Slowly, then, it all came back, the beating, the faces, the glares all mixed up with the queasiness of sickness and hurt. And somewhere in the midst of the sickness I saw that smile of Lola's.
I must have gone out of my head for a while. I heard someone screaming obscenities at the night with the monotonous hopelessness of a dog baying at the moon. A long time passed before I realized that the sounds were coming from my own mouth. The grass became spikes to my face, and the dew ice, as I began pushing myself up.
I made it somehow, standing upright in the ditch, holding myself together with my clutched hands. Sweat poured off my face and ran down my back. I lifted my face and stared up at the darkness, and then I made a savage vow to the great black god. Finally I began walking, walking....
The lights came at me suddenly, a cluster of lights set off from the highway, and when I got closer I saw that it was a shack of some kind, with three big semi-trucks and trailers parked in front. Somebody was laughing and a jukebox blared. When I opened the door and went in the laughing stopped. But the jukebox blared on and on. Five men were sitting at the counter and there was a man behind the counter with half a pie in one hand and a knife in the other. The five men sat there with their mouths open, not making a sound. The jukebox stopped, changed records, and started again. The man behind the counter set the pie down very carefully and stared.
I had to work my mouth several times to get the words out. “Have you got a phone?”
“God, yes!” the counterman said. “There on the wall. Help yourself.”
They all watched as I went over to it. I got a coin out and managed to dial. I heard ringing at the other end, and when I heard the click of the receiver coming off the cradle I said, “Vida, I'm at a place called Mac's Truck Stop. It's west of town on highway seventy-two, I think. Vida—come get me.”
I leaned against the wall, feeling my legs going out from under me. The counterman said, “Catch him, Johnny. He's goin' on his face!”
I pushed myself away from the wall and said, “No. I'm all right.”
And I went out.
I was about a hundred yards down the highway when I heard the tires screaming and that red convertible rocked to a stop beside me.
“Roy! Roy!”
I let go then. I could still hear the jukebox blaring.
8
IT WAS MORNING WHEN I awakened. The pain was still with me, but it wasn't as bad. I lay for a long while, my eyes closed, listening to the distant sound of highway traffic. I didn't know where I was at first, and I didn't particularly care. The sheets were clean and the feel of them was good against me.
But Vida wasn't there. The shallow depression in the mattress was there beside me, the place she had lain. Vida was gone.
Instantly I was awake. The night before was vivid now. I remembered waking up in the gutter by the side of the highway. I remembered Sid, Seaward, Max, and all the rest of them, and with near insanity I remembered Lola.
Then panic seized me and I began to shake and couldn't stop. Your nerves are gone to hell, I thought. They've beat the guts out of you, literally. You're scared to death and there's nowhere to go. “Vida!” I shouted.
I pushed myself up in bed, looking around, finally realizing where I was. The room was part of the same tourist court that Vida and I had been in before. I wondered how badly I was hurt. I had to find out sooner or later, so I swung my legs off the side of the bed and sat there in my shorts and undershirt, feeling the sickness race up to my throat. The shock of sudden movement almost numbed me. Sweat was cold on my face as I inspected my body. All I could see were ugly blue bruises turning a dirty green. A rupture on the inside couldn't be seen, I knew, but it made me feel a little better when I tried lifting my legs without making the pain much worse. Those bruises, being where they were, were going to hurt. But they were sure as hell better than a ruptured gut.
Anyway it gave me something to think about until I heard the car outside. It pulled into the car port at the side of the cabin and in a minute the door opened and it was Vida.
She had a large brown bag in her arms. She wore a black wool dress and a little white jacket, and she was as clean as mountain air.
“How do you feel?” she asked, her face grave.
“I'm not sure. I haven't tried to walk yet.”
“The doctor said you would be all right in a few days, except for the soreness caused by the bruises.”
“What doctor?”
“The one that was here last night. Don't you remember?”
I didn't remember a thing after I had walked out of the roadside eating joint and Vida drove up. She went into the kitchenette and began taking things out of the bag. After a minute she came back in, carrying some things. I was still sitting there, too sick to move again.
“I had to go home this morning,” she said, “before Sid got up. You were sleeping and I didn't want to wake you. I would've come back sooner, but I had to wait for the stores to open. I got you a razor and some shaving cream and underwear and things.”
I touched her face, letting my fingers slide down the curve of her throat. Her skin was as rich and smooth as waxed ivory. Then I gathered up the new underwear and socks and started pushing myself up from the bed. My insides felt as if they were going to break loose as I stood there, shaking. Vida's face began to break up—a little at a time at first, and then it was all to pieces as she put her arms around me to keep me from going over on my face.
“Why, Roy?” she said tightly. “Why did they do it?”
I held onto her until my legs stopped quivering and I could stand alone. “I made a mistake,” I heard myself saying bitterly. “A bad mistake, but I learned something out of it. You can't underestimate anybody in this business, Vida.”
She didn't understand and I don't think she cared. “Will you take me away, Roy? I know how Barney works and how brutal he is. You have to get out of Big Prairie, Roy, or he'll kill you.”
I thought about that, knowing that she was right but now I didn't know what to do about it. “Maybe, I'd better have something to eat,” I said.
