You Live Once.

John D MacDonald.

Chapter 1.

I have never awakened easily. I have always had a sneaking envy for those people who seem to be able to bound out of bed, functioning perfectly. I have to use two alarm clocks on work mornings.

The prolonged hammering at my door finally awakened me. I groped blindly for my bathrobe, and shouldered into it as I walked heavily, still drugged with sleep, from the bedroom of my apartment out through the living room to the front door.

I knew that it was a Sunday morning in May, and knew that I had a truly sickening headache, far out of proportion to the drinking I had done on Sat.u.r.day night-two c.o.c.ktails before dinner and two widely s.p.a.ced highb.a.l.l.s afterward. I wondered if I had been poisoned by something I had eaten. The headache seemed focused over my right ear in a tender area as big as an apple. My hangover headaches are aches that go straight through. And why the sore spot?

I opened my front door and squinted at the two men standing on the shallow front stoop in the bright morning sunshine. One was in uniform and one was not. Their prowl car stood where I usually park my car. I remembered where my car was.

"You Clinton Sewell?" the man in the grey suit asked. I said I was and they walked in.

"Were you out with Mary Olan last night?"

I sat down and looked up at them. I was afraid I knew what this was all about.

"An accident? Is she hurt?"

Grey suit was spokesman.

"What makes you ask that?"

"I swear she seemed all right to me. The night air straightened her out. She said she could drive and I believed her."

"You had a date with her last night."

"That's right. She played golf with some woman yesterday afternoon at the Locust Ridge Club. It was arranged that I'd meet her later, along with the Raymonds, and we'd have dinner there. There was a dance last night. I drove out about six, and the Raymonds arrived a little later. Mary had brought a change of clothing with her, and she was waiting in the c.o.c.ktail lounge."

"When did you leave?"

"About two this morning. That was about... nine hours ago according to my watch."

"But you didn't take her home?" The uniformed man strolled over and looked in my bedroom, then the bathroom, and came back.

"No. She had her own car. She got a little high. Too high to drive safely. That made it complicated. I had my car there. It's still there, in fact. After an argument she agreed to let me drive her home. I was going to take a cab from her house, either back here or back to my car, whichever I felt like. I hadn't decided. We had the top down on her car. I got her almost home and she said she felt fine. She seemed to be okay. So I turned around and drove back here and got out and she went on home. Did something happen on the way home?"

"She never got home, Mr. Sewell. Her aunt got Mr. Stine, the Commissioner of Public Safety, out of bed this morning. That gave it a priority. I guess you know what the Olans and the Pryors mean in this town. Did Miss Olan say anything about going any place else?"

"No. She was pretty tired. She'd played twenty-seven holes of golf. We planned to go up to Smith Lake this afternoon and do some water skiing."

"Why did she drive you here, instead of back to your car?"

"She started to, but then we decided that she'd drive me on up to Smith Lake in her car today, picking me up here.

Then when we got back to town late today, she would leave me ofi at the club."

They had both relaxed a bit. The one in uniform said, "It'll turn out she went to see somebody and stayed with them."

Grey suit shrugged.

"Could be. Thanks, Mr. Sewell.

Sorry we woke you up."

I stood in the doorway and watched them get in the prowl car, swing around and drive out. It was a beautiful day-bright, clear and warm. This would be my second summer in Warren, my second summer in the Midwest. I wondered what had happened to Mary. I wasn't particularly worried; she was unpredictable. I decided I would go up to the lake anyway, on the off chance that she'd show up. Some of her friends would be up there.

I was close to the phone when it rang.

"Clint?" It was the cautious voice of Dodd Raymond, my new boss.

"Good morning to you, Dodd. Do you feel as bad as I do? You had the lobster too, didn't you? Got a headache like mine?"

"Clint, have they asked you about Mary?" I could tell from the tone of his voice that he was speaking so that his wife, Nancy, couldn't overhear the call. I ached to call him a fool.

"The police were here. She didn't get home last night.

She dropped me off here."

"I thought you were going to drive her home?"

"We had the top down. She felt better after a while."

"They phoned me. Her aunt told them she heard her say she planned to see us at the club. I told them she had a date with you."

"In a manner of speaking."

"Knock it off! I told them where you live."

"Thanks. So why didn't you phone me and tell me they were coming?"

"Clint, that d.a.m.n phone rang twenty-three times before I hung up."

"Well, they don't know anything so far. She'll turn up.

I'm going on up to the lake anyway. Will you?"

"I don't know yet. See you Monday if we don't."

He hung up. I went and opened the can of cold tomato juice, poured a high gla.s.s and laced it with Tabasco. I leaned against the sink and let it go down slowly. The headache throbbed over my right ear.

I thought about Mary and about my d.a.m.n fool boss, Dodd Raymond. My dating Mary Olan was supposed to be misdirection, the way a magician operates. I wouldn't have stood still for any such fool arrangement had it not been for Dodd's wife, Nancy. And I had earnestly tried to follow Nancy's unspoken plea. Even last night when I had parked Mary's car in the dark driveway beside my apartment, turned out the lights and made an expansive pa.s.s. Mary had permitted herself to be kissed. But her heart wasn't in it. She was a highly exciting, and excitable, woman but I was just a good friend. She told me so.

Emboldened by her intake of liquor, not my own, I had suggested that she leave Dodd alone. She hadn't gotten angry; she had just laughed. I had made another halfhearted try, but it had been ruined by some d.a.m.n fool who had used my driveway to turn around in, lighting us up like a stage.

That had spoiled the mood. We'd planned the trip to the lake and I had explained to her my unique habits of sleep.