As the afternoon turned into night, it began to cool down. Very suddenly there was a chill in the air. He could smell the salt then, sharp and fresh.
The one in the baseball cap buttoned his shirt up to his throat. "Getting cool," he said.
"We're running up the coast," the one called Lon said. "Be damned cold tonight."
They kept looking at him, then over at his suitcase. "You know, it sure would be nice if we had something to keep us warm on a cold night like it's going to be," the one in the baseball cap said.
"Sure would," Lon said.
"Say, friend," the one in the baseball cap said. "You wouldn't want to let us have anything in that bag there, would you?"
"What do you mean?" he said.
"Well, it's sure going to be chilly tonight. Be real fine if you was to have something in there to keep us warm."
"Like what?"
"Maybe a blanket. Or a coat. Like that."
"No."
"You sure, now?"
"There's nothing in there like that."
"You wouldn't want to be holding out on a couple of fellows, now would you?"
"Then suppose you just open up that case and let us have a look inside," Lon said.
He put his hand on the case.
"You got no right," he said.
"Well, I say we do," the one in the baseball cap said.
"I say we got plenty of right."
"Sure we do," Lon said.
They stood up.
"Come on, friend," the one in the baseball cap said. "Open up that case."
He stood up too.
"No," he said. "Stay away. I'm warning you."
"He's warning us," the one in the baseball cap said. "You get that, Lon?"
"Sure," Lon said. "He's warning us."
They stood there, the two men staring at him. He clutched the suitcase tightly in his right hand. Then, as they stood there, the freight began to slow. They were coming into a siding.
Outside it had begun to get dark. There were long shadows inside the box car.
The men watched each other, warily, and then, suddenly, Lon made a grab for the suitcase, and the one in the baseball cap pushed him back up against the wall of the box, and Lon tore the suitcase from his fingers.
He backed up against the wall. He was breathing hard. They shouldn't have done that, he thought. I told them. They shouldn't have done that.
He took out the knife.
Lon stopped pawing at the catch on the suitcase. They were both staring at him.
"Hey!" Lon said. "Hey, now."
"All right," he said to them. "I told you."
"Take it easy," the one in the baseball cap said, staring at the knife.
"Put the suitcase down," he said to Lou.
"Sure," Lon said. "You just take it easy."
"It was just a joke, friend," the one in the baseball cap said. "You know. A couple of fellows having a little game."
"That's it," Lon said. "Just a joke."
"We wasn't going to take nothing," the one in the baseball cap said.
He held the knife straight out in front of him. The blade was flat and wide and very sharp.
"Put it down," he said again.
"Sure," Lon said. He leaned down, never taking his eyes off the knife, and let go of the suitcase. The catch had been loosened in the struggle, and from Lon's pawing, and when it hit the floor of the box, it came open.
He said, "You get off this train. Right now. You just get off this train." He moved the knife in a wide circle and took a step toward them.
The one in the baseball cap said, "Oh, my God!" He took a step backward, and his face was the color of chalk. The freight was at a standstill, now.
"Get off," he said again. His head had begun to hurt.
The one in the baseball cap backed to the door, watching the knife, and caught on to the jamb and then turned and stepped off. Lon ran to the door and jumped off after him.
He put the knife away. He stood there for a time, and his mind whirled, and for a moment, just a moment, he remembered what had happened last night with Joanie—how he had forced his way into her flat, raging with anger, and told her he knew about the other man, and how she had denied it and said she was going to call the police, and how, then, he had hit her, and hit her again, and then he had seen the knife, the knife there on the table in the kitchen, the flat, sharp knife, and then it went black for him again and he could not remember anything.
The freight had begun to pull out of the siding. It was picking up speed. The whistle sounded in the night.
He turned and walked to where the suitcase lay, open on the floor of the box. He knelt down and began to cry.
He said, "It's all right now. We're going home. Going home to Ridgemont. Just like I promised you, Joanie. We're going home for good."
Joanie's head stared up at him from the open suitcase.
"Liar's Dice" was the basis for a 1995 USA-Cable TV movie called (over my screams of protest) Tails You Live, Heads You're Dead. The film essentially begins where the story ends, supplying a ready answer to the question the narrator—and the reader—is left to contemplate. This is the problem with the movie, which has nowhere to go other than into the realm of the cat-and-mouse, serial-killer subgenre, with routine results. The story's enigmatic ending is far more terrifying, to my mind, than the film's resolution, or any that I might have tacked on myself. You may not agree, of course. Your call.
Liar's Dice
"Excuse me. Do you play liar's dice?"
I looked over at the man two stools to my right. He was about my age, early forties; average height, average weight, brown hair, medium complexion—really a pretty nondescript sort except for a pleasant and disarming smile. Expensively dressed in an Armani suit and a silk jacquard tie. Drinking white wine. I had never seen him before. Or had I? There was something familiar about him, as if our paths had crossed somewhere or other, once or twice.
Not here in Tony's, though. Tony's is a suburban-mall bar that caters to the shopping trade from the big department and grocery stores surrounding it. I stopped in no more than a couple of times a month, usually when Connie asked me to pick up something at Safeway on my way home from San Francisco, occasionally when I had a Saturday errand to run. I knew the few regulars by sight, and it was never very crowded anyway. There were only four patrons at the moment: the nondescript gent and myself on stools, and a young couple in a booth at the rear.
"I do play, as a matter of fact," I said to the fellow. Fairly well too, though I wasn't about to admit that. Liar's dice and I were old acquaintances.
"Would you care to shake for a drink?"
"Well, my usual limit is one . . ."
"For a chit for your next visit, then."
"All right, why not? I feel lucky tonight."
"Do you? Good. I should warn you, I'm very good at the game."
"I'm not so bad myself."
"No, I mean I'm very good. I seldom lose."
It was the kind of remark that would have nettled me if it had been said with even a modicum of conceit. But he wasn't bragging; he was merely stating a fact, mentioning a special skill of which he felt justifiably proud. So instead of annoying me, his comment made me eager to test him.
We introduced ourselves; his name was Jones. Then I called to Tony for the dice cups. He brought them down, winked at me, said, "No gambling now," and went back to the other end of the bar. Strictly speaking, shaking dice for drinks and/or money is illegal in California. But nobody pays much attention to nuisance laws like that, and most bar owners keep dice cups on hand for their customers. The game stimulates business. I know because I've been involved in some spirited liar's dice tournaments in my time.