Swag

by Elmore Leonard

  “That’s wild,” Barry said, a little awed. “It really is.”

  “No, what it is,” Frank said, “it’s a fucking shame.”

  A little before eleven they drove over to Woodward to find a liquor store open. They needed Scotch, vodka, and beer.

  “And grapefruit juice,” Stick said. Stick had got to the car first and he was driving. “All the broads I think’re drinking Salty Dogs. You taste one?”

  “They’re having a good time,” Frank said. “Everybody is. I think there’s only one turd in the bunch and she left. No, maybe there’s two, I don’t know.”

  “Who do you mean?”

  “That Irish broad, the nurse.”

  “She’s all right. She’s going through her first change.”

  “I’ll check it out,” Frank said. “That cute little housewife, I think she’s another sleeper. Her husband’s busy with Jackie, looking down her kitty outfit. Or I could steer him over to Karen. Yeah, I could do that. She’d keep him busy. Christ, her appetite, she’d eat him up.”

  Stick glanced over. “You wouldn’t mind that?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You wouldn’t care if he got her in the sack?”

  “Why should I?”

  “I just wondered.”

  “Karen’s all right,” Frank said. “You know, nice build and all. Maybe a little bigger than she looks. I’d say she goes about one thirty-five. But she’s kind of bossy. You see her there? Like she’s the hostess, getting Jackie to pass the cheese and crackers. That’s the way she is. In the sack she says, Okay, that’s enough of that, now do this. Yeah, that’s it right there. A little more. No, a little up. That’s it, good. Okay, the other thing again. All right, let’s try this. It’s like doing it by the fucking numbers.” Frank put his head back on the seat cushion, relaxed, comfortably high. “It’s something,” he said. “All that scratch in one place. You believe it?”

  “You don’t say that anymore,” Stick said. “Now you say, ‘Well, here we are.’ ”

  “That’s right. Well, here we are. And you say, ‘You sure?’ Say it.”

  “You sure?”

  “You bet your ass I’m sure,” Frank said. “That’s a quiz show on TV. It isn’t really, but those dumb broads, they believe anything you tell them. Hey, am I sure? You better believe it I’m sure, because we got it fucking knocked and it’s going to get even better. I don’t know what happened to Marlys. I saw her this afternoon, I told her stop by, she wasn’t doing anything. What’s tomorrow?”

  “Sunday.”

  “All right we’ll wait’ll Monday, we’ll go down there, I’ll show you around. It’s not worked out yet, you understand, but I want you, I think you ought to start to get the feel of the place.”

  “I’ve been to Hudson’s, Frank. Lots of times.”

  “Upstairs, where the offices are?”

  “I think so.”

  “End of the day,” Frank said, “they leave fifty bucks in the cash registers, everything else goes upstairs.”

  Stick was a little high but alert, moving along in the night traffic on North Woodward, watching for a liquor store that was still open. He didn’t want to get in an argument with Frank or even a discussion with him now. It would be pointless. Frank would start yelling and wouldn’t remember anything.

  Stick said, “You look on your side.”

  He saw it then, in the next block across the street, the neon sign and the lights inside, and felt himself relax again.

  “There’s a place, Frank. It’s still open.”

  They parked in front. Going in, Frank said, “What do we need? J&B, vodka?”

  “Grapefruit juice,” Stick said. “I don’t think they’ll have it. Maybe.”

  He asked the clerk behind the counter, a neat little gray-haired man with rimless glasses, and the clerk said, “Yes sir, right over there. All your juices.”

  Stick got four big cans and brought them to the counter. Frank was ordering the liquor. Stick went over to the cooler and pulled out a case of Stroh’s, the brand the young executives were drinking. Walking back to the counter with it, where the clerk was waiting, he saw Frank up by the front of the store.

  “We got everything?”

  “I’ll be right back,” Frank said. He went out the door.

  There were three bottles of J&B and three top-priced Smirnoffs on the counter. The clerk was putting them one at a time into an empty liquor case.

  “That be it?” the clerk asked.

