by Thomas King
“You bought a cowboy hat?”
Stas turned the kettle on. “Sure. Yes. Why not. Mayor has new program. Everyone is to pretend to be western people.”
“The Howdy program.”
“Yes. Howdy. Everyone friendly.” Stas put the hat on his head. “Howdy! What do you think?”
“Perfect.”
The hat was too small for Stas’s head.
“I have new words also,” said the mechanic. “‘Yoppee,’ ‘pardner,’ ‘weacken.’ Is this correct?”
“Close enough,” said Thumps.
Stas hung the hat back on the hook. “In Russia we have Cossacks. Like cowboys. Also like Indians. But no Howdy program.”
Thumps smiled.
“So, there is good news and there is bad news. This is how you say it, yes?”
“It is.”
“First,” said Stas, “Volvo is a good car. Swedish, sure. Better than Lada or Volga piece of shit. Not so good as German, but still good.”
“Nice to know.”
“Of course, now Volvo is Chinese, and that is maybe not so good,” said Stas. “But your car is Swedish car.”
“So that’s good?”
“Yes. Of course. But the accident. That is not so good.” The kettle began whistling. Stas poured the water into two cups. “Peppermint?”
“Peppermint is fine.”
“So,” said Stas as he handed Thumps one of the cups. “Now we see what is what.”
The Volvo was at the back, hiding in the shadow of an old yellow school bus. The front window was gone, and the entire passenger side from the front bumper to the trunk was smashed and scraped.
“Man who runs red light strikes your Volvo here.” Stas patted the hood. “Then both cars crash into each other. Boom. Like bomb.”
The Volvo was listing badly. One wheel was twisted and bent under the frame, as though the car had broken a leg.
“Man who runs red light driving Chrysler.” Stas made a face. “Chrysler. Like Lada. Piece of shit.”
The damage was as bad as Thumps had imagined.
“You have insurance, yes?”
“Just comprehensive.”
“Ah,” said Stas. “Okay. So, good news. The other guy, he is at fault.”
Thumps walked the length of the Volvo. How long had he and the car been together? Certainly before Chinook. Even before that deadly summer on the California coast. Now that Thumps thought about it, the Volvo was probably his longest-standing relationship. What did that say about him?
“So Chrysler man must pay for car value. But value is not enough to make repairs.” Stas took a slip of paper out of his pocket. “Bad news. Here is cost to make car like new.”
Thumps looked at the figure.
“Maybe you friends with car. Like horse, yes? Maybe you want to fix. Maybe you want new horse.” Stas sipped his tea. “You tell me as you wish.”
“Was Cooley injured?”
“Cooley?” Stas’s face broke out into a broad grin. “Cuts. Bruises. Cooley was not happy with Chrysler man.”
“Cooley hurt the guy?”
“No, no,” said Stas. “Okay, yes, maybe scare him little bit.”
“I don’t know what I want to do.” Thumps put his hand on the trunk. The metal felt cold and dead. “I haven’t talked to the insurance company yet.”
“Insurance.” Stas spat on the ground. “Like big stomach.”
“What?”
“Money goes in one end,” said Stas. “Shit comes out other end. This is true, yes?”
The sky to the west had turned a cold silver. It was early, but at this time of the year there was always the chance of a storm sneaking in out of the northwest and burying the high plains.
“If I want to get the car fixed, how long will it take?”
“Two weeks,” said Stas. “Maybe more. Insurance pay for rental car?”
Thumps shrugged. “I don’t know.”
“No matter,” said Stas. “No rental cars in town. Television people took them all.”
“The reality show?”
“Sure,” said Stas. “Reality. Bullshit. All the same, yes?”
“Great.”
“You know Cooley, yes?”
“Sure.”
“He is your friend?”
Thumps nodded, not really knowing where Stas was headed.
“He is my friend as well. He takes me hunting. Moose. Elk. Does not mind that I am Russian man. For him, I am family. You understand?”
“I understand.”
