Skunk Hunt (2 page)

Marvin had not realized how comforting the
sight and sound of the plow had been until it was gone. Its
industrious presence had signified accomplishment, activity,
freedom of movement. Its absence signaled the reverse. Nothing was
getting done, and those who ignored that fact risked getting
stranded. Only a handful of cocky 4-wheel-drivers had passed the
tiny strip mall, volunteers for Meals on Wheels or taking workers
to the hospital. The rest were just assholes showing off their
maneuverability as long as they could before they got stuck and
added one more barrier in the road. This stretch of Staples Mill
had been visited twice this morning by the big county plows, yet
already another slippery coat had been laid on. The entire area was
becoming an ice boutique, and Marvin could think of no better place
to be stuck at than home.

The snow wore on him like mental sandpaper.
Not that long ago he would have been waiting breathlessly for the
news that the schools were closed due to inclement weather. Only
now he was part of the school of life, as Uncle Vern would say, and
the call that would release him refused to come. Was Vernon sitting
in the warm comfort of his 3,000 square foot Southern Living
custom-designed mini-palace? Was he watching his monitor? Could he
be sniggering at his useless nephew staring mindlessly at the
mindless world?

Marvin started. He had to find something
useful to do. But chronic non-starters are woefully unprepared to
be useful. He could take out a Handi-Wipe and dust the displays. He
could even shovel snow off the sidewalk, but he quickly dismissed
the idea. Reason being the handmaid of sloth, he decided there was
no reason for heroic measures. Let the snow finish, then shovel it
off. By then, of course, the contractor would have returned and
done the job for him.

He went to the back office and stared at the
computer screensaver, a to-be-expected image of the Hope Diamond.
Vernon would be impressed no end if Marvin checked the Rapaport
Diamond Report for the latest pricing trends. The risk being that,
if Marvin proved competent at judging wholesale markets, or even
just reporting on them, Vernon might take it into his head to add
it to his daily chores.

His cell phone rang. He read the display and
grinned. Uncle Vern's home number. He was going to call it a day!
And none too soon. Marvin had doubts he would be able to negotiate
his diminutive Reno through this mess.

"Hello?"

"Marvin. This is your Aunt Hilary."

He was glad she had identified herself.
Marvin rarely spoke to Vernon's wife. And her voice seemed changed,
somehow. Stress?

"Hi," Marvin said numbly. He didn't know how
to speak to relatives, even close relatives—Vernon being a case in
point.

"Are you in the shop?"

"Well...yeah."

"Listen..."

Aunt Hilary was breathing hard. There was
noise in the background. An echo from a PA system, a series of
shouts. Marvin's intestines roiled.

"You sound like you're in a hospital," he
said into his phone.

"I'm at Henrico Doctors'. Marvin, there's
been an accident. Your Uncle Vernon..."

"Oh my God..." Marvin's mind gonged
with dismay and glee. Was he going to get the rest of the day off?
But would he have to visit Vernon in the hospital? But wait...what
if his uncle expected him to run the shop until his return? How
badly was he injured? Was it possible he would be told to watch the
store by himself for days on end? Even
weeks
? For all of his uncle's gruff ways, he
provided a sense of security. He could browbeat roving salesmen
with the best of them, and his ability to dismiss irate customers
held a certain rude charm. Marvin could not function without
Vernon's certainty, as his uncle well knew. He could not hold the
fort for any extended length of time.

But wait...was Uncle Vernon...God
forbid...
dead
? Yes, God
forbid. But that would entail Aunt Hilary taking over the business,
probably selling it, and then Marvin would be...
free
. God forbid.

A lot could go through Marvin's head when it
was properly activated.

"He'll be all right," came Aunt Hilary's
tense voice. Marvin found it hard to say if she was pleased by this
information. "I just spoke with him. They've taken him in for
X-rays. Some idiot rear-ended him on River Road."

Marvin tried to think of a proper way to
convey deep concern. He cleared his throat. "How's his car?"

