have nailed him.”
“Yes sir.”
“Yes sir,” said the old man, less to Bud than to himself, 'yes sir, I'd have nailed him. Just couldn't get that last damned break.”
When Bud finally got back to his truck, the full force of the day's heat lay upon him. He checked his watch: Dammit, he'd spent close to half an hour with the pitiful old goat, when he'd only meant to spend ten minutes. He shook his head at what had become of the mighty Lieutenant Henderson. He still felt a little woozy from the smoke and the dark claustrophobia of the place, or maybe it was the force of his sexual anticipation. Anyway, he got in and drove to Holly's, feeling he'd earned it.
It took him twenty extra minutes to find the place, and he'd have to come up with an excuse to account for the time, he knew. But by the time he got there, he wasn't thinking about such things. He thought he'd burst.
He pulled up, nodded at a black kid on a yellow plastic trike on the sidewalk, and bounded to the porch.
“Well, damn my soul,” she said.
“The hero himself.”
Bud looked around theatrically.
“Oh yeah? There's a hero here? Always wanted to meet one of them boys, shake his hand.”
“Git you in here. Bud Pewtie, this very instant. You can tell me how much you like my house and how sorry you are I had to move in by myself… later.”
She pulled him in and began to grope with him, immediately coming upon his guns.
“Oh, my, well sir, maybe we ought not to do a thing, so as you don't have to readjust all your equipment.”
“I'd gladly dump ’em in the trash, darling', for a few minutes with you.”
“Well I hope it's longer than a few minutes.”
And it was. Bud was in fine form today, released of all his inhibitions, driven forward by the peculiar intensity of his wants. His pains vanished; his legs were young again, his lungs full of stamina. The games started in the living room on a sofa, moved up the stairs, though pausing there for several minutes owing to the possibilities of the steep upward rake of the steps, then continued in her upstairs bedroom, where things got immensely tangled and complicated until at last the moment itself arrived, exploded, and then departed.
“Whooee, wasn't that a time?” Bud said.
“You should do more of this man-killing. Bud. It does wonders for you.”
“Wasn't I the boy, though?” he said.
“You certainly were.”
He laid around in her bed for another half an hour and then the mood came across him again. Squealing delightedly, she accommodated him; she was smooth and slippery as an eel.
And when that one was done, he said, 'Well, I think we broke in the new house right nice.”
“Would say so. Want to see it?”
Bud knew he shouldn't. Too much time, he was late already; but she was so proud of the damn thing.
“Sure,” he said.
They dressed, and she lugged him around, room to room. Bud tried hard to keep his enthusiasm up, but he knew he was doing a poor job. And, there really wasn't much to see:
her trailer furniture, spread throughout a six-room house, looked sparse. And for some reason, the house looked grayer and dirtier than he had remembered it looking.
Could he live here? It wasn't nearly as nice as his wonderful and comfortable old place.
“It's a great little place, honey,” he said.
“You'll help me paint it?”
Bud hated painting.
“Of course.”
“Oh, Bud, we'll be so happy here. I know we will.”
“Yes ma'am, I know we will. Now, uh, I've—”
“I know. Bud. And you don't want to do any talking at all. Okay, Bud. Will I see you tomorrow?”
“Of course you will,” he said.
“By god, of course you will.”
* * if Bud drove home, thinking of lies, or rather expansions on the truth.
Old CD.” now I had to go see him. It ain't right what they done to him and what they're saying about him.
And you know how that man can talk (she didn't, of course). He just jaws onward and onward and you can't slow him down any. And he's so bitter I didn't want to insult him any further. Plus, he had to hear the story of my famous shootout. And of course he had a lot of comments and constructive criticism. The time just flew away on me.
He actually mouthed the words out loud, so they'd feel familiar in his mind. You didn't want to be making stuff up in an escapade like this, because you could just as easy as pie come up with something that invalidated something you'd said before; pick a nice, simple, believable story, near to the truth as you can make it (not very, in this case, but believable) and stick to it. He had a laugh here, remembering an old story about a football quarterback who was out helling around and his wife caught him sneaking in around seven in the morning, and he had a dandy all set up.
He told her he'd come back at about ten the night before, but since she was already asleep he didn't want to wake her so, since it was such a nice night out, he'd decided to sleep in the hammock out there in the front yard, and that's where he'd been. She said, 'That's very nice, but I took the hammock down two weeks ago.” So the fellow said, 'Well, that's my story and I'm sticking to it.”
Bud pulled in the driveway, and immediately one of the OSBI youngsters got out and came up to him.
“Sergeant Pewtie?”
“Yes?” he said, suddenly alerted by the youngster's gravity. Oh Christ: What was wrong?
“Sergeant, your wife has been looking all over hell and gone for you.”
“What's wrong?” he said.
“It's your son.”
“My son?”
Bud watched him in horror, thinking his whole life might be about to change: Lamar, his son, vengeance, it all came together in a single, horrifying moment.
“Your youngest boy, Jeff.”
Oh, God, thought Bud.
“He just been arrested by the city police. Assault. He attacked two boys in school. Hurt ’em bad, too.”
CHAPTER 26
The papers, in all their accounts of the famous gunfight at Jimmy Ky's, gave no personal details about this Bud Pewtie. Oklahoma highway patrol sergeant, forty-eight, that was all. His name was in no phone book either, but that was common: Cops seldom had listed phone numbers.
“How are we going to find him, Daddy?” Ruta Beth asked.
“Oh,” said Lamar, 'there're ways. He's left a trail. A sly old dog like me, hell, I'll sniff him out.”
Lamar stared at the photo in the paper, and Bud Pewtie stared back. It was a grave, authoritarian face, the face of a manhunter. Lamar had seen it on a few cops in his time, but fewer and fewer of late, as the cops had gotten younger and somehow sweeter. But Pewtie had the gray eyes and flat mouth of a hero type, an ass-kicker, a shooter. And goddamn, he'd done some shooting. Lamar looked at the bandage swaddling his left hand. Two fingers, just gone, as if by surgery.
Luck or talent? Lamar knew it was probably luck, but it left him a little uneasy. No man should be that lucky.
“He's a scary man,” said Richard.
