The Terror of Living

by Urban Waite

  "Oh, this," Drake said. "This is just part of the costume."

  "My husband wears one occasionally, though we don't see them on this side of the mountains often."

  Drake looked to the man at the table. He didn't seem much like the type to wear a cowboy hat, or any kind of hat, his black hair slicked back and a face that could have been Mexican but could have been anything really.

  "I'm Nora," the woman said.

  "Bobby."

  "What were you wondering about, Bobby?"

  "They told me over at the track that you've been keeping horses for almost twenty years now."

  "That's right."

  "You've probably come in contact with a lot of different people."

  "All types."

  "I'd really like to know how someone learns to ride." The image of the man riding bareback into the thick woods came to him, the pulse of the animal. "I mean really ride, like they do in the movies."

  Nora laughed and looked away, and when she looked back, her eyes were wet at the edges. "How old are you?" she said.

  "Thirty."

  "Have you ever been on a horse before?"

  "My family kept a few horses when I was young, but not anymore. Once recently."

  "Let me show you something." She took him out back and walked him over to the run. "This is what's called a triple bar and this is a hog's back. We don't do it here, but I'll give you a number and you can call and get lessons. You live around here, don't you?"

  "Up north, but I'll be down here on business for a few days. Do you think they could squeeze me in?"

  "You don't seem like you have a problem squeezing in." Nora laughed. "Wait here, I'll get you the number."

  Drake watched her go. The Mexican was standing at the back door, looking out on them, and when she came up the steps he went in after her. Drake walked over and offered his knuckles to the stabled horses; he counted six horses for the ten stalls. Two of the six were out in a field farther on.

  When Nora came back, he said, "Looks like you've got room for me when I get serious."

  Nora gave a weak smile. "Slow month."

  "Sorry to hear it," Drake said, his face screwed up with embarrassment. He should have known better.

  "Don't worry about it, Bobby. I know you were just asking."

  Drake looked out on the two horses in the paddock, and when he looked back he said, "You seem like a really nice person. I'm sure things will turn around for you. They usually do. At any rate I appreciate the help."

  "Happy to give it," Nora said. "It's funny, you know. I thought you were going to be someone else entirely."

  "I hope I didn't disappoint."

  "Not at all. Did you have something like this when you were growing up?"

  "No, nothing like this, just a few feet of open ground and a converted garage for a stable. Nothing fancy."

  "We were always planning on having kids, but it never happened. Always thought it would be a wonderful thing for them."

  "Wish I would have known about this place as a kid. I would have been down here every weekend."

  "Nice of you to say. You have any?"

  "Not that I know of."

  "That's pretty much what my husband says. He's always giving me little heart attacks."

  "Husbands do that."

  "Yes, they do."

  Drake didn't say anything, and then after a second had passed, he said, "Thank you, Nora. I'm going to call this number and see what I can work out."

  "They'll do something for you, I'm sure."

  Drake walked around the side of the house to his car. He passed the trailer and, out of habit, looked in at the garage. A late-model Honda sat in the bay, but not the truck he'd been expecting.

  THE CALL CONCERNING THE HEROIN CAME AN HOUR later than the lawyer expected. The driver stopped the car and ran around to open the back. The lawyer held the phone to his ear as he got out of the car. He was big in the belly and wore a shirt and tie, opened a bit at the collar, and fine slacks that fell straight from below the bulge of his stomach. The lawyer had been expecting this call from his Vietnamese clients, but not this late, and as he looked out on his property, at the rhododendron plants and the white gravel drive, he told the man on the other end of the phone not to worry. "There has been a little holdup, but it will be here tomorrow."

  The driver pulled away and left the lawyer in front of the expansive house, which looked on the far side of the property toward the ocean and was held over the hillside by metal stilts. In truth he didn't know why Grady hadn't delivered the girl. He had never run into a problem like this one before, Grady always being very thorough, always punctual, always clean. Perhaps the lawyer had been unclear with his instructions. Perhaps Grady had thought he'd just deliver when he had both girls. The lawyer didn't know for sure. He could hear the angry tone of the man on the other end of the line.

