The Elephant of Surprise

by Joe R. Lansdale

  We couldn’t set everything right. Hell, me and Leonard had done all we could for that girl, and now the cops had her and she was safe. We were done.

  Sure. It was over.

  Like hell it was.

  20

  One morning I got the call from Manny.

  “Here’s what we’ve learned. The girl is feeling much better. She wrote down her name. It’s Nikki. She won’t say her last name. We’ve asked her what happened, what’s going on? She wrote that she wanted you and Leonard. Actually, she wrote, ‘I want the black guy and the white guy who saved me.’”

  “Okay.”

  “She’s still here at the station. Doesn’t want to go to the hospital. I don’t blame her. In a nest of cops is probably the safest place she could be. Her tongue swelling has gone down. She might even be able to talk in a few days, and if she is, will you two come down and hear what she has to say so we can hear it too? Or maybe she writes it all down for you. Doesn’t matter. But I’d like for you to come.”

  “We can do that,” I said.

  “Should you ask Leonard?”

  “I know what his answer will be. We’ve been talking about her, wondering how she was, what had happened to her. Wondering if someone out there was still determined to kill her.”

  “Wondering the same myself. I’ll call you when I think she’s ready for it, because right now she’s on some strong pain relievers and sleeps a lot. Outside of her tongue cut like that, almost cut off, she’s all right. Looks like the doctor stitched it back together. The doctor, she says Nikki will be fine in time. But I wanted to know you two can be here so I could tell her. Have you heard the weather report?”

  “I quit listening. It’s always bad.”

  “It’s going to get worse. A series of tornadoes are expected for our area. Lots of rain and high wind the rest of the time, and then we’ll get some hurricane from the Gulf. Probably fire and pestilence to follow, could be a plague of boils and locusts, maybe an egg and bacon shortage to top things off.”

  “Thanks for making my day.”

  “Hey, blame global warming, not me. Who the hell expects hurricanes this time of year. Mother Earth hates us.”

  * * *

  That night I came down from the bedroom, where I had been reading in bed beside Brett, and found Leonard in the kitchen with Reba. There was a bag of vanilla cookies on the table and she had a glass of milk and he had a large cup of coffee. I could smell the coffee when I came into the kitchen, and now I wanted some. I went over and put a decaf pod in the machine, put the cup under, and got that going.

  “Now I get a cookie,” Reba said.

  “Just one,” Leonard said.

  Reba took one from the bag, dipped it in her milk like she was drowning someone she didn’t like.

  I sat at the table with them and told Leonard what Manny said.

  “That little white girl ain’t something oughta be messed with,” Reba said. “White people get you killed. Real white one like that, she’s nothing but trouble. More white on they ass, more trouble they is.”

  “You don’t even know her,” I said.

  “Got some idea.”

  “I’m white.”

  “Done said that. And you trouble too. But guess you my trouble, and she ain’t. She ain’t oughta be none of yours.”

  Reba had seen some death in her young years, had been disappointed by people more than once. I couldn’t blame her youthful cynicism, but sometimes, the depth of it for a child, the knowledge she had, pained me.

  “She’s got no one else right now,” I said. “You know how that is.”

  Reba eyed me for a long moment, then looked at the sack of cookies. “Ain’t you supposed to take a turn?” she said to Leonard.

  Leonard reached in the bag and took one. Reba turned the bag and took one for herself. “Now we even,” she said.

  “You’re one ahead,” Leonard said.

  “Ain’t I always?” she said.

  21

  Upstairs, back in bed with Brett, I told her what was going on, said, “You know what?”

  “What,” she said.

  “I think you should take the girls, including the dog girl, and you should go someplace else for a while.”

  “Sending us out for our own protection again,” she said. “I can take care of myself.”

  “I know that, but I’m not so sure about Chance and Reba or Buffy the Dog.”

  “I think you’re being all macho, the man taking care of his little woman. You know what?”

  “What?”

  “I like that. I’m all for being an empowered female badass, but I still need someone to lift heavy things off the top closet shelf.”

  “There’s nothing heavy up there.”

  “Now you’re going to get technical. Listen, Hap, I do appreciate you watching out for me. But I can take care of myself, boy. I like the thought, but I’ve been known to be trouble myself.”

  “This is true.”

  “You’re not the only one has murder in his history. You, me, and Leonard.”

  “Thing is, why have more? It’s a heavy weight, and more just makes it heavier.”

  “And no one hates carrying it more than you.”

  “So you’re really fine with what you’ve done? What we’ve done? Hell, what me and Leonard have done?”

  “It’s not about being fine with it, dear. It’s about knowing why it was done. I never lie down and think I’m a random killer or that I did anything for money or profit.”

  “In my case, revenge has been in the soup a few times.”

  “But there was more to it than being angry about being cut off in traffic or someone beating you to a Walmart Black Friday sale. It was more complicated than just getting even. You’ve stepped on some bugs, Hap. Me and you and Leonard.”

  “We do a lot of stepping.”

  “When the law does its job, we don’t need to do a thing. They don’t always. And as you’ve said, when the law breaks the law or refuses to do its job, there is no law.”

