The Royal Family (137 page)

I can’t rightly say, the man answered.

The wall behind the counter was hung with banjos and guitars, some black-lacquered. After those, just behind the man, rifles and shotguns leaned barrel up in a long row like prison bars. Within the region of glass case which touched the man’s belly were the pistols and revolvers, beautiful, black, silver and grim.

Can I hold one of those? pleaded the girl laughingly.

Nope, said the man.

I have I.D.

Let’s see it, then.

I’m nineteen.

Then you’re not old enough.

Please?

Nope.

I’m not going to buy it, I promise. I just want to look.

If you can’t buy it, what’s the use of looking? the man said, pleased with his own logic.

I just want to know what it feels like to hold a gun, the girl whispered with lowered eyes.

Her friend screeched mirthfully: Don’t you let her, mister!

Nope, said the man calmly.

The two girls fled. When they were safely outside the store, the pleader turned around and outstretched her tongue.

Can I see that Browning there? said Dan Smooth. What is it, a Buck Mark?

Nope. That’s a Browning Challenger III.

Ah, so it is, said Smooth, flicking his driver’s license down onto the glass counter. The man took it between two fingers and studied it with all the weary thoroughness of an immigration agent inspecting passports. Then he unlocked the counter and took out the dark, gleaming thing with its walnut grips.

Beautiful, said Smooth. But I might not have the
guts,
you see.

Oh, yeah, said the man. That’s almost new.

How much?

Three twenty-nine.

Uh huh, said Smooth wisely, setting the gun down. At once, the man secreted it under glass again.

Those homeless people still living in the tunnels around the corner? he asked.

Nope.

I see, said Smooth, looking the man in the face. And why’s that?

Why do you want to know?

Business reasons, Smooth explained.

There’s nothing, the man said. Just the
traces
of ’em. Just the traces of people having been there.

(Down the counter, an 1898 silver dollar caught Smooth’s glance.)

We’ve been around fifty years, the man volunteered unexpectedly. Them homeless, they’ve been around fifty thousand years.

Shame on you, said Smooth with a wink. I’ve told you a million times not to exaggerate.

The man smiled politely.

Of course you never saw a small black woman named Africa in one of those tunnels, Smooth said. Of course you never went inside . . .

Nope.

How much for that Ruger? said Smooth.

You can have it for four hundred. It’s a 1945 original.

I didn’t know they had Rugers in 1945.

Nope, said the man.

Well
, said Smooth, raising his left eyebrow. Then why not three hundred?

Nope.

He took out his wallet. —Here’s two seventy-five for the Browning.

Three hundred.

Nope!
screamed Smooth gleefully.

Tyler set off the metal detector. —If you do that three times I’ll have to arrest you, joked the deputy. Now go stand over there.

All right, said Tyler. Once you arrested me, I guess I wouldn’t set it off anymore, would I?

Striding across the new granite flagstones, he arrived at the computer printout and looked up the name, XREF, floor, cell, and pod number. There was no release date. At considerable taxpayer expense they’d installed an aquarium and sandblasted the rock wall with kitschy foliage.

Beaming lawyers turned their backs to the public who had to wait. There were two lines, one for the public and one for the lawyers. The line for the lawyers moved. The one for the public didn’t.

Another lawyer appeared.

The old lady ahead of Tyler said: I’ve been waiting for my entire lunch hour to see my daughter. I’ll probably have to leave soon. Can you hold my place while I feed the parking meter?

Sure can, ma’am.

I’m going to be late for work. Excuse me. Thank you, sir.

She hobbled out. When she returned five minutes later, the public line had not moved an inch, and another lawyer with a big fat grin had stepped into the fast line.

Look what just walked in, the old lady said. There goes another fifteen minutes.

Half an hour later another lawyer walked in, and the old lady said: Screw this! and walked out.

An hour later, Tyler had reached the head of the line.

What is it? said the policeman behind glass.

I’m here to see Daniel Clement Smooth, please, said Tyler. This is his reference number, his floor, his cell, and his pod number.

Oh, today’s his court date, said the cop. No visits allowed today. Come back again another day.

Tyler called his friend Buddy Lopez at the public defender’s office. Perhaps Lopez wasn’t quite his friend after all, for it took him awhile to place Tyler. Finally he said: Okay, I get it. Yeah. You’re the one who . . . Hey, didn’t I help you out on the Louise Nugent case?

No, lied Tyler, I kind of figure I helped
you
out.

You did? What did you do for me?

I got you the tape that proved that Louise was hit over the head
before
she slit that guy’s throat.

And how did you do that?

No offense, chum, said Tyler, but if your memory’s really that bad, you’re going to forget it all before the next time I call you. So let’s just say I told you and you already forgot. How does that grab you?

Why, you impudent sonofabitch. What do you want?

You familiar with the Dan Smooth case?

