As Good As Gone (9781616206000) (28 page)

THIRTY-­THREE

Jesus, Calvin thinks, is there a bar anywhere on the planet that doesn't stink of stale beer, stale cigars, spilled whiskey, and unwashed men? The Wagon Wheel might be new to Gladstone since Calvin moved away, but this bar is no different from those he leaned against in his drinking days. The haze of cigarette smoke, the dim light, the dark glitter of bottles lined up behind the bar—oh, yes, Calvin is right at home here. Over by the begrimed window where there's enough light for them to see their cards, four men are playing pinochle. At one end of the bar a solitary drinker is hunched over the
Gladstone Gazette
. At the other end, three men in suits and ties are loudly arguing over a political issue that might or might not have a solution, but either way it sure as hell won't be found inside the walls of the Wagon Wheel. A young cowboy and a woman old enough to be his mother are hanging over the jukebox as if they believe moony looks are enough to play any song.

The bartender, a burly young fellow with a bushy mustache, slides down to where Calvin Sidey stands.

“What can I do you for,” asks the bartender. Then he takes one hand off the bar, ready to reach for a glass, as if he's been in the business long enough to know what a man like Calvin Sidey comes in to drink. A shot of Old Crow.

“I'm looking for a man who spends a lot of time here—”

But before Calvin can ask for Lonnie Black Pipe, Calvin's own name is called out.

“Cal? Cal Sidey?”

In the whiskey light of the Wagon Wheel, the little man who's tottering toward Calvin looks like a character from a fairy tale, a hunched-­over white-­bearded gnome complete with a hand-­carved walking stick that might turn into a snake if he throws it to the floor. Nothing about the old man is familiar to Calvin, who wants to turn back to the bartender and to his reason for being in the Wagon Wheel.

“Judas Priest,” the bent old man says, his voice high-­pitched and wheezy, as if every sound he makes has to squeeze through a too-­small opening. “Cal Sidey. I heard you was dead.”

“Not hardly.”

“I even heard tell how it happened. Dropped dead of a heart attack out in the middle of the prairie and not found for days.”

“Maybe someday,” Calvin says. “Not yet.”

“By God. Calvin Sidey. I'll be go to hell.”

“And maybe that too,” Calvin says, and steps back to the bar.

“You ain't got any notion who I am, do you?” the old man asks. “Not a notion.”

To the bartender, Calvin says, “I'm looking for—”

“Roland Sill,” the old man says, his voice raised as near to a shout as it will come. “Eh? Now you remember?”

“I remember you,” Calvin says.

Pauline had been fond of Roland Sill, a rag peddler whose horse-­drawn cart clattered up and down the streets of the town, loaded with pots, pans, and the scraps and bolts of the fabric he bought and sold. Roland and his brother lived in a shack just outside Gladstone. They were Jews from back East, some people said; Gypsies, others said. But as long as Roland bought and sold at fair prices, his origins didn't much matter.

Calvin knew from Pauline that Roland Sill came from Montreal. One day Roland greeted Pauline in her native language, and she was so delighted to hear and speak French that she invited Roland over. There he became a regular visitor, sitting at the kitchen table, drinking tea, smoking his pipe, and gabbing away with Pauline in a language that Calvin could only understand a few words of, at least as those two spoke it—as rapidly as birds trilling in the trees.

Calvin walked in on one of those conversations one day, and for some reason he thought they were talking about him. And laughing. To Roland Sill, Calvin said, “Don't you have work to do?”

Roland heard the tone in Calvin's question and he jumped to his feet. “Yes, sir!” But on his way out the door, he said quietly to Calvin, “You got nothing to worry about from me, brother.” Even then, Roland Sill was a wizened little man who walked as if he were carrying a heavy bundle of rags on his back.

It looks as though Roland Sill's burden, like every man's, has only gotten heavier over the years. He's so bent over that it's all he can do to shift his gaze from the Wagon Wheel's dirty floor up to Calvin Sidey.

“I remember you,” Calvin says again. “How have you been, Roland?”

“Pas mal,” says Roland. “Better if you let me buy you a drink.”

“Maybe another day. I'm here looking for a man. Lonnie Black Pipe? You know him? Have you seen him around?”

