragged and ignorant.”
“You must have had a lot of fun.”
“Sure I did! My old man was a drunken bum and my old lady was a drunken slob.”
“Is that why you left home?”
“Partly.”
“What’s the other part?”
“Just to get away from these rocks and see if I could find a dollar to carry in my pocket.”
“Did you find one?”
“I’ve been doing all right.”
“Now you’re going to do even better, aren’t you? Now you’re going to have a whole quarter of a million dollars to carry in your pocket.”
“That’s right.”
“No, it isn’t. That’s wrong.”
“You think so? Wait and see.”
“Do you really imagine that fellow you called Banty can pull off something like this?”
“Sure. Why not? Banty’s smart.”
“I doubt it. Anyhow, he’s weak. He doesn’t have anything inside. He’s just some curly hair on top of nothing.”
“You don’t know him, that’s all.”
“I don’t have to know him. All I had to do was look at him and hear him talk. You’ll find out. He’ll botch the job and squeal on you, and both of you will end up in prison, and maybe in the gas chamber.”
“Shut up. If you haven’t got anything sensible to say, just keep your mouth shut.”
“Take my advice. Get out while you can. You could get away if you left right now.”
“You’d like that, wouldn’t you?”
“It makes no difference to me, really. I just hate to see you get into any more trouble than you’re already in. That Banty’s bad luck.”
“I should tie you in bed and leave you there.”
“Have it your own way,” she said.
She shrugged and began leafing through another old magazine, and I began to think again about Banty and try to figure when he’d probably be back. He hadn’t told me any schedule, of course, because that was something he’d have to work out in KC after he got there, but I figured he’d probably contact Arnold Gotlot tonight, or maybe even this afternoon, since the job was hot. Besides, he wouldn’t want to prolong his chances of running accidentally into Archie Flowers or one of his boys. He’d tell Arnold Gotlot about having Felicia and wanting the half million to give her back alive, and then he’d probably hang up and let Gotlot think about it for a while. Later on, maybe tonight or early tomorrow, he’d call again from another phone and set the time and place exactly for the payoff. I didn’t know where the place or when the time would be, naturally, but I knew, knowing Banty, that the place would be one he’d choose carefully and the time would be soon, and it was my bet that it would be tomorrow night. That meant Banty would be back early the next morning at the latest, probably between midnight and daylight.
As I expected, it was a long day and a bad one, and I thought it would never pass, but it did. We ate something from cans about noon, and something else from cans before dark, and between the two times, Felicia Gotlot went into the bedroom and lay down on the bed and had a nap. I was tired and sleepy myself, having started the day so early after a hard night, but I didn’t dare go to sleep because of having to watch Felicia Gotlot, to see that she didn’t run away, maybe hitting me over the head or shooting me with my own .38 before running. I made her leave the door to the bedroom open so I could see her lying in there from where I sat, and I played Old Sol ten times with a pack of cards I found, and he beat me every time.
A little while after dark, I was so tired and sleepy I couldn’t stand it any longer, and I told her I was going to bed and she’d have to go too.
“Are you going to tie me in bed already?”
“That’s right.”
“Would you let me sit up by myself if I promise not to do anything you told me not to?”
“No.”
“You aren’t quite as dumb as I thought you were.”
“I’m not dumb enough to think you wouldn’t lie to me if it suited you.”
“I’m quite an accomplished liar. I have a particular talent for it.”
“And that’s the truth,” I said.
I tied her in bed the same way Banty and I had tied her before. She didn’t fight it, or try to talk me out of it anymore, but just lay there quietly looking up at me with that odd little smile on her face.
“Enjoy yourself while you can,” I said.
“You aren’t as dumb as I thought,” she said, “but you’re still pretty dumb.”
“You may change your mind,” I said.
“What makes you so sure Banty’s coming back?”
“He’ll be back.”
“Well,” she said, “half a million is twice as much as a quarter million, and I don’t see what’s to keep him from going north or east or west instead of south.”
Then she closed her eyes, still smiling, and I don’t mind admitting that I couldn’t put what she’d said out of my mind, and I couldn’t sleep because of it, tired as I was and much as I needed to. I got up and began smoking cigarettes, but I had to quit after a while because I only had about half a pack left to last me until Banty came back, if he ever did, and I sat there in the dark for almost ten years trying to convince myself that he surely would. Finally I lay down on the sofa again and shut my eyes, but I kept seeing Banty heading any direction but south, and it was after midnight before I went to sleep and began dreaming about the same thing. It was a dirty trick of Felicia Gotlot’s to put me deliberately in such a frame of mind, and I hoped she was having as much trouble sleeping as I was, but she said the next morning she hadn’t.
I got back at her a little by leaving her tied in bed until the middle of the morning, but then I let her up for coffee, and let her stay up afterward. Things were strained between us, though, and it wasn’t until afternoon, after we’d had something to eat out of cans, that she finally said any more to me than was strictly demanded by necessity. Then she said she was sick of staying inside all the time and would like to take a walk.
“I don’t think so,” I said.
“Oh, come on. We could just walk up the hill to the crest and back. What harm could it do?”
“Well, none, I guess.”