Skunk Hunt (56 page)

But where were the official twits, the ones
in uniform? We were drawing attention to ourselves like nobody's
business. They should have been on us like monkeys on bananas. But
that only goes to show where assumptions get you. I learned later
that a movie was being filmed at the state capitol. The entire
police force must have been up there, ogling the stars.

I heard a ping like a hotel deskbell.
Turning, I saw a dent bulging in the wall inches from my head. A
brief hope that surveillance vans were bulletproofed as a matter of
course spiraled out of the realm of possibility. The shattered
glass should have been enough proof, but we all know that hope
springs eternal, or at least for a minute or so, in the moronic
breast. To reinforce my moron credentials, I raised my head for
another peek out the window. Butch Congreve was in the process of
taking aim with a pistol out the passenger window. I ducked and a
bullet zinged overhead, smashing into a panel above Marvin.

"There goes $10,000 plus tax," Marvin
moaned.

"As if it was your money," Uncle Vern
snarled.

If this all sounds like too much levity, I
assure you it really happened and we really said those things. The
fact of the matter was that, in spite of barreling down the road
with the minimum of control, and being shot at in the process, none
of us really believed we would die. It's the cinematic cretin
instilled by years of comically tense dialogue imagined by
screenwriters who think people yack instead of squawk when
threatened with death. Sure enough, we were so saturated with this
idiocy that we followed the script.

One thing movies leave out is actual pain.
Our education would be infinitely enhanced if we could actually
feel those bullets ripping through the actors on the big screen.
Watch out, Drill-o-rama is on the way.

We were being shot at in real time, though,
and it was beholding on us to take it seriously. The nonsense that
came out of our mouths evaporated cleanly, leaving us free to fight
back. Another bullet through the broken window convinced me there
was no time to switch places with Marvin.

"Stop all that swerving!" I shouted at Uncle
Vern.

"What?" he shouted back, then looked in his
rearview mirror and saw me trying to stand at the window. He said
something to the effect that one less twit in the world wouldn't
hurt the economy—or maybe I imagined it and he was simply
acquiescing to the need for additional mayhem.

Butch was again taking aim, but I beat him to
the draw, probably because I wasn't aiming. I just pulled the
trigger and kept on pulling until the gun stopped pissing. When I
opened my eyes, the Grand Prix was gone.

Then and there I became a
convert—guns
could
produce
miracles. They were like genie-bottles. A little rub-dub, and your
foes disappeared. But I couldn't resist taking a little
credit.

"I did it!"

My self-acclamation, so rare and
precious, was short-lived. There was a
plonk
on the van's flank that had the
unmistakable barrel-knocking flavor of metal on metal. I glanced up
at the screen over Marvin's head. He had maneuvered the periscope,
giving us an eye-popping view of Butch half-leaning out the
passenger window. I could also see my marksmanship hadn't been so
awful—the car's windshield was so starred with cracks it must be
almost impossible to see through.

The Congreves realized they wouldn't get much
further before they crashed blindly into some structurally sound
impediment. They solved their dilemma by roaring ahead to cut us
off. I blandly handed Marvin the empty gun.

"I think you need to reload it."

Marvin stared at it as though I had planted
an octopus on his palm.

"You're out of bullets?" Todd asked tensely,
gripping the edge of the counter.

"I never learned..."

Up front, Uncle Vern made a sound like a
teacher smacked awake by one of his students. He couldn't believe
he'd been struck, but he couldn't complain because he'd been caught
napping in his own classroom.

A loud bang announced a ferocious sideswipe.
Our faces went blank as Uncle Vern lost control and we confronted
our justifiable demise. When you're about to die, there's no point
to emoting.

Well, we didn't die, and a qualified actuary
would probably claim we didn't even come close. In fact, when we
bounced over the curb, raced through a Laundromat parking lot, then
jounced over another curb and down a slope to another parking lot,
we realized we might survive this crash and began screaming like
hell.

"Verrrrrnnnn!" Marvin wailed, tossing the
avuncular and almost his lunch.

Grass and dirt scooped up by the Transit's
fashionably thin bumper was flung on the windshield in a series of
Pollockian slaps, grass and dirt zigzagging across the glass with
blind artistic aplomb.

