That was the whole trouble with my theory right then. I was sure it would make a splash, but without more evidence to give it buoyancy I was just as sure it would sink like a rock.
15
The next day was like the day before. No problems, smooth as oil. That was the day. The night was something else.
I was working my stand and getting a good Saturday night play and my mind was as innocently blank as a two-year-old's. Then an arrow-paced whistle went by me and I glanced over at Gabby. When he saw me look he gave a slight nod with his head and I looked around and saw a couple of bad news birds coming my way.
I swept up my walnut shells and said, "That's all for now, folks. The hawks are about."
The two hard characters waited till my marks drifted off- which was considerate of them, I thought-and then one of them stepped up and drew his wallet and flashed a badge at me.
"Mr. Thaxton? Lieutenant Ferris wants to see you."
"Only two of you this time?" I said. "The rest of the storm troop on holiday?"
The man with the badge put his wallet away and said, "Let's make a deal, Mr. Thaxton. You don't make with the tired funnies and we won't tell you to keep your big mouth shut."
They were somewhat on the new breed pattern but not quite. The one who had flashed the buzzer was of medium height, spare built-a thin-faced dark man giving the impression of a steel hardness not wholly physical. I classified him as a tough baby.
The other one was maybe twenty-three. He had fair wavy hair like a halo over a youthful, almost girlish face. There was something a little wrong with his baby blue eyes and with the tense way he grinned at me.
"Has another body been found?" I asked, smiling.
"Ask me no questions, Mr. Thaxton, and I'll tell you no lies," the thin-faced man said. "Shall we go?"
It wasn't really a question. I shrugged at Gabby and the three of us walked out of the sideshow.
I started to turn south once we reached the hub of the central garden, thinking we would go on over to the bunk-house. But the thin-faced man took me by the elbow, lightly, and said,"No. We're going to headquarters."
Something was out of stride. I didn't know what and I didn't like what I didn't know. But I said nothing.
We went through the main gate. The parking lot was well lighted and I expected to see a squad car waiting in front but there was none. There were only two or three thousand cars parked out there.
We walked along the north drag until we came to aisle 10 and we turned down that and walked some more. Nobody said anything and every time I looked the pansy faced guy on my left was grinning the same tight, plastic grin.
I'm not simple-just slow. I started to lag my pace.
"Uh-maybe I better have another peek at your buzzer," I suggested to the thin-faced man.
He took me by the arm again.
"Let's not have any trouble, Mr. Thaxton," he said levelly.
"Naw," Pansy-face spoke for the first time. "He don't want no trouble, Chad. Do you, mouth?" He gave me an elbow nudge in the ribs.
I started to take in my breath. The thin-faced man, Chad, stopped short. He stopped me. We were standing by a dark new sedan. I can't tell one new American car from another but I could tell that this one wasn't a police car.
A third man was sitting behind the wheel. He looked out the window at me with bright little piggy eyes that were set in a face the color of uncooked dough. That's what the glaring bluewhite arc lights did for him.
"Okay?" he, the driver, said.
"Okay," Chad said.
Not by me it wasn't. I pivoted like a soldier doing an about-face and planted my right in Pansy-face's bread basket, and at the same time Chad gave me a chop behind the neck with the edge of his hand and Pansy-face and I leaned together like a couple of drunks holding each other up, or like a pair of lovers trying it English style.
Then Pansy-face gutted me and I swung to the left with a windy grunt and doubled over, and his upcoming knee brushed past my shoulder and caught me on the side of the face and straightened me out quick, sending my head toward the stars, and just then I heard Chad say "Enough!" and I felt the hard, positive business-end of a pistol barrel in the small of my back.
"Sonofabitch tagged me, Chad!" Pansy-face cried. "Ain't no bastard on gawd's earth goan lay hands on me!"
"I think I said it was enough," Chad said. "Is that right?" His voice was very flat, very impersonal, and when you heard it you knew you were dealing with a man of authority.
Pansy-face backed down grudgingly. I think he was on something. I didn't smell any booze so it was probably a needle.
"Get in the car, you -ing mouth!" He gave me a shove.
The dough-faced driver had reached back and swung open the rear door and I collided with the edge of it. Pansy-face got me under both armpits and gave me a heave from behind and if I hadn't ducked my head I would have lost the upper half of it as I was propelled into the backseat.
Pansy-face followed me in and slammed the door after himself.
"Okay," I said in a strained voice. "Okay, I've had enough."
"You gawddamn better believe it, boy," Pansy-face snarled. "Or I'll purely gouge your -ing eyes out!"
It was important to me that he believed he really had me cowed. I didn't want him reaching for his shoulder holster with the intention of subduing me further with his gun. If he reached, he would discover that the holster was empty.
I had palmed his Roscoe while we were hugging each other and had slipped it under my belt when I swung away and doubled up. It was a twentytwo with a snubbed barrel, the kind that is easy to pack and doesn't make much noise and is nice for close work. I let it rest where it was because there was no chance to unlimber it right then. The driver was holding another snubnosed revolver on me while Chad went around the back of the car and got in up front on the passenger side.
Chad pulled his own Roscoe and rested it on the top of his seat, aiming in my direction.
"Go," he said to the driver.
Dough-face turned the motor over and punched R and looked around and we backed out of our parking space. He braked and punched DI and swung the wheel andwe started cruising down the aisle, all the chrome bumper guards and exaggerated tailfins and red parking lights winking and gleaming and turning to a smear as we picked up speed.
"Slow," Chad said to the driver, watching me. "Let's not attract attention to ourselves. We don't need a speeding citation tonight. Is that right?"
"I've been here before, Chad, remember?" the driver said. He watched the headlight-illuminated aisle ahead. "I know what I'm doing."
"Yes you do," Chad said. His eyes never left me.
Pansy-face was starting to get jittery. He needed more action.
"What say we have Bob stop somewheres first, Chad?" he said. "The mouth here purely needs some working on."
He gave me a short vicious one in the ribs.
"Don't you, mouth? You need some exercise, huh?"
He worried me. His kind of bent-brain needed to feel power. He liked to intimidate helpless people. I was afraid he would want to pull his bobbed target pistol, to wave it in my face and make me cringe.
"Cut it out," Chad said. Then he said to me, "No hard feelings about this, Mr. Thaxton. It's the way the cookie crumbles."
"Or the ball bounces," I said.
We were out on the highway now and I could just make out the gray strip of beach with its pile line of foam running along on the left side of us.
"How serious is it?" I asked him. "Do I just get a working over from the hophead here, or are you going whole hog?"
"Oh, you're gonna be mine, boy," Pansy-face murmured.
"I wouldn't worry about it, Mr. Thaxton," Chad said. "One way or another, you've got to face it."