"It's been towed. Now listen, Marvin, Vern
told me to tell you to close up shop, now."

"All right."

"No, Marvin.
Now
. No fiddling with the computer, no waiting
for customers...not that anyone would come out on a day like
this."

She was making him feel like a chump for
showing up on the job. But no more of a chump than Vernon, who had,
apparently, paid the price for his work ethic.

"Do you understand me? He wants you out of
the shop this instant."

He was suddenly alarmed. Why this urgency? It
would be just like Uncle Vernon to try and close a deal on his
deathbed. If Marvin chose to linger about, there was a remote
chance he could make a sale. For his uncle to write off an entire
day as a total loss sounded unnatural.

As was to be expected in a young man, Marvin
had a mulish streak. Being pushed out the door—even to his benefit,
because it sounded like a delightful proposition—caused his hackles
to rise and his feet to dig in. Fortunately, he had enough common
sense to cut short his protest. Unfortunately for him, and for
others, he didn't do it soon enough. He paused, hemmed, startling
Aunt Hilary with tones of a stoic and stalwart employee. He would
see out the storm, he would keep the Ice Boutique lights lit up,
people passing by would be impressed by such dedication and drop in
to make a purchase—

"There won't be anyone passing by, you
moron!" Aunt Hilary cut him short. "They're calling for eight more
inches!"

Marvin gaped at the phone. His aunt had
called him a moron! What had her husband said to her about him? His
heels dug in harder—then suddenly released. What was he doing?
Eight inches on top of what had already fallen! In Richmond, such
an event was considered a catastrophe. Besides, he was talking
himself into a hole. Aunt Hilary might decide Marvin could keep the
store open by himself for however long it took Vernon to recover.
Although, from the sound of it, she could scarcely credit him with
enough sense to lock the door on leaving.

"All right, Aunt Hilary, I'm going, I'm
going."

"What's that? I don't hear you going."

"OK, bye." He disconnected. In somewhat of a
huff, he sat before the monitor, brooding, tempted to visit a
couple of sites that his uncle would disapprove of, just on the
off-chance he could infect the computer with a virus from a porn
sight. That would be a hoot. Ol' Vernon checking the price of
diamonds and getting a pop-up of a beaver. The saint would go
ballistic.

But the eight additional inches began
cluttering Marvin's mind. Neither the Subway nor the pizza joint
had opened. If he got stranded here, he would starve. He couldn't
go two hours straight without putting something in his mouth, and
there was a chance he could get stuck here a lot longer than
that.

He closed down the computer and donned the
goofy, hoodless red, white and blue striped L.L. Bean jacket his
mother had foisted on him. Going out front, he began to arm the
security system, when his eyes drifted beyond the touchpad to the
parking lot.

A car was sitting in front of the store. A
beat-up old something-or-other, maybe a Firebird from before he was
born. Definitely not the kind of vehicle someone shopping for
pricey jewelry would be driving. He thought he could see two faces
behind the sweeping windshield wipers.

Two men got out. One was small and had a face
like chewed gum. He had a lit cigarette dangling between his lips,
the smoke indistinguishable from his steaming breath. The other guy
was large, quite large. Beyond that, Marvin could not describe
them. He was more intent on the pistol in the large man's hand and
the shotgun cradled by the small man.

They were making no attempt to hide their
intention. As Marvin raced back behind the Tecno display, the large
man jerked at the glass door. Marvin breathed hard, making sure his
hand was nowhere near the door release button. Instead, he did the
inconceivable. He reached down for the Heckler & Koch in the
nook next to the cash register.

Safety, safety, safety...he knew he had to do
something before he could fire. He glanced down frantically at the
gun. He saw no special button or lever. He looked up.

To his astonishment, the big man was
motioning him to unlock the door. Was he crazy? Well yeah, he had
to be crazy to come marching up to the shop with gun drawn. Marvin
wanted to shout at him,
Are you nuts? You
can't rob a jewelry store just like that! We're a regular fortress
here. You'd better watch out!