Getting to the bathroom was like learning to walk all over again. I was going to be sore for a long time, but even at that, I could consider myself lucky that they hadn't crippled me.
My face was a mess, the cheek split, the mouth puffy and bruised. But I still had all my teeth, and that was something. I turned the hot water on in the shower, got under it, and let it almost scald me. The steaming spray relaxed me, soaked away some of the soreness. Finally I lathered my face and shaved carefully around the cuts in my face.
The smell of frying bacon drifted into the bathroom as I got into clean underwear and socks. I hobbled into the kitchenette where Vida had dime-store plates and cutlery set out on a drop-down table. She looked around and smiled vaguely.
“You look better. Do you want some coffee, Roy?”
“I need something worse than coffee.” I took her shoulders and turned her around. “I missed you like hell, Vida, when I woke up awhile ago and you weren't there. I'm not complete without you. I need you, Vida.”
I pulled her to me. I pressed my hands to the small of her back and felt the hard-softness of her body flowing against me.
“Roy, no! You're not well!”
I held her closer, pressing her against me until I felt her begin to quiver. “Roy, you can't!” But even as she said it she closed her eyes and that red mouth began searching, and I knew that she had reached the point from which there was no turning back. Somehow we were in the other room and Vida was saying something over and over in a very small voice twisted by some awful ache. I wanted her more than I'd ever thought it was possible to want a woman.
Later, after the electricity of the storm had passed, I lay there sick with pain, too sick to move or make a sound, and still I felt a calmness and peace.
“Roy. Oh, Roy,” she murmured, clinging to me, her face pressed to my shoulder. “Roy, you will take me with you, won't you?”
“Where
?”
“Anywhere you go. I don't care.”
To a skid-row hotel? I thought. Eating in hash houses, smelling of hash houses? How long would a thing like that last before it went sour?
I said, “I think I could use that coffee now.”
“Answer me, Roy. Will you take me?”
I looked at her. “Of course. Now, how about that coffee?”
I watched her dress and we didn't say anything else until she went into the kitchenette and came back with the coffee.
“What is it, Roy?”
“I don't know. An idea keeps walking along the edge of my mind, but it's too far away. I can't reach it. Tell me about this load of liquor Barney's bringing in.”
She looked away. “They'll kill you, Roy.”
“I just want to hear about it,” I said. “When is it due?”
“Tomorrow night.” And then she told me what she had learned from Sid, her voice as final as an obituary. “Roy, you're not going to try it, are you?”
“I don't know.”
It would be tough; twice as tough a: it would have been the way I had first planned it. As things were now, I wouldn't have a chance to let it cool off. And even if I got away with the hijacking, where was I going to sell the liquor? I thought vaguely, Maybe Sid would buy it. But I knew that was wishful thinking. He wasn't going to cross Seaward just for one load of liquor. And then that nagging thought came again, How did a dumb guy like Sid get where he is?
I said, “Tell me about Sid, Vida. How did he ever get in the bootlegging business anyway?”
“I'm not sure,” she said finally. “Sid was just a runner when I first knew him.” She smiled faintly. “That seems like a long time ago, but it was only a little over four years. He was a big ox of a guy, always grinning, making people laugh. He didn't seem to care about anything.” Then she shook her head, puzzled. “But he changed.”
“What changed him?”
“I'm not sure. He never used to drink much, but he started drinking more and more, and then one day I realized that it had been months since I had seen him sober.” She shook her head again, in that strange way.
“What happened then?” I said.
“Nothing. He kept drinking more and more.” She sat there looking at her hands. “I think I loved him once,” she said finally, “but that was so long ago that I'm not sure any more. I was working in a drive-in joint and Sid used to come out there and kid around with everybody. He didn't have much money then but he was full of life, like a kid who never bothered to grow up, and everybody liked him. And maybe I loved him.
“Well, we were married a little over four years ago, when Sid was still a runner. We moved into a little four-room place over on the east side because that was all we could afford. I guess it was all I ever expected to have, but it was enough. And Sid was good to me. He was big and clumsy and somehow gentle at the same time. Maybe I was mistaking gratitude for love, but I don't know now.”
She was quiet for a while, and finally I said, “How did Sid make the big jump from runner to retailer?”
She shrugged. “He just came in one day and said that Seaward was giving him part of Kingkade's territory in Big Prairie. That was all I ever knew about it. He made money fast after that, but things were never the same again, for some reason.”
“Was that when he started drinking?”
She nodded. “I think so. About then.”
“But why?” The question suddenly seemed important, and I didn't know why. “It doesn't make sense,” I said. “He gets promoted from a common runner to retailer, he's making plenty of money, so he starts drinking himself into unconsciousness.”
A quiet excitement started deep inside me somewhere and began to rise. It seemed pretty obvious that Sid had found himself a club somewhere and had blackmailed himself into a retailer's position by holding the club over Seaward's head. I wasn't sure just how that was going to help me, but it was. The answer was there, if I could just find it.
Vida was looking at me in that strange way again. “Roy, what is it?”
