The Man Offside

by A. W. Gray

  It was a tossup as to which stood out the most in traffic, Muhammed’s limo or Honeybear’s Ford. The Ford had a sparkling new pale green paint job, and black mud flaps with chrome lightning bolts covered the top portions of the rear gangster-wall tires. The hood ornament was a big chrome goose with its wings extended, and I had to sit up high in the seat in order to see over the silver bird. As a crowning touch Honeybear had installed Hollywood Glaspac twin mufflers; I hadn’t heard the crackling, rumbling noise made by Glaspacs since the sixties, and I wondered where Honeybear had found the muffler shop that still carried the things. So I was off and running. But I was going to have a hard time sneaking up on anyone.

  First I drove out to Redbird Shopping Mall and bought some more comfortable clothes. Plates Tyson’s disguise was so good that I’d quit worrying about anyone recognizing me, so I strolled right on into the mall among throngs of shoppers—working women mostly, poking here and there among the dress shops and lingering around the paperback counter at B. Dalton’s, checking out the week’s supply of historical romance bodice-rippers—and went straight to the Gap. There I bought a pair of soft Levi preshrunk jeans—I was surprised to find that my artificial fat pouches had increased my waist size to a thirty-eight—along with a pale blue T-shirt with the Gap’s logo across the front. From the Gap I moseyed on down to the Athlete’s Foot, where a pimply teenager with braces sold me a pair of white Reebok low-quarter sneakers. I went into the fitting room and changed my clothes, discarding my suit, tie, and built-up shoes in a wastebasket, then walked casually out of the mall. From there I drove the rumbling old Ford out to Highland Park and cruised the neighborhood around Senator James’s house.

  Ever since I’d watched the good senator cavort on his lawn while he and Cassel discussed the best way to get rid of me for good, I’d been forming an idea. Whatever scores I had to settle with Breaux, Cassel, and Company were going to come to a head in the next twenty-four hours, but James was an entirely different proposition. Whatever else James was into—in spite of what Muhammed had told me about the senator being a pawn, I wasn’t convinced that James was entirely clear of the dope and porno business—he had something coming for the way he’d treated his daughter. And no way was he coming to our party tomorrow night; he couldn’t afford to take the chance. So for the good senator to get what was coming to him I was going to do a little framing.

  First I cruised the alley running behind the houses on James’s block. It was a waste of time. The rear of the senator’s home was guarded by a high redwood fence with three wicked strands of barbed wire across the top; there were no hand- or footholds in the smooth redwood of the fence, so getting into James’s yard from the rear would have been a pretty good trick even if it hadn’t been for the wire. Just beyond the senator’s fence the alley became a dead end that overlooked Turtle Creek. I backed up, turned around, drove around to Beverly Drive, and parked on the bridge as close as possible to the curb. Then I took the bags of cocaine from the Samsonite case, carried them to the end of the bridge and down the dirt bank to the creek bed. There I crept along ten feet below the western wall of James’s Gothic home and looked for a good place to break in.

  Clods of soft dirt broke up under my feet; once I tripped on a root and nearly fell, catching myself with one outstretched hand and nearly dropping the cocaine into the foot-wide trickle of water. On my right, something slithered along the bank and wriggled into the stream. Probably a cottonmouth on the prowl.

  There was a waist-high, clipped hedge along the house, spanning beneath the six visible ground-floor windows. Lights shone in two of the windows: one with curtains drawn at the front of the house, and the drapeless, next-to-last window on my right. I gulped some moist creek-bed air and clambered up the bank to crouch beneath the lighted window with the drapes closed. There was a slit about an inch wide between the thick curtains, so I raised my head above the windowsill and peeked inside.

  I was looking at a formal living room. James was seated on a loveseat drinking a tiny stemmed glass of liqueur, probably cognac, along with a woman. The senator wore the same tennis outfit I’d seen earlier in the day. The woman was a statuesque brunette of around forty, who had the kind of figure that she kept in shape with lots of massages and tennis at the club. She wore a flowing white nightdress belted at the waist, and a big white diamond sparkled on her marrying finger. As I watched, James leaned close and said something to her. Her big bosom shook with laughter and she squeezed his thigh. In addition to the loveseat where the senator and his lady fair were seated, the room held a long velvet divan, several easy chairs, and a concert grand piano. Several oil paintings hung on the walls, and I wondered if the portrait of James behind his desk at the capitol was a Dimitri Vail like the one of Donna, Jack, and the palomino that hung in the Brendy home. Hanging from the center of the ceiling was a crystal chandelier. I got back down on my haunches and half crawled, half duck-walked along the side of the house to the other lighted window, and rose up to see what I could see.

