Lone Rock

by Duane Lindsay

  Suddenly Maggie snorted, a quite unfeminine sound. She stared up, her eyes wide, glistening with tears.” Oh, Pieburn! A warthog? You were doing so well before the warthog.” She burst into loud laughter.

  Adrian looked first at Pieburn, kneeling innocently by the fireplace, then to Maggie, rolling, literally, on the floor. “You made this up”

  Pieburn laughed. “My parents are professionals in Kenya. Mother is an accountant for an anesthesiologist at a medical center. Father is professor of Modem Languages at the University. They live in a split level ranch house with a two car garage.”

  He said with great dignity, “Father drives a Range Rover.”

  “A Range Rover!” Maggie squealed with glee.

  Finally, Adrian got it. “Ha-ha,” he said flatly. But he smiled at himself as Pieburn crawled over to Maggie and slapped her palm with a low five.

  They sat around the living room drinking red wine , watching the embers of the fire.“There’s something wrong going on at Control-logics,” Maggie said. “Really, Adrian. It isn’t possible for them to do the projects you’re doing without buying from me.”

  “What do you mean?” said Pieburn.” What’s happening at Hydro?”

  Here we go, thought Adrian. He sipped his wine and listened, not wanting to be involved, but knowing Maggie wouldn’t let it go. So what? They’re doing something illegal. I don’t care. He let his thoughts drift to Corley Sayres. If something bad was happening, he was probably to blame.

  “It’s like this,” Maggie said.” Carlton Electric is a supplier for say, Westmoreland products. That means, if you want to buy something in Denver, you’d have to go through me because we’re the sole reps in Colorado. Even if you called the main office they’d refer you to me. We’re an exclusive distributor, you can only buy from us.”

  Pieburn turned to Adrian.” So why isn’t Control-logics buying anything made by Westmoreland? I know you’re using their control systems, you told me so yourself. Where do they get the stuff?”

  “It’s old inventory,” Adrian said. Let it go, he thought. Just let it go.

  Maggie wouldn’t. “Control-logics used to buy from us. When Wally Clooner took over he started getting a lot of large jobs and he never bought anything again.”

  “That’s not true,” Pieburn said. “I made an order just last month for switches and indicators from Carlton Electric.”

  “Small things. I looked it up. Last year Control-logics ordered only $50,000 worth from us—and nothing major. But you’re doing projects that use equipment you have to get from us. So how do they do it?”

  “Maybe they buy from other manufacturers,” Adrian ventured, hoping to end this talk. Thinking about confronting Corley made him nervous.

  “They don’t. I called some other vendors, took a couple of them to lunch and they all said the same thing. Other engineering companies buy from us, but Control-logics doesn’t.”

  “What do you mean large?” Pieburn turned to poke at the fire, making it crackle and spark noisily. His face glowed from the flames.

  “Controllers,” Maggie said.” Computer systems, GUI’s, the high tech stuff.”

  “GUI’s?”

  “Graphical User Interface,” said Adrian.” It’s a computer program that allows a user to see displays and operate complex computer systems without knowing any of the programming. Sort of like a word processing program on a regular computer that lets a user just sit down an type without knowing anything about computers.”

  “Right,” Maggie agreed.” It’s expensive. Also the biggest sales commissions. I am literally getting shafted by them not buying what they have to be buying.”

  “I used a Westmoreland controller last year, at a plant in Wyoming,” Pieburn said.” Are you saying we didn’t get that from your company?”

  “That’s what I’m saying.”

  “Where did we get them?”

  “That’s my point exactly.”

  “That’s enough,” Adrian announced. He was tired of this. His head buzzed from the wine and he didn’t want to go further. “So what, Maggie? Maybe they cut a few corners and get things from some black market somewhere. And they cut you out of a commission, which is crappy. But... so...what?”

  “You don’t care?” she asked, watching him carefully.

  “I don’t care,” Adrian agreed.” It’s no big deal. They’re just another company that figured out a way to scam somebody and make an extra profit. It is not something to get involved in.”

  “If they’re doing something illegal you have to get involved.”

