by Dean Ing
Vangie tried. Ms. Schultheis, it transpired, was attending a convention. At the Dallas Market Center. “Ahh,” said Vangie, when Wes clarified it for her. “She’s supposed to be flacking our Shorthaulers in Dallas, where Weatherby just happens to be, but instead, she and that cowpoke - ”
“She can do both,” Wes cut in calmly. “Let me remind you that it’s not altogether coincidence because Weatherby and I are in the same business. And Alma had the idea for our display back in, um, April. Before she even met that cowpoke, as you call him. They’re just getting away for a few days, is all.”
“And rubbing shoulders with Joseph A. Weatherby,” she riposted. “A pity you couldn’t manage it yourself.”
“Who says I can’t,” he said suddenly, reaching down to scratch abraded skin under that ankle holster. “Rogan will be there. It’s neutral turf.” Brightening, “For that matter, you can come with me.”
Her face cleared for a moment, then fell. “I think Mr. Weatherby might not like that, on several counts. And don’t kid yourself, he would soon know if I were there. That man has more tripwires than a bayou farmer.”
“Book me on the next flight,” he said, slapping his desktop, rising. “A room, too, all under the name of Lou Boyle.” He spelled it out for her, an old racer’s joke that Vangie missed completely. “I’ll toss a few things in a suitcase. Call me at home with the flight booking. ”
He was at the door when she said, “Wes?” He turned. “Be sure and wear your little ankle bracelet.”
“That’s mainly what gets checked through with the suitcase,” he replied, and returned to kiss her. Judging her expression, he added, “Relax, honey. It’s going to be all right,” and made sure he exited smiling.
The set of her jaw had said, clearer than words, that Vangie feared for him. Whatthehell, he thought, Alma and Rogan have different reasons but they won’t like it either. Add Weatherby into the equation and I’m the only one who does like it. Which is as good a reason as any to do it.
* * * *
Once he found his way out of that county-sized airport near Dallas, Wes was almost to his destination. He felt the faintest pang of remorse when registering at the Marriott; Alma might never forgive him. But it was next to the action, all right. Weatherby was not registered there, but a man could tell just from watching the flow of clientele that the Market Center Marriott was, for the time being, the biggest dang truck stop in all creation. It was almost dinnertime, but Wes registered into the convention as Lou Boyle and checked the exhibit map.
Alma Schultheis, sitting near a sparkling Peel Shorthauler where she could change Peel Transit videotapes and exercise her best marketing smile, surprised him. “My Lord, look who’s coming to dinner,” she cried happily, and stood to embrace him. “You devil, I’ll bet you’re just checking up on me!” Then she saw his name tag. “Lube oil? I don’t get it. I mean, I get it, but...” Her eyes widened. ‘ ‘You’re meeting someone,” she accused softly, with a half-smile that said, “naughty boy.”
“Could be; not for the reason you think,” he said, and explained, ending with, “I think a hotel lobby is about as good a place as any. ”
‘ ‘Would you feel better with another good man beside you?’ ’ Her eyes sparkled with her secret, and Wes chose to let her enjoy the telling. “Glenn is here.”
He registered surprise and nodded. “I’ll bet he’s at Six Rags, trying the thrill rides.”
“Not him. He purely hates any ride where he’s not at the controls.” She waved around her where crowds were thinning for the evening, and cargo vehicles of many kinds squatted silently, gleaming with paint and pinstriping. “He’s tried on most of these rigs by now. He’d be doing a slalom between the pillars if they’d let him.”
Wes laughed and agreed, curiously lighthearted to find that Alma accepted his sudden appearance so easily. She was showing him the packet of cards signed by truckers interested in Peel Shorthaulers when Rogan appeared, at first with some reserve. It disappeared when Wes divulged his reason for anonymity.
Rogan asked, “You figure on just walking up to this guy, having it out in front of God and everybody?”
It might not be all that traumatic, Wes explained. Joey Weatherby could be veiy smooth, especially when he saw an advantage in smoothness. “But it might be nice if I had someone with me.”
“Me, for instance.”
“For instance,” Wes nodded. “But it’s barely possible there could be trouble.”
“You’re lookin’ at the regional distributor,” Rogan grinned. “Sure you’re ready for it?”
