Someone Is Bleeding by Richard Matheson Page B

her chest rising and falling with sharp breaths.
    “Dennis is in my room, I said.
    “What has that got to do with . . .”
    “He’s dead,” I said.
    She stared at me.
    “What?”
    “He has an icepick in his head,” I said slowly and watched the look come over her face. A lost look. Her mouth fell open. She stepped back and bumped against the couch. She sank down on it and looked at the far wall.
    “He’s . . . ?”
    I didn’t say anything.
    “Dennis?”
    “Yes, Dennis,” I said, “how long have you been home?”
    “I . . . I don’t know. A few hours, I guess.”
    “Think!”
    “It was . . . I remember looking at my watch. We were . . . just turning the corner at Wilshire, I think. Yes, we . . .”
    “What time?”
    “12:30. No, 12:45.”
    I looked at my watch. It was past four.
    “Did Jim stay here?” I asked.
    “For a while,” she said.
    “How long?”
    “Oh . . . twenty minutes.”
    Then she was in my arms, crying. Her fingers held tightly to me.
    “Davie, Davie, what’s the matter with everything?”
    “All right,” I said, “I know you didn’t do it.”
    She drew back as if she’d been struck.
    “Me!” she said. “You thought I’d killed him!”
    She pulled away from me.
    “Get out of here,” she said. “Oh, get out of here!”
    “Peggy, listen to me.”
    “No, I won’t listen to you,” she said. “I’ve had enough of you. All you’ve done is act suspicious and hateful!”
    She looked at me angrily, hands clenched.
    ”Listen, Peggy,” I said, “your pride is rather unimportant now. In the past week, two men have been murdered. That’s a little more important than vanity, isn’t it?”
    She turned away. “I don’t know,” she said. “I know I’m tired of everything. I’m tired of it. I’ll never find any happiness.”
    “I’ll leave you alone then,” I said. “You can go to sleep. But I advise you to call Jim. You’d better find out if he’s arranged an alibi for you.”
    She looked at me but I left. I got in my car and drove back to the room. I was going to walk up to the gas station and call Jones.
    I didn’t notice the big car as I parked and got out. I didn’t notice anything, I was so upset.
    But there were two plainclothesmen waiting. And Jones said, “I’m glad you had the sense to come back.”
    * * *
    The body was gone. Jones and I were sitting in the room. “And that’s your story,” he said.
    “Easily checked,” I said. “Ask Peggy Lister. Ask Jim Vaughan. I was with them.”
    “There’s a long time you weren’t with them.”
    “I saw other people then.”
    “We’ll find out about Vaughan first,” he said.
    “Do you really think I’m lying?”
    He shrugged. “The pick is from your drawer,” he said.
    “Are you . . . do you actually think I did it?”
    He shrugged again. “You’ll do for now,” he said.
    “Are you serious?” I said.
    “For God’s sake, why should I come back here if I did it!” “Come on.”
    “I told you I was going to call you!”
    “Are you coming?”
    “Listen . . .”
    “Let it go, boy,” he said. “Get some toilet articles and let’s get out of here.”
    That’s how I spent my first night in jail. Lying on a cot in a cell. Staring at the walls. Listening to a drunk singing college songs.
    In the morning I was taken to Jones’ office.
    He sat there working on some papers while I waited nervously. I watched his lean, blue-veined hands shuffling through papers. I looked at his thin face, the dark eyes.
    Finally the eyes were on me.
    “So you were with Vaughan,” he said.
    ‘That’s what I said. Have you spoken to him?”
    “Yes,” he said, “we have.”
    “Well . . . ?”
    He kept looking at me and not answering and all of a sudden the bottom started dropping out.
    “Oh, no!” I said.
    He looked at me without speaking. He nodded. “This is crazy!” I said. “You mean that he actually said he wasn’t with me last night?”
    “He actually said that.”
    “Well, he’s lying!