  “I guess a couple bottles of tonic,” Stick said. He got potato chips and Fritos from a rack, a can of mixed nuts. The clerk was coming back with the tonic. He stopped, his eyes wide open behind the rimless glasses. Stick looked around.

  Frank was coming toward the counter with a grin on his face, his Colt Python in one hand and Stick’s Smith & Wesson in the other.

  “What the fuck,” Frank said. “Right?”

  Stick almost said his name. It was right there—Frank, you dumb shit.

  But they were into it already and it wasn’t something you could call off and say, Oops, just a minute, let’s start over. Or tell the guy you were just kidding.

  No, he had to take the poor scared-shitless clerk into the backroom and tie him up with masking tape and paste a strip of it over his mouth, while Frank, the dumb shit, was out there cleaning the cash register. Stick didn’t say a word to the clerk. He laid him on the floor and patted his shoulder, twice, telling the guy with the touch to be calm and not to move.

  He still didn’t say anything out in the store again. He picked up the cardboard case and took it to the car, got in and waited while Frank brought out a case of Scotch and a case of Jack Daniel’s and put them on the back seat.

  Leaning in he said, “You think while we’re at it we should grab some more beer?”

  Stick, waiting behind the wheel, said, “Get in the fucking car.”

  When Frank’s door slammed, Stick took his time pulling away from the curb and working the T-bird into the stream of traffic, his eyes going to the mirror to watch the headlights coming up behind them.

  “I’d say we got five, six hundred,” Frank said. “You missed the wad in the guy’s pocket. I got it, I went back there for the cases. Let’s see, plus a couple hundred worth of booze, just like that. Not bad for a quick trip to the store, uh?”

  Stick didn’t answer.

  “You’re not going to talk to me now?” Frank said. “Is that my punishment? For Christ sake, you saw the guy, the place is empty. You can’t pass up something like that, it’s too good.”

  “We’re in a car,” Stick said, “in your name. The registration, the plates.”

  “All right—this one time, it’s an exception. There it is, you got to make up your mind that instant. So it’s done and nobody saw us.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Because I didn’t see anybody. You got to see somebody for them to see you.”

  “Somebody could’ve been coming in,” Stick said. “They see Twogun in there, for Christ sake, and they get out. But the car’s sitting there, right? And they could’ve gotten the number.”

  “All right—we get home, we report it stolen.”

  “Frank, a dozen witnesses up there, they know we went out. The guy in the store, it’d take him one second to pick us out of a lineup.”

  “Hey, Ernest,” Frank said, “don’t be so fucking earnest, all right? It was a spur-of-the-moment thing. It’s over, it’s done. You want to live by the book all the time, is that it?”

  “You wrote the book, ten rules for success and happiness,” Stick said. “I didn’t.”

  Neither of them said anything else until they reached the apartment building and Stick turned into the private parking area.

  “There’s a spot, right by the door.”

  “I already saw it,” Stick said. He eased the T-bird into the space, turned off the ignition and the headlights.

  Frank opened his door and paused. “You know something?”


  Stick waited. “What?”

  “I been thinking. I bet we end up with Karen and Jackie,” Frank said. “I mean if Marlys doesn’t show.”

  “That’s what you been thinking, uh?”

  “Yeah. Which one you want?”

  17

  THERE WEREN’T AS MANY PEOPLE, though it was still smoky and smelled of incense and the noise level was high. Somebody had taken off Loretta Lynn and put on one of Frank’s Mantovanis. The quiet, good-looking Ron had passed out on Stick’s bed, smelling like he’d thrown up. Stick came out to the bar and looked around as he made a drink.

  Arlene wasn’t there. Or the junior executive who’d been admiring her jewelry.

  Frank came over to make a drink. “The place’s thinning out. We’ll have to get it going again.”

  Stick didn’t say anything. He wasn’t angry, he was tired. He wasn’t upset about the guy passed out on his bed, he wanted to go sit down someplace where it was quiet. He thought of Arlene again. He’d like to get with her and fool around a little. Except she wasn’t here.

