All rights reserved.
I’ve always enjoyed eating at Billie Jo’s. Unlike those places designed to have your food in front of you, your money in the cash register and you out of the way as quickly and efficiently as possible, Billy Jo’s still caters to the individual. It still has a gleaming wood floor and the original tongue-and-groove wainscot on all the walls, and the plaster above the wainscot is still painted in the Thirties apple green. The counter still has an ebony top and spinning stools, and the ceiling still has the stamped-tin put in sometime just before the turn of the century. The waitresses still use little green pads and you can order food from a table menu that sill calls a hamburger a hamburger and ice cream ice cream in simple unadulterated English. You can also still get an open-faced sandwich hot-beef sandwich served on a plate with mashed potatoes made from potatoes, served between tow thick slices of homemade bread and the whole thing slathered with rich brown gravy made from meat drippings rather than packaged flavorings, together with dishes of fresh, not canned, vegetables on the side.
That’s what I had. I also had a slice of hot apple pie that Nellie Johnson made every morning. And I had a large scoop of the plain-English ice cream with it. I had finished my dessert and was drinking my second coffee when Larry Johnson came over and sat with me.
“How’s it going, Fred? We haven’t seen you for a while.”
“Been busy at the store,” I said, swallowing the remaining coffee.
“Everything’s going okay, though, isn’t it?” There was a note in his voice.
“Not bad, really, though it could be better.”
“Haven’t seen you since the trial.”
Larry has a natural poker face. He can squint through a cloud of smoke and raise the bet in such a way you know beyond a doubt he’s going to plaster your three of a kind and you invariably back down when you shouldn’t. Having known him since I swept floors and bussed dishes for him as a teenager, I recognized the poker face.
“I haven’t been out much since the trial,” I said.
“So is everything going okay or not?”
I said, “Everything’s going like crap, Larry.”
He puffed his cigarette, let the smoke drift through his yellowed fingers. “Want to talk about it?”
“Not here. And only if you’re going to say what’s on your mind.”
He smiled. His rasping breath said his lungs were shot to hell. “Let’s have us a little drink.”
We went into the side room he opened for suppers. He poured us both half a water glass of whiskey from a bottle he took from under the buffet counter. He put ice in mine and we drank, making small talk until he lit another cigarette and said, “What do think about the trial?”
“Are you looking for anything specific?”
“Just how you feel about Gates taking the fall. That’s all.”
“What makes you thing he took a fall?”
“I’ve got ears, Fred, and eyes. People talk.”
“So what have you heard? What are people talking?”
“Just what I told you. And a few things about Ruthie.”
“Go on.”
“She was into coke.”
“Go on.”
“You’re not surprised?”
“I’d figured something like that.”
“She got messed up with some rough people.”
“Do I have to pull your teeth to find out what’s on your mind?”
“Anybody else and you wouldn’t get this much. Look, I know you had your problems with her. You got to realize I’ve thought a lot about everything connected here. I feel like I’m sticking my neck out. I could you piss off and lose a good friend. Maybe I’ve already said too much. I don’t know. I hope not.”
“No, you haven’t yet. And I don’t think you will. Tell me what’s on your mind, Larry.”
He took a deep breath and started talking, the smoke drifting up and around his face from his mouth and nose. “Gates took the fall, Fred. That I’m sure of.”
“How? Why?”
“Just listen. One of your problems. You never did listen. You remember that chink family that moved in over on Fillmore? Ruthie was sweet on one of their kids. Every time she was in town she looked him up. I guess the old man and the old lady didn’t want him messing around with her you know how those goddamned gooks are.”
“So?”
“So she got her chink boyfriend hooked and he was selling for her to for his habit. What she didn’t know is how tight these chinks are.”
“You’re saying that they killed her?”
He nodded. “You look like I struck a nerve.”
I tried to smile.
“You didn’t know.’
I shook my head.
He poured more whiskey. “Jesus, me and my big mouth.”
“It’s okay, Larry,” I said. “If it’s true--”
“It is, my friend. Dead true.”
I could see where he would believe it was true. “They wouldn’t have any reason.”
“Chinks don’t need a hello of a lot of reason. But here was this trashy white girl, if you’ll excuse me, ruining their little yellow-skinned prince. Her dragging them down by getting him on drugs made them lose face. Some of their relatives came in and did her.”
