Clea's Moon

by Edward Wright

  “Let’s say she drive in her nice car over to his house, ‘way up there off Mulholland. He expecting her, and he meet her in the driveway and take her inside. They already know each other a little bit. She very well dressed, got a lot of style. Inside, they talk, he offer her a drink, everything proper. He a dangerous man, everybody know that, but this lady important herself, and she act like she not afraid of him, and he respect that.

  “So she give him the pictures and leave in her nice car. And Mr. B., he sit up for a while with his drink, then he go to bed.” The Creole stopped to chew.

  “And?”

  “And let’s suppose they was somebody else in the lady’s nice car when she park it off to the side, around from the front where nobody keep an eye on it. And this person sneak out of the car while she inside and find a way inside the house, where he hide in a cleaning closet. Like I say, Mr. B, he a dangerous man, but he don’t feel anybody really dangerous to him, ‘cause he only got two men in the house, and they playing cards in the dining room.

  “And let’s say this person wait a long time there in that closet smellin’ like furniture polish, ‘til everybody asleep, and then he slip a nylon stocking over his head and make his way up those stairs. He hear snoring, and he go in this bedroom, but he find this old lady asleep there, and he leave without bothering her. Next door turn out to be Mr. B’s room. And there he pull something out of his shoe, and he fix him real good. And just after Mr. B feel his throat cut, but before he die, he hear somebody whisper a name, a little girl’s name. And so he go to Hell remembering that name.”

  Amen, Horn felt himself saying, almost as his father might have said it.

  “But just then the light come on, and there somebody in bed with him. She sit up, all white, looking at all the blood. And she want to scream, but he do this—” The Creole put a finger to his lips in a hushing motion. “—and she be quiet. Just froze there.”

  Horn never knew what made him ask. “What did she look like?”

  “Young,” the Creole said. “You not surprised, huh? But she not a child, not this one. Beautiful young lady, dark hair. Funny thing: She look almost familiar to him, you know?”

  Yes, he thought. I know.

  “But that’s just a story.” The Creole wiped his face one more time, laid money on the counter, and got up to leave.

  “My treat,” he said. “Now we even.”

  * * *

  The woman who answered his knock on the door wore the same soiled apron. Her resigned expression shifted into recognition when she saw his face. “My husband’s not home,” she said.

  “Yes, ma’am, I know. I just saw him leave,” Horn said.

  This did not reassure her. He pressed on quickly.

  “Mrs. Taro, your husband doesn’t owe money; I’m not here for that. I know I didn’t behave very well the last time, but this is different. I just need a minute with you, and I’ll be gone.” He tried to smile reassuringly.

  She reluctantly opened the door wider, and he stepped into the living room, where he stood awkwardly.

  “The man I work for wants you to know he made a little mistake in his bookkeeping,” Horn told her. “Seems I collected too much from your husband.”

  “Too much?” She seemed to be having trouble with the idea.

  “Yes, ma’am. He wanted me to return this to you.” He handed her some folded bills.

  She held them without counting them, looking dumbly at him. “Well, thank you very much,” she said finally.

  “One other thing,” he said. “Man I work for says there’s one condition. He wants to make sure this money doesn’t go for gambling. Said I should ask you to promise to spend it on yourself and the boy. Clothes and food and things like that.”

  She nodded slowly. Wisps of gray-tinged brown had escaped the pins holding her hair in a bun on the back of her neck. She reminded Horn of a photo he had once seen, a shot of a farm wife during the Depression, her face a map of toil.

  “Naturally, I don’t want to go behind your husband’s back. But you think you can promise me that?”

  “Well, I guess I can,” she said softly.

  “That’s good. I saw your boy for a minute the last time I was here. Is he around?”

  “Uh-huh.” Her expression brightened. “He’s out by the side of the house, swapping comic books with a friend of his.” She led him to a side window of the shabby living room. Looking out, he saw the boy sitting with another on a sidewalk that led to the back of the house. His lame leg was tucked protectively under him. Between the two boys stood several stacks of comic books, and they appeared to be bargaining heatedly.

  “What’s his name?” Horn asked.

  “Orville,” she said. “After his grandfather.”

  “Is that his friend Lee?”

  “How’d you know?”

  “Oh, he mentioned him. He said Lee likes Sunset Carson, for some strange reason.”

  “I wouldn’t know about that,” she said vaguely.

  “I just remembered something,” he said. “I’ll be right back.” He went out to his car and returned with a roll of heavy paper about two feet long. “I’d like to leave this for Orville, if it’s all right with you.”

  “You want to see him?” She started for the window.

  “No, that’s all right. Maybe you could just give this to him.”

  She unrolled the stiff paper partway down. It was the poster for Wyoming Thunder. “He told me he likes the movies,” Horn said.

  “He sure does,” she said. “But he doesn’t have anything like this. You’re very nice to—” She looked at the image more closely. “Oh, my goodness. Is this you?”

  “I guess I ought to go.” He opened the door.

  “It’s you, ain’t it?”

  Funny, he thought. The boy wanted to know the same thing.

  He paused in the doorway. “Yes, ma’am, it’s me,” he said finally. “And I’d appreciate it if you’d tell him that.”

  THE END