“I don’t know. I don’t know that he wants to stay.”
Ask him.
“Lucas?” Taft called up the ladder.
“Yo,” said Lucas.
“What do you think? We’re about done. Do you want to come back next week, work on painting?”
“I don’t mind,” said Lucas.
What did I tell you?
“I wouldn’t call that a ringing, vigorous assent,” said Taft.
I would. That’s exactly what I’d call it. Consider the source. He’s a country boy. He’s a Vermont country boy. What the devil do you want, Chief? Do you want it in blank verse?
“You may be right.”
You know I’m right. I predict big things for this kid. This kid is going far.
Atop the ladder, Lucas let his scraper drop to the ground at Taft’s feet. “That’s it,” he said. “It’s done. Hey, how come you’re always talking to yourself?”
Taft didn’t answer. He let go the ladder and stepped back to let Lucas climb down. For that moment, the ladder was free. Taft turned, and started for the house. Just then,
Heads up! said Dangerfield, atop the roof, and he kicked the ladder away from the house. The ladder didn’t fall, but Lucas lost his hold, cried out once, and came off the ladder backwards, his arms pinwheeling helplessly, like a doomed soldier shot as he mounts the wall of a besieged city—came off the top of the ladder, forty feet in the air, falling, falling.
Oops, said Dangerfield.
Taft was there. He caught Lucas in his arms the way you catch a sack of grain or coal. He didn’t so much as waver as he took the boy’s weight, but set him down lightly on his feet.
“I’ve got you,” said Taft.
Lucas was shaking. He was white as a ghost. “How did you do that?” He asked Taft. “How did you get here? You were over there.”
Taft winked at him.
• • •
In the study, Taft poured out a large Sir Walter Scott for Dangerfield and handed it across the desk. Then he poured one for himself. He sat. He faced Dangerfield.
“What was that for?” he asked.
What was what for, Chief? Dangerfield asked mildly.
“Kicking the ladder,” said Taft. He was angry. “Throwing the kid off from way up there. He might have been killed.”
Really, Chief? With you around? You watching over him? His protector? His friend? The moves you’ve got? The speed? The strength? Talk about Talents! I wasn’t sure even I could put that over. But I did. That’s our deal. As you may remember? So spare me the outrage, okay? Suffice to say, the kid was in no danger, and you and I both know it.
“Suppose he wasn’t. Why do it? Just to scare him?”
Action, said Dangerfield. A little business, you know, a little spectacle? Something going on? Something to look at? That kid? Sure, you’re working with him out there, you’re being his pal, his mentor, you’re hanging out, you’re shooting the shit. You’re being firm, but kind; kind, but firm. Blah, blah, blah. And all that’s okay, that’s great—as far as it goes. But it was starting to run long, Chief. You know it was. It was starting to feel too much like Act Three. So I juiced things a little. It’s all part of the service. Don’t thank me.
“I wasn’t about to thank you,” said Taft.
Lighten up, Chief. Smile. Don’t you get it? We’re in show business, here. End of the day, it’s vaudeville we’re in. We are such stuff as dreams are made on, you know? You know that line? From your reading?
“I know that line,” said Taft.
Sure, you do, said Dangerfield. Show biz, all the way. What else? And so? Come on, Chief. You’re the one who wanted drama, right? You’re the one who wanted a plot. Can’t say you haven’t got one, can you? Look at you. You’re up to your ass in plot—and you’re the hero. What a deal, right?
“Until the curtain comes down,” said Taft. “Until Columbus Day. Or is that just part of the show, as well?”
No, Chief. On Columbus Day, the show’s over. As you know, right? So what? My advice? Don’t think about it. Have fun. Take the better, leave the bitter. Seize the day. Seize that sucker.
“You’re a monument of originality, aren’t you?”
In my line of work, you don’t really need to be original. In fact, it can be a liability.
“Mmm,” said Taft. “The bottle stands by you, I think, old sport.” He nodded at the Sir Walter’s on the desk between them.
Don’t “old-sport” me, Chief, said Dangerfield. I’m not your lumberjack chum.
“My, my, old boy,” said Taft. “Climb down. Bit tetchy today, aren’t we? You yourself this minute said originality can be overdone.”
Hah, said Dangerfield. Okay, Chief, you win.
