by Gores
***
It was the grassy interior of California here, hot and endless and unchanging, and Louise drove it half asleep. Far to the east was the blue smudge of the Sierra; to the west the low dark backs of the Coast Range. Here were just grass and moaning wind and hovering white-tailed kites, beautiful lean snowy birds that might have been gulls or terns except for that unmistakable predator's head.
What else could she have done except leave? If Moyers had told Runyan about her, any relationship between them was gone anyway. Better leave him thinking she was still working out some imagined debt to a former lover; he already had assimilated that incomplete part of the story. Why was she not on her way to Hawaii or Florida or Puerto Rico or even Atlantic City, any resort area where a woman with her sort of talents could always find an uneasy living? Why was she returning to the house of a man she had come to loathe?
To pick up her half-completed scraps of stories, no other reason. From the beginning, she now saw, her brief season with Runyan had been doomed to failure--but it had somehow ruined her taste for the good life on the edge. His struggle to break free from his past had made her want to break free from hers.
Together, they might have done it. Apart, both would fail. But she was going to keep going through the motions, because conventional wisdom held that sometimes appearance became reality.
For the first time in over a year, she wished she had some coke. Coming back to Runyan, she hadn't brought her sleeping pills. She hadn't thought she'd need them. Without them, she needed some coke to kick her past this first, bad part. Well, maybe booze would do it. Maybe she would stop at a motel before dark, sign in, and get drunk.
***
Runyan sat on his side of the assistant bank manager's desk as the young middle-aged man with round glasses and a precise manner laid down the magnifying glass he'd been using to examine the sheaf of bonds, and cleared his throat. "I'm sorry to have been so ... cautious, Mr. Dawson, but these are worth a great deal of money, and as you come to me without references . . ."
Runyan nodded pleasantly.
"I understand. But they are bearer bonds, and I am the bearer. . ."
"Precisely," said the banker, as if the fact caused him pain. "And I realize the necessity of confidentiality in, ah, business arrangements which require a large amount of cash. .."
"Five-hundreds and a few hundreds are fine," said Runyan. "And a couple of envelopes to put them in. .."
***
Louise followed the freeway signs indicating FOODLODGING-GAS to the most anonymous motel in a motel row on the outskirts of Redding: motel, pool, restaurant, and piano bar all in one. She stopped in front of the office and put on her sunglasses to go register.
***
Runyan was waiting when Patty Cardwell came trudging up with her blue book bag, dressed in another skirt and a white blouse, her sweater around her waist with the arms knotted in front. With her father so recently dead, he hadn't been sure she would come here to play; but he also figured she didn't have much of anywhere else to go. She stopped dead at sight of him, remembering. Then she came on.
"My daddy is dead," she said.
"I know. I'm sorry, Patty."
"He was shot." She sat down in a swing. "Like on TV."
He took one of the bank envelopes out of his inner coat pocket and crouched to stuff it down into her bag between schoolbooks. He looked up into her solemn watching eyes.
"I want you to go right home and give this to your mother. It's something your father gave me to keep for her. Can you remember that?"
She stared at him for a very long moment. "Sure."
She turned and ran off with the book bag. Runyan watched her until she was out of sight. At least Betty and the kid would make out all right: The envelope contained just shy of $300,000.
***
Louise started with a shrimp cocktail, had a green salad with Roquefort dressing, went on to filet mignon with baked potato and sour cream and butter, garlic toast and the vegetable of the day--slightly undercooked zucchini--and finished with a chocolate mousse and two cups of coffee with cream and sugar. With the meal she had a half-carafe of Zinfandel. After the meal, she went into the lounge to drink Margaritas without salt.
***
Runyan taped the second envelope to the inside of one thigh with adhesive tape, had two cheeseburgers and a large fries at Jack-in-the-Box, then started drinking boilermakers through the Tenderloin. The coldness of his face, the flatness of his voice, and the obvious conditioning of his body protected him from the predators. They preferred their prey maimed; even at his most drunken, Runyan looked as ready to attack as they.
