by Jack Lynch
She smiled again, making me feel genuinely happy I’d come to Sand Valley, beatings, threats and all. “No, in fact maybe you could do me a big favor.”
“What’s that?”
“Give the funny little man a ride back into town. I got a little drunk myself last night at a place where he entertains. We got to talking and I told him I had this piano that was horribly out of tune. He said he could fix it for me. I offered to fix breakfast for him in exchange.”
She looked at me with one of those looks women give you when they’re not going to tell you a great deal more.
“Did he tune your piano?”
“Yes, but you showed up before I had time to give him breakfast. I have to send him away hungry. That’s why it would be nice if you gave him a ride.”
“Okay. Tell him I’ll meet him down at the car.”
FIFTEEN
From his grumpy mood in the car, Harvey Pastor wasn’t very happy about losing out on breakfast and heaven knew what else by a combination of circumstances that included myself. It had taken him a while to get down to the car, which suggested he’d tried to talk Cathy out of rushing in to work. He couldn’t be openly hostile to me because I was saving him the price of a cab, but he didn’t have to love me like a brother, either. He asked me finally what I did for a living. I told him I was a detail man for one of the drug houses. I asked what he did and he told me.
“Sounds a lot more interesting than my line,” I said. “Do you meet a lot of girls in your job?”
It helped lift him out of his funk. He laughed and clasped his hands behind his head. “Yes, quite a few. How about yourself?”
“It’s not bad in the cities. But it’s tough in smaller places where people know one another. Girls in small towns are still small-town girls.”
“I know what you mean, brother. That’s why I usually try to hit on the tourist dames in areas like this. They’re out looking for a good time to begin with. A dash of adventure And they’re not apt to get phone calls asking them to go into work early.”
“Yeah, it’s tough. Do you know many people in town?”
“Naw. This place is eerie. First night here, the day before my gig started out at Rancho Sanchez, I went into town, to the Sky Lodge. Been there?”
“Just briefly.”
“That’s the best way. I thought the place was sensational at first. Then I discovered all the girls were whoring for the house. That’s when they gave me the bill for three hundred dollars. I damn near choked. Started to make a beef about it. One of the girls I’d been with told the guy I was arguing with that I was a piano player from out at the Rancho Sanchez. I expected it to get me a discount or something. Instead, all the guy said was if I didn’t pay up he’d have somebody break all my fingers. Thank Christ for Master Charge. But that’s the last the Sky Lodge will see of this big spender.”
“Where you headed for now?”
“Back to the Rancho, I guess, but you can drop me off anywhere I can catch a bus or something.”
“That’s all right. I’m headed that way myself. Ever get up to San Francisco?”
“Haven’t for a couple of years or so. I have an ex-wife living there now.”
“Been married, huh?”
“Thrice. They’re a weakness. I’ve finally gotten smart, and decided to quit marrying them. I just fall in love and let it go at that.”
“Ever get the urge to see the ex-wives?”
“Of course. I’m great friends with all of them. It’s better this way. When we were married, they all wanted me to themselves.”
“Some girls are like that. What does the one in San Francisco do?”
“She runs some sort of restaurant. Seems happy enough.”
“You keep in touch, huh?”
“Sure thing. We exchange cards at Christmas and on birthdays and things. I phone once in a while. I never know when I might get up her way again.”
We talked some more but I didn’t learn much else. I managed to dance the conversation around to the airport near the Rancho, but he said he’d never noticed it. I dropped him off in the parking lot.
From the road I saw that Turner and Hicks still were waiting over by the plane. Something must have delayed the Colonel. I drove on out to the Truck Stop. Somebody had been doing some road work out there. About halfway from the county road into the Truck Stop, near an old shed, somebody had created a number of ruts and furrows that would have your head banging against the car roof if you didn’t slow down to about three miles an hour. I was jouncing through this stretch when a guy stepped out from behind the shed and aimed a rifle at my head. He was a big man, wearing coveralls.
“Why don’t you stop a minute, bud?”
It sounded like a good idea to me, if that’s what he wanted. I braked and carefully removed my wallet to show him some ID. “I did Ma a favor last night. Do you have some way to check?”
“Yeah.” He handed the ID to somebody inside the shed. The somebody had a walkie-talkie type of radio and used it. A minute later the other guy lowered his rifle and gave me back my ID.
“Just be sure you go to Ma’s place. Nowhere else.”
I gave him a salute and bounced on down the road. When it smoothed out I didn’t speed up all that much. There was a lot of activity going on over by the maintenance station and sheds near the river. Trucks were backed up at a loading dock and a lot of stuff was being carted out of the buildings. It looked as if they were expecting air raids. Colonel Saunders’s camper was parked over in front of the Truck Stop. It was jacked up with both right wheels missing. The Colonel’s girlfriend, Terry, was squatted down beside it, resting her chin on her hands.
“Hi, deadeye, what’s going on?”
She waved a hand in the general direction of the maintenance station. “Sam is over there fixing some shot-out tires.”
“What happened?”
“The Colonel spotted the ruts back on the road on the way in. It worried him, so he swung off the road and tried going around an old shed there when a man stepped out and began shooting at the tires. After he got three of them Joe decided to stop.”