“So, you are Cooley’s friend, friend of family, and I must find you a car.” Stas tossed the rest of his tea on the ground. “You want school bus?”
Thumps looked at the bus next to the Volvo. All four tires were flat. The hood was up and Thumps could see that the motor had been removed. “That’s a joke, right?”
“Yes, of course,” said Stas. “Good joke, yes?”
“Excellent,” said Thumps.
THE TRUCK WAS an old Dodge step-side with a short bed. Both fenders were dented, and rust had begun to chew its way through the metal.
“Not pretty,” said Stas, “but good heart.”
“It’s fine.”
“This is my first vehicle. When Angie and I get married, her father gives me this.”
The windshield had several long cracks running through the glass, and the rear bumper was bent, as though someone had backed into an immovable object at speed. At one time the truck had been white, but time and weather had scrubbed it grey.
“You talk to insurance. You make decision on car. Now I have time to fix. Later there is elk, maybe moose.”
Thumps took the keys and weighed them. “Cooley at home?”
Stas waved a hand. “Maybe. Maybe not. Cooley has job with television people. They want Indians who look like Indians. You understand?”
“Sure.”
“So they hire Cooley. He looks like good movie Indian, yes?”
“Yes.”
Malice Aforethought. The money they were offering would cover most of the repairs. It might even buy him a good used car.
“Maybe you can get job as movie Indian,” said Stas, his voice matter-of-fact. “Good money in looking like movie Indian. Then maybe you can afford new German car.”
“I really appreciate the truck.”
“Sure, sure.” Stas waved a hand and headed back to the garage. “When you see Cooley, tell him I say howdy.”
Thumps looked at the Volvo. He wondered if the car felt deserted, if it knew he was thinking of leaving it to rot in the backyard of a Russian cowboy. Climbing into the cab of Stas’s truck seemed like a betrayal, but he did it anyway. Then he set the key in the ignition and pulled the old step-side into gear.
Seven
The truck drove like a truck, and it rode like a truck. Thumps could feel every imperfection in the road, along with some that weren’t even there. Maybe this was the buckboard and stagecoach experience he had read about in westerns, had seen on late-night television. Still, he was grateful for the transportation. It wasn’t a Porsche or a BMW, but then neither was it a beat-to-shit yellow school bus with flat tires and no engine.
Parking in the downtown was always an adventure. Most times, you would have to circle the block, watching for the telltale signs that someone was pulling out of a parking space.
Exhaust fumes. Tail lights. An open trunk.
On the fifth pass, he gave up and pulled into the city lot behind the library with the pay-as-you-go parking ticket dispenser. Maybe things were going to look up later.
He couldn’t imagine anyone wanting to steal the Dodge, but he locked it anyway. If the Volvo was a writeoff and he had to replace it, he might think about getting a pickup. There was, Thumps had to admit, a certain ethos to a truck that a Swedish sedan could never hope to match.
A half-ton with mud flaps, a tool box, a gun rack, and one of those pine-tree-shaped air fresheners hanging from the rear-view mirror.
DOLORES CARDOZA WAS on the phone wi
th a customer. She motioned for Thumps to take a seat. “That’s what a deductible is,” she was saying. “That’s why they call it a deductible.”
Dolores’s office seemed to suggest that selling insurance was neither a glamorous nor a profitable occupation. Dark wood panelling, a dropped ceiling with yellowing acoustical tiles, shag carpet that looked like a plowed field, and a dead fern in a bucket.
Evidently the mayor’s Howdy program hadn’t found its way here yet.
“Yes, the total damage to your kitchen is $4,240.” Dolores looked at Thumps and rolled her eyes. “And from that amount we deduct the deductible, which in your case is a thousand dollars.”
Thumps had never paid a great deal of attention to the business of insurance. He had house insurance, of course, and car insurance. But he had never considered life insurance or health insurance or a policy that covered disability. He had heard of dancers who insured their legs and singers who insured their voices. Aside from the house and car, the only thing he had of any value was his camera equipment, and that would be covered by his home insurance policy.