The night was a descending spiral into purgatorial images and impressions. Sometimes it was just faces. Faces lost, angry, sad, frightened, but always the faces of the Tenderloin: whores, male and female, beckoning and smirking, all ages, all colors, all races. Old people scuttling like crabs, their Social Security checks clutched in their pockets. Money went further here, and there was, after all, the illusion of life on these streets. Cops. Runaways. Dealers. Players. Narcs. People seeking action. A degenerate youth, who could have been one of the trio he had used to get his stuff out of the Westward Hotel, groped him. He shoved the boy aside and shambled on.
A tough-faced cop paused to look him over, perhaps thinking paddy wagon and drunk tank. Runyan turned into a convenient corner grocery store and bought an apple, and the moment passed. Later he was aware only of single sharp details: the line of a jaw; light shining amber through a raised drink; a heavy skull-and-crossbones ring on the finger of an outlaw cyclist; his own features distorted by a cheap back-bar mirror.
The streets seemed to grow darker; their detail softened from sharp to fuzzy to blurry and finally to contorted as his alcohol level rose. He threw up into the gutter between two parked cars, knowing he had to be finished with the Tenderloin's mean streets before they finished him. He would never escape if he gave in to the obscure feelings of worthlessness Louise's defection had triggered. Together, supporting one another, they could have made it. Alone, apart ...
He drank hot black coffee and wandered again. The darkness became literal: The nighttime streets had become the black man's streets. He was standing in front of Sister Sally's. He started up the steps. He wasn't sober, but he was composmentis.
***
The man was a foot taller and five years younger than Louise, with golden flowing hair, a bandito mustache, the bodybuilder's bunched shoulders and trim waist, and the selfcentered stud's empty eyes. She had noted his bulging muscles at poolside, and had felt his eyes on her during dinner. For the past 20 minutes she had been feeling his hand on her thigh, and hadn't had enough self-esteem to remove it.
The woman playing the piano, who was pushing 40 hard enough to sprain a wrist, knew exactly. After ten minutes of dagger looks at Louise, she started to play the old Pal Joey tune, The Lady Is a Tramp.
Terrific. Everyone kept telling her, in words and actions, that that was who she was, what she was good at. So why fight it? It might as well be right away, like climbing back on the horse right after he'd thrown you. Otherwise maybe she'd never do it again.
"One more drink first," she said to the blond stud. She paid. Of course.
CHAPTER 30
Voices, laughter, sweat, perfume, and smoke filled the air, all weaving through Donna Summer's She Works Hard for the Money. Runyan decided it probably was as apt a song for Sister Sally's as He's a Sixty-Minute Man had been for similar establishments in the post-World War II era of his father's bourbon memories. Sister Sally, immense behind the bar, caught Runyan's eye but made no move to serve him. Instead, she leaned across the bar toward him, her great breasts overflowing against the polished hardwood. Her hair gleamed with pomade like shavings of gunmetal.
"Somebody made his point the hard way with Taps last night. Firebombed the mortuary and caught up with him at home. Now they gonna be playin' Taps at his funeral." She gave a sudden rich peal of laughter that shook the mou
nds of her breasts and belly like bagged jello under the tentlike futa. "Gonna have to bury him out of somebody else's funeral home."
A petite shapely girl with knowing eyes and very full lips, wearing only a red Fleur de Lace bodysuit of filmy silk, slipped up beside Runyan. She twined her arm through his. Feeling a sad stillness inside him, he ignored her to say, "His woman? Grace?"
Sister Sally shrugged, disinterested in any women not her own. The girl pulled Runyan toward the stairs to the second floor with professional urgency.
"C'mon, sweetie," she said, "Emmy Lou show you some grace."
***
Louise unlocked the door of her motel room and went in, the blond stud close behind her, already breathing hard as if mere proximity put him in rut. Before she could even close the door he had her pressed back against the wall, his face buried in her throat, his practiced hands cupping her breasts, massaging them, seeking the nipples through the cloth of her brassiere.
