Trust

by George V. Higgins

  “So, mister,” Earl said, “I hate to hurt your feelings, but I got to tell the truth. We’ve had some junkers on this lot and in time we got them sold. But your car if it was a horse, the place to take it, way it is, would be the dog food factory. It’s shot. It’s not worth anything, except, maybe, to you.”

  “Gee,” the man said wistfully, “I really didn’t expect much, no more’n a few hundred dollars. But, nothing? Nothing at all? I got to have a car, my job, I never know, I’m gonna need it, but it’s got to be around.”

  Earl spread his hands. “What can I tell you?” he said. “Whaddaya want me to do? You want me to hike up the price on something that’ll do what you want, need a car for? We got what you’re looking for, I think. At least one and possibly three. We got a nice ’sixty-three Falcon, out in the yard in the back. Why’s it out back, instead of out front, if it’s such a bargain for someone? Because most of the people, come in off the street, they come in when they see the hot stuff. Convertibles, hardtops, real jazzy wheels: that’s what brings them in here. When we get a Cadillac, right? Or a Lincoln, big Chrysler or something—if it can be polished, it goes out in front, and better cars, not flashy but better, they go in the back.

  “Now,” Earl said, “this little Falcon, it’s white and it’s got Fordomatic. Which means it’s a two-speed, hitched to a six-banger, and quick off the line it is not. It’ll go sixty, go sixty-five, but you’ll have to be patient getting there. If some cop arrests you for seventy-five, go to court and you’ll get acquitted. The most it’ll ever do, running flat out, is seventy—that takes a week. And the downside of a steep hill with a good stiff wind behind you. Thrilling this car is not.”

  The man smiled weakly. “No good for picking up girls,” he said.

  “No good at all for that,” Earl said. “You might get an old nun, you trolled long enough, but otherwise, no hope at all.”

  “What’s the mileage?” the man said.

  “Twenty-seven honest thousand,” Earl said. “You doubt that, I suggest you check the carpeting, the seats, and the inside of the trunk. All the usual stuff, and all original, that most people never learn is how you tell if the clock’s honest. It gets, at least they tell me, it gets nineteen miles the gallon.”

  “And the old lady who owned it drove it just to church on Sundays,” the man said.

  “We don’t know who owned it,” Earl said. “We got it at an auction when a big dealer out in Holyoke got himself overextended and had to Chapter-Eleven his inventory. All I can tell you’s that he sold it new to whoever it was, and whoever it was’d just traded it when the guy’s show went belly-up. His nameplate’s still on the trunk. You got a toothpick or something, you can run it along the letters and peel off the dried paste wax that owner missed with his rag. This car had good care. But good care don’t go out front.”

  “How much is it,” the man said.

  “That’s what I was getting to,” Earl said. “I got to look it up in our book—which I’m not gonna show you—because I really don’t know what we own it for, or what we’re asking for it. So my question is, when I look at those numbers, what do you want me to do? I tell you your car is worth nothing to us—your unit is ready for Goldie’s. You drive it down there, it’s right down in Braintree, if it’ll make it that far, and Goldie might give you two tens and a fin, maybe five tens if he’s in a good mood and he knows a guy desperate for ’fifty-five Ford chrome parts—your chrome does look pretty good. If I stick to that statement, that we don’t want your car, is that gonna hurt all your feelings? Hurt them enough so you go somewhere else, get someone to tell you nice lies?

  “Because I can do that, you know,” Earl said, smiling. “I tell lies with the best of them. And if that makes you happy, happier at least, just say so and I will get going. I’ll get down the book and I’ll look at the numbers, and then I’ll add three hundred bucks. And then I’ll say to you, a completely straight face: ‘Well, sir, I’ll go this far for you. Two hundred bucks is the best I can do for that fine antique car you drove in.’ And you can tell me that that’s not enough, you got to have four at the least. And I’ll cough and I’ll shake my head, shake my head lots, and do some more math on my pad. And then I’ll say: ‘Look, this is it: two fifty on yours for the Falcon.’ And you’ll say. ‘Three fifty.’ I’ll say: ‘Split the difference.’ You’ll grin and then we’ll shake hands.’ And you will end up paying eight hundred dollars, if that’s what we do have to get, and Monday or Tuesday the boss’ll tell me: ‘Your lunch hour today, drive that clapped-out old Ford down to Goldie’s, and keep what he gives you, yourself. I’ll pick you up, my way in.’

