The Last Good Kiss (53 page)
"I hope it was worth it," I said, then stood up and
went back out into the hallway to pick up my jailer.
That afternoon as I drove out of town, Sheriff Roy
followed on the tail of my El Camino. He flashed his
287
headlights at me, then when I wouldn't stop, switched
on his spinning blue lights. I didn't even slow down, not
even when he opened up his siren, and ten miles out of
town, he cut it all off and left me alone. When he
stopped to tum around, I stopped too and backed up.
We both climbed out and met midway between our
cars.
"You got a lot of guts, boy," he said.
"And you've got a lot of gall," I answered.
"I just didn't want you making the mistake of coming
back up here to straighten things out," he said.
"What things?"
"Person or persons unknown," he said. "Leave it at
that."
"They paid me more than you," I said, then headed
back toward my pickup.
"They didn't pay me nothing," he claimed behind
me, and I believed him.
In jail, I had missed the funerals, but when I got to
California, I saw the graves. Betty Sue had been buried
between her brothers in one of those modem, tasteful cemeteries, nothing but lawn and flat stones. It keeps the upkeep down. They can mow right over
the headstones. Right over the rotting meat. Oney
and Lester had dug right through the concrete and
buried Fireball in front of the doorway of Rosie's
place, then poured a new concrete plug upon which
his name and dates were scrawled in a drunken
scribble.
The afternoon I got to Sonoma, Rosie and I were
sitting on the front steps, looking at his grave, Lester
and Oney flanking us with the beers I had bought them.
"You boys go on inside," she said, and they did. "I
thank you for all your trouble," she said.
"I'm sorry," I said.
"At least I saw her that once," she said, "and that's
288
better than nothing. " Then she paused to hit on her
beer bottle. "She told me about . . . about everything,
" she said softly, "but l just don't understand why they
had to kill her. She would've paid the money back, you
know that, or if they could've waited, her husband
would've paid it-he told me that when he came down
with the body-they didn't have to kill her. "
"No," I said.
Then she turned to me, saying, "I don't reckon I
could hire you again to . . . to take care of those
people out in Denver . . . would you?"
"No," I said, "you couldn't hire me, and it wouldn't
do any good anyway."
"The man who killed her, he probably didn't even
know . . . didn't even know her . . . didn't even know
why . . .
" she stammered, then dropped her head into
her arms.
"That's right," I said, letting her think it had been
that way.
"I won't cry yet," she said as she lifted her head
quickly.
"Will you do me a favor?" I asked.
"What's that?"
"I've got some of Betty Sue's money," I said, "and
I know she'd want you to have it." I dug the
five thousand out of my hip pocket and handed it to
her. I had already sent Torres his money. If he was
afraid to cash the check, that was his problem. "Why
don't you get on an airplane and go to Hawaii or
some goddamned place? I could run the place for
you. "
"That's too much to ask," she said as she slapped the
sheaf of bills against her thigh.
"Do it," I said, sounding angrier than I meant to.
"You sure?" she asked.
"Dead sure."
289
"I'd rather fly back to Oklahoma to see some of my
kin," she said quietly.
"Stay as long as you like," I said, and finally Rosie
turned loose the tears. When she stopped, she went
back to the trailer to pack, and Lester and Oney used
my pickup to take her over to San Francisco and the
airport.
While she was gone, I tended the bar, ran the place,
and spent my days waiting for him to show up.
It took him a week, but finally, on a Thursday
afternoon, Trahearne showed up, rolling through the
front door like a drunken bear. He paused long enough
to exchange boozy condolences with Lester and Oney,
then he ambled back to the far end of the bar, where I
waited. As he shuffled onto a stool, I walked back down
the bar, cracked two beers for the boys and a third for
the old man.
"How you doing, boy?" he said as I sat it in front of
him.
"Better than you, old man," I said.
"How's that?"
"My conscience is clear."
"Yeah, I know," he mumbled. "If I hadn't been so
broke, none of this would've happened. That Hyland
son of a bitch!"
"Who?"
"Hyland," he answered. "That son of bitch down in
Denver. "
"He was dead when we left the house," I said.
Trahearne didn't say anything for a moment,
then he said, "You don't know that. He might have
talked his way out of it or something. You don't know
that."
"I saw the body, old man."
"Then it must have been that big ugly son of bitch,"
he said.
290
"It was a big ugly son of a bitch," I said, "but he
didn't have the guts to pull the trigger."
"What's that?"
"He got his ex-wife to pull the trigger," I said.
"I don't understand," he said.
"She pulled the trigger," I said, "but you put the gun
in her hand. And all for nothing, old man. Betty Sue
was gone, already gone. "
"Oh, come on, boy, you've got t o b e kidding,"
Trahearne said, then laughed hollowly. "Let me buy
you a beer, boy, before I take off? I've got to get home,
you know, get back to the old desk. Like you said, I've
been standing too far from it. So get yourself a beer,
boy."
"Go home," I said as I jerked his bottle out of his
hand. "Get your ass home, old man."
"Come on, boy, gimme my beer," he whined.
I threw it on the duckboards beside me.
"Okay, if you feel that way, boy, I'll take off," he
said.
"When you get home," I said, "I want you to do me
a favor."
"What's that?" he asked as he stood up, drawing
himself up like a wounded man.
"Wait for me. "
" I don't know what you mean," he said, confused,
rolling his head.
"Go home and wait for me," I said. "I've got a brand
new elk rifle, a 7rnm magnum, old man, and some
afternoon, some afternoon, you're going to step out on
your front deck after a day of scribble, scribble,
scribble , and I'm going to put a 175-grain hunk of lead
right through your gut. "
"Always with the jokes, Sughrue," h e said as he
stumbled back from the bar.
"Go horne, old man," I said, "go home and wait for
me and try to work, old man."
291
"Come on," the big man pleaded as he banged into
the pool table.
"You're dead," I said. "Go home before you start to
stink."
I guess he did. The last I saw of him, he was hurrying
out of Rosie's place, stumbling over Fireball's grave.
292