  "I've already sent someone to pick up the first girl from the airport," the lawyer said, trying to think it over, trying to come up with some sort of answer. "The other spooked and walked off the plane in Vancouver. My contact in customs was able to find her, and both packages will be delivered tomorrow. Noon, beside the downtown ferry docks." The lawyer closed the phone without waiting for a response.

  He walked to the edge of the rock retaining wall and lit a cigarette. The tops of pine and fir trees climbed out of the landscape. An odor of turned earth came from lower down, fresh manure and wood chips, the faint smell of lemon coming off the pines. He held the burning ember of his cigarette out in front of him, its smoke taken on the wind. He felt the tobacco in his lungs, hot as his own blood. In the far distance he could see the other side of the sound, the blurry shape of land across the water, green and smoldering with mist, like fresh-hewn branches laid across a fire. He still held the phone in his hand, and when he'd drawn deeply from the cigarette, letting the smoke rush back out into the world through his nostrils, he dialed Grady and waited for a response.

  EDDIE'S BAYLINER WAS TIED AT THE END OF THE DOCK, just fifty feet from the ramp. Hunt had stopped hiding drugs in the thing years before. Taking the example from the old-time smugglers who used to bring it across in the rims of their tires, in the past he'd stuffed each inflatable bumper with wide cylinders of rolled and Cryovaced cocaine and heroin and hung them from the side for all to see. It was the oblong bumpers he stood working with, unscrewing the false bottoms and checking the space into which he would slip the drugs later. The bumpers, really just opaque containers for air, sealed with a lid and a rubber washer, were airtight. It was the perfect place for drugs, easily cut loose from the boat, easy to access, and often overlooked, the same way that smugglers in the Florida Keys sealed their drugs to the undersides of their boats in fiberglass compartments called blisters. Hunt needed something he could ditch with ease and speed.

  The Bayliner held two Mercury engines, six hundred horses between the two of them, and enough fuel to get him suitably lost. He'd preferred the privacy of the mountains, but it would do; it was how he'd come into it all those years ago.

  A man and his daughter sat on the far dock, picking fried chicken into a crab trap. The daughter, not much older than five or six, stood nearly at the height of her father's waist. At the base of the ramp was another family, the father bringing the trailer down and two teenage boys bringing the boat up until the hull squealed across the carpet pad. Hunt sat and watched them for a time. He cleaned down the cockpit and checked the boat permit. A man passed the family on the ramp, joking with the father, then, after spotting Hunt, walked out along the dock.

  From the man's pocket, Hunt heard the pulse of a phone ringing. The man seemed to consider this, pausing to debate whether to pick it up, then, deciding against it, walked forward down the dock as if he and Hunt had some sort of appointment to keep. The man carried with him a small bag that, as he walked, swung from his hand and connected in a rhythm with his thigh. It reminded Hunt of a large cue case, square, with a zipper along its length and a handle in the middle.
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br />   "Let me ask you a question," the man said. He was even with Hunt, looking down from the dock. "How far can one of these take you? It's a real nice boat. I'd like to have one of my own someday."

  Hunt looked up at him from the bow of the boat, where he stood coiling a length of rope. The man was very pale, with a blond, almost white mustache, and though his eyes were blue, the skin around them seemed thin and dark, as if the blood were coming through very close to the surface. There was something familiar about the man, a passing memory, broken like a bubble as the thing formed in Hunt's mind.

  "Hey," the man said, "weren't you in Monroe a few years back?"

  Hunt gave him a deadpan face. "I was there."

  "You remember me?"

  "Can't say I do." He didn't want to talk about this, didn't care. He had a few friends from his time in Monroe, a few friends up north he used for stashing drugs, for a place to stay on long trips. He didn't want to make any new friends. Didn't need any.

  The man held out his hand. "Grady Fisher. We did a year together. After that, I didn't see you anymore. Must have got out. Doesn't look like you're doing too bad for yourself."