From behind Calvin comes a voice. “You found me.”

Calvin turns, and for an instant he wonders if he's walked into a circus. He took Roland Sill for a magic dwarf, and the man Calvin is facing now—the man who must be Lonnie Black Pipe—has a face so hideously scarred he could be a freak show attraction.

“You're Black Pipe?”

“Everybody here knows that. What they're wondering is, who the hell are you?” Lonnie is dressed in black, from his boots right up to a big, flat-­brimmed hat. He takes the hat off now and sets it carefully on the bar. On half his skull black hair grows in a thick mat; on the other half, the half glistening with the same burn scars that cover the left side of his face, a few tufts of hair sprout like weeds.

“And maybe the real question is,” Lonnie Black Pipe says, “what the hell are you doing here?” Lonnie Black Pipe is a barrel-­chested, big-­gutted fat man, but he still looks powerful behind all that weight.

Calvin wishes now that he hadn't left the gun in the truck. He hadn't brought it in the first place thinking that he'd use it, but he wanted to make an impression, an unmistakable, unforgettable impression, and nothing does that quite like the round black vacancy of a gun barrel. But as he was driving here, he was arguing in his mind with Beverly Lodge, and she must have won the argument because, when he parked the truck, he put the gun back in the glove box.

But he can't go back outside, retrieve the pistol, and then return to the bar and resume the conversation.

“I'm here with a message,” Calvin says. “For you.” A message. It was exactly what he said to that kid. What the hell. He's been looking for a way he can be of some use in his old age, and maybe he's found his occupation. Calvin Sidey, messenger.

Lonnie Black Pipe laughs, or as close as he can come to a laugh with that twisted mouth of his. “Like Western Union, you mean?” He looks around the bar as if he knows he's performing and he wants to make certain the audience is attentive.

“I found your goddamn bomb, and you're lucky I didn't go to the sheriff with it. But don't think you're getting off. If you so much as go near the Sideys or their property, you'll wish you were behind bars so you don't have to deal with me.”

“A
bomb
? What the hell are you talking about?”

“You know damn good and well. Out back by their garage.”

“You listen to me. Does this here look like the face of a man who's going to fuck around with a bomb? If I got a problem with you—and I can feel one coming on pretty goddamn fast—I'll let you know to your face. What the hell do I need with goddamn bomb?
Shit
.”

“I'd be impressed with that line of talk if I didn't know you for a man who takes up his argument with women, shouting and scaring the hell out of them in the process. That's my idea of a bully and a coward.”

Lonnie Black Pipe twists around in order to address everyone in the bar. “Does
anyone
here know what the hell he's talking about?” He gestures to the bartender. “Randy—hey, Randy. You let a crazy son of a bitch in here, you know that?”

Randy says, “Take it easy, Lon.”

“
Me
? Me take it easy? This crazy bastard comes in here talking about bombs, but I'm supposed to take it easy? The hell.”

Calvin breathes a little easier as he listens to Lonnie Black Pipe. A man innocent of Calvin's charge would register more outrage and wouldn't be talking as much as Black Pipe is. What's more, Calvin called him a bully and a coward, and Black Pipe let that pass. Calvin guesses that his point has been made, and this little dance will soon be over.

“You heard what I came here to say. You'll stay away from the Sideys.”

“Mister, I'm running out of patience here. Now, I don't know if you got me mixed up with someone else or if you're just plain senile and don't know what the fuck you're talking about.”

Then Calvin makes what he realizes almost immediately is a mistake. He points a finger at Lonnie Black Pipe and says, “You've been warned.”

“You're warning me, old man?” Lonnie Black Pipe takes a step back, but there's no retreat in his movement. “You point that goddamn finger at me again, I'll break it off at the knuckle.”

Then Calvin Sidey does another foolish thing, and again he knows how wrong-­headed it is even as he's doing it. But he has his own problems with threats, especially when he's in the right, as he's certain he has been from the start with Lonnie Black Pipe, in spite of the man's denials.

Calvin walks up close to Black Pipe, lifts the finger that he's been warned not to point, aims it like a gun, and presses it right between the Indian's eyes.