  “So what’s it going to be,” Earl said. “Eight ball, nine ball, straight pool?”

  The man forced his smile again. “Let’s go and look at the book,” he said. “And if that’s in the ballpark, the car.”

  The man said he was impressed with the Falcon. He sat in it and looked under the hood, repeating the inspection steps he had seen Earl perform on the Ford. “I really don’t know why I’m doing all this,” he said, standing up after rapping the rocker panels lightly with his fist. “I just saw you do it, so I know there must be a reason. Makes me feel like I know what I’m doing.”

  “Well,” Earl said, “if somebody asks you sometime, you ever do it again, the reason is that’s how you tell if you got rust starting under the paint, coming from inside out. If it’s solid, there isn’t, or there probably ain’t—if it isn’t, there certainly is, and it’s not gonna be long before you can see it, which is when you say ‘bye-bye’ your dough.”

  The man dusted his hands off and looked critically at the Falcon. “It’s pretty much the way you described it,” he said. “I’d like a test drive, though.”

  “Well,” Earl said, frowning, “you oughta get one, of course. But my problem is, I’m here alone, and I can’t leave the office, but our rules say I got to ride with you. That way if the car doesn’t come back, neither do I, but the cops take kidnapping more serious’n they do plain auto theft. That’s if the boss isn’t mad at me that day, so he decides not to report it.”

  The man laughed. “Well,” he said, “is anyone else coming in?”

  Earl looked at his watch. “He was due back from lunch twenty minutes ago,” he said. “But that doesn’t mean what you think. Roy don’t do it often, but every now and then he gets to having a glass of beer with his sandwich. And then he has another one, and sometimes he comes back pretty late. Like maybe two or three days.”

  The man looked crestfallen. “I’m sorry,” Earl said. “If you think I’m pulling something on you, you’re wrong. I really want to sell you this car, and I’d like to close it today. Because I think you like it, and I’m off tomorrow, and I will bet you will come back. Which will mean Roy will be here, and he’ll close the deal, and he’ll get at least half commission. When I was the one that made the damned sale, and he’s getting paid for beer drinking.”

  “Well,” the man said, “suppose we do this: Get all the paperwork done now, and I’ll give you a deposit. Then I’ll come back tomorrow and road-test the thing, and if it’s okay, I’ll pay the rest.”

  Earl studied him. “How you planning, pay for this?” he said.

  The man shrugged. “I’m not going to borrow the money,” he said. “If that’s what you’re thinking about. I’ve seen too many people, much better off than I am, get themselves in trouble taking out loans. Even when they manage to pay them off on time, it’s always a struggle. And it’s usually because they weren’t able to control themselves, and decided to spend more’n they could afford—Cadillacs on Chevy wages—so that they got in too deep. I’ve got no self-control, either. Well, not much, at least. Just enough so I don’t even go to new-car places, and tempt myself. I shop for bargains, where bargains’re are sold, and I only carry as much money as I can safely spend. I carry that much in cold cash.”

  “But you’ve got the checking account, I assume,” Earl said.

  “Sure,” the man
said, “but there isn’t much in it, I’m sorry to say. Maybe two or three hundred bucks.”

  “Okay,” Earl said, “how about this? We agreed on eight hundred plus your car. Which looks like I’m giving you a hundred but is actually fifty big bucks. Now this little Falcon is cheap to repair—not that I think it needs work. If the front end is shot, or the thing’s out of line, the most it can cost you’s a hundred. You give me seven in cash, and your regular check for a hundred. I can’t deposit the check until Monday, so you can stop it before then, or let it go through, get the car fixed yourself. And that means we do the deal right this minute, and my thirsty friend gets no divvies.”

  The man smiled. “Excellent,” he said. “Where there’s a will, there’s a way.”

  Back at Earl’s desk in the office, the man produced his checkbook and the registration for the Crown Victoria. He wrote the check to Centre Street Motors for a hundred dollars, and Earl filled in the serial and engine numbers of the Falcon on the standard bill of sale, along with the description of make, model, and year. He signed it. He said, “Hey, all of this, we’ve been talking all this time and I wish to God all my customers were like you, but I never did get your name.”

