He looked away for a moment and started to get up. “I can go to the bar.”
“Don’t leave me,” Karen said.
He eased back in the chair. “Those guys bother you?”
“No, they’re all right. I meant, you just got here.” She picked up her drink and placed it in front of him. “Help yourself.” She watched him take a sip.
He smacked his lips. “Bourbon.”
“You’re close.”
He said, “You mean Jack Daniel’s isn’t a bourbon?” She smiled at him and he said, “No, I guess it isn’t. You like Jim Beam, Early Times?”
“They’re okay.”
“Wild Turkey?”
“Love it.”
He said, “Well, we got that out of the way.”
She watched him take another sip and place the glass in front of her. “Did you ever see Stranger Than Paradise?”
He looked out at the snow and she knew he had.
“The two guys take the girl who just arrived from Czechoslovakia, someplace like that, to Cleveland to see Lake Erie? And there’s so much snow you can’t see the lake? That one?”
She was smiling at him.
He said, “Was that some kind of test question?”
“One of the guys gives her a dress,” Karen said. “She takes it off, throws it in a trash bin and goes, ‘That dress bugged me.’”
He said, “You like to act goofy, don’t you?”
“When I have time.”
“What do you do for a living?”
“I’m a sales rep. I came here to call on a customer and they gave me a hard time because I’m a girl.”
“Is that how you think of yourself ?”
“What, as a sales rep?”
“A girl.”
“I don’t have a problem with it.”
“I like your hair. And that suit.”
“I had one just like it—well, it was the same idea, but I had to get rid of it.”
“You did?”
“It smelled.”
“Having it cleaned didn’t help, huh?”
She said no. She asked him, “What do you do for a living, Gary?” and saw his eyes change, become almost solemn.
He said, “How far do we go with this?”
It stopped her, threw her off balance. Karen said, “Not yet. Don’t say anything yet. Okay?”
He said, “I don’t think it works if we’re somebody else. You know what I mean? Gary and Celeste, Jesus, what do they know about anything?”
She knew he was right, but had to take a moment before saying, “If we’re not someone else then we’re ourselves. But don’t ask me where we’re going with it or how it ends, okay? Because I haven’t a fucking clue. I’ve never played this before.”
The way he said, “It’s not a game,” she knew he meant it.
“Well, does it make sense to you?”
He said, “It doesn’t have to, it’s something that happens. It’s like seeing a person you never saw before—you could be passing on the street—and you look at each other . . .”
Karen was nodding. “You make eye contact without meaning to.”
“And for a few moments,” Foley said, “there’s a kind of recognition. You look at each other and you know something.”
“That no one else knows,” Karen said. “You see it in their eyes.”
“And the next moment the person’s gone,” Foley said, “and it’s too late to do anything about it, but you remember it because it was right there and you let it go, and you think, What if I had stopped and said something? It might happen only a few times in your life.”
“Or once,” Karen said. “Why don’t we get out of here.”
“Where do you want to go?”
Karen looked up. The advertising guys were getting ready to leave, dropping napkins, pushing their chairs back, taking forever. Philip looked over, and then Andy. Andy waved. Karen watched them leave the table finally and make their way out.
It was quiet. She looked at Foley in the slim-cut navy-blue suit, his white shirt with its button-down collar, his burgundy and blue rep tie—the conservative business executive—looked in his eyes and said, “Let’s go to my place.”
“Your room?”
“My suite. I showed my credentials and they upgraded me.”
“You must do pretty well, in your business.”
“I don’t know, Jack. The way things are going I may be looking for work.”
NINETEEN
* * *
THERE WAS MAURICE, WHITE BOY BOB, KENNETH AND THE new one, Glenn, in the living room getting ready, guns and boxes of bullets on the coffee table. Moselle stood watching them from the foyer. She got to meet this Glenn, but didn’t mention anybody looking for him.
