by Jack Bunker
He’d taken her from a weak-chinned finger who was already betraying his partners. He’d never fooled around on the job much, but the man’s lack of loyalty offended him. And, well, the obvious, low cleavage and long legs that she paraded around in front of him like it was on sale, made it easy to make an exception. Now, even at fifty, she was hot enough to melt the ice on the front walk. That joke had made her smile for the last fifteen years.
The lake house was the perfect backdrop for that joke. In the beginning they had come here only during the winter months, when the lake was abandoned. The rest of the time they’d lived in hotels and on room service. Once or twice a year, he’d pull a job. But here, Grace said, they could be themselves. And perhaps they were. Sometimes Hobbs had trouble remembering what his real name was, especially up here in the snow. And his self? He honestly had no idea.
He was the job. And when he wasn’t on the job, he was antsy. As he was now. He didn’t know how much longer he could hang around here. Nothing had come together in a while. Everything seemed harder now. As if the world had changed. But maybe he was just older.
Once Grace had teased him about retiring. It had started harmlessly enough. She was stroking her fingers through his closely cropped gray hair. She told him how the years looked good on him. And that this gray was a sign that it was time for Hobbs to retire so they could grow old together.
He had stiffened and turned, gotten up from in front of the fireplace, and fixed himself a drink. She had followed, missing the signal, still teasing. Telling the old man to pack it in. The times were moving too fast for him. It was one of the only times he had hit her, and he had immediately regretted it.
She had turned away and held her hand to her face for a long time. Then she had turned back, looking at the blood from her lip. She had reached down with her bloody hand and grabbed a few cubes of ice. She’d brought them to her lips, trying to be tough girl about it, but Hobbs could see the tears in her eyes.
He had shaken his head and almost apologized. She had thrown the ice in his face and kissed him, warm and salty and tasting of blood. They’d made love, right there, as they had the first time—when they had cheated death and the law and had made it out alive. When they were done, that’s when Hobbs had realized there was something wrong with him. A hole in the water of his soul that he just couldn’t fill.
They had gotten away with it. She once. He many times. They had escaped death and betrayal and jail. This was supposed to be it. This life with this beautiful woman, not rich, but beyond the cares of money, this was the prize. How many had he seen go down to the grave or up to the pen? And as they breathed their last or as the cellblock clanged shut behind them, this—this very moment that Hobbs had—wasn’t this what they had prayed for?
For Hobbs, it was not enough.
He rubbed his eyes. In the darkness behind his lids he saw the glassy-eyed squirrels in a pile below the tree, saw them disappearing into the sack. Saw the sack sinking into the blackness of the lake water.
From the house he heard the phone ring. Not a shitty electronic warble, but the honest sound that was made when one piece of metal slammed into another, bell-shaped piece of metal.
Grace waved him up to the house. The bell tolled for him.
As he walked to the house, he thought maybe the thing that drove him was the same thing that caused the squirrels to climb over a pile of dead bodies for a chance at the feeder.
In the kitchen he picked up the phone and said, “Hobbs.”
On the other end of the line was a gruff voice, the kind that sounded as if it ate cigars for lunch. The voice said, “I’m closing the place down. If you want to pay ya tab or ya respects, come ahead. If you don’t, then the hell wit’ cha.” Then the voice hung up.
“Who was it?” asked Grace.
Hobbs replaced the phone on its hanger and said, “I gotta go see a guy.”
“When?” she asked.
“Tomorrow.”
“But it’s your birthday!” she said.
Hobbs went back outside.
SEVEN
Smeagles had been an old-fashioned kind of neighborhood bar in an old-fashioned kind of neighborhood. It was the kind of dive you could depend on. One that would lend money, store luggage, and, most importantly for Hobbs, take messages. It was owned and operated by Sean Cleary, a former associate of Hobbs’s who had decided that for his “retirement” he would open a sports bar.
Cleary had gotten the money to buy the joint from working a bank job with Hobbs back in the salad days. They had knocked off the Farmers and Merchants Bank of Altoona by firing a stolen howitzer through the lock mechanism. They hadn’t wasted time on that job, they’d backed a dump truck right through the brick wall and fired the gun right from the bed.
