The door to the café, which had annoying bells on a string, kept clattering open and shut to admit a broad sample of the community. David enjoyed all the comradely greetings and gentle needling from the ranchers, and felt himself to be connected to the scene, if lightly. Only the fellow from Utah, sitting alone, seemed entirely apart. The cook pushed dish after dish across her tall counter while the waitress sped to keep up. She had a lot to do, but it lent her a star quality among the diners, who teased her with mock personal questions or air-pinched as her bottom went past.
David made notes about this and that on a pad he took from his shirt pocket, until the waitress, a yellow pencil stuck in her chignon, arrived with his bacon and eggs. He turned a welcoming smile to her, hoping that when he looked back the man would be gone, but he was still at his table, giving David an odd military salute and then holding his nose. David didn’t understand these gestures and was disquieted by the implication that he knew the man. He ate quickly, then went to the counter to pay. The waitress came out of the kitchen, wiping her hands on a dishcloth, looked the cash register up and down, and said, “Everything okay, Dave?”
“Yes, very good, thanks.”
“Put it away in an awful hurry. Out to Larsen’s?”
“No, I was there yesterday. Bred heifers. They held everything back.”
“They’re big on next year. I wonder if it’ll do them any good.”
“They’re still here, ain’t they? I’m headed for Jorgensen’s. Big day.”
Two of the ranchers had finished eating, and, Stetsons on the back of their heads, chairs tilted, they picked their teeth with the corners of their menus. As David put his wallet in his pocket and headed for the door, he realized he was being followed. He didn’t turn until he was halfway across the parking lot. When he did, the gun was in his stomach and his new friend was smiling at him. “Name’s Ray. Where’s your outfit?”
Ray had a long, narrow face and tightly marcelled dirty-blond hair that fell low on his forehead.
“Are you robbing me?”
“I need a ride.”
Ray got in the front seat of David’s car, tucked the gun in his pants, and pulled his shirt over the top of it, a blue terry-cloth shirt with a large breast pocket that contained a pocket liner and a number of ballpoint pens. The flap of the pocket liner said Powell Savings, Modesto, CA.
“Nice car. What’re all the files in back for?”
“Breeding records — cattle-breeding records.”
“Mind?” He picked up David’s cell phone and, without waiting for an answer, tapped in a number. In a moment his voice changed to an intimate murmur. “I’m there, or almost there—” Covering the mouthpiece, he pointed to the intersection. “Take that one right there.” David turned east. “I got it wrote down someplace, East 200, North 13, but give it to me again, my angel. Or I can call you as we get closer. Okay, a friend’s giving me a lift.” He covered the mouthpiece. “Your name?”
“David.”
“David from?”
“Reed Point.”
“Yeah, great guy I knew back in Reed Place.”
“Reed Point.”
“I mean Reed Point. Left the Beamer for an oil change, and Dave said he was headed this way. Wouldn’t even let me split the gas. So, okay, just leaving Jordan. How much longer, Morsel? Two hours! Are you fucking kidding? Okay, okay, two hours. I’m just anxious to see you, baby, not being short with you at all.”
Lifting his eyes to the empty miles of sagebrush, Ray snapped the cell phone shut and said, sighing, “Two fucking hours.” If it weren’t for the gun in his pants, he could have been any other aging lovebird. He turned the radio on briefly. “Swap Shop” was on the air: “Broken refrigerator suitable for a smoker.” Babies bawling in the background. He turned it off. David was trying to guess who Ray might really be — that is, if he was a fugitive from the law, someone he could bring to justice, in exchange for fame or some kind of reward, something good for business. He had tried everything he could to enhance his cattle-insemination business, even refrigerator magnets with his face on them that said, “Don’t go bust shipping dries.”
He asked, “Ray, do you feel like telling me what this is all about?”
“Sure, Dave. It’s all about you doing as you’re told.”
“I see. And I’m taking you somewhere, am I?”
“Uh-huh, and staying as needed. Jesus Christ, if this isn’t the ugliest country I ever seen.”
“How did you pick me?”
“I picked your car. You were a throw-in. I hadn’t took you along you’d’ve reported your car stolen. This way you still got it. It’s a win-win. The lucky thing for you is you’re my partner now. And you wanna pick up the tempo here? You’re driving like my grandma.”
“This isn’t a great road. Deer jump out on it all the time. My cousin had one come through the windshield on him.”
“Fuckin’ pin it or I’ll drive it like I did steal it.”
David sped up slightly. This seemed to placate Ray and he slumped by the window and stared at the landscape going by. They passed an old pickup truck traveling in the opposite direction, a dead animal in the back with one upright leg trailing an American flag.
After they’d driven for nearly two hours, mostly in silence, a light tail-dragger aircraft with red-and-white-banded wings flew just overhead and landed on the road in front of them. The pilot climbed out and shuffled toward the car. David rolled down his window, and a lean, weathered face under a sweat-stained cowboy hat looked in. “You missed your turn,” the man said. “Mile back, turn north on the two-track.” Ray seemed to be trying to send a greeting that showed all his teeth, but he was ignored by the pilot. “Nice little Piper J-3 Cub,” Ray said.
The pilot strode back to the plane, taxied down the road, got airborne, and banked sharply over a five-strand barbed wire, startling seven cows and their calves, which ran off into the sage, scattering meadowlarks and clouds of pollen. David turned the car around.
Ray said, “Old fellow back at the hotel said there’s supposed to be dinosaurs around here.” He gazed at the pale light of a gas well on a far ridge.
“That’s what they say.”
“What d’you suppose one of them is worth? Like a whole Tyrannosaurus rex?”
David just looked at Ray. Here was the turn, a two-track that was barely manageable in an ordinary sedan, and David couldn’t imagine how it was negotiated in winter or spring, when the notorious local gumbo turned to mud. He’d delivered a Charolais bull near here one fall, and it was bad enough then. Plus the bull had torn up his trailer and he’d lost money on the deal.
“So, Dave, we’re about to arrive and I should tell you what the gun is for. I’m here to meet a girl, but I don’t know how it’s gonna turn out. I may need to bail and you’re my lift. The story is, my car is in for repair. You stay until we see how this goes and carry me out of here, if necessary. My friend here says you’re onboard.”