“I have a Walther PPK strapped to my right ankle. I’ll never get used to the thing,” Wes said. “I don’t suppose you’re armed.”
“Give me time to rustle up a long-neck bottle of Lone Star, and I will be,” Rogan promised.
And then Alma made an observation about machismo, and then Wes took them both to see what the Marriott’s menu boasted.
Wes was polishing off a Texas-style strawberry shortcake, with layers like stacked pancakes, when a smiling, fresh-faced young redhead in stylish lederhosen stopped by their table and, saying only “Ma’am,” to Alma, presented Wes with a note on Marriott stationery. The young man waited, his smile innocuous and unwavering, while Wes read.
Vangie was right about NTC tripwires. Aloud he said to the young man, “I’d be delighted. Would fifteen minutes be all right?”
“Yessir, I think so.”
“He may want to meet my chief test pilot, Mr. Rogan.” The smile broadened. “Two on two sounds good,” he said politely, and strode off.
“It takes good legs to wear those things,” Alma mused, watching him go.
“And better padding than he has, to hide that flat little piece he’s wearing,” Rogan remarked. “Should I order that beer now?”
Wes nodded. “Weatherby wants to see me at the Short-hauler. Good a place as any. News sure travels fast here.”
Alma’s eyes widened. “That darlin’ young man is a Weatherby thug?”
“Takes one to know one,” Rogan chuckled, and patted her shoulder, rising. “I’ll go by the bar, Mr. Peel. Alma, I’ll see you at the room. ’ ’
“Just like that,” she said to Wes in faintly outraged tones.
“You know he’ll make it up to you,” Wes said, signalling for a waiter.
“He’d better. You bring him back intact, John Wesley Peel.”
Wes paid the bill and found Glenn Rogan, thinking, But
why does Joey Weatherby want to see me?
****
Rogan had to make do with a bottle of Pearl, and kept it under his sport coat until they had reentered the display hall. The place was nearly innocent of passers-by at this hour, and as their heels generated hollow chirps of echo, Wes felt less secure. Then Rogan grinned at him, the same grin you trade with the guy strapped into the next car on the starting grid when you’re both trying to deny the flutter of leathery wings in your bellies, and Wes grinned back. If and when that flag dropped, you both knew what to do. . . .
Joey Weatherby pushed up from Alma’s folding chair, and his smile was strictly proforma. “Been a long time,” he said, reaching his immaculate manicure toward Wes. He introduced the redhead as Grover O’Grady; the deep-set eyes showed real interest when Wes introduced Rogan as the test pilot of Delta
One but, “The new breed of long-haulers looks pretty much like the old one,” was all he said, perhaps in the sincerest of compliments. He turned to Wes. “Why the cute name tag, Peel?”
“Actually, I just dropped in to see you. Seemed more informal this way.”
“Well, I’m damned,” Weatherby rumbled, and one thatched eyebrow went up. “You been trying to reach me by a third party, by any chance?”
“My third party. Used to be yours,” Wes said, with a faint smile.
Weatherby sucked a tooth, glanced up at the Shorthauler cab nearby, and jerked a thumb upward. “They tell me a Shorthauler’s seats are easy on the butt. What say the two of us t
ry ’em out?”
Wes realized that they could talk freely inside the cab and saw the faintest of nods from Rogan. Without a word, Wes hitched his gimpy leg up to the inset step, then swung into the driver’s seat, opening the other for Weatherby, offering his hand to help the big man puff into the adjacent seat.
Joey Weatherby sighed and leaned back. “Last thing I ever expected was a helping hand from Peel Transit. Funny how things work out,” he added, and bought thinking time by offering Wes his choice from a pocket humidor. Wes shook his head even before it occurred to him that poisoned cigars were not unheard of.
Weatherby chose one, lit up, adjusted his window. Then, “Sorry about the Broussard girl. It was just business.” “You’ve sent a lot of funny business my way,” said Wes laconically. “It’s not the kind that’ll help us get together. Ever.”
“Yeah, well - a lot has happened, the last couple of weeks. Enough to set me thinking. Maybe I can make it up to you.” Now Wes was smiling. “That doesn’t sound like the Joey Weatherby I knew and loved.”