  “I don’t think Marlys’s coming,” Frank said. “We better get a couple before they’re all taken.” He looked around the room, his gaze going past Mary Kay on the sofa. “I don’t know, it’s getting pretty thin.”

  He knew Sonny had left. He didn’t see Donna or Arlene. Jackie was smashed. Karen—maybe.

  Gordon, Donna’s boyfriend, came over with two empty glasses.

  “Where’s Donna?” Frank asked him, “in the can?”

  “She left,” Gordon said. “I told her I’d be down in a little while. It’s my Saturday, but I’m having a very interesting conversation with Karen.”

  “It’s your Saturday?”

  “Every other Saturday I spend the night with Donna,” Gordon said.

  “What if you felt like doing it on a Tuesday night?”

  Gordon was intently measuring an ounce and a half of vodka into each glass. He used the stainless-steel shot glass and had been measuring ounces and a half for over four hours.

  “Sometimes Tuesday night,” Gordon said, “if there’s a special reason. See, Donna doesn’t work on Wednesday.”

  “She rations it, uh?” Frank said. “She afraid she’s going to run out?”

  “No, she’s got an idea about not overdoing anything. See, Donna’s very parental. Usually she’s into her critical parent. She uses should a lot. You should do this, you shouldn’t do that. Then on Saturday, every other Saturday, she allows herself to get into her nurturing parent. Now Karen”—Gordon looked over to where she was sitting on the floor against a pile of orange and yellow pillows, still in her bikini—“Karen is very visceral. She feels and acts instinctively and has quite a lot of natural child in her.”

  “You’re going to find out,” Frank said, “she’s got a lot of mama in her, too.”

  Gordon held the can of grapefruit juice poised over the glasses. He seemed interested and a little surprised.

  “Are you into transactional analysis?”

  “Uh-unh,” Frank said, “but I’ve been into Karen.” He looked around to get Stick’s reaction. Stick wasn’t there.

  There were two Arlenes looking at him, the one holding the door partly open, wearing a man’s white shirt over her bikini, and a life-size cutout of her on the other side of the room, the one Arlene pouting, the other smiling in her silver Hi-Performance Cams outfit and white boots.

  Arlene said, “I don’t know if I want to talk to you. I don’t see you all week, you don’t call—”

  “I came by here, twice, you weren’t home,” Stick said.

  “You don’t pay any attention to me, you’re busy talking to the other girls, putting your arms around them.”

  “How about you and the guy on the floor?”

  “You told me to be nice to him.”

  “Is he here?”

  “He got sick.”

  “Arlene,” Stick said, “I haven’t been feeling too good myself all week. I went to see a doctor, he checked me over, gave me a prescription—”

  Arlene was showing a little concern. “What’s wrong with you?”

  “I went to the drugstore, gave the prescription to the pharmacist?”

  “Yeah?”

  “He said, ‘You want this filled?’ I said, ‘No, it’s a holdup note in Latin, you dumb shit.’ ”

  She laughed and he was in.

  Sitting down next to Mary Kay, alone on the sofa, Frank said, “Honey, you cook any good?”

  Mary Kay looked at him with filmy eyes.

  “Why?”

  “I’m making conversation. You tell me what you like and I’ll tell you what I like. Move over a little.” He pulled an LP out from under him and sailed it at the hi-fi.

  “If you want to talk, why don’t you talk about something real,” Mary Kay said.

  “Okay. How do you like that Mantovani? Nice, uh?”

  “It sounds like cafeteria music.”

  “What do you like, then?”

  “Nothing you’ve got, I looked. Country-western and Mantovani.”

  “What’re you,” Frank said, “you get a little high, you like to argue?”

  “I’m not arguing, I’m telling you what I don’t like.”

  “You’re a nurse, RN. I thought you were very sympathetic, got along with people, like to make them happy and all.”

  “Where’d you hear that?”

  “Really,” Frank said quietly. “I bet you are sympathetic . . . kind. I can see it in your eyes, you care about people.”

