We went on like that for a while. After I’d named twenty parts of the engine he began asking me how I’d fix various problems. I guess he was happy with my answers. I did know about cars.
“You say you’re a hot-and-cold man but you know your cars.”
“I know boiler rooms and air conditioners too,” I said. Working as the building supervisor I had to know how every machine at a school worked.
Oliphant rubbed his ravaged jaw and regarded me.
“I do have a position open,” he said. “But how’d you know about it?”
“Sam Houston,” I said.
“And here I thought the great man had died.” Oliphant’s smile was somewhat sinister.
“Not the original,” I said. “This one’s from Texas too, but he’s black and owns a restaurant in L.A. called Hambones. He found out about it somewhere.”
I doubted that Oliphant would go so far as to check my story but I’d already asked Sam to cover for me.
“Last boy to work here didn’t work out,” Gator said. “Broke my supervisor’s nose and broke into the safe too.”
“Was he from Louisiana?”
That got Gator laughing again. He liked to laugh.
“Okay, Larry,” he said. “We’ll try you out. If you can work as good as you talk you’ll do just fine.”
We smiled into each other’s eyes. He had the kind of eyes that made you feel that he knew what was going on in your mind.
TILLY MONROE was the first man I had to deal with. I knew his name from the moment I saw him—that wasn’t hard. First off he had a bandage over his black-and-blue swollen nose. Then he was short, five-five tops. He also wore red coveralls with the name TILLY stitched over his heart. All he needed was good sense and six inches and he could have been a matinee idol.
“So you the new buck?” he said, and I wondered why Ross had waited so long to bust his face.
“Just a mechanic,” I said.
“This ain’t no penny-ante backyard garage here, son,” he said. “This here’s a first-class operation. You get a job and a time estimate and you better believe that you will finish on time and keep your station clean.”
I inhaled through my nose and held it, trying to keep from saying something angry.
“No personal phone calls,” Tilly added, “except in emergency, and no sick pay. You get paid for hours worked and you work every hour you here. Understand?”
“Yes sir.” I hated myself for saying it.
I was given three engines and told that I had a week to overhaul them for the used-car lot across the street. That way, Tilly said, he could make sure that it was me and not some other man doing the job.
I signed up for the evening shift and worked into the night. It didn’t bother me not being home. Bonnie and I barely spoke but still it hurt my heart to have her near.
I SPENT SIX HOURS there and didn’t find out one thing that would help clear Ross Henry.
Gator was well named. He cruised around the garage like a huge green predator. He had the same kind of evil grin as the alligator and seemed to come up out of nowhere. I met eight men other than Oliphant, Tilly, and Ed. Ed was the kid I met coming in. I don’t remember anyone else’s name. They all worked hard and laughed well. Maybe one of them robbed the safe. It was beyond my ability to tell.
The garage closed at eight that Sunday night. I dawdled around until nearly nine, cleaning up my station.
“See ya, Larry,” Ed said to me.
“Later, kid.”
His bright smile shone in answer and Ed turned toward the door.
“You about finished, Burdon?” Tilly asked me.
When I looked up to see the small man, I saw Gator beyond him, looking at us both through the glass wall of his office. His brow was dark and dangerous.
“Just about,” I said.
“’Cause we don’t want any of the brothers around when we’re not here to watch ’em, if you know what I mean.” Tilly was standing nearly on top of me, which was unsettling because I was down on my knees putting my tools into an iron chest.
I stood to my full height and Tilly fell back, one step and then another.
“Didn’t that man who stole your money break your nose for you?” I asked him.
“What of it?”
“Nuthin’,” I said. “It’s just that you should go home and study your eyes and that nose in the mirror. See if you can find a correlation between the two.”
“Corra-what?”
I never expected to return to Oliphant’s garage. Why not give them a glimpse of the man who hid from them in plain sight?
“See you tomorrow,” I said.