They were in and out in under ten minutes. A noisy ten minutes, but then that was back when noisy was OK. No way in hell anybody could pull that job today. Too many cameras. Too many cell phones, sensors, and radios. The cops would come on like a hammer. Hell, cops didn’t even look like cops anymore. They all dressed as if they were going to invade the Middle East after lunch. Acted like it too.
When Cleary bought the bar, the guys he worked with regular-like were certain he would be back on the job inside a year. How long could it take to drink the inventory? What a storybook mistake. Literally the start of a joke. So this Irishman buys a bar…
But he hadn’t. To start with, he was too broke. Too broke to even buy a sign. So he had borrowed a brush and painted “Smear ’Em, Eagles!” on a piece of stolen plywood. He propped his “sign” next to the door. That’s all it took. Joint was packed from then on in. As time passed and the sign faded, the name was shortened. When Cleary sprang for a new sign, the place was Smeagles and that was it.
The neighborhood around it was a hell of a lot nicer than it had been when he opened. Old buildings had turned to condos, new condos had been put up. And Smeagles had thrived. As Hobbs circled the block looking for a parking space, he felt a small twinge of gratitude for that. Times may change, he thought, but Smeagles would remain.
As he pushed into the darkness of the bar, the smell was familiar. A place where life’s frustrations were vented on the liver. But something was wrong. It was bright. As bright as he had ever seen it. There were fluorescent lights on the ceiling. They looked as if they had been there since light was invented, but Hobbs had never seen them turned on before.
“We’re closed for renovations,” said a young man in a tie. He didn’t look up from his sheaf of plans laid out on a table.
Hobbs didn’t even break stride.
“I said…,” said the man, but trailed off when Hobbs stepped uncomfortably close to him. The younger man took a step back.
“What’s this?” Hobbs asked.
“I…I…said,” said the young man in the tie.
“What’s your name?”
“Michael, who—”
“Where’s Cleary?”
From the back room Hobbs heard Cleary’s voice say, “Let that man alone, Son. He’s here to pay his tab!”
Cleary waddled out of the back, hitching up his pants up around his gut.
“Mikey, this here is one of my oldest surviving associates, Mr.—” He paused to let Hobbs fill in the rest.
“Caspar. Caspar, Ronald Caspar from Denver.”
“Yes, lad, Ronnie and me go way back.”
“Just not by that name?” Michael asked. He looked back and forth between his father and Hobbs. Then he shook his head. “I don’t want to know.”
“No,” said Hobbs, “you don’t. Cleary, what the fuck is this?”
“Progress, Mr. Caspar, pro-gress,” said Cleary with a smile that looked as if it had been used as a getaway car.
“I just need you to sign this, Dad, and I’m on my way,” said Michael.
Hobbs poured himself a short beer and took a seat at the bar while father and son tended to their business. When they were done, Mikey shut off the overhead lights. Cleary came over
and sat on the bar stool next to him.
“He’s takin’ over the place,” Cleary said without being prompted.
“You couldn’t have told me that over the phone?”
Cleary looked hurt. “Why, I thought you’d want to come by and pay your last respects to the place, such as it was. ’Fraid it’d be too much of a strain on your auld heart if you came by and the place had been all yuppified wi’out me warning you.”
Hobbs sipped his beer.
“I’m not detecting the proper note of gratitude for my enduring and undying friendship,” Cleary said, reaching over to clink his glass against Hobbs’s. “You know, it’s not yer fault yer bitter, Hobbsy, it all wen’ to shit when they shot Kennedy.”
Hobbs shook his head and made a noise in the back of his throat.
“Nah, you think about it. You’re slowin’ down now, or will be soon enough. You’ll see. You’ll have plenty of time to think. It’s time, Hobbs, it’s time. Time to shed the auld life like a tree weepin’ leaves in the fall. Time to step down and give the young ones a chance. I mean, can you believe it? The set of coincidences that had to occur for me to wind up with a boy like Michael. And then not to fuck him up so bad that he couldn’t get into college. And then have the kid actually graduate from college—work hard and get a loan to buy his old man out. Who would loan the likes of us money?”