When he came, Maurice told him he was late and Glenn said, “Oh, is that right?” and told Maurice to look out the fucking window he’d know why. Glenn saying his hands ached from gripping the fucking wheel, hanging on, man, trying to stay in the fucking tracks. A car’d go by and all the slop and shit from the road would hit the windshield. Maurice saying, “You suppose to be the ace driver, you pass the cars, they don’t pass you.” Glenn saying, “Oh, is that right?” Snippy, Moselle thought, for a man. He told how he came up behind a salt truck and got blasted with it, like shrapnel hitting the car. He told how a woman pulled out in front of him and when he braked did a three-sixty, spun all the way around. He said you couldn’t see anything and said driving in that ice and snow was fucking work, man, it wore you out.
“You done?” Maurice said. “If you done we can get on with business.”
“I’m not driving,” Glenn said, “so forget it.”
“I hope to tell you you not driving,” Maurice said, and looked over. “Moselle, you want something?”
“My grocery money.”
“That’s what we going to get. Put our mittens on, our masks, case we want to do some skiing . . . There. I look like a Ninja?”
“You going to see Curtis, aren’t you?”
“We be back, oh, ’bout two hours,” Maurice said. “Where’s my little Tuffy dog? I want to kiss her good-bye.”
“You going to see Curtis,” Moselle said.
• • •
MAURICE WIGGED HEARING ABOUT HIS DOG AND GLENN thought for a minute he’d call off the gig, Jesus, ranting and raving. They got in the van Kenneth had picked up and Maurice sat in front with him, saying once he found out who it was ran over little Tuffy that man’s ass was his. He’d set fire to the man’s house with the man in it. Kenneth was wired on crystal meth, talkative, asking Maurice how he was going to find the man in the first place. Maurice said don’t worry, he’d find him, but never said how. He punched the dashboard with his fist a few times keeping himself primed, Glenn believed, for whatever was coming up. Kenneth would brake hard and as the van slid sideways would go “Yeaaaaah,” and lift his hands from the wheel. Maurice didn’t say anything to him until a couple of miles down Woodward Avenue—the streetlights making it weird-looking with the snow coming down—they turned on to Boston Boulevard, a street of homes bigger than Maurice’s, the van sideswiped a parked car, bounced off it, and Maurice said, “What’s wrong with you?” That’s all, until they came to the house, a big dark place showing only a few lights, dim ones, and Maurice said, “Leave it on the street. We don’t want to come out find we stuck.” Kenneth said, “We shoveling away, here come the police,” sounding as if he thought that would be pretty funny. Jesus, these guys. Maurice said, “We ready? Check your weapons.” Glenn had a little snub-nosed .38 they’d given him. Kenneth had a shotgun. White Boy Bob had some kind of pistol and a fire ax. Maurice had a .45 because Huey P. Newton had said one time, “An Army .45 will stop all jive,” and Maurice had been told about Huey P. and the Black Panthers when he was a kid. He said to Glenn, “You and Kenneth gonna come with me around back. White Boy goes in the front. We hear him busting in, we go in.” Looking at the house he said, “Man, this is when to do it. They don’t even see you co
ming.”
Glenn said, “How many are they?”
“The man, Frankie, his wife Inez and a nigga works for them name Cedric,” Maurice said. “’Less they have company, huh?”
As soon as they were out of the van they moved in a hurry, went past the side of the house single file, Kenneth making a path through the deep snow squeaking under their tennis shoes, all three pulling their ski masks down as they reached the back of the house. Right away they heard glass breaking, White Boy Bob smashing his way into the house, sounding like he was tearing it apart with his fire ax. They heard his voice, far away but clear, yell, “Police! Don’t move!” Maurice said, “Go ahead,” and Kenneth used the butt end of the shotgun to bust a pane in the French door, reached through to unlock it and Glenn followed them into the house and around a dining room table in the dark as a door swung in and Glenn saw a black guy with a gun, a shotgun, lights on in the kitchen behind him. They surprised him being so close. He tried to get back in the kitchen, but Maurice put the .45 in his face and told Glenn to take his shotgun. Maurice said, “Cedric, my man. You thought I forgot about you, huh?” He pulled Cedric out of the doorway to walk in front of them to the living room, telling Glenn, “This the nigga ratted me out the time I went down.” Cedric said something over his shoulder Glenn didn’t hear and Maurice whacked him across the head with the .45, like slapping him with the barrel. Cedric hunched his shoulders and put his hand up to his head.
