Signwave

by Andrew Vachss

“For what?” the big girl said. “There’s no money in women’s softball. The pro league is a joke, and Olympic Gold might get me a few minutes of attention—big deal.”

  “Remember when we went down to that college so you could score a yearbook?”

  “Sure.”

  “Well, wasn’t that woman supposed to be getting some kind of advanced degree, so she could coach?”

  “Yeah. But she wasn’t an athlete. She was all about ‘monetizing.’ You know, getting to be an agent, or a financial planner for some of the moneymakers who went pro.”

  “Couldn’t you…?”

  “If it was representing females, they’d have to be real superstars to make any money. Males, I’d never get a shot. Anyway, that’s not me. I’m not a negotiator.”

  No, you’re not, I thought to myself. It’s not as if you tried to talk Cameron Taft out of using your little sister—you just shot him in the head.

  “Wouldn’t a degree mean you could make more money, no matter what kind of job you wanted?”

  “It would,” MaryLou said, her tone telling me that she’d thought all this through. “And it wouldn’t have to be a degree from a softball powerhouse. I know the game, inside out. There’s no reason why I couldn’t coach. High school, not college.”

  “You’d still—”

  “I’ve only got the one more year left. I could finish that anywhere. Or I could take a year off, if I wanted.”

  “I guess that’s right. But would they hold your scholarship…?”

  “They’d hold it for ten years, once they saw I could still bring it,” the big girl said. Not bragging, stating a fact. A fact that didn’t seem to make her all that happy.

  “You could coach here,” Mack said. “The high school would probably crawl through five miles of broken glass to get you.”

  “Here? After…after what happened?”

  “Why not?” Dolly said, in her “How far do you want to take it?” voice.

  “Yeah. Why not?” Franklin finally spoke.

  “I thought we were here to talk about Bridgette’s shop,” MaryLou said.

  —

  Khaki was one hell of a scout.

  The parcel of land Mack bought was slightly less than a half-acre, on a sloping, wooded hill. The owner couldn’t wait to sell it: Mud slides are so common around here that insurance on the houses built on that hill is ridiculous. Plus, anyone fool enough to build there would have to walk up a hill to get to their own house.

  The architectural plan Dolly got someone to do for her showed a tiny little house, with a “widow’s walk” tower sticking out of the top. The whole place was six hundred square feet, so the tower would only take one person at a time—it looked like a long TV antenna growing out of the roof.

  Bridgette was a jewelry designer. No shortage of those around here, but she’d built up a serious reputation already. Not just for her craftsmanship, but for the designing itself—there’s nothing a woman likes better than hearing, “I never saw one like that!” about her necklace. Or earrings. Or bracelet…It didn’t matter, because if Bridgette made it there never was going to be another one, ever. That’s why she called the little shop One of One—everything she turned out was the ultra-max of “limited edition.”

  The little house would be more than spacious enough for working on her designs, and propane could provide all the power easily enough. If anyone wanted to make the trek, they could see whatever was on display. And going to all that trouble would only add to the cachet—that’s what Dolly said.

  Bridgette could also do a showing whenever she had enough pieces ready—there was always empty storefront space, and a month’s rent would be better than waiting for someone to actually open up a business in most of them.

  “We could do it,” Franklin said, more confidence vibrating in his voice than I’d ever heard. “A parcel that size, we’d have to cut a lot of timber, but it wouldn’t go to waste. I know we couldn’t get a truck up there, but there’s a way to drag the wood out. You use chains, and make this kind of slide. Mr. Spyros showed me how to do it. We get a few jobs like that every year.”

  “A slab foundation,” Mack said. “But it could be tricky, getting it all level.”

  “Not that much trouble,” Franklin assured him.

  MaryLou stood up and put her hand on Franklin’s shoulder.

  Dolly was smiling with deep, true pleasure.

  I was thinking about what kind of intel Conrad could pick up from that tower.

  —

  I figured on waiting a couple of months, so working on Bridgette’s shop was perfect in a lot of ways.