“Nobody ever needed to,” Hobbs said.
“Ah, but listen to me, gettin’ all maudlin and weepin’ like the old Irish bastard I am.” He raised his glass. “No reason for me to be cryin’. I’m just about to start my second retirement. A lotta guys don’t even live to see one.”
“Some guys don’t even want one,” Hobbs said, quietly, into his beer.
“Don’t say that, Hobbs. Or Caspar or whatever you’re callin’ yourself these days for the purposes of trade. You put your feet up and enjoy your dotage.”
Hobbs sucked down the rest of his beer and planted the glass on the bar. “I’ll quit when I’m done. Last time I checked we were square. You call me here because you ran out of friends?”
“Someone asked for you.”
“Who?”
“Young fella, fulla sand.”
“Young fella? Heat?”
“I don’t think so.”
Cleary walked behind the bar and punched NO SALE on the ancient cash register. The hunk of metal jumped and popped open, sounding as if somebody had just slammed a meter maid between a pair of giant cymbals. He pulled a napkin from the drawer and slid it across the bar to Hobbs. Next to the phone number the name Junior was scrawled.
“You think I should hear him out?” asked Hobbs.
“I think you should fucking retire already, Hobbsy. But that’s fuck all. The question is, what do you think?”
Hobbs slid the napkin back across the bar. “Tell him to meet me.”
“Where?”
Hobbs told him. They talked about the details of the meet for a while, then Hobbs flipped a twenty out on the bar and left.
EIGHT
When Hobbs had asked how he’d recognize the kid, Cleary asked him, “Did ye ever find Waldo?”
Hobbs shook his head.
“Nothing? You’ve never read Where’s Waldo?”
Hobbs had just looked at him.
“Ye’ve no children, or grandchildren or nieces or nephews?”
Hobbs hadn’t changed his expression.
“Well it’s a fine idea of livin’ you’ve got for yourself if you don’t mind me saying so.”
“I don’t like kids.”
“How do you expect your memory will be preserved for posterity?”
“I don’t. Now how will I know him?”
“Believe me, you’ll know him, he’s a regular fashion plate, this one. Besides, I’ll tell him to find you. Just look for the dour old man who looks as out of place as a child molester.”
“I don’t like kids.”
“Well, you’ve picked a hell of a place for it, then.”
Hobbs had told Cleary he’d meet the kid on a bench in front of the entrance to the Wild One, the gigantic wooden roller coaster that cut right through the middle of Six Flags. Cleary had had a good laugh at that: “Amusement park. I said he was young, I didn’t mean he was a kid kid.”
So now Hobbs sat on a bench at Six Flags, surrounded by a never-ending stream of children. Their shrieks of delight and terror and their tantrums echoed from throughout the park. And he sat through all of it. In his gray work pants and white shirt, he was out of place, as if he had been left there from a time when the park ran in black and white. Every so often he mopped at the sweat on his neck and forehead.
He spotted the kid immediately. A punk, and a rich punk at that. Skinny jeans that looked like leggings, hat on sideways, a knit cap even though it was ninety goddamn degrees out here, and horizontally red-and-white-striped shirt. Freak show. Hobbs almost got up and walked away right then and there. But there was something about the way the kid walked. As if he was in on a secret that nobody else knew. Hobbs stayed put.
The kid sat next to him. He nodded hello, and then looked away as if he were waiting for someone else. Then he dug in his messenger bag and asked no one in particular, “Is your smart-phone encrypted?”
“I don’t have a phone. Wrong end of the leash,” said Hobbs.
Alan looked up sharply, losing his cool for a moment. Didn’t have a phone! But he reeled it back in quickly.
“I go see people. I talk to them. They call people. Then I talk to them to see how the call went,” said Hobbs.
“But for, like, friends, don’t you ever call friends? Or Facebook, like Facebook friends?”
