The Art of Disposal (33 page)

I dunked the razor into the half-filled sink, shook it furiously through the water and watched the foam and stubble float around like a pepper cream sauce.

And there I was again, in the mirror, but looking a little bit younger. I had sad eyes. I wondered if I always looked that way to other people, or if it was just now, in the bad light of my cheap motel room. I wiped my face a few times, rinsed out the sink, and flopped down on the bed. I dug out the second Modelo, which had been chilling in the trash can that I'd filled with ice.

There is no colder beer in the world than one that you've sunk into a tiny motel trash can and covered with motel ice-machine cubes. I cracked that second one open, and it almost hurt going down it was so cold and dry. I flipped channels and caught an old Honeymooners episode, the one where Ralph appears on a television Quiz Show and flubs the “Swanee River” question.

I got up and checked the locks on the door, and I tilted a chair under the doorknob for good measure, and then I peeked out the window at the herd of sleeping RVs that lived in a lot alongside the back of the motel. I made sure my Beretta and Walther were both loaded and ready to go, and I screwed the suppressor onto the Walther and tapped at the brass-catcher and wondered how many warranties Dan the Man had voided with that very same gun.

I turned off the television and clicked off the lights.

Ah, sweet dreams. Maybe it was the two cans of beer, maybe not. But I was taken away to a green and misty jungle with only the steady chatter of bugs and treefrogs, and the occasional cry of a happy bird.

There I was alone. I looked behind me, and a stocky elephant, short, built for the forest, was approaching. The elephant stopped and I climbed onto its back. Off we went, lumbering along through the hot damp air, huge teardrop leaves brushing over my face.

Ahead of us, at the side of the narrow trail, a young kid walked with his back to us. How familiar he was.

As we passed, he looked up. The kid was me. The elephant stopped, the kid reached up for me. I grabbed his hand—my hand—and pulled him up. Together we rode off, into the darkest parts of the tropical jungle, my heart in a state of utter peace and joy.

Then a great mechanical belching woke me, and I started out of bed, fairly upset at having to leave my younger self and the elephant behind in the land of pleasant dreams.

I pulled the curtain from the window. A few of the RVs had woken up before me, and were idling, or pushing up the slope in first gear. They looked so ugly compared to that elephant.

I killed three hours. Then I put on a good suit and tie.

Eddie spends Saturdays putzing around the house, or maybe he takes a fishing rod and drives over to the spot where the river runs past the old textile factory. He casts his line and props the rod up in the crook of good Y-shaped stick. Then he smokes a cigar and watches the train trestle across the way, and sometimes peeks at his tall yellow bobber out there in the ripples to make sure it hasn't gone under.

I parked at the turn-out, and I loosened my tie a little. It was getting hot. My Walther was in my shoulder-holster under my sport-coat, and as I walked down the trail toward the river, the gun shifted a bit with every step and kept reminding me how it was there.

I could smell the cigar smoke before I ever saw Eddie. He sat on a fold-out camping chair, and he wore a floppy gardening hat. I stood for a minute and watched him watch those train tracks on the other side of the river. A few ducks flew by, and his head turned to follow their progress. Then he puffed on his cigar.

“Eddie,” I said.

He swiveled halfway around. “Hey, Champ.”

“They bitin'?” I said.

“Too hot I guess.”

“What kind do you get on a good day?”

“Oh, Sunfish. Perch. If you was to go deep, with a sinker and a triple hook, you might get you a nice catfish or two, but I wouldn't eat 'em. Not anymore.”

I walked down the bank, over a few tree roots, and out onto the little sandbar where Eddie sat. I stood there right next to him, but I didn't look at him. I stared over at the empty train trestle.

“Figured I'd come out here today,” Eddie said. “Keep this away from Irene. She don't need to know about it.”

There was a nice sized stone in front of Eddie, half sunk in the river, half on shore, so I walked over to it and sat down on it, facing Eddie.

I took the Walther out of its holster, and I held it in my lap.

Eddie smiled. “What's with the suit?”

“Got a job to do.”

“Dress for success,” Eddie said.

I watched the edge of the river bite at the base of the stone.

“I like you, Eddie.”

“I like you too, Champ.”

“But it's not about likes or dislikes—that's what Dan the Man taught me.”

“He was right,” Eddie said. “Put it in the back of my head, while I'm looking at the river.”

