dead, so they go after the boys, thinking, Well, they probably told the mom anyway.'
Donnell said, 'Robin, huh?' and started to smile. 'First time we met I said you must be dumb as shit, didn't I? I'll tell you something now that we talked again. You still dumb as shit. You live in your little get-even bomb world, down there bent over taking wires apart. See, that's why people like you get hired by people like me. I write down 'Mr. Mankowski' and 'twenty-oh-oh-oh' on one of these checks, man, you'll dive in with your clothes on. It don't matter who's doing what or why and don't tell me different. 'Cause once you on the take, man, you on it, for good.'
Chris said, 'Let's go sit down.'
He walked off, going to the lounge area half-way up the length of the pool--the arrangement of chairs and low tables by the bar and stereo system--and poured himself a scotch. There was water in the ice bucket. A buzzing sound came from the phone sitting on the bar and a light went on. Chris took his drink to a table and sat down.
Donnell said, from the shallow end of the pool, 'That's Mr. Woody. Wait half a minute, he'll forget what he wants.'
Chris sipped his whiskey. The phone buzzed a few more times. Donnell was staring at the clear water.
'Say that thing could still go off?'
'You never know,' Chris said. The phone had stopped buzzing. 'Come on, sit down. Tell me what Robin said when she called.'
That got his attention. Donnell looked over but didn't say anything.
'I'm dumb as shit,' Chris said, 'you have to straighten me out. So it's not a payback, it's a pay up or get blown up. The anarchist turned capitalist. It used to be political, now it's for money.' He thought about it a moment, nodding. 'It makes sense. Get out of that dump she's living in. Or she's bored, uh? Tired of writing those books. . . .' Chris sipped his drink.
Donnell was still watching him.
'So why didn't you call Nine-eleven? You find a bomb, you call the police, fire, anybody you can get. The only reason I can see why you didn't,' Chris said, 'you must be in on it. You're working it with her.'
Donnell came away from the shallow end now. 'I let somebody send me a bomb? Am I crazy? Then get you to get rid of the motherfucker? Explain that to me.'
Chris said, 'Maybe you got involved after the bomb was delivered . . . when she called. It was Robin, wasn't it?'
Donnell didn't answer that one but kept coming, not taking his eyes off Chris.
'I think what happened,' Chris said, 'she thinks the bomb's already gone off, outside. That's the warning shot. Now she tells you on the phone how much she wants and you're thinking, Man, why don't I get in on this? Or you don't think she's asking enough, so you tell her you'll be her agent, get her a better deal. Extortion, though, I imagine you'd want more than ten percent.'
'What I want,' Donnell said, laying the checkbook on the table, 'is to know how much you want. That's the only business we have, understand?'
Chris sipped his drink, in no hurry. 'I'll tell you what I have a problem with, and I'll bet you do too. The first bomb, the one that took out Mark. That wasn't a warning shot, was it? That one had Woody's name on it. Yours, too, if you open doors for him. But how do they make any money if Woody's dead?'
Donnell didn't move or say a word.
'Unless their original idea,' Chris said, 'was to get Woody out of the way and go after Mark. Only Mark went after the peanuts. That can happen, something unforeseen. But you get down and look at it, I don't think Robin knows what she's doing. It seems to me she and Skip are as fucked up as they ever were. Back when they were crazies. I think about it some more and it doesn't surprise me. You know why?'
Donnell kept looking at him, but didn't answer.
'Because people don't get into crime unless they're fucked up to begin with.'
Donnell said, 'The policeman talking now.'
'You know what I'm saying. Think of all the guys you used to hang out with are in the joint. You've been trying to think of ways yourself to fuck up, haven't you?'
Chris reached over to open the leather-bound book on the table and look at the three checks signed by Woodrow Ricks, the name written big, all curves and circles.
'You could write 'Donnell Lewis' and some big numbers on one of these, you must've thought of that. But first you have to get him to transfer enough money into the account to make it worthwhile, huh? And you haven't figured out how to work that.'
Donnell said, 'How much you want?'
'Twenty-five,' Chris said, 'nothing for you, no commission on this one. And if Woody stops payment, I put the bomb back in the pool.'
'Gonna take the man for all you can get.'
'Why not? Everybody else is.'
In that big dim library Greta was saying to Woody, 'You're trying to be nice to me now, because of what you did.' He was making her nervous.
Telling her, Sit here. No, sit there, it's more comfortable. What could he get her, another drink? Did she want to watch a movie? Did she like Busby Berkeley? Ever see his banana number? But he didn't know how to put on the video cassette, and when he tried calling Donnell on the phone there was no answer.
Greta said, 'Would you sit still so I can talk to you? That other time you hardly moved. Would you wipe your mouth, please? Doesn't that bother you? Look at your robe, it's a mess.' He seemed to be listening now, but it was hard to tell. His face was like a road map, all the red and blue lines in it. If that liver spot on his cheek was Little Rock, there was U.S. 40 going over to West Memphis. The Mississippi came down his nose full of tributaries and drainage canals, curved around O.K. Bend at his mouth and went on down to the Louisiana line. Did he like being the way he was?
'Remember at the Seesaw audition, right after I tried out Mark had me sit with him? You were in the row behind us. I felt you touch my hair a couple times. I should've realized what the deal was, but I was busy listening to Mark talking to the director, being smart. That girl with the little plastic derby finished her number, she did 'Little Things' and the director goes, 'She must get a lot of love at home to have the confidence to come here.' That was okay; the girl really wasn't very good. But Mark said nasty things like 'She ought to have her vocal cords removed,' and I remember you laughing, thinking it was funny. You and Mark had no feeling for the person, what it's like to get up there with your legs shaking, trying to remember the words. . . . That one girl did 'The Sweetest Sounds I've Ever Heard' and Mark goes, 'Throwing up'd be a sweeter sound than that.' Trying to be funny, but everything he said was mean. I stayed and listened 'cause I wanted to play Gittel so bad, not knowing the deal was I'd have to play with you. Nobody asked me, okay, if I did, if I agreed to be humiliated, how much would I charge? See, you just went ahead, like buying something without asking the price. Well, now I'm gonna tell you what it is.'
Chris went in the pool in his white briefs, dove straight down to the bottom, saw only one wire connected to the clock and made sure of it, a wire that ran to the dry-cell battery. He went up for a breath, dove again, removed the blasting cap from the dynamite and this time pushed off the bottom with the five sticks taped together, holding them over his head as he surfaced. Donnell was no help. He stayed at the shallow end, inside the doorway to the sunroom. On his third dive, Chris brought up the clock and the battery and placed them next to the dynamite on the tiled edge of the pool. Donnell approached as Chris swam over with the black athletic bag, swung it at him and let go, and Donnell jumped back as he caught the bag and dropped it, quick.
'Man, you get me all wet.'
Chris pulled himself out of the pool. He picked up the bag, held it open in the light from the windows and got a surprise. Inside were a pair of pliers, a short coil of copper wire and several clothespins. Maybe left by mistake-- the guy forgot the stuff was in there. Or it was a hurry-up job. Maybe the guy had to work in the dark. It was all evidence and Chris knew he should take it with him. Or put it in a safe place--he liked that better--and tell Donnell to keep his hands off, don't go near it. Scare him. He looked around the pool house. Maybe in the library; there were a lot of cabinets in there. And pick it up later on, if he had to.
Donnell said, 'It's mean-looking shit, that dynamite.' He put his hands on his knees for a closer study. 'The clock, hey, only got one hand on it.'
'The hour hand,' Chris said. 'You see the hole punched right next to the 'eleven'? There was a screw in