  This room was a study. The walls were lined with floor-to-ceiling bookcases containing law books, four or five sets of encyclopedias, and a three-volume set of the current edition of Books in Print in addition to classic fiction and some current stuff: Stephen King, Tom Clancy, Anne Tyler, and Rosamunde Pilcher, to name a few. There was a small wood conference table, and on one end of it was a portable electric typewriter—either a Smith-Corona or a Burroughs, I couldn’t make out the brand name—with a single sheet of paper rolled into the platen. I reached out and jiggled the window. It slid noiselessly open; Jesus, this was too easy. The hairs at the nape of my neck standing on end, I threw a leg over the sill and climbed inside.

  I held my breath and waited for the roof to cave in. It didn’t. Visible through the open doorway and across the hall was a darkened room with the foot of a twin bed in sight. Beside the bed sat a Pretty Pony rocking horse. I stood still a little longer. No one came running into the study to shoot me, so I began to move around.

  I bent to look at the page in the typewriter. Centered at the top was the title, “To Kill a Vampire,” and the second line of print identified the work as “A Novel by Cora James.” So the lady of the house was a horror fiction writer, probably something to occupy her time while her husband got high with Crystal.

  I went over to the bookcase and removed three volumes of the Southwestern Reporter. I was in luck; there was just enough space behind the books for me to hide the cocaine. So I did, carefully lining the cellophane bags along the wall and replacing the volumes. Climbing out the window, I closed it behind me, then stood, and listened for the sirens. Miraculously, I heard none. I retraced my path through the creek bed, climbed the bank up to Beverly Drive, and drove Honeybear’s Ford away from there.

  “Then I need his home number,” I said. “It’s important.” I was seated on the bed, facing the window. Outside, lights illuminated a ragged, unkept patch of lawn, a white wood fence with chipped paint, and a faded sign in the shape of a sailing vessel with the title “ANCHOR MOTEL” done in blue script. Beyond the sign, a forty-foot tractor-trailer thundered by on Harry Hines Boulevard, braked, and pulled into Googie’s Restaurant. Inside Googie’s, truckers dawdled over thick coffee, stale doughnuts, and greasy cheeseburgers.

  The tenor voice on the phone said to me, “We’re not authorized to give out home numbers. Look, I’m Detective Green, I’m handling his caseload on the night shift. Why don’t you just discuss whatever it is with me?”

  I took a hot drag from a Pall Mall, then set the cigarette in an ashtray on the nightstand. “I’ve got to talk to Atchley personally,” I said. “I’ve got some information about Rick Bannion.”

  “Everybody got information about Rick Bannion, friend. Why don’t you come on down and fill out a form?”

  All I needed, a funny guy. I said, “Listen, you dumbfuck. You’re talking to Rick Bannion, and if you don’t give me Atchley’s number in five seconds, I’m hanging up and taking my most-wanted ass out of tow
n.”

  “Yeah, Bannion. Come on down, I got a coffeepot on.”

  “One,” I said. Two.”

  “Hold it,” the cop said. “Hold it, I’m getting the number.”

  He put me on hold, then came back on, and gave me the number while I wrote it on a motel message pad. The cop asked me which seasons I’d played for the Cowboys. I hung up on him and called Atchley. A sleepy female answered, listened, told me to wait. Finally Atchley’s good-ole-boy voice said, “Yeah, Roy Atchley.”

  “When you got me out of the city lockup, I told you I’d deliver whoever killed Jack Brendy within forty-eight hours,” I said. “Doesn’t look like I’ve come through for you too well.”

  After a brief silence, he said, “Jesus Christ.”

  “I think I may be in a little trouble, Roy. But I do know who killed Jack. And Catfish, Donald Lund, plus Connie Swarm. Oh, yeah, and a fat federal snitch named Skeezix. And . . . Donna Brendy, too.” The thought of Donna caused my vision to blur.

  “Yeah,” Atchley said. “Yeah, I think I know who killed ‘em, too. I think I’m talking to him. Bannion, I’m not going to waste time asking you to turn yourself in, but I’ll promise you that sooner or later we’ll pick you up. Or somebody will.”

