Curtains (8 page)

He stared at the driver's license.

It didn't make sense. It was his face, all
right. But this license was gone, floating somewhere in the East
River. He read the name slowly, his lips shaping the syllables.

Robert Daniel Wells.

He moved fast, got to the street, but Sid was
gone.

Vincent glanced at the crowd, among the eyes
that seemed to shine like search beacons. Which ones belonged to
Joey's people?

He broke into a run. A laugh tore itself from
his lungs, a spasm borne of fear and hysteria. He should have known
that Joey's reach, even from a prison cell, was longer than the
longest arm of the law. Vincent had been around long enough to know
that Joey liked to play.

Like a cat with a cornered mouse, like a
spider with a stuck fly.

Vincent ran on. He thought that maybe if he
ran fast enough, someday he'd catch up to himself. But somedays
never come, and Robert Wells had a debt to pay.

Under any name.

GOOD FENCES

That fence post was leaning again.

Herman could tell just by looking out the
window, though the neighbor’s yard was over two hundred feet away.
You’d think people would have a little pride. Back in Herman’s day,
you kept your split rails pointing straight up to God, even here in
the Blue Ridge mountains where level ground was as scarce as hen’s
teeth. Of course, you were supposed to keep your grass mowed down
close, too.

A hippie lived in that house. The new
neighbor drove by every morning, hunched over the wheel of a
Japanese junkaroo with a ski rack on top. The hippie had waved the
first week after moving in, but each time Herman had given him a
no-nonsense, get-a-haircut stare. Nowadays the hippie didn’t even
look over, just rattled up the road to whatever job Communists held
while plotting the revolution.

Too bad. The hippie could learn something
about American pride from Herman. You keep your house painted and
your windows clean. Your mailbox flap doesn’t sag open. The flag
comes down when it rains, even if a stoned-out longhair would
rather burn one than fly one. But most of all, by God, you set your
fences straight.

Fences were the first impression, the first
line of defense against those who thought the world belonged to
everybody. Herman would bet his John Wayne video collection that
the hippie at 107 Oakdale had a peace sign poster on his bedroom
wall. The peace sign was nothing but the footprint of the American
chicken. Herman didn’t mind a peaceful neighbor on general
principle, but the lessons of history were clear. Peace started
with strong borders, strong fences.

Herman was a picket man himself. There was
something trustworthy about the sharp picket tips, a row of
threatening teeth that promised to nip at unwelcome guests. Best of
all, you could paint them church-white. Not that split rails
couldn’t look proper if you took a little pride in them.

The door to 107 opened. Herman dropped the
curtain in disgust and sat again at his bowl of oatmeal. Doctor
said oats would clean out his pipes, and if a healthy diet didn’t
do the job, then a pervert with a medical degree and a hospital
hose would. The fear of a stranger meddling up his backside was
about the only thing that could make Herman eat oatmeal. The stuff
was barely fit for livestock.

As he spooned a butter-heavy dose into his
mouth, he looked out the window. The hippie’s front door swung open
wide, and a shaggy little dog raced out and squatted in the weeds.
Hippie didn’t even have enough self-respect to get a boxer or a
hound, something territorial that would chew the leg off a
trespassing little brat. No, he had an overgrown lap dog, one that
would probably be plopping piles of dookie all over Herman’s yard
if the picket fence weren’t there.

The dog finished its business and ran to the
hippie, who patted it on the head. Herman scowled into his oatmeal.
Public displays of affection were the mark of a sissy who couldn’t
be trusted. He waited until the hippie’s car passed, then he went
into the garage. Tools neatly lined the rear wall, hanging on
pegboard and shining under the glow of a single fluorescent
tube.

He selected a claw hammer, then gritted his
teeth and swung it viciously, imagining the hammer head sinking
into the hippie’s skull. He swung again and again, his breath rapid
and shallow, his heartbeat like the salvos of an anti-aircraft gun.
His arm soon grew tired and he let the hammer rest against his
thigh.

