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That was when he got Elizabeth. For protection. What a laugh. She would have looked after him if he'd let her. But he was too afraid she would get hurt. Like now, she knew something was wrong and she was worrying-looking across at him with a dent in her black forehead, her gold-pointed eyebrows bunched together, just like a mother. He put his hand on the back of her neck. She was an old lady, a little slow on the uptake, anymore she didn't see so good or hear so good, and she didn't like her routine interrupted, but she was clocking now and ready to rumble, if it came to that.

Roy's Taxicab passed the cut-off to Indian Mound Downs-Two-Tie looked over his shoulder but got no last eyeful of the jewel green bullring, the bottomland by the river was still a basin of fog-sped past the Horseman's Motel and Trailer Court, the length of the little strip that passed for a town, and up into the hills. Two-Tie prepared a few words, I always run a honest business, I thought more of you, family comes first, but then the cab bounced past the steep driveway down to Joe Dale Bigg's farm. D'Ambrisi was pushing it too fast for the patched and cracked West Virginia blacktop, taking the snaky curves along the ridge on two wheels, stomping the brake at the same time. He was no lowrider, he must be afraid somebody would see them. It looked bad and sounded bad-nobody saying a goddamn word and D'Ambrisi's hands shaking on the steering wheel.

Do me one favor, Breezy. Don't leave the dog with nobody to look after her. She's an old dog. She won't know what's happening. Where I go she goes. You follow me?

Nobody ain't gonna hurt the dog, Biggy said. I like dogs. You want to come home with me, fella? Whaddaya say, duke? He roughhoused Elizabeth's head, and her lip curled up.

She's a lady, she don't like that rough stuff, Two-Tie said. He despaired of explaining anything to Biggy. Promise me, Breezy. You hear? She won't know where she is. If anything happens to me, put a bullet in her head. He had a picture of Elizabeth shambling blindly around some pile of rubble deep in the woods that still smelled like him, confused and hungry, lying down, getting up, lying down again, walking around in circles looking for him, waiting for him to come back, till she starved.

He wants we should off the dog, Biggy said indignantly. His own dog! What kinda guy is that?

I ain't packing, Breezy whined.

These two lames would be no help whatsoever. Two-Tie sank back hopelessly into the seat cushions. If it wasn't for Elizabeth, he saw, and it was like a slap across the head with a two-by-four, he wouldn't care if they took him out. Not even these assholes. Be my guest. He was so sick of assholes he was almost ready to go. He looked back in his mind and saw the zig-zag line of his actions lately, that craziness with the niece, he done things that weren't like him, weren't prudent. Why? What did he care if little Margaret knew him or not? If they croaked him, would she cry? She'd gasp when she heard the news, then forget him in five minutes. You could even believe he'd been trying to buy it, the way he'd been making a weird nuisance of himself lately, like he'd seen other chumps who didn't have nobody to look after them go off the deep end in the past.

But the big boys should at least have sent somebody halfway intelligent, somebody more respectful. The best you could say, it was fast, the way these dumb hoods brought it to you-or otherwise he waits to get decrepit like Elizabeth, and who looks after him when he's old and blind? Nobody. If he didn't have Elizabeth to worry about, he'd have to worry about himself, and where was the sense in that? He didn't care no more, if he had ever cared. Of course nobody likes the idea of turning up dead in a garbage bag in a culvert, scaring some poor Cub Scout out of his wits with your empty eye holes and eaten-up head, it ain't dignified.

The taxicab jolted off down an oiled rock lane behind a little black and white arrow sign, Ohio County Landfill 1, then they turned at once on another unmarked two-track into the woods, some old mining or logging road, or maybe a back way into the dump. They passed one of those country oil wells that nod up and down like mechanical donkeys at the trough. Then the road got worse. The taxicab splashed into a puddle that was really a creek bed, and spun its wheels coming out the other side.

Goddamn cab's gonna be mud all over, Biggy lamented, you heard Daddy, just don't throw me no heat, now what if we get stuck back here? I thought you said the road was okay.

It used to be okay. You didn't give me no time to think, Breezy said.

Bushes swatted the windows, like Nature wanted to punish them but didn't have the equipment. The cab's old springs creaked as they dipped into a hole. Bastid, Biggy muttered, rolling against the door, and the gun wavered where it was pushed up against Two-Tie's kidney. Just then the sun popped through the trees and smacked Two-Tie's eyes in a great big blank of glittering light. He couldn't take no more.

Gimme that, you idiot. He snatched at the rude hardware of the gun barrel in his side and yanked it upward and twisted on it. He had some crazy, hopeless idea of getting hold of it and shooting Elizabeth himself, and at the same time everything opened up very wide around him, and he knew this was giving up, like taking a fabulous suite at the Sans Souci in Miami Beach for a week, which he knew he wouldn't be around to pay for it. Three shots, bang bang bang. He saw the first one, a little round hole winking at him from the back of the driver's seat, smoking and frying black along its edges, and he was studying it, thinking it wasn't so bad, when he remembered about the other two. Where were they? I'm hit, Breezy yelled, then heavy crunching and swishing leaves, like a elephant in the jungle, and, whomp, a tree in the middle of the windshield. Fuck, fuck, fuck, Biggy screamed, Daddy said don't shoot him in the car, and look what I done, I shot him in the car. Elizabeth, barking in this one's face, that one's face, not grasping what had went wrong, making a terrible racket. I'm hit, Breezy wept, oh jesus, oh jesus, let's get outa here. A whirr like getting sucked up in some machine-the taxicab, tryna back out. Wait, punk. Biggy slapped the back of Breezy's head and they rocked to a stop. Two-Tie wanted to explain that it didn't matter, he always thought if you died, everything went black, like, the whole picture went and you was off like a TV set, but it wasn't like that at all. He could feel some of his middle was gone, gut, tubes, pupik, the whole bucket of shit, you would think you needed your middle but it was better like this, blown away was the right word, sky blue, wide open, all like bubbles going up. Quiet, he wanted to say, quiet, but he couldn't find his breath.