  The man had taken out his wallet and was counting crisp new hundreds onto the desk, making seven of them into a fan. “Make it out in my wife’s name,” he said. “I’m in the process of putting all our bigger assets in her name. In case I should drop dead or something. Get more conscious of that possibility, I find, as you get closer to forty. Eleanor D. Forrest. With two rs.”

  Earl paused. “Yeah,” he said, “well, I hope the Ford’s in your name, though. Or else she signed that registration over.”

  “No, no,” the man said. “The Ford’s in my name, all right. Like I told you, I bought that little beauty when I was a single man.”

  “Good,” Earl said, writing in the woman’s name. “I could just see this falling through at the last minute because of some piddly thing like that.”

  “Nope,” the man said. He endorsed the back of his registration to Centre Street Motors, and signed it. He pushed the currency and the check and the registration across the desk to Earl, who handed him the bill of sale. “Looks fine to me,” they said in unison. They both laughed. They stood up.

  “Well,” the man said, folding the bill of sale and putting it in his inside jacket pocket, then extending his hand to Earl, “a pleasure to do business with you.” He laughed again. “And I never did get your name, either.”

  Earl laughed. He shook hands. “Earl Beale,” he said, turning the registration over with his left hand. “Mister Forrest.” He looked up, still smiling, but frowning. “Chatham?” he said. “You live in Chatham? All the way down on the Cape? I thought you lived somewhere round here.”

  Michael Forrest shook his head. “No,” he said, “well, fairly near here. I live, well, we live, north of Boston. Up in Andover. We register the car in Chatham because the insurance rates’re lower.”

  Earl rolled his eyes. “Well, I know,” he said, “but isn’t that taking a chance? I mean, where you register the car, where you insure the car, it’s supposed to be where you keep the thing, and where you do most of your driving. You get in an accident, and they find out, you’re actually up Andover there, and there’s where the car is garaged, well, your policy won’t be no good.”

  “Oh,” Forrest said, “that’s no problem. We have a house in Chatham. A summer house in Chatham. And that is where the car’s garaged. And that is where we use it. In the summer Eleanor moves down there with the kids, and I lead the bachelor life. On weekends I just take the bus from in town to the Cape. So I have our car up here, if I happen to need it—most days I take the train—and she has, or had, the Ford down there, for errands and the beach.”

  “Well, jeez,” Earl said, “we didn’t advertise that Falcon. Why come all the way down here to buy a car? Andover’s quite a ways. Or if the Cape is where you use it, why not just buy one there?”

  “Simple,” Forrest said. “In Andover everyone knows exactly what I do. If someone hasn’t told them, all they do is look it up. In the town directory. And to a lesser degree they also know, down there on the Cape, though it matters less down there. On the Cape all the dealers inflate prices when they sell to summer residents, because that in their estimation is why God created them. On groceries and stuff like that, we have to sit and take it. But not on cars, uh uh, not when we’re buying cars.”

  “Then why not Andover?” Earl said. “That’s a pretty nice town, isn’t it? Should take some good trades in up there.”

  “Because of what I do,” Forrest said. “On the Cape they screw me on general principles. In Andover it’s specific, because of my assignment. I’m a government lawyer. People don’t like us a lot.”

  “That’s a new one on me,” Earl said. “The guy that … what do you do? Put people in jail?”

  “Oh, no,” Forrest said, picking the Falcon keys off Earl’s desk, “I don’t do that. Okay to drive this around and swap the plates out front?”

  “Sure, sure,” Earl said. “Well, what do you do?”

  “I’m just a counsel, in-house counsel,” Forrest said. “An office lawyer, that’s all. Just a standard drone.”

  “Well, who do you do this for?” Earl said.

  Forrest smiled at him. He took out his wallet again and gave Earl a business card. It read: “U.S. Department of the Treasury. Internal Revenue Service.” The seal of the United States was embossed in gold below the agency name. Below it was the man’s name, and below that, in the lower-left-hand corner: “Regional Counsel. Northeast Region.” A Boston address and a phone number were listed on the lower right.

