The Lincoln Highway

by Amor Towles

  The house was bigger than just about any house that Billy had ever seen. At its near end was the screen door that Emmett must have gone through. Quietly, Billy climbed the steps of the stoop, peeked through the screen, and let himself inside, being sure not to let the door slam behind him.

  The first room he entered was a storage area with all sorts of things that you would use outside, like boots and raincoats, skates and rifles. On the wall were the ten rules for Closing the House. Billy could tell the list was written in the order in which you were supposed to do things, but he wondered about the last item, the one that said Go home. After a moment, Billy decided it must have been put there in jest.

  Poking his head out of the storage room, Billy could see his brother at the end of the hallway, staring at the ceiling of a large room. Emmett would do that sometimes—stop and stare at a room in order to understand how it had been built. After a moment, Emmett climbed a set of stairs. When Billy could hear his brother’s footsteps overhead, he snuck down the hallway and into the large room.

  As soon as he saw the fireplace big enough for everyone to gather around, Billy knew exactly where he was. Through the windows he could see the porch with the overhanging roof, under which you could sit on rainy afternoons and on top of which you could lie on warm summer nights. Upstairs there would be enough rooms for friends and family to visit for the holidays. And there in the corner was the special spot for the Christmas tree.

  Behind the staircase was a room with a long table and chairs. That must be the dining room, thought Billy, where Woolly gave the Gettysburg Address.

  Crossing the large room and entering the opposite hallway, Billy poked his head into the first room that he passed. It was the study, right where Woolly had drawn it. While the large room had been neat and tidy, the study was not. It was a mess, with books and papers scattered about and a bust of Abraham Lincoln lying on the floor under a painting of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. On a chair near the bust were a hammer and some screwdrivers, and there were scratches all across the front of the safe.

  Woolly and Duchess must have been trying to get into the safe with the hammer and screwdrivers, thought Billy, but it wasn’t going to work. A safe was made of steel and designed to be impenetrable. If you could open a safe with a hammer and screwdrivers, then it wouldn’t be a safe.

  The door of the safe had four dials, each of which showed the numbers zero through nine. That meant there were ten thousand different possible combinations. Duchess and Woolly would have been better off trying all ten thousand by starting with 0000 and working their way up to 9999, thought Billy. That would have taken less time than trying to break in with the hammer and screwdrivers. Even better, though, would be to guess the combination that Woolly’s great-grandfather had chosen.

  It took Billy six tries.

  Once the door of the safe was open, it reminded Billy of the box at the bottom of his father’s bureau, in that there were important papers inside—just a lot more of them. But under the shelf with all of the important papers, Billy counted fifteen stacks of fifty-dollar bills. Billy remembered that Woolly’s great-grandfather had put a hundred and fifty thousand dollars in his safe. That meant that each stack was made up of ten thousand dollars. Stacks of ten thousand dollars, thought Billy, in a safe with ten thousand possible combinations. Closing the door of the safe, Billy turned away, but then turned back again in order to spin the dials.

  Leaving the study, Billy continued down the hallway and went into the kitchen. It was neat and tidy except for an empty soda pop bottle and a can of beans that had a spoon sticking straight up out of it like the stick on a candy apple. The only other sign that someone had been in the kitchen was the envelope tucked between the salt and pepper shakers on the table. The envelope, which said To Be Opened in the Event of My Absence, had been left there by Woolly. Billy could tell it had been left by Woolly because the handwriting on the envelope matched the handwriting on Woolly’s drawing of the house.

  As Billy was putting the envelope back between the salt and pepper shakers, he heard the sound of metal hitting metal. Tiptoeing down the hallway and peeking through the door of the study, he saw Duchess swinging an ax at the safe.

  He was about to explain to Duchess about the ten thousand combinations when he heard his brother’s footsteps thumping down the stairs. Running back down the hallway, Billy slipped back into the kitchen and out of sight.

