“Keep talking,” I said.
“I say, five hundred now,” Bill said, “five hundred when we actually start out, and you give me the check when we finish.”
“Here’s how it is, Bill,” I said. “We give you two-fifty now. That’ll keep you in paint thinner, but I advise you not use any until we finish up things.”
Bill’s eyes shifted away from mine.
“And I thought he was just messy,” Brett said.
“There’s paint all over his coat,” I said. “He sniffs a little paint with thinner. They used to call it doing the bag. Sometimes it’s glue instead of paint and thinner. But with Bill here, it’s thinner. Am I right, Bill?”
“I’m not addicted,” he said.
“I really don’t give a shit,” Leonard said. “You don’t touch that shit until we’re out of your life.”
“Five hundred now,” Bill said.
“We don’t even know you’ll follow through on things,” I said. “Two-fifty now. Two-fifty when we get going. Rest of the cash and check when we finish the job.”
“Things are hard,” Bill said. “I need the money.”
“Hell,” Leonard said. “My thing is always hard, but you don’t hear me whining about it.”
“You don’t know what life is like for me,” Bill said.
“Oh shit, here we go,” Leonard said. “Let me guess. You’re displaced Kickapoos. Your culture is all lost. You don’t get to hunt the sacred deer. You know what, that’s sad. Really. But, on the other hand, I don’t give a shit. I’m fuckin’ tired of the whining and the excuses for not getting on with life. I could sit here and give you my poor-little- nigger speech, but I won’t. Because I don’t see myself that way. My people came from a bunch of ignorant farmers, and so did Hap’s, and he’s white, and that’s his drawback. Way I see it, I’m black and I’m human and I don’t beg nobody for nothin’. So, you believe whatever you want, but it’s not my problem.”
“All right,” Bill said. “I see where this is going. Take care of yourselves.”
“We will,” Leonard said. “Try not to track anything on the carpet on your way out.”
Bill didn’t move. He fumbled inside his jacket for cigarettes.
“Don’t smoke that,” Brett said.
Bill pushed the cigarette back into the pack. He just couldn’t win. He hung his head. He sighed.
“Very well,” he said. “I’ll take the two-fifty now, and talk to my partners.”
“I’ll go with you while you talk to your partners,” I said. “Then maybe you’ll take two-fifty.”
Bill didn’t even try to argue this time. He merely nodded.
“You, Leonard,” Bill said. “One word of caution. Watch yourself. Your mouth could easily write a check with me your ass can’t cash.”
Leonard grinned at him. “I can write a damn big check, Early Bird.”
Brett opened her purse, peeled out two hundred and fifty dollars and gave it to me. I put it in my wallet. I took one of the handguns and put it in the holster I had clipped under my shirt. I said to Bill, “Can we find your friends now?”
Bill nodded.
“We’ll keep your weapons here,” Leonard said to Bill. “A word of warning. Hap there. He’s one of those intellectuals, and he likes poor folks and puppy dogs, niggers, injuns, kikes and rednecks, white trash and midgets. He probably even cares you’re a poor little Kickapoo done lost your culture. But you fuck with him, he will stomp your ass into next Sunday.”
Bill looked at me. “That true, Hap?”
“Most likely,” I said. “But just so you won’t think I’m a complete humanitarian, I don’t have any kind of thing for cats.”
22
Bill Early Bird drove an old Ford pickup that looked as if it had been in a meteor shower. It had gray filler plastered all over it, and what wasn’t filler was blue paint and not very good blue paint at that. Every time Bill stepped on the brakes the truck sounded as if it were in pain. The tires were so thin on tread you could almost see the air inside.
We drove through the little town of Echo, Texas, to the outskirts, crossed over a large overpass, went off the highway and down a dirt road and around a curve to where there was no real road, and still we drove. Eventually the overpass loomed above us, and beneath it I could see a fire, and when we parked and got out, I could see the fire came from an old fifty-five gallon drum. The air was cool and the flames leaped and crackled and most of the heat went up and away. There were some cardboard and plywood shacks under the overpass, and there were people to go with them. Four were visible, all Indians, squatting down, passing something between them, and as Bill came up and called out, two others drifted from the hovels and squatted with the others.
“Uncle,” Bill called out to one of the men. “It’s Billy.”
An elderly man, built along the line of five coat hangers with two teeth and lots of gray hair, slurred back Bill’s name.
Bill bent down and hugged the old man and the old man patted him on the back. When Bill stood up, he said, “This is my Uncle Brin.”