Wouldn’t it?
“Yes, you can get a policy with no deductible,” Dolores was telling her client. “But you have to decide on that when you take out the policy, not when you make a claim.”
A coat of paint would do wonders for the office. Take out the shag and put in a nice Berber. Lose the dropped ceiling and get rid of the fern.
“Probably be a week before head office sends you a cheque.” Dolores set the phone back on the cradle and turned to Thumps. “I suppose you want money too.”
“Sure.”
Dolores opened a file. “You only have comprehensive,” she said, as though this were a serious misdemeanour. “And we’re still a ‘fault’ state, thank God.”
Thumps waited.
“I’ve seen the police report.” Dolores opened a file. “A Mr. Dettmer from Orleans, Massachusetts, ran a red light and smashed into your car, so technically his insurance company is on the hook for any damages to your car or any personal injury you may have suffered.”
“Technically?”
“Apparently Mr. Dettmer doesn’t have any insurance.” Dolores closed the file. “And it seems he’s left town. He was supposed to be in court last week but didn’t show.”
Thumps slumped a bit in the chair. “So I guess I’ll cancel my policy.”
Dolores’s head snapped up. “Why would you do that?”
“I don’t have a car.”
“But you’re going to get your car repaired or find another car.”
“Maybe.”
“What about a rental?”
“What about it?”
“If you drive a rental, you’ll have to have insurance.” Dolores leaned forward, as though she were going to reach across the desk and shake some sense into him. “And while you’re here, we should talk about the benefits of investing in a whole-life policy.”
THE TRUCK WAS where Thumps had left it and, so far as he could tell, no one had tried to steal it. Dolores was right, of course. As long as he was driving Stas’s truck or a rental or any car for that matter, he would need insurance.
He was surprised to discover that his cameras and lenses were not covered by his homeowner’s policy. Because it was professional equipment, he would need an additional rider to protect it from accidental loss or theft, a rider that Dolores was only too happy to sell him.
So there was no coverage for the car. And no coverage on his cameras. Maybe he should reconsider the job with Maslow and Malice Aforethought.
Or maybe Stas would trade a framed photograph of a herd of elk in a winter landscape for the school bus.
“Hey, Thumps.”
Cooley Small Elk was leaning on the fender of the step-side. The truck was trying its best to stay upright.
“You okay?”
“Fine.”
Cooley had a bad cut on his forehead that had required stitches and a dark bruise just below one eye. “Dolores any help?”
Thumps shook his head. “Guy who hit you didn’t have insurance.”
Cooley stood up. So did the truck.
“Guy ran a red light. Didn’t see him coming.”
“Drunk?”
“Just stupid.”
Cooley made most people uneasy. It wasn’t his fault. In spite of his good nature, the man looked foreboding and dangerous, as though he had just stepped off the pages of a James Fenimore Cooper novel. With black hair, black eyes, dark skin that got even darker under the summer sun, Cooley Small Elk would have been the perfect poster boy for Wild West shows and wagon-train massacres.
And he was massive, a large boulder that had just rolled down a mountain and landed with a thud next to where you were standing.
Cooley had always had long hair. But Thumps couldn’t remember him wearing it in braids before.
“That for the TV people?”
Cooley tugged on one of the braids. “Feels real strange. Don’t think my hair likes being tied up in knots.”
“Looks authentic.”
Cooley smiled. “You coming tomorrow night?”
“Tomorrow?”
“Big Halloween party at the bookstore,” said Cooley. “You’re supposed to dress up like people who scare you.”
Thumps tried to think of people who scared him.
“Marvin’s bringing the big drum,” said Cooley. “You want to sit in?”
“Maybe I’ll see if Claire wants to come.”
Cooley shook his head. “She’s gone.”
“What?”
“Moses and me stopped by her place, but she wasn’t there. Her truck was gone along with the stuff people take with them when they’re going somewhere else.”
“Where’d she go?”