And speaking of dumb luck, not only did Uncle
Vern manage to keep the van upright, we ended up back on the
highway. Admittedly, we were pointed in the wrong direction, but
even during rush hour this part of Route 1 was virtually
traffic-free, most people hereabouts being either unemployed or
otherwise unoccupied. The only other car in sight was the
Congreves' Grand Prix, which was right on course for—

Wham
!

They must have slammed on the brakes before
broadsiding us, but the hit was still powerful enough to send us
thudding off the walls like wooden marbles. The image from the
telescope tilted crazily, giving the impression Butch was falling
and his brother rising to the sky. But they were only halfway out
of their car when a meteor the size and shape of a Dodge van swept
through a gap in the median and banged into the rear door on the
driver's side. The collision knocked us around some more, but it
knocked the Congreves worse. They fell on the road in rowdy heaps,
rolling in opposite directions. From the way they bounced to their
feet, it seemed neither was hurt, yet their first instinct was
flight. An unknown adversary had hit the scene, one as dumb and
indifferent to vehicular mayhem as themselves, and the best vantage
point from which to survey the situation was from a distance. From
the way they hoofed North and South, the best distance was as far
away as possible. But chicken wasn't their style and I knew they
would be back as soon as they were over the shock.

Uncle Vern had the van in gear and looked
ready to rocket away when a familiar voice shouted for him to
wait.

"I thought I recognized Kendle's heap,"
Marvin said. "I think she's got Jeremy with her."

Todd and I emitted grunts equally
proportioned between disgust and loathing. I gave him a quizzical
look. How well did he know Jeremy?

"What are you doing here?" Uncle Vern
demanded, lowering his window as Jeremy trotted up.

"I planted a GPS on your van," he announced
casually. Before Uncle Vern and Marvin could respond with oaths
(with equal amounts of disgust and loathing), Jeremy hastened to
add, "We need to get going. The cops'll show up or the Congreves'll
be back, and I don't want either. Does this thing still run?"

"I believe so," said Uncle Vern with a kind
of Old World weariness that was a clue to where all this was
headed, although I couldn't guess that at the time. He had already
begun pulling away when Jeremy shouted, so my brother's question
was a waste of rhetoric, except he was out to prove a point: we had
to haul ass—but where were we headed?

"Mine, too," said Jeremy. This was proven
when the van began backing away from its cracked nest in the Grand
Prix. Someone else was responsible for heave-hoeing into the
Congreves. The tilted periscope provided only a silhouette in the
driver's seat, but when the van had pulled off a half dozen yards
our guess was confirmed when we saw Yvonne Kendle's wicked grin.
She was a masher, all right. And a smasher.

There was a
plonk
on the side of the van.

"What that a bullet?" Marvin demanded, losing
his grammar with a jump.

"We'll meet at the usual place!" Jeremy
shouted, racing back to his car.

"We most certainly will not," grumbled Uncle
Vern, hitting the gas. A few rattles had been added to the
clobbered van, but otherwise we seemed to be in good shape.

"We're not headed for the usual place,"
Marvin said.

"We need distance, first," came Vern's
response, which I agreed with wholeheartedly, especially after
hearing another metallic
thwonk
on the rear panel. The police must be nowhere in sight,
still, or else the Congreves wouldn't be subjecting us to a
long-distance fusillade. That was my theory, at least. Were they
all really watching a movie being made downtown? Jesus, was it a
Spielberg production?

But what was this about Jeremy and a 'usual
place'?

"Have you been conspiring with Jeremy?" I
shouted over the engine noise coming through the shattered rear
window.

"You don't want to know," Marvin responded
for his uncle. "You'll find out soon enough, but you'll be sorry
you asked."

After making it as far as Bellwood without
being followed, Uncle Vern turned onto a side road and began a
zigzag drive back to Richmond.

Well...almost....

CHAPTER 26

The improbability of improbability is only
increased (but not eliminated) by its improbability. You might
believe that's like saying the inanity of inanity is only increased
by its inanity, but in that case there's no chance of
elimination.

Why am I striking off on this abstract path?
Don't worry, its a short path. In fact, it ends right here, at the
meat and potatoes buffet.