  Hunt looked up at him. He didn't offer his name or his hand. "You always prelude a question like that?"

  "Like what?"

  "By asking the question, 'Can I ask you a question?'"

  "I didn't want to be impolite." He closed his hand and let it drop to his side.

  Hunt stared back at him. "This boat will get me just about anywhere when the tanks are full."

  "Sorry if I intruded."

  Hunt didn't say anything. He finished coiling the rope and stuffed it into a low compartment.

  "I'm a cook," Grady said. He patted the case with his free hand, smiling as if Hunt had asked him what the bag was for. "I was wondering if you might be going fishing?"

  He had a funny way of talking, slow at times, almost stuttering, more curious and melodic than anything. Hunt thought about this. The man wouldn't leave; he was just sitting there watching Hunt. "What's in the case?" Hunt asked.

  "Oh, this," he said, as if he'd just remembered he'd been holding it. "These are my knives." Hunt gave him another look. He was ready to leave, but the idea of a man carrying knives around in broad daylight interested him. It seemed completely rational when he thought of it. He probably passed a chef every day of his life, with a collection of knives sitting shotgun right beside him. "Let me show you." Grady put the case down on the dock and unzipped the top. "I've been collecting them for years."

  The only two things Hunt could identify were a hacksaw and a large chef's knife - he guessed the blade to be about twelve inches long. "Those look very nice," Hunt said. The man smiled and gave a little giggle. He unfolded the sides until they were laid out as two halves on the dock, the knives fully exposed.

  "Go on," Grady said. "Pick one up. The weight on them is counterbalanced so it doesn't feel like anything when they make their first cut. You have to be careful sometimes. It's like cutting fish with a laser beam."

  Hunt looked up at Grady, and the whole while, Grady was just looking back at him with the same goofy half smile. The girl behind them on the far dock made a shout of discovery, but the two men didn't look away. "What's this one for?" Hunt asked, bringing a small knife out of the bag.

  Grady looked down at the knife. "Careful," he said. "Witnesses."

  Hunt gave him a look.

  "Just a little Monroe humor, that's all," Grady said. "That's a boning knife. I use it mostly for small jobs." He pointed to his own shoulder and showed Hunt where the ligaments and tendons ran.

  "They say Jacques Pepin can debone a chicken in five seconds. Do you know who he is?"

  "What does your shoulder have in common with a chicken?"

  "More than you'd expect."

  Hunt looked down at the knife in his hand.

  Grady held out his hand and Hunt passed the knife back to him. "Just finished gutting a little Asian piglet," Grady said with that same disfigured giggle. "Beautiful little thing. Keep your knives sharp and they'll cut through just about anything." He smiled, and the thin, almost colorless line of hair over his lip flattened.

  Hunt held up the hacksaw. "That thing is sort of a brute," Grady said. "Just what you think it is. I use it mostly on the bigger jobs, whole pigs, leg of lamb. Separating the large into the small." He made a little motion with his hands, imagining the cuts. "I could do it blindfolded if I had to."

  "That right?"

  "That's right."

  "I wish I could talk more, but-"

  "You have to go," Grady finished.

  "Yes."

  "It was a real pleasure," Grady said, holding out his hand for Hunt to take.

  The hand Hunt took was thicker than he'd expected, filled with muscle and a little plump. "Perhaps one day you'll get that boat."

  "Yes, perhaps." Grady stood watching Hunt as he untied the boat and pushed it a few feet into the water. The engines started and Hunt felt the back dig in. The Bayliner moved out and around, aiming for the edge of the rock jetty. When Hunt looked back, Grady was still standing there, his case of knives in his hand, just staring.

  GRADY DROVE AN OLD NISSAN WITH A SQUARE BODY and four doors, registered under an alias. He watched Hunt pull out and make the turn into open water. Then he walked back to his car and opened his bag. Under the seat he had an AR-15 with retractable stock and carbine switched for use as a long-range rifle, measuring about the same length as the hacksaw, a foot and a half with the stock closed. He placed it in the bag.

