"But I don't-"
"A cigar burn," he said. And he held his hand out, palm up.
And, at last, I recognized him.
He sat down in Dad's big leather chair, grinning at me. He brushed his hand across the arm, knocking off the coffee cup and saucer I'd left there.
"We got some talking to do, bud, and I'm thirsty. You got some whiskey around? An unopened bottle? I ain't no whiskey hog, understand, but some places I like to see a seal on a bottle."
"I've got a phone around," I said, "and the jail's about six blocks away. Now, drag your ass out of here before you find yourself in it."
"Huh-uh," he said. "You want to use that phone, go right ahead, bud."
I started to. I figured he'd be afraid to go through with it, and if he did, well, my word was still better than any bum's. No one had anything on me, and I was still Lou Ford. And he wouldn't get his mouth open before someone smacked a sap in it.
"Go 'head, bud, but it'll cost you. It'll sure cost you. And it won't be just the price of a burned hand."
I held onto the phone, but I didn't lift the receiver. "Go on," I said, "let's have it."
"I got interested in you, bud. I spent a year stretch on the Houston pea farm, and I seen a couple guys like you there; and I figured it might pay to watch you a little. So I followed you that night. I heard some of the talk you had with that labor fellow…"
"And I reckon it meant a hell of a lot to you, didn't it?" I said.
"No, sir," he wagged his head, "hardly meant a thing to me. Fact is, it didn't mean much to me a couple nights later when you came up to that old farm house where I was shacked up, and then cut cross-prairie to that little white house. That didn't mean much neither, then… You say you had some whiskey, bud? An unopened bottle?"
I went into the laboratory, and got a pint of old prescription liquor from the stores cabinet. I brought it back with a glass; and he opened it and poured the glass half full.
"Have one on the house," he said, and handed it to me.
I drank it; I needed it. I passed the glass back to him, and he dropped it on the floor with the cup and saucer. He took a big swig from the bottle, and smacked his lips.
"No, sir," he went on, "it didn't mean a thing, and I couldn't stick around to figure it out. I hiked out of there, early Monday morning, and hit up the pipeline for a job. They put me with a jackhammer crew way the hell over on the Pecos, so far out I couldn't make town my first payday. Just three of us there by ourselves cut off from the whole danged world. But this payday it was different. We'd finished up on the Pecos, and I got to come in. I caught up on the news, bud, and those things you'd done and said meant plenty."
I nodded. I felt kind of glad. It was out of my hands, now, and the pieces were falling into place. I knew I had to do it, and how I was going to do it.
He took another swallow of whiskey and dug a cigarette from his shirt pocket. "I'm an understandin' man, bud, and the law ain't helped me none and I ain't helpin' it none. Unless I have to. What you figure it's worth to you to go on living?"
"I-" I shook my head. I had to go slow. I couldn't give in too easily. "I haven't got much money," I said. "Just what I make on my job."
"You got this place. Must be worth a pretty tidy sum, too."
"Yeah, but, hell," I said. "It's all I've got. If I'm not going to have a window left to throw it out of, there's not much percentage in keeping you quiet."
"You might change your mind about that, bud," he said. But he didn't sound too firm about it.
"Anyway," I said, "it's just not practical to sell it. People would wonder what I'd done with the money. I'd have to account for it to the government and pay a big chunk of taxes on it. For that matter-I reckon you're in kind of a hurry-"
"You reckon right, bud."
"Well, it would take quite a while to get rid of a place like this. I'd want to sell it to a doctor, someone who'd pay for my Dad's practice and equipment. It'd be worth at least a third more that way, but the deal couldn't be swung in a hurry."
He studied me, suspiciously, trying to figure out how much if any I was stringing him. As a matter of fact, I wasn't lying more'n a little bit.
"I don't know," he said slowly. "I don't know much about them things. Maybe-you reckon you could swing a loan on it?"
"Well, I'd sure hate to do that-"
"That ain't what I asked you, bud."
"But, look," I said, making it good, "how would I pay it back out of my job? I just couldn't do it. I probably wouldn't get more than five thousand after they took out interest and brokerage fees. And I'd have to turn right around somewhere and swing another loan to pay off the first one, and-hell, that's no way to do business. Now, if you'll just give me four-five months to find someone who-"
"Huh-uh. How long it take you to swing this loan? A week?"
"Well…" I might have to give her a little longer than that. I wanted to give her longer. "I think that'd be a little bit quick. I'd say two weeks; but I'd sure hate-"
"Five thousand," he said, sloshing the whiskey in the bottle. "Five thousand in two weeks. Two weeks from tonight. All right, bud, we'll call that a deal. An' it'll be a deal, understand? I ain't no hog about money or nothin'. I get the five thousand and that's the last we'll see of each other."
I scowled and cussed, but I said, "Well, all right."
He tucked the whiskey into his hip pocket, and stood up. "Okay, bud. I'm going back out to the pipeline tonight. This ain't a very friendly place for easy-livin' men, so I'll stay out there another payday. But don't get no notions about runnin' out on me."
"How the hell could I?" I said. "You think I'm crazy?"
"You ask unpleasant questions, bud, and you may get unpleasant answers. Just be here with that five grand two weeks from tonight and there won't be no trouble."
I gave him a clincher; I still felt I might be giving in too easy. "Maybe you'd better not come here," I said. "Someone might see you and-"
"No one will. I'll watch myself like I did tonight. I ain't no more anxious for trouble than you are."
"Well," I said, "I just thought it might be better if we-"
"Now, bud"-he shook his head-"what happened the last time you was out wanderin' around old empty farm houses? It didn't turn out so good, did it?"
"All right," I said. "Suit yourself about it."
"That's just what I aim to do." He glanced toward the clock. "We got it all straight, then. Five thousand, two weeks from tonight, nine o'clock. That's it, and don't slip up on it."
"Don't worry. You'll get it," I said.
He stood at the front door a moment, sizing up the situation outside. Then he slipped out and off of the porch, and disappeared in the trees on the lawn.
I grinned, feeling a little sorry for him. It was funny the way these people kept asking for it. Just latching onto you, no matter how you tried to brush them off, and almost telling you how they wanted it done. Why'd they all have to come to me to get killed? Why couldn't they kill themselves?
I cleaned up the broken dishes in the office. I went upstairs and lay down and waited for Amy. I didn't have long to wait.
I didn't have long; and in a way she was the same as always, sort of snappy and trying not to be. But I could sense a difference, the stiffness that comes when you want to say or do something and don't know how to begin. Or maybe she could sense it in me; maybe we sensed it in each other.
I guess that's the way it was, because we both came out with it together. We spoke at the same time:
"Lou, why don't we…"
"Amy, why don't we…" we said.
We laughed and said "bread and butter," and then she spoke again.
"You do want to, don't you, darling? Honest and truly?"
"Didn't I just start to ask you?" I said.
"How-when do you-"