White Boy was in the living room turning a lamp on, cold air coming in from a big front window smashed to pieces. He said, “They went upstairs.” Maurice said, “White Boy, take Cedric here and put him in front of you.” They went up a stairway that turned once to reach the second floor and now they were in a wide hallway of doors, all closed. Maurice poked Cedric with the .45 saying, “Take us to your leader.” Cedric didn’t say anything this time. He took them to the door at the end of the hall where Maurice called out, “Police! Y’all come out with your hands up!” But didn’t wait to see if they would. He said, “White Boy,” and White Boy swung his ax at the door to smash the lock and the force of it swung the door in. Maurice pushed Cedric into the room and with his .45 waved White Boy and Kenneth in after him.
Glenn followed Maurice expecting to see a bedroom, but it was like an office, an office, say, in a factory or a warehouse, old desks and file cabinets, cardboard boxes piled up, vodka bottles, ashtrays full of butts, a scale, a calculator. A white guy in shirtsleeves stood by an open window. A woman was coming out of the bathroom with the sound of the toilet flushing. Skanky, stringy-haired junkies was the way Glenn saw them, both holding their arms to their bodies now, rubbing themselves.
The man said, “Police, shit,” sounding drunk or sleepy, in a nod. “Maurice, is that you, dude?”
Maurice lifted his ski mask. So did White Boy and Kenneth. Glenn left his covering his face.
“If it wasn’t me, Frankie, it’d be somebody else.”
The man said, “I’ll tell you right now you won’t find any product.”
“You flush it down the toilet, we won’t. No, I don’t imagine. Inez, how you doing, girl? Not too good, huh? Man, you look like you been chewed up and spit out. Frankie, you gonna catch cold with that window open.” Maurice turned his head to Glenn. “This is the gentleman I was telling you about use to be a customer, use to wear a suit and comb his hair; hell, use to be Frank, this scarecrow, Frankie and his lovely wife Inez. See what scag can do to a person? Now then, so we don’t have to tear up your nice home,” Maurice said, “get out the green from where you hid it. I’m gonna say forty fifty thousand and it’s in this room. Frankie? Pay attention. You’re gonna have to tell me where it is before I count to three. You ready? . . . One two three.” Maurice raised the .45, put it on Cedric and shot him in the head. The impact sent him against the file cabinets and he seemed to hold on before sliding to the floor. Maurice stepped over to him and Glenn thought he was going to shoot him again, but all he did was stare at him—until Frankie spoke and Maurice looked up.
“You’ve been wanting to do him, haven’t you? Shit, you came to do him.”
“You think so, let’s try Inez,” Maurice said, turning to her as he raised the .45. “Ready for the count?”
Inez was looking right at him, all eyes, shoulders hunched, her hands tightened into fists. She said, “Give it to him!” raising her voice, the words sounding hoarse and scratchy and she began to cough saying, “Give him what he wants.”
“He’s gonna shoot you anyway,” Frankie said, “he’s gonna shoot us both,” and looked at Maurice. “Aren’t you?”
“Right this second,” Maurice said, “you don’t tell me where your money’s at.”
“It’s different places in that file cabinet,” Frankie said, “the one by Cedric.”
Kenneth said, “You don’t need Inez no more. Can I have her?”
“Go on,” Maurice said, “but be quick.” Kenneth took Inez by the arm and she went with him, eyes glued wide-open, tripping over her own feet, out of the room. Maurice, making a face, said to Glenn, “Would you fuck that woman? Kenneth, he don’t pass up nothing has a pussy and it’s free.”
White Boy said, “Man, I wouldn’t fuck her with your dick.”
“All right,” Maurice said, pulling the file cabinet open, “let’s see what’s in here.” He poked through the files, finding currency he handed to Glenn who counted it, all small bills, and dropped the money in a cardboard box. It amounted to a few bucks over twenty-eight hundred. That was it. Maurice said to Frankie, “You gonna make us work, huh? You sure you want to?”
“Fuck you,” Frankie said, “you’re gonna kill me anyway.”
Maurice didn’t say if he would or not. He didn’t say anything at all until they’d dumped all the files from the cabinets, looked in the boxes—some with little crack bottles in them—looked in the desk drawers, looked in the toilet tank, looked everywhere they could look, and when they were done Maurice said to Frankie, “You’re right,” and shot him twice in the chest—like that, bang, bang, nothing to it—Glenn watching Frankie almost go out the window, hit the sill and fall dead. Maurice said, “I guess we through here.”