  “If they are. And no, I don’t.”

  “You’ re afraid of losing your job,” Maggie said.

  “Yes.” Adrian knew it was more than that. He was afraid. He’d gotten involved before and was not going to do it again.

  “You won’t get involved just because of your job?” Pieburn asked

  “Right.”

  “But it’s a crappy job. You said so yourself.”

  “Doesn’t matter. This isn’t my business, Maggie.”

  “How can you say that? You have to get involved.”

  Adrian felt his cheeks flush. She doesn’t know, he thought. She has no idea. There are things out there that bite, monsters in the night that rip lives apart. And I won’t see them again.

  He said, “I think the evening is over.”

  “What?” Maggie was surprised.

  “I’m tired.” The mood of the evening was broken. Adrian held Maggie’s coat, even kissed her cheek in a parody of closeness, but the togetherness had vanished. It was a quiet group that shouldered through the door.

  Adrian stood at the window and watched the cars leave, their headlights piercing the night only slightly, illuminating individual truths only, concealing the universal darkness everywhere.

  Adrian closed the door, shut off the lights and went to bed.

  “My dad’s been letting me drive the Buick,” Toby said.

  “Uh-huh. You want to help me with the back seat here?”

  “Sure.” Toby picked up his end and together he and Adrian struggled the seat into the back of the Lark. They shoved and prodded it into place.

  “Got my learner’s permit and everything.”

  “Uh-huh. Now the front seat, it’s the hard one.” The car was nearly finished. The interior had a cool new smell, from the vinyl floor mats and seats, fresh from the upholsterer, to the new painted metal dashboard. The steering wheel, a large circle of heavy plastic, was original and had partly determined the interior color scheme when they found that new ones were impossible to find.

  They wrestled the seat into the car and sprawled in uncomfortable positions common to mechanics and appliance repairmen. Toby, his head near the clutch said, “7/16ths, deep socket.” Adrian passed over the wrench without comment, concentrating on getting his side of the seat aligned with the sliding mechanism. Toby finished ratcheting and tossed the wrench back. Adrian tightened his own bolts.

  “We’re done.” said Adrian

  “We’re done,” agreed Toby. They grinned at each other over the wide front seat. Adrian stretched.

  “I’ve already been around the block about a thousand times now. In the Buick,” Toby said. He looked innocently at Adrian over the yellow roof, leaning his elbows on the car.

  “A thousand,” Adrian said dryly. He went around the front of the car and gently lowered the hood, pushing down to seat it. The Studebaker bounced lightly on its new shocks.

  “A thousand at least,” said Toby.

  “Uh-huh.”

  “And Drivers Ed. Did I mention—?”

  “You did mention, yes.”

  “And Dad’s been letting me drive the Buick,” Toby said.

  Adrian walked around the car, fishing in his pocket. He pulled out a small key chain with a silver pair of keys. “One for the trunk. One for the ignition.” He tossed the set gently to Toby who caught them, wide eyed.

  “This set is for you. Want to go for a drive?”


  “You’re shitting me!” Toby yelled. “You are...” he looked at Adrian’s face and smiled slyly. “...kidding me.”

  Adrian laughed. “No kidding. Let’s take her out.” It was all good, he thought. The car had been Toby’s idea; the first drive should be his. He drifted back over the long months working on the car. He recalled Toby dragging him into the project and his own initial resistance. The problems getting it from the shed...the gradual disassembly...the long evenings and weekends, crammed in between engineering trips...the music and the pizza and the laughing...

  The laughing. That had been what this was all about, the companionship of working on a project with a partner. Adrian watched Toby with affection. This had been fun.

  “Wait,” he said. “Your father should be part of this.”

  Toby smiled in surprise. “I guess he should.”

  “Go get him.”

  Toby ran off, a long legged colt, and soon returned with his father. Juan stopped in front of Adrian. “Thanks for inviting me.”

  “Thanks for letting me have him for a while.” Adrian slid into the back seat, Juan into the front.

