when you think people are out to get you, then are you still paranoid when people are out to get you? I mean, shit. It isn’t pleasant sitting in a room knowing maybe some stranger’s going to walk in off the street with a gun.
The operator told me how much money and I dropped the coins in. I listened to the phone ring and pictured the apartment in my mind and she answered. “Hello?” she said.
I said nothing.
“Hello,” she said, “who is this? Hello?”
“Hello, Peg.”
“… Quarry?”
“Hello, Peg.”
“God. God, Quarry. You’re alive.”
“How are you, Peg?”
“The papers were full of blood the day after you left. The papers are still talking about it. It’s horrible.”
“Oh?”
“When Vince turned up dead, I thought… but you couldn’t have done that to him. The papers said his body was… you didn’t do that to him.”
“Peg.”
“Yes?”
“It’s good to hear your voice.”
“It’s good to hear… Quarry, people are in town asking questions.”
“What sort of people?”
“I don’t know. Different sorts. FBI. People like that.”
“I see. What sort of questions they asking?”
“I don’t know for sure. They haven’t talked to me yet. I hope they don’t. I don’t know what I’m going to say to them if they do.”
“Don’t say anything.”
“You know I won’t tell them anything about you. But what about me? My mind’s full of what I can’t tell anybody.”
“Forget all that.”
“How can. I? Quarry?”
“Yes?”
“Why did you call?”
“I wanted to talk to you. I’d like to see you again, Peg.”
“Quarry…”
“Not right away, maybe, but I want to see you. I have some money saved up, Peg. I could help you. Maybe you and I could…”
“Quarry, what are you talking about?”
“Peg.”
“I’m just a broad you shacked up with once. For a fucking day, at that. Why talk like it’s something else?”
“It is something else.”
“How do you know? How do you know you’re not just another one-night stand for me, huh? I’m a one-night stand sort of person, you know.”
“I feel something for you, Peg.”
“Oh, Quarry, goddamn you…”
“I want to see you again.”
“I don’t know.”
“What? You don’t know what?”
“I don’t know if I want to see you.”
“Why?”
“Because I’ve been thinking, Quarry. I’ve been thinking about things that happened while you were in town. I’ve been thinking about certain things you said. I’ve been thinking about what’s been in the papers.”
“Forget all that.”
“Okay. Okay I will. But first I want you to tell me something. I want you to tell me what you do. What do you do, Quarry? You said you were like Frank. Something illegal. Okay. I can live with that. But be specific. What is it you do, Quarry?”
I kill people.
“You kill people, don’t you?” she said.
I said nothing.
“Good-bye, Quarry,” she said.
The line went dead.
I played with the shooting machine for another half an hour, and when I quit there were ten free games left on it. Then I went back to my A-frame and for the rest of the afternoon I swam.