“No idea. Moses thought she might be at Roxanne’s, but she wasn’t.” Cooley tugged on one braid and then on the other as though he were trying to make sure that his head was even. “She’s got relatives in Great Falls, but she’s not there either.”
“What about Stick?”
“We asked, but he don’t know where his mom is. Moses figures that she took off so she could think about things. According to Moses, this is something that women do.”
Thumps yawned. He was suddenly tired, as though his blood sugars had dropped when he wasn’t looking.
“Moses figures she’ll come home when she’s ready.” Cooley gave each braid another hard yank. “Moses says that, in the end, everyone comes home. Even cats.”
Eight
Thumps left the truck parked where it was and walked the three blocks to the Aegean. The bookstore was housed in an old Carnegie library that Archimedes Kousoulas had rescued from a developer and turned into what the little Greek liked to call “the best bookstore in the real west.”
There was Prairie Lights in Iowa City, Archie would explain to any who would listen, Powell’s in Portland, and Elliott Bay in Seattle, so the Midwest and the West Coast were covered. But in the real west, at least according to Archie, the Aegean was it.
“The best bookstore in the real west” wasn’t a motto, and the Aegean wasn’t just a bookstore. It was more a cultural centre, and given the mayor’s Howdy program, Thumps expected the place would be done up like a western saloon or a Deadwood brothel or maybe even an army fort.
Today, however, the Aegean looked like a clothing store, smelled like a clothing store, smelled like clothes that had been left in the closet too long or clothes that had been packed away in trunks and drawers along with little sacks of cedar or a generous helping of mothballs.
“Thumps!” Archie popped out from behind a rack of men’s suits. “It’s about time.”
Thumps didn’t ask Archie why it was about time. He knew better than that.
“You don’t write, you don’t call. You’re back, what, a week, and you don’t stop by until now?”
“Two days.”
“What?”
“I’ve been back two days,” said Thumps. “Actually, a day and a
half.”
Archie normally wore slacks and a shirt to work. Today he was dressed in a pair of baggy grey pants, a light blue shirt with a big pointy collar, and an argyle sweater vest. Along with a pair of two-tone shoes, black and white, that Thumps recognized from old detective movies.
“Okay,” said Archie. “So how is Claire? How are you? How was the operation? Tell me everything.”
Thumps looked around the bookstore. The books were still there, but they had been pushed back to make way for the clothes.
“What’s all this?”
Archie frowned. “Vintage clothing of course.” Archie took a suit jacket off the hanger. “Here, try this on.”
Before Thumps could object, Archie had the jacket on him and was straightening the shoulders.
“1940s double-breasted.” Archie hurried Thumps over to a full-length mirror. “Probably British. Dark blue with chalk stripes. Centre crease pants with cuffs. Flannel instead of wool. Wide lapels. Padded shoulders. All you need is a nice homburg with a petersham band and a pair of lace-up oxfords with a contrasting cap toe and you’re set.”
Thumps tried to remember the last time he had worn a suit.
“I don’t need a suit.”
“Of course you need a suit,” said Archie. “And why buy a new one when you can have the exclusivity of vintage.”
“Exclusivity?”
“What? You think you’re going to see this suit on anyone else in town?”
“The Aegean is a vintage clothing store?”
Archie waved a hand. “No, of course not. This is temporary. Just until Gabby can get her shop set up.”
Thumps tried to pretend he recognized the name.
“Gabriella Santucci?” said Archie. “Used to own a vintage clothing store in Helena? Moved here this spring?”
“Your girlfriend?”
Archie blushed. “She’s not my girlfriend. She’s a friend. Okay? I’m just helping her get settled.”
“Okay.”
Archie slipped the jacket off and hung it back on the hanger. “No, it’s not okay. That’s how rumours get started.”
“Okay.”
“Would you stop saying ‘okay’?”
“It’s a nice jacket.”
“Of course it’s a nice jacket. Gabby has a great eye.” Archie turned in a slow circle. “How do I look?”