  Franklin could only work nights and weekends, but MaryLou was with me almost every day.

  A couple of times, Mack walked up with a whole crowd of that “permanent homeless” crew of teenagers he watched over. Their leader, a redhead named Timmy, had already met me, and I recognized a few of his crew, so no tension there. And nobody asked MaryLou any questions, either because Mack had told them not to, or because the survival skills they’d been forced to develop had kicked in.

  I guess half the town owed Dolly favors. People just showed up with their tools. There was an electrician, a plumber, four beefy guys with a sewage tank, Martin and Johnny harassing Mack with questions about Bridgette’s taste in plantings…they never stopped coming.

  “She doesn’t know about this?” Franklin asked Mack.

  “Not a clue,” he responded. “It’s got to be a surprise.”

  “But…but what if she doesn’t like it?”

  MaryLou cracked him across the back of his head hard enough to cause brain damage in any of the awed teenagers. “She’ll love it, you mope! When she sees what went into this, she’ll get weak in the knees, I promise you.”

  Franklin blinked a couple of times. Not from MaryLou’s slap—that probably hadn’t even registered—but from the thinking I could see him doing.

  You get the message yet? I thought to myself.

  “Oh, that’s the truth,” Dolly backed up MaryLou. Whenever I was going someplace for the day, I would ask Dolly if she wanted me to bring her back anything. Her answer was always the same: “A surprise!”

  —

  I was sitting by myself on a big chunk of timber that would have to be cut a few more times before it could go down the hill, trying to work through all the possible outcomes before I moved.

  “I wish I could do something like that,” Franklin said, taking a seat next to me.

  “You just did something like that,” I told him, puzzled at the wistful note in his thunder-bass voice.

  “I don’t mean build something. I know I can do that, Mist—Dell. It’s the…I don’t know how to say it, exactly…the ‘surprise’ thing. Mack, he’s so excited to be doing this, right? Because it’s going to make Bridgette real happy.”

  “Sure…”

  “See, making Bridgette happy, that makes him happy. If I could make MaryLou happy, it would make me happy. But I don’t know anything I could do. Not like this, I mean,” he said, swiveling his head to take in the whole scope of the work everyone had put in.

  “Franklin…Uh, you’re talking to the wrong man about this. You think I knew that women love surprises before Dolly told me? No. How would I? Me, I don’t like surprises. So how could I…?”

  “Why don’t you like surprises?”

  The more I talk, the less I help, I thought to myself. How could I explain to Franklin that when I was his age there was no such thing as a good surprise?

  “I’m not sure,” I said, feeling my way. “I just don’t. Never did.”

  “You think it’s because you’re a man?”

  “That’d be the easy way out, Franklin. But I haven’t known enough women to say they all like surprises. I know Dolly does, because she said so. A million times. But…?”

  “Like MaryLou just said to me, right?”

  I just nodded. If Franklin was “retarded,” I’d hate to meet a genius. I guess he just fell into the role because it
was an easier one to play. Maybe he was slower to get things, but once he got them, they were locked down.

  I remember Franklin vehemently saying that MaryLou just couldn’t be gay. They went to the prom together. He loved her. Case closed.

  I cursed myself for a fool, but I knew I owed the big man a try. “Franklin, you know what I think? I think some women love surprises, but you can’t be sure about any of them unless they find a way to tell you they do.”

  “I know. I know now, anyway. But, see, Mack, he didn’t only know his wife loved surprises, he even knew what kind of surprise she’d really like.”

  “Maybe you do, too,” I said. “About MaryLou, I mean.”

  “Huh?”

  “Well, you know you can build a house, right? Not by yourself, but with everyone pitching in to help. Like we’re doing now.”

  “But how could I…?”

  “Franklin, whatever you’re about to say is wrong. All those permits and code-compliance things, Dolly knows how to get them. Or get them done, anyway. You think Mack wouldn’t help you? Or even that gang of kids he brought along?”