  Once Emmett was inside the study, Billy couldn’t hear what his brother was saying, but he could tell that he was angry from the tone of his voice. After a moment, Billy heard what sounded like a scuffle, then Emmett emerged from the study holding Duchess by the elbow. As Emmett marched him down the hallway, Duchess was speaking quickly about something that Woolly had chosen for himself for his own reasons. Then Emmett marched Duchess into the storage room.

  Following quickly but quietly down the hallway, Billy peeked around the doorframe of the storage room in time to hear Duchess tell Emmett why they shouldn’t go to the cops. Then Emmett pushed Duchess out the door.

  * * *

  • • •

  In chapter one of the Compendium of Heroes, Adventurers, and Other Intrepid Travelers—after the part when Professor Abernathe explains how many of the greatest adventure stories start in medias res—he goes on to explain the tragic flaws of classical heroes. All classical heroes, he says, however strong or wise or courageous they may be, have some flaw in their character which leads to their undoing. For Achilles the fatal flaw had been anger. When he was angry, Achilles could not contain himself. Even though it had been foretold that he might die during the Trojan War, once his friend Patroclus was killed, Achilles returned to the battlefield blinded by a black and murderous rage. And that’s when he was struck by the poisonous arrow.

  Billy understood that his brother had the same flaw as Achilles. Emmett was not a reckless person. He rarely raised his voice or showed impatience. But when something happened to make him angry, the force of his fury could come to such a boil that it resulted in an injudicious act with irreversible consequences. According to Billy’s father, that’s what Judge Schomer had said Emmett was guilty of when he had hit Jimmy Snyder: an injudicious act with irreversible consequences.

  Through the screen door, Billy could see that Emmett was coming to a boil right now. His face was growing red, and having taken Duchess by the shirt, he was shouting. He was shouting that there was no trust fund, no inheritance, no money in the safe. Then he shoved Duchess to the ground.

  This must be it, thought Billy. This is the time and place at which I needed to be in order to play my essential role in the course of events. So Billy opened the screen door and told his brother that there was money in the safe.

  But when Emmett turned around, Duchess hit him on the head with a stone and Emmett fell to the ground. He fell to the ground just as Jimmy Snyder had.

  —Emmett! Billy shouted.

  And Emmett must have heard Billy because he began to get up onto his knees. Then Duchess was suddenly at the doorway pushing Billy inside, locking the door, and talking quickly.

  —Why did you hit Emmett? Billy said. Why did you hit him, Duchess? You shouldn’t have hit him.

  Duchess swore he wouldn’t do it again, but then he went back to talking quickly. He was talking about something called a snafu. And then about the safe. And Woolly. And the Yankees.

  When Emmett began banging on the storage-room door, Duchess pushed Billy into the hallway, and when Emmett’s banging stopped, Duchess started talking again, this time about the authorities and the house in California.

  And suddenly, Billy felt like he had been here before. The tightness of Duchess’s grip and the urgency with which he was speaking made Billy feel like he was back on the West Side Elevated in the dark in the hands of Pastor John.

  —We’re going to talk to Emmett, said Duchess. We’re going to talk with him all about
it, Billy. But for the moment, it’s just you and me.

  Then Billy understood.

  Emmett wasn’t there. Ulysses wasn’t there. Sally wasn’t there. Once again, he was alone and forsaken. Forsaken by everyone, including his Maker. And whatever happened next rested only in his hands.

  Opening his eyes, Billy kicked Duchess as hard as he could.

  In the instant, Billy could feel Duchess’s grip release. Then Billy was running down the hallway. He was running down the hallway to the hiding place under the stairs. He found the door with the tiny latch right where Woolly had said it was. The doorway was about half the size of a normal doorway and had a triangular top because it had been cut to fit under the staircase. But it was tall enough for Billy. Slipping inside, he pulled the door closed and held his breath.

  A moment later he could hear Duchess calling his name.

