Stick

by Elmore Leonard

  Somebody touched him on the shoulder. Chucky felt it. He twisted enough to see Stick on the balcony and yelled at him, “Get away from me!”

  He heard Stick say, “Let me help you . . .”

  Help him what? He yelled again, “Get away from me or I’ll put him over!”

  And didn’t see Stick again.

  He had to get his breath—in and out, in and out, slowly. It didn’t do much good. He felt like he was running. He held Moke’s ankles, raising them as he went down to his knees and sat back on his sneakers to look at Moke’s upside-down face through the bars, Chucky breathing in and out, in and out.

  He said, “How you doing, pard?”

  Believing he was in control but hearing the words as a raw, breathless sound. It did him good to look at Moke, at Moke’s eyes bugged out, face livid, straining, veins coming blue on his forehead. He wanted to tell Moke, “Don’t move,” and go get his camera. Lighten up the situation. But his shoulders and arms ached and what he wanted was to end it. He said, “You had enough?” He said, “You gonna be a good boy?”

  Moke said, straining, but making the words clear enough, “Fuck you.”

  Chucky stared and began to experience a feeling of deep sadness, despair creeping over him. He was tired, his arms ached . . . What he should do was jump up, move—let’s go!—grab a hat, psych himself, be somebody, anybody. But with the sad feeling he knew that if he tried even to scream, to lose himself in the effort of emptying his lungs, the sound would come out a moan. He stared at Moke’s upside-down face, hair hanging as though electrified. Looked into blunt eyes, unforgiving, that would never change. He thought, oh well. Raised Moke’s legs above his head and gave a push.

  Moke did it for him. Screamed.

  * * *

  They watched him eat pills he found on the floor of the balcony. They watched him pick up the revolver and come in, closing the glass door, closing out whatever was outside. He sat down in a deep chair, holding the gun in his lap.

  Kyle waited. She swallowed to wet the dryness of her mouth; she felt her heart beating. She looked up, surprised, as Stick came over. He didn’t say anything. It was like he was checking on her; yes, she was still here. She watched him walk over to Chucky, touch his shoulder, reach to take the revolver. But Chucky came alive for a moment, pointed the gun at him and Stick stepped away. She would remember him talking to Chucky, the quiet tone of his voice.

  He said, the first thing he said was, “You have a lawyer?”

  Chucky didn’t answer. The room was so still.

  “You have money to hire a good one?”

  Chucky didn’t answer.

  “I owe you some. Soon as my checks come I’ll pay you back. Seventy-two five. Man. Well . . . You want anything? Is there anything I can get you?”

  Chucky didn’t answer.

  “I’d think about dropping the piece over the side. It’s his, let the cops find it with him. He assaulted you, didn’t he?”

  Chucky didn’t answer.

  “I’ll talk to them if you want. I’ll talk to Nestor, tell him what happened . . . Let’s call nine-eleven and get it over with. What do you say?”

  Kyle watched Chucky look up. He said, “I’m not going to jail.” He said, “I am not going to jail.” She would remember looking at Stick then as he said:

  “I don’t blame you.”

  Stick came over to her and said, “Time to go.” It was something else she would remember and come to realize how much more he knew than she did. Not, “Let’s go.” He said, “Time to go.”

  They were waiting for the elevator . . . The door opened. They heard the single gunshot. She heard her own sharp intake of breath and turned to go back in the apartment. But he held her by the arm.

  When they were outside he said, “I’ll take us back and get the Rolls later.”

  “I’m going home,” Kyle said.

  “All right. I’ll drive you.”

  She said, “I’d rather you didn’t. Tell Barry I’ll return the car sometime.” She paused. “But I should wait for the police . . .”

  Stick shook his head. “They’ll figure it out.”

  She said then, “I was right, after all. I’m not ready for you yet.” Her eyes, still aware, could look into his and store pictures and feelings, but she would have to decide alone, another time, what to do with them. She walked to the Rolls and opened the door. Before getting in she looked at him again and said, “But call me sometime. Will you?”

