The lot was loaded with cars, but we found an empty space with some big shot’s name written on the curb. We parked in that slot like it was ours and we were proud to be there.
The secretary was thin, young, silver-blond, and so goddamn cheery I wanted to strangle her. We told her we would like to see King Arthur, and she told us he was out. We asked to see someone in charge, and after twenty minutes in the guest chairs, the skimming of several stimulating magazines on the chili business, a nice-looking man about fifty with shiny gray hair came out. He was dressed in a plum-purple leisure suit with a white belt and white shoes. The leisure suit looked brand-new, and this baffled me. They had quit making those horrors years ago. It pointed to the scary proposition that this guy liked those fuckers so much he had them special-made. In my eyes he was already guilty of something, if nothing more than being a public eyesore.
He came over, shook our hands, told us his name was G. H. Bissinggame, and we told him ours. He asked us what he could do for us. I told him about Raul, how he used to cut King Arthur’s hair, told him about Raul’s murder, said we were curious about his death.
Leonard said, “We’re kind of poking around, nothing official. We wanted to know if King Arthur could tell us anything about Raul might help us figure out who killed him.”
Bissinggame furrowed his brow. “Why would Mr. Arthur know such a thing? Isn’t this a matter for the police?”
“We’re not saying he knows anything directly,” I said. “We’d just like to talk to him. Something Raul might have said, anything might give us a lead.”
“Why would he say anything to Mr. Arthur?” Bissinggame said. “Mr. Arthur was a customer, not the boy’s therapist.”
“Then you knew Raul?” Leonard asked.
“No.”
“Then how did you know he was young?” Leonard said. “You called him a boy.”
“Whoa, here,” Bissinggame said. “You’re being a little nasty. You’re trying to tie me into something, way you talk. You’re not the law. You don’t have the right to do that, and I’m sure there’s no need for Mr. Arthur to talk to you.”
“I just asked if you knew him,” Leonard said.
“No, you didn’t,” Bissinggame said.
“You’re right,” I said. “Leonard, here, he and Raul were very close. He’s a little touchy.”
“I apologize,” Leonard said, but with his tone of voice he might as well have gone on and called Bissinggame an asshole.
“Could you do this?” I asked. “Could we write down our names, phone numbers, and could you ask Mr. Arthur to call? We’re trying to help out the family, sort of piece things together for them. You know, last bits of information about their son.”
“You said you were trying to find leads to the murder,” Bissinggame said.
“That too,” I said.
“I’ll tell you now,” Bissinggame said. “Mr. Arthur, he doesn’t return calls. That’s why he has a secretary, and this Raul, I recognize who he is because Mr. Arthur often conducted business while getting his hair cut here at the plant. But I didn’t really know the boy. Mr. Arthur said very little to him, as I recall.”
“Let me ask this,” Leonard said. “What if Raul had a King Arthur Chili pad, and inside the pad there were some letters written down that coincided with phone numbers, and say these phone numbers connected with video stores, and say me and Hap had the pad and a couple videos, would that interest Mr. Arthur?”
Bissinggame looked at Leonard as if he had just swung in on a vine. “What?”
“Never mind,” Leonard said.
“You need a lesson in manners,” Bissinggame said to Leonard.
“You gonna give it to me?” Leonard said. “A man wearing a fuckin’ purple leisure suit is the one needs manners. Don’t you know shit like that offends everyone?”
“Come on, Leonard,” I said.
“I’m going to call security, you don’t leave right now,” Bissinggame said. “Our security people, they aren’t a bunch of fat cops. They don’t mess around.”
“Come on, Leonard,” I said.
“Security?” Leonard said. “Now I’m scared. What kind of leisure suits they wear? Lime green? Peach? You had on one of them peach kind, I’d have to hit you.”
“We’re going,” I said.
“Best do,” Bissinggame said. “Helen,” he yelled to the secretary. “Call security.”
Helen picked up the phone. I took Leonard’s elbow and led him out of there. As we went down the corridor toward the exit, I said, “Shit, Leonard. I can’t take you anywhere. Next time, you stay your ass in the car.”
“I bet that dick’s got on spotted boxer shorts,” Leonard said. “Man, them leisure suits, they’re a crime against humanity.”
“Well, you’re right about that.”
“Guy like that, way he defends his boss, I bet he’s got naked pictures of ole Chili King doing the ass end of a dead beef. Pins that to his mirror while he whacks off with his dick poking out of that leisure suit. Know what I’m sayin’?”
“I got you.”
“Fucker would give a snake a blow job, it wore a leisure suit.”
“Give it a rest, Leonard.”
“Cocksucker,” Leonard said. “Hope he gets a bowl of bad chili. Probably likes it that way, strained through his goddamn shit-stained underwear.”
“Careful. You start talking bad about chili, Texas is sure to be next. And you know well as I do that’s not good.”
“You’re right,” Leonard said. “I stepped over the line.”
We had just gone out the door when a white car with KING ARTHUR CHILI written on the side of it parked in the middle of the lot and two guys in green uniforms with badges and no guns came over and stood in front of us. One of them was about the size of a moose, and the other may well have been a moose without antlers.
“We got a call you two were causing trouble,” said the real moose. He was chewing on an unlit cigar as casually as a cow chewing cud. The other guy, the one the size of a moose, had an expression about as illuminating as a potted plant, but lacking the warmth. He could have been thinking about mayhem and murder, lunch break and a cigarette, sex or a gerbil up his ass. That face gave nothing away.
“How you know it’s us?” Leonard said.
Moose grinned. “They said a white guy and a black guy.”
“Yeah,” Leonard said. “How do you know you ain’t got the wrong black and white guy?”
Not A Moose said, “Because they said the nigger had a smart mouth. You’re a nigger. You got a smart mouth.”
“Now you’ve done it,” I said.
“What?” Moose said.
“I said now you’ve done it.”
“What the fuck’s that mean?” Moose said.
“It means,” Leonard said, “I’m in the mood to snap your dick off and shove it in your ear. Who you think you’re connin’? You ain’t even real law. Guys like you, we wipe our asses on you.”
“Daily,” I said.
“Yeah,” Leonard said. “Daily.”
“Sometimes twice a day,” I said.
“That too,” Leonard said.
“Yeah,” Moose said, and his hand went to his back pocket and came back wearing a pair of brass knuckles.
Leonard said “Asswipe!,” stomped the guard’s foot, grabbed the hand with the knucks on it, swung under the guy’s arm, then with a palm on the fucker’s elbow snapped him to the cement, bouncing his head off of it, smashing his cigar into his face.
Not A Moose rushed forward then, about to grab Leonard. I kicked him in the leg, just above the ankle, stuck my thumb in his eye. He let out a yell and sat down in the parking lot, both hands over his face.
“I’m blind! I’m blind!” he yelled.
“Are not,” I said.
“I can’t see!”
“Take your hands off your face, you ignorant motherfucker,” I said.
As Not A Moose experimented with his vision, I turned to watch Leonard. Leonard peeled the brass knucks off Moose’s hand and tossed them on top of the chili building, said, “Fetch that, dick cheese.”
Dick Cheese, also known as Moose, came up on one knee and stayed there. He wouldn’t even look at us. He let the mashed cigar fall from his lips as if he were shedding a tooth.