  Billy could tell that Duchess was only a few feet away, but he wouldn’t be able to find Billy. As Woolly had said, no one ever thought to look in the hiding place under the stairs because it was right there in front of them.

  Emmett

  After trying the muck-room door and finding it bolted, Emmett ran around the back of the house and tried the door that led into the dining room. When he found that door locked and then the kitchen door too, he was through trying doors. Removing his belt, he wrapped it around his right hand so that the buckle was on top of his knuckles. Then he smashed one of the panes of glass in the door. Using the metal surface of the buckle, he knocked away the remaining shards that jutted from the frame. Sticking his left hand through the cleared pane, he unlocked the door. The belt, he left wrapped around his fist, thinking it might come in handy right where it was.

  As Emmett stepped into the kitchen, he saw Duchess’s figure at the far end of the hallway turning a corner at a sprint and disappearing into the muck room—without Billy.

  Emmett didn’t run in pursuit. Understanding that Billy had broken free, he no longer felt a sense of peril. What he felt now was inevitability. No matter how fast Duchess ran, no matter where he ran to, it was inevitable that Emmett would have his hands upon him.

  But as Emmett left the kitchen, he heard glass breaking. It wasn’t the sound of a windowpane. It was a sheet of glass. A moment later, Duchess reappeared at the other end of the hallway holding one of the rifles.

  That Duchess had a rifle didn’t change anything for Emmett. Slowly, but unhesitantly, he began walking toward Duchess, and Duchess walked toward him. When they were both about ten feet short of the staircase, they stopped, leaving twenty feet between them. Duchess was holding the rifle in one hand with the barrel pointing at the ground, his finger on the trigger. From the way he held the rifle, Emmett could tell that Duchess had held one before, but that didn’t change anything either.

  —Put down the rifle, he said.

  —I can’t do that, Emmett. Not until you calm down and start talking sense.

  —Sense is what I’ve been talking, Duchess. For the first time in a week. Willing or unwilling, you’re going to the police station.

  Duchess looked genuinely frustrated.

  —Because of Woolly?

  —Not because of Woolly.

  —Then why?

  —Because the cops think you clobbered someone back in Morgen with a two-by-four, and then put Ackerly in the hospital.

  Now Duchess looked dumbfounded.

  —What are you talking about, Emmett? Why would I hit some guy in Morgen? I’d never been there in my life. And as to Ackerly, the list of people who’d like to put him in the hospital must be a thousand pages long.

  —It really doesn’t matter whether you did these things or not, Duchess. What matters is that the cops think you did them—and that I was somehow involved. As long as they’re looking for you, they’ll be looking for me. So you’ll have to turn yourself in and sort it out with them.

  Emmett took a step forward, but this time Duchess raised the rifle so that the barrel was pointing at his chest.

  In the back of his mind, Emmett knew that he should be taking the threat from Duchess seriously. Like Townhouse had said, when Duchess was intent on something, everyone on the periphery was at risk. Whether his intentions now were focused on avoiding Salina, or obtaining the money from the safe, or seeing to the unfinished business with his father, in the heat of the moment Duchess was perfectly capable of doing something as stupid as pulling a trigger. And if Emmett got himself shot, what would happen to Billy?

  But before Emmett could acknowledge the merits of this train of thought, before he had the chance to even hesitate, out of the corner of his eye he noticed a fedora on the cushion of a high-back chair, and the memory of Duchess sitting at the piano in Ma Belle’s lounge with his hat tilted back on his head in that cocksure manner gave Emmett a new surge of anger that restored his sense of inevitability. Emmett would have Duchess in his hands, he would take him to the police, and soon enough, Duchess would be on his way back to Salina, or Topeka, or wherever they wanted to send him.

  Emmett resumed walking, closing the gap between them.

  —Emmett, said Duchess with an expression of anticipatory regret, I don’t want to shoot you. But I will shoot you if you leave me no choice.

