The Wounded and the Slain Read online

  Then he felt the pressure of the bandages. He was wearing several bandages. There was one wrapped thickly around his right arm from the elbow all the way up to the shoulder. Another bandage circled his left shoulder, and still another was bound around his middle, and there were more on both legs just above the knees. But under the pressure you don’t feel anything, he thought. They must have given you a needle, or something. When it wears off you’ll catch hell from these cuts. You’re sure cut up very nicely. He did some fancy carving with that blade. I guess that’s what knocked you out, losing all that blood. Or maybe you just ran out of gas and hit the floor. So that makes you the loser, the fumbler. You let him get away.

  But now his eyes were able to focus and he gazed across the room and saw them in the dim orange glow of the lamp near the cot. There were two of them sitting on the edge of the cot.

  One of them was Nathan, whose face was bruised. Nathan had a purplish lump over his left eye. His mouth was puffed and bleeding, and the right side of his jaw was extremely swollen. The other man was Inspector Archinroy in a bathrobe. He was writing something in a notebook while Nathan talked quietly through the puffed and bleeding lips. On the Inspector’s lap there was a blackjack, and on the cot at the Inspector’s side there was a broken bottle.

  For some moments Bevan focused on the broken bottle. Then he turned his head just a little and saw Winnie, who stood near the cot with her arms folded. She was listening intently to what Nathan was saying. She was nodding slowly.

  At Bevan’s shoulder a voice said, “It needs more bandage. Here, along his ribs.”

  “There is no more bandage. We use it all up.” This was a policeman’s voice.

  The other voice said, “Give me the scissors.”

  “To cut your dress? But that might infect the wound. Your dress is all dirty.”

  “Then I’ll use what I have underneath. Give me the scissors.”

  “But you are wearing only— Look, lady, the ambulance will be here soon.”

  “Please give me the scissors.” Then a pause, and then, “Thank you,” and after that he heard the sound of the scissors snipping fabric. He couldn’t turn his head to look at her because now they’d eased him over on his side. He felt her hands on his bare flesh as she applied the improvised bandage to his ribs, up near the armpit. The touch of her hands was warm and soft. Feels nice, he thought. Feels so nice.

  THEIR VACATION IN PARADISE

  BECAME A DESCENT INTO HELL

  Their marriage on the rocks, James and Cora Bevan flew to Jamaica for a last chance at patching things up. But in the slums of Kingston James found himself fighting for his life — while Cora found her own path to destruction, in the arms of another man.

  Available for the first time in more than 50 years, this lost novel by legendary pulp author David Goodis is a stunning, shocking tale of cruelty, danger, desperation…and the possibility of redemption.

  ACCLAIM FOR DAVID GOODIS…

  “Some of the best crime writing of the genre’s golden decades.”

  —LOS ANGELES TIMES

  “In his day David Goodis ranked with pulp greats Raymond Chandler and Dashiell Hammett”

  —PLAYBOY

  “This is pulp writing of a whole other stripe… David Goodis suffered for his art, but what great art it was.”

  —THE EDGE