"The German nation of today," he went on quickly, "is a most pleasant place to be, for the peoples, they have not the savage nature of the past, and many now live fruitful lives, the same as you and I. The children and the grandchilds, I do not think they remember the bad things their country do to us before."
Gloria's manner, her posture and the alarming change taking place around her mouth, her throat, and, most especially in her eyes, had begun the moment Ricky Chavez embarked on his essay of the German people of today. Ricky, though, was so entranced with his new, and impressive fabrication of places he'd never seen, and a language no more familiar than Hindustani or Japanese, he missed the warning he should have seen.
"And what is us?" Gloria said, her jaw thrust out in a challenge that made Ricky blink. "Who is it we are talking about here? I don't recall any Germans bombing Acapulco or some other such town. You want to tell me what you're complaining about?"
Ricky was appalled. He felt the blood rush to his face. "I must tell you I was born in Laredo, Miss Mundi. I am an American, the same as you."
"Well muy beano for you. That's about half a block from that other Laredo, if I got my geography right."
"I–did not think you were of the racial persuasion. I regret to hear this is so."
"Is that so?" Gloria stood so quickly Ricky stood as well, sending the straightback clattering to the floor. This woman was not overly tall without her stripper shoes, but anger seemed to add inches to her height.
"The way you talk, I thought you had a real feeling for the German people, an' I see that you don't. On the contraire, as the Frenchies like to say, you fucking don't like 'em at all."
"Please. You are mistake my intent..."
"I know about your intent, mister, which is to stare at what I got inside my pants. I get enough of that at work, I sure don't need to put up with it here. And if you'd read your history careful, you'd know everyone in Germany wasn't all of the Hitler persuasion. Some of them fought 'cause that's the country where they was born. Just like some of our boys might have been Republican folks or someone from New York, that didn't stop them from defending their native land."
"This is–most certainly true," Ricky said, seeing all the progress he'd made fading before his eyes, thinking, now, he'd have to climb down the fucking ladder in the middle of the night, that he surely had no chance of staying up in the Junkers JU 52.
"The boy who flew this very airplane, who's name I will not mention to you, was just doing his duty to his country, and he had no part in the historic crimes of the National Social Party on people of other creeds."
Ricky looked at her. "Excuse me. How would you possibly know this was so?"
"And don't you approach me in a romantic manner anymore, and don't bring me any shit. And this isn't because you're a Mescan, don't get the idea it is."
"Thank you. I appreciate that."
"You don't like my coffee you don't have to try and hide it somewhere."
"If you will try to accept my apology, Miss Mundi. Please. Der Straus verdancin is kaput, und der boaten is gesunk."
"An' what's that supposed to mean?"
"With all my heart, I beg that you–"
"Don't start, I don't need that kind of talk and I don't want it in German, either. Get out of my house, Mr. Chavez, before I get real pissed with you."
Climbing down the shaky ladder with his eyes closed seemed to help, or would have, if he hadn't peeked to see if he was close to the ground.
Ricky was deeply upset. This was clearly a step back in his pursuit of Gloria Mundi. There would have to be new thought on the matter, an entirely new approach, which did not include candy or flowers. Possibly, this approach would not call for any of the normal practices of courtship at all.
Surely, it would have to include more in-depth research on the new Germany, and at least a basic understanding of the language.
"Dios! How is one supposed to know the fucking Krauts are as good as us now? When did they come up with that?"
Chapter Twenty-Three
What he thought about was how it was before, how it was when things were going right, when things were going fine. There weren't that fucking many, like you had to take a day off to count them up or anything, it wouldn't take a lot of time.
In the movies, some jerk's thinking, he's thinking how it was in fifth grade, how he's riding on his bike, running through a bunch of leaves. It's always fucking autumn, the leaves are always falling off the trees.
The other thing is, there's a cute little chick, she's wearing this fuzzy sweater, her tits are just starting to grow, and the guy likes that, but he doesn't know what the hell to do. Dad's out mowing the lawn and the kid says "Hi!" and goes up to his room and jerks off, thinking about the pretty girl.
They don't ever show that, but that's what the kid's doing, you can bet your ass on that.