  “I think I stole that from the Billy Jack movie. I don’t know how much I believe it.”

  “I’m not saying it’s cut and dried, but you really seem worried. More than usual. What exactly are you afraid of?”

  “I’m not sure. The weather, for one. It’s becoming worse, and if the weather reports hold, it’s going to make LaBorde very wet.”

  “It’s East Texas, baby. We always have storms.”

  “And there’s those guys I told you about. They’re bad news. They know what they’re doing, and what they’re doing is dangerous and ugly, and they are persistent. I’ve got an uncomfortable feeling about that girl, like maybe whatever went on with her is still going on, and me and Leonard are somehow in the pile. That leads to you guys.”

  “You said they don’t know who you are.”

  “Things can be found out. Guys that have the kind of organization and weapons and determination these people do, well, they got money behind them. And if you got money, you have power, and you have connections. We can be found out, and then you’re found out. All that leads to Chance and Reba. I need them taken care of, and you’re the one to do it. They love you, they trust you, and as you said, you’re a badass.”

  “Where would we go?”

  “First time in our life, we got a little money,” I said. “My life, anyway. Why not take advantage of it? We aren’t going to be getting any private-investigation business in this weather, and me and Leonard will be tied up a little with Manny and the girl, so, you know, you could go most anyplace.”

  “And what if you go in to talk with Manny, and you’re back in two hours?”

  “Then I’ll meet up with you guys.”

  Brett twisted her mouth the way she does when she’s considering an idea.

  “We could go to Tyler,” she said. “I’d like to do some shopping. They got a Half Price Books there, a Thai place. I ate there when I bought Reba shoes. I like shoes too.”

  “All the sho
es you got, it’s like you got a lot more feet than two. It’s like you’re a centipede.”

  “They have a new theater there too. Lots of movies.”

  “That sounds good.”

  “They have a hotel right there in the mall. All kinds of stores. It’s big-time for East Texas.”

  “Does the hotel allow dogs?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe not. If they don’t, then the closest hotel to the mall that does allow dogs would be our pick.”

  “Sounding better and better.”

  “I’ll be spending some serious money if I go over there.”

  “It’s your money more than mine. I work for you, remember?”

  “I never forget.”

  “So?”

  “I’ll give it some thought. We might do that. I do, you join us there when you’re finished.”

  “Good. Go there and wait until you hear from me, stay as long as you need to stay. I’ll catch up with you.”

  “Hap, you sound like you’re really worried, not like you’re excited about a vacation.”

  “I said as much.”

  “Yeah, but this feels different.”

  “That’s because I’m really worried, but I’m not exactly sure what I’m worried about, and that worries me even more. I hope you’ll take that vacation, and before it gets really stormy.”

  Brett rolled over and put her arm across my chest.

  “Maybe we should see if we can make a storm ourselves.”

  “I’m feeling a bit like a tornado,” I said.

  “And I know a tornado alley you might like to visit.”

  “Oh my, girl, you are nasty.”

  “Uh-huh, I am.”

  22

  Time passed but the wind and rain didn’t. The tornadoes Manny warned me about came, but we were lucky and our place wasn’t hit by any. The twisters tore up the woods on the eastern edge of town and took a few houses and mobile homes out in the country on a sightseeing tour, and though there were some minor injuries, no one was killed, though there were reports of missing chickens.

  That was a good thing, no one being hurt, though who knows about the chickens. The morning Manny called us to come down to the station, the weather was still bad. The sky was black, the wind was high, and the rain was furious.

  We drove to the cop shop in Leonard’s truck, and as we went, we saw the roofs of some houses were missing, and there were plenty of shingles lying about like dead soldiers. The streets were littered with wet leaves and paper. Now and again, something unidentifiable blew by or against the truck.

  Even that early in the day we drove with the lights on. There were few cars out, probably folks like us, doing only what they had to do. We reached the center of town. Leonard drove slow and easy because the brick streets were slick as owl shit. There were a couple cars crashed alongside the road. I wondered how long they had been there.

  Stores were closed, even the café on the corner. We had to turn a street early because we could see parked city electric company trucks and workers wearing yellow slickers in our path.

  It felt so eerie.

  We took Pecan Street next to the bookstore, went up a ways, turned left, crossed North Street, and came to the rear of the cop shop.

  There was a parking lot back there, and there were two police cars in the lot. One of them had a crumpled front end, most likely a result of the stormy weather. There was a white transport bus there too. It had wire mesh on the windows. It was an old bus and had once been used to transport prisoners, and from time to time it still was. According to Marvin, it was supposed to be sold in the next county auction.

  We cruised through the back lot, went around the side of the building, and parked out front. There were only a couple of cars there.

  We got out wearing our black hooded rain slickers (“Same alike,” Reba called them) and made our way into the station, leaning into the wind the way you would if you were trying to push a truck uphill and feared a hernia.

