“I can’t listen to any more of this,” I said, standing up. “I’ve gotta get out of here before I throw your stupid ass right in the river.”
“Alex, you gotta help me.”
“I was helping you,” I said. “You let me run around like a maniac, trying to prove you were innocent.”
“I’m sorry, okay? I didn’t know what to do. But now I really need you. This guy is gonna be back, Alex. He thinks we’re all in on this. You included. You heard what he said.”
“You go to the police, Bennett. And then I’ll help you.”
“You know I can’t do that.”
“Then you’re on your own,” I said. “You made your deal with the devil. You can live with it now.”
“I have to kill him, Alex. It’s the only way. When this Blondie comes back, I have to kill him.”
I stood there looking at him in the dim light. A cool evening wind drifted in off the river.
“Just when I think you can’t get any dumber, Bennett…”
“Alex, please. I’m begging you.”
“Good night,” I said. And then I left.
Chapter Eighteen
I was already mad when I left Bennett sitting there by the river. The more I thought about it, the madder I got. By the time I got back to Paradise, I was ready to take someone’s head off. I should have known better than to stop in at the Glasgow. I should have just gone home.
That’s not what I did.
“You knew where that cup came from, didn’t you,” I said. I had come right into the place and sat down at the bar.
“Good evening to you, too,” he said. He was having a little late dinner, standing next to the register. “What the hell happened to your face?”
“You weren’t straight with me,” I said. “You let me run all over the place trying to find out who did this to you.”
“Who beat you up, Alex? Did Bennett do this to you?”
“You knew all along. You could have stopped me.”
“I seem to recall trying to do just that,” he said. “It was Bennett, wasn’t it…I know he looks kind of old now, but I’ve seen him finish some fights in his day, believe me.”
“Just knock it off, Jackie. Why didn’t you tell me Bennett did this?”
“Because I knew you’d go off the deep end, Alex. Just like always.”
“And how come I’ve got to find out your whole family history from him, anyway? I thought we were friends.”
“All you gotta do is ask me, Alex. When’s the last time you actually asked me a question about myself?”
“Fifteen years, you never thought to mention that your father went down right out there in the lake?”
He put his sandwich down on the plate, then took the plate back into the kitchen. When he came back out, he took a cold Canadian out of the cooler and put it in front of me. “You’ve been living in your own little world for a long time,” he said. “You’ll go weeks at a time, never even stepping foot in this place. Then suddenly you’ll drop in again and spend the whole day here. If you ever stopped for five minutes and said, ‘Hey, what did your father do for a living?’ Or even, ‘When did your father die?’ Anything like that, I would have told you the whole story. But no. If you say two words to me, it’s to either ask me to make you dinner, or get you a beer, or to tell me about your latest problem-which is almost always just a matter of you losing control of yourself again and getting your ass kicked. And now that I’ve got my own problem to worry about, the last person in the world I want helping me is you. Because all you’ll do is go out and stir up more trouble. From the looks of your face, you already have.”
I wasn’t sure what to say to that. It hurt me more than anything Vargas had hit me with that day.
“What did Bennett tell you?” Jackie said. “Did he tell you why he did this?”
“He said his son needed the money.”
“His son Sean.”
“Yes.”
“That’s what I figured. I knew Sean was in some kind of a jam.”
“Do you have any idea what they’ve done to you, Jackie? They pulled you right into the middle of this.”
“You know what, Alex? I think Bennett’s the biggest damned fool in the world. You know what else? I love him for it. He did the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard of, but he did it for the right reason. He was trying to save Sean. And that old tin cup he made them give me. Goddamn it all, who else would do something that crazy?”
“No, it wasn’t crazy at all,” I said. “Think about it. Giving you that cup was just a way to cover himself. He knew you’d fall for it, Jackie. You’ve got that cup so now you’re a part of it. You might even think he was doing it for you, just as much as he was doing it for his son. Good old Bennett. What a guy.”
“You don’t get it,” he said.
“No, you don’t get it. And that makes you as big a fool as he is.”
He took the bottle off the bar. “I think you should leave now,” he said.
“I think you’re right.”
I left.
When I got home, I couldn’t sleep, so I sat up reading with a bag of ice pressed against my mouth. I tried not to think about anything except the words on the page. It didn’t work.
I gave up and went outside for awhile, listening to the crickets and to the distant sound of the lake until the mosquitoes found me.
The phone was ringing when I got back inside. I picked it up and heard a woman’s voice. “Alex, this is Cynthia Vargas.”
“Mrs. Vargas? Is everything all right?”
“Oh, just dandy. My husband has been limping around here all night, calling you every name in the book. I think he wants to kill you, Alex. I mean really kill you.”
“Tell him he’ll have to come out to Paradise. I don’t imagine I’ll have any reason to visit your house again.”
“That’s a shame. Life will be pretty dull around here.”
“I’m sure you’ll find some way to keep it interesting.”
“I’m just looking out for you, Alex. You don’t have to be a wise-ass.”
“I’m not trying to be,” I said. “I mean, look, I’ve had a tough day here…”
“I’ll let you go,” she said. “Just thought I’d warn you. If you see him coming, be ready.”
“I will. I appreciate it.”
She said good night to me. If I had wanted to, I could have read some things into her phone call. Or into the sound of her voice even. On this night, I didn’t even want to try. Instead I tried to sleep again, lying there looking up at the ceiling. You live in your head too much, Jackie said. He was right.
When I finally did sleep, it came on hard and didn’t let go of me until late the next morning. The sound of the wind woke me up. Through the window I could see a sky the color of slate, and the pine trees bending and returning and then bending some more. It wasn’t raining yet, but when it came it would be like something out of the Bible. God help anyone who was out on the lake.
I got up and stood in front of the mirror. My face was as ugly as the weather, with bruises all along the left side of my jaw and around both eyes. Any color of the rainbow-you name it, I was wearing it.
I stood under a hot shower for a good thirty minutes, waiting for my neck and my shoulders to loosen up. I had some coffee and some breakfast, and then spent the rest of the day doing nothing. I carried an ice bag around with me, holding it against whatever part of my head or body happened to be hurting.
I had lunch by myself. I read a little bit. I had a beer. I got more ice out of the freezer. Outside the storm passed without raining a drop. Just like that, it was gone. The sun came out. All of a sudden it was a beautiful day. I had no desire to go out and see it.
I read some more. I had dinner by myself, a cheap frozen dinner warmed up in the microwave. I had another beer. The sun went down.
Nobody bothered me. I didn’t have to deal with Bennett O’Dell and the crazy mess he had brought upon himself. I didn’t have to deal with Winston Vargas and his yapping little dog. Or some mobbed-up Canadian thug who actually went around letting people call him Blondie.