“In any case, the bottle stands by you.”
So it does, said Dangerfield, and he shoved it over.
9
A HELL OF A MARTINI
BOLD, HARD, WITH THE SWAGGER OF A LORD AND THE aggression of a fighting mastiff, the partner from the New York office strode into the dining room of the little country inn. Jack Raptor, the long-knife litigator, in town for the opening of court tomorrow. A pro, Raptor was, one of the victors, a winner whose suit cost more than a week’s receipts from the establishment in which he found himself, and whose bonus at the end of last year might have bought the place—might have bought the whole fucking town, said Raptor, who, in his speech, affected the foul-mouthed dash of the rich and powerful.
He paused at the tiny, four-stool bar, but no bartender was visible. Raptor struck the bar sharply with the flat of his hand. A young man wearing a waiter’s white apron appeared. “Can I help you, sir?” he asked.
“I don’t know,” said Raptor. “Is this a bar, or is it some kind of fucking church?”
The waiter smiled agreeably. “Sir?” he asked.
“Make me a white one,” said Raptor.
The young man looked at him. “White wine, sir?” he asked. “We have a new Chardonnay—”
“A Martini,” barked Raptor. “Beefeater’s. Olive. Straight up. You know what I’m talking about? You heard of a Martini up here in the woods?”
“Oh,” said the kid. “Yes, sir. One gin Martini. Will you want a table?”
“This is the dining room, isn’t it? It says so on the door. Yeah, I’ll want a table. I’m meeting somebody.”
“He’s here, sir,” said the waiter.
Raptor looked. The dining room, brightly lit, had some dozen tables. This evening, most were idle. On one side of the room, two women were having their dessert. At another table, three men were being served. Near them, a family. At a table in the far end of the dining room, near the empty fireplace, a single man waited, presumably Raptor’s dinner companion and coadjutor, the local hayseed lawyer who would appear in court with Raptor tomorrow and hold up the hometown end of the Shithead Posse as Raptor threw in the weight of the bank that retained him, united with the weight of his mighty firm, to crush, utterly, whatever poor fool had wandered into the path of his terrifying, annihilating onset. Tyler was the hick counsel’s name. Something Tyler. Some hick name: Calvin or Virgil. Dumb woodchucks. Raptor turned from the bar and went to join him at his table.
“Do you want your drink, sir?” the kid behind the bar asked him. He was mixing the Martini.
“For Christ’s sake,” snarled Raptor. “No, I don’t want it. That’s why I ordered it. Yeah, I want it, okay? Bring it.” He advanced across the room.
“Evening,” said the man at the table when Raptor approached. “You’re Mr. Raptor?”
“Tyler?” asked Raptor.
“Pliny couldn’t make it.”
“What the fuck? Couldn’t make it? What do you mean, he couldn’t make it. What the fuck is that?”
“He asked me to meet you in his place.”
“And you are?”
“Adams. Eli Adams.”
Eli, thought Raptor. There you go. Calvin. Virgil. Pliny. Eli. Fucking rednecks. Where do they all come from?
Th
e kid from the bar brought Raptor’s Martini and set it down in front of him. Raptor picked up the glass, drank half, devoured the olive, drank the other half, and handed the empty glass back to the waiter. “Again,” he said.
“What can I get you, sir?” the waiter asked Eli Adams.
“Oh, I’ll have a beer,” said Eli.
“In beers, this evening, we have—” the waiter began.
“Anything at all,” said Eli. The waiter left them.
“So, you’ll be in court tomorrow, too?” Raptor asked Eli.
“I hope not,” said Eli. “I hope nobody will.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Orson Hayes. You’re in court tomorrow about his situation, aren’t you? You’re going to try to get a judgment in his case, a disposition, or something? I’m not sure how you say it.”
“You’re not a lawyer?”
Eli shook his head.
“Let me help you, then,” said Raptor. “We’re not going to depose Hayes tomorrow, we’re not going to negotiate with him, we’re not going to counsel him. We’re going to foreclose his sorry ass.”
“That’s right. But, that was why I thought … I hoped. You see, Orson? That’s his home, that old place. He was born in that house. It’s all he’s got. He’s what? Eighty? Eighty-five? He’s not in the best shape. He’s got a lot of friends around here.”