  “When I’m rich,” Stick said.

  27

  CORNELL WAS TELLING HIM TO look around, man, look out the window at the sights, at the beauty of it, not to mention the food and the fringes, man, the fringes alone you couldn’t even find anyplace else. All Stick could think of, he had seventy-three thousand dollars in Florida First National, Biscayne Boulevard and Thirty-Sixth. He told Cornell he was not into fringes.

  “I’m not knocking ’em, don’t get me wrong. As you say, whatever your imagination allows. This is wonderland, if you like it.”

  “You learned something,” Cornell said, “didn’t you?”

  “I hope so. I know I can’t hang around country clubs with guys that put one hand in their pocket and their foot up on the bumper and think they’re smarter than the people they work for,” Stick said. “I learned I can’t wait around.”

  “You know where you going?”

  “It doesn’t matter.” Not with seventy-three thousand dollars—Jesus—in the bank.

  “Well, you know what direction you going?”

  “Straight,” Stick said. “I may try Palm Beach.”

  “You got delusions . . . You give your notice?”

  “First thing this morning. He said I’m not going anywhere till they count the silver. We talked it over, he said stop by sometime.”

  “I got to go take the man some fresh coffee.”

  “I’ll see you before I leave,” Stick said, packing his sporty outfits in the canvas bag, leaving the tan and gray and black suits hanging in the closet for the next poor guy.

  Barry was at the umbrella table with the Wall Street Journal and assorted legal-looking papers. Stick put on his sunglasses, walked down with his bag.

  “What’s good this morning?”

  “Tootsie Roll at thirteen and a quarter and I’m not putting you on. Earnings are up to a buck eighty a share.” Barry looked toward the guest house, putting the paper down. “And where’s my girl when I need her? Calls me last night, she’s home doing her laundry. I said, how can you be home doing your laundry, your clothes’re still here? I think she’s getting spacey, hanging around with the help. Hey, and the phone in the Cadillac . . . I’m getting some stuff out of there—what happened to the phone, for Christ sake?”

  “It broke,” Stick said.

  “You mean, it broke?”

  Cornell was coming with the coffee.

  “I don’t know,” Stick said. “Somebody must’ve been fooling with it.”

  “I thought maybe you called your lawyer,” Barry said, “and got pissed off and tried to throw the phone out the window.”

  Stick said, “What? . . . I don’t have a lawyer.”

  “Yeah, well, you better get one, quick . . . Here.” Barry lifted the Journal, picked up three sheets of white, legal-size paper clipped together. “Here it is.”

  Cornell said, pouring, “Man come looking for you while you’re taking your shower.”

  “What man?”

  “A process server,” Barry said.

  Why did he seem to be enjoying himself all of a sudden? It tightened Stick up, looking at the legal papers Barry was holding. “What is it?”

  “I couldn’t help but notice,” Barry said. “You’ve been presented with a motion, a show cause and a hearing date.”

  “For what?” Not sure he really wanted to know.

  Barry held up the papers. “Circuit Court for the County of Broward . . . the plaintiff, Mary Lou Stickley, now comes before the court . . .”

  “My ex
-wife?”

  “ . . . with a motion for immediate payment of child support in arrears etcetera and . . . this one, the court wants you to show cause why you shouldn’t be held in contempt, Stickley, for being such a shiny dad and not paying any child support for the past seven years . . .”

  “I just gave her three hundred bucks.” He sounded amazed now.

  “Well, she wants back pay, ten grand a year for the seven years since the divorce, which comes to—”

  “Seventy thousand dollars,” Stick said, so quietly they barely heard him.

  “If you don’t have it, you don’t have it,” Barry said. “I would advise you, though, to seek employment quick and keep mailing in those payments or you’ll be going back to you know where . . . Hey! . . . Hey, where you going?” Barry looked at Cornell. “Where’s he going?”

  “I doubt he knows,” Cornell said, and watched him cross the lawn to the driveway and pass from view around the corner of the garage.

  There you are, Stick thought.