Jack can't think of any leaves. He can think about a bike but it's broken all the time. The thing he thinks about is riding in the Buick in Oklahoma City with the long-legged girl before the money from the job runs out. He thinks about a guy in a shit-kicker bar, the guy is built like a side of Kansas City beef, and Jack takes everything the guy can put out, then decks him with a left to the kidney and the guy sits down and cries.
There were four, maybe six other times. One had to do with drinking good whiskey, dropping a roll on the bar, buying drinks for the house. One had to do with another long-legged girl, this one in a trailer in Brazoria, Texas, a dirt-poor woman who had more class than the girl in the Buick, which happened sometimes.
And all those good times Jack could keep in a very small corner of his mind, they didn't take any room at all. What took up space, crowded everything out, was doing time in Huntsville, Texas, watching his gut go bad until it dried up all the mean he'd brought in from outside.
When that was gone the niggers and the spics and the Nazi fucking white trash remembered the tough guy they'd seen walk in, and were glad to see the fun times come around again.
Jack wasn't mad at Cecil or even Grape or Cat. That was a lesson he'd learned in Huntsville too. All mad did was fuck up your head. Mad's the same as getting hot, an old con told him. Thinking, laying back, using your head, that's the same as being cool.
The guy who told him that was likely still there, but that didn't mean it wasn't true. What it meant was, crawling naked on the floor, everyone watching your dick bounce around didn't mean a thing now. It wasn't anything you could ever take back, play it right again. Lay back, be cool, you could think of something good, like punching out the big guy, riding with the long-legged girl. Fuck it, you did that once, you could do it again, turn everything around, make it like it was before.
He still meant to kill Cecil R. Dupree, and Grape and Cat too. Pull a nice caper, get enough money to buy some good clothes, get a haircut, get some fine shoes. Shoes that didn't look like you played fucking nigger basketball.
Get on the good side of Gloria, the clothes would help with that. So would whacking Ricky Chavez, but he'd have to be careful, she'd really be pissed if she ever found out.
That's maybe four things to do, Jack thought, if you counted Cecil and his crew as just one. Four things is a lot, but what else did he have to do? Besides scrubbing pots and waiting tables in Piggs? Waiting for Rhino to think of some shit for him to do. You don't ever reach for something bigger than you are, you're never going to get a fucking star.
He heard Grape walk up the stairs to Cecil's place, saw the dust drift from the cracks with each step he passed by.
He wasn't dozing off this time, he was wide awake now, and it didn't take any time at all to get where he wanted to go.
A concrete slab, one of the old cellar walls, had slots near the top where someone meant to put beams sometime. There were eight or ten slots Jack had found, wandering about the old dog pens with a flash. One of these was less than two feet beneath the boards of Cecil's floor.
It wasn't a comfortable perch, and your ass froze off on the cold co
ncrete, but he didn't mind that. He could hear Cecil talk, hear him breathe, hear him on the john if you didn't stick your fingers in your ears.
Jack knew the two were drinking, you could hear the bottle click against the glass, you could smell the smoke from Cecil's cheap cigar.
Cecil wasn't happy, he was pissed, but there was nothing new about that.
"He says he's going to come, he better come," Cecil said. "Junior Ambrose wants to work with me, he better get a guy up here, stop fucking around."
"You heard what he said," Grape told him, "he said the guy was coming. Said he'd send him right away."
"Said he's comin' from where? He's coming from New Orleans, he's coming from fucking Mars?"
Grape laughed, and shook the ice in his glass. "Maybe Ambrose's kid, he's sending some guy got a little smarts. He isn't sending no Hutt Kenny this time, some asshole isn't smart enough to see if he's maybe got something shouldn't ought to be in his trunk.
"A guy don't check his car, a guy don't check his trunk, don't look under the hood, a guy like that's going to wind up in a dumpster somewhere, he's got no more smarts than that."
Grape felt he was on a roll now, that a story like this was worth telling twice, or maybe more than that.
"A guy like Kenny, he don't think about shit like that. He's thinking, he's thinking about Alabama Straight, what she's doing in his lap. He's thinking he gets back quick, he's got somebody that'll do that again. What he's thinking is–"
"I'm calling Junior. Fuck this."