The crow’s-feet crinkled, nearly hiding the man’s gaze. “You keep being cute, I’ll get the idea you’ve got no respect. ” Vigorous headshake from Wes, “Never think that, Weath-erby. If I didn’t respect the hell out of you, I wouldn’t waste so much time wishing we were closer together.” He paused, gazed directly at the big man. “But since an incident at my house a few weeks ago, I wonder if I should add fear to that respect.’’
Something unreadable passed across Weatherby’s face. He toyed with his cigar ash, using a little finger with a one-carat stone on it, and nodded. “Don’t believe everything you read in the scandal sheets, Peel. I’ve already had some federal cops around, oh, hat-in-hand, very polite and all, but they had the same idea. They don’t worry me worth shit. You know why?” “I’d like to.”
“Because they’re good, and they can sniff a clean smell as well as a dirty one. And the NTC is clean. Anyhow,” he went on, the square mouth turning down at the edges in reminiscence, “that ain’t my style, as Casey said. We don’t hire anybody who’d stuff a load of dynamite up his ass.”
At Wes’s laugh, both Rogan and O’Grady looked up quickly, then returned to their careful, noncommittal discussion. Wes adjusted his own window a trifle to wave the smoke away, then said, “Well, the little fella sure knew how to break up a party.”
“Uhm. And you figured the NTC might have some more party-poopers out there, somewhere, so you decided to sit down with me about it on my own turf.”
“I thought of it as neutral,” Wes said.
Weatherby’s entire frame shook with mirth. “Peel, you straight-arrows get me, you really do. This place is as much my backyard as I want it to be. So are the interstate highways when it comes to the rough stuff, and if we want it to be. But leave it; you’re safe as my own brother-in-law, God rot him.” “You do wonders for a man’s confidence,” Wes grumbled.
“Good. Because somewhere out there are some more people who want you in little pieces. You’ll need more help than a sidekick with a beer bottle to stop ’em.”
Wes sat up, repressing a shiver. “I’d like a few specifics.” Weatherby hung the cigar out the window; waved a clearer path through the blue-tinted air. “You wouldn’t be running a chicken-wire, would you?” Then, seeing the blank look from Wes, “A wire; a microphone, Peel,” he said, with elaborate patience.
In answer, Wes lifted his arms. The big man ran thick hands up and down his rib cage, his arms, then leaned back. “You could still be bugged, the feds have some great stuff these days. And so do we. That has a bearing on what I’m gonna tell you, and it’s strictly to save your personal hide. So I’m counting on you to be clean of wires. You want to take a little walk? Come back in a few minutes, no questions asked?” Weatherby’s face was straight, but his eyes held mild amusement. There was none in Wes’s as he said, “No wires. That’s not why I came.”
The big barrel chest was heaving again. “Oh, you straight-arrows. Well, no offense, Peel. I would’ve worn one, in your place.” He let his chuckles subside, then went on earnestly. “You know why guys like you survive against guys like me? I’ll tell you why: because of the fucking feds, is why!” With lowered voice, “And I was twenty years in this business before I realized that it was a good thing. Sure, there’s cops on the take, and stupid cops, and bad laws. But by and large, the system works. I’ve got grandkids, Peel; if I thought there was a better system someplace else, I’d try to have ’em grow up there.
“Only I haven’t found one as good. Canada? Pulling itself in two. Switzerland? Gimme a break. We’re stuck with this system, and it’s in deep shit and getting deeper, thanks to energy trouble and NASA trouble and just plain don’t-give-a-damn trouble. I got a grandson, won’t wipe his nose without he gets a quarter for it, and he better get the quarter now, for a goddamn video game, you know what I mean, Peel? We could be heading where England is, and by God I won’t have it!”
Weatherby’s big fist raised to strike the padded dash. He lowered it again, with a muttered, “Remind me not to shout. O’Grady is the nervous type, you don’t want to take his smile too seriously. Anyhow, it gravels the shit out of me to say it, but my priest claims it’ll be good for my soul: you’re more important to the future of this country than anybody in the NTC. Now,” he growled, “ask me how I know.”
“You have my full attention,” Wes said. “How?”
