Split Images (1981) (23 page)

"You asked him a few leading questions."

"A few."

There you are, Bryan thought. She talked to Chichi's doorman and the doorman picked up thephone and called somebody. His fingers were greasy. He glanced up to catch the waitress, get some clean napkins and took a look at the two cowboys staring at them: giving them their toughhombre movie-cowboy stares that wouldn't have been worth shit without the big hats. They were both in their twenties, shirts open, straggly hair coming out of their hats. Not powerfully built young men--thank God--but that dirty mean type Bryan had been sending to Jackson for the past sixteen years. He would bet they had put in some hard time at Raiford or maybe a federal lockup. They wore pass-the-time tattoos on their arms, the coarse designs of prison artists.

One of them said, "Hey, lady . . ."

And Bryan thought, Here we go.

Angela was saying, "You have to be excited about what you're doing. If you don't have enthusiasm then your words are gonna just sit there. That's the problem I was getting into with Robbie. My angle was flat."

"Hey, lady, what're you doing with that old fart?"

Bryan looked at them now straight on. He might as well.

Angela said, "What? Are you talking to me?"

"You aren't married to him, are you?"

"Shit, he's too old for'r," the other one said.

"Come on over here, talk to us."Angela said, "Are you serious?"

Bryan liked her tone: quiet, matter-of-fact, but with a put-down edge to it.

The one cowboy raised and recrossed his rundown boots on the chair in front of him. He said, "What you want an old fart like him for? Can't even get it up."

"I like old farts," Angela said, a little more tense.

"Leave us alone."

"My, my, my, my," the first cowboy said. "you got a tongue, haven't you? Stick it out, let's see it."

The other cowboy said, "I got something she can tongue."

The first cowboy said, "What's the matter with your old man? He don't say nothing . . . Mister, you mind we take your girl out the van? You stay here, drink your beer."

Bryan edged out of the booth to stand up. He felt Angela's hand touch his arm.

"Bryan . . ."

"It's all right."

"Bry-an? That your name?" They thought it was pretty funny.

The second cowboy said, "Oh, Bry-an, Bryan . . . Where you going, Bryan? You nervous, gonna go take a piss?"

"He's gonna complain to the management," the first cowboy said. "We ain't doing nothing."

Angela watched the Hawaiian shirt cross to thehallway where a sign read Rest Rooms * Telephone. The two cowboys stared at her now. She looked past them. Bryan was gone. The waitress came over with napkins; she said, "Will there be anything else?" Angela told her no, just the check, please. The two cowboys stared at her.

One of them said, "Who's the guy you're with?"

"I don't believe this," Angela said.

"Where you staying?" the same one said now.

"We'll come visit . . . You like weed? What do you like? How 'bout ludes?" His tone was different: intimate, coaxing. "Get rid of the old man we'll see you later, have some fun."

Angela picked up a napkin and concentrated on wiping her hands.

"You tight with that fella? He don't look like he knows where it's at." A confiding tone. "Some guy you picked up? Girl, you can do way better'n that tourist. Where's he from--up north?"

The other one said, "He come down here in his motor home?"

Angela saw Bryan coming back now, taking his time. She watched him walk over to the waitress at the service section of the bar and stand there while she totaled their check. She watched him take money out and pay her, the waitress laughing at something he said as he waited for his change.

"Tell him you're going with us. What do you say?"Bryan was coming from the bar. Angela couldn't believe it: he was carrying a pitcher of beer.

"You don't want to tell him don't say nothing, we just walk out. The fuck can he do about it?"

She watched him come past their table to the booth. One of them said, "Well, here's Bry-an back, Hey, Bry-an, you thirsty? He must be thirsty."

Bryan said to her, "I'll see you outside." When she hesitated he said, "It's okay, I'll be right out."

He turned and placed the pitcher of beer on the table between the two cowboys. She was out of the booth now. She heard one of them say, "What's this?" And the other one say, "Trying to suck up, so he don't get hurt." She walked away from the booth. She saw the waitress watching. The waitress and a couple at the bar with serious expressions.

The juke box was playing a Willie Nelson piece, "On the Road Again." She looked back and saw Bryan standing above the two cowboys. He was watching and nodded to her. She continued on to the double-door entrance but that was as far as she was going. She saw Bryan turn to the two cowboys.

They were looking up at him with keen expressions at this point, curious, the fresh pitcher of beer between them.

Bryan said, "Can I sit down?" He took hold of the chair where crossed boots rested and pulled the chair out from under the boots, carefully, the cow-boy having no choice but to lower his feet to the floor. Bryan said, "Thank you," and sat down.

In a pleasant, normal tone he said, "Fellas, I'm down here on my vacation . . ."

He looked at their showdown stares waiting, those big, sweaty hard-rider hats pointing straight at him and he started over.

He said, "Fellas, let me put it another way," still with the nice tone. "I don't want to see either of you cocksuckers in my sight ever again. I'm telling you the truth. If I do, I'm gonna kick the shit out of you, sign a complaint you tried to assault me or sell me a controlled substance. Then I'm gonna see you get sent back to wherever you got those ugly fucking tattoos." He paused before getting up. "Are we of one mind on this?"

Angela watched him leave the table and cross toward her. She saw the two cowboys looking at each other, starting to move. Bryan didn't look back. He reached her, put a hand on her arm. Willie was still singing. She would remember that and remember going out the door into soft evening light and seeing the gumball on top of the squad car turning without sound, Gary Hammond coming out of the car.

Bryan said to him, "You got a stick?"

Gary said, "I got a flashlight."

Bryan said, "Let me have it."

Gary reached into the squad car. He tossed theflashlight underhand, arching it flat, the chrome catching light. Bryan swiped it out of the air the way you catch a baton and turned to stand squarely before the entrance to Chuck's Bar-B-Que Pit.

