The Cut of the Whip Page 5

  Port got the car to stop and turned back deliberately. A strange piece of luck, because Port knew that road. It went into the arroyo where he had tried out his Luger. It went in there and didn’t come out again because the arroyo was blind.

  Port watched the beams from Heering’s lights for awhile, where they danced along the walls of the gulch. He couldn’t see the car itself, but it would take Heering at least ten minutes to come back out. Port drove the short way back to the diner, the one where he had stopped during the day, and pulled around in the front so the car headed back in Heering’s direction. Then Port went inside. He was not taking much of a chance on losing the man and this might be the only free time he would have between now and getting back to the Heering estate.

  Port went to the wall phone inside and dialed long distance. His connection didn’t take long and he kept watching the road through the window.

  “Heering residence,” said the voice.

  “This is Dan Port. May I speak to Mr. Heering?”

  A few clicks on the line and then Heering.

  “Did you meet?” said Heering, as if this was the middle of a long conversation.

  “Yes,” said Port. “I called to tell you we’re coming back.”

  “You have the material?”

  “Yes. Actually—”

  “When will you be back?”

  “By car? Not before the day after tomorrow. If you can arrange—”

  “It will have to be by car. You will remember I want nobody else involved and I remind you of Robert’s condition. Take nothing for granted with him, discount whatever he may say, and please be aware of the fact that a certain cleverness, rather surprising at times, is part and parcel of his condition.”

  “All right. I have to hang up now.”

  “I’m depending on you completely, Mr. Port.”

  “I know. Don’t worry about it,” and then they hung up.

  Port left the diner and ran to his car. He tore down the highway with unnecessary speed and wished that something violent would happen. As if the whole job ahead were a vague thing and unknown. But this was ridiculous. Hunting Robert Heering into the end of the arroyo was like shooting an animal caught in a box trap.

  For the second time Port knew why he felt wrong. To hunt a loser made him feel sick…

  The arroyo wasn’t long, but it wound back and forth, and Port was sure that Heering would have driven almost up to the end before seeing the dead stop. What Port had misjudged was the time it would take for Heering to come back.

  He came through the bend in reverse, the taillights bobbing up and down, closer and closer. Port had come into the gulch with his lights off, and the Benz kept coming at him. Port’s headlights snapped on, showing the back of the big car nodding closer, and then the Benz jumped and tore straight towards the hood of Port’s car.

  Port clutched and ground the car into reverse before it had come to a stop, and with full pedal squealed backwards, throwing stones and loose sand. The Benz shot by and kept going.

  It was now very much the kind of feeling Port had waited for, the sharp anger with a real object and the hard action with an aim that wasn’t too far away.

  Part way up the incline leading to the walls of the arroyo, Port stopped. He couldn’t have gone further anyway. He yanked the gearshift into first, wheeled hard, and bounced back on the road after the Benz. The big car was just making a bend, but then it never got quite out of sight. Going forward Port had more speed and more skill, and even if he hadn’t reminded himself that young Heering was crazy, he would still have done the same thing.

  He gunned hard and rammed the Benz with his right front wheel and kept pushing.

  Then he let up. The other car kept going for a stretch longer but couldn’t steer any more. The rear end dug into the side of the gulch and the car stopped.

  Port stopped and got out. Nothing moved for a moment, except the slow dust moving through the beam of the headlights. There was no wind in the gulch, like on the highway, and the only noise was the long sigh from the cut tire.

  And why hadn’t Heering moved? Remember, he’s off—

  The Benz suddenly rocked and the door flew open. Robert Heering squinted into the light, but only a moment, and started to run. It was getting to be a familiar sight, an irritating sight and a useless delay.

  “Stop it,” said Port. “For chrissake—” But the man kept going.

  Port moved to the side of the Benz and looked up at the sky. He could hear the man. Stones falling and sliding sounds.

  “Heering—come back here!”

  No change in sounds.

  Port took up the Luger, aimed for the line where the sky was lighter than the rim of the gulch, and squeezed twice.

  He couldn’t have hit the man!

  But the man screamed and screamed, and the sounds from the steep incline were rushing each other, with the screams getting louder.

  He was running. He was screaming and running back. When Port met him, Heering did a difficult thing: he swung at Port’s head while running, and made it good enough to burn his knuckles on Port’s skull.

  Port hit for the midriff with the heel of his hand, let his hand slide on up and jar into the jaw.

  Robert Heering kept going forward and fell on his face.

  Chapter VI

  HE JUST lay there, making no move. Port couldn’t tell if the man were hurt or if he were waiting his chance.

  “Heering,” he said, “get up.” And then again, “Come on, fellow—up!”

  Port moved with a great deal of caution. He stayed well back and reached out to touch Heering’s arm. The touch would do something. It would end the stalemate, it would tell Port something.

  He took the arm harder now, feeling how tense it was.

  All of Heering was tense. He turned on his back and stared up at Port, as if frozen, and Port saw that there wasn’t going to be a fast jump, or a kick, or any attack. Robert Heering was in a stark panic.