Raptor snorted. “Look, Virgil,” he said. “Or, it’s Eli, right? Look, Eli. I’m sure what’s-his-name’s a good old guy, but, you see, as far as I’m concerned, he’s just another shithead.”
“Shithead?” asked Eli.
“Deadbeat. Stiff. Bad debt. Nonperformer. Shithead. If he wanted to hold onto his fucking house, he ought to have seen that the fucking payments were made.”
“They were.”
Raptor chuckled. “I have a six-inch stack of paperwork in my case, up in my room in this dump, that says they weren’t.”
“The papers are wrong. It’s a mistake.”
“Do I care? Do I fucking care? I just told you. I’ve got the paperwork.”
The young waiter came to serve Raptor’s second drink and take their orders. Raptor ordered a third Martini and the loin of venison, very rare—“So rare,” said Raptor. “So rare, you can still hear the shot that killed the fucking deer, get it?” Adams ordered the brook trout.
“Maybe I oughtn’t to have said ‘mistake,’” said Eli after the waiter had left them. “Orson’s place is out on Diamond Mountain. All that land, that’s what Magog Partners has been buying up.”
Raptor snickered. “Never heard of them,” he said.
“You sure?” asked Eli. “We thought you would have.”
“Who’s we?”
“Me, and, mostly, the fellow who’s advising Orson.”
“He’s full of shit.”
“Tell him that.”
“Don’t worry. When I see him in court tomorrow, I’ll be sure to tell him that.”
“No need to wait till tomorrow,” said Eli. He looked past Raptor’s left shoulder and nodded.
Langdon Taft joined them at the table. He took a place beside Raptor, but it didn’t look as though he’d come to dine. He moved his chair right up to Raptor’s and turned it so he sat facing him, quite close. Too close for Raptor. He drew back a little. “Who’s this?” he asked Eli.
“Langdon, this is Mr. Raptor, from New York City,” said Eli mildly. “Langdon Taft. Mr. Raptor never heard of Magog,” he told Taft.
“Is that right?” said Taft. “That strikes me as funny, though, since Magog’s owned by the bank that’s paying Mr. Raptor’s ticket.”
“Who told you that?” asked Raptor.
“I must have heard it on the radio,” said Taft.
Raptor snickered again. “Can the radio prove it?” he asked.
“That might be difficult,” said Taft, “seeing Magog is a corporation registered in Bermuda, which is owned by a fund in Zurich, which, technically, is what your bank owns. Or it’s what owns your bank. I’m not sure. Doesn’t matter. And that’s not even asking about the energy company in Dallas. Or the one in Russia. What’s that one called? Ikon?”
Raptor moved his chair a little farther from Taft. He looked at him. “You’ve got a lot of bad info, friend,” he said. “What do you want?”
“Mr. Raptor wonders what we want, Eli,” said Taft. “We’d better tell him, don’t you think?”
“We better had,” said Eli.
“You want to fill Mr. Raptor in, Eli? You want to tell him about our proposition?”
“You’d better do it,” said Eli.
“Proposition?” asked Raptor.
“That’s right,” said Taft. “A business proposition.”
“I’m listening,” said Raptor. “I asked you once. What do you want?”
“First,” said Taft. “We want you to move on. Go back where you came from. Go tonight. Dinner’s on us, of course. Then you check out and be on your way. You stand down on the Orson Hayes foreclosure.”
“Stand down?” asked Raptor. “Are you out of your fucking mind? Stand down?”
Taft smiled at him. The waiter brought their orders. He laid the plates before Eli and Raptor. “Shall I set another place, sir?” he asked Eli, glancing at Taft.
“No need,” said Eli.
Raptor handed his empty glass to the waiter. “Do it,” he said. The waiter took his glass. “Enjoy your dinner,” he said.
“Are you nuts?” Raptor asked Taft when the waiter had gone. “I stand down? I go home? Don’t be silly. I don’t go home. You go home. You think you can just turn something like this off?”
“I can’t,” said Taft. “You can. That’s our proposition.”
Raptor shot him a crafty grin. “You’re fucking crazy,” he said. “But let’s pretend you aren’t. Even so, you haven’t put out a proposition. You’ve put out half a proposition.”
“That’s correct,” said Taft.
“Suppose,” said Raptor. “Suppose I did stand down? I won’t. I can’t. But what would I get if I did?”