What about it? That asshole doesn’t need a public defender. He’s got a house. He’s got
assets.
Let him liquidate his assets and hire an attorney. Scuttlebutt is, they have him dead in the water. Crimes against children and all that. That’s gonna be one helluva case. Pretty juicy details if you ask me. Hey, you know what I heard? In that compound of his on Q Street, they found three dildoes covered with blood. They’re doing the DNA tests now. And you wanna hear the kicker?
These dildoes are tiny, man.
They had to’ve been used on kids.
Little
kids.

Who knows? said Tyler. Maybe Smooth was into consensual S & M with midgets. Innocent until proven guilty, right?

You’re quite the party pooper, said Lopez.

Yeah, there’s a sourpuss like me at every Roman circus. How much time do you figure he’ll do?

Well, with time, everyone relaxes. Even a case with a lot of news coverage just becomes another matter in court with the passage of time. If you know the process, Henry, first comes the initial public outcry. The D.A. can beat his chest and demand the death penalty, and when the case gets settled, it could be for something mild the newspapers might be appalled at. And this ain’t no death penalty case, so . . .

Five years?

Maybe twenty, if he’s lucky. Multiple cases. Multiple victims. For something like this, maybe the statute of limitations will
never
run out.

Dan Smooth lay dreaming that he was watching his niece make a sand castle. She said: It’s got to be dark inside, ’cuz the King hates the sun.

Why is that? said Smooth, resting a hand on the child’s buttock.

I dunno. The name of this castle is Virgin Castle—no, Mayflower Castle. The name of the King is King James. That’s my daddy.

Ah, Smooth said. Do go on.

And this rock is Mommy and this stick is you and this stick is me. We’re the royal family. And now it’s snowing, and a big monster—a
BIG
monster—is going to kill everybody. First he kills Daddy, then Mommy, then the Queen, then you, then me. Now I want to make everybody alive again, but the sand castle’s too messy. Let’s make up another game.

•

And I will heap evils upon them; I will spend my arrows upon them; they shall be wasted with hunger, and devoured with burning heat and poisonous pestilence; and I will send the teeth of beasts against them, with venom of crawling things of the dust.

 

D
EUTERONOMY
32.23-24

•

It was just before ten o’clock when Tyler got into Dan Smooth’s car. The keychain with the pink plastic heart on it hung between his fingers. He plucked the silver-colored key from its trembling amidst copper keys large and small (more copper-mass here than the Queen’s magic charm), guided it into the angled ignition slit, slowly began turning it until the seatbelt alarm sounded and the windshield wipers began their eager idiotic arcs, rotated it farther until the motor sang, turned off the windshield wipers, clicked his lap belt buckle into the receptacle by his hip, which silenced the alarm, idled the motor for another ten seconds of conscientiousness, then shifted into reverse and backed out of Dan Smooth’s driveway far more slowly than he could have walked. Q Street lay trafficless. He stopped, shifted into drive, alone inside this latest unconscious partner, and headed northwest through midtown. The cassette in Dan Smooth’s tape deck clicked like a shy child clearing its throat, reached its silent limit, and passed successfully through the ritual of reversal. Then a Bulgarian women’s choir began to sing sweet dirges. Half-listening, Tyler found himself already halfway across the trestle bridge, which was reflected in the river as it would have been in the fingerprinted mirror of an old Tenderloin pay phone whose metal-scaled cord had been wrenched out and twisted into an infinity sign: almost a hundred miles from the Tenderloin, he’d lost himself, found himself, lost himself, found himself now passing the sign which neither encouraged nor discouraged him from entering Yolo County. —Don’t you forget old Dan Smooth, the very same had said to him once, and he wouldn’t, not ever, although remembering was as lonely as Ocean Beach at night. —Connie, check that pink case note, Dr. Jasper had said. Can you read it to me? —
Two glasses of liquid were found by deceased near his feet
, replied dutiful Connie, pulling off the sheet. —Dan Smooth’s eyes were open, dark and fixed, not unlike the glass spheres in a trophy deer’s head. No more sly sidewise glances from him! Smooth gazed straight up at the ceiling, or maybe at heaven, where he doubtless would have charmed all the prepubescent angels. —Dr. Jasper stepped on the pedal of the dictaphone, picked up his scapel, and said to the world: The head is symmetrical and shows no trauma period. —Tyler, grimacing, stood with his hands folded behind his back. He hadn’t tied the green scrub gown on tightly enough.

Why are you
here
, exactly? said Connie.

I ask myself that every day, said Tyler. I hope I figure it out before they bring me to Dr. Jasper here.

Well, you only have a one in four chance of ending up in this room, said Connie. More than six thousand deaths every year get signed off elsewhere in the county.

I’m not from this county anyway, said Tyler. I mean, I was, but not now.

Could you step to one side, please? asked Connie.

Where are you from? said Tyler.

Moldavia, said Connie.

Oh, how is it over there?

Fine, said Connie.

And how is it over here?

All right.

Well, I guess we’ve covered all the bases, said Tyler. If it’s all right over here, then why don’t you want me to end up here?

I really don’t care, to be honest, Connie said. You can step back closer now if you want.