The August morning sun was bright on the dew
when he went outside. Mrs. Breedlove from 103 had her television
turned up too loud. That was okay, because Mrs. Breedlove kept her
flower gardens in military formation, heads up and rumps tucked in
tight. She had her flaws, but maintaining appearances wasn’t one of
them.

Herman gathered a spare picket from the
woodpile and tucked it under his arm. He stepped through the gate
and walked down Oakdale, frowning at the dead leaves that clustered
along the curb. He’d be needing the rake before long. One of the
neighbor kids from 108 squealed in the distance. Brats. The budding
delinquents would wear a path in your grass and not think
twice.

A kid on a bicycle came out from the trees
near the end of the block. It was a girl, one of the ugly redheads
from 104. You’d think she’d be in school, since this was Friday.
Ever since they’d made a big fuss over teachers’ rights, the brats
did most of their learning from each other. And the lesson they
learned best was how to mess on other people’s property.

Herman tucked his hammer behind his back. The
redhead pedaled up, then stopped. She wore a New York Jets jersey,
and the only thing worse would have been Yankee pinstripes. The
early settlers of Aldridge Falls should have barred the dirt roads
and burned all the bridges, because outsiders had the run of the
place now. Rich folks with their Florida tans and fast New England
accents and property law attorneys.

“Morning, Mr. Weeks,” the girl said. “What
you doing with that stick?”

“Fixing things,” he said, smiling and holding
up the picket. Maybe it wasn’t too late to pass along the concept
of respect.

“A fence?” she asked.

He nodded. “I like good fences.”

“My daddy said fences are for greedy
people.”

“You should always listen to your father.”
Herman kept smiling, his face like warm wax in the sun.

The kid smiled back, confused, then pedaled
on past. Herman walked to the hippie’s leaning fence post. It was
cedar, a little more manageable than locust though it would rot a
lot faster. He knelt and examined the base of the post.

He’d repaired the same post twice already
this week. Usually he fixed things right the first time, but once
in a while you got hold of a stubborn piece of wood. He leaned the
post until it was ninety degrees, then eyeballed the angle against
the corner of the hippie’s house. Satisfied, he wedged the picket
into the ground, driving it with the hammer until the dirt was
packed.

He reached for the top of the post to test it
for sturdiness. He touched wood, and a sharp pain lanced along his
finger. At first he figured he’d drawn a splinter, but the wound
was clean. Herman bent for a closer look.

A razor blade had been embedded in the cedar.
Its silver edge glinted in the dawn.

“Tarnation.” Herman muttered under his
breath, sucking on his wounded finger. A closer study of the fence
revealed several more razor blades in the crosspieces.

Herman glanced at the houses along the
street. This was a Community Watch neighborhood. He didn’t dare
trespass on the hippie’s property. But he was within his rights to
walk the perimeter of the yard. As a concerned citizen, mind you,
checking up on things.

At one corner of the fence, the ground was
bare where animals cut through the forsythia. Herman saw a long
fishhook wedged into a crack in the fence. Bits of cat fur and a
tiny piece of shriveled flesh hung from the hook’s barb. The fur
was light gray, the color of Widow Hampton’s cat.

Herman hadn’t seen the cat in several days.
It had a habit of spraying in Herman’s yard, stinking up the
petunias. Cat had no sense of territory and could scamper over a
fence like it wasn’t there. He grinned at the thought of the cat
yowling in pain after getting snagged by the hook.

Herman headed back to his house with new
admiration for the hippie. You had to fight to protect what was
yours. Hell, when you come right down to it, a hippie could be just
like any normal person. All it took was a haircut and a Bible.

The red-headed girl rode up on her bike,
stopped with a scruffing of brakes. “Sorry, mister.”

Herman had been lost in thought. “Huh? Sorry
for what?”

She pointed up the street. “I ran into your
fence.” She blushed beneath her freckles.

Herman saw leaning pickets, a whole section
of them, one snapped in half. He bit back a curse. His hand went to
his back pocket for the hammer. His cut finger bumped into the
handle, and the pain drove his anger away.

“It’s okay, honey,” he said. He resisted the
urge to pat her head, because he was afraid he might grab her hair
and jerk her off the bicycle. A curtain lifted in nosy Mrs.
Breedlove’s house. Community watch at its finest.

