Mr. X

lived on the fringes of human existence like a starving wolf: what could be more natural than that he demand more? Did I think he intended to marry Laurie Hatch, get his hands on Stewart's family trust, and then dispose of both Laurie and Cobbie? A final sip of whiskey made this far-fetched idea almost entirely implausible. Yet enough of it lingered so that I could not spend the night in Laurie's bed.

 •97

 •I put on the rest of my clothes in the dark. In a sleepy voice, Laurie said, 'You're always going somewhere.' “I have to be ready for the funeral.'

    She raised her head for a kiss.

    “I'll call you tomorrow.'

    'That's what the guy last night said.'

    I drove on past dark houses to the highway. Eighteen-wheelers loomed up from behind like yellow-eyed monsters and swung out to wash by before sailing ahead to become red dots poised at the edge of infinity. A handful of cars ghosted along the streets of Edgerton. I found a parking place in front of the Speedway, crossed the street, and entered Turnip Lane.

    In my haste, I nearly stumbled over a figure like a heap of discarded clothes. I bent down, thinking that if he was Piney Woods, I would give him the price of a bed at the Hotel Paris. The odors of unwashed flesh and alcohol floated up from a stranger with matted hair and scabs on his cheeks. His eyelids twitched, as if he sensed me looking at him. Somewhere near, a man snored in bursts like the starting and stopping of a chain saw.

    On Leather Lane, a man reeled out of a doorway and collapsed facedown on the cobbles. A woman's voice rose from a basement room, saying, It'salways the same, always the same. It is always the same, exact story, and I'm sick of it. Somewhere a toilet flushed. Under the feeble illumination of an iron street lamp, I turned into Fish.

    I had gone about thirty feet between the huddled buildings when, in a signal as old as childhood, someone whistled two notes, the second an octave down from the first. I turned around and saw an empty lane. I turned back. About twenty feet away, Joe Staggers was lurching into Fish out of Lavender Lane. He laughed, steadied himself, and planted his feet.

    'Well. Well, now. Looks like party time.' With the fluidity of practice, Staggers drew a knife from his back pocket and snapped his wrist. The blade locked into place with a heavy metallicclunk.

    I looked over my shoulder. Yuk Yuk—Shorty—stood beneath the light at the other end.

    'Are you ready, Dunstan? Are you, little pal?' Staggers said. 'No fancy bullshit tonight.' He stepped forward.

    I yanked the pistol out of the holster, pushed down the safety, and aimed at Staggers. 'Stop right there.' I looked at Shorty, who had not moved, and chambered the first bullet. 'Drop the knife.'

    'Whoa, boy. Are you gonna shoot me?'

    “If I have to.' I swung the pistol across the front of my body and pointed it at Shorty. 'Get out of here. Now.'

    'He won't shoot,' Staggers said. 'That's Gospel.'

    'He busted in Minor's head,' Shorty said.

    'This guy never fired a gun in his life. But he cheated us out of our money, in case you forgot.'

    'Not enough money to get killed for.'

    I swung the barrel back to Staggers. He had advanced a couple of feet.

    'Forget the money, think about being a man for a change,' Staggers said. “If he shoots anybody, it'll be me.'

    I looked at Shorty without taking the gun off Staggers. When I glanced back at Staggers, he was in a crouch, his arms at his sides, smiling at me. 'Shorty,' I said, 'take off while you can.'

    Staggers said, 'Fancy boy ain't gonna hit anything. Come ahead.'

    I heard Shorty take a hesitant step forward, rotated, and aimed at his chest. Then I sighted an inch to the left and pulled the trigger. A red flare came from the barrel, and the explosion kicked the pistol upward. The bullet smacked into a brick wall, ricocheted across the lane, and struck a boarded window. Shorty lumbered off. I chambered another round and heard the shell case ping offa cobble.

    Still crouching, Joe Staggers was within four yards of me, the knife edge-up in his lightly extended hand. 'Missed him on purpose, you dipshit.'

    “I won't miss you,' I said.

    'Suppose I drop the knife and you drop the gun. Suppose we take it from there.'

    'Suppose you get out of here before I put a bullet in your head,' I said.

    A crablike step brought him closer.

    I aimed the pistol at his forehead. 'Put it down.'

    'Guess I'll do that.'

    Staggers lowered his knife hand, glanced up at me, and vaulted forward, like a frog. I aimed at the big plaid shape speeding over the cobbles. There was a flash of red, an explosion, the sound of a bullet pinging off a stone. Staggers rammed into my legs and knocked me onto my back.

    Now, I thought,do it now!

    My stomach cramped. Pain blossomed in my head. The fabric of the world melted into yielding softness, and I fell through sixty years, more or less, with Joe Staggers clinging to my legs.

    There came the familiar sense ofwrongness, of dislocation. In amiasma of horse dung, beer, and sewage. Fish Lane tilted up and down like a seesaw. When my vision cleared, I was lying on my back a few yards beyond the entrance to a tavern. About twice the usual number of stars blanketed the night sky. I lifted my head and saw Joe Staggers struggling onto his hands and knees. I knew what I was going to do to him even before the tavern door opened upon a grim knot of men in worn jackets and thick caps. An amazed and sinister chuckle spread through them. One of the men came toward us, and two or three others followed. Staggers sank onto his heels and raised his knife.

    It would never have occurred to him that his clean shirt, his sturdy yellow Timberlands, his fresh haircut denied him sympathy from the men before us. He did not look rich, but he looked richer than they were. Waving his knife made it worse. He swiveled his head to look at me, and the pain and confusion in his eyes nearly made me pity him. 'Where the hell are we?' Most of the men standing at the entrance to the bar pulled out knives of their own.

    One of the men moved away from the others. The ripped pockets of his jacket flopped like rabbit ears. A rough voice said,You got that one, Bumpy.

    I threw the pistol down the lane and heard it skittering over the cobbles. Bumpy took another step, and I did what I had to do.

    Darkness stretched out on either side. My head pounded, and sweat ran down my face. Abandoned buildings and boarded windows looked down in calm silence. I pushed myself upright and smelled cordite. Down at the crossing of the lanes, two drunks goggled at me from beneath a street lamp. A siren wailed on Word Street. 'He ran down there,' I shouted, pointing to the far end of Fish Lane. The drunks turned unsteadily around, and I raced into the darkness.

 •98

 •Mr. Spaulding's hearse preceded Clark's gleaming Buick on the way to Little Ridge, and I followed both, headlights on. Through the gates we went and over the crunching gravel to a narrow drive that ribboned past orderly headstones. The hearse glided to a stop beside a little rise, and Clark and I swung in behind it. We all got out of our vehicles. It was a fine, sunny morning without too much humidity.

    In their dark print dresses and face collars, Nettie and May could have been a pair of deacons' wives. In his eggplant-colored suit, white shirt with a Mr. B collar, black necktie, and a chocolate brown, wide-brimmed fedora, Clark looked more elegant than I had ever seen him. A carpet of artificial grass the bright green of Astroturf lay over the mound of earth soon to be muscled back into the ground by the yellow bulldozer parked further along the