  The Extras

  I. ALL BY ELMORE: THE CRIME NOVELS; THE WESTERNS

  II. SELECTED FILMOGRAPHY

  III. IF IT SOUNDS LIKE WRITING, REWRITE IT

  V. MARTIN AMIS INTERVIEWS “THE DICKENS OF DETROIT”

  This section was prepared by the editorial staff of HarperCollins e-books, who thank Mr. Gregg Sutter, Elmore Leonard’s longtime researcher and aide-de-camp, for his unstinting support and help in the assembling of this material.

  Further riches await the reader at the website that Mr. Sutter maintains, www.elmoreleonard.com, and in “The Extras” sections of other HarperCollins editions of Elmore Leonard’s novels (“All by Elmore” and “Selected Filmography” come standard in each e-book).

  All by Elmore: The Crime Novels; The Westerns

  The Crime Novels

  The Big Bounce (1969); Mr. Majestyk (1974); 52 Pickup (1974); Swag* (1976); Unknown Man #89 (1977); The Hunted (1977); The Switch (1978); City Primeval: High Noon in Detroit (1980); Gold Coast (1980); Split Images (1981); Cat Chaser (1982); Stick (1983); LaBrava (1983); Glitz (1985); Bandits (1987); Touch (1987); Freaky Deaky (1988); Killshot(1989); Get Shorty (1990); Maximum Bob (1991); Rum Punch (1992); Pronto (1993); Riding the Rap(1995); Out of Sight (1996); Be Cool (1999); Pagan Babies (2000); “Fire in the Hole”* (e-book original story, 2001); Tishomingo Blues (2002); When the Women Come Out to Dance: Stories (2002).

  The Westerns

  The Bounty Hunters* (1953); The Law at Randado* (1954); Escape from Five Shadows* (1956); Last Stand at Saber River* (1959); Hombre* (1961); The Moonshine War* (1969); Valdez Is Coming* (1970); Forty Lashes Less One* (1972); Gunsights* (1979) Cuba Libre (1998); The Tonto Woman and Other Western Stories* (1998).

  As of November 2002: Unless otherwise indicated (*), all titles are available from HarperCollins e-books. All titles are available in print form in dazzling new editions by HarperTorch paperbacks, with the exception of: The Moonshine War (1969); Swag (1976); “Fire in the Hole” (2001). “Fire in the Hole” is available within HarperCollins e-book and William Morrow hardcover editions of When the Women Come Out to Dance (2002).

  The Crime Novels

  The Big Bounce(1969)

  Jack Ryan always wanted to play pro ball. But he couldn’t hit a curveball, so he turned his attention to less legal pursuits. A tough guy who likes walking the razor’s edge, he’s just met his match — and more — in Nancy. She’s a rich man’s plaything, seriously into thrills and risk, and together she and Jack are pure heat ready to explode. But when simple housebreaking and burglary give way to the deadly pursuit of a really big score, the stakes suddenly skyrocket. Because violence and double-cross are the name of this game — and it’s going to take every ounce of cunning Jack and Nancy possess to survive . . . each other.

  Houston Chronicle: “[Leonard is] a sage poet of crime.”

  From the novel:

  She was facing him now, her cold look gone and smiling a little. Of course it’s loaded.

  “You going to shoot something?”

  “We could. Windows are good.”

  “So you brought a gun to shoot at windows.”

  “And boats. Boats are fun.”

  “I imagine they would be. How about cars?”

  “I didn’t think about cars.” She seemed pleasantly surprised. “Isn’t that funny?

  “Yeah that is funny.”

  “There’s a difference,” Ryan said, “between breaking and entering and armed robbery.”

  “And there’s a difference between seventy-eight dollars and fifty thousand dollars.”

  Nancy said, “How badly do you want it?”