“A friend is somebody who comes by to visit every once in a while; everybody else is just an asshole who wastes your time,” said Hobbs.
Alan let this sink in. “Well, good,” he blustered, trying to get to his original point. “’Cause that tower over there”—he nodded his chin to the cell tower silhouetted against the sky behind the Wild One—“it’s a fake. NSA or somebody dummied it up to practice cracking phones.”
He held up his phone. On the screen it read, “Unencrypted connection. Caution: The mobile network’s standard encryption has been turned off, possibly by a rogue base station (‘unknown’).” Alan continued smugly, “Anybody in this park, well, let’s just say all their nudie pictures belong to somebody else now.”
“Let’s ride the ride,” said Hobbs.
“You like roller coasters?” asked Alan with a snicker.
“No,” said Hobbs.
As they shuffled through the endless line, Alan tried to start a serious conversation, about the job. About what he could do for Hobbs.
“Save it,” was all Hobbs said.
By the luck of the draw, they were placed in the first car on the roller coaster. As the padded bar dropped over them, Hobbs said, “Let me see your phone.” Alan handed it over, confident that no force on earth could defeat its encryption. Hobbs called out to the guy working the ride. “Hey!” As soon as the guy looked, Hobbs tossed him the phone. The attendant bobbled it twice, then got it under control. “Hang on to that,” Hobbs said as the ride started.
“What the fuck? That’s my phone.”
“I don’t like being recorded. And I don’t like taking chances.”
As the roller coaster picked up speed, Alan was forced to yell into the wind, “My phone is secure from all that shit.”
“Yeah, but I don’t trust you.”
“Why should you?” asked Alan.
Hobbs smiled as the roller coaster chugged up the big hill at the start. As the first car went over the edge, and the coaster picked up speed, Hobbs said, “Give it to me.”
Alan did, as quickly as possible, pausing only when the coaster swung them around one of the sharper curves. An armored car full of cash, benefit payments, still made in cash to poor folks along the Florida Panhandle. The rest, cash paid to contractors working in and around Eglin Air Force Base.
When they g
ot off the ride, Hobbs asked, “You sellin’ or you want in?”
“I want in.”
Hobbs opened his mouth to say something and closed it again, afraid that what was going to come out wouldn’t be words. Goddamned roller coasters.
“Are you OK?” asked Alan.
“No,” said Hobbs.
“You look a little green.”
He leaned heavily on Alan, putting an arm around his shoulders. Then he held Alan in place as he threw up on the kid’s five-hundred-dollar sneakers. When he recovered himself he said, “I’m gonna look into it. If it checks out, I’ll be in Saint Louis in a week. Chase Park Plaza Hotel. I’ll be there as Ronald Caspar. Meet me.”
“Don’t you have a cell phone, or an e-mail address or something? I mean, what if it doesn’t check out? What if you change your mind? I mean, what is in Saint Louis? I would have wasted a trip.”
“Get a new pair of shoes,” said Hobbs. Then he walked away, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.
Neither of them stopped to look at the pictures of the last run of the roller coaster. A crowd gathered to laugh at the faces twisted in horror and delight as they flashed up on the screen. As the coaster had passed over the biggest drop on the run, the camera had captured Hobbs and Alan locked in conversation. While everyone else behind them was wide eyed and/or screaming, their eyes were locked on each other’s. It looked as if they were preparing to fight to the death in the middle of a plane crash.
NINE
Stomach still shaky, Hobbs pulled out of Six Flags and drove south. Two days later he was in Tallahassee.
Hobbs checked into a hotel and made a call from the lobby phone. He confused the desk clerk when he asked for a phone book, but after he described the item and its function, the clerk was able to dig one up.
Hobbs looked up a number, called, left a message, and went to sleep. A few hours later, the phone started ringing. Hobbs sat up in the darkened room, coughed hard, and got it on the fifth ring. “Yeah.”
“Why, Hobbs, what a pleasant surprise it was to get your call and to hear your voice,” said Lester Broyles Jr. in an accent that sounded as Southern, dipped in shit, and confident as if this slippery fucker had won the Civil War single-handedly.