The large man shrugged and nodded at the
small man, who recovered from a coughing fit long enough to raise
his shotgun and point it at the door.

"Jesus!"

Marvin crouched behind the main display. He
shook so hard he could barely see the gun in his hand, let alone
any subtle safety mechanism. And then he remembered something
Vernon had said while terrorizing his employee with the weapon's
very presence.

Squeeze
cocker
.

All someone had to do was to hold the gun in
the proper grip and it was ready to fire. Even a dummy could do it.
But what was the proper—

There was an explosion. A double-fist-sized
hole appeared in glass that sagged at the edges. The big man
reached through and pushed on the door lever. The door swung
in.

"This is a stick-up!" he shouted. It sounded
like...almost like laughter. "You didn't want to make this
easy?"

The big man's voice had a naturally
aggressive quality, each word like gravel flung in your face. But
Marvin decided the smaller man was more dangerous. He had the
shotgun. And the shotgun was...well,
bigger
.

He stood and aimed. There was a fleeting
impression of two startled faces, one compressed by a wheezy cough.
He squeezed and fired.

It was like letting a firecracker go off in
his hand. The shock almost caused him to drop the gun. The small
man staggered back. The shotgun clattered on the floor.

"Son of a bitch!" the big man yelled. He was
trapped between the two front displays, with no sideways room for
maneuver. He had to go either forward or backward. Instead, he
stood his ground and raised his gun.

Marvin didn't know he had closed his eyes. To
him, the sight of his assailants was burned onto his mental retina,
as clear to him as if he was staring down their throats. It was
this image he was firing at when he squeezed off another round,
then another.

And then he was clobbered, dead center,
electrifying pain. His eyes flew open. To his surprise, he found
himself on the floor, doubled like a closed carjack, his knees
touching the sliding panels of the display, his back against the
wall. How had this happened? He started to pull himself up. More
pain shot out from his chest and dragged him back down. He lowered
his chin and saw blood.

"Ah! Ah!"

He heard footsteps. The gun! Where was it?
Not on the floor in front of him. He tried to look behind him but
pain jammed him like a doorstop. Had he dropped it on the display
counter? He lifted his eyes and saw a dark, angular object through
the glass top. There was no way...

His eye fell on the beige panic button
halfway down the gun nook. How stupid...how stupid... Fighting the
pain, he reached up and pressed the alarm. There were no bells or
whistles. The silent alarm was connected to the phone, which
signaled Richmond Alarm Company's central station. Within a minute
or two the police would be contacted. But even if it worked like it
was supposed to, how long would it take for help to arrive in this
blizzard?

And then he heard the crunch of someone
walking on glass.

Raising himself on his elbow, he peered
through the display glass at the front of the store. The big man
had checked on the status of his partner. He leaned back,
muttering, then looked towards the back. He began to approach the
counter.

Fear replaced pain, at least enough to
generate movement. Pulling his legs back from the base of the
counter, Marvin began crawling sideways. He knew he was going the
wrong direction, away from the safety of the back office and its
lockable door. But he couldn't move fast enough. There was no time
to turn around.

He had made it to the end of the display when
the robber turned the corner at the opposite end of the counter and
looked down the aisle at him.

"Where is he?" the big man said.

"Oh...oh..." Marvin gasped. Not only had the
pain returned with a vengeance, but he now saw the trail of blood
he had left behind as he crawled.

"That sounds bad, mighty bad." The man nodded
at the top of the counter. "And you left your gun behind."

"Please...p...p—"

The man stepped over to the office and
disappeared through the door.

"Fuck!" he shouted a moment later from
inside.

Marvin tried to crawl some more. But a
numbness had overcome his limbs. He was finished with trying to
escape. He was at the robber's mercy.

When the big man came out, he noted the
bloody smear on the panic button and grunted.

"Stop crying," he said. "You'll get help soon
enough."

"I'm not—" Marvin gasped, then stopped when
he realized he was.