“Where’s the Colonel now?”
“Inside, talking to Ma Leary. If you see him, ask him to forget about the camper and see if we can’t buy something else and boogie on out of here. I’m ready to leave this place.”
“I’ll tell him.” I went on inside. The girls had nearly finished straightening the mess from the night before, but there wasn’t much hilarity in the air. The gambling room was deserted. Waitresses sat around in thin underwear and long faces. A pair of truckers at the bar tossed back shots of whiskey, swallowed their beers and headed for the door, giving me mean looks on their way out.
Harmony was over behind the bar in yellow shorts and top. She seemed to be in a thoughtful frame of mind until she saw me.
“Hey there, Pete, how are you?” she grinned.
“Mostly flattered that you didn’t call me Lucky.”
“Shucks, after what you did last night? How could I forget? Besides, we got a date for this evening, right?”
She was worried about it, as if she’d been stood up a lot during her life.
“I’d like to, Harmony, but the way this town is right now, it’s hard to tell what I’ll be doing by this evening. Where’s Ma?”
“Up in her office. Want some Early Times?”
“Not now.” I went through the casino area. It had the empty feeling of a place that’s lost its license. I went upstairs and across the roof. The drapes were open and Ma waved me in. She was sitting behind her desk talking on the phone. She didn’t have on the dingleberry hat and whip outfit today. She was all business, in a tailored, lightweight suit. Colonel Joe Saunders was seated across from her. He lifted a couple of fingers in greeting.
“Saw your girl downstairs,” I told him. “Sounds as if you ran into some bad luck.”
He shook his head briefly. “It’s tough, man. I’m beginning to sense bad vibes about this part of the country.
”
“How’s that?”
He nodded toward Ma Leary. “She’s getting reports from around town. It’s bad, man.”
“Your girl suggested you try to buy another car and abandon the camper. Says she’d sort of like to leave the area.”
“I wouldn’t mind that myself, but the guy who’s supposed to pay me for the load of grass is in shooting up the town. I’m not leaving before I get paid.”
Ma Leary hung up the phone. “Hello, Pete.”
“Hi. How’s tricks?”
“Whatever it is you’re talking about, they aren’t good. There’s a lot of badness going on.”
“I know, I’ve seen some of it. You have a lot of animals coming through here dressed up like truck drivers.”
She spun her chair half around to stare out the windows. “So?”
“So I imagine that by about now Carl Slide is livid. He has pride, money and connections. He’ll be coming back to get you, Ma, you must know that.”
“It’s not my fault the boys got mad at how I was treated last night. Besides, how did I know what these gorillas would do?”
“Come off it, Ma. I’ve heard about the operation you have going on out in the sheds. Those aren’t a lot of happy-go-lucky knights of the open road. You’ve got a bunch of crooks operating out of here.”
“But I haven’t got any control over them. I don’t watch what they might be doing out there. And they pay me well for my lack of interest.”
“But Slide won’t look at it that way. You’re the captain, just like aboard ship. You’re the one who’s responsible, even for what goes on below decks.”
She sat and thought for a moment. “What does Slide want?”
“He wants the shed operation closed down. And he wants the Colonel here to find another airfield.”
She did some more thinking. “What if all that happened? Would he leave me alone then?”
Saunders scraped his cowboy boots and sat up a little straighter. “Hey, wait a minute, Ma.”
“You stay out of this, fly boy. I have every cent I own invested in this place. It can’t just take off and land somewhere else, the way your business can. Besides, there’s the girls to worry about.”
Saunders muttered an impolite word.
“What do you think, Pete? Would that satisfy Slide?”
“I’m not sure. It might be too late for that now. That’s what he told me last night, before his casino and all the people inside it got torn up. It wasn’t a very pretty sight.”
She tapped a knuckle on her desk top. “How’s your job for Armando going?”
“Just so-so. The things that go on in Sand Valley could cause all sorts of murder and mayhem. I just haven’t got it sorted out yet.”
“Then how about taking a couple hours off to do a little job for me?”
“What kind of job?”
“Go negotiate with Carl Slide for me. See if we can’t stop the fighting before the whole town comes down around our ears. It could put us both out of business. Tell him I’m willing to close down the stolen goods exchange.”
“What about the Colonel here?”
“I’m not willing to go that far. Not yet anyhow.”
Saunders relaxed back in his chair. I looked across at him.
“You must pay her pretty well.”
He made a little face and fanned one hand in the air as if he’d singed his fingers.
“Okay, Ma,” I told her, getting up. “I wanted to have another talk with him anyhow. Do you have any idea what he’s really afraid of?”
“What do you mean?”
“I’ve gotten the impression he has a sideline going that he doesn’t want the rest of the world to learn about.”
“I don’t know anything about him, beyond his having the same kind of joint that I have here. A little tonier is all.”
“I’ve also learned his brother didn’t die of natural causes. Who shot him?”
“Moon did, if you have to know.”
I whistled. “How did it happen?”