  When they were three paces apart, Emmett stopped. It wasn’t the threat of the rifle or the plea from Duchess that made him stop. It was the fact that ten feet beyond Duchess, Billy had appeared.

  He must have been hiding somewhere behind the staircase. Now he was moving quietly into the open so that he could see what was happening. Emmett wanted to signal Billy that he should return to wherever he’d been hiding, to signal him without making Duchess aware.

  But it was too late. Duchess had noted the change in Emmett’s expression and glanced back to see what was behind him. When Duchess realized it was Billy, he took two steps to the side and rotated forty-five degrees so that he could still see Emmett while training the rifle’s barrel on Billy.

  —Stay there, Emmett said to his brother.

  —That’s right, Billy. Don’t make a move. Then your brother won’t make a move and I won’t make a move, and we can talk this through together.

  —Don’t worry, said Billy to Emmett. He can’t shoot me.

  —Billy, you don’t know what Duchess will or won’t do.

  —No, said Billy. I don’t know what Duchess will or won’t do. But I do know that he can’t shoot me. Because he can’t read.

  —What? said Emmett and Duchess together, the one perplexed, the other offended.

  —Who says I can’t read? demanded Duchess.

  —You did, explained Billy. First you said that small print gave you a headache. Then you said that reading in cars made you queasy. Then you said that you were allergic to books.

  Billy turned to Emmett.

  —He says it that way because he’s too ashamed to admit that he can’t read. Just like he’s too ashamed to admit that he can’t swim.

  As Billy was talking, Emmett kept his attention on Duchess and he could see that Duchess was growing red. Maybe it was from shame, thought Emmett, but more likely from resentment.

  —Billy, Emmett cautioned, whether or not Duchess can read doesn’t make any difference right now. Why don’t you just leave this to me.

  But Billy was shaking his head.

  —It does make a difference, Emmett. It makes a difference because Duchess doesn’t know the rules for closing the house.

  Emmett looked at his brother for a moment. Then he looked at Duchess—poor, misguided, illiterate Duchess. Taking the last three strides, Emmett put his hands on the rifle, and yanked it from Duchess’s grip.

  Duchess began talking a mile a minute about how he would never have pulled the trigger. Not against a Watson. Not in a million years. But over Duchess’s talking what Emmett heard was his brother saying a single word. Saying his name in the manner of a
reminder.

  —Emmett . . .

  And Emmett understood. On the lawn of the county courthouse, Emmett had made the promise to his brother. A promise he intended to keep. So as Duchess rattled on about all the things he never would have done, Emmett counted to ten. And as he counted, he could feel the old heat subsiding, he could feel the anger seeping away, until he didn’t feel angry at all. Then raising the butt of the rifle, he hit Duchess in the face, giving it everything he had.

  * * *

  —I think you should look at this now, insisted Billy.

  After Duchess had hit the ground, Billy had gone to the kitchen. When he returned a moment later, Emmett told him to sit on the staircase and not move a muscle. Then taking Duchess under the armpits, he began dragging him through the living room. His plan was to drag him out of the muck room, down the stoop, and across the lawn to the Studebaker so that he could drive him to the closest police station and dump him at their door. He hadn’t gotten more than two steps when Billy had spoken.

  Looking up, Emmett could see that his brother was holding an envelope. Another letter from their father, Emmett thought with a touch of exasperation. Or another postcard from their mother. Or another map of America.

  —I can look at it later, said Emmett.

  —No, said Billy shaking his head. No. I think you should look at it now.

  Dropping Duchess back on the floor, Emmett went over to his brother.

  —It’s from Woolly, said Billy. To be opened in the event of his absence.

  A little stunned, Emmett looked at the inscription on the envelope.

  —He is absent, isn’t he? asked Billy.

  Emmett hadn’t quite decided how or whether he should tell his brother about Woolly. But from the way Billy said absent, it seemed like he already knew.