Lonnie Black Pipe responds in a way that Calvin would not have predicted. He leans into Calvin's finger, increasing the pressure on his own forehead in the process. He smiles up at Calvin as if this turn of events delights him.

Calvin is about to back away, his point having been made, when Lonnie Black Pipe lifts his booted foot and slams it down hard on Calvin's foot.

For an instant, Calvin is pinned in place, and before he can pull away, Lonnie Black Pipe pushes him, but this is no ordinary shove. Lonnie Black Pipe slams his hands into Calvin's chest, and Calvin, unable to get both feet under him, loses his balance and reels backward.

Even as he's stumbling back, Calvin thinks, Don't go down, don't go down, don't go down. If he hits the floor and Lonnie Black Pipe remains standing, Calvin is sure he'll get his head kicked in.

Somehow Calvin is able to grab the raised edge of the bar and keep himself upright. He also regains his balance, and he's put just enough distance between himself and Lonnie Black Pipe that he's able to prepare for the charge that's coming at him.

By now, he realizes that this has been Black Pipe's strategy all along. An experienced bar fighter, Black Pipe must know how important it is to strike first and hard and keep the other man off balance. But by now Calvin has raised his fists and is ready for Lonnie Black Pipe.

The Indian also raises his fists, and he drops into a crouch. Calvin quickly develops his own strategy: he has a reach advantage, and he can use this to keep Lonnie Black Pipe from getting inside and pummeling him with body blows. But Calvin guesses too that Black Pipe is willing to accept five blows in order to land one of his own. Calvin will have to make certain that his punches are punishing enough to make Black Pipe reconsider. The problem is Black Pipe doesn't present much in the way of a target, nothing but the top of his head, and Calvin might break his knuckles on that big skull.

All conversation in the bar has ceased. The couple at the jukebox can save their coins. No one wants to hear any music. And the two men with their fists raised aren't dancing or circling. They aren't bobbing or weaving. They're waiting, waiting for the other to throw a punch or to show a weakness.

Calvin Sidey has been in his share of dustups over the years. The last time, unless you count the fracas with the boy this afternoon, was maybe ten, twelve years ago. But it's not just being older and out of practice that has Calvin worried. There's a look in Lonnie Black Pipe's eye that says he just might be enjoying this.

And here it comes—Black Pipe's shoulder hunches and it looks as though he's going to throw a hook. But no. It's only a feint. Yet it moves Calvin back another step.

“That's enough,” Randy the bartender shouts. “God damn it. Take this outside or I call the cops right now. I don't give a shit if you split each other's skulls, but I'm not cleaning up the blood and puke in here.”

Lonnie Black Pipe nods in understanding and starts for the door, all the while watching Calvin to make sure he follows.

Calvin drops his hands but only a little and heads for the sunlit street and the violence to come. Most of the bar's patrons trail closely behind, including Roland Sill, hobbling as fast as his bent body will allow.

Over his shoulder, Calvin says, “Say something in French, Roland. Let me hear it one more time.”

“S'il vous plaît soyez prudent, mon ami.”

Calvin hasn't understood a single word Roland Sill said. Nevertheless, Calvin replies, “And au revoir to you,” and pushes open the door.

FROM THEIR STOOLS AT
the counter, Will, Stuart, and Gary blow straw wrappers at the
o
's in Groom's, the chipped gilt letters decorating a high shelf. When one of the wrappers flies off course and lands on the grill, Mr. Groom barks, “What the hell are you trying to do—burn the place down?” Then Will and his friends move to a table by the window, but when Mr. Groom sees Stuart trickling sugar into his mouth directly from the dispenser, he slams his spatula on the counter. “Put that sugar down! Any more trouble from the three of you and you'll be out the door!”

So they try to behave themselves, but they aren't very successful. Will can't sit still but squirms to try to prevent his still-­damp clothes from chafing and sticking to him. He half expects to be kicked out of the diner because the smell of the river and his own vomit still cling to him. Stuart, perhaps because the exhilaration of almost killing someone continues to throb in his veins, keeps finding any excuse at all to slug Gary in the arm or shoulder. Meanwhile, Gary, having assumed the role that's usually Will's, looks uncomfortable, as though he isn't quite sure he belongs in the company of the other two.