Jon Talton - South Phoenix Rules

Robin said, “It’s going to be okay, David.” And that was the only sound besides the rush of the freeway.

The person was sitting in one of the rocking chairs in front of the big picture window. I could only see the dark silhouette and make out the motion of the chair. I didn’t turn on Cypress but instead drove north on Third, my body taut.

I thought about calling the cops. A suspicious person. Let the uniforms handle it. But where would that get us? At best, he’d be a scumbag with warrants out on him, and another scumbag would replace him tomorrow. At worse, he’d show them I.D., get a warning, and go away without me ever knowing who he was.

“If he wanted to kill us, I’m not sure he’d just be rocking on the front patio,” Robin said.

“Unless he’s a hit man with real sang froid .”

I turned and crossed Windsor Street to Fifth Avenue and turned south again. I parked a little past Encanto and gave Robin instructions. The Python was already on my belt-I had retrieved it from the trunk first thing when we got to the car at the airport. Now I walked slowly toward home, keeping close to the fronts of the houses on the north side of Cypress Street. The sun was gone, replaced by the long, deep-blue twilight that was peculiar to the desert. I hoped it would provide enough cover for me. The sounds and glow of televisions intruded on my senses as I wondered if a neighbor would call the cops on me. But by then I was two houses away. I pulled the Python and carried it straight down, concealed by my leg.

“Howdy.”

The silhouette in the chair started. “You…” That was all he got out.

“I want to see your hands.” I dropped into a combat shooting stance. My finger was on the trigger and I knew exactly how much pressure the Colt gunsmiths had required to make the hammer and firing pin do their jobs. “Now.”

The form didn’t hesitate. Two hands shot up straight like in an old Western. It was a small, older man.

“Just take my wallet. I’ll get it out for you!” A quavering voice.

“Keep those hands up,” I said. “Are you armed?”

“No!”

The house looked fine and the guy didn’t seem to have any backup. I moved in closer.

The man in the rocking chair could have been anywhere between sixty and eighty. He was completely bald and clean-shaven. His face looked like a walnut with eyebrows. The walnut was dressed in a loud golf shirt and khaki slacks. His shoes looked expensive. I put my finger on the trigger guard, cocked my arm to raise the gun away, and gave him a quick pat-down. His bones felt brittle. Now I placed him closer to eighty.

“I said you can have the wallet.” This time his voice was testy.

“I don’t want your wallet. Who the hell are you and why are you sitting in my rocking chair?”

Without taking my eyes off him, I gave a signal to Robin, who had been following me at a distance.

He said, “You’re Dr. David Mapstone? I have a business proposition for you.”

I let him lower his hands. I holstered the Python and sat in the other chair.

He went on, “You have a funny way of greeting people.”

“What’s your name and why are you here?” I was not in a hospitable mood.

“Can we go inside?”

“No.”

Robin pulled in the car and started bringing luggage into the house. I heard the alarm’s warning beep until she disarmed it.

“May I?” He held up a small hand. I nodded. He reached into his shirt pocket and pulled out a business-card case. He handed me the white card. It said: Judson Lee, Attorney at Law.

I told him to come in the house.

“I haven’t really practiced law for twenty years. I have a few clients, friends mostly, that I do favors for.”

Now he was in the study, in the low armchair, while I sat at the desk. My mind was still back in Washington, where history was everywhere. I hadn’t been to the city in years and Robin had never been there. The three of us had walked from the White House to Capitol Hill, around the Supreme Court, the Library of Congress, and the Capitol itself as I told stories. The Capitol dome wasn’t even complete when the Civil War broke out and wounded union soldiers were hospitalized inside. The building held a crypt for George Washington, even though he was buried at Mount Vernon. Sam Rayburn’s “Bourbon-and-branch water” sessions were held in his basement hideaway, where young LBJ ingratiated himself to the lonely House speaker.

Lindsey seemed distracted, the woman who had once been so moved when I talked history. She walked alongside us, but she didn’t really seem to be with us. The National Portrait Gallery entranced Robin; we spent an afternoon there while Lindsey was working. She said little about her new job. Maybe she told Robin more when they had sister time. We ate in restaurants we couldn’t afford. The bad economy seemed far away and to a casual observer I was fortunate to be in the company of two attractive women. Lindsey was luminous. Robin, I saw with new eyes. “I’m glad you two are getting along,” Lindsey said. I had assigned a guilty cryptic message, of course. But I kept myself tamped down. Mostly.

“Now I have a client who needs your help.” The little man paused. “Your special combination of skills, the historian and the deputy.”

“I’m not with the Sheriff’s Office any longer.”

“I know this, Dr. Mapstone. That’s why it’s a business proposition.” He looked at me as if he expected to be offered a refreshment. I sat back and said nothing.

“I’m sure you’ve heard the name Harley Talbott?”

Of course I had. He was one of the most controversial of Arizonans. Some said he was a great philanthropist. He had his name on a building at the University of Arizona. Others claimed he was a gangster who had been behind the murder of an Arizona Republic reporter in the 1970s. Nobody argued that he initially made his money as the biggest liquor dealer in Phoenix.

Lindsey had rented an apartment in the District. She furnished it from Ikea, getting an allowance from the government. Robin slept on the sofa while Lindsey and I shared her new bed. It felt strange, of course. Late at night, I tried to tunnel into Lindsey with compliments-she had cut her hair again, into something called an angled bob; I liked her hair longer but I told her how looked lovely she looked, which was the truth. Her blue eyes were still so stunning against the darkness of her hair. She had new glasses. I told her people in Phoenix thought she was such a star in the new cyber war. Little neighborhood gossip was another light topic, such as whose house had been on the market for two years now, or how the new sheriff was training deputies to be immigration enforcers. My tunneling attempts failed. She said matter-of-factly, “You have a beard.”

She wanted to know how Robin was doing. Inside, I wanted to rage “what the hell about us?” I didn’t. The crisis back home kept me oddly in control during this visit. I gave her the details of the case but she didn’t react much. I felt as if we were back home over the past year, when her silences had grown to terrify me. The closest we came to a fight was when Lindsey once again refused to let Robin stay with her in D.C. The job was too all-consuming right now. She didn’t have time to entertain Robin, much less look out for her.

We didn’t make love. I lay down in bed nude, like I always used to sleep with her. She slept in her panties, a new innovation. We made out a little but then she patted me on the arm and pulled away, gently but obviously. It was like a switch flipped off. This had been happening for a long time. It made what took place last year more remarkable. Every marriage has its ups and downs. Every marriage has moments when you think you’ve awakened with a total stranger, when you have moments when you really dislike this person you know that you love. Our story was nothing special. That’s what I told myself. But Lindsey’s waning interest in sex didn’t mean she wasn’t interested. I wasn’t that self-absorbed. It meant she wasn’t interested in sex with me. I lay awake as she slept. On her side of the bed, I noticed a blue pack of Gauloises Blondes. She was smoking again, but not around me. I wondered who else she might share a cigarette with?