Long pause before, “You ever hear of a little double-dome named Dr. Bruce Hassan Winthorp?”
Wes tried to keep everything in order; wished he did have a recorder to keep it all straight. It seemed that NTC board member Tony Ciano had given an interview to a man claiming a scholarly interest in the NTC, and it hadn’t taken Ciano long to intuit a hidden agenda. The long and short of it was that if the economic future of the NTC was shaky because of Peel Transit, and if John Wesley Peel was such a thorn in the side of the NTC, well, perhaps that thorn should be plucked. Permanently. All very theoretical, very indirect, very innocent and full of questions instead of assertions. But Ciano thought the little bastard had “Federal Sting Operation” written all over him. It was entrapment, of course, but . . .
Tony Ciano had the elegant little scholar followed to a motel; got a friendly inquiry run on the name p.nd number on the credit card he’d used for his room; and learned enough to approach Joey with some solid facts as well as a tape of the whole effing interview. Ciano smelled smoke and, after handing the facts to Joey, wanted nothing further to do with the whole mess.
With the utmost caution, Joey’s own people, men with the innocent smiles of a Grover O’Grady, flitted mothlike around
the neighborhood of Professor Winthorp, around Grayson University and, in point of fact, around Winthorp’s anal-reten-tively neat bungalow. Unless the feds were utterly and terminally off their collective gourds with this choice of a stinger, this butter-wouldn’t-melt-in-his-mouth midwest professor was a genuine loony with no connections to Uncle Whiskers. But maybe with a few connections to someplace else. The man had made two calls to public telephones in Michigan within a week, then had driven away from the bungalow in his Caddie with two big suitcases. Somehow they had botched his tail. The tapes were gibberish, but a tame NTC language hotshot identified it as a Middle East dialect. One word that kept recurring on the tapes was one you didn’t have to be an Ayrab to understand: It was “Peel.”
“So there you are,” Weatherby finished, stubbing out his cigar in the Shorthauler’s ashtray. “With the new laws against bugging, or use of credit cards, or hell, half the stuff our people did checking this fucker out, I’d just as soon not have to tell anybody what I know, much less how I know.”
Wes, with wry good humor: “And you told me only because of your priest, and me not even Catholic?”
“Shit, I don’t care if you’re Mr. Harry Krishna, the principle’s the same. Anyhow, I drew the old Confessor, and I knew what he’d say. I put it to him this way: I’ve got this business competitor who�
��s bustin’ my balls by doing things different. But now I find his way is right. I’m pretty sure it’s right because some of the world’s sneakiest people want me to pop this guy. They seem to be people who are out to put this country in the dumper, and so far, they’re doing pretty well. They probably want this guy popped because his ways work better than mine for my country as a whole; and it looks like they’ve already tried to pop him themselves, and, uh, blew it. Those foreign fuckers thought I was on their side, Peel! That’s not this country’s side; I’m certain of that. Ciano might not think it through this way, but that’s how I see it.
So I’m sure not gonna have this guy popped; this is my country, too.
“Some of these old priests can ask questions that make a man squirm, you know it? So then I ask mine. Question, Father: Can I sit back and watch, or must I tell this competitor where the heat is coming from?” Weatherby waved an idle hand as if considering a matter of little importance. “So I get this lecture about the liigher good, just like I expected - and by the way, you don’t want to go and quote me on any of this. Man in my position isn’t smart to let on he makes real bottom-line decisions based on, uh, Providence.”
“You can say ‘God’ without losing my respect, Weatherby. Or ‘patriotism,’ either; but I know what you mean.”
“I wonder if you do; you Protestants have it easy, Peel. If I didn’t tell you about that confession, well, you might not take this seriously enough. Telling you about it is enough to bag me some Hail Marys.” Weatherby’s laugh asked Wes not to.
“You can say ‘sin’ to me, too,” Wes replied. “You don’t think I get stuck between thou-shalt-nots?” Wes remembered old Nell Peel, perhaps not so old at that, now that Wes himself was nearing fifty, and thought of the old girl’s role as his spiritual advisor and yes, sometimes his confessor. “I’ve made some sacred promises that give me more trouble, the longer I live to see how little sense they made. But I made ’em, and now it’s too late to start over - what’s funny?”