Dale sat down on the ancient swivel chair and stared at the clock. Some things he couldn’t tidy up by being methodical. Like the weather. He picked up the remote and thumbed on the TV. He’d been tuned in to the Weather Channel exclusively for the last week.
Rain was bad for the equipment business.
He waited through a commercial and then watched Heather Tesch stand in front of a map of the United States. Behind her, a straggling green amoeba of precipitation crept across North Dakota, Minnesota, and into Wisconsin. Low pressure squatted on the Midwest, fed by a warm front coming from the Gulf.
The Gulf air drove the jet stream into a coil up and into the North, disrupting the normal pattern. Where the hot Gulf air and cool stuff from Canada collided it was raining like hell. In the wake of the storms, the fields were green sponges.
At least the thunderstorms had moved on through Minnesota and Wisconsin and were petering out along Lake Michigan. It caused delays. Even the biggest crawlers were stymied by mud.
But he’d used up all his waiting sitting behind this desk, sifting through these files. When he started working for his dad he’d had an electric typewriter and a rotary phone. Dad never really trusted him on the big iron; that was Ace’s job, running the machines. Dad put Dale in the office. When he started he’d filled legal pads with his crisp penmanship-Palmer Method-drilled into him at Langdon Elementary in the second grade by flat-chested Miss Heidi Klunder, with skin like oatmeal and skinny blond hair.
Not like Ginny Weller.
That was ten years ago and he could still hear Ginny’s voice like it was right now, like in an echo chamber; still feel the tease of her lips, her moist warm breath against his ear. “C’mon Dale baby, we’re all alone, just you and me. Just be a minute and I’ll give you a feel…”
He dropped his eyes to the computer screen, clicked through the invoices. He tried to avoid looking at the clock on the wall. But in the right-hand corner of the blue bar at the bottom of the screen the digital time stared at him.
Once he had endured time like everybody else. Now he felt it gushing like a Niagara of digital code through his chest. He tried to get his mind around numbers; tried to imagine a million people going about their lives, all of them taking time for granted. None of them knowing for sure how many days, minutes, hours, seconds…
He laughed. Christ, there weren’t a million people in all of North Dakota.
Then, vividly, he pictured the tape hidden in the kitchen pantry, in a box of Fruit Loops. He moved the tape every day to a different hidey-hole.
Thinking about the tape stopped his breath. He almost gasped. The tumescent squirm of anticipation was like the petals of a flower opening deep inside. Gave him shivers.
For years, down in his basement apartment, alone, he’d fanta-sized the image of Ginny Weller down on her knees, begging him not to punish her for what she’d-
The bell on the front door jingled and Gordy Riker strolled in looking very pleased with himself. The image of Ginny vanished. Gordy had an elbow raised and was conspicuously sucking on the knuckles of his right hand.
“Hey, Needle-Dick, we gotta talk.” Gordy bouncy, full of himself, jerked his thick neck back across the road.
“Don’t call me that,” Dale said calmly.
Gordy mugged surprise at Dale’s controlled response. It only slowed him for a few beats. “Okay, sure, I’m sorry. Don’t mean to offend. But the thing is, you gotta talk to Ace.”
“I heard about the woman, and I just saw you hit that guy.”
“You see me put him on his ass with one punch? He’s bigger’n me, too.”
“Who is he?” Dale said.
“Bitch’s husband, she says.” Gordy furrowed his brow.
“What do you mean, ‘she says’?” Dale said.
“Kinda coincidental, don’t you think? She shows up in a bar hardly nobody goes to, on a highway hardly nobody who ain’t local uses,” Gordy said.
“So?”
“And she’s traveling with the only lesbian ever seen north of Grand Forks.”
Dale perked up, went to the window, and stared across the highway at the bar. “A lesbian? Here? No shit.” Now that would be something.
“What I’m saying is, it’s too coincidental. Nobody comes to Langdon except…”
“Yeah, yeah, for weddings, funerals, or unless their job sends them here,” Dale said. He smiled at Gordy’s consternation. “So you think she’s working, huh?” If Gordy was worried, it could only be about one thing. “Some kind of snitch? Cop maybe?”
Gordy shrugged. “Maybe the Canadian excise people are bitching about the whiskey again.”
Dale’s smile broadened, enjoying Gordy’s discomfort. “Ace don’t ship that much. It’s the meth has everybody riled. More likely she’s after you.”
Gordy was not amused. “Ha ha. But that ain’t the point. Ace’s thinking with his pecker. I mean, c’mon, at the very least she’s a lush. And he’s drinking.”
“Think of that: the two of them shacked up in the back room. They’ll drink up the inventory.”
“I’m serious here. They catch him driving and drinking one more time, he’ll be eating takeout pizza in county. Walking the halls for exercise, on one cigarette a day.”
Dale shrugged fatalistically. “It’s because of Darlene and the kids leaving. The divorce.” He made a sympathetic assay with his flat blue eyes. But behind his expression he hid a swell of satisfaction. Ace was finally falling back to earth in flaming, whiskey-soaked pieces, spiraling so low he was almost taking orders from this piece of shit, Gordy, who’d had a D average, who had to go to summer school to graduate. Who had to get special permission from the principal to go on the Senior Trip.
“So what do you say? Have a talk with him.”
Dale nodded without enthusiasm. “He don’t listen to me, you know.”
“At least try.”
“Okay. I’ll talk to him.”
Gordy nodded, looked around. “So, ah, where’s our favorite funny fucking Indian?”
Dale settled back into his desk chair and took his time reaching into the refrigerator, taking out a Coke, popping the top. Gordy called Joe Reed the “funny fucking Indian” because Joe had this very un-Indian habit, according to Gordy, anyway, of always being strictly on time.
So that’s why he’s here. He wants Joe back. Dale jerked his head north. “Went over the border yesterday. Don’t know why. He don’t exactly leave detailed trip tickets. Guy like Joe, I don’t really want to know.”
“I hear you. Well, when he gets his sneaky blanket ass back here, tell him to drop by and talk to me,” Gordy said.
“You ain’t got the balls to say that to his face,” Dale said.
They stared each other down. Gordy broke first, laughed, and said, “You’re absolutely right. But like I said, ask him polite to drop by.”
“I don’t think he’s into running your dope across the border anymore, Gordy,” Dale said.
“Yeah, right. He’s got such a future here, huh?”
“Hey.” Dale brightened. “I just sold off two of my last three machines, Irv Fuller bought ’em. He’s in the big time now. Got that construction outfit outside the Twin Cities, just won the bid on a big job.”
“Irv Fuller.” Gordy made a face.
“Yeah, Irv Fuller,” Dale said. Irv had been Homecoming King. And Ginny Weller had been Homecoming Queen.
“Did Irv pay you?”
“Put some money down,” Dale said.
“That’s Irv. Be twenty years getting the balance.”
Dale shrugged. “Oh, I don’t know. I gotta feeling this deal is going to work out for me.”
“Yeah, right. So whattaya say, talk to Ace, will you?”
“I told you. I’ll try.”
“Good. So, ah, what are you going to do?”
“Sell off the last machine and lock the door. You know anybody needs a cheap 644 front-end loader?”