  Toby, with goggle eyed concentration, slid the key in the ignition, mounted on the dashboard in this old a car. He pumped the gas, turned the key and the engine fired. It settled into a low well-tuned hum and Toby grinned like a maniac. Carefully he pulled down the shift lever and the Studebaker backed majestically out of the driveway for her maiden voyage.

  “Try not to hit anything,” said Adrian.

  “Yeah. Dad says that, too.”

  The sun was bright. The day was a crisp mid-forties, according to the paper. Juan reached over and shoved the heat lever, twisted the white knob for the fan and a pleasant whirr filled the cab. The car glowed like new gold, like a giant bumblebee, like a sunflower...

  “Watch the curb!” Juan yelled.

  “I got it. I got it.” Toby twisted the wheel even further and they missed Mrs. LaBuche’s garbage cans by an ample inch or two. They stopped at the corner, Toby peering both ways twice, and slowly curved out onto the road. They passed the Mini-Mall and the Tavern and the barber shop and reached the entrance to the highway. Toby stopped the car at the crest of the hill, looking down the long ramp to the interstate.

  “Can you?” asked Adrian.

  Toby paused, considering. The moment was a watershed. The road was more than a highway, it was the road to adulthood. The car was more than an old sedan, it was Toby’s own, built with his hands, crafted with his own diligence and skill. When he went ahead, he would never be the same.

  “Yeah,” he said solemnly. “I’m ready.”

  He touched the gas lightly and a yellow Studebaker launched him onto the highway.

  Corley Sayres was robbing an electronics distributor in Cleveland, Ohio, feeling none of the usual joy. He broke through the chain at the truck entrance without the usual pulse of excitement. He drove the rented white van to the loading dock, parked, and walked around the broken window, just as he had nearly half a dozen times now in half a dozen cities.

  His heart wasn’t in it.

  It was Adrian Beck he thought about. When he opened the overhead and waited for the metal door to lift, when he shoved the heavy cardboard boxes full of extremely expensive computer cards to the van, making sure he stole things unrelated to his own needs, in order to mislead. When he closed the doors, turned off the lights and drove away into the cool Midwestern night, all he thought about was Adrian Beck. The Bastard.

  He was laughing at me, Corley supposed bitterly, He imagined the scene up so high on that tower...Pieburn falling, Adrian Beck holding out a hand for the belt, the look in his eyes when Corley refused. Saw him slowly but steadily climb out onto the girders, saw the look of surprise when he slid down the icy metal and went over the edge. Corley wished Adrian had fallen, rather than face what he’d actually done.

  What had he done? Somehow turned a graceless fall into a rescue. Plucked Dafari out of the air and hung there as if waiting for applause. Corley couldn’t stand it.

  The part of him that always insisted on honesty spoke up as he passed locked warehouses, barred storefronts, a shuttered Dairy Queen, He didn’t do this to embarrass you.

  The van motor hummed. The heater purred out warm air around his legs. He didn’t do this to embarrass you. You’re afraid of heights, he isn’t. That’s all It was.

  “No,” he said aloud. His voice sounded haggard. In the rear view mirror his face appeared unnatural in the amber glow of the dashboard. He felt weary and shook his head to dispel the sensation. “I don’t want to hear it.” Even if it was his own voice of reason.

  But he didn’t—

  With a snarl Corley cut himself off. “I don’t care,” That moment of untruth placed him on a path very different from what he’d intended. “I don’t care.”

  He looked over his shoulder at the well packed van. All of this stuff for Kelly Ridge, for Adrian Beck’s project. Anger filled him and he curled his fingers tighter on the wheel, closer to losing control than he could remember; closer still to not caring.

  Corley followed the usual routine. Park the van far from the door, get some sleep, call Wally in the morning to report in. He woke at eight and this morning he didn’t feel like it. He dawdled over his shower, dressed slowly, stared at the phone, shook his head and decided to have an early breakfast.

  The little restaurant on the corner of the parking lot billed itself as “family.” Corley, with a disgusted glance at a faded menu taped to the door next to a notice of a farm tractor auction, thought it merely dirty. He slid into a red vinyl booth, frowned at the battered Formica, at the spider webbed plastic glasses, at the stained white coffee mugs. He pushed a full ashtray to the edge of the booth. The sight of it made him want to gag.