  “I tried,” Mary Kay said. “I used to knock myself out being nice. And you know what you get? You get stepped on. If you’re nice to people, they’re nice to you? That’s a lot of crap. They use you, give you the worst jobs. ‘Sullivan, take care of One Oh Four—’ ”

  “Who’s Sullivan?”

  “I’m Sullivan. ‘Right away, Sullivan. One Oh Four’s painting his wall with shit again.’ That’s what I get all night, things like that.”

  “This person,” Frank said, “actually paints with it?”

  “Smears it on the wall. Sometimes he eats it.”

  “Jesus,” Frank said. He took the smudged glass from her hand. “Here, let me freshen you up.” He fixed both of them a drink—Mary Kay’s in a clean glass—came back and sat down again, close to her.

  “You forgot the salt.”

  “You shouldn’t use salt. It’s not good for you.” Frank laid his arm along the back of the couch and let his hand fall lightly on Mary Kay’s shoulder.

  “Listen, let me tell you something,” he said, using his quiet tone again. “People who care, people who feel, are nice to one another. They make each other happy.”

  “I heard that,” Mary Kay said. “All my life I heard it. And if you don’t mind my saying, or whether you mind or not—”

  “Wait, don’t say it, Mary Kay.” He turned her face gently and stared at her with his nice-guy expression. “All right?” Her lips were parted; there was a fresh pimple scar at the corner of her mouth. “You have to trust people, Mary Kay. No matter what kind of deals you’ve been handed, you have to go on trusting and believing.”

  “In what?”

  “In yourself, in your own right to . . . have a good time and enjoy life. People need people.” Frank paused, trying to think of the words to the song. “People who need people . . . lonely people needing people—” He was improvising now. “You know what I mean? They share their loneliness and find something.”

  “I get so tired of it,” Mary Kay said.

  “I know,” Frank said. He was pretty tired himself, but he moved in closer. “I know.”

  “Why do I have to smile all the time and be nice when I don’t feel like it?”

  “You don’t, honey. You should do what you feel like doing.”

  She snuggled against him, closing her eyes. “God, I get tired. The same thing all the time. Sometimes my face aches from smiling when I don’t even want to.”

  “Listen, Mary Kay, how’d y
ou like to stretch out and get comfortable?”

  “Hmmm?”

  “Go to your place, where it’s quiet. What do you think?”

  “I don’t know if I could make it down the stairs, I’m so tired.”

  “Well, I guess I could help you,” Frank said.

  Mary Kay sighed. “You’re a nice person, you know that?”

  “I try to be,” Frank said.

  There was one picture Stick especially liked, Arlene kneeling with her back arched, winking as she kissed the knob of a Hi-Performance Four-Speed Shifter. There were shots of Arlene at the Nationals and at hot-rod shows and conventions. Arlene said the SEMA show was her favorite. Stick said he guessed it would be. He didn’t ask her what See-Ma meant. He fixed them a couple more drinks and brought them over to the couch where Arlene was holding open the big album and got to see pictures of her posing with “Big Daddy” Don Garlits, Tom “Mongoose” McEwan, and Don “The Snake” Prudhomme. She pointed them out and named them. She said she also had their autographs on a pair of her panties as a joke, if he wanted to see them. Stick said he’d look at anything she showed him.

  All right, then.

  The second album she got out wasn’t as big as the first one and there weren’t any shots of Hi-Performance machinery in it or silver outfits or white boots, either. It was Arlene in her birthday suit, skinny hips, perky boobs, and all, like a little girl posing for exotica. Stick said they were really cute pictures of her and found out her friend was a camera nut and owned three Nikons that cost about a thousand dollars each.

  He wondered if she showed him the nude pictures on purpose. Whether she did or not they were working.

  When she went in the bathroom to take a leak—that’s what she said, “Be right back, I got to take a leak”—Stick picked up the two drinks and headed for the bedroom. He heard the toilet flush and the door open and then Arlene’s voice out in the other room.

  “Hey, where are you?”

  He let her find him, lying on the bed in his striped shorts with the two drinks on the night table. Arlene said, “I suppose you want me to take my rings off.”