I watched him go, gave him a minute. Then I went too, back inside, picked up my drink from the bar, carried it to the phone in the back.
A pretty young girl with a lot of blue eyeshadow was on the phone, talking animatedly with the receiver pressed to one ear and her index finger in the other. I waited, drinking bourbon.
Finally she was through. She hung up and sashayed across the room to a table where a skinny boy with a skinny mustache was waiting. I picked up the receiver, to which the scent of her perfume still clung. It was nice perfume. I fed the phone, dialed Eve Colgate. When she answered there was Schubert in the background again.
'I just wanted to make sure you were home,' I told her. 'There's something I want to talk to you about. Can I come over?'
'Yes. When?'
'Soon. After I get something to eat.'
'Where are you?'
'At Tony's, but I'm not staying. Too many people here for me.'
I could hear the small smile in her voice. 'I know how that feels.' A hesitant pause; then, 'Why don't you come here?'
As she spoke the jukebox started up, filling the room with Charlie Daniels. 'Sorry?' I said.
'For dinner. Come here. I have beef stew. There's plenty.'
'Well, I—' I stopped myself. 'Thanks. I'd like that.'
When I left, the bar's door swung closed behind me, as though, if allowed to drift out, the light and the music, the talk, the taste of bourbon and gin would dissipate like woodsmoke in the vast darkness, and Antonelli's would be as empty and desolate as the night.
I crunched up through the gravel of Tony's lot toward the road, hearing nothing but my own footsteps and the hissing of the wind, seeing nothing but the shadowy forms of trees moving restlessly. In those trees, patient and alert, owls waited.
My car, up by the road, was a mound of flat, featureless black in the surrounding murk. No moon or stars threw careless light to be reflected off it; no cars rushed past it to emphasize by their motion its own stillness. Dark, and still, and silent, full of things I could only sense, not see: the night up here was always like that, and in that sense, comforting.
But here, now, in this night, something moved. Beyond my car, a red glow, the tip of a cigarette drifting lazily through the air.
Such a small thing, an everyday thing.
My skin sizzled. All my senses were instantly alert and bare. I reached, but there was nothing else, no sound, scent, nothing more I could see from that place.
But the night had changed completely.
I eased the zipper of my jacket down, slid my .38 out as the red glow vanished. If this was someone just finishing off a last smoke out in the night before driving home, he'd get in his car now and pull out. It didn't happen. Or if he'd just wanted a few moments of peace before heading down to Antonelli's, his footsteps would start soon, and he'd pass me, nodding a greeting, going on.
That didn't happen either. The smoker, quiet as the night, didn't move. Up by my car, he waited for me.
I didn't slow my steps. I could be walking into a setup, but it wasn't likely. If he'd wanted me dead without fuss he could have picked me off as I stood framed in Tony's doorway. This was someone who wanted to talk, just us two.
Still, I slipped the safety off the gun as I covered the last few yards.
He was on the far side of my car, a dark form between it and another I could now see parked beyond it. On this side of my car, nothing, no one else visible. A few more steps. Then I swung the gun up sharply, the car still between us, and snapped, 'All right, don't move!'
The stillness changed; I could feel the smoker's body go stiff, maybe with surprise, maybe obedience. But not that, because although there was no movement, a girl's soft voice breathed, 'Wow! Are you going to shoot me?'
I was at my car now, facing her across it. At this distance we could see each other, though shadowed and indistinct. She was small, her face pale, her clothes dark; I was large, and I was armed. For a moment nothing moved. The entire night was waiting for us. Then slowly she lifted her hands. She wore gloves without fingertips, the gloves you need if you're hammering nails or selling apples by the side of the road; and I could just make out her mocking smile as she wiggled her fingers like a child saying bye-bye, showing me they were empty.
I held the gun steady. She hesitated, then shrugged. Reaching up, she pulled her knit cap off, shook out her thick, golden hair.
'Fuck this hat. I fucking hate hats.' The words were spoken with a careful casualness, the way you'd try out a phrase when you found yourself among native speakers of a language you'd been studying. 'But it worked.' Her voice held a self-satisfied tone. 'You didn't see me until you got close.'
A dark turtleneck sweater, much too big for her, engulfed her tiny frame in soft folds. Her tight jeans were tucked into high leather boots; even with the heel on the boot, she was barely five feet tall. Without looking, she tossed the unwanted cap onto the hood of her car.
'The cigarette was a big mistake,' I told her.
'Well, shit, I've been freezing my ass off out here for a fucking hour! Guys keep coming in and out of that stupid bar. How was I supposed to know this time it was you?'
'Doesn't matter. If you don't keep your focus, you lose.'