  “But even if they did…I mean, even if I could get a terrific house, why do you think MaryLou would like that for a surprise, Dell?”

  “I think she just told you she would, my friend.”

  I got up. Franklin stayed where he was. Probably had some thinking of his own to do.

  —

  “I’m scared of guns,” Johnny said the next evening. “But Martin thinks we should have one, so we agreed…to ask you about it, I mean.”

  I didn’t waste my time with any “Why me?” stuff. They weren’t wrong, and we all knew it.

  “I think it’s probably a good idea,” I said, picking my words carefully. “You live way out of town, and stupid people get stupid ideas.”

  “What stupid people?” Johnny demanded.

  “There’s no shortage of them,” I said, catching Martin’s nod out of the corner of my eye. “Especially with the coast becoming the meth capital of the country.”

  “We’ve never had any—”

  “You asked me if I thought it was a good idea. I said it was. I don’t want to argue with you, okay?”

  “That’s just the way Johnny talks,” Martin said. “It sounds like he’s starting an argument, but he’s just making sure you understand before you go. We already agreed between us. That you’d know better than we would about this. And Dolly…”

  His voice trailed off. I already figured this whole thing was my wife’s idea. Not getting a gun, but settling a…disagreement between her two friends. Martin probably was dead-set on getting a firearm, and Johnny was probably not—it’d be just like Dolly to tell them to get some kind of independent arbiter. And nominate me for the job.

  “You’re talking about something for the house? For the store? To carry around?”

  “Well, you’re the expert,” Johnny said, just short of waspish.

  “You’ll never need a gun for the store,” I said. But even though Johnny was glad to hear that, he had to be himself, so:

  “Why is that?”

  “Because if someone wants to rob your store—during business hours, I mean, not some night-working burglar—the last thing you want to do is endanger your customers. It’s just money. You can always get more money.”

  “And we never keep much cash in the shop, either,” Martin said. “Most people pay by debit card, or a check. There’s even an app if they want to—”

  “Good,” I cut in, thinking, That’s one down. “Carrying a gun doesn’t make any sense, either. Nobody’s after you, nobody’s going to pull a broad-daylight carjack, not around here. That’s for idiots who go out looking for an old lady driving a Lincoln. They don’t have a plan, they don’t even know what to do with the car. Or a fool so wasted that he points a gun at someone because he doesn’t have the money to get a cab ride home.”

  “True enough,” Martin said. Two down.

  “But for the house, yeah, it makes sense. To protect yourselves, not any…not any thing, like a TV or whatever. And if you had a dog, you wouldn’t need a gun to protect the house, anyway.”

  Before Martin could start off complaining that Johnny didn’t like dogs, Johnny sliced in with: “You’ve got a dog. And I’ll bet you’re carrying a gun right this minute.”

  “The dog’s not with me,” I said, staying very calm. I don’t like being baited, but I know how to spin when someone tries it. “That mutt’s never with me unless Dolly is, too. Rascal’s a great dog. He’d protect Dolly with his life, wouldn’t even think about it. Rascal’s not the problem; Dolly is.”

  “I don’t under—”

  “Come on!” I appealed to both of them. “You know Dolly. If someone broke into the house when I wasn’t home, and Rascal went after them, Dolly’d jump right in to protect him.”

  They both laughed—they’d known Dolly a long time.

  “We don’t know anything about guns,” Johnny finally said. “Could you show us…?”

  “I can show you how to use a self-defense weapon; that won’t take more than a couple of hours. But stuff like making sure you have a clear field of fire, that you’d have to practice. Over and over. A shotgun is the best for what you need, but whichever one of you is holding it has to know that the other one is behind him before he pulls the trigger.”

  “A shotgun?” Martin said, clearly disappointed.

  “Yes. You’re both strong enough to handle a twelve-gauge. And with the right load, not only is it guaranteed to discourage anything that’s on the wrong side of the weapon, it’s the simplest and safest choice.”

  “You’ll pick it out and…?”