"What, you mean now? You callin' him now?"
"What'd I say? I say, I'm calling him now, I'm calling him Easter, I'm calling him Christmas day?"
Jack could hardly hear Cecil's voice, even a few feet away, but when he started talking like that, you could figure the blood was pumping into his Lone Ranger face, turning it from cherry-red to black.
Grape, Jack knew, was aware of this too, because he wasn't real smartmouth now, he was talking extra quiet, like a yard guy maybe, or a waiter in a fancy restaurant.
"I was saying, what I was saying is it's awful late, Mr. Dupree, I don't give a fuck you're disturbing this guy, fuck him, he don't get to sleep all night. I'm thinking, an' you set me straight if I'm wrong, I'm thinking, even if the old man's kid he isn't too bright, he's maybe goin' to wonder, why is Mr. Dupree callin' in the middle of the night? Somethin's wrong up there, he's got somethin' on his mind, he's pulling some shit on me? I'm just sayin' what he's maybe thinking, I don't even know the guy's smart as that."
After a minute, Cecil said, "I think he's maybe not. I think he's a stupid fuck, or he wouldn't send someone like Kenny the Hutt up here to deal with me."
"I think you're absolutely right, Mr. Dupree–"
"I'm talking. I'm still talking, I'm saying maybe you're right, maybe the old man's watching the kid now, the kid screws up with Hutt. Maybe he's unretiring for a minute, even if his dick's falling off. I'm calling tomorrow. I'm calling after breakfast, I'm not calling Junior, I'm calling Ambrose, I'm talking to the old man myself. I'm– What? What's that, what you saying now?"
"I didn't say nothing, Mr. Dupree."
"You didn't say nothing, your face said something, okay? Guy's thinking something, he don't want to say it, that's what you're going to see, it's sitting on his face."
"Hey. It wasn't worth saying, I was thinking, you know, about Ambrose, what you said."
"The old man."
"Right, the old man. Not the kid, the old man."
"What?"
"Nothing, Mr. Dupree, I'm just saying, I'm saying up front, you know what you want to do, it's just what I was thinking, which don't mean shit, I'll say it anyway. I got to be straight, I don't feel good talking to Junior or the old man either one. I'm saying, don't give these fuckers nothing, like we give a shit about the buy or not. You don't show up, fuck you. There's lots of guys got merchandise, we'll get it somewhere else."
Cecil didn't answer at all. Jack hoped Grape was suffering, hoped he couldn't breathe, hoped his gut was knotting up. Grape was a cocky little bastard and mean as a snake, but he was scared of Cecil Dupree. Like anyone who had good sense knew Cecil didn't give a shit about anyone's opinion but his own.
"Where's Cat," Cecil said finally, "where's the dummy at?"
"You want him, I'll kick his ass, I'll get him up here."
"I don't want him, you don't want to kick his ass, you aren't as fucking dumb as that. Get me a couple Mars bars at the 7-'leven, I don't want a Mounds, I don't want a Milky Way, they don't got a Mars, you get it somewhere else."
"Yes, sir. Mars bars. You want me to get Cat go an' get a couple Mars bars, no Mounds, no–"
"I didn't say Cat, you hear me say Cat? You go, and take Cat with you. Get me a Dr Pepper too, they don't have that don't get me a fucking Pepsi, don't get me nothing at all."
"I'm on it," Grape said, "I think they got the Dr Pepper, I told the slope there last time we don't want to be drivin' all over the fucking county, we want him to keep 'em here."
"Do it," Cecil said. "Don't fucking talk about it, do it right now."
Jack listened to Grape stomp down the stairs, saw his motion through the cracks. In a minute, he heard Cat growling somewhere, then they both were gone.
Jack's back hurt and his legs had gone numb, but he didn't want to move, it was much too quiet up there. Cecil didn't even know he had a cellar under Piggs, and Jack didn't want to tell him now.
Jack tried to rub some feeling in his legs, but he couldn't reach far. Cecil hadn't moved, hadn't breathed as far as Jack could tell. How long did it take to go to the store and back? Ten, fifteen minutes. Maybe ten inside, fifteen back. Two, carry your four...