  Mr. Majestyk(1974)

  Vincent Majestyk saw too much death in the jungles of Southeast Asia. All he wants to do now is farm his melons and forget. But peace can be an elusive commodity, even in the Arizona hinterlands — and especially when the local mob is calling all the shots. And one quiet, proud man’s refusal to be strong-armed by a powerful hood is about to start a violent chain reaction that will leave Mr. Majestyk ruined, in shackles, and without a friend in the world — except for one tough and beautiful woman. But his tormentors never realized something about their mark: This is not his first war. Vince Majestyk knows more than they’ll ever know about survival . . . and everything about revenge.

  Bergen Record: “First rate . . . an excellent thriller . . . well-plotted and smoothly written and crackles with suspense.”

  From the novel:

  Majestyk was running across the open scrub, weaving through the dusty brush clumps, by the time Renda got out of the car and began firing at him with the automatic, both hands extended in the handcuffs. Majestyk kept running. Renda jumped across the ditch, got to the fence, and laid the .45 on the top of a post, aimed, and squeezed the trigger three times, but the figure out in the scrub was too small now and it would have to be a lucky shot to bring him down. He fired once more and the automatic clicked empty.

  Seventy, eighty yards away, Majestyk finally came to a stop, worn out, getting his breath. He turned to look at the man standing by the fence post and, for a while, they stared at one another, each knowing who the other man was and what he felt and not having to say anything. Renda crossed the ditch to the Jag and Majestyk watched it drive away.

  52 Pickup (1974)

  Detroit businessman Harry Mitchell had had only one affair in his twenty-two years of happy matrimony. Unfortunately someone caught his indiscretion on film and now wants Harry to fork over one hundred grand to keep his infidelity a secret. And if Harry doesn’t pay up, the blackmailer and his associates plan to press a lot harder — up to and including homicide, if necessary. But the psychos picked the wrong pigeon for their murderous scam. Because Harry Mitchell doesn’t get mad . . . he gets even.

  Chicago Tribune: “A splendid thriller.”

  From the novel:

  The Gray Line sightseeing bus was approaching the foot of Woodward Avenue when Bobby Shy started up the aisle in his light-gray business suit and sun-glasses, past the thirty-six heads he had counted from his seat in the rear. They were mostly couples, out-of-town conventioneers and their wives, middle-aged or older, almost all of them wearing glasses and name tags.

  “That beautiful structure on the left is the City-Country Building,” the driver was saying into the mike clipped to his lapel. “And the statue in front is the world-famous ‘Spirit of Detroit.’ Sitting there, that man is sixteen feet high and weighs over sixteen thousand pounds. Ahead of us now you see the Detroit River.”

  As the bus turned left onto Jefferson, heads raised and gazes shifted to look at the river and dismal gray skyline beyond.

  “Across the way, beautiful downtown Windsor, Ontario,” the drive said. “You can get over to Canada by tunnel or bridge. There used to be a ferry, but I believe he was arrested some time back. The amazing thing is that, at this particular point, Canada is south of the United States.”

  At the front of the bus now Bobby Shy ducked his head t
o look out. Straightening again he reached inside the jacket of his light-gray business suit, came out with a .38 Colt Special and placed the barrel gently against the driver’s ear.

  “Give me the mike, man,” Bobby Shy said.

  Swag (1976)

  Three guys with illegal expertise, a plan to snag a tax-free hundred grand, and a taste of summertime Detroit’s sweet life. But it means committing armed robbery. And being smart enough to get away with it.

  Publishers Weekly: “An electrifying novel . . . with a murderous, well-timed suspenseful finale.”

  The New York Times: “Leonard is nobody’s follower, and he has a style of his own. “Swag” is one of the best of the year.”

  From the novel:

  There was a photograph of Frank in an ad that ran in the Detroit Free Press and showed all the friendly salesmen at Red Bowers Chevrolet. Under his photo it said Frank J. Ryan. He had on a nice smile, a styled moustache, and a summer-weight suit made out of that material that’s shiny and looks like it has snags in it.

  There was a photograph of Stick on file at 1300 Beaubein, Detroit Police Headquarters. Under the photo it said Ernest Stickley, Jr. 89037. He had on a sport shirt that had sailboats and palm trees on it. He’d bought it in Pompano Beach, Florida.