  “I can’t do that. You have to sign paper and go through some little background check—for a shotgun, they’ll do it while you wait. You’d be the registered owner, so you’d have to make the buy.”

  “But we wouldn’t know which one to buy,” Martin said.

  “You want a twelve-gauge, single-trigger side-by-side, one barrel full-choke, the other modified. There’s a gun store not five miles from here. You’ve got the specs. Almost any brand will do. Ithaca, Remington…there’s no real difference.”

  —

  “Just like you said,” Martin told me, a week later. He was holding a beautiful Parker 12-gauge out for inspection.

  “That’s not a new one.”

  “Oh, we understand,” Johnny said. “It’s really beautiful, isn’t it?”

  I had to admit it was, but: “You haven’t fired it?”

  “Noooo,” Johnny answered. “We thought we’d wait for you to show us, and everything.”

  —

  “Why are you doing all that?” Johnny asked, bending a little to the waspish side again.

  Apparently, he wasn’t crazy about my setting up the shotgun in a brace, then wiring the trigger with about a fifty-foot lead line, all before I broke the piece and loaded it.

  “That isn’t a new gun. Probably a hundred years old. And it’s been updated quite a bit.”

  “Of course. We know it’s an antique—a work of art, too. But that’s no reason why it wouldn’t work.”

  All I did was tell them to stand back. Then I pulled on the wire. Twice.

  It didn’t blow up, so I walked over, extracted the spent shells, and checked it over. Closely. Whoever had modified this thing meant to use it. I didn’t want to ask how much they’d paid for this “collectible,” or spoil their mood by explaining that every modification—and I could see a few of them—made it worth less to a collector, not more.

  By the time the sun was setting, both of them were confident they could handle the kick—the extended buttplate of crosshatched rubber helped—and understood basic safety, like keeping the thing loaded but broke open, so all they’d have to do was snap it shut and be ready to go.

  They’d be a little sore the next morning—went through a hundred rounds apiece—but nothing serious.

  What was serious was the safety instructions I drilled int
o them until they were ready to chuck the whole thing. Well, almost ready.

  And then I made them show me they could snap it closed, lift it to shoulder height, and fire twice before I was ready to leave the shotgun with them. The last ten times, I made them do it blindfolded.

  “Really?” Johnny snapped at me.

  “Someone breaks into your home in the middle of the night, you’re gonna turn on the lights for them?”

  “He’s right,” Martin said.

  “I know. But I just don’t…”

  “What?”

  “Never mind,” Johnny sulked. But he let me put the black sleep mask over his eyes without any more bitching.

  —

  “Stay home this morning,” Dolly said while we were eating breakfast.

  Just me and Dolly.

  And Rascal, who always scored his percentage.

  I didn’t ask any questions.

  It was another hour or so later when we saw two cars pull up behind the house. Martin’s hopped-up Mini Cooper, and some other one I didn’t recognize.

  “Could you come outside for a minute?” Martin asked me.

  I got up, Dolly and Rascal right behind me.

  The second car was a Peugeot 403. Had to be at least sixty years old. I knew that car; its engine was probably twice the size of my motorcycle’s, but had to pull four times the weight. I’d driven a couple of them, years ago. A study in contradictions: it was small, but a real four-door sedan, and the back seat wasn’t any less comfortable than the front. It had a four-speed manual, but the shift lever was on the column. And it had a sunroof that you cranked open by hand.

  “You know what this is?” Martin asked me.

  I told him I did. He didn’t seem surprised—after all, I’d recognized the Facel Vega he was still “rebuilding” when I’d first seen the stripped body up on blocks years ago, and this was a French car….

  “Ever drive one?” he asked.

  “A few times.”

  “Want to try it out?”

  “Sure,” I told him. Not to be polite—I really did want to see if it was anything like I’d remembered.

  “The keys are in it,” he said, opening the passenger door and climbing in. Dolly and Johnny went back to the house.

  It fired right up. I slipped the lever into first, let out the soft, smooth clutch, and we were off.