Air Raid by Ray Cummings Read online

  supposed to keep on.”

  the windows! Stay inside. Keep calm,

  An auto came past. Arthur reappeared.

  everybody.”

  “Hey, you! Pull up!” he shouted.

  An automobile with half a dozen

  “Just goin’ to Crosby street—we live

  people in it slued up to the curb. The man with there,” somebody called.

  Black Book Detective

  6

  “Pull up here!”

  “Guess so. I want to see if anybody

  The car’s glaring headlights dimmed,

  comes along the street—get ’em inside. What but it kept on. Then Red found himself the heck—if a bomb hits this little house we dashing across the sidewalk again with Arthur.

  won’t have to worry. The house an’ us—we

  “Listen, what can I do?” Red jus’ won’t be here.”

  demanded. “Everybody ought to do

  “The planes are getting fainter.”

  something.”

  “Yes. Maybe they’re ours.”

  They crouched in the cold darkness,

  IT SEEMED suddenly as though everything

  silent for a moment. And suddenly Red was that Red had ever done was unimportant now.

  thinking of Luke. Luke was up almost over A lot of things in life had appeared important.

  their heads. Maybe he was dead by now.

  Now you realized that they weren’t—not with The drone of the planes was gone.

  things like this happening.

  “My job,” Arthur was murmuring.

  “This street light,” Arthur was saying.

  “See, I got charge of half a dozen of these

  “My job to put it out—forgot my little houses. Buckets o’ sand up near the screwdriver—”

  roofs—if an incendiary should drop—”

  The street light, up on its metal pole,

  “Yeh. I’ll help.”

  was glaring above them like a beacon of

  “The planes are gone,” Arthur said out

  death. Red saw that the rest of the street was of another silence. “Maybe this is just another dark. He stood beside Arthur as the young false alarm—or maybe our planes chased ’em fellow stooped at the metal base of the pole.

  off.”

  Arthur’s hand shook with his haste.

  “Yeh. Hope so. Won’t they sound an

  The screwdriver slipped.

  All Clear?”

  “That screw?” Red murmured.

  “Nothing to do but wait for it.”

  “Lemme do it?”

  “I got it.” The screw came loose. A

  THAT would be funny—if Luke were the

  foot-square metal plate like a door swung out.

  only one who died in this affair. Funny

  Arthur reached in and pulled a switch. The everything was so unimportant, one man’s

  light was extinguished.

  life, or another’s, when the life of a nation was

  “You think it’s the real thing?” Red

  at stake. But suddenly, to the tense Red, Luke murmured.

  didn’t seem unimportant. If he died, Red at

  “Dunno. Maybe—defense plant over at

  least would know what killed him.

  the crossroads. Or maybe they’d be just

  Red O’Conner would be a murderer.

  heading in an’ down toward New York.”

  Nobody would know it except Red. But he’d

  “Well, I don’t hear—”

  know it, always. He’d never be able to get Then they both heard it—the faint away from it—and it seemed even more distant drone of planes. The sky was black.

  horrible than he had ever imagined it could be.

  Red felt Arthur pulling at him.

  This air raid—and the only death in it—not by

  “Come on—shouldn’t stay here.”

  an enemy bomb, but by Red O’Conner.

  They crouched, breathless, by the open

  “If they dropped any eggs around

  grating door under the stoop of Mrs. Megan’s.

  here—most likely they’d aim at the plant,”

  Suddenly everything was silent. There was Arthur was saying. “I work over there—

  just the faint drone of the planes.

  airplane wings—an’ we’re starting precision

  “You think we’re in the best place?”

  tools in an adjacent building.”

  Red muttered.

  Red felt trapped here in the dark

  Air Raid

  7

  basement doorway. If he could only get out man who killed him.

  and get up to Luke—maybe there was some

  “Sure was gas here,” somebody said.

  way he could think of an excuse.

  “You can—”

  The silence of the little village was

  A startled shout from Arthur checked

  abruptly broken. The siren sounded again—a him. Then Red was at Luke’s kitchen door.

  long, continuous blast this time.