“You’re positive?”
He didn’t bother to answer.
I said, “Do you have any names?”
“Just the chink she was supplying. Name’s Bobby.”
“You said Gates took a fall. If he did, he’s protecting somebody. Do you know who?”
“Nobody’s saying.”
I said, “Thanks, Larry.”
“I’m sorry.” He took the green tab from my fingers. “Don’t worry about this. I’ll probably owe you a couple of meals now.”
“Larry--”
He said, “Go on. Get out of here before I make you pay anyway.”
Next door I bought a can of English pipe tobacco. I didn’t know the cashier. She was fat and surly, more interested in her gothic novel than her job. I paid for the tobacco and stopped to use the phone by the door. A woman answered on the second ring.
I said, “Jack told me to call. I’m looking for a job, driving maybe.”
“I don’t think we need anybody right now.”
“I’m a good driver. I’ve got a good car. Got lots of storage. Maybe I could do some deliveries.”
“I see,” she said. “Give me your name and number and someone will call you back.”
“My name’s Fred. I don’t have a phone. I’ll have to call you back.”
“Do you have experience, Fred?”
“Not really. But I’ve driven south a few times. I know the roads and a little of the language. I can get around pretty good. Look, I’m in a jam right now. I need some quick cash. I could make a trip right away.”
“Well, Fred, we need people we can depend on.”
“Look, I really need the money. Besides, if it works out, I’d be interested in driving regularly.”
“Okay, thanks. Call back in a day or two.”
Well, I hadn’t struck out, but neither was I encouraged. Maybe I hadn’t sounded hungry enough.
“Hey,” the fat cashier said, “you really looking for work?”
“That’s what I told them,” I said, uncomfortable with her eavesdropping.
“Well, maybe I’ve got a friend who can help you. Depends on whether you’re serious or not. And how serious.”
“If it’s the right kind of work.”
“Pays good.”
“Delivery or what?” She didn’t answer, seeming not to have heard, to be concentrating on her gothic novel. I said, “I need a job.”
She still said nothing. I turned to leave. She said, “With all that stuff you said about the car and knowing the roads and the language and everything,” still looking at her book.
I turned back. “So do you think your friend could use me or not?”
She sucked on the straw in her paper cup still not lifting her eyes from her book. “It’s nothing I’m into, you understand. I just know he does it and he needs help now and then. I send him people sometimes when I think he can use them.”
“I need money real quick.” I hoped I sounded earnest.
She picked up the phone’s receiver and pushed buttons. After a few seconds she said, “Hi, how’s everything?”
She listened a bit, said, “Look, there’s a guy here who wants a job.”
She listened again.
“Yeah, he says he needs money real quick. Real bad.”
More listening.
“Uh huh.” She looked at me. “What’re you doing in ten minutes?”
“Taking a job interview?”
She smirked. “He’ll be there. Big guy. Five eleven, glasses, insulated hunting suit. Okay, just a minute.” To me, “What are you driving?”
“An old mail truck. The kind they use around town.”
She repeated it, hung up. She said, “Corner of Park and Main . Be there in ten minutes. Wait as close to the corner on Park as you can and wait in your truck.” She sucked on her straw and reopened her book.
“That’s it?”
“You want fireworks?”
That easy. I’d spent the morning beating on someone and trying to run a scam on two others, and all it had really taken was, maybe, a chance eavesdropper hearing me say I really needed money.
Back in Billy Jo’s, Larry gave me the keys to his truck. “You’re lucky, kiddo,” he said. “I just had the doorway shoveled out this morning.”
It fired up immediately despite the cold and lack of use. It drove and sounded like a geriatric jeep. The steering was stiff and the heater didn’t work and I had to scrape the windshield while driving one-handed. It also felt crazy driving from the right side.
At Park and Main , I pulled into a spot catty-cornered from the junior high. Forty minutes of waiting and the kids had long since stopped traipsing back from lunch and I was getting ready to drive away. I was reaching for the key when a kid with dirty blond hair tapped on my window. I lowered it.
He said, “You the guy Marty sent?”
“Maybe,” I said, “if Marty works in the store next to Billy Jo’s.”