  Watching Hunt handle the knives had given him a thrill the way some animals played with their food before eating it. "Let him do the exchange, then do it," the lawyer had said on the phone. It was a shame he'd need to use something like a rifle to do something so simple.

  The padlock on the marina gate took him fifteen seconds to pick. He pushed the thing closed behind him and snapped the lock back on the gate again. He was carrying the bag, and when he found a midnight blue boat with twin Volvo engines, he threw the bag over and then stepped aboard.

  TWELVE HOURS EARLIER, EDDIE HAD PUT IT TO HUNT like this: "You run and they'll use Nora to get to you. You take Nora and they'll use me." Eddie laughed as though something was funny. There wasn't one funny thing about it, but he couldn't stop the nervous laughter. "The kid is dead. He's fucking gone. It took them about five hours after he arrived to arrange it. The only reason you're not dead is because you had the sense to get out of there. They're not too happy about the lost product, but you're not a liability to them. They figure we owe them. The way it was put to me was that they've invested in us and they want a favorable return."

  Hunt could hear the news playing in the other room. The weatherman warned of showers turning to snow later in the week. Through the doorway he could see the back of the couch and Nora sitting on it. "Jesus, Eddie. When did we start working with people like this?"

  "I'm telling you to protect yourself."

  "He was just some kid. Twenty-two years old."

  "Look, Hunt, these people like to be in control. If it had been you in there, they would have done the same thing. You're lucky. But we still owe these people some work."

  "Why don't we run now? What's stopping us?"

  "How many times have you mortgaged this house? You have anything in the bank? You started out in this business trying to put a straight life together, but now it's more like you use the money to keep the straight life afloat. If you want to run, you're going to need to stay hidden, and that takes money. Because you're not coming back."

  "You would help us, wouldn't you, Eddie?"

  "I would help you if I could. I'm just as broke as you. That car out there and my boat are about all I have to show for myself. I'm just like you."

  "But we've made money, haven't we?"

  "We've made it, but everything is in cash, the boat, the car. I've been playing it pretty close to the heart. This was supposed to be our big break, our time to really make money."

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nbsp; "This is amazing," Hunt said. "It's just amazing. I get out of

  Monroe and I can't find a job, I can't even go to school. I'm just scraping by, hoping my bets at the track hold up. So I take this thing with you to make a little money and all the time-twenty years-" Hunt stopped here, his voice caught somewhere deep in his throat like a piece of meat swallowed too fast. Year after year after year, he kept adding, putting the time together in his mind, adding it all up, his life and what it amounted to. "Two decades," he said. "I'm building this life for that long and this is what it comes down to."

  "We owe these people money, Hunt. I don't know what else to tell you. There's nothing else we can do about it. We do this job and we're on our way. It's simple. We both knew how it could be when we started on this."

  "How many more times will there be?"

  "As many as it takes."

  "Doesn't it make you uneasy, what they did to the kid? Doesn't that make you want to run?"

  "What do you want me to say?"

  Hunt placed his hands on the table. He looked over at him. "They've got us good, don't they? "

  "Yes, they do," Eddie said. "And the sickest thing is, it makes them happy."

  HUNT PUSHED THE THROTTLE FORWARD ON THE BOAT until the speedometer read fifteen knots. Twenty years he'd been making this run. And he could do it now almost without a second thought. It was strange to him that over all those years he had thought of himself as independent. He had Eddie. He always had Eddie, but they were more partners than anything else. At the age of nineteen he'd been a prisoner. Just a year out of childhood, just a year beyond the watch of parents and the guidance of teachers and coaches, people who had at one point or another meant something to him. He laughed a bit at the thought, remembering how they'd all considered themselves prisoners in school. But it wasn't a thing like prison or being held captive. He had disappeared in Monroe. Stood in one place and just disappeared, like a magician doing a magic trick. One moment there, the next gone.