Free 1973 - Have a Change of Scene by James Hadley Chase

faced me and I slowed the Buick.
    Ahead of me I could see a clapboard bungalow that looked lost, broken and sordid.
    ‘Is this your home?’
    ‘That’s it.’
    I pulled up and regarded the building. To me, there could be no worse place in which to live. Tangled weeds, some of them five feet high surrounded the bungalow. The fencing had gone, smothered in weeds; several oil drums, empty food cans and bits of paper lay scattered around the approach to the bungalow.
    ‘Come on!’ she said impatiently. ‘What are you gaping at?’
    ‘Is this really your home?’
    She lit another cigarette.
    ‘My stupid punk of a father lived here. This is all he left us,’ she said. ‘Why should you care? If you don’t want to go further, I can walk the rest of the way.’
    ‘Us? Who is us?’
    ‘My brother and me.’ She opened the car door and slid out. ‘So long, Mr. Do-gooder. Thanks for the ride,’ and she started over the rough, debris strewn ground with long, quick strides.
    I waited until she had reached the front door, then set the car in motion, pulled up when the road petered out and leaving the car, walked up to the bungalow.
    The front door stood open. I looked into the tiny lobby. A door to my left stood open.
    I heard a man say, ‘Jesus! So you’re back!’
    A wave of cold, bitter frustration ran through me. I’ll pay my fare, had been a con.
    I moved forward, and Rhea, hearing me, turned.
    We stared at each other.
    ‘You want something?’ she asked.
    A man appeared. He had to be her brother: tall, powerfully built with the same thick chestnut-coloured hair, a square-shaped face, green eyes. He was in something that looked like a dirty sack and soiled jeans.
    He would be some years younger than she: twenty-four, probably less.
    ‘Who’s this?’
    ‘I’m Larry Carr,’ I said. ‘A welfare worker.’
    We regarded each other and I began to hate him as he gave a sneering little chortle.
    ‘The things that go with you,’ he said to Rhea. ‘Maggots out of cheese now a welfare worker!’
    ‘Oh, shut up!’ she snapped. ‘He’s a do-gooder. Any food in this stinking place?’
    I looked from one to the other. They were right out of my world. My mind flashed back to Paradise City with its fat, rich old women and their dogs, Sydney, buzzing and fluttering, the clean, sexy looking kids in their way-out gear, and yet this sordid scene had a fascination for me.
    ‘How about having a wash?’ I said. ‘I’ll buy you both a meal.’
    The man shoved Rhea aside and moved up to me.
    ‘You think I need a wash?’
    Then I really hated him.
    ‘Sure you certainly do, you stink.’
    Watching, Rhea laughed and moved between us.
    ‘He’s my thing, Fel. Leave him alone.’
    Over her shoulder, the man glared at me, his green eyes glittering. I waited for his first move. I felt the urge to hit him. He might have seen this in my expression for he turned and walked across the shabby, dirty room, pushed open a door and disappeared.
    ‘Some homecoming,’ I said. ‘Do you want me to buy you a meal?’
    She studied me. Her emerald-green eyes were jeering.
    ‘Man! Don’t you want it!’ she said. ‘When you have me, it’ll cost you more than a meal.’
    This was a challenge and a promise and I grinned at her.
    ‘I’m at the Bendix Hotel, anytime,’ I said and walked out of the bungalow and to my car.
    Sooner or later, I told myself, we would come together: it would be an experience worth waiting for.
     
    * * *
     
    I drove back to Luceville, had lunch at Luigi’s, then bought a bunch of grapes and went to the hospital.
    Jenny was looking brighter. She smiled eagerly as I sat on the hard backed chair by her bedside.
    ‘How did it go?’ she asked, after thanking me for the grapes.
    I gave her an edited version of my meeting with Rhea Morgan. I said I had met her, and driven her to her home and had left her there. I said her brother seemed tricky and hadn’t welcomed me.
    But Jenny wasn’t that easy to fool. She