  “I’m not staying on the phone long enough for anybody to trace me, Roy, in case you’re thinking of it. You won’t waste time asking me to come in, I won’t waste time telling you I didn’t kill anybody. I didn’t, but it’s gone so far I’ll never clear myself. It’s going to take a manhunt to get me, buddy, and I’m going to take care of the people responsible for the killings myself. Or they might take care of me, I’m not sure.” I held the receiver against my ear and lay back on the bed, looking now at the motel’s cracked ceiling.

  “Use your head for once, Bannion,” Atchley said. “Where the hell are you?”

  “No way will I tell you that, but I am going to give you a tip. You can call it an anonymous tip if you don’t want people knowing it came from me. I don’t give a shit anymore.”

  “A tip on what?” Atchley sounded as though he’d rather go back to sleep.

  “A tip on Senator Louis P. James. About two pounds of cocaine hidden behind three volumes of the Southwestern Reporter, In the bookcase in James’s study.”

  “Louis . . . now I’m convinced you’re a nut. Hell, I couldn’t get a warrant even if it was true. No judge is going to call a tip from you sufficient probable cause. What is it, you on peyote?”

  “Oh, I think you can get a warrant, Roy,” I said. “Dream up some probable cause. That’s what you guys usually do.”

  “On a state senator?” Atchley said. “Good fucking luck.”

  “I’m going to give you two days, Roy,” I said. “Then I’m going to give the information to Norman Aycock. I’ll tell him you knew about James having the coke all along, but wouldn’t do anything about it. Don’t think for a minute I won’t, Roy.”

  “Now, goddammit,” Atchley said, “I didn’t tell you I wasn’t going to do anything. You keep the hell away from those federal fucks. Jesus, I just got rid of the bastards.”

  “Now, that’s more like it, Roy,” I said.

  17

  I sat on the fender of Muhammed’s limo as a pair of headlights, low beams glowing a dull off-white, came through the tunnel underneath Stemmons Freeway and began the gentle, winding climb up Grauwyler Road in my direction. From the freeway to Loop 12 in Irving, Grauwyler is a two-lane blacktop country road. Crickets whirred in scrubby bushes and low mesquite trees on both sides. On my right were the bald greens and burnt-out fairways of a failed municipal golf course. Overhead, the early September moon appeared to have a halo around it as it beamed softly through the light Dallas smog.

  I was wearing the same clothes I’d bought the night before at Redbird Mall. As the headlights came nearer, I climbed down, went around, and opened the driver’s door of the limo. Two cellophane bags of baking soda lay in the seat beside a couple of blank tape cassettes I’d bought at Radio Shack. I patted my back pocket: Sweaty’s Browning 9mm made more of a bulge than my Smith & Wesson had. I carried the tapes and the bags back up front, laid them on the hood, and climbed back up on the fender.

  I said loudly, “It’s them, it’s got to be.”

  From fifty yards ahead in the bushes, Honey bear answered. “You think me an’ Snakey blind? Hurry up. These chiggers biting the shit out of me.”

  The headlights stopped twenty feet from the limo’s nose. In the bushes, ahead and to my right, there was a slight rustling noise, and I pictured Honeybear and Snakey crouched side by side, ready for whatever was coming down. The grille of the car was a shadowy outline behind the beams; it was a Mercedes grille, of course, but I hadn’t needed to see that. I’d known all along that it was Cassel.

  Both front doors of the Mercedes opened as one, and there was the scrape of leather soles on asphalt as dark figures emerged on both sides of the car. Fred Cassel’s voice, slightly higher-pitched than normal, said, “I don’t know who you are, friend, but you’re blocking the road.”

  I nearly laughed out loud. Then I reached up with both hands and peeled the false mustache from my lips, held it off to one side, and dropped it on the asphalt. I’d removed the bloating material from my cheeks earlier. I rubbed the top of my head. “It’s me, Fred,” I said. “I can’t do anything about the hair, it’ll have to grow back in on its own. But trust me, it’s me.”

  “Do you have the things we talked about?” Cassel’s tone was returning to normal; he was pretty sure he had me right where he wanted me, and I wasn’t certain that he wasn’t dead on the money.

  I patted the bags and tapes on the limo’s hood. “Right here, old buddy.”

  Bodie Breaux came around from the passenger side, outlined in the headlights, and pointed a pistol at me with both hands. The beam caught a flash of yellow on his hat. “Don’t be cute, Ricky boy. Twice I could have popped you and didn’t, but that don’t mean I won’t.”