  “Oh,” Earl said.

  “I’m surprised you didn’t guess,” Forrest said, smiling.

  Earl snickered. “No, you’re not,” he said. “You know you’re cute enough to do it, fool dumb clucks like me.”

  “Oh, yeah?” Forrest said. “Look, the deal’s done now. You want to level with me? How much’s my car actually worth, that you think you’ll get for it?”

  Earl shrugged. “I dunno,” he said. “Some kid comes in, looking for a new Corvette with three hundred in his pocket, I might get a couple hundred. Leave him enough, insurance. Chances of that happening aren’t good, I’ll tell you that. But I could turn a quick dollar. If I should get lucky.”

  “And how much,” Forrest said, “was your honest-to-God rock-bottom on the Falcon? What you would’ve sold it for, if you had to move that car?”

  “Just what you paid for it,” Earl said, looking him straight in the eye. “And you know why? Because I did have to move that car. We got inventory problems here, and we’re hurting for cash.”

  “Do I believe that?” Forrest said.

  “In your line of work,” Earl said, “I’d tend to doubt it, myself. Your habits’re probably pretty strong now. But I did tell you the truth.”

  Forrest nodded and headed toward the back door. When he had left the office, Earl picked up the card from the desk, and put it in his pocket.

  When Fritchie returned from lunch at quarter of three, he resisted Earl’s suggestion that he sleep it off in the storeroom. He mumbled something about “new fuckin’ junker out in front. Waldo’ll have your ass for that one.” He took off his jacket and sat down at his desk and gazed into space, moistening his lips from time to time. Then he rested his forearms on the desk and gazed. Finally he folded his arms on the desk and rested his head on them. Earl let him snore softly for ten minutes. Then he got up and gently pulled Fritchie’s chair away from his desk, easing Fritchie’s arms and head up and back so that his head lolled gaping-mouthed to the right and his hands lay on his crotch. Earl wheeled him slowly and quietly through the office and into the back room where the tools and ramps were kept, pushed him into the darkness, and shut the door. He returned to his own desk.

  The phone rang just as Charlene Gaffney and her mother appeared at the front door. He picked up the handset and said: “Ce
ntre Street Motors. Hold a minute, please?” He put the line on Hold. He went to the door and ushered the two women in. “On the phone,” he said, pointing to his desk. “Come in, sit down. Just be a minute.” He went back to the phone. “Centre Street,” he said, “thank you for waiting.” Then he said: “Hey, sorry, boss. Had some customers come in, same time as your call. You told me the rules, old buddy. Customers got to come first. No, it’s been pretty quiet. Roy took the late lunch. Isn’t back yet. So I’m here all by myself. Yeah, uh huh. Yup, one. The Falcon. Guy wanted it, his beach place. No, didn’t give me any trouble. Nice clean sale, for just what we wanted. I don’t think you need to, really. Roy should be back in an hour. This is his late night. Okay, so I’ll see you on Monday. Yes, I do, boss, don’t kid me—I have got tomorrow off.” He hung up the handset.

  “Mrs. Arnold, Charlene,” he said, “why don’t you two all come with me and sit down. Tell me what I can do, help you out.” He got up and ushered them into Waldo’s private office. They took chairs facing him at the desk.

  Charlene wet her lips and looked at her mother. Mrs. Arnold in her black coat sat without expression, her black bag clenched in her hands. Charlene looked pleadingly at Earl. “Mister Beale,” she said, “I hope maybe you can help us. Me. We, after we went home, I started calling people? The restaurants, like you said? And they do have some jobs. But I got no experience, so I get starting pay. And, it isn’t very much. After what Ma tells me.”

  Mrs. Arnold shook her head once. “I tried to tell her that,” she said. “God knows how many times. I guess this is better, though. When someone that she don’t know, that’s got no reason to protect her, tells her the exact same thing, well then, at least, she listens.”

  “How much is it?” Earl said. “What does it come to?”

  Charlene licked her lips again. Mrs. Arnold answered. “By the time they get through,” she said, “taking things out, and the hours that they’ll let her work, she’ll be lucky she brings home fifty a week. And that’s working almost full-time that place. It’s criminal what they can do.”