He was prancing from foot to foot, hands jammed deep into the pockets of his Greenwood-High jacket complete with letter. His nose, ears, and cheeks were red from the cold. “Yeah, that’s her. Come on. I’ll show you where to go.”
He motioned for me to get out and I locked up and went along to a white ford with black windows half a block back.
He said, “Get in front,” and kept walking.
I did.
There were two men: one under at the wheel, the other in the right back seat. The one at the wheel spoke. “Marty said you need money bad. How bad?” He had the complexion of a TV addict and middle-aged, the belly to match.
I said, “Pretty bad. Like last week.”
“What for/”
“What business is that of yours?”
“Everything’s our business, unless you don’t want a job.”
I shrugged. “I owe a couple of guys who are getting impatient.” I tried to look and sound even more nervous than I was.
“How much?”
I’d thought about it while waiting in the truck. It had to be a figure steep enough to get me in trouble with the loan sharks as well as to entice these guys to take the risk on me. “Twenty grand, give or take a few. That was last week. I don’t know how much it is now without working it our or getting hold of them. And I’m not talking to them until I have money in my fist.”
“Why so much?”
“Horses. Baseball. Football. Now they want to get paid.”
“You bet on the cuff?” He sounded incredulous.
I nodded. “And they’re tired of waiting.”
“Who are these guys?”
“They’re in Chicago
The guy behind the wheel looked at the buy behind me. The guy behind me said, “What will you do for the money?”
I turned. He was dressed in blue jeans and scuffed climbing boots. He wore and insulated jacket, oversized sunglasses and one of those military-style shooting caps with the gold braid all over the bill. His face deep inside the upturned jacket collar was lean and angular behind the sunglasses and a full reddish mustache.
“I’ll do damn near anything except kill,” I said.
The angular face remained impassive. I had the feeling of a rabbit to close to a hungry lynx.
The guy at the wheel said, “You anything about Mexico
“I was down there a couple of years ago.”
“Where?”
“Mexico City, Guadalajara, Chiapas, Guerrero.”
“Where in Guerrero?” He rolled the “r’s” pretty well.
“The whole coast. I messed around in the little towns mostly. I was in Acapulco
“Hablas español?” he said, asking if I spoke Spanish.
“Sí,” I said, but screwing up my accent and the grammar, “I speak her very goodly.”
He smirked, said in English, “”How’d you learn it?”
“Down there. I had to live.”
“Ever been to Puerto Escondido?” the guy at the wheel said.
“Sure, it’s in Oaxaca
“All kinds?” the guy behind me said.
“All kinds,” I affirmed.
“How about Chilpancingo? You know where that it?”
“Oh, sure,” I paused as though remembering. “It’s on the road to Mexico City from Acapulco
“What’s your name?” the guy at the wheel said.
“Fred.”
“Fred what?” the guy at wheel said.
“Just Fred. I don’t know you and you don’t know me. Makes things easier and safer all the way around.”
“How long would it take you to get to Brownsville
“Puerto Escondido?”
He nodded.
“Three days. Four if I didn’t want to wear out.”
“Why so long?” he said.
“There are three ways out of Puerto Escondido. North, south, and east. Any of them will take two whole days to get to Mexico City Mexico City to Brownsville Mexico
The guy at the wheel again looked at the guy in the back who said, “You know the area all right.”
“Well?” I said.
The guy in back said, “Meet Chuck at the airport at one a.m., Fred. You’ll get everything you’ll need for the trip then.”
“That’s great,” I said. I took a deep breath and sighed, most of it honest relief.
“You get back here like you’re told and you’ll have fifteen hundred waiting for you.”
“That won’t even pay this week’s interest,” I complained.
“If you stay here what are the chances you’ll love to pay the interest?” the guy at the wheel said.
I made as if thinking it over, tried to look scared. “Okay, okay. I’ll take it.”
The guy in the back smiled. I didn’t like his smile. He said, “I thought you might.”
“See you tonight, Freddie,” Chuck said.
I pushed my door open. A hand on my shoulder kept me from getting out. I looked back. The hand belonged to the guy behind me. He was leaning forward. He shoved something very hard into my ribs. It was a nickel-plated .357.
He said, “If you don’t get back as instructed, Fred.” He smiled again.
I liked it even less this time.
Copyright 1998 by Will Wyckoff
All rights reserved.
