Kornell Vulrich - The Blood Stone [= The Death Stone;= The Earring; novelet]

The latchkey jammed, and I had to stand there shaking as if I had St. Vitus dance before I could get it to work right. My wrists shook, my arms shook, my shoulders shook, trying to force it around. And above all else, my heart shook with the terror.

I was shaking so, it even made the empty milk-bottle standing outside the door sing out. Id accidentally touched it with the tip of my shoe, I guess. The day maid had a note for the milkman curled up in the neck of it, in the shape of a little paper funnel.

I took the key out, drew a deep breath, and tried again. This time the door opened like pie. There hadnt been anything the matter with the key; Id been holding it upside down, that was all. I sidled in, eased the door silently closed again behind me and Mrs. James Shaw was home.

The hall clock chimed four times. They say you can only die once, but I died four times, once for each chime-stroke. Not that I wasnt supposed to be out. I could have even rung the doorbell, and saved myself all that wrestling with the key. But I couldnt face anyone, not even Jimmy, just then. Even if hed just said, Have a good time at the night club with the Perrys?, even if hed just looked at me, I would have busted down and tried to crawl into his lapel. I needed to be alone, I needed time to pull myself together.

Hed left the light on for me in the hall. He was still up, working away in the library on his income tax report. He had the door dosed, but I could tell by the light shining out under the sill of it. He always waited until the last minute, like most taxpayers do, and then he had to sit up all night to beat the deadline on it. That was why hed had to miss the party, send me out with the Perrys alone.

It was just a coincidence, but I could thank my lucky stars hed had to finish it tonight.

That was just about the only thing in the whole mess there was to be thankful for. That at least there wouldnt be any trouble between Jimmy and me.

I tiptoed down the hall toward our bedroom, slipped in, closed the door behind me. I gave it the lights and took a couple of deep body-sobs that had been ganged up in me for the past three-quarters of an hour or more.

The glass showed me a golden wreck staggering across the room toward it. All glittery on the outside: gold-sheath dress, diamonds everywhere there was room to hang them, around my neck, around my wrists, swinging from my ears. Not so glittery on the inside: plenty scared.

I sat down in front of the glass, held my head with both hands for a minute.

When I got my second wind, the first thing I did was open my gold evening pouch and take out what I had in it. The style ran to big evening bags this season, and that was a good thing for me. Id needed a lot of room tonight. The letters made a bulky packet. And the little gun Id taken along, just to be on the safe side, that took up room, too. The ten thousand dollars in cash didnt take up any room, because I hadnt brought that back with me, Id swapped that for the letters.

That gives you the whole story. Well, maybe not quite, so in fairness to myself Id better run over it just once. His name was Carpenter. The letters had been written to him five years ago, three years before I even knew there was a Jimmy Shaw in the world. I should have been safe enough. But hed made use of a trick to bring them up to date. It was a clever trick. I granted him that.

Heres what hed done. At the time Id originally written them, wed both been at the same seaside resort hotel, only on different floors. Id had them delivered to him personally by bellboys and what not, not sent through the mail. In other words hed received the envelopes sealed and addressed to him in my handwriting, but unstamped and undated by any post office cancellation.

He must have been a careful letter opener, the kind that just makes a neat slit down the side instead of tearing them ragged. Hed pasted over the slits with strips of thin wax paper, put a brand new stamp on each one, added his present street and city address beneath the name, and then sent them back through the mail a second time to himself. One at a time, over a period of weeks, careful to match the mailing date with the original date inside at the top of the note paper. Get the idea?

Each one had come back to him with this years date postmarked on the outside, to match the five-year-old date on the inside. I hadnt bothered inserting the year, just the day of the week and the month. Hed had the devils own luck with those cancellations, too. Not one of them had blurred or smudged; the 1950 stood out clear as a diamond. Then when hed gotten them back, hed peeled off the wax paper.

In other words, hed turned a lot of gushy but harmless mash notes written to him by a young girl into a batch of deadly dangerous, incriminating letters written to him by a respectable and socially prominent young married woman with a wealthy husband. And hed done it by simply sticking stamps on them. What an investment! At an expenditure of two cents a head, hed gotten back one thousand dollars on each one. There had been ten that were usable; the others either had been signed with my full family name or had things in them that dated them as from that summer.

Youd think a corny setup like that, which they dont even use in the movies any more, wouldnt go over. I should have refused to pay off, gone straight to Jimmy about it. But its so easy to be brave until youre face to face with something like that. Hed had me over a barrel. His technique had been beautifully simple and direct. Hed first called me three or four days ago. Hed said, Remember me? Well, I need ten thousand dollars.

Id hung up.

Hed called right back again before I could even move away from the phone. You didnt let me finish what I was saying. I have some letters that you wrote to me. I thought maybe that youd prefer to have them back than to have them lying around loose.

Id hung up again.

Hed called back late that same night, after midnight. Luckily, I answered, and not Jimmy. Im giving you one more chance. One of thems in the mail already, enclosed in an envelope addressed to your husband. Hell get one every morning, until theyre all used up. And the price for the restll go up a thousand, each time I send one out. Im sending the first one to your house and tipping you off ahead of time, so youll still have a chance to sidetrack it before he sees it. After that, theyll go to his club, where you cant get your hands on them. Think it over. Call me tomorrow at eleven, and let me know what youve decided. And he gave me his number.

I sneaked the letter off the mail tray before Jimmy saw it. I read it over. It should have been written on asbestos. All night I lie awake and dream of you... Id follow you to the ends of the earth...

I saw what hed done. How could I prove Id written them in 1945 and not 1950? My handwriting hadnt changed. Note paper doesnt show any particular age, especially the deckled gray kind Id used then and was still using now, with just a crest instead of a monogram. The tables turned. I could hardly wait for eleven to come. I hung around the phone all morning.

When he answered, all I said, breathlessly, was, Thatll be all right. Just tell me where and when.

Tonight had been when, and the flat Id just come from had been where. And ten thousand dollars out of my own private checking account had been how much.

At least Id gotten them all back and it was over. Or is blackmail ever over with? Is it a game that you can ever beat?

There was a fireplace in our bedroom, and I burned the letters in there, one by one; contents and envelopes and spiked cancellations. When the last of them was gone in smoke, I felt a lot better. For about three and a half minutes.

I started to strip off the sparkle, and I opened the little embossed leather case I kept it all in. It was divided into compartments for each variety. The bracelets went into one, the rings into another, and so on. I came to the one for the earrings last. I took the right one off first and pitched it in. Then I reached for the left, and just got air and the bare lobe of my ear. No left earring.