Free Death's Sweet Song by Clifton Adams Page B

called, “It's me, Otto.”
    “Who?”
    “It's me,” Sheldon called again.
    I could see Otto now. When he opened the garage door a thin slice of light fell across the parking area in back of the building. The old man was standing in the light, holding a big hog-leg revolver in front of him. Sheldon kept walking toward him. “Can't you see a damn thing, Otto?” he said jokingly. “Don't you know who I am?”
    “Oh,” the old watchman said uncertainly. “Well...” Then he let his revolver sag at his side. He still couldn't see a thing, standing in the light the way he was. Sheldon walked right up to him, and hit him.
    That's all there was to it. I heard Sheldon's fist crack against the watchman's jaw, and then the old man's revolver clattered to the cement driveway, and he fell as though he had been shot. It was all very neat and clean and I felt weak with relief.
    Sheldon dragged the old man inside the garage. I drove the Buick up against the building, in the shadows, then I got the satchel and Sheldon stuck his head through the doorway. “All right, Hooper. We can't take all night.”
    The garage was a big affair, almost as big as the warehouse itself, and the air was heavy with the smell of gasoline and oil. Four big trucks were parked in there and they seemed almost lost in the vastness of the place. A whisper could ricochet from one wall to another, building itself up until it sounded like a scream. “Over here, Hooper!” Sheldon called, and the loudness of his voice startled me.
    The old watchman was as limp as a rag and pale as death, but there was only a trace of blood where Sheldon had hit him.
    “Is he all right?” I asked.
    “Sure he's all right. Now where is that master switch to the office building?”
    I couldn't take my eyes off the old man. Sheldon already had him bound and gagged, but it looked like an unnecessary precaution to me. Otto Finney was dead! I would swear it! He lay there as still as any corpse I had ever seen, and his face had that yellowish cast that the dead or dying always have. As I stared at him I could feel the cold feet of panic walking right up my spine.
    “He's dead!” I heard the words, but I didn't recognize the voice as mine.
    “I told you he's all right,” Sheldon said impatiently. “Now where is that switch?”
    I wheeled on Sheldon with a kind of rage that I had never felt before. “You sonofabitch! He's dead! Do you think I don't know a dead man when I see one?” I went down on my knees and put my hand over the old man's heart.
    I felt like a fool. The beat was there, as strong and steady as the tides.
    “Are you satisfied?” Sheldon said dryly.
    “All right, I'm sorry. The switch boxes are over on the west wall, over there by the workbenches. You want me to take care of it?”
    Sheldon was all business. “You go back to the garage door and keep your eyes open. I probably know more about electrical wiring than you do. Besides, you don't want the old man waking up and recognizing you, do you?”
    I hadn't even thought of that. I got out of there.
    The minutes crawled by. Every minute seemed like an hour as I stood there in the darkness behind the garage with a thousand insane fears tearing through my brain. What if Sheldon fouled it up? What if he pulled the wrong switch, cut the wrong wire? What if the sky fell? What difference did it make? I was in it to my neck and there was no pulling out.
    Then the lights went out. The garage was black. The whole building was black. But the lights were still on in the factory building across the way, and the floodlights were still on. I heard my breath whistling through my teeth in relief.
    Sheldon had done the job right. Sheldon was a good man. At that moment I almost loved him. I heard him walking carefully across the cement floor of the garage, and then he was at the door.
    “All right,” he said, “I got the keys off the watchman. Let's go.”
    We went around to the far corner of the building, then under the