The Black Lizard Big Book of Black Mask Stories

He said: “You’re wrong, mister. That man would know whether he heard it or not. Maybe the tree would know, wouldn’t it? And maybe other people would know, too.”

“I don’t get your point,” I told him. “What are you trying to prove?”

“Murder, mister. You just got up from sitting next to a murderer.”

I stared at him again, but he didn’t look crazy. Far off, a train whistled, faintly. I said: “I don’t understand you.”

“The guy sitting on the bench,” he said. “Bill Meyers. He murdered his wife. Her and his hired man.”

His voice was quite loud. I felt uncomfortable; I wished that far train was a lot nearer. I didn’t know what went on here, but I knew I’d rather be on the train. Out of the corner of my eye I looked at the tall man with the granite face and the big hands. He was still staring out across the tracks. Not a muscle in his face had moved.

The station agent said: “I’ll tell you about it, mister. I like to tell people about it. His wife was a cousin of mine, a fine woman. Mandy Eppert, her name was, before she married that skunk. He was mean to her, dirt mean. Know how mean a man can be to a woman who’s helpless?

“She was seventeen when she was fool enough to marry him seven years ago. She was twenty-four when she died last spring. She’d done more work than most women do in a lifetime, out on that farm of his. He worked her like a horse and treated her like a slave. And her religion wouldn’t let her divorce him or even leave him. See what I mean, mister?”

I cleared my throat, but there didn’t seem to be anything to say. He didn’t need prodding or comment. He went on.

“So how can you blame her, mister, for loving a decent guy, a clean, young fellow her own age, when he fell in love with her? Just loving him, that’s all. I’d bet my life on that, because I knew Mandy. Oh, they talked, and they looked at each other — I wouldn’t gamble too much there wasn’t a stolen kiss now and then. But nothing to kill them for, mister.”

I felt uneasy; I wished the train would come and get me out of this. I had to say something, though; the agent was waiting. I said: “Even if there had been, the unwritten law is out of date.”

“Right, mister.” I’d said the right thing. “But you know what that bastard sitting over there did? He went deaf.”

“Huh?” I said.

“He went deaf. He came in town to see the doc and said he’d been having earaches and couldn’t hear any more. Was afraid he was going deaf. Doc gave him some stuff to try, and you know where he went from the doc’s office?”

I didn’t try to guess.

“Sheriff’s office,” he said. “Told the sheriff he wanted to report his wife and his hired man were missing, see? Smart of him. Wasn’t it? Swore out a complaint and said he’d prosecute if they were found. But he had an awful lot of trouble getting any of the questions the sheriff asked. Sheriff got tired of yelling and wrote ’em down on paper. Smart. See what I mean?”

“Not exactly,” I said. “Hadn’t his wife run away?”

“He’d murdered her. And him. Or rather, he was murdering them. Must have taken a couple of weeks, about. Found ’em a month later.”

He glowered, his face black with anger.

“In the smokehouse,” he said. “A new smokehouse made out of concrete and not used yet. With a padlock on the outside of the door. He’d walked through the farmyard one day about a month before — he said after their bodies were found — and noticed the padlock wasn’t locked, just hanging in the hook and not even through the hasp.

“See? Just to keep the padlock from being lost or swiped, he slips it through the hasp and snaps it.”

“My God,” I said. “And they were in there? They starved to death?”

“Thirst kills you quicker, if you haven’t either water or food. Oh, they’d tried hard to get out, all right. Scraped halfway through the door with a piece of concrete he’d worked loose. It was a thick door. I figure they yelled, after a while. I figure they hammered on that door plenty. Was there sound, mister, with only a deaf man living near that door, passing it twenty times a day?”