The Black Train

while his lids were getting redder.

“Mr. Sute, are you sure you’re all right?”

He gulped, and repatted the handkerchief to his forehead. “I suppose I’m really not, Mr. Collier. I’m not feeling well. It’s been wonderful having lunch with you, but I’m afraid I must excuse myself.”

“Go home and get some rest,” Collier advised. And don’t drink a SHITLOAD of martinis next time. “I’m sure you’ll feel better soon.”

“Thank you.” Sute rose, wobbly. He shook Collier’s hand. “And I hope my accounts of the town’s strange history entertained you.”

“Very much so.”

Quite suddenly, a sixtyish man probably even heavier than Sute wended around the table: balding, white beard, big jolly Santa Claus face. “J.G.!” the man greeted with a stout voice. “Going so soon? Stay and have a drink!”

“Oh, no, Hank, I’ve had too much already—”

The hugely grinning man turned to Collier.

“And Mr. Justin Collier! Word travels fast when a celebrity comes to town, and I’m always the first to get the news.” He pumped Collier’s hand like a car jack. “I’m Hank Snodden, and I must say it’s a pleasure to meet you! I love your show, by the way. I can’t wait for next season!”

Sorry, buddy, but you WILL wait for next season, Collier thought. “Thanks for the kind words, Mr. Snodden.”

“Hank is the mayor of our humble little town,” Sute informed.

The ebullient man slapped Collier on the back. “And I’m also the county clerk, the town license inspector, and the recorder of deeds.” A hokey elbow to Collier’s ribs. “I also own the car lot on the corner. Come on in and I’ll give you a really good deal!”

Collier faked a chuckle. “I love your town, Mr. Snodden.”

The bubbly man turned back to Sute, then frowned. “J.G., you don’t look well.”

Sute reeled on his feet. “I’m a bit under the weather…”

“No, you’re drunk!” Snodden laughed. “Just like me! Go home and sleep it off—”

“Yes, I’m leaving now—”

“—but don’t forget chess club on Monday! I’ll be kicking your tail!”

Sute sidestepped away. “Thank you again, Mr. Collier. I hope we meet again.”

“’Bye…”

Sute finally made his exit, almost stumbling out the front door.

“He’s a character, all right, Mr. Collier,” the mayor piped. “I’ve known him thirty years and I don’t think I’ve ever seen him that stewed. And speaking of stewed, please let me buy you a drink.”

This guy’s a little too high-amp for me, Collier realized. Besides, those lagers had buzzed him up but good. “Thanks, sir, but I’ve got to be going myself.”

“Well, if there’s anything you need, you just call up the mayor’s office, tell them you’re a personal friend of mine, and I’ll get you fixed up in no time.”

“Thanks, sir.”

The big man’s eyes beamed. “And I guess J.G. was talking about his books.”

“Yes. I bought a few. But he mentioned that one of his books never—”

“—never got published because—well—he’s not a very good writer! So that’s what he was bending your ear about, Harwood Gast and his notorious railroad.”

“Yes, it’s pretty grim, but it’s also a fascinating story—”

Another elbow in the ribs. “And pure bullshit, Mr. Collier, but you know how these Southerners are. They love to spin a tale. Horrible Harwood and Mrs. Tinkle, they called them.”

Collier squinted. “Mrs. Twinkle?”

“Tinkle, Mr. Collier, Mrs. Tinkle—that was her nickname, among other things.”

“Why’d they call her that?”

“Oh, there’s my wife, Mr. Collier—I better go before she starts yelling at me—” He slipped a business card in Collier’s hand. “But it’s been a pleasure meeting you!”

“You, too, sir, but—wait—why did they call her—”

Snodden rushed away, to a sneering wife in a dress that looked like a pup tent with flowers on it.

Mrs. Tinkle? Collier paid the check, frowning. Here was something Sute had skirted in his indelicate description of Penelope Gast. It didn’t take Collier long to assume between the lines. Sex maniac, indeed. Water sports, he guessed. She was probably one of these kinky weirdos who likes guys to piss on her. It wasn’t all bonnets and mint juleps on the porch. Every age had its veneers.

He shook his head as he left the restaurant. A piss freak…But his guts sank when he reminded himself that he thought he’d smelled urine in his room.

The gorgeous day helped him get Sute’s dreadful story out of his head. However—

Maybe I’ll walk around town a bit, walk off this buzz. He knew he needed to be 100 percent sober when the time came for his dinner date with Dominique.

Wait a minute! he remembered now. She won’t want to eat at her own restaurant. I’ll have to take her someplace…Now a new kind of dread sank in his guts. I can’t take the woman of my dreams out in that lime on wheels! He looked around for a car rental but wasn’t surprised that a small town like this wouldn’t need one. Suddenly the problem felt like a crisis.

I should’ve asked Sute. He probably would’ve loaned me his Caddy. It would be his prize at the chess club: to brag about how the TV star had asked to borrow his car. But Sute was gone, and too mysteriously distressed to call now. Then Collier thought: Jiff! I’ll bet he’s got a car! I’m sure he’d loan it to me in a heartbeat…

Collier was about to head back to the inn but stopped in the street. Two blocks down, he was pretty sure he spotted Jiff walking into a store.

He followed the clean street down, ducking whenever it appeared he’d been recognized. This celebrity crap is getting on my nerves. I should’ve grown a beard… When he got closer to the store, he realized it wasn’t a store. It was that place he’d seen last night.

THE RAILROAD SPIKE, read the awning sign.

Just what I need, another bar…

A swing door with a circular window opened into murky darkness. Cigarette stench smacked him in the face, and the place smelled like stale Miller Lite. A long bar descended deep, with padded stools as though the place had once been a diner. Collier peered through murk but saw no sign of Jiff. A woman sat alone in a booth, applying lipstick, while several men eyed him from another booth. The bar itself stood tenantless.

What a dive, Collier thought.

A tall barkeep cruised slowly down to his spot. His apparel seemed off-the-wall and then some: a leather vest with no shirt beneath it, and he had a haircut that oddly reminded Collier of Frankenstein’s monster. He held a shot in his hand, slapped it down on the bar, and slid it to Collier.

“That’s a tin roof, just for you,” the guy said in a wrestler’s voice.

“A tin roof?” Collier questioned.

The keep rolled his eyes. “It’s on the house.”

“Uh, thanks,” Collier said, dismayed. Damn, I hate shots, and I don’t want to stay if Jiff’s not here. But he’d feel rude in declining. He sat down at the cigarette-burned bar top. Collier downed the shot. Not bad, even though I HATE shots. “Thanks. That was pretty good.”

“Glad you liked it, Mr. Collier, and like I said, that’s on the house. I heard you got to town yesterday. It’s damn exciting to have a TV star in my bar.”

It never ends, Collier’s mind droned.

“I love your show, and it’s good luck, you being a beer man and all.” The keep extended a huge hand behind him, to a row of beer taps. “We’re not some redneck dump here, Mr. Collier. We’ve got the