The 'usual place' turned out to be Todd's
house, which opened a world of wonders. I had sort of suspected my
twin was a part of what I could only think of as a conspiracy, and
this cinched it. I should have guessed more than I had when I saw
the registration for Todd's Jaguar.

Marvin did a lot of wincing and moaning as he
came through the door. I thought at first he was reacting to Todd's
apocalyptic housekeeping, but when I saw real pain on his face I
realized he really had been shot, and not all that long ago.

My math skill was indecently limited, ranging
from null to numbskull, but this particular 2 + 2 was a no-brainer:
there had been a gunfight at the Ice Boutique and this twerp had
managed to ace two grown men before himself going down. I gave
Marvin a solicitous arm, and mentally congratulated Skunk on
plugging him.

At this point the math became circular,
a never-ending
pi
that riddled
common sense. Why would Marvin be stalking me? What if I caught him
out—as I had, sort of—when, as a loyal son, I might return the
favor he had done my father? He couldn't be looking to recover
stolen jewels, since (alas) Skunk had never come close to
successfully robbing his store.

How wrong I was. Ahem. And then...how right I
was. Double-hem.

Jeremy followed Uncle Vern inside. He had
probably just saved our lives, so I granted without too much
disgust his shit-eating grin. Following him like a snow plow
shoving a full load came Yvonne Kendle. She was not grinning,
although she had been the actual engineer of our salvation. Maybe
she was having second thoughts about ramming the Congreves
temporarily out of the picture.

Apparently not knowing what else to do, Todd
attempted to play host. "Anyone want a—"

"Beer," said Yvonne peremptorily.

"Any particular kind?" he asked, sounding too
much like me, both in tone and in the particulars.

"Lots."

Todd scrunched up his face, as though he had
never heard of the brand. He came back with a Miller Lite, drawing
a chubby frown from my one-time playmate.

"What?" Todd asked, his tone suggesting
freeloaders who got freebies left preferences at the door.

"I don't believe in 'lite'," said Yvonne.

My face twitched in syncopated sympathy with
Todd's as he suppressed the obvious comeback. Interestingly enough,
Jeremy too gave a twitch, supplying evidence that genes did not
have to be identical to rough out similar reactions.

Todd handed the Miller to me and went back to
the kitchen. He returned with a Heineken. Yvonne nodded like
someone receiving her due, requiring no thanks on her part. I would
probably get the same reaction from her if I played 'Hail to the
Chief'. Since I consider outsized self-esteem as much a disease as
in-your-face self-effacement, I could only criticize her for being
my opposite.

"Wish I'd been here to see your face when you
saw his face," said Jeremy, finding a small valley next to Yvonne
which he occupied with some difficulty. She snapped at him for
disrupting her guzzle.

I looked around. "You talking to me?"

"You see any other Mutes around here?" he
answered, laughing at his own pun.

"So you've known—"

"How could I not?" Jeremy cut me off. "Okay,
I couldn't remember the Ferncrest address. But I remember leaving
this house with one its one shitty fucktardo and arriving on Oregon
Hill to find another fucktardo just like him. A real punching
bag."

I felt all eyes on me: Uncle Vern, Marvin,
Todd, Jeremy, Yvonne. They had a knowing look, the kind of look
Julius Caesar got from his fellow senators. I wasn't in on the Big
Joke, and I could only pray the joke didn't include daggers. I got
the horrible feeling that these people knew me better than I knew
myself. Considering all that had happened lately, it was probably
true. I was the guy who lived in Skunk's house, but was otherwise
doing nada for his posterity.

"O…kay…" I said, blushing.

Uncle Vern was munching on his moustache.
Marvin was catering to some secret cavity behind his lower lip.
Yvonne was bug-eyed behind her Heinekin. Jeremy continued to savor
his pun, as though knowing it would be the only witticism he would
come up with in his lifetime. Todd was the most unsettling of all,
looking exactly the way I would have looked had the situation been
reversed. It was obvious that, outside of Vern and Marvin, no one
here had realized the unexplained investments had paid off so
handsomely—or, in my case, that there had been any investments at
all.