“Yeah?” I said.
“Yeah,” Leonard said. “You see, honkie is a very derogatory black term for whites,” Leonard said to me. “You see, stuff like peckerwood, ofay, and honkie, it’s very insulting. It’s like whites calling us nigger or coon or jungle bunny.”
“No shit?” I said.
The big black guy glared at me, said, “You ain’t never heard honkie before, motherfucker?”
“He’s sheltered,” Leonard said. Then to me: “ Motherfucker, Hap, is a common term meaning you fuck your mother. Even if you don’t fuck your mother, folks say it anyway if they’re mad at you or want to make you mad. It’s designed to be derogatory.”
“I see,” I said.
“You cocksuckers best quit fuckin’ with me!” the big black guy said.
“ Cocksucker,” Leonard said to me, “is a common term-”
“Cut it out, you motherfuckers!”
A lot of folks were looking at us now, wondering how much blood would be involved. The jukebox wrapped up its tune and the air went silent with the threat of murder.
The bartender said over the bar, softly, “Clemmon, ease off, these fellas just come in for a drink.”
“I ease off I want to ease off,” said the big black guy.
I glanced out of the corner of my eye at the front door. About twenty steps. Five, if you were leaping.
“Hey, buddy,” I said, showing more confidence than I felt, “I’m not bothering you.”
“You come down here and slum with the niggers, is what bothers me,” said the big black man. “You white pieces of shit always lookin’ down your noses at us. Come in here, smart-mouth me. It’s gonna get you hurt. I bet you think I’m on food stamps.”
“I hadn’t thought about it,” I said.
“Well, I ain’t. I own my own business.”
“Congratulations,” I said, “but I’m warning you, go on about your business. ’Cause you fuck with me, tomorrow your relatives will be splitting up your belongings.”
“What’s that mean?” the big man said. “What the fuck you talkin’ about?”
“He’s threatening to kick your ass plumb to death,” said someone at a nearby table.
“Appreciate that translation,” I said.
“You’re welcome,” said the man at the table.
It finally registered with the big black guy that he was being insulted, and the game was over. He reached for me.
I batted his hand to the inside with my palm and raised out of my seat and hooked my other arm behind his head and dropped down quick with all my weight, brought his head into the edge of the table, sharply. The bottles on the table jumped and fell over. I slammed the guy behind the neck with my forearm and he came down and met my knee and rolled over on the floor and made a sound like he might get up, but didn’t. He lay there in a ball and tried to look comfortable. I was glad he was drunk.
Leonard stood up. A lot of folks were standing up. I heard the click of a knife opening nearby. I picked a fallen bottle off the table and held it by the neck. Some of its contents ran out and splashed on my shoe. I reached in my pocket with my free hand and got some money and put it on the table. I wished I was wearing a wide-brimmed black hat and a serape. A damp shirt and pants would have to do, though.
The bartender said very softly, “Go ’head on and leave, boys.”
I turned and looked at him. He was a little jet-black man wearing a white shirt with black bow tie. The neon throbbed colors on his shirt. He was holding a sawed-off pump shotgun, gauge of twelve. He wasn’t holding it tensely, just showing it off. If he’d thought it through, he’d probably loaded it with slugs. You let down on it, you cleaned out fewer innocent customers that way.
“We were just leaving,” I said.
“I thought you was,” he said. “Don’t forget the tip.”
22.
When we got back to Leonard’s place, Florida’s car was parked in the drive and she was on the porch sitting in the glider. It was a bright-enough night I could see she was wearing some kind of cartoon character T-shirt, blue jean short-shorts and big wooden shoes that reminded me of miniature pontoons. She looked cute as a new puppy.
Next door there was the usual activity of drug selling, and I could hear Mohawk’s, alias Strip’s, alias Melton’s, voice above everyone else’s. When Melton got excited, his vocal cords achieved a kind of shrill quality, like something oily was trying to crawl up his ass and he was liking it.
“Not a real good place for a lady to hang out this time of night,” I said to Florida.
“They think I’m inside, I bet.”
The way the glider was positioned, the shadows, that was possible, but I still didn’t think it was a good idea. Guys like the ones next door knew we were gone, saw her car over here, they might decide to investigate.
“You’ll promise me you won’t do this again, though, won’t you?” I said.
“I promise,” she said.
“Want to come in?” Leonard asked her.
“No,” she said, “I’m going to steal Hap from you. I’m taking him on a picnic.”
“Picnic?” I said. “This time of night?”
“I been waiting since dark,” she said. “I’m hungry. And I don’t care if you just ate dinner, we’re picnicking, and you will eat. I made the stuff myself.”
“Yes ma’am.”
“I don’t mean to be rude,” Florida said to Leonard, “stealing Hap off and not inviting you, but-”
“That’s all right,” Leonard said, hanging his head and pretending to be sad. “I have a TV dinner, meatloaf, I think, and they’re having a Three’s Company rerun marathon on channel nine. I wouldn’t want to miss that. And right before it, there’s an hour of The Brady Bunch.”
Florida giggled sweetly and Leonard raised his head and smiled.
I said to Leonard, “We’ll talk later.”
“I want to sleep on a few things anyway,” Leonard said.
“Pretty mysterious, you two,” Florida said.
“That’s us,” Leonard said, “The Mysterious Duo.”
I got in the car with Florida and she drove us out Highway 7 East. I reached in the back for the picnic basket, an official wicker one with handle, and she said, “Uh-uh.”
“I just wanted to know what we were having on this picnic,” I said.
“It’s a surprise. You find out as you eat it. But I bet you can guess what dessert is.”
“Is it chocolate colored and sweet and shaped like a taco and you keep it in a warm place?”
“My God,” she said, “The Amazing Kreskin. Come over here and ride bitch, big boy.”
I slid over next to her and she smelled sweet and delectable. She said, “What’s that cologne, Hap? Frog and Pond?”
I slid away from her. “Do I smell that bad?”
“Get back over here,” she said. “Always did like a man smelled faintly of frog. Maybe you’ll tell me how you came by that aroma?”
“Maybe,” I said, and slid back and kissed her softly on the neck.
We continued until we came to a turnoff that announced a Scenic Overlook. The idea of an overlook in East Texas, especially if you’ve ever been to Colorado, someplace with mountains, is pretty funny. What it means here is a high hill, and not all that high.
We drove up there, and at the top were a couple of concrete picnic tables, a chained-down metal trash receptacle, and a whitewashed chain that ran between thick white posts that designated the area.
We got out of the car, and I carried the basket over to a table. Florida put her arm around me, and we walked to the chain barrier and looked down. You fell, you’d go almost six feet before you were in a pasture. Not exactly scary or breathtaking. But the deal was this: Here, on this hill, you looked straight out, there was a big V in the usual line of trees, and you could see a long ways, and the trees in the distance, especially now at night, looked like blue and purple mountains, and above those trees, the stars were like glitter being poured into a funnel. Directly overhead, it was so clear the stars seemed close enough to snag with a butterfly net. The air was invigorating.
The depression I was feeling after the rush of adrenaline from discovering the body in the van and the brief bar fight was subsiding.