hellhounds slipped 53
back under the truck, where they lay watching us from the shadows, the two of them as quiet as a pair of snipers. "What about this one?" Paul asked, patting the hood of a black 1977 Thunderbird with a bike rack bolted to the roof. "It's only got a hundred thousand miles on it," he said. "Was that before or after you turned back the odometer?" "After, of course. Hey, man, at least you can't say I'm a liar." "I like the bike rack," I said. "With this ride I'll probably need it." At that instant a rat sprinted out in front of us and ran behind some stacks of retreads outside a rusted corrugated shed. We both saw it at the same time. Paul frowned at me and, with a stern expression on his face, placed his left index finger vertically across his lips. "Time for safari," he whispered. "Be right back." Paul crept behind the row of dilapidated cars and disap- peared behind the shed, his gun barrel up and next to his ear. I was just thinking that I had to find a new mechanic when I heard the shot. The three men bent over the open hood of a car by the garage straightened up and looked in our direc- tion. They stared for a moment, then went back to work. All of them knew their boss very well. Paul came back a minute later. The gun was stuck into the waistband of his blue jumpsuit. From the look on his face, I knew that the safari had not been a success. "Did you get him?" I asked. "How the hell should I know?" he retorted. "You think I got the time to look for the body of a dead rat?" It was six o'clock when I drove my "new" black Thun- derbird out of March's lot, and I hadn't gone very far when I realized that, like the last car he'd sold me, this was one I probably wouldn't be driving for too much longer. They had cleaned it up and given it a shiny new paint job, but it was 54
nothing except war paint on a steel hag. The engine coughed at every stoplight, and I had a pretty good idea that there was something wrong with the carburetor. By the time I got home, I was glad just to have made it. When I shut off the ignition, the car kept making noises for the next thirty sec- onds, like loose bolts in a steel bucket. I took a shower and drank a beer, then turned on the news and sat in my black recliner with my feet up, listening to the day's calamities and scandals, but if you had tested me on any of it ten minutes later, I wouldn't have been able to recall a single thing. After a while I got tired of the anchorman's handsome, self-assured expression and shut off the set. I was in a strange mood that is hard to describe, except to say it was as though there were a neon Vacant sign blinking over my heart like a permanent question I didn't have an answer for. Maybe I'd been living alone too long. Maybe it was time to get a cat. I thought of calling Barbara, my ex-wife, but she lived up in New York, and I couldn't afford very much long-distance. I liked to tell people that we were on good terms, except that it always sounded as though we'd had some kind of business relationship rather than a romance that had petered out like a flower that needed more watering than either of us could agree to. She was a stockbroker and I was a cop, and never the twain did meet, and even now, after five years, I had yet to figure out how it was that the longer we were together, the more like strangers we became. But I didn't call Barbara, and it wasn't just the long-dis- tance charges either. We were both too far gone from one an- other, and I didn't feel like hearing about the Dow Jones or about her new boyfriend, whoever he was this time around. There were times when she dropped hints to the effect that she wanted kids and I might still be in the running for sperm donor. It seemed that in that overheated Barnard brain of 55
hers the baby clock had begun to go tick-tock, and I suppose it was to be taken as a compliment that she still thought I had good genes. But it was clear from the way she put it that what she had in mind was in no
back under the truck, where they lay watching us from the shadows, the two of them as quiet as a pair of snipers. "What about this one?" Paul asked, patting the hood of a black 1977 Thunderbird with a bike rack bolted to the roof. "It's only got a hundred thousand miles on it," he said. "Was that before or after you turned back the odometer?" "After, of course. Hey, man, at least you can't say I'm a liar." "I like the bike rack," I said. "With this ride I'll probably need it." At that instant a rat sprinted out in front of us and ran behind some stacks of retreads outside a rusted corrugated shed. We both saw it at the same time. Paul frowned at me and, with a stern expression on his face, placed his left index finger vertically across his lips. "Time for safari," he whispered. "Be right back." Paul crept behind the row of dilapidated cars and disap- peared behind the shed, his gun barrel up and next to his ear. I was just thinking that I had to find a new mechanic when I heard the shot. The three men bent over the open hood of a car by the garage straightened up and looked in our direc- tion. They stared for a moment, then went back to work. All of them knew their boss very well. Paul came back a minute later. The gun was stuck into the waistband of his blue jumpsuit. From the look on his face, I knew that the safari had not been a success. "Did you get him?" I asked. "How the hell should I know?" he retorted. "You think I got the time to look for the body of a dead rat?" It was six o'clock when I drove my "new" black Thun- derbird out of March's lot, and I hadn't gone very far when I realized that, like the last car he'd sold me, this was one I probably wouldn't be driving for too much longer. They had cleaned it up and given it a shiny new paint job, but it was 54
nothing except war paint on a steel hag. The engine coughed at every stoplight, and I had a pretty good idea that there was something wrong with the carburetor. By the time I got home, I was glad just to have made it. When I shut off the ignition, the car kept making noises for the next thirty sec- onds, like loose bolts in a steel bucket. I took a shower and drank a beer, then turned on the news and sat in my black recliner with my feet up, listening to the day's calamities and scandals, but if you had tested me on any of it ten minutes later, I wouldn't have been able to recall a single thing. After a while I got tired of the anchorman's handsome, self-assured expression and shut off the set. I was in a strange mood that is hard to describe, except to say it was as though there were a neon Vacant sign blinking over my heart like a permanent question I didn't have an answer for. Maybe I'd been living alone too long. Maybe it was time to get a cat. I thought of calling Barbara, my ex-wife, but she lived up in New York, and I couldn't afford very much long-distance. I liked to tell people that we were on good terms, except that it always sounded as though we'd had some kind of business relationship rather than a romance that had petered out like a flower that needed more watering than either of us could agree to. She was a stockbroker and I was a cop, and never the twain did meet, and even now, after five years, I had yet to figure out how it was that the longer we were together, the more like strangers we became. But I didn't call Barbara, and it wasn't just the long-dis- tance charges either. We were both too far gone from one an- other, and I didn't feel like hearing about the Dow Jones or about her new boyfriend, whoever he was this time around. There were times when she dropped hints to the effect that she wanted kids and I might still be in the running for sperm donor. It seemed that in that overheated Barnard brain of 55
hers the baby clock had begun to go tick-tock, and I suppose it was to be taken as a compliment that she still thought I had good genes. But it was clear from the way she put it that what she had in mind was in no
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