  “What’ll it be, hon?”

  He looked up at a middle aged woman wearing a blue waitress dress. Her hair under a net was dishwater brown. She held a small pad ready.

  “Coffee?’ she asked.

  “Yeah,” Corley agreed sourly.

  “Juice?”

  “Sure.”

  “Small or large?”

  “Whatever. Small. And two eggs, over hard. English muffins.” Normally Corley was polite to people when it didn’t matter. Today he was on edge enough to yell at anyone.

  “We don’t have muffins,” the waitress said.

  “Of course not.” His anger was a living thing, curling around his stomach. He wondered if he should eat at all, especially here. “Toast then, try not to burn it. And is there a place to get a paper?”

  “Over there.” She pointed to the front, near the cash register. “The Herald. Cost fifty cents.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Betcha.” She went away with her pad and her hairnet and Corley slipped out of the booth, fumbled for change and bought the Herald. He returned to sip at very dark coffee and scan the pages. Mostly it was what he expected, a rural rag catering to a boring city, farm reports and minor arrests, but a filler article caught his attention. Nestled in a section called This day in History which capsulized interesting historical facts, such as ...This year in history, 1861, the former slave Dred Scott was executed.

  The one that galvanized Corley Sayres was: Nine months ago...Adrian Beck, the so called ‘Bus Vigilante’ was attacked by a gang of youths on a local bus. He was injured in the attack and one gang member was killed.

  “My God,” whispered Corley.

  “More coffee?”

  “What?” Corley looked up, the waitress forgotten. But there she stood, gesturing with a red handled pot of black sludge at his mug. “Sure,” Corley said. “Sure.” He pulled his eyes back to the paper. Nine months ago...Adrian Beck, the so called ‘Bus Vigilante...’

  A newly energized Corley Sayres demanded directions from the waitress who in turn had to ask a couple of old guys at the counter, who didn’t know either. Finally a consultation with the cook got things moving: “South on Elm, down two blocks, turn right at the new p
olice station. You can’t miss it.”

  Corley parked beneath a weathered old oak and ran into the library through a light mist. He stopped at The front counter and asked the first lady he saw where back issues of newspapers were kept.

  “Where do I find old newspapers?”

  “They’re back in the stacks,” said an older lady. She wore a shapeless dress covered by a light blue sweater, buttoned to her chin despite the heat from a hissing radiator. “This way. What time period are you seeking?”

  “Nine months ago, maybe a little earlier.”

  She made a sharp turn, nearly stepping on his feet. “That would be on microfilm. We process all of our newspapers after only two months.” She turned back to beam at him, a myopic expression through black plastic glasses. “Most branches can’t keep up, but we believe in efficiency here at the Carter Public Library.”

  They reached the microfilm machine. “I can run the machine. You can go away now.”

  “Well!” She turned and left without quite completing, “I never!”

  Corley sat down and fed a tape onto the reels, lit the screen and pressed the forward button. The wheels whirred, images sped by too fast to see. He stopped. looked at the date and continued searching. In only five minutes he found it. Adrian Beck, the bus Vigilante.

  36 – Why Don’t You Do Right?

  Maggie sang, “Muriel plays piano, every Friday at the Hollywood...” and Adrian said, “Hey.”

  “What,” Maggie said, a little annoyed at the interruption. She turned down the radio and listened, but silently finished the song

  “Why don’t you?” Adrian asked. He sat in the passenger seat of Maggie’s little Fiero, alternately watching the scenery go by and listening to Maggie sing along with the radio. He discovered he enjoyed music when she was involved, otherwise it left him as cold as the babbling hosts of talk shows.

  “Why don’t I what?”

  “Play someplace.”

  “Are you kidding?”

  “I don’t think so.” Adrian glanced at the side of the road where two dented cars waited for a tow. Pieces of plastic and dented fenders drew him, like eating too much chocolate—a guilty pleasure. “You’re really good, why don’t you perform?”