  A third man materialized behind Breaux, came around him, and started toward me. This guy was wearing a ski mask and dark clothes. He was broad-shouldered and about my height.

  Breaux said, “Turn around and put your hands on the hood.”

  I glanced at the bags and tapes, climbed down, spread my hands, and leaned on the hood. They’d play the tapes and check out the dope before they did anything more. Then they were planning to kill me. I didn’t see that they had any choice about that.

  In a few seconds gloved hands touched my neck, searched under my collar. Then the hands moved underneath my armpits, rubbed me down. As the hands approached my waist I said, “That ski mask is pretty hot, isn’t it, Buddy?”

  There was a sharp intake of breath behind me, and then Buddy Morley stood back and said, “How did you know?”

  Twenty years since I’d heard that voice, but it hadn’t changed any, same slow South Texas drawl. I looked down between my extended arms at my shoes. There was a dull ache in my throat. “It couldn’t be anybody else,” I said. “No one but your mom knew we’d changed hotels, and there wasn’t but one person that she’d tell about that. You knew Jack through Donna, and since your family all thought you were in some kind of investments I guess you got that idea from him, to cover up what you were doing. You fuck. You had your little sister murdered.” My voice was shaking and there were tears in my eyes.

  “Shut up,” he hissed. “Just shut up, Rick. You just shut up and stand there.”

  “A world full of people,” I said. “A world full of people and a world full of towns, and I’ve got to grow up with you. I guess it’s that fucking dope, Buddy. That what turned you into an asshole?”

  “You should know,” Buddy said.

  “I kicked my habit,” I said. I raised my head and stared at the limo’s windshield. “Finish what you’re doing, you fuck. Just don’t talk to me anymore.”

  Buddy came closer behind me, ran his gloved hands underneath my waistband. As he did, there was a loud, scuffling noise behind
us, followed by Cassel’s voice, excited, saying, “Jesus, they’re—” Cassel’s voice became a strangled croak. I didn’t have to see to know what was going on back there. I’d watched Honeybear and Snakey go to work on Skeezix, and not too long ago.

  With a startled grunt Buddy whirled toward the Mercedes. It was all the opening I needed. I brought my arm up behind me and threw an elbow; the elbow slammed into Buddy’s face through the ski mask with a satisfying crunch. I turned around, stuck my head between the numbers, and tackled him. As Buddy and I fell, twisting and grappling, onto the asphalt, two rapid gunshots sounded from the vicinity of the Mercedes. I hugged Buddy around the middle and rolled on top of him, straddled his chest, and pinned his arms with my knees. I grabbed the ski mask from the top, yanked it off, and cast it aside. Then I grabbed Buddy’s ears and pounded his head on the road. He yelled in pain. I dug the Browning from my hip pocket, pointed it at his face, and aired back the hammer. For an instant we were still, our gazes locked.

  Moonlight is kind: it doesn’t show the wrinkles of age. Buddy’s square face was exactly as I remembered it. His eyes narrowed into angry slits, then suddenly he grinned. “Fuck you, Rick,” he said.

  I shot him in the face. The Browning jerked in my hand; his body stiffened, then went limp. There was a gaping hole in his right cheek; a dark mass oozed onto the pavement and puddled behind his head. He was still grinning at me.

  From twenty feet away, Honeybear said, “This mothafuckah dead.”

  As though in a daze, I climbed to my feet and walked to the Mercedes. The Browning hung limply by my hip. Honeybear stood by the passenger side, his massive head bent as he looked downward. I stepped up beside him. Breaux lay on the asphalt on his back, his yellow cap askew. There was a bullet wound in his chest, over the heart, and his eyes were wide and staring. I went around to the other side, where Snakey stood watch over Fred Cassel. Cassel was facedown, his neck bent at an odd angle. I touched his wrist, felt for a pulse. There wasn’t any. I didn’t glance at Buddy Morley as I led Snakey and Honeybear back to the limo. As I climbed in behind the wheel, Honeybear hesitated, shrugged, and got in the backseat with Snakey. I turned the key and started the engine; the automatic sentinel turned the headlights on. Buddy’s still form was illuminated in the beam, and I looked at him for a second. Suddenly I dropped the lever into gear, floor-boarded the accelerator, and ran over him. Then I backed up and ran over him again. Finally I backed up a second time, turned the Caddy around, and drove off.