Cecil moved. The floor creaked when he stalked across the room, bare feet slapping against the floor. He stopped, somewhere to Jack's right. The lock clicked loudly in the door. Clicked once, clicked twice again. Jack had never been in Cecil's rooms, but the locks were no surprise. A gangster of Cecil's stature would want some good locks on the door.
Cecil turned on the TV. It sounded like an all-night movie. Jack thought it might be Ben Hur. Man, that chariot race was something else again. They used to show it in Huntsville all the time. The cons would bet on it, and try to kill each other if their guy didn't win.
Cecil moved across the room. Walked right up above Jack, then stopped. Jack felt the hairs stand up on his neck. Cecil couldn't see him, couldn't guess he was there, but that didn't help at all. Your person of the criminal persuasion could see things regular people couldn't see. Crooks and cops, they could both do that. Jack wished he had some of that extra-sensitive power himself, but he'd never been that good.
Cecil squatted down. The floorboards squeaked, letting in a tiny speck of light. It sounded like Cecil was prying up the floor. Jack held his breath. Cecil was doing something, just past the concrete wall, where Jack couldn't see. And he didn't have to pry, the boards just sort of rolled free.
Cecil lifted something out. Set it down right above Jack.
Another click, another lock. Jack listened, pressed his ear closer to the boards by his head.
A new sound now, a sound like leaves, a whispery, rustly kind of sound. Slick-slick-slick. A crinkle then a snap. A really pleasant sound, nice as it could be. A sound like that could help a person sleep real good...
It struck, him, then, and Jack made a little sound himself, and cut it off quick. Money. That's what it was. Holy shit, Cecil Dupree was counting his money, a whole box full!
Slick-slick-slick. Big, stubby Cecil fingers rifling through the bills. A stack went plop! on the floor, and then another after that.
How high could you go before a stack fell? You wouldn't keep them all in one stack, you'd do a different stack, maybe a different stack for different bills. Cecil wouldn't bother with ones, so they had to be big. Twenties and hundreds, Jack guessed. Your crime boss, even if he lived in Mexican Wells, wouldn't want to mess with little bills. They'd be in little stacks, then, with paper strips around them
, or maybe rubber bands. All you had to do was count a stack, you wouldn't have to–
Jack almost fell off his perch. Grape hit the stairs, three at a time, Cat pounding on his heels, a gorilla, Godzilla, a buffalo in heat.
Just above Jack, the stacks hopped quickly back in the box, and the box disappeared.
"Hey, Mr. Dupree?" Grape said, rattling the knob, "I can't get in, I think the thing's locked."
Cecil clicked the locks, opened the door.
"What you got it locked for, Mr. Dupree? Why you lockin' the door?"
"'Cause you don't got any manners, asshole, you or Cat either one. You knock from now on, you don't come walking in, you show a little respect, act like you– What's that, what the fuck you got there? If that's a fucking Mounds, you bring me something with coconut in it, you're headed back to the 7-'leven store."
"They didn't have nothing else, Mr. Dupree."
"That's what they had," Cat said, "they didn't have nothing else."
"Shut up. Shut the fuck up."
Cecil grabbed the sack from Grape. "Don't bother coming in, you're going back out. I'm thinking, I'm thinking this Mescan, this Ricky whatever, he's hanging around, he's messing with the girls. I don't want him in Piggs. What it is, I don't want him anywhere. Do I got to explain this to you or what?"
"No sir, you sure don't. I don't like him, he's all the time, like you said, messing with the girls. He comes in tomorrow, me and Cat, we'll take care of the guy–"
"No. You won't." Cecil poked a finger in Grape's chest.
"You don't fuck with the guy in Piggs. You don't do nothing here. The guy's got a condo in San Antone. He's in the book. You do it there."
"Right. First thing tomorrow, we'll get on it, me an' Cat."
"Now."
"What?"
"Get in the fucking car, no you can't take the Cad. Get in the car, take care of it now."
"It's the middle of the night," Cat said.
"How the fuck do you know? You can't tell time, how you know it's the middle of the night?"
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