The bright green and white ducks flew over again, chattering and honking, and they glided down at an angle and skidded across the water far out in the middle of the river, sending up a glassy spray.

“Remember these?” I said, pulling out Ricky Cervetti's black gloves.

“Ricky,” Eddie said. “That was tough, but it was business. This right here, what you gotta do right now, this is business too. And I don't hate you for it.”

I put the gloves on. “I don't want to kill you, Eddie. Not unless I have to.”

He puffed a few times, then he placed the cigar on top of his tackle box, and he got out of his chair and picked up the fishing rod. He reeled it in, and looked at the glistening line and silver hook.

“Those bastards stole my worm,” he said. He opened a Styrofoam cup full of redworms, and he threaded a worm onto the hook. I watched it squirm and fight against its spiny doom. Then Eddie tossed the line back into the river, and put the rod back into the crook of the half-buried stick.

“You heard of a guy named Jack Lomand?” I said.

“Why's that?”

“I've seen him around.”

Eddie sat down. Puffed the cigar. His hand shook, and his face turned white.

“Who is he?” I said.

“A killer. He's a goddamn nightmare is what he is. But I doubt you seen him. He ain't done any work since the old days.”

“I think Frank sent him here to watch me and Carlino. If I don't finish this job, I think Jack Lomand will. Me included. What would you do Eddie, if I was you and you were me?”

Eddie untied and retied his shoelaces. He looked at the train trestle. He looked at the yellow bobber, bobbing. Then he looked at me.

“I ain't so nice as you, Champ.”

“Leave town,” I said. “Tonight.”

Eddie tapped the cigar. A huge ash fell off and blew away in the wind.

“You're putting me in a hell of a spot, Eddie.”

“Jack Lomand,” Eddie said, like he was staring at a twenty foot long crocodile.

I gripped the suppressor, unscrewed it a little, and tightened it up again. The metal squeaked. I raised the gun and I aimed it right at Eddie's face, just like I'd rehearsed it in my mind a hundred times the night before.

“What's it going to be?” I said, staring down the barrel.

Eddie looked ridiculous in that floppy hat.

“Give me twenty minutes to finish this,” he said, and held up the cigar. “It'd be a crime to waste a Padrón.”

“I mean it, Eddie.”

“Where am I s'posed to go?”

“South.”

“South?” Eddie said.

“Sport fishing.”

“Sunshine. Bocce ball. Broads,” Eddie said, looking up through the leaves of the trees, imagining his retirement.

“A quiet life,” I said.

“That don't exist, Champ. Not for guys like us.”

The sun hit the river just right and made it shine like chrome. I was getting tired, keeping that Walther leveled right at Eddie's face.

“What do I tell Irene?” Eddie said. “She's got a quilt she's been working on for the local church. It's almost finished.”

“Stay, then. Dante can use it to wrap the two of you up.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Eddie said.

“Get gone by dinner time. I'm at the Moonbeam Motel. Stop by and let me know you're packed and on your way.”

“Forced into early retirement,” Eddie said. “Running like a coward.”

I pointed at the Walther. “It beats the hell out of this.”

I stood up and dusted off the backside of my pants. I put the Walther back in my shoulder-holster, and I watched Eddie pick up his stainless steel thermos, unscrew the cap, and pour a cup of steaming coffee into it. He took a sip. Then he set the cup down quick, and jerked up out of his chair and grabbed his fishing rod. The bobber had gone under. He snapped the rod back to set the hook, and then he started reeling the line in. I rushed over and watched the taut line zig back and forth, pulled by an unseen force below the green surface of the river.

Then you could sort of make out the shape of the small fish, about the size of a child's hand. It shined like a mirror sometimes, when it rolled just so.

Then it was out of the water, and Eddie was gripping the fish in his left hand, and working the hook out with his right.

“Sunfish,” I said.

“Pumpkinseed,” Eddie said.

“Same thing.”

“Goddamn it,” Eddie said, “he's hooked in the throat.”

He took a pair of crusty pliers from his tackle box, gripped the eye-end of the hook with them, and rocked it back and forth. You could hear a wet crunch when the hook tore out.

Eddie tossed the little sunfish back into the shallow water, where it promptly tried to swim away. All it could do, however, was turn in lazy circles at the surface of the water, leaving ribbons of blood that the river carried away.