Angela was next to the car in the first parking place, looking at the back of Bryan's Hawaiian shirt. She saw one of the double doors bang open and saw Bryan step in and sidearm the flashlight at the first one out, slamming it into him to send his big hat flying and the cowboy stumbling back, grabbing hold of his head. She saw Bryan swipe the other one across the face and saw the flashlight come apart, batteries spilling out. She saw the two cowboys as though they were dancing, the one trying to hold up the one with blood on his face. Gary Hammond came past her, looking at Bryan cop-tocop, asking no questions, a hand behind him working the cuffs from the back of his belt.

Bryan said, "It's okay. It was a misunderstanding." He said to the cowboys, "That's right, isn't it?

You thought we were somebody else?"

They sat in the rented Buick and watched the yellow van pull out onto Federal Highway followed by the squad car. Angela let her breath out in a sigh.

Bryan lighted a cigarette and handed it to her.

She said, "You called Gary?"

"I had him radioed--talking fast." He said, "Did you learn anything?"

"I'm shaking.""But did you learn anything?"

She said, "For a quiet evening, go out with cops."

He said, "I didn't bring them. When you ask questions about people in that business they want to know who you are, look you over."

That brought her eyes open wide. "Those two work for Chichi?"

"Or somebody close to him," Bryan said. He started the car. "If it was me I'd fire them, get somebody can do the job."

In the night she said, "Does everybody have another person inside them?"

They had both been awake for some time, though not speaking. He said, "What if you saw me shoot someone?" And turned to see her staring at a shape on the ceiling, a reflection of the window.

"I've pictured that. I can understand that. Having to shoot somebody," Angela said. She was silent then.

He said, "But hitting the Miami cowboys seemed what? Vicious, unnecessary."

She remained silent.

He said, "Maybe it wasn't necessary. But I thought it was. I had to give them a reason to stay away from you while I'm gone." He felt her turn to him. "I want them to think about it and take theirtime and by then I'll be back. Unless you want to go with me."

Her head turned on the pillow, looking at him.

"You have to go home?"

"Annie called today. They've got a witness in the Curtis Moore shooting, but the guy's holding back, won't tell everything he knows."

"When're you going?"

"Tomorrow sometime. I want to talk to Walter first, if I can. Walter could be the key to the whole thing." There was a silence again. He felt alone: the same feeling he'd had when she told him she was going to Tucson, the feeling of losing her. He wished she would say something without having to ask her a question first.

He said, "With the two cowboys--maybe I was showing off a little, too."

After a few moments she said, "Maybe I can help you with Walter." Giving him something, but not as much as he wanted.

WHEN BRYAN CALLED Walter's wife in West Palm, Irene Kouza said, "Walter? Walter who? I don't know anybody by that name."

Bryan said, "Mrs. Kouza, we met at Lieutenant Daugherty's retirement dinner at Carl's about three years ago."

She asked him if he was down here on vacation.

He said yes. Was he having a good time? Yes, a very nice time. She said, then what did he want to talk to Walter for and spoil it? She was way ahead of him and it took Bryan the first couple of minutes to realize it.

Bryan said, while he was down here he was hoping he could stop in and see Walter, say hello. Irene Kouza said both their daughters were down with their husbands on vacation and Mr. Big Shot hadn't even bothered to call yet, her dry tone becoming abrasively cute. Anybody who wanted to talk to Mr. Big Shot had to call over there to the beach and leave their name. She began telling Bryan the costof lawn service for the tiny yard they had, seventyfive dollars to trim a hedge because Mr. Big Shot didn't have time no more, he was too busy--and Bryan got off the line as quickly as he could without sounding rude, feeling like he'd made an escape.

The idea had been to catch Walter at home or arrange to meet him there: try to pry open the old Walter in a familiar setting. But Walter was staying clear of West Palm. Bryan had seen it before. A man able to kill other men, but scared to death of his wife.

Angela said, "Let me try something."

She called Walter at the Daniels place and invited him to lunch. She needed a little help with the piece she was doing on Robbie Daniels, an insider's view of how rich people lived. Walter said, certainly.

She said to Bryan, "Charley's Crab at noon. See?

You need me."

That was all it took. He felt inspired again.

A light blue suit coat straining, stretched across heavy shoulders--there he was, hunched over the bar with his shot and a beer and a pack of Camels.

Bryan said, "Like getting ready for the second shift, Dodge Main."

Walter turned to him, pompadour rising. "The fuck you want?"

"Angela's gonna be a little late. I told her I'd buyyou a drink." It was ten to twelve. Bryan watched the bartender, good-looking young guy, serving customers on the other side of the bar pen, giving them draft beers to go with buckets of clams. The hostess was seating others in the near room among planters and plain-wood decor where young girls in black vests took over with smiles. Everything nice on a sunny day in season.

"Walter, what's he want to shoot somebody for?"

"You talking about?"

"He gave me the same routine he gave you. He shows me the guns, he says Walter took one look--he goes, 'What're you gonna do, invade Cuba?' "

"Guy's a collector, he likes guns," Walter finished the bottom of his shot and picked up the glass of beer. He said to the bartender, "Hey, buddy, do it again."

Bryan ordered a draft. He waited for it to be placed in front of him, gave Walter time to pick up the new shot and sip off half of it.

"He's got some beauties. His gun collection."

Walter salted his beer and pushed the shaker toward Bryan.

"He showed me the Python he used on the guy that broke in." Walter didn't comment. "What I can't figure out," Bryan said, "is how you can have all that money, can do anything you want and stillbe bored. Christ, we'd think of something to do with it. You imagine?"