I grinned. “I think I know how to make the hijacking work.” Then, before she could protest, I went on. “The thing that was wrong with it was that I'm fair game for Seaward's thugs and I wouldn't have any way of getting rid of the liquor after I had stolen it. I think I know of a way now. Sid can buy the stuff. And he will. I think he will.”
I could see fear jump up behind her eyes. I said, “Look, it's clear that Sid is blackmailing Seaward. When everything fits together, that's the kind of picture it makes. Both of us know that Sid would have been a runner all his life if he hadn't got something on Seaward. And it must be something pretty bad. You say Sid started drinking about the time Seaward installed him as a retailer. That fits with something Sid told me once—he said that he had done Barney a big favor once. It begins to look like this favor was a job of murder.”
Vida's eyes were wide. “Roy, no! Sid isn't the kind of man who could ever kill anybody!”
“That's what makes it look like murder. Sid couldn't kill a man and forget it, the way some people could. A man like him would do just what Sid did—try to drown himself in a bottle. The only thing that doesn't fit is why Sid did it in the first place. He wouldn't have the guts to kill anybody unless he had a damn strong reason—a lot stronger than a man's ordinary greed for money.” I looked at Vida and her face was as pale as death.
“Do you know of any reason why Sid would do a thing like that?” I asked.
“No.” Not looking at me.
“It couldn't be,” I said, “that those four rooms on the east side got too small, could it? It couldn't be that you began to want things that Sid couldn't buy on his pay?”
I knew that I'd hit it. She dropped her head, and after a moment she began crying without making a sound. I touched her and she was cold. I put my arms around her and held her close while she got rid of it. I put my face to the softness of her hair and said, “I didn't want to hurt you, but I had to know, Vida.” She still didn't make a sound. “Look,” I said, “we've been playing make-believe in a flesh and blood world. Now we can stop pretending that we can leave Big Prairie and I can get a hash-house job and maybe you can get a job in a beer joint and everything will be just fine. It wouldn't work, Vida. Living from hand to mouth would kill whatever you feel for me. I love you, Vida. Nothing but grime and poverty can ever change that. Do you understand now why I've got to go through with the hijacking? We'll have money, Vida. Money enough to start again somewhere else.”
“Money won't buy peace.”
I knew she was thinking of Lola, but I wouldn't let myself think of her now. I said finally, “Tell me again about this shipment of Seaward's.”
By the time the next morning came around I knew what I was going to do. Vida didn't come back to the cabin that night because I needed the time to get the thing thought out. It was a little before daylight when I got up and pulled my clothes on. P was still sore and I hurt like hell when I bent over, but I began to get over the feeling that my insides had torn loose. After I was dressed I called a cab.
I got out in front of the house and went up to the front porch and pushed the doorbell. The morning was dead quiet, still dark, and I had to ring two more times before I heard anything moving on me inside. Then Vida opened the door.
She stood there, stunned at seeing me, holding a silk robe together with her hands. “Roy!”
“I've got to talk to Sid,” I said.
“This is crazy! Roy, if anyone sees you—”
She left the words hanging as I pushed the door wide and stepped inside. “Is he asleep?”
“He's passed out,” she said.
“Then you'd better go to—another part of the house. He's going to get a rude awakening, I'm afraid.”
I left her standing there and went through the room, down the hall and into the back bedroom where Sid lay sprawled and snoring. I took hold of the front of Sid's pajama jacket and jerked him upright. I slapped him three times across t
he face, crack, crack, crack, like pistol shots in the quiet of the room.
“Wake up!”
He lay across the bed, stunned and drunk.
I went into the bathroom and soaked a heavy bath-towel in cold water. I hit him in the face with it, wielding the towel like a club. The pain finally got through to his whisky-soaked brain, and he threw his arms over his face, cringing back against the headboard. He still didn't have any idea who I was.
“What the hell is this?” he said hoarsely.
I hit him once more, just to make sure. “You'd better be awake,” I said, “because this is going to be a big day. This is the day you turn on Seaward and kick him right in the gut.”
His arms still over his face, he shook his head as if he couldn't believe it. Finally he lowered his arms. He looked at me for a full thirty seconds before he realized that it was no dream. I could see a kind of sluggish anger burr behind his eyes.
“You cheap bastard,” he snarled, “get out of my house!”
I hit him right between the eyes with my fist. His eyes went glassy as he fell back on one elbow. I got him by the throat again and said, “I'm not fooling, Sid.”
“You sonofabitch!” Then he lunged at me, but it only got him tangled up in the covers. I hit him with my left fist, then I swung with my right and got him under the eye. I planted my feet and kept swinging, monotonously, like a boxer working out on a heavy bag. Pretty soon I had his face cut up, and one eye turned an ugly blue and began to swell. I landed a punch just to the side of his Adam's apple and he fell back gasping.
I said, “Is that enough to convince you?”
“They'll kill you for this!” he said, his voice almost a whine.
I hit him again, dropped him in the center of the bed and he lay there gasping. “Listen to me,” I said. “I've got a lot of hate to work out on somebody, and it's going to be you unless you're willing to listen to a proposition.”
“I don't make deals with punk bastards!”
I hit him from behind, just below the ribs, in the kidneys.
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