The truth was, I wanted to get out of the house myself, and I was glad to go. We walked on up the hill at an angle to the crest, and it was something to see how well she managed to walk among the rocks in her high heels and tight skirt, and she was, as I’ve said, pretty remarkable at more things than you’d think. There was a fallen tree near the crest, and we sat down to rest on the trunk of the tree. It was mighty nice up there, if you care for rocks and scrub timber, and I could see, glittering in the sunlight at the foot of the hill below the house, the good fishing stream that Cousin Theodore came here to fish in.
“I’ve made up my mind to tell you something,” Felicia Gotlot said.
“Don’t bother,” I said.
“I’ve made up my mind to tell you the truth, and you’d better listen.”
“I’ll bet it’s the truth!”
“You know why I’ve made up my mind to tell you? Because you’re not a really bad fellow, only dumb. It’s that bad Banty who makes you do things that get you into trouble, but Banty won’t do it anymore, because Banty won’t be back.”
“There you go again, and you may as well quit.”
“I don’t mean because he’ll run away. I just said that to bother you and make you realize how dumb it is to trust someone like that Banty. I mean because the police will get him.”
“Not Banty.”
“Yes, they will, and I’ll tell you why. Do you want me to tell you?”
“Suit yourself.”
“The police will get him because when he goes for the payoff, whenever and wherever it is, Arnold Gotlot will have enough men there to fight a small war.”
“No, he won’t. Not after Banty tells him what will happen to his precious daughter if he tries any tricks.”
“That’s what I’ve been getting around to telling you. Nothing is going to happen to Arnold Gotlot’s daughter, and Arnold Gotlot knows it, because his daughter is at home this minute with a broken leg, where she has been for nearly a week.”
“What the hell you talking about?”
“I’m talking about Felicia Gotlot’s leg, which is broken. She fell off a horse.”
“Oh, sure. And I suppose you’re Felicia Gotlot’s grandmother or someone like that. Is that it?”
“No one like that at all. My name is Amanda Swanson, and I’m a maid in the Gotlot home. Felicia likes me and humors me, and when I go out at night she lets me wear her clothes and jewelry. When that Banty was so nasty last night, refusing to take me back to Kansas City and all, I lied about being Felicia because I thought it would impress him and make him take me. Then when he got the idea to kidnap me, it was too late to tell the truth, because he wouldn’t have believed me. Besides, I didn’t like him, and wanted to get him into trouble, which I have, and he deserves every bit of it.”
“I don’t believe you. You’re always telling lies, you said so yourself, and you’re lying now.”
“I admit I’m a good liar, and I lie when it pleases me, but now it pleases me to tell the truth, and you’d better believe me. I know old Arnold Gotlot like the palm of my hand, and I know how he hates con men and blackmailers and crooks of all sorts. The minute Banty contacts him, he’ll start laying the trap to catch him. He won’t let on or say a word about Felicia’s being at home, because that would scare Banty off. What he’ll do, he’ll play along and agree to everything, setting the trap all the while, and then, probably tonight, it’ll be the end of Banty, and if you don’t get out of here right away, it’ll be the end of you too.”
I’ll say that I was excited, and I almost lost my head. All I wanted to do, all at once, was to start running and keep on running, without ever looking back, until I couldn’t run any farther, and I wished I’d never seen or heard of Felicia Gotlot, or Amanda Swanson, whichever she was, or of Banty either. I was sort of crazy for a minute, that’s what I was, and I did actually jump up and take a couple of steps downhill, almost on my way, when I suddenly stopped and thought better of it.
“Hold on,” I said. “How do I know you weren’t telling the truth before, and telling lies now?”
“So far as that goes,” she said, “you don’t.”
“You’re Felicia Gotlot, all right. You’re just trying to get me to run away so you can walk somewhere and call Kansas City and get Bandy caught.”
“Your concern for Banty is touching. Too bad he wouldn’t feel the same about you. However, you could prevent my going anywhere by tying me in bed again. It wouldn’t matter much to me. The police will be here sometime tonight in my opinion.”
“Banty will be here, that’s who. He’ll be here with half a million dollars, and I’ll be right here to get my share of it. Nothing doing, sister. You’d just as well quit lying, because it won’t do you any good.”
“I was wrong,” she said. “You’re just as dumb as I thought you were at first. You’re simply too dumb to take proper care of yourself.”
“You’d better quit calling me names too. I’m getting tired of it. Come on. Let’s get back down to the house.”
She walked down ahead of me, without saying another word. In the house, she went directly to the bedroom and stayed in there all the rest of the afternoon, until it was time to open some more cans, and afterward she went back and stayed in there alone all evening until I decided it was time to tie her in bed again in case I fell asleep, although I was getting more and more nervous as it got later and later, and didn’t feel like sleeping in spite of being as tired as I can remember ever being.
“So you’re really going to wait for Banty,” she said.
“That’s what I’m going to do.”
“Pleasant waiting,” she said. “Wake me up when the police come.”
“That will be a couple days after Banty and I are gone,” I said. “I hope you don’t get too lonesome in the meanwhile.”
“It will be an interesting speculation for you,” she said. “Maybe it will help to pass the night faster. It ought to be quite exciting as time grows shorter and shorter. Will it be Banty or the police? The police or Banty? A simple thing like that can get into your head and drive you crazy if you don’t get it out soon enough.”
You can see that she’d done it again. Just like she’d done it last night about Banty running off with the money. She’d put it in my head, and I couldn’t get it out. It stayed right there and kept repeating itself over and over again, first one way and then the other, Banty or the police, the police or Banty, and to make matters worse I ran out of cigarettes. I gathered up all the butts I’d left in saucers around the place, and I smoked these, a few drags off each one, but pretty soon they were all gone too, and it was only about ten o’clock with a long, long time still to wait.
I didn’t know exactly how long, of course, and I began trying to guess, and I guessed four hours. There wasn’t any reason for guessing four instead of three or five, but it somehow made me feel better and surer to have a certain time to look forward to. I guessed that Banty would make the contact for the payoff at eleven sharp, which would leave him three hours to get back down here if he hurried, which he sure as hell would, and after eleven I began to try to follow him along the highway in the jalopy, placing him at certain places at certain times. As it turned out I wasn’t far wrong, for he was only about fifty miles away in my head when someone suddenly kicked the front door open, and five cops jumped into the room with their guns out, and every cop was nine feet tall.
Well, that’s the way it ended, and it’s over, and I’m almost glad. As you can see, Banty was bright but had no luck, and I had no luck and was stupid besides.
Not that Felicia Gotlot, though. She was bright and lucky both, besides being the best liar I ever met. It was simply impossible to know when to believe her, because she told the truth like a lie and a lie like the truth. I don’t hold anything against her, though. I liked her, and still do, and I remember that she tried her best to get me out of it before it was too late, which it now is. The prettiest and altogether the most remarkable woman I’ve ever known was Felicia Gotlot — Amanda Swanson, I mean.