“I wasn’t there, so all my information was second or thirdhand. I heard that Burt came toward a scattering of people just leaving church. He had a gun and started shooting. Moon carried a gun too. So he dropped Burt. It was pretty clear-cut.”
“I wish you’d told me that last night.”
“Last night I had other things on my mind. By the way, how much do you charge?”
“Depends on how much trouble I have getting to see Carl Slide. We’ll talk about it later.”
Downstairs somebody had put some money into the jukebox. Kris Kristofferson was singing about death again, making everybody feel real good. I waved at Harmony and headed for the front door. She came out from behind the bar and followed me to the car.
“Pete?”
I turned. “What is it, pretty?”
She lowered her eyes and sniffed.
“What’s wrong, Harmony? I have an errand to run.”
She tugged at my jacket lapels and pressed her face against my shirt. “Don’t go, Pete. I’m scared. I’m afraid they’ll come back and hurt me. Let’s just go on down to my place. I’ll take the rest of the day off.”
Over her shoulder I noticed the Colonel’s girl, Terry, watching us. She had a little smile on her face.
I patted Harmony’s behind. “Later, maybe. I have work to do now. Honest. But don’t you worry. There are guys around here who know what they’re doing. They’re very particular who they let in here just now. You’ll be okay.”
Harmony stepped back and looked up at me with another sniff. She didn’t say anything, but her face told me I’d let her down. She turned and went back inside. Terry still watched me with that little smile.
I drove back to the edge of town and phoned Slide’s office, explaining that I was on a truce mission. I figured he might have been enraged enough either to refuse to see me or to shoot me on sight. Also, there was no sense in driving through the combat area if there wasn’t anybody to talk to once I got there. His voice sounded a little tight, like he was having a problem controlling it, but he agreed to see me. He said he hadn’t been at the Sky Lodge when the place was invaded, but he was there now. I drove around the town to park behind the building and went in through the loading dock. The place had a stilled air to it. What staff I saw were still numbed by the ferocity of the raid, and were standing around in groups reliving it all. I didn’t have any trouble making my way through to the front and up to Slide’s office. A bodyguard was posted outside. He checked with Slide and ushered me in. Slide had been conferring with two more of his hired guns. They left the room and Slide, with elbows on his desk and hands holding the sides of his head, listened to Ma’s proposition. He was outwardly calm, but his face had lost some of its color. When I finished talking he leaned back in his chair.
“My personal feelings aside,” he began quietly, “about what those apes did to all the innocent people who were working the lounge downstairs when they came through here, my hands are tied. The temporary help I brought in have taken things into their own hands. Some of them were here when the truckers came through. One of them will never see again. A couple of others had bones broken. One of my bartenders downstairs was murdered. We were expecting some attempt at retaliation, but nothing quite like that. It prompted the fellows I brought in to go a little crazy. They are out to hunt down and kill as many of that raiding party as they can find. They have—again, on their own—phoned other people in other towns. Those additional people are on their way here right now. So the answer is no, Bragg. My boys are going to have their revenge. Nothing I could do will stop them.”
“I guess you must have promised them pretty good wages to come in and work for you.”
“I promised them pretty good wages.”
“Have they been paid?”
“A third of what we agreed on.”
“You could call them off under threat of not paying them the rest of it.”
“And they could maybe stuff me into the
trunk of my own automobile and shoot several hundred rounds of ammunition into it. I am not a foolish man. I am at this moment a sad man. Sad that things got out of hand. But you don’t know what went on downstairs.”
“For whatever it’s worth, I do know. I watched from just across the street. I went through the lounge afterward. I can guess at your feelings. But that’s beside the point. If they’re not stopped—all of them—they are going to destroy this town. Is that what you want?”
“No, Bragg. And for that I am saddest of all.” He wagged his head. “But it’s too late. It’s just too late.”
“Maybe not. And somebody has to make the first move to save it. That’s what Ma did by sending me over here.”
He stared at me with tight lips, then got to his feet. “Her truckers made enough first moves to last a lifetime. Let me show you something else they did.”
He crossed to the closed door to his small bathroom and swung it open. The blue point Siamese cat had been pinned to it by a cargo hook that someone had driven through its neck. There still was a spatter of blood on the bathroom floor that had drained from the cat. Slide closed the door and returned to his desk.
“Now I’ll tell you a couple of things with my personal feelings not aside. First, you can tell Ma Leary that I hold her, and Armando Barker before her, personally responsible for what is going on in this town right now. It is going to cause me a great inconvenience. It is going to cause me more inconvenience than she can even imagine. And she does have a limited imagination. Running a cheap whorehouse for working stiffs pushes her to the limit. So I want her out of this town. You can tell her for me she will either leave this town or I will have her killed. Within the next twenty-four hours. Tell her I am not kidding about that.
“Second, is about you, Bragg. I still am not satisfied that you are here for the reason you say you are. But it no longer matters. This town is now coming apart. I am going to be a very busy man trying to salvage what I can. I do not want any other little worries nagging at me. Worries like you. So I want you out of town within one hour. Or I will have you killed. A lot of the guns I hired have seen you. In one hour it is open season on Mr. Peter Bragg. Now beat it.”