by Thom Whalen
* * *
Russo was way the other side of Wemsley from Utica. We didn’t have time to get out there on Wednesday night. Instead, Randal and I hit the road at the crack of dawn on Thursday. It was seven-thirty in the morning when we got to Dino’s Service Station. I was damned tired of sitting on a motorcycle seat. Saddle sores are no fun. And we still had to get back to Wemsley in time to prep for lunch.
Dino’s was open. Johnny Paul eyed us balefully when we dismounted.
“Remember us?” Randal asked.
“You steal my money?” Johnny asked in return.
“No,” Randal said.
“Yes,” I said. “I forgot to give you the seven bucks that the guy paid for his fill-up. I kept it for you.” I fished seven dollars out of my wallet and held it out to him. It was the same bills that the customer had given to me. I hadn’t spent them.
“Yeah?” He took the money.
“Yeah. I’m sorry about that. I forgot that I had it until we were halfway back to Wemsley.”
“Yeah, well I got shit for being short.”
“I’m glad that you didn’t get fired.”
“Old Fred can’t fire me,” he said. “I’m the only mechanic in Russo.”
I still couldn’t imagine Johnny as a mechanic, but everyone kept saying that he was, so it must be true.
“It’s good to be irreplaceable,” Randal said.
“Yeah.” He looked at Randal. “You get your watch back?”
I was confused for a moment; then I remembered that Randal’s story to Johnny was that his watch had been stolen when Billy was killed.
“Naw,” Randal said. “I’m still looking for who might have killed Billy. You have any thoughts about that?”
Johnny shook his head sadly. “Just about every one who knew him. Billy collected enemies like some people collect stamps. He was my brother, but that is the truth.”
“Did he treat you square?” Randal asked.
“Not for as long as I can remember. He took toys away from me as soon as he was old enough to grab them. Before either one of us was in kindergarten.” He shrugged. “I’m still gonna miss him, though. He was blood.”
“I know how that goes,” Randal said. “You don’t gotta like someone to love them.”
“Strange but true. It’s something that I don’t think that I’ll ever understand.”
Randal let a moment for philosophical mediation elapse before saying, “There’s another thing, though.”
“Yeah?” There might have been a tear or two wetting Johnny’s eyelashes when he looked up.
“I wasn’t directly involved in Billy’s business before, but now that he’s gone, I’ve decided to take it on.”
“Yeah?” There was a spark of interest in Johnny’s eye – the first since Randal had started talking about Billy.
“Yeah. So I was wondering if you might have any interest in a key.”
“I don’t know you.”
“Sure you do. We’re the guys who rode all the way back here to return seven bucks because our conscience was bothering us.”
“Yeah, right.” Johnny’s tone was as dry as dust.
“So you going to do business with us?”
“Same terms as Billy?” he asked.
“Four hundred now or five-fifty if you want us to front you.”
“Billy was three and four.”
Randal shrugged. “Inflation.”
“That’s what I do with tires. Not with money. I pay four if you front me. If that’s not good enough for you then it’s nothing for either of us. Billy was ripping me off bad enough. I won’t let you do worse to me than he did. He was my brother.”
Randal looked pained for a minute. Then he said, “I’ll honor Billy’s memory. We’ll front you a key for four. But you can’t tell anyone else what our deal is. Got that?”
“I don’t got nobody to tell because I don’t know who else dealt with Billy. He kept his business private, even from me. Billy wasn’t a trusting soul.”
Randal dismounted from his bike and unstrapped the bag from his sissy bar. “We’ll be back in a week to collect the four and drop off another key if you want it.”
“Come back in three weeks,” Johnny said. “This is Russo, not New York City. There ain’t much traffic through here.”
“Three weeks it is.”
We rode off into the sunset.
It wasn’t until later that I remembered that, last time, we’d been here in his little pickup truck but this time Randal was riding Billy’s bike. Johnny didn’t mention the bike but he must have noticed. I wondered what he thought about that.