For a few moments she submitted, head back against the doorframe, eyes shut, trying to will participation. But when his groping hand hiked up the front of her skirt and slid down the front of her panties, she made a strangled sound in her throat and tore free, her eyes wide open, wild as the eyes of a fire-trapped horse.
"Look, I made a mistake," she said. "I'm sorry, I really am. I just . . ." She sought words to describe an inner devastation for which there were no words. "Just ... sorry. .."
He chuckled and began forcing her to her knees. "I dealt with prick-teasers before, little lady. Once you taste the-"
She rammed her head violently up under his chin, hearing his teeth crunch together and knocking him just enough off balance so she could shove him out the door. In the same motion she slammed and locked it.
He began pounding on it, shaking it against the frame with the violence of his blows. As she slid on the night lock, he began yelling obscenities; from somewhere down the line of units came another male voice, heavy as a baying hound.
"KNOCK IT OFF OR I'M COMING OUT THERE AND YOU WON'T LIKE WHAT I DO WHEN I GET THERE!"
The pounding ceased. The obscenities ceased. Louise, her head against the door, heard mutters, then retreating steps. Back to the lounge to soften up the piano player; still plenty of time. The night was yet young.
But Louise wasn't. She got her suitcase out of the closet and began putting back into it the things she had taken out. Much better to drive all through the night than this degradation. Which, come to think of it, had never seemed degrading before. Perhaps she had begun building a soul.
***
Runyan lay on his back on the bed, enveloped by Emmy Lou's cheap musk, staring at the ceiling and remembering the last time he had lain like this, with Louise, as they had talked about their hopes and plans. Gone, all gone.
Emmy Lou, hunched between his legs, was crooning to it like a mother comforting a frightened child.
"Don't you fret none, honey, you jus' a little tired. Emmy Lou jus' work on you a little more, bring you up proud as-"
Runyan raised his head to look down at her small, ebony body crouched over his dead stick.
"I'm sorry, Emmy Lou," he said. "I made a mistake. This was the wrong way to say goodbye to someone."
***
Ten minutes later he was standing in front of the empty firebombed shell of Taps's funeral parlor, hands in pockets, thoughts somber. When he got Taps involved in their old San Quentin fantasy, he should have remembered that Taps wanted it all, right now, and could be a fool in the things he would do to get it. Just like Jamie, he had ended up with nothing. Not even his life.
There was the stench of scorched electrical wiring in the air, the reek of released chemicals, the thick char of wood ash and oily blistered smell of bubbled paint. Police CRIME SCENE tapes were up, but there seemed to be no watchman on duty. He stepped over the plastic tape and moved through the ruins of the building toward the rear.
Grace sat behind her debris-littered desk in what was left of the office, the only illumination that of streetlights through the glassless windows. Disorienting shadow patterns were cast by the remains of thin metal decorator blinds hanging at grotesque heat-twisted angles.
As she poured herself another shot, Runyan came through the doorway, glass crunching loudly beneath his soles. Grace tossed back her drink and poured again.
"I guess I loved that rotten ugly nigger," she said. Her voice sharpened. "Where's that little lady of yours? Only good thing about you."
"Gone." Runyan picked up the phone receiver from the floor, replaced it on the hooks, then lifted it again and listened. There was a dial tone. He tapped out a number. "She found out there wasn't any free lunch."
"Huh-uh. No way. Not that lady. She left, somethin' drove her off." She looked at him again. "You, probably. God knows you bad enough news."
Runyan, listening to the phone ring, picked up her whiskey, toasted her slightly with it, and tossed it back neat. He set the shotglass down in front of her again.
"Bad enough news," Grace repeated softly.
"Hello," said the phone almost cautiously in Runyan's ear.
He said, "Gatian? Runyan. Cardwell convinced me. What you want is in a coin locker at the Trailways Depot."
Grace was saying to herself, "Guess I should leave."
"The key is under the right-hand chair at the shoe-shine stand. I called you because I figure you don't have the balls to cross Delarty."