Glenn, with the money, followed Maurice along the hall wanting to get out of here, man, right now, run down the stairs and out. They came to a bedroom with the door open and there was Kenneth by the bed pulling up his pants, Inez lying on the bed with her knees still raised, her legs apart and Glenn said, “Jesus,” the sight repulsive to him, this worn-out junkie showing herself, that dark wedge deep between her pure white thighs, it was ugly, and yet he felt himself becoming aroused.
Kenneth said, “Who wants a piece of this?”
Glenn stood there holding the carton of money; he was one of them, wasn’t he? He said, “You leave any for us?” Like he was kidding.
Maurice said, “Look out,” moving into the doorway and raised his big army pistol.
Kenneth saw him and held up his hand as if to hold him off. “Wait. What you doing?” Hurrying then to get his belt fastened.
Maurice extended his .45 into the room and fired and the white stick figure on the bed jumped and its legs came straight out stiff and hit the bed. Maurice fired again and the body jumped again, though not as much this time. Maurice paused. “She dead?”
Kenneth looked down at Inez, Glenn watching, waiting to hear.
“If she ain’t, she ought to be. Man, I never been this close.”
“Make sure,” Maurice said.
Glenn followed him down the stairs and out the front door once they got it unlocked, down the walk through a foot of snow to breathe in the cold air, breathe it in and let it out slow, seeing his breath. Man oh man, these guys. He got in the van with Maurice, who sat looking at the house saying, “Come on, come on.” They waited. When Kenneth got in behind the wheel Maurice said, “She dead?”
“She is now.”
Glenn wanted to know what he did to her, but Maurice didn’t ask so he kept quiet.
The
y waited, the engine running now but it was still cold, their breath coming out like smoke. Finally Glenn said, “Where in the hell’s White Boy?”
“In there leaving his calling card,” Maurice said, and Kenneth laughed. “White Boy’s a shitter.”
Kenneth kept laughing till Maurice told him to be quiet. Glenn sat there in the dark, cold in his wool-lined raincoat, wondering what he was doing here.
• • •
WHEN THEY GOT HOME MAURICE PEELED OFF SOME BILLS FOR MOSELLE. She looked at the money saying, “This is it, huh? I can do better with the police. Was on the radio, they give you a hundred dollars for every gun you turn in, no questions asked.”
“You believe that?” Maurice said. “You believe they don’t check the serial numbers, see was any stole?”
“Was on JZZ just now. They wouldn’t say it it wasn’t true.”
“Touch my weapons,” Maurice said, “I’ll trade you in.” He turned to Glenn. “You gonna stay with me now, I can keep an eye on you.”
Glenn frowned, squinting at him. “The fuck’re you talking about?”
“So you don’t disappear on me.”
Glenn kept squinting, trying hard to show surprise. “Why would I do that?”
“Like he has the gift,” Moselle said to Glenn, “can read your mind. I wasn’t even there and I know what you’re thinking. Was worse than you imagined, wasn’t it? Baby, you with the bad boys now.”
TWENTY
* * *
SHE WAS QUIET IN THE ELEVATOR, QUIET ONCE THEY WERE IN the suite and Foley had called room service and learned it would take about fifteen minutes. When he told her she said, “Oh,” and looked around the room as if wondering where they would sit. He watched her turn on lamps and go to the window to tell him it was still snowing. He watched her cross to the bedroom saying she’d be right back, but knew room service would arrive before she came out.
The waiter delivered a fifth of Wild Turkey, a bucket of ice, a pitcher of water, two glasses and a dish of peanuts, placing the tray on the coffee table. Foley paid him. He was sitting on the sofa pouring drinks when Karen came out of the bedroom with a cigarette, still wearing the black suit. She said, “Oh, it’s here. I hope you signed for it.” He didn’t say if he did or not. He was eating peanuts. He got up with a drink in each hand, walked over to her and she said, “Oh, thanks,” taking the drink He watched her sip from the glass and then raise her eyebrows to say, “Mmmm,” as if she’d never tasted bourbon before.