  Port hunched down on his heels slowly and then took out a cigarette. He lit it and smoked.

  “Here,” he said and handed it over.

  The young man, after a while, shook his head.

  Port smoked again, waiting it out. In a while Robert Heering sat up and his hands were trembling now. Port watched, hoping the shakes would run their course and die out.

  “Don’t be afraid,” he said “It’s over.”

  He offered the man a cigarette from his pack and this time Heering took it. Port stayed where he was and let him light it himself.

  “Better?”

  The young man smoked. There was no need to answer.

  Port got up, stretching himself, then flipped his cigarette into the bank of the arroyo. It hit and rolled a short way. Then it lay there and went out.

  “All right, Robert. Give me the package.”

  For a moment a peculiar look came over Heering’s face, but then he put down his head and exhaled. The long, breathy sound then became like a cough, or perhaps a laugh, but whatever it was it was all resignation.

  “My father sent you?” said Heering.

  “Yes.”

  The young man made the sound again, like a laugh this time. “I didn’t think he’d go this far.”

  “Far?” Port thought a moment, then said, “The shots were my own idea. He didn’t say I should shoot you.”

  Heering got up. “I didn’t mean that.” He brushed at himself, doing no good. He wasn’t paying attention. “I mean allowing a stranger. He goes far—”

  Heering took a deep breath and looked up at the skyline He did this without interest, as if he were through expecting, or looking.

  “Give me the package,” said Port.

  “Oh, yes,” and Heering just handed it over.

  It was wrapped and tied, the way Port had first seen it, and there were papers inside.

  “Is he paying you much for this job?” Heering asked.

  “Compared to the million he’s going to make, no.”

  �
�What?” said Heering, and he laughed a little.

  Port didn’t answer. He walked to his car, past the Benz, and kept his eyes out of the beams. He didn’t look back because he could hear the young man following him. The footsteps were unhurried, just walking. Port stopped by his car and opened the door.

  “We’ll take mine,” he said.

  “Oh?” said Heering. “That’s decent of you, but I’ll manage. I’ll just change this tire.”

  It wasn’t going to be simple, Port saw. This man didn’t grasp anything.

  And then Heering came closer, so he could see Port and talk without shouting. He said, “Considering, you’ve been very decent. Really, I mean it.”

  “Thank you.”

  “I feel hopeful,” he went on, “asking you just this one favor. It’s small, considering, and if you say nothing to father, he won’t be concerned.”

  “Robert,” said Port, “there’s nothing personal between you and me. That’s why I’d like all this to be over as quickly as possible, and the less delay the less friction. Uh—so let’s go,” he finished off.

  He had finished off rather suddenly, frowning over what he had said. Robert Heering, with all his removed manner, had drawn something personal out of Port. It’s a thing about crazy people, Port thought to himself. He felt confused.

  “You didn’t let me finish,” said Robert Heering.

  “Oh?”

  “I just want to have one of the photographs. There are four, I think. Just let me have one.”

  There was no detachment now, but a very serious wish.

  Port tossed the packet into the front seat and leaned his arms on the top of the open door.

  “Robert,” he said, “I’m sorry. It’s the whole point of my job, you can see that. I can’t even give you a photostat.”

  “I said photo,” explained Heering and he too was patient. His growing anxiety would only slow down if he too stayed slow, spoke that way and tried to be reasonable.

  “Yes,” said Port, not wanting an argument. “Look at it this way, Robert. Think of me as a machine, built for a special job. You wouldn’t argue with a machine, would you?” Port coughed, then he said, “I’ve been sent to get the conference notes and I’ve got them. And I’ve got to bring them back. I can’t give them to you.”

  Robert Heering blinked, licked his lips and seemed to be on the point of saying something. Then a small tic, like a short shake of the head, developed. Port took his arms off the top of the door and stood carefully.

  “Are you crazy?” said Robert Heering.

  Port ran one hand back and forth over his face so that he wouldn’t have to worry about his expression. He didn’t know what to answer; finally he said, “No.”

  “Who are you, anyway?” said Robert Heering.

  “My name’s Daniel Port.” He felt somewhat safer.

  “Well, you needn’t lie to me, Mr. Port—”

  “All right, Robert.” The young man’s agitation was bad now.

  “Did my father really send you?”

  “Why, of course!”

  “My God!” Heering said, and then again, very loud, “My God! Did he tell you that?”

  Heering had thrown up his arms and then clapped them down again, hitting his sides. He took some fast steps, but not towards Port, walking towards the wall of the arroyo and then back to the car again. “Listen to me,” he shouted at Port. “What did you come after me for?”

  “Your father hired me—” Port started patiently but Heering was shouting again.

  “What for? To do what?”

  “To bring you back, Robert, so that there won’t be any complications for you, and to bring back the conference notes.”

  “Conference notes? Oil deal?” Robert Heering’s face was glutted with rage. “Is that what the filthy swine said?”

