Nate raised a hand in greeting to Willie when he entered the bar, but Willie merely grimaced in response.
“What can I get you?” asked Nate.
“I need to use your phone,” said Willie. There was a crowd of loud young women at the back of the bar, where the public phone stood close to the men’s room, and there was something in Willie’s voice and expression that told Nate this wasn’t the kind of call you wanted someone to overhear.
“Go in back,” said Nate. “Use my office. Close the door.”
Willie thanked him and slipped under the bar. He took a seat at Nate’s desk, a desk that, in its general neatness and sense of order, bore no resemblance to his own. Nate’s phone was an old rotary dial model, adapted for the modern age but still requiring the judicious application of a forefinger to make a call. The one time Willie was in a hurry, and trust Nate to have a phone that Edison could have built.
First of all, Willie called the answering service and left a message for Angel and Louis, repeating verbatim what the man named Milton had told him to say in the faint hope that one of them might pick it up before all of this went any further. Next he called Maine. The Detective wasn’t home, so Willie decided to try the bar in Portland where he was now working. It took him a while to remember the name. Something Lost. The Lost Something. The Great Lost Bear, that was it. He got the number from 411, and the phone was answered by a woman. He could hear music playing in the background, but he couldn’t identify it. After a couple of minutes, the Detective came on the line.
“It’s Willie Brew,” said Willie.
“How you doin’, Willie?”
“Uh, up and down, up and down. You didn’t see the papers?”
“No, I was out of town for a while, up in the County. I just got back this morning. Why?”
Willie gave him a summary of all that had happened. The Detective didn’t ask any questions until Willie was done. He just listened. Willie liked that about him. The man might have made him nervous for reasons that he both could and could not put his finger on, but there was a calmness about him at times that reminded Willie of Louis.
“Do you know where they went?”
“Upstate. The guy who warned us mentioned somewhere near Massena, someone named Arthur Leehagen.”
“Are there procedures in place for when something goes wrong?”
“There’s an answering service. I leave a message, and then they can pick it up. They’re supposed to check it every twelve hours when they’re away. I’ve done that, but I don’t know when last they called to check in and, y’know, it doesn’t seem right just to wait around in the hope that it’ll all work out.”
The Detective didn’t even bother to ask about cellphones.
“What was that name you were given again?”
“Leehagen. Arthur Leehagen.”
“All right. You at the shop?”
“No, I’m down at Nate’s. I’m worried that my phone might be tapped.”
“Why would someone tap your phone?”
Willie explained about the visit by the feds.
“Hell. Shout me the number of where you are.”
Willie gave it to him, then hung up the phone. There was a soft knock at the door.
“Yeah?”
Nate appeared. He had a snifter with two fingers of brandy in his hand.
“Thought you might need this,” he said. “On the house.”
Willie thanked him, but waved the glass away. “Not for me,” he said. “I think it’s going to be a long night.”
“Somebody die?” asked Nate.
“Not yet,” said Willie. “I’m just trying to keep it that way.”
When he returned to the auto shop nearly an hour later, Arno was still sitting in the office, but the bottle of Maker’s Mark had been put away, and instead there was the smell of brewing from the Mr. Coffee machine.
“You want some?” asked Arno.
“Sure.”
Willie went to a shelf and removed a Triple A road atlas. He opened it to the New York page and began tracing a route with his finger. Arno filled a mug with coffee, added some creamer, then put it by his boss’s right hand.
“So?” Arno asked.
“Road trip.”
“You’re going up there?”
“That’s right.”
“You think that’s a good idea?”
Willie thought for a second. “No,” he said. “Probably not.”
“The Detective going too?”
“Yeah.”
“Driving?”
“Yeah.”
“Couldn’t he fly? Wouldn’t it be quicker?”
“With guns? He’s not Air America.”
Willie considered removed his bib overalls, then decided against it. He was happier wearing them, and anything that lightened his current mood wasn’t to be dismissed easily. Instead, he shrugged on an old jacket over them.
“You stay here,” he said to Arno. “In case they call.”
“I wasn’t going anyway,” said Arno. “I told you. I’m not that kind of guy.”
“I just thought you were going to offer, like in the westerns.”
“You kidding? You ever see a Scandinavian western?”
Willie tried to remember if Charles Bronson had been Scandinavian. Actually, he thought that Bronson might have been Lithuanian. He was an -anian anyway, that much he knew.
“I guess not,” he said at last.
Arno followed him to the rear of the auto shop, where Willie’s old Shelby stood in the yard. It looked like it wouldn’t go two miles without shedding parts and oil, but Arno knew that there wasn’t a better-maintained automobile this side of New Jersey.
“Okay.” Willie nodded at Arno. Arno nodded back. He suddenly felt like the little woman in the relationship. He was tempted to hug Willie, or straighten the collar on his shirt. Instead, he contented himself with simply shaking his boss’s hand and advising him to be careful.
“Look after my place, now,” said Willie. “And, listen, if all this goes to hell, you close up and walk away. Contact my lawyer. Old Friedman knows what to do. I put you in my will. You got no worries if I die.”
Arno smiled. “I knew that, I’d have killed you myself long before now.”
“Yeah, well that’s why I didn’t tell you. That, or you’d just be bitchin’ at me for your cut all the time.”
“Drive safe, boss.”
“I will. Don’t pay any bills while I’m away.”
Willie climbed in the car, backed out of the yard. He raised a hand in farewell, then was gone. Arno went back inside, and saw that Willie hadn’t even touched his coffee. It made him sad.
It was a long ride north, as long a drive as Willie had ever tackled without a proper break. He was tempted once or twice to stop for coffee or a soda, something with caffeine and sugar in it to keep him alert, but he had a bladder that was ten years older than he was and he didn’t want to waste even more time by having to pull off the highway to relieve himself twenty minutes after he’d finished whatever he’d had to drink. He listened to WCBS until it began to fade, then found a Tony Bennett cassette in the glove compartment and let that play instead. There was a tightness in his gut. At first, he wondered if it was fear, but then he realized that it was anticipation. He had been coasting for a long time, living from day to day, doing what he loved but never stretching himself much, never testing himself. Willie had thought those days were behind him, that they were part of his youth, but he had been proved wrong. He patted the Browning in his jacket pocket. It seemed too small and light to be of use, but it also felt as if it was radiating heat, so that he could sense its warmth against the side of his leg. He tried to imagine using it, and found that he could not. This was a weapon for killing up close, and Willie had never had to look a man in the face when he fired off a shot at him. As for dying, he didn’t believe that he was frightened of it: the manner of it, perhaps, but not the fact of it. After all, he had reached an age where dying had started to become an objective reality instead of an abstract concept.