“That ain't right,” Eddie said. “I hate to hook 'em in the throat.”

I took the Walther out again, and I triggered the gun and sent an almost silent bullet right through the sunfish. It drifted away like a unmanned silver boat.

“He's in a better place,” I said, and put the gun away.

Eddie looked at me. I looked at Eddie. I reached out my hand. Eddie took it. We shook hands, and I patted Eddie's back. “You take care of yourself,” I said.

“You too, Champ.”

I walked back up the trail, got into my car, and drove away—wondering what would come next; wondering what I'd tell Frank Conese; wondering if I'd ever find the light at the end of this tunnel.

The afternoon dragged. I flipped channels, or stood at the motel window and watched old men roll down awnings on the sides of the RVs that they parked in the overnight spots. The sky was smoky and streaked with dirty orange, like there were fires and cannons and musket blasts somewhere, a phantom Civil War battle perhaps, on some distant hill beyond the tangled trees.

I called Eddie's land-line. No answer.

It's weird how you'll tell yourself that something is one way when you know it's another. Maybe Eddie's still loading up his car. Maybe Irene wanted to drop off that half-finished quilt. Maybe they hit some traffic, or had a fender-bender, and Eddie's filling out a form and schmoozing one of Greedy Pete's buddies.

Yeah, you tell yourself that kind of stuff, but all the while the real you is back there in the fog of your mind, holding up both arms and waving them around. I paced. I tried to do a crossword. I drank a can of ginger ale. My fingers were thin and cold; nothing but skin-covered bones.

I dialed up Eddie's land-line again, and I imagined him answering and saying
what is it Champ?
and me saying, aren't you on the road yet Boss?

But it rang and rang.

So I dialed up his pay-as-you-go cell phone number, and that's something you never do; not unless you want Eddie's foot up your ass. That number is for major emergencies only. Say your leg gets caught in a bear-trap, and you're all alone in the snowy woods, at night, with wolves howling like faraway ghosts. Even then you don't call Eddie's pay-as-you-go phone. He'd just tell you to man up, pull some snow around yourself to keep warm through the night, quit your whining, and what kind of dummy steps on a bear-trap anyway?

I gave it a ring. No answer. I sat on the edge of the bed and let this nasty worm of paranoia eat its way through my brain. It felt like the whole floor, the whole room, dropped twenty feet and pulled me down with it. What if Carlino was double-crossing me? Maybe even Bullfrog. Maybe they already killed Eddie, and they were waiting to get me, too. I put the phone down. I went to the window and watched an old man walk a hound-dog, back and forth, back and forth, as the dog looked for just the right spot to hunch its back and do its business.

I got my gun.

I drove to the office, but I parked far away, down a side street, and walked along the river path, head down, my hands in my pockets, feeling like a guy who's about to pull a B&E in a quiet neighborhood.

Someone had jimmied the office door. It was two inches open, and the wood near the lock was gouged out. I pushed the door, and it creaked and whined, and it felt like the whole office exhaled a cool mollified sigh. I could hear the air conditioner running. It was as cold as January in there.

“Eddie,” I called out.

No answer. I pulled the Walther from my shoulder holster.

I could hear the aquarium filter turning, kah-rum, kah-rum, kah-rum. I clicked on the main light in the room.

“Eddie,” I said. “You here?”

No answer.

I walked over to the aquarium and turned on its long fluorescent light. The angelfish were dead, and they floated and danced along the top of the water, and were then pulled under and spit back up again, like corpses in the irresistible current at the base of a dam.

I saw a square tin can sitting on the table, crushed and dented. Lighter fluid. Lighter fluid for Eddie's fancy cigar lighter. Some heartless bastard had squeezed the contents of that can right into the aquarium. My beautiful angelfish had suffered a cramped chemical death.

When I left the office, birds were chirping their drowsy bedtime songs and owl-eyed moths were waking up for the night shift. Families were finishing up their strolls along the river as the smeared sun gradually fell to the other side of the earth. I nodded to a woman and her small boy, who were throwing bread chunks to a vocally grateful crew of ducks and geese at the water's edge. As I passed them, I heard the boy laughing; his Mom saying, “don't stand so close to the water, it's getting dark, it's time to go home now.” There were tiny stars of light: the distant windows of people living better lives.