  And Arthur was bending down to where on

  “All clear,” Arthur said. “Well, that’s

  the floor Luke was up on one elbow—not

  that.”

  dead—just recovering consciousness, and

  From inside the house Mrs. Megan looking confused by the people.

  called.

  “What happened? Good Lord—looks

  “You, Arthur—you out there? Is it all

  like he fell!”

  right now?”

  “Is he sick? Maybe he’s drunk.”

  Then there was a woman’s voice that

  “I’m all right,” Luke was gasping.

  seemed from upstairs.

  “That siren just now—was that an air-raid?

  “Mrs. Megan—oh, Mrs. Megan—”

  What happened? I—I fell—hit my head, I

  It sounded urgent, frightened. Numbed

  guess I’m all right. What happened?”

  with horror, Red wanted to run. As though he Arthur lifted him up, sat him on a

  could run away from his guilt. He couldn’t.

  chair, where he wobbled dizzily.

  He’d have to live with it the rest of his life.

  “One of these gas burners is on,”

  “Mrs.

  Megan—is

  Arthur down there?

  somebody said.

  Mrs. Megan was at the

  He better come up. That new lodger—I can

  door.

  smell gas up here.”

  “I shut off the gas down at the meter

  There it was, discovered already. like you tol’ me, Arthur. I did it when the first Every instinct in Red made him want to run, alarm sounded, right away—an’ I haven’t

  but, fascinated with horror, he found himself turned it on yet.”

  following Arthur upstairs. Excited people

  “Lucky you did,” somebody said.

  were in the hall and the doorways, all talking

  “This fellow lying here—there was sure gas of the raid—had the enemy planes really been here—looks like he got a pretty good dose of somewhere near here? Or was it just another it even so.”

  scare? Nobody paid any attention to Red.

  In all the babble, Red stood silent,

  “I thought I smelt gas,” a woman was

  ignored. That air raid hadn’t killed anybody. It saying. “I don’t know—all that excitement, had done just the reverse. It had saved a life—

  you forget everything.”

  and it had saved Red from what would have Silent, his heart pounding, Red stood

  been a horror!

  against the wall in the upper hall. Arthur was Luke was coughing, still choked from

  thumping on Luke’s door. No answer—of the gas and dizzy from the wallop Red had course he wouldn’t get any answer. Then given him. Then his gaze fell on Red, clung Arthur shoved the door open. With several of for a minute. But Luke, with the old instinct, the others, Red crowded forward. You could didn’t give any sign of recognition. His gaze smell the gas now. Not very much, but a

  shifted to Mrs. Megan.

  little—

  “I’m all right,” he said. “What the heck

  is all this rumpus? Can’t these people get out THEN Red was in Luke’s hallway. Why of here?”

  couldn’t he run? There would be Luke’s dead

  “I got your rent, Mrs. Megan. Wasn’t

  face—horrible—most horrible of all to the stallin’ this afternoon—matter o’ fact I owe a

  Black Book Detective

  8

  lot of money I can’t pay—things go right, for a job,” he added suddenly.

  mebbe I will some day. Here’s your rent, Mrs.

  “Ought to be easy,” Arthur said.

  Megan.”

  “What can you do?”

  “Oh, nonsense, I don’t want it now,

  “Well—I can take a car apart an’ put it

  Mr. Blainey,” the abashed Mrs. Megan said.

  together, an’ there wouldn’t be nothin’ left

  “I’m sorry you hurt yourself—didn’t mean

  over either. I was thinkin’—that defense

  what I said this afternoon.”

  business you’re workin’ at. If I could learn Red retreated with some of the other

  it—”

  tenants. Then he found young Arthur beside

  “I’ll take you over in the morning if

  him.

  you like.”

  “You’re a stranger here?” Arthur said.

  “Yeh—that’s swell. That’s what I’d

  “Yeah. Just came up from New York.

  like.”

  My girl lives over Cayuga way. I’m lookin’

 

 

  Monte Herridge, Air Raid by Ray Cummings

 

 

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