He walked back to his house as the girl
pedaled away, off to her next act of trespassing and destruction.
Herman spent the rest of the morning repairing his own fence, then
went in for lunch and his daily bout of Gospel radio. He took a nap
in the afternoon, charging his batteries for the night’s
mission.

Supper was liver mush and potatoes, plus some
pole beans grown in the garden out back. Back when Verna was alive,
they kept up with the canning, making preserves from the apples and
sauce from the tomatoes. With Verna passed on to the Lord, Herman
saw little need to stock up for the future. He grew most of what he
needed and in the winter there were grocery stores. Gas was so
high, thanks to them sand-nigger terrorists, he didn’t drive much
anymore. And the radio said the Democrats had gutted Social
Security again, so he tried to pinch a penny where he could.
Mostly, he kept to the house, which is why he wanted the fences in
good shape. When your world got smaller, the part that was yours
took on new value.

Night fell, and Herman left the lights on
while he snuck around the house and into the vacant lot that ran
beside the hippie’s house. The land had belonged to a dentist up on
the hill, but when the dentist died, it fell into the hands of his
sons, who were living somewhere contrary like Oregon or New
Hampshire. The land had been a Christmas tree farm, and lately a
hay meadow, but now it mostly just raised briars and bunnies.

He fought off the thorns and ducked into the
forsythia, crabapple, and jackvine that straddled the property
line. After checking the crosspieces for sharp edges, he slipped
through the fence and waited. Soon enough, the hippie’s door opened
and the shaggy, post-pissing mongrel came out, the hippie right
behind. Even with the moon out, the hippie wouldn’t be able to see
Herman crouching in the thicket, but the dog started whining right
away. The hippie made a beeline for the post that Herman had
straightened that morning. The hippie put a hand on it and leaned
it forward, careful to avoid the razor blade embedded in the
wood.

“There,” the hippie said to the whimpering
mutt. “That ought to give the geezer something to fix tomorrow. Or
else a heart attack.”

The hippie jumped as if electrocuted when
Herman flipped on the flashlight. The longhair froze in the orange
cone of light, pupils the size of BBs. Probably on meth heroin or
whatever dope his kind cooked up these days.

“They look better if you do them square,”
Herman said.

The hippie squinted against the flashlight’s
beam. “Who’s there?”

“A concerned neighbor,” Herman said.

“You the one with the picket fence, up at
101?”

“None other.” Herman stood and flicked off
the light. They stared at each other’s silhouettes under the
quarter moon.

“Why have you been messing with my fence?”
The hippie folded his arms across his chest. The shaggy mutt
stopped whimpering and crouched at its master’s feet.

“Why you been making me?” Herman snapped his
shoulders back Marine-style, even though it was dark and the hippie
couldn’t get a cheap lesson in proper posture. This was his
neighborhood. He had a right to take an interest.

“I like to know my neighbors,” the hippie
said. “The faster you peg the weirdoes, the faster you can take
steps to protect yourself.”

Herman’s jaw loosened. “You mean you done
this on purpose? Like some kind of trap?”

The hippie’s high-dollar teeth caught the
scant moonlight as he smiled. “One of them. The other traps are
scattered around the perimeter.”

A light came on upstairs in the Hampton
house. From his dark vantage point, Herman could see the top half
of the widow as she slipped off her robe and stepped into the
shower. His pulse jumped a gear and he felt a flush of shame.
Spying like trash, that’s what he was doing. But she’d left her
curtains open, so it was her fault.

“Ain’t seen Miss Hampton’s cat around
lately,” Herman said. “You wouldn’t know nothing about that, would
you?”

“You might find it at the foot of the
dogwood,” the hippie said, nodding to the corner of his lot.

“Dogwood?”

“I thought that was fitting punishment,” the
hippie said. “Get it? A cat and a dogwood?”

The mutt’s ears perked up at the sound of its
master’s laughter.

“You buried her cat on your property?”
Herman’s thumb twitched against the flashlight, and he wasn’t sure
if he wanted to laugh with the hippie or addle the fool’s brains
with a sideswipe.