John D. MacDonald - April Evil

JohnD. MacDonald - APRIL EVIL

FirstPublished in 1955

ChapterOne

Thecouple arrived in Flamingo, a town of twelve thousand population onFlorida's west coast, at about eleven-thirty on the morning of theeleventh of April. They arrived in a gray Buick sedan with Illinoisplates. The big car was dirty after the long trip. Racked clothinghung in the back.

The gray Buick cruised the main shopping section on Bay Avenuefor a few minutes and then pulled into a drive-in restaurant on thewest end of Bay Avenue near the approach to the causeway and bridgethat led to Flamingo Key.

It was a hot day, too hot to eat in the car. There was no one inthe other cars. The other customers were all inside the restaurant. Awaitress in a green cotton uniform stood in the angular patch ofshade made by the building itself, her back against the pink wall,and watched the couple as they got out of the gray car. She smoked acigarette and watched them and wondered idly about them.

The man was tall. He was about thirty years old. He had the lookof someone still recovering from a serious illness. He slid carefullyout from behind the wheel and stood by the car, his posture bad,shoulders thrust forward. He wore a white shirt with the sleevesrolled up and the collar open, gray pants that were baggy at theknees. The shirt and trousers looked as though they had been made fora larger man. The trousers were gathered at the belt line and hungslack in the back.

He stood blinking in the bright sunshine, his shadow blackagainst the blue-black of the asphalt. His color was not good and theglossy black of his hair seemed the most alive thing about him. Hestood and looked toward the causeway. He rubbed his left arm andelbow gingerly. It was pink from the sun, from resting on the sill ofthe car window as he drove.

The woman was still in the car, putting on lipstick. The manturned and looked up Bay Avenue toward the shopping section, and thenturned farther and looked at the waitress. There were deep lines inhis cheeks. There were, dark patches under hot dark eyes. His nosewas long, thin at the bridge, wide at the nostrils. He looked at thewaitress with a complete lack of expression. That is not somethingoften seen. The dead wear no expression. Neither do the victims ofdementia praecox when in catatonic state. Something behind the facelooked out of the dark eyes at her, and the face told her nothing.The waitress felt oddly uncomfortable. She was a handsome husky girl,accustomed to stares, but not of that sort. She looked away.

The man spoke in a low impatient voice to the woman in the car.She got out quickly. She was a tall girl of about twenty-five, astall as the man in her high heels. She wore a sheer white blouse. Hertan linen skirt was badly wrinkled. She smoothed it across her hipswith the back of her hand. Her blonde hair was cropped short, and thewaitress decided it was not becoming to her. It made the girl's facelook too large, too heavy. The girl had the wide cheekbones, theshort upper Up, the wide-set blue eyes, the heaviness of mouth thathave become a stereotype of sensual beauty. Her tall figure was good,but slightly heavy. There was a look of softness about it. Her legswere very white. The girl's face was passive, with a hint of almostbovine endurance. She walked in an oddly constricted way. It was awalk in which there was body-consciousness and a flavor of humility.She walked as though she half expected a sudden blow, and yet wouldnot mind too much if it came.

The man locked the car quickly and passed the girl on the way tothe door and held it open for her. The waitress snapped her cigaretteout onto the asphalt. She thought that the couple had not had a verygood trip. It looked as though the girl had gotten the wrong man, andthat was too bad. But a lot of us get the wrong ones. And it's toolate then and not much you can do about it. There are more wrong onesthan right ones.

The waitress went in the side door of the restaurant. The manhad taken a paper from the rack by the door. They had taken a tablefor two. The man read the morning Flamingo _Record._ The waitress wasglad it was not her table. The girl sat quite still and looked beyondthe man, out the big side window toward the blue water of the bay andthe white houses on the key beyond the bay. At intervals she lifted acigarette slowly to her mouth, and as slowly returned it to hold itover the chipped glass ashtray on the formica table.

By twoo'clock, using the name Mr. and Mrs. John Wheeler, the couple hadrented the Mather house on the bay shore three miles south of thecenter of town. Hedges, the realtor, had tried to interest them in ahouse on the key, but they had not wanted to be on the key. TheMather house was long, low--a three-bedroom two-bath cypress housewith a terrace that faced the bay, a new dock but no boat. Thenearest house north of it was over two hundred feet away, and almostentirely screened by dense plantings. The vacant land south of thehouse was thickly overgrown with palmetto and cabbage palm and weeds.

The Mather house had a curving shell drive, live oaks heavy withSpanish moss, some delicate punk trees, a few pepper trees, a clumpof coconut palm. There was a phone in the house on temporarydisconnect, and Hedges promised to have it hooked up that same day.The man had paid in cash, seven hundred and seventy-two dollars andfifty cents. This included the three per cent state tax. It coveredthe rental up to May fifteenth.

After the transaction was complete, Bud Hedges, not a veryimaginative or sensitive man, wondered why he should have strangefancies about the couple. They had not responded to any of his eagerlisting of the delights of a vacation in Flamingo. Even the dustygray car had seemed blunt and sullen. He wondered why he had takenthe precaution of jotting down the number from the Illinois plates.He shrugged off his strange feelings. The money was in hand. Mrs.Mather would be pleased. He had made thirty-seven-fifty for an hourof work during the month when the tourist season was ending. And theWheelers had gotten what they wanted, a house with a maximum ofprivacy. He had not expected them to pay that much freight. The man'sshoes had been black, cheap, cracked across the instep. Hedges alwayslooked at their shoes. It was a better index than automobiles. Youcouldn't buy shoes on time.

Theylooked the house over more carefully after Hedges had gone. Theycarried the luggage in. The man wandered around the grounds while thegirl unpacked. He went down and stood on the dock. Mullet jumped inthe bay. A man in a yellow boat with a very quiet outboard motortrolled in a wide circle. A gray cabin cruiser went south by thechannel markers. He could see the narrow pass between Flamingo Keyand Sand Key, see the deeper blue of the waters of the Gulf of Mexicobeyond the pass.

The girl came out on the front terrace and called to him. "It'sall unpacked. We got to get some stuff."

He walked up to the terrace. "Like what?"

"You know. Staples. Bread and butter and eggs and cans andstuff."

"Can you cook?"

"I can cook some. You don't want to go out much, do you?"

"No. I don't want to go out much."

"I fixed the trays and turned the 'frig on high. Thereought to be ice pretty quick."

"Little homemaker."

"Well...hell."

"Pick up a couple bottles too. Here."

She took the money. He heard the car leave a few minutes later.He paced through the empty house. He turned on a radio in the bigkitchen. He found soap operas, hill-billies and Havana stations. Heturned it off, drank a glass of water, frowned at the sulphur taste.He tried the phone but it wasn't hooked up yet. He went in and testedthe beds. They felt all right. He took a shower. After the shower hedressed in the cotton slacks and aqua sports shirt he had picked upin that store in Georgia. He looked at himself in the full-lengthmirror as he combed his black glossy hair.