Matt Lennox - The Carpenter

There was a pay phone at the back of the diner. Stan dialed Dick’s house and Fran answered. She said she was happy to hear from him, said how they would have him over for supper anytime.

— Dick’s not home, is he?

— I’m sorry, Stan. Dick’s down at the drill hall with Richard Junior. Brian’s getting sworn in to the Air Cadets tonight. Dick’s wearing his Europe medals for it. Do you want me to tell him you called?

— No, that’s fine, Fran. So long.

It was close to eight by the time Stan was back at the truck stop. There were some rigs pulled into the lot for the night and a dozen or so cars and pickups parked in front of the North Star. Inside, it was cigarette smoke and music from the jukebox. Thirty or thirty-five patrons. The band was clustered in discussion at the back of the riser. They were talking to the man with the rolled-back cuffs Stan had seen when he’d come in earlier.

For the first time it occurred to Stan that he had no idea what he’d say if he actually made Gilmore’s acquaintance. Maybe it was just a matter of knowing the face attached to the name. Stan took a stool at the bar. The sheer weirdness of this situation overcame his thoughts. A drunk barfly two stools down gave him a big friendly nod and offered a hand to shake.

— These boys put on a good show, said the barfly. Just you wait.

The bartender came down to Stan. She was young and had a streetwise comeliness to her. Stan could see how she lifted her eyebrows a little when she took him in.

— What will you have?

He ordered Coors in a bottle. Draft didn’t agree with him any more. She came back with a bottle and set it on a coaster in front of him. The barfly two stools down pushed a bowl of pretzels in Stan’s direction.

— Say, said Stan to the bartender. Does a fellow named Colin Gilmore hang around here?

She didn’t have to say anything. Her face gave it away.

— Maybe, said the bartender.

— I’m over from EZ Acres, just wanted to pass a message on to him from the manager.

— I don’t know if he’s here tonight.

— If he is, said Stan.

She nodded. She coasted back down to the other end of the bar.

A few minutes later, the front man of the band took his guitar and stood to the microphone. The jukebox cut out. The barfly leaned over and patted Stan on the arm and gave him a thumbs-up. The band launched into some rock ‘n’ roll piece. Stan nursed the beer he’d ordered. Speculating. The roadhouse was all possibility. But what was he really going to say?

The band had played through their first song when Stan became aware of a man who’d sat on the stool immediately to his right. The man was leaning back against the bar, one arm stretched along the bevelled edge. He had a slim build and a thick head of hair, jeans, engineer boots, a dark T-shirt, but otherwise he was as they’d said. He was anyone.

— If I happened to see one older gent like yourself in a bar or if I saw a hundred it would never look quite right to me. But maybe that’s my own kind of prejudice.

— You’d be Mr. Gilmore?

The man laughed a little: I’ll go with that. Mr. Gilmore.

He took his arm off the edge of the bar to shake Stan’s hand.

— I’m Bill, said Stan.

— How do you do, Bill. Are you enjoying the music?

— It’s a year or two after my time.

They shared a thin chuckle at that. Stan had put himself in a corner and he knew it. The last of his beer had gotten warm and he didn’t have much taste for it. He quarter-turned on the stool to better converse.

— Mr. Gilmore, I’m a friend of a family you might know.

— Okay. So you’re not from the trailer park.

— No. I’m friends with the Lacroixes. Would you have a word with me about Judy?

Stan wasn’t sure what effect forthrightness would bring, but Gilmore remained good-natured. He said: Wasn’t that a goddamn shock.

— Yes, said Stan. Nobody thought Judy would do that. But we guessed you might of been the last person to see her alive and we just wanted to know if you had any thoughts on it. On how she was acting.

— I’m sorry to say, Bill, but I didn’t see her for a couple of weeks. We kind of parted ways. I didn’t know about it till I heard around town. So sad.

— Yes.

— I have to use the men’s room. You think up some more questions if you want.

Gilmore patted Stan on the shoulder and got down from the stool. He went to a rear corridor past the riser. Ten minutes later he hadn’t come back. Stan looked around. He saw the girl behind the bar making a telephone call. She was looking right at him. When she was finished, she came to ask Stan if he wanted another beer. He told her no thanks and asked what he owed.

— A dollar-fifty, said the girl.

— You wouldn’t be related to Alec Reynolds by any chance, said Stan.

— He’s my uncle. Do you know him?

— Not well. I hear he’s in the hospital.

— Yes, said the girl. A long time now.

Stan nodded. He put some money on the bartop.

He went into the rear corridor and looked in the men’s washroom. There was a fat townie at one of the urinals. Stan went back into the corridor and went down to the door at the end with Offi e lettered on it. There was no knob on this side of the door and it didn’t move when he tried to push it.

— There’s a reason we keep the office locked.

The man with the rolled-back cuffs was in the corridor behind Stan. Stan apologized, said he was lost. He went past the man and back into the bar but the man followed him out and took his sleeve.

— How about I just show you out of here. Come on.

— How about you take your hand off my arm.

— Come on. Nobody wants any trouble.

He gave Stan’s sleeve a tug. Stan pulled his arm away and took handfuls of the man’s shirt and pressed him against the wall. Through his teeth, Stan said: I wouldn’t let the white hair fool you.

But then a big bearded man with a bald head and a pair of glasses appeared, moving fluidly for all his size. He wrapped his forearm around Stan’s neck from behind and jerked him backwards and at first Stan kept his grip on the man with the rolled-back cuffs and they all moved together. Then Stan let go of the man he was holding and clawed at the arm around his throat. The big man holding him wasn’t saying anything at all. Stan kicked out one leg and succeeded only in knocking over a table in front of them. A couple of drinks jumped off the tabletop and splashed down the front of his trousers. By now the band had quit. People were shouting and getting out of the way. The big man hauled Stan across the floor. Stan was spitting between his teeth and his vision was greying out.

A moment later, he was being moved out into the coolness of the night. The big man held onto him until he’d pulled him down the front steps. On the flat ground of the parking lot Stan was forcefully let go. He stumbled about, bent double, gagging air. He grasped hold of the side-view mirror on a pickup truck. When he was able to stand straight again, he saw the big man poised halfway up the steps to the roadhouse. The faces of a few townies were crowding out of the front door above.

— You son of a bitch, said Stan.

He took a step forward. He was so angry that he was grinding his teeth together. The wrath was all the worse for how his body wasn’t responding as it used to. But the man on the steps, the faces in the door, they weren’t looking at him. They were looking at something behind him. Stan turned.

Two cops, young, unknown to him, were coming across the parking lot.

For a full minute, Frank didn’t say anything. He was wearing jeans and a sweatshirt. They’d called him in from home. Stan was the only one in the holding cell at the back of the detachment. They’d taken away his belt and his shoes and his keys and his wallet and his little penknife.