Ginny grabbed the dashboard. “Slow down. We’re illegally in the country and you’re wearing guns registered to Archie.”
I backed it down to eighty although I really wanted to punch the pedal through the floor. “You may be right about him being the angel,” I said. “Damn it. He was disturbed enough to plant the guns, write me a note, and then lie about it when we showed up at his office. I made him lie to me, Ginny.”
“Guilt. Good. A little introspection is a good thing.”
“Oh Christ. I’m talking about Archie, not me. I told you how his son got killed. I put Archie’s tail in a crack the second I asked him to fix me up with a gun in Venice. I don’t feel good about it.”
“I’m guessing Archie doesn’t want you to know that he killed someone to save you. We are alive right now because of that man.”
“He’s my best friend.”
“Say that again.”
We were passing vineyards, miles of them. I wished I were one of those billion dusty grapes. “What the hell do you want from me?”
Out of the corner of my eye I saw Ginny watching. “Have you ever told Archie he’s your best friend?” she asked.
I thought about it.“No.”
“Why not?”
“It’s complicated.”
“That’s a given. Can you think of a single relationship that really meant something to you that wasn’t?”
“No,” I admitted. “I love Archie as a friend, though. I do. I’m telling you I would do anything for him.”
“I believe that. You’d spend your only day off for a year to help him fix that goofy car he drives.”
“It’s a Humvee. You’re heading to the bookmark, aren’t you?”
“So you’re lifting up the front of his Jeep with one finger while he’s under it with the wrenches and the two of you are talking about stunts . . . women. And everything is great until the conversation turns personal. At that very moment you drop the car on him, without even knowing it. Drop it right on his feelings.”
“I don’t have to listen to this.”
“Well, you can block your ears and scream, ‘Woop, woop,’ but I’m saying it anyway. On one hand you have all these amazing capacities— you can squash tall cities and leap locomotives—and on the other hand, you’re utterly and completely out of touch with human emotions. It’s not your fault,” Ginny added. “I’m not attacking you.”
“Oh really? Because that’s exactly what it feels like to me.”
“I hoped you’d say that.”
I felt trapped. I was driving through Ginny Gianelli’s hall of mirrors and I couldn’t find my way out. “Why’d you hope I’d say that?”
“Because you’re
I was doing eighty on the interstate, but was stopped dead in front of Ginny.
“I can see it,” I admitted.
Ginny sighed with relief.“Now . . . you won’t like what I’m going to say next.”
I gripped the wheel.
“For a boy who lost his parents so violently, it was totally natural and even helpful for you to expect to be hurt at any moment. But tell me . . . how well has it worked for you as an adult?”
I took a deep breath. Ginny did the same. I considered her question for another billion grapes.
“You’re not to blame any more than Archie is for lying about being in Milan,” Ginny said. “Look at him. Here’s this resourceful person, a Vietnam vet. At eighteen, nineteen years old he probably saw and did absolutely atrocious things. When the war was through with him, he came out a changed man. Maybe got involved with some disreputable people. Somewhere down the line he had a son whom he probably didn’t know how to father, but whom he loved with all his big heart. Then, in a senseless tragedy, he lost him. And ten years ago, through a set of circumstances that involved nearly killing someone with his car, he began to project all of his unspent parental love onto an enigmatic young stuntman orphan. I ask you, can you blame him?”
Ginny pulled her hair back and stretched in her seat as I considered her insight into Archie, and me.
She looked out her side window and said, “My God, that’s a lot of wine.”
Clicking on the radio, she started scanning stations. She stopped on Aretha singing “Respect,” and joined in for the backup vocals. Damned if she didn’t hit all the “sock it to me”s with soul. Awful lot of soul for an Italian girl from Staten Island. Sang in tune, too.
As we crossed over to the coast road nine hours later, an untroubled moon illuminated the landscape. Redwoods reached toward the pinpricks of yellow in the distant galaxies, and crickets and crows scratched and swooped. We rolled on, ignored by all except for the odd raccoon whose retinas reflected our passing headlights.
Finally, Little River appeared on the bluff, the shiny black ocean bobbing behind it. Though the full effect was lost in the darkness, it was still spectacular—the Mendocino coast.
We pulled down a long tree-lined road to the Hollister House andstaggered out of the Jag. We checked in at the main building, a little dazed and buzzing from the ride.