“It’s not so much what you get if you do,” said Taft. “It’s what you get if you don’t.”
Raptor shook his head. Fucking boondockers. He was hungry. He picked up his knife and fork, cut a piece of venison, looked at it, and dropped his knife and fork onto his plate with a clank.
“I ordered rare,” he said. He turned in his chair and snapped his fingers at the waiter, who was coming with his fresh Martini.
“I ordered rare,” said Raptor again.
“Yes, sir,” said the waiter. He put Raptor’s drink on the table before him.
“So, you call this rare?” Raptor asked him.
The waiter looked at Raptor’s plate. “Sir?” he asked.
Raptor pushed his plate away. “Take it back,” he said. “It’s fucking leather. Take it back to the kitchen. Send out the cook.”
“Yes, sir, right away.” The waiter picked up Raptor’s plate and went toward the kitchen.
“And bring me another whitey,” Raptor called after him.
“Fucking woodchucks,” said Raptor. Eli and Taft were silent. “I ordered rare,” said Raptor.
“Why don’t you ease off?” Eli asked him. “You’ll bust something. Eat your dinner. It looked alright to me.”
“You don’t understand, Eli,” said Taft. “Mr. Raptor didn’t get what he wanted. Did you, Mr. Raptor?”
“I did fucking not,” said Raptor. “I wanted rare. That wasn’t rare. I won’t eat it.”
“Mr. Raptor is dissatisfied, Eli,” said Taft. “Maybe you should go and explain that to them in the kitchen. Tell the cook? Tell the cook Mr. Raptor wishes to see him.”
Eli nodded. He pushed his chair back from their table, rose, and started toward the kitchen.
When Eli had gone, Raptor looked around the dining room. Then he looked at Taft. He blinked, looked harder. He was having a little trouble focusing his eyes. Taft had somehow grown dim. The room itself, which ha
d been well-lighted, was now, Raptor saw, murky, and hung with shadows. It was also, suddenly, empty save for their table. The two women, the three men, the family, had left. They were alone.
“Hey,” said Raptor. “Where is everybody?”
“They’ve gone home, Jack,” said Taft. “It’s not much of a late-night place, you see.”
“Place is dead. Fucking woodchucks.”
He’s repetitious, whispered Dangerfield. He had joined them. He stood behind Taft’s chair. He was got up in black tie, complete to the waistcoat, like the maître-d’ in a restaurant far, far from where they were tonight. He’s repetitious. Like the other one. They’re all repetitious.
“You’re repetitious, Jack,” said Taft.
“Huh?” asked Raptor.
“Didn’t care for your meat?” Raptor heard himself being asked. He looked up. Standing to his right, towering over him, was an enormous black man wearing a chef’s white toque and tunic. He must have been near seven feet tall, and his skin, the color of strong coffee, glistened with sweat from the heat of the kitchen. He bent toward Raptor. He put the Martini Raptor had ordered before him.
“I said, didn’t care for your meat?”
“Mr. Raptor,” said Taft. “Say hello to BZ. BZ’s the chef de cuisine here. BZ, Mr. Raptor. From New York. Oh, and this is Ash.”
Raptor looked to his other side to find, standing near Taft’s chair, another African, on the same scale as the cook.
“Ash is the sous-chef,” said Taft.
Raptor swallowed. He attempted a smirk. “What is this,” he managed to ask, “the NBA?”
“What’s wrong with it?” asked BZ, the cook.
“With the NBA? Nothing,” said Raptor.
“With your dinner.”
“Um, I think I ordered the venison rare.”
“No you didn’t, either.”
“Uh, I believe I did,” said Raptor.
The cook laid a hand the size of a fielder’s glove on the back of Raptor’s chair and tilted the chair backward on its rear legs, then farther, as though he were a barber or a dentist getting ready to go to work on Raptor. “I don’t care what you believe,” said the cook.
The sous-chef, Ash, chuckled. “Don’t nobody care,” he said.
Raptor looked around the table. Now the room seemed almost dark, save for a kind of yellow light, candle light or lamplight, that played on their table seemingly from below. Taft and the two giants from the kitchen were lit obscurely, fitfully, as though by a campfire. Raptor gaped at them. How many drinks had he had?
The Devil in the Valley Page 8