Grace sighed, "Guess I got nowhere to go."
Runyan added, "I don't want either one of you clowns coming at me afterwards, claiming that I stiffed you."
Grace said, "Guess I got nothing to go with."
"Wait," said Gatian, "I don't underst-"
"This squares us," said Runyan, and hung up.
Grace was watching him. She gave a bitter little laugh.
"Getting yo'self off the hook?"
Runyan didn't answer. He was tapping out another number on the phone. As it started to ring, he took the other banker's envelope from his pocket and tossed it on the desk.
"Police Emergency, Operator Four," said the phone.
Grace, frowning, reached out a slow hand for the envelope.
Runyan said to the police dispatcher, "Tell Waterhouse to get his butt over to the Trailways Depot right now if he wants to close out the Tenconi and Cardwell hits."
He hung up. Grace had the packet open and was riffling through the money with unbelieving fingers. She raised her head to look at him. "Runyan, I can't take this. All along Taps was planning to double-cross you."
"You weren't," said Runyan.
***
Austin was a narrow one-block alley which ran behind Runyan's rooming house on Bush Street. As Runyan came trudging up from Franklin, the man standing on the roof of the building across the alley moved quickly back from the edge so he wouldn't be seen.
The man went back down the narrow stairway to the second floor. The building smelled of Oriental cooking. He unlocked his door, crossed the room without turning on the lights, and crouched in front of the window. It looked directly at the back of Runyan's rooming house. He settled in to wait.
Runyan stopped just inside the doorway, hand still on the light switch. The room had been expertly tossed by someone who didn't care if he left tracks. The mattress had been slit and gutted, the pillow was a spent storm of feathers, the mouldings had been ripped from the baseboard.
Runyan came the rest of the way into the room, shut the door, and started to take off his shirt. The closet door opened and Moyers stepped out, a flashlight in his left hand, his right hand in his topcoat pocket. He had a nasty-sly grin on his face.
In that instant, Grace's remark of an hour before returned-if Louise had left, someone had driven her off. His manner said Moyers was the one.
A great weight lifted. His mind began to work again. He tossed his shirt on top of the bureau, went to the sink, and ran cold water to splash over his head, face, shoulders, and chest.
"Find anything interesting?"
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"So you didn't stash them here. You can't blame me for making sure." When Runyan didn't respond, he added, "She really got to you, didn't she?"
Runyan gave a harsh little laugh and turned off the water and started rubbing vigorously at his hair and face with a towel from the rack beside the sink. Louise had been forced away. What else mattered?
Well, staying alive, for openers.
He said, "You wanted her gone to isolate me so I had nobody to back up my story except you. But I can't figure what you threatened her with to make her go."
He crossed the room, still rubbing at his hair, and tossed the wet towel over the back of the room's single straight-backed chair. He put his foot on the seat and leaned one elbow on the raised knee.
Moyers said, "You don't want to know. Just give me the diamonds and I'll be on my way."
"I'll bet you will," said Runyan, "since you never intended to turn them back to the insurance company anyway. First you nudge the authorities into granting me a parole, then you furnish me with an alibi for two murders. If I don't hand them over, you withdraw the alibi and I go back to prison." He laughed harshly. A lot of things had fallen into place for him. "But if I do hand them over, I get killed."
Moyers was standing with his legs slightly spread, square on to Runyan, both hands now in the topcoat pockets. Runyan's left hand had retained its grip on a corner of the towel, where Moyers could not see it.
"I can arrange police protection against-"
"Who? Delarty and Gatian?" Runyan shook his head. "Hell, it was you killed Tenconi and Cardwell--to eliminate some of the competition. So giving me an alibi gave you one, too. The beauty of it is that I give you the diamonds, I get shot, and Delarty and Gatian get blamed for it. Getting revenge for their dead associates. Neat."
He tightened his grip on the towel.
"But Delarty and Gatian got arrested about an hour ago for trafficking in hot bonds. And there aren't any diamonds. When I went back to get them, they were gone. So you see-"