  Port felt his teeth clamped tight. He was losing his patience.

  “That filthy swine said conference notes? You know what’s in that packet, you idiot?”

  “All right,” said Port and got ready to move.

  “Love letters! You hear me? They’re love letters in there, from that swine to his illegitimate wife!”

  Robert Heering went to the bank and sat down there. He put his arms on top of his knees and kept sitting like that. Now and then he ran his hands over his face.

  Port watched him a moment. He lit himself a cigarette but did not offer the other man one. Then he sat down in the front seat of his car, facing out of the open door, and smoked. After a while he reached back without turning and found the brown packet there. He held it in his lap and felt it with his fingers. Then he tore it open.

  A dozen letters, perhaps, in their envelopes.

  They were very old. They were dated back thirty years. They were written by hand, a steep, angular hand, and they all started, My darling, Darling Emmy. The envelopes were addressed to Miss E. Semmerling.

  Port didn’t read much. Some were stilted and awkward and others showed a free passion. There were musings and plans of how they would live. They were all signed Carl.

  “What’s your father’s name?” said Port.

  “Carl.”

  Port folded the letters and wrapped them again. It was a great, deep mess and he wished he had never gotten into it.

  Robert Heering got up and walked over. He looked stiff and bent.

  “Please, Mr. Port. I ask you this one favor, this one—”

  “The picture?”

  “Please!”

  Port opened the packet again and in one of the letters there were three pictures

  “Which one?” and Port held them out.

  Robert Heering took one with a young woman sitting on a bench and holding a small child in her lap. He gave back the other two.

  Port put them back and wrapped the packet again.

  “Tell me, Robert,” he said. “If you want.”

  Robert Heering was putting the picture into a pocket and when he looked up his face showed a gratefulness and a relief which took the old lines away. But then it all stopped very abruptly and the face tensed again, because Heering was listening.

  “You understand,” Port was saying, “that I’ll have to see your father again. If you could tell me more, it would help.”

  Heering waited, showing his nervousness.

  “Why did you steal this?” asked Port. “Why did you want these letters?”

  “You know who this is?” and Robert Heering held out the picture. “See this woman? That’s the Mrs. Powell you saw, back there in that house. It’s her, years ago, when she was Emmy Semmerling and she and my father were in love. Can you imagine that? About my father I mean?” Heering laughed, a frantic and heartless laugh, and then, “And this baby here, see this baby? That’s me!”

  He started to laugh again, but then, at the last moment, changed it into a deep breath and when that was gone he seemed to have lost all interest. Port could hardly hear what he said.

  “Do you have any idea, Mr. Port, what it’s like being Carl Heering’s illegitimate son?”

  They had turned off the headlights to save the battery and sat in the dark car in the arroyo. The motor was idling so that the heater would work. The night was very cold outside the car. Port smoked and listened while Robert Heering told the long story.

  The elder Heering had met Emmy Semmerling when he was in his twenties. She was the daughter of a pump man and Carl Heering was an engineer. It was the first time he had left the East, his first job in the fields, and Emmy was his first woman. She was soft and simple, and made no demands on him.

  He loved the girl with the same sudden intensity with which his new life must have struck him; the raw men, with whom he suddenly felt equal, the gamble of the work, which everyone felt like a tonic, the wildcat fever everywhere. But it went just so far with him and no further. His ordered mind was more inclined to planning, and his temperament to act by plan. His jobs began to change from working in the field to working from the map. Carl Heering began to know Texas and Okla
homa better underground than on the top, and he saw fortunes, big ones, in oil. Except that he had no ante. That’s when his father died.

  The death meant fifty thousand dollars clear, paid to Carl Heering—if he stayed single till he was thirty-one. It was a revolting form of discipline, but coming from his father, Carl Heering didn’t question it. He had three years to go before he got the money and Emmy Semmerling said yes, she’d wait. And Heering borrowed money on his inheritance, he speculated, he made deals, he worked all day and planned all night. And then he wildcatted. He changed. The wildcat fever was the only thing that still reminded of Carl Heering’s brief show of life and intensity.

  He and the girl made an arrangement. She had the baby and would wait.

  It wasn’t a matter of money being more important to Carl Heering than his love for Emmy Semmerling; nothing that simple. It was Carl Heering finding his way of life: hard work, long hours, the peculiar thrill of complicated deals, cold calculations, and the kind of singleminded drive without which nobody gets rich or powerful any more. The qualities he showed were nothing new; rather, he had forgotten them for one brief interlude before his father’s death.

  Not that he forgot about the girl, or the new baby.

  Carl Heering paid the girl regularly, so she and the new baby would get along. And then he struck oil, and he paid all his creditors, and struck more oil, and made more commitments, and struck again, and paid again, and so on till his life, like all big business, was one continuous stream of owing and of paying.

  “Except,” said Robert Heering, “when it came to business he always made more than he owed. Still does. It’s the other way around with the rest of his life.”

  He didn’t say anything for a while and then Port prompted him.

  “You mean about your mother?”