  The receptionist knew us and we walked over to the plasti-glass she was behind and spoke into the little grate that allowed our voices through but not much else. That glass, Marvin once said, was built like the Great Wall of China. Evelyn was always friendly and kept her kids’ and grandkids’ photos in frames on her desk, which bent like a horseshoe around her in what was a good-size room. She looked like a lady who loved bacon and grease. She wore big flowery explosions of cloth and always had a tall Styrofoam cup of something on her desk. She had hair like a wasps’ nest, but it wasn’t by accident—she styled it that way. There was enough hairspray on it to pin a wrestler to the mat, and she wore a flakey white lipstick that reminded me of cake frosting.

  “How’s things with the family?” Leonard said.

  “Fine. You boys in new trouble yet?”

  “Why, Evelyn,” I said. “We don’t get in trouble, we get in adventures.”

  “Is that what you call them?”

  “Yeah,” I said. “We go with that.”

  “That’s not what Chief Hanson calls them,” she said, and pointed at the door to the side of her office and buzzed the lock. With waves to her, we pushed the door and went in.

  Manny was easy to find. She was in Hanson’s office going over some paperwork. The door was open. We went in.

  “Caught you working,” I said.

  “Pretending to work,” she said.

  “So how is she?” Leonard said, and we both took off our slickers and hung them on hooks on the back of the open door and sat.

  “She can talk a little, but not for long. She gets tired and her tongue starts to hurt. She might talk some and write some. But she can communicate and claims she’ll tell more with you guys here. I’m not sure what the attraction is.”

  “Sterling manhood,” Leonard said. “There’s nothing like a real man that’s queer as a duck in trousers to bring out the enthusiasm of either sex.”

  “What about me?” I said. “I’m not gay.”

  “That sort of sets you back a notch,” Leonard said. “But you’ll do.”

  “That’s funny,” Manny said. “Just not enough.”

  “I think I’m perfectly manly,” I said.

  Leonard grinned at me. Manny chose not to get involved.

  Manny got up and led us out of the office and down the hall. There was a jail cell at the back with its door swung wide, and Nikki was sitting up in a hospital bed that had been rolled in for her. She had a stack of pillows behind her head and at her back. She wore an orange jumpsuit, same as a criminal. She had an IV in her arm, and the bag for it hung on an IV rack. The nurse, a slim, older woman, nodded at us and then, without a word, got up and went out.

  I guess Manny had her trained.

  There were three chairs in the cell, and they had provided Nikki with a small table. There were four books on it, popular bestsellers. There was a yellow legal pad and a ballpoint pen beside them.

  We sat in the chairs.

  I smiled at Nikki. “How are you?”

  “Terrible,” she said. I understood her clearly, but there was an oddness about her voice. She had to pronounce the word “terrible” with painful care, and it arrived as if by banana boat.

  “Looks like you got a lot of reading material,” I said.

  “Nurse’s stuff,” she said. “She’s very sweet.”

  “Manny said you’d like to talk to us.”

  She nodded. She waved her hand, indicating we should come closer. We scooted our chairs nearer to the bed. When we were settled, Nikki reached out and took Leonard’s hand and pulled it up on the little table and held it. It was quite a contrast, the hand of a snow-white woman grasping a hand as black as the bottom of a coal mine.

  She took a deep breath, let it out, said, “I’m scared.”

  “We know what you’re scared of,” I said. “But we don’t know who they are or why they’re after you. That something you can explain?”

  “Nicole Beckman.”

  The three of us just stared at her. She might a
s well have pulled a name out of a hat, stuck her finger on a name in the phone book, or said that Santa Claus had sent his elves after her.

  “Who’s that?” Manny said.

  “A year ago,” Nikki said, “she was murdered in her home, and her girlfriend was there with her.”

  I thought I had the answer. I said, “Are you the girlfriend?”

  She shook her head gently. “I bat for the other team.”

  “Okay,” I said. “How are you connected to her?”

  “I’m not. Not really.”

  “Shit,” Manny said. “Beckman. Yeah. Wait. I heard about that. Around Tyler, right?”

  Nikki nodded.

  Manny explained. “No one could figure out why Nicole Beckman was killed. No record. No indication of criminal activity of any kind. Someone broke in her house and blew her brains out while she was in bed. Her girlfriend was with her, and the girlfriend said the man with the gun came in and said to Nicole, ‘Is your name Nicole Beckman?’ She said it was, and he shot her, hit the girlfriend in the head with the stock of the shotgun, and got out of there quick. No one has any idea who it was killed Beckman, or why. Killer wore a mask, animal mask of some sort. The girlfriend said he seemed unsteady on his feet, like maybe he’d spent too much time at a bar. Odd observation, but I remember that’s what she said, what was reported, anyway.”

  I was more baffled now than before I came to the station.

  Leonard’s mouth fell open, and I saw a look in his eye like a chicken that had just laid an egg and was mighty proud of it. He leaned forward in his chair, said, “And is Nikki short for something else?”

  “Nicole,” she said.

  “And your last name is?” he said.

  “Beckman.”

  23

  Someone killed the wrong Nicole Beckman,” Leonard said. “They were after you.”

  Nikki nodded.

  She started talking, and although she eventually had to resort to writing it down, we got the complete story, and it was an odd one.

  It boiled down to this, at least at